Lost Towns of Illinois - Murpheysboro, Illinois.

The oldest and least known lost village in Macon County is Murpheysboro (with an "E") in Friends Creek township. It was just south of the town of Old Newburg on the farm known to old settlers as the Volgamot farm.

Platted sometime in the early 1830s by a North Carolinian named Murphy. Murpheysboro, at one time, had four or five log houses, a girls' school, a blacksmith shop and a general store. For a while, it flourished and was thought to rival Decatur, Illinois. 

When the railroad bypassed Murpheysboro, people up and moved. Buildings were dismantled and moved or sold. It didn't take long for Murpheysboro to disappear.

Nothing remains of the town. Even its precise location has been forgotten.

Compiled by Dr. Neil Gale, Ph.D. 

Lost Towns of Illinois - Sag Bridge, Illinois.

Sag Bridge was a village that is now part of the Village of Lemont. It had a hotel and its own post office, a number of businesses, a railroad station, a stop on the electric line between Chicago and Joliet, and a port on the I&M canal.

Photo of farmland where the Cal-Sag Channel now is. The town of Sag Bridge is behind the buildings in the background on the left. On the right, the land rises to St. James Church on the bluff. 1910

Joshua Bell, who came to Sag Bridge in the 1830s, was the postmaster and owner of the saloon/hotel. Although the town soon found it too expensive to continue as a village, it had a school district composed of one of the last one-room schoolhouses in the state, which did not close until 1961.

When the glaciers retreated from Northern Illinois, Prehistoric Lake Chicago remained, which eventually receded, leaving Lake Michigan. As it receded, it left two valleys, the Des Plaines River Valley and the Sag Valley, on either side of an elevated triangle of land called Mount Forest Island.

Sag Bridge was located on the south side of the Sag Valley. The historic St. James at Sag Bridge, the oldest continuously operating Catholic Church in Cook County, was built on the north bluff in the forests at the western edge of Mount Forest Island. The cornerstone of the church was laid in 1853. It took six years to haul the quarried rock up the bluff to complete the building.

Before permanent settlement, Mount Forest Island had been inhabited by Indians who valued the land for its vantage point and strategic location.

St. James Catholic Church and Cemetery, aka Monk's Castle and St. James at Sag Bridge Church, is a historic church and cemetery in the Sag Bridge area of the village of Lemont, Illinois. It is claimed to have been built on the site of an Indian village, possibly over an Indian mound, and later a French fortification building. Father Jacques Marquette and Louis Joliet stopped there during their exploration.

Many immigrants to Sag Bridge came from Ireland to find jobs digging the I&M canal in the 1840s, and when the canal was finished they stayed to farm or work in the local quarries. In the 1890s, the sanitary canal, the waterway that reversed the flow of the Chicago River, brought more Irish to Sag Bridge and Lemont, as well as the Bridgeport neighborhood of Chicago.

What does “Sag” mean, and what was the bridge? The answers are speculative. The term Sag probably derived from a Potawatomi Indian word, Saginaw, which may have meant “swamp.” The Sag Valley was a low-lying swampy area, and it is presumed that a bridge may have provided transport across it. The name could also refer to the geographic coming together of the two valleys. When one considers that recorded history relates that the first white settlers to arrive in the area came in 1833 and that the oldest grave at St. James Cemetery is that of Michael Dillon, buried in 1816, further fuel is added to doubts about the accuracy of the history.

Compiled by Dr. Neil Gale, Ph.D.

The Ghosts of Sag Bridge, Illinois.

The late 1890s seems to be when ghost activity peaked in the area of Sag Bridge, Illinois, now the northeast corner of Lemont. Many ghostly tales, some well documented, began here.

In late December of 1897, a rash of new sightings and hauntings was stirred up. Some said it was due to the discovery of the skeletons of nine Indians, well documented by scientists from Chicago. Professor Dosey determined the skeletons were several hundred years old, one being over seven feet tall. This was not the first time: skeletons had been turning up in and near Sag Bridge for years. But now villagers began reporting phantom Indians on horseback riding through the town at night and other visions of roaming spirits. Some felt this was due to the fact that the skeletons had been disturbed and demanded they be reburied. Some were reburied, but some were sent to the Field Museum in Chicago.

