KILBOURNE YESTERDAY and TODAY
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977.3553 K551 /(2^rL^€u .)JS HISTORICAL SLfRVEY. '^arz^^^^^ — 1 — ; OUR LITTLE TOWN interwoven We like to live in a little town. For life is we learn to know, Where the trees meet across the street; With the friends and sorrows Where you wave your hand and say "Hello" And we hear their joys To everyone you meet. As we daily come and go. like to live in a little town. We like to stand for a moment So we more to roam Outside the grocery store, And care no house in a little town And listen to the friendly gossip For every a house — it's home. Of the folks that live next door. Is more than On a place mat from the "Bronze Lantern" Dinner House and Motel, Yuma, Colorado, visited by Hazel and Glen Hughes in 1952. - 2 - 977,3553 K551 KILBOURNE YESTERDAY and TODAY 1870 - 1970 t^7 PUBLISHED BY THE KILBOURNE CENTENNIAL ASSOCIATION with the cooperation of THE CENTENNIAL HISTORICAL COMMITTEE - 3 - KILBOURNE - A GREAT PLACE TO LIVE ". 'The Kilbourne Independent' published Kilbourne is located in the "Lincoln Country of the December 5, 1902 by Ernest Madison states: Within easy driving distance are several — Park at "Kilbourne is situated eleven miles southeast of famous Lincoln memorials New Salem and other Havana, the county seat. It is located on the Petersburg, Lincoln's Home and Tomb C.P.&St.L. Railway. The Sangamon River flows historical sites in Springfield. Other nearby places of within 1'4 miles of the village, which, with the creeks interest include Dickson Mounds, Mason State Forest, and lakes within three miles, form fine fishing and Chautauqua Wildlife Refuge, Mason State Tree hunting grounds. Kilbourne has the best drinking Nursery, all near Havana, and Jubilee College State water in the state of Illinois. Physicians and Park near Peoria. are also surrounded by some of the best prominent men have pronounced it such. Persons in We Peoria, poor health say they have better health here than ever colleges and universities — Bradley at Illinois State and Wesleyan at before. Kilbourne has good shipping facilities and is Western at Macomb, Urbana, surrounded by one of the most productive agricultural Bloomington, University of Illinois at at Lincoln, soils on which the principal products are wheat and Millikin at Decatur, Lincoln College " corn. Southern Illinois at Carbondale, and colleges at Today, the railway has changed to the Chicago Springfield, Canton, Peoria, and Eureka. occupations. Cars and Illinois Midland; corn continues as an important Our people have many different quite crop, but wheat has given place on many farms to begin buzzing early each weekday morning as a leave for their work in corn, soy beans, melons of all kinds, plus vegetable number of our community Springfield, crops such as green beans, potatoes, sweet corn, Peoria, Pekin, Bartonviile, Lincoln, other carrots, onions, and squash. Approximately 400 acres Petersburg, Beardstown, Canton, and possibly or are locally in the area are in production of vegetables and towns. Others either own businesses chief industry of melons. These products can be found, in season, at the employed. Since agriculture is the in phase of farming. roadside stands in and near Kilbourne. The land itself the area, many are engaged some have changed throughout is still one of our great assets. Although many things some things Due to the existence of a vast underground lake, the history of Kilbourne, fortunately, Fish and wildlife are still water for irrigation is readily available. Mason remain almost unchanged. clean, "smog- County has about 22,000 acres under irrigation. As of rather plentiful. We continue to have " best drinking the present, 6000 acres of the total are in vegetable free air. And, we think we have the crops and the remainder in corn. Kilbourne Township water to be found anywhere! has nine irrigators totaling 2,650 acres according to WE LIKE KILBOURNE!! records of Co-operative Extension Service. — 4 . BEFORE THE WHITE MAN CAME Menard County. The remainder of the county, including the townships of Havana, Sherman, Manito, Forest City, The ancestors of the American Indian were Pennsylvania, Aliens Grove, older county of Tazewell thought to have come from Asia across to Alaska and Quiver, belonged to the within the present county were drifted into the desert regions of the West. At the time The lands for settlement in the years 1821 of the melting of the last glacier, about 12,000 to 15,000 surveyed and opened and others. During the next B.C., a small number journeyed to the Midwest. A to 1825 by William L. May twenty-five families very few of the artifacts that have been found in decade, there were fewer than County. Settlements Mason County are