2007 Year in Review

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What Is In a Name?

During our sesquicentennial celebration we learned that Morrison was named after Mr. Charles Morrison. He was that rich fellow from New York who was to invest all his money in our emerging town. The problem was that he lost all his money before he ever got here to invest it. Morrison never even came to visit his namesake.

The origin of some of the local names of interest are pretty easy to determine. Union Grove and Round Grove got their names from large "groves" of trees. The Cottonwood school building was made from cottonwood logs, thus, folks went to the "Cottonwood School." Twin Oaks had many oak trees that had two limbs sprouting off the trunk, sort of like twins. Legend has it that a school teacher gave the name Mt. Pleasant to the small school she taught. It was located on a small hill, evidently a hill that she found to be a pleasant place.

The names of the old one-room country schools like McAllister, Cobb, Gridley, and Robertson were probably named after the families that gave title to the land to the school district so they could build a school. Bunker Hill, Lincoln, and Independence, most certainly, were reflections of this nation’s history. Green Valley is a beautiful name, but it lies on level land, certainly no valley. Spring Valley lies in a valley, and I am sure there are plenty of springs around.

Samuel Mathews Kilgore was an early settler of a nearby area. He was supposed to have looked out across the wonderful area where he planned to settle and exclaimed, "A plain garden everywhere." Mr. Kilgore became the first township supervisor and one of the founders of the Presbyterian Church in Garden Plain.

Many settlers came to the north of Morrison from Scotland. It reminded them so much of their former homes near the river Clyde in Scotland. When it came time to name the township, it was a natural fit to name it Clyde. That is one story. The other story I found was that the area was originally called Dent’s Grove. The folks wanted to rename it Watertown, but there was already such a town in Illinois. Supposedly, they put a bunch of letters in a box and drew out five; those letters spelled Clyde. These settlers also had the naming of their schools figured out. There was West Clyde, East Clyde---well, you get the idea. I like the story about the river better.

Most of you have driven along Highway 30 past "Blind Charlie’s Corner" and probably never thought how it got its name. To those of you not familiar with the area, it is between Morrison and Fulton. Janet Smaltz, former local resident, tells this story in her book "The Cabin Story," a book that we have in our Museum file. Janet tells the story this way.

"The store of Charlie Baker and his wife Nancy was located just east of the junction of Penrose and Smaltz Roads, facing Union Grove Road. Charles Baker became blind in 1861 but continued to operate the store for several more years. The store and the home of the Bakers provided a stopping place for farmers to water the horses and buy supplies on their way to and from Fulton. A pump stood at the site well into the 1930's, although the building was long since gone.

When the Bakers were not able to operate the store because of old age, they were taken to the Whiteside County Farm at Round Grove. Someone related the story of the sad sight when the Bakers were being taken (with meager possessions) in a lumber wagon by a kindly neighbor to the County Farm at Round Grove." I guess that is what legends are made of!

Then there is the name that they got all wrong. Siebel Akker was a farmer who owned a large tract of land south of Blind Charlie’s Corner. It is most-famous for the large rock quarry that is on the property. They hauled huge quantities of rock from there when they built Lock and Dam 13, back in the 1930's. It was only natural that, when the County named the roads, they would honor Mr. Akker by naming the road that passed through his land Akker Road. They did this--the only problem was that they misspelled his name. I guess we have to live with Acker Road.

Someone once said that good history is usually a lie. That may well be the case with these stories. At least you have been warned!

by Orville Goodenough, Guest Columnist
January 11, 2007

 

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