Not only Indians haunted the area. There were tales of a horse-drawn hearse traveling along Archer Avenue, pulling an infant’s casket, which was seen to glow through the viewing window. A county policeman reported chasing several figures in monk-like robes until they vanished before his eyes. A priest is rumored to have seen the ground rise and fall as if it were breathing.

Much of this activity seems to have been near St. James at Sag Bridge, a church in the middle of the forest, surrounded by a cemetery dating back to the early 1800s, years before the church was built. It is said that the site was originally an Indian village and an ancient Indian burial ground. Even in the daytime, the property gives off an eerie atmosphere.

A story told about St. James at Sag Bridge also happened in 1897. Two musicians, Professor William Looney and John Kelly, had provided entertainment for a parish event, which went on until 1 am. Not wanting to return to their homes at this late hour, they slept overnight in a small building on the property. Looney was awakened during the night by the sound of galloping hoofs on the gravel road and looked out the window. He could see nothing to account for the sound, and gradually it faded.

Looney woke Kelly to tell him what had happened, and as they spoke, the sound returned. Both men looked out, and as the sounds again faded, the form of a young woman appeared in the road. The sounds again approached, and this time horses and a carriage were seen coming partway up the drive. The woman danced in the road until she entered the shadow, and the horses and carriage disappeared, only to start again a short time later. Each time they appeared, something new was added to the scene, and the woman began to call, “Come on!” as she disappeared.

The men reported the incident to local police the next morning, and it was verified that NO drinking had taken place to account for the tale. Since that time, similar sightings have continued to be reported by respectable residents. It is said the ghosts were the spirits of a young parish helper and housekeeper from the church, who fell in love and decided to elope. The man told his young lover to wait partway down the hill while he hitched the horses, but they were startled and bolted as he was coming for her. The wagon was overturned, and both were killed.

By Pat Camalliere, "The Mystery at Sag Bridge."

Lost Towns of Illnois - Bayville, Illinois.

Bayville was a village in Pike County, Illinois that flourished on Bay Creek about a mile southeast of the present site of Pleasant Hill, Illinois. 

Bayville had several stores, a mill, a smithy, and a plow factory. Dr. Hezekiah Dodge was the area's first doctor. The village had a cemetery, and the business district had a lot of activity. The area's first school was built. 

The Collard family had twelve children who all became teachers, most in the south Pike area. Most prominent was John J. Collard, an outstanding teacher and two-time county clerk. 

Bayville faded in the 19th century, leaving only the cemetery and the school as evidence that a town with people had been there.

Compiled by Dr. Neil Gale, Ph.D.

Lost Towns of Illnois - Montezuma, Illinois.

The Illinois River port of the Village of Montezuma is located in Pike County, Illinois.

In 1880 Montezuma had a population around 100. The town was highly developed and riverboats routinely stopped there. Montezuma flourished as a riverport through the 19th century. The town had a church, a school, a warehouses, a general store, a grain elevator, a blacksmith shop, a photograph studio, and a saloon or two. 

The railroad and trucks brought big changes. 

A railroad was built through the Pearl area, skipping both Montezuma and its inland partner, Milton. Livestock was still shipped to market by boat, but starting in the mid-1920s most livestock was shipped in trucks. Montezuma rapidly faded. Although some vestiges of the town remain, the town plat, which projected a town three-quarters of a mile long, was not needed. 

Compiled by Dr. Neil Gale, Ph.D.

The History of Funks Grove Pure Maple Sirup Farm in Funks Grove, Illinois.

The benefits of maple trees growing in this native timber area were likely enjoyed long before the Funk family settled in 1824.

History has it that Indians were the first maple sirup producers. They used maple sugar to season their corn and other vegetables and poured maple sirup over their fish and meat. Following is one of the many legends of how maple sirup was first discovered.

One night upon returning from hunting, an Iroquois chief named Woksis plunged his hatchet into the side of a tree for safekeeping overnight. In the morning, he removed his hatchet and went out to hunt. There happened to be a bowl directly underneath the gash left by Woksis' hatchet, and the sap began to flow in the bowl. Woksis' wife later noticed that this bowl was full of liquid and, mistaking it for water, used it to cook a venison stew. The water evaporated from the sap as the stew cooked, leaving a thick, sweet substance. Both Woksis and his wife were pleasantly surprised by the sweet-tasting stew, and thus it was discovered how maple sirup could be made from sap.

