County government typically required a courtroom and a prison. Like early county buildings elsewhere in Pennsylvania, this one is based on the domestic model of a central-hall-plan house. Built of native stone in Georgian proportions it has hints of the new Federal style in the simplicity of the openings. The reduced windows on the right side mark the spaces converted to jail space when the new courthouse was constructed in 1874. The belfry, added in 1846, was crowned by a weathervane carved by George Biddis, son of the village's founder, in the shape of the local fish, the trout—not a pike. It was retired to the town museum in 1932 and replaced by a replica carved by Ralph Myer.