of the Paleo Indian culture. Later, residing in the limits of Mason the region of the county within the this group was followed by the Archie, Early were slow because looked Woodland, Late Woodland. Mississippian, Proto-His- forks of the Illinois and Sangamon rivers was waste, devoid of interest toric, and Historical cultures. Each of these larger upon as a sandy, barren groups might consist of many tribes and tongues. The except for roving hunters and fishermen. white to set foot Mississippian period is represented in the Dickson Historians tell that the first men Mounds excavation. on Mason County were Louis Joliet, a French trader, missionary. An The maps of the earliest French explorers show and James Marquette, a Jesuit is believed to the Michigamea Tribe on the north bluff of the obscure squatter named James Hokum Sangamon River (which they named the Emiquen), dwell on the soil that later became Havana and Mason is recorded southeast of the present town of Kilbourne. This is County; he did not remain. James Hokum for Major probably •Yellow Banks" where Dr. Root found many as working as an Illinois River ferryman both Fulton of his famous Indian relics, most of which seem to Ossian N. Ross, who had earlier founded set up a ferry now be at Smithsonian Institute in Washington, D.C. County and Lewistown. Mr. Ross The Michigameas were later driven out by the Fox service at the mouth of Spoon River, opposite the resided the Indians and finally settled in Arkansas. Later, the present location of Havana. On that site Kickapoo (sometimes called the Prairie Kickapoo) squatter James Hokum. He had a child born in his child born in Mason County. occupied this region. home — the first white and took charge of Some of the descendants of Mr William Craggs Ossian Ross moved to Havana entered the first land in the Sr. who settled north of town in 1845, remember his the ferry in 1827 and city of Havana now stands. The telling that the Indians still had a camp at that time, county, where the laid by Stephen Dewey in November. in the timber on the old Eichenauer farm where the town was out to pour into the county Kenneth Fanters now live. Years later, the rings of About 1837, settlers began the finest earth which had been banked around the wigwams rapidly. It became known that some of of the unpromising soil, and were still visible farms could be made out the population increased. Because the county seats of Tazewell and Menard were too far away for HISTORY OF MASON COUNTY convenience, the matter of the formation of a new county was agitated; and in 1841, Governor Thomas Mason County. Mason County, one of the one hundred two Carlin approved formation of Havana and Bath were counties of the State of Illinois, was formed from From the beginning, seat of justice of Mason County. parts of Sangamon. Menard, and Tazewell by an act competitors for the County Seat from 1843-1851. When an approved on January 20, 1841. Bath became the 1850, Bath realized that When the Territory of Illinois was formed in 1809, election was approved in defeat the heavily populated the future Mason County was a part of St. Clair strategy was needed to of Havana. A place called Cuba, located in County; then in 1812, it became a part of Madison area Section 10. centrally located, County. Three years after Illinois was admitted to Kilbourne Township on paper as a new county seat location. statehood, Sangamon County was organized in 1821, was laid out on On March 1851. Havana won the election, and Cuba and it contained the region that became Mason out of existence. County. By 1839. the area forming Mason County was was election in November, 1861. adopted the transferred to Menard County. The northern portion An of government. Eleven townships. of our county was taken from Tazewell township form City, Aliens Grove, Pennsylvania, Mason At the time of its establishment, there were only Mason Plains, Manito, Quiver. Havana, Crane Creek, Bath, three precincts in the territory that comprised Mason The boundaries of these County. They were known as the Havana Precinct, and Lynchburg, were formed. today, except fo/ Salt Creek Precinct, and the Texas Precinct. Other (township) were much the same as from Havana and precincts were formed from these as time passed. the formation of Sherman townships, and of Kilbourne from Bath Records show that the part which is now Bath, Pennsylvania name of Mason Plains was Lynchburg. Kilbourne, Crane Creek, Salt Creek, and and Crane Creek. The Forest City Township in 1874. Mason City belonged to Sangamon, and later to changed to 5 - be the first practitioner in the county. A county EARLY SETTLERS history states that Dr. Field built the first frame house in Kilbourne Township and the third in the county.