Isaac Funk and Cassandra, his wife. Circa 1850s

Isaac Funk, the pioneer founder of what would later become known as Funks Grove, chose his location well in 1824—good water supply, fertile soil, and timber for shelter and heat. 

Isaac raised livestock and drove it to market on foot. He later served in the Illinois Senate, where he was a friend and supporter of Abraham Lincoln. While he was away, his sons, led by the eldest, George Washington Funk (whom they dubbed "The General"), took care of the farm. Isaac and his sons also made maple sirup and sugar—cooking the sap in kettles over a fire—for personal use since it was the only readily available source of sweetener. Around 1860, Isaac's youngest son, Isaac II, took over the sirup production. 

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Arthur Funk opened the first commercial maple sirup farm at Funks Grove, Illinois, in the spring of 1891. 

Arthur Funk, Issac Funk II's son, replaced his father's wooden spouts with metal spouts purchased from Vermont. The small, peaked cabin that served as the first commercial sirup farm's cooking house stood on the ground now occupied by the Funks Grove Interstate 55 rest area. 

Funks Grove Sugarhouse in the 1890s.

In 1896, Arthur's brother, Lawrence, took over the operation, cooking the sirup in a flat-pan evaporator and putting out about 1,000 buckets at once.

​In the early 1920s, the reigns were handed over to Arthur and Lawrence's cousin, Hazel Funk Holmes (daughter of Isaac II's brother Absalom Funk), who owned the property on which the sirup operation is now located. Hazel's permanent residence was out East, so she rented the property to tenants who farmed the land and made the maple sirup. She had the little peaked cabin Arthur, and Lawrence had used as a cooking house moved to the present location, using it as a guesthouse and her summer home. A new sugarhouse was built to accommodate a flue-pan evaporator. During this same time, the paved road that later became Route 66 was finished near the sirup farm. At this time, the Funks Grove sirup producers were hanging about 600 buckets and made up to 240 gallons of sirup per year.

In her will, Hazel arranged for her timber and farmland to be protected by a trust that ensures that future generations will continue to enjoy the "sweet stuff" produced in Funks Grove. In this trust, Hazel expressed her wish to keep the spelling of "sirup" with an "i." The Funks obliged. 

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“Sirup” with an 'i' is listed in Webster's Dictionary as the concentrated juice of a fruit or plant. It's the same definition given for "Syrup." Sirup was commonly produced without adding any other types or forms, natural or chemical, of sugars.  Funks Grove uses this time honored method.

In 1942, sirup production was halted because of the war—heavy taxes on sugar made the business unprofitable. But production resumed in 1943, and in 1947 Stephen Funk, son of Lawrence, and his wife, Glaida, took over the operation. In 1958, Stephen had the first underground cistern installed. Before, the sap had been emptied into a storage tank higher than the evaporator, employing gravity to cause the sap to flow into the evaporator. They also began using oil to fuel the cooking process rather than wood. In 1960, Stephen experimented with tubing as a method for gathering sap. The tubing ran along the ground, and the Funks soon found that squirrels could chew up the lines faster than they could be repaired, so they decided to return to using the traditional metal buckets.

Funks Sugarhouse, 1967.

In the early 1970s, construction began on Interstate 55—and it was routed to cut right through the Funks Grove timber. Fortunately, the Funks were able to petition to get it rerouted and save their precious timber. At first, the Funks were concerned that this new road would detract from one of their primary sources of customers—people who decided on impulse to stop while traveling Route 66—but once they erected a sign on the new interstate, new business started stopping in. Stephen and his son Mike formed a partnership In the late 1970s.

In 1988, Stephen retired, and Mike and his wife, Debby, took over the business. This same year Stephen, Mike, and Mike's brothers, Larry and Adam, built the sugarhouse we use today. 

Funks Grove Pure Maple Sirup Video

In 1989, Mike decided to try tubing again, this time with the lines suspended above the ground and has continued to improve and expand this system over the years since. 

Funks Grove Store Entrance.

During the "in-vogue" nostalgic craze for Route 66 from the 1970s into the 2000s, interest in Funks Grove Maple Sirup grew into shipping International sales, and people from many countries found their way to Rt.66 and Funks Grove. Bikers groups, caravans of all kinds of groups traveling the Illinois portion or traveling the entire Rt.66.

Funks Grove is still going strong and looking forward to their 2023 season—March through August.

I will try the Bourbon Barrel-Aged Maple Sirup next year since I was too late this season. 

History by the Funk Family

Edited by Dr. Neil Gale, Ph.D. — BOD, Route 66 Association of Illinois, 2013-2015

Lost Towns of Illinois - Indian Creek Village, Illinois.

Indian Creek Village is within today's DeKalb County's Shabbona Lake State Park, located north of Ottawa and approximately 6 miles west of Illinois Route 23. The settlement was the site of the Indian Creek Massacre during the 1832 Black Hawk War. There are no residents.

During the Black Hawk War (1832), the Shabbona area, including Indian Creek Village, was in LaSalle County, Illinois. DeKalb County, Illinois, was founded on March 4, 1837.

A cropped image from the 1836 "County Map of the States of Ohio, Indiana, Illinois,
and the Michigan Territory," showing the entire La Salle County area.
View the Library of Congress 1836 Map.

The Indian Creek Massacre occurred on May 21, 1832, when a group of United States settlers in LaSalle County, Illinois, were attacked by a party of Indians. The massacre was sparked by the outbreak of the Black Hawk War, but it was not directly related to Sauk leader Black Hawk's conflict with the United States. Instead, the incident stemmed from a settler's refusal to remove a dam that jeopardized a food source for a nearby Potawatomi village. After the Black Hawk War began, between 40 and 80, Potawatomi and three Sauks attacked the settlement. Fifteen settlers, including women and children, were killed. Two young women kidnapped by the raiders were ransomed and released unharmed about two weeks later.

In the aftermath of the massacre, white settlers fled their homes for the safety of frontier forts and the protection of the militia. After the war ended, three Native men were arrested for the murders, but the charges were dropped after witnesses could not confirm that they had taken part in the massacre. Today, the site of the massacre is marked by memorials in Shabbona County Park in LaSalle County, about 14 miles north of Ottawa, Illinois.

The Indian Creek massacre stemmed from a dispute between U.S. settlers and a Potawatomi Native American village along Indian Creek in LaSalle County, Illinois. In the spring of 1832, a blacksmith named William Davis dammed the creek to provide power for his sawmill. 

Meaueus, the principal chief of the small Potawatomi village, protested to Davis that the dam prevented fish from reaching the village. Davis ignored the protests and assaulted a Potawatomi man who tried dismantling the dam. The villagers wanted to retaliate, but Potawatomi chiefs Shabbona and Waubonsie managed to keep the peace, convincing the villagers to fish below the dam.

Meanwhile, in April 1832, the Sauk leader named Black Hawk (The "Life of Black Hawk" as dictated by himself.") led a group of Sauks, Meskwakis, and Kickapoos known as the "British Band" across the Mississippi River into the U.S. state of Illinois. Black Hawk's motives were ambiguous, but he hoped to avoid bloodshed while settling on land ceded to the United States in a disputed 1804 treaty.

Black Hawk hoped that the Potawatomi people in Illinois would support him. In February 1832, he invited the Potawatomi to join him in a coalition against the United States. Although Potawatomi had grievances stemming from the expansion of the United States into Indian land, Potawatomi leaders feared that the United States had become too powerful to oppose by force. Potawatomi chiefs urged their people to stay neutral in the coming conflict, but, as in other tribes, chiefs did not have the authority or power to compel compliance. Potawatomi leaders worried that the tribe would be punished by supporting Black Hawk. At a council outside Chicago on May 1, 1832, Potawatomi leaders, including Billy Caldwell, "passed a resolution declaring any Potawatomi who supported Black Hawk, a traitor to his tribe." In mid-May, Potawatomi leaders told Black Hawk they would not aid him.

Hostilities in the Black Hawk War began on May 14, 1832, when Black Hawk's warriors soundly defeated Illinois militiamen at the Battle of Stillman's Run. Potawatomi chief Shabbona worried that Black Hawk's success would encourage Native attacks on American settlements and that Potawatomi would be held responsible. Soon after the battle, Shabbona, his son, and his nephew rode out to warn nearby American settlers that they were in danger. Many people heeded the warnings and fled to Ottawa for safety, but William Davis, the settler who had built the controversial dam, decided to stay. Davis convinced some of his neighbors that danger was not imminent. Twenty-three people remained at the Davis settlement, including the Davis family, the Hall family, the Pettigrew family, and several other men.

On May 21, 1832, a party of about forty to eighty Potawatomi attacked the Davis house. Three Sauks from Black Hawk's Band accompanied the Potawatomi. It was late afternoon when the inhabitants at the settlement saw the group of Native American warriors approach the cabin, vault the fence and sprint forward to attack. Several men and boys worked in the fields and the blacksmith's shop when the attack began. Several men who rushed to the house during the attack were killed, but six young men escaped the slaughter by fleeing. In all, fifteen settlers were killed and scalped. "The men and children were chopped to pieces," writes historian Kerry Trask, "and the dead women were hung by their feet," and their bodies mutilated in ways too gruesome for contemporary observers to record in writing.

Most modern scholars do not name the leader of this attack. According to historian Patrick Jung, the attack was led by the Potawatomi man who had been assaulted at the dam by Davis. Still, Jung did not identify this Potawatomi by name. Historians Kerry Trask and John Hall identified the man who had been assaulted as Keewassee. Still, they did not specifically describe him as taking part in the attack, nor did they name a leader of the attack. Historian David Edmunds wrote that the attack was led by Toquame and Comee, two Potawatomi warriors. According to Jung, however, Keewasse, Toquame, and Comee were three Sauk warriors who accompanied the Potawatomi during the attack.

In 1872, amateur historian Nehemiah Matson wrote that the raid was led by a man named Mike Girty, supposedly a mixed-race son of Simon Girty. But a 1960 profile of Matson stated, "Because of his indiscriminate mixing of fact and legend, however, scholars generally discount his books as valid sources." In a 1903 book, Frank E. Stevens dismissed Matson's story, writing, "The statement by Matson that one Mike Girty was connected with the Indian Creek massacre is incorrect." Modern scholarly accounts of the Black Hawk War and the Indian Creek massacre were mentioned by Mike Girty.

Two young women from the settlement, Sylvia Hall (19) and Rachel Hall (17), were spared by the attackers and taken northwards. At one point, Sylvia fainted when she recognized that one of the warriors carried her mother's scalp. After an arduous journey of about 80 miles, they arrived at Black Hawk's camp. The Hall sisters were held for eleven days at Black Hawk's camp, where they were treated well. Black Hawk insisted that the three Sauks with the Potawatomi had saved the Hall sisters' lives in his memoirs dictated after the war. Black Hawk recounted:

They were brought to our encampment, and a messenger sent to the Winnebago, as they were friendly on both sides, to come and get them, and carry them to the whites. If these young men belonging to my Band had not gone with the Potawatomi, the two young squaws would have shared the same fate as their friends.

A Ho-Chunk chief named White Crow negotiated their release. Like some other area Ho-Chunks, White Crow was trying to placate the Americans while clandestinely aiding the British Band. U.S. Indian agent Henry Gratiot paid a ransom for the girls of ten horses, wampum, and corn. The Hall sisters were released on June 1, 1832.

The Indian Creek massacre was one of the Black Hawk War's most famous and well-publicized incidents. The killings triggered panic in the white population nearby, and people abandoned settlements and sought refuge inside frontier forts, such as Fort Dearborn in Chicago.

On May 21 or 22, the people in Chicago, including those who had fled, dispatched a company of militia scouts to ascertain the situation along the Chicago-Ottawa trail. The detachment, under the command of Captain Jesse B. Brown, came upon the mangled remains of the 15 victims at Indian Creek on May 22. They buried the dead and continued to Ottawa, where they reported their gruesome discovery. As a result, the Illinois militia used the event to draw more recruits from Illinois and Kentucky.

After the war, three Indians were charged with murder for the Indian Creek massacre and warrants were issued at the LaSalle County Courthouse for Keewasee, Toquame, and Comee. The charges were dropped when the Hall sisters could not identify the three men as part of the attacking party. In 1833, the Illinois General Assembly passed a law granting both Hall sisters 80 acres of land each along the Illinois and Michigan Canal as compensation and recognition for their hardships.

In 1877, William Munson, who had married Rachel Hall, erected a monument where the massacre's victims were buried. The memorial, located 14 miles north of Ottawa, Illinois, cost $700 to erect. In 1902, the area was designated as Shabbona Park, and $5,000 was appropriated by the Illinois legislature for the erection and maintenance of a new monument. On August 29, 1906, a 16-foot granite monument was dedicated in a ceremony attended by four thousand people. Shabbona County Park, separate from Shabbona Lake State Park in DeKalb County, is located in northern LaSalle County, west of Illinois Route 23.

Indian Creek Massacre and Captivity of Hall Girls, pub 1915, 133 pages.

Compiled by Dr. Neil Gale, Ph.D.

Lost Towns of Illinois - Evans, Illinois.

Evans (aka Evans Point) was in Marshall County, Illinois, on the old Chicago & Alton railroad grade. 

Evans Township is traversed by two railroads; the Illinois Central extends most of the way along its eastern border and the Chicago & Alton through the center of the southern half. The crossing of the two railroads was selected for a station. At that point, the planned rail station was amidst an immense prairie with not a settler or house for miles.

On section 28 of Evans township was a railroad station on the Chicago & Alton railroad, which took the name of "Evans." It was quite a busy shipping point for grain and livestock. Evans had a general store and a blacksmith shop. The post office opened in 1873 but was discontinued in 1905 because of the advent of Rural Free Delivery (RFD). 

Evans did not improve, according to the expectations of its founders, and returned to the beginning; an "Evans Point" rail station for shipping and not much else. Its most prominent characteristic was its claim of the highest point between the Illinois and Wabash Rivers.

The local Post Office in Wenona, Illinois, a Chicago & Alton railroad town, said there was absolutely nothing left of Evans, Illinois.

Compiled by Dr. Neil Gale, Ph.D.

Lost Towns of Illinois - Greenridge, Illinois.

Greenridge is located in Nilwood Township, Macoupin County, on Rt 4, two miles north-north-east of Nilwood.

It was right next to a railroad that is no longer in use, which is probably why Greenridge, like other towns, became a ghost town. Residents moved to other nearby locations. There was one house left close to where downtown was.

Compiled by Dr. Neil Gale, Ph.D.

Lost Towns of Illinois - Stachnikville, Illinois.

The exact location is unknown, but I believe it is very close to Peoria, Illinois.

Stacknikville is a desolate ghost town in Tazewell County, Illinois, founded in 1856 as a small coal mining settlement. 

It reached its peak in 1873 and then began a steep decline. Coal miners fell on hard times in the late 19th century. The town was ridden by poverty and sickness as people fought to keep their families together as their main source of income dwindled. A rebound began when an underground spring was discovered but didn't make much of a difference.

The population diminished rather quickly as the surrounding towns became more popular and the coal mining industry dried up in this area. The only thing that still remains is the Hillman Street Barn. 

The original town had been leveled, and the property was returned to cultivable land. 

Compiled by Dr. Neil Gale, Ph.D.

Lost Towns of Illinois - Ledford, Illinois.

Ledford was an unincorporated community in the Harrisburg Township, Saline County, Illinois.

Ledford was located just south of Harrisburg, Illinois, on US 45. It was named after a well-known Ledford family in the area. In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, the peak of the coal boom in Saline County, it was a thriving mining center home to more than 1,000 people.

At one time, it had a population of 1,100 to 1,400 people. According to an early edition of the Harrisburg Daily Register, there was a time during the first 10 years of the 20th century when the population of Ledford was larger than that of Harrisburg, the county seat. In 1905, Saline County had numerous small slope mines and 15 major shaft mines. Thirteen of these larger mines were along the Big Four Railway; "The Cleveland, Cincinnati, Chicago and St. Louis Railway Company" [CCC&StL], (1889-1930), that traveled through Ledford.

At some point, Ledford was annexed to Harrisburg, Illinois. Almost all signs of the mining industry are gone. The mines’ air shafts and fans are gone, along with the many coal tipples[1] and mine ponds that dotted the area. The smokestacks are missing, and the air is clean. Gone are the sounds of the tipples hoisting coal, the steam whistles signaling the men, and the occasional snorts of a steam locomotive or the groaning of a streetcar motor. 

Ledford is now one of Harrisburg's ten neighborhoods; Buena Vista, Dorris Heights, Dorrisville, Garden Heights, Gaskins City, Ledford, Liberty, Old Harrisburg Village, and the Wilmoth Addition.

Compiled by Dr. Neil Gale, Ph.D.

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[1] A tipple is a structure used at a mine to load the extracted coal or ores for transport, typically into railroad hopper cars.

Lost Towns of Illinois - Horace, Illinois.

Horace has suffered the ultimate indignity: its name is misspelled on Illinois maps as "Harris." It appears to have been a small farming hamlet.

Horace was located in Edgar County, about one mile west of Illinois Route 1 and five miles north of Paris, Illinois. The Edgar County Airport is where the location of Horace, Illinois, was located.

The major remnant is an old brick mercantile building, although there are some other abandoned buildings in the area.

Compiled by Dr. Neil Gale, Ph.D.

Lost Towns of Illinois - Fillmore, Illinois.

Fillmore is a ghost town in Bourbon Township, Douglas County, Illinois, that was located one mile northeast of Chesterville.

Compiled by Dr. Neil Gale, Ph.D.

Lost Towns of Illinois - Bourbonais, Illinois.

Bourbonais is a former settlement in Bureau County, Illinois, United States. Bourbonais was located in Concord Township, along the Burlington railroad line southwest of Wyanet and northeast of Buda. 

It was platted in 1864 and named for a man of mixed French and Indian ancestry who had settled in this general area in 1820.

Compiled by Dr. Neil Gale, Ph.D.

Lost Towns of Illinois - Wilson, Illinois.

Wilson was an unincorporated community in southern Warren Township, Lake County, Illinois, United States. The community was located along Illinois Route 120 (Belvidere Road) and is now part of the cities of Waukegan and Park City and the village of Gurnee.

The community in southern Warren Township was originally known as "Warrenton". In 1873, the Milwaukee and St. Paul Railroad (predecessor to the Milwaukee Road) built a railroad depot in Warrenton, and the following year, Warrenton School was organized. 

In the early 20th century, entrepreneur Thomas E. Wilson purchased 2,000 acres of land in the area, which became known as the Edellyn Farms estate. The depot, post office and school were eventually renamed "Wilson" in his honor.

After World War II, Wilson's identity slowly began to disappear. In 1954, Wilson School was sold for use as a private residence. It was eventually razed to make room for the expansion of Belvidere Road.

In 1958, other parts of the area were incorporated into Park City to avoid annexation by Waukegan. In 1959, the Milwaukee Road Depot was abandoned and eventually razed. The nearby communities of Gurnee and Waukegan expanded, incorporating large parts of Wilson into their borders. 

In 1968, several hundred acres of Edellyn Farms were sold to the city of Waukegan for development as the (now defunct) Lakehurst Mall. 

Very little of the Wilson area remains unincorporated today, though the name still appears on topographic maps.

Compiled by Dr. Neil Gale, Ph.D.

Lost Towns of Illinois - Whistleville, Illinois.

Although the Big Creek upper watershed is open space now, it was one of the first points settled by Euro-Americans in the 1820s in what became Macon County. Today, the settlement site is closest to Decatur, Illinois.

The settlers found mature oaks and hickories here, looking for wooded land on the unforested prairie. The first settlers named their pioneer settlement Whistleville. Soon a stagecoach route made the settlement a port of call between Indiana and Central Illinois.

Early settlers were mostly from the American South. The settlement was identified as a location of Southern sympathizers during the American Civil War. 

After the Civil War, Whistleville dwindled and disappeared into ghost town status.

Compiled by Dr. Neil Gale, Ph.D.

Lost Towns of Illinois - Tracy, Illinois.

Tracy is a ghost town in Essex Township, Kankakee County, Illinois.

Tracy was a relatively small settlement, amounting to about a dozen buildings, which housed coal miners exploiting a nearby coal seam in the 1800s. It disappeared quickly around 1900 when the seam ran dry. 

According to the 1892 Map of the Illinois Central Railroad, Tracy was located just northwest of Buckingham and served as a major Illinois Central Railroad spur.

Compiled by Dr. Neil Gale, Ph.D.

Lost Towns of Illinois - Totten Prairie, Illinois.

When the Indians were sporting over the prairies of Illinois and wolves were prowling through the forests, William Totten placed his family and effects in a one-horse cart in Ohio and found his way to Kentucky, then to Indiana, and finally to Fulton County, Illinois, where he settled in 1823. Mr. Totten was remarkable for retaining peace with the Indians. When on the warpath, they would visit him, trade and sport with him and leave peaceably. 

Totten Prairie (aka Totten's Prairie) was a small settlement in Cass Township, Fulton County, Illinois, just to the southeast of the present Smithfield, Illinois. It was named after William Totten, who was the first to settle here in 1823. He settled upon the southwest quarter of section 27.

By an act of the State of Illinois legislature approved on January 28, 1823, Fulton county was given authority to organize. A commission consisting of Hugh R. Colter, John Totten and Stephen Chase was appointed to locate the county seat. In the same year, William Totten was appointed as a Constable.

The Sheriff was ordered to summon persons to compose the first grand jury "for the next term of the Circuit Court," which was to have been held at the courthouse on the second Monday of October 1823. From the Circuit Court records, it is evident that no Court was held until the following spring, when another jury was summoned, which was composed of almost the same men. Totten was on that list as a Grand Jurist.

Totten and others built a fortified blockhouse on Totten's prairie during the Winnebago troubles in 1827 [1]. 

Black Hawk (Ma-Ka-Tai-Me-She-Kia-Kiak) was very friendly to the Totten's and would not allow his braves to disturb them, even during the Black Hawk War of 1832. He often visited the Totten's, and they shot at targets as a pastime. 

A small cemetery, called Totten Cemetery or Old Totten's Prairie Cemetery, still exists in Smithfield, Illinois.

A FASCINATING READ: The Life of Black Hawk (1767-1838) as dictated by himself.

Compiled by Dr. Neil Gale, Ph.D.

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[1] The Winnebago War was a brief conflict that took place in 1827 in the Upper Mississippi River region of the United States, primarily in what is now the state of Wisconsin and the northern portion of Illinois. Not quite a war, the hostilities were limited to a few attacks on American civilians by a portion of the Winnebago (or Ho-Chunk) Indian tribe. The Ho-Chunks were reacting to a wave of lead miners trespassing on their lands and to false rumors that the United States Government had sent two Ho-Chunk prisoners to a rival tribe for execution.

Lost Towns of Illinois - Tedens, Illinois.

Tedens is a ghost town in Lemont, Downers Grove Township, DuPage County, Illinois.

John Henry Tedens (1833-1899) operated a department store at 106 Stephen Street in Lemont beginning in 1862. In the late-1890s, the business changed to Tedens Hardware Store. Tedens Opera House opened on the second floor in 1896.

Newspaper advertisement for the John Tedens and Alderman Dystrip's Department Store. Look at the store's offerings.

Compiled by Dr. Neil Gale, Ph.D.

Lost Towns of Illinois - Tacaogane, Illinois.

Tacaogane was a former settlement in Massac County, Illinois.

It was shown on the 1684 map of Louisiana by Jean-Baptiste-Louis Franquelin, who placed the settlement near the confluence of the Ohio and Tennessee Rivers, though the exact location of the settlement is undocumented.

"Tacaogane" may be a corruption of an Algonqian or Iroquoian word referring to speakers of another language, though it isn't clear which group this may refer to. Despite its apparent proximity to Kincaid Mounds, it is unlikely that Tacaogane refers to a surviving Mississippian settlement from the late 17th century.

Compiled by Dr. Neil Gale, Ph.D.

Lost Towns of Illinois - Sylvan, Illinois.

Sylvan was a former settlement in Cass County, Illinois, located two and one-half miles west-southwest of Newmansville. 

A few old farmhouses still stand. The town was populated during the mid-19th century mostly by Irish immigrants. There is one cemetery there.

Compiled by Dr. Neil Gale, Ph.D.