Town 3 north, range 3 east of the third principal meridian, is Alma. Who
suggested the name is not known, but whoever it was evidently had a sweetheart.
Big creek and Dumb's creek drain the township; the water from the first named
flowing into the Kaskaskia, from the latter into the Wabash. Grand Prairie in
the north, Summit Prairie in the center and a very small prairie in the
southeast is called from a spring there, Red Lick. This township was originally
mostly prairie and is now mostly cultivated, and like Stevenson, has fine farms
and farm buildings and many orchards. The Illinois Central, Chicago branch,
passes across the northwest corner of the township, while the Chicago & Eastern
Illinois Railroad crosses it from north to south, leaving the township at the
northwest corner of Stevenson township, just touching the southeast corner of
Tonti. This railroad was originally the Chicago, Peoria & Memphis. It enters the
township in section 3 and bends to the west and passes out as stated.
Marshall Wantland settled on section 35, and his brother, John, on 36, in 1826.
They were from Tennessee. It is told of John that he carried a spade and
wandered over the country for a radius of thirteen miles, digging here and there
and examining the soil, but concluded that section 36 was the best, so settled
there. Both moved to Omega township and later Marshall went to Texas and John to
Saline county. James Beard, another Tennessean, with his wife and two children,
settled in section 23, but stayed only about ten years, when he moved to
Missouri.
A Tennessean by the name of James Chance, a blacksmith,
settled in Salem in 1822. He had a large family. He was elected Sheriff and,
served for eight years. He settled in section 11 at the expiration of his term
of office and remained until 1835 when he moved to Tonti township, where he died
in 1863.
Mrs. Letitia Duncan, the widow of a soldier under Jackson at
New Orleans, who died in the hospital after the battle, brought her ten
children, settled in Tennessee Prairie about 1818, but in 1833 she located in
Alma, where she died in 1846. Mark Tully's brother William came from Virginia
about 1825, and after remaining in Salem about ten years settled on section 35.
Afterward he went to Texas. Peter Bretz and Robert Phillips both came from Ohio
about the same time. Bretz had six children and Phillips had nine, among whom
were Israel and John, so long and well known in the east side of the county. J.
P. French came from St. Clair county in 1838, and after living in Tonti township
until 1855, moved into Alma. The township was first named Pleasant, but later
changed to Alma.
The Baptists built the first church in the township in
1848. It stood on the line between sections 35 and 36. It was a small frame
house. The first preacher of this church was N. R. Eskridge. There are now three
Methodist churches, one Baptist and one Christian church, besides regular union
services are held in the town hall.
The first school was held in an old
abandoned cabin and was taught by Isaac Kagy. The cabin stood on what is known
as the Wantland (Marshall) place. It was a subscription school and the
subscriptions were paid in produce, which in turn was bartered at Rate's store.
In 1842 the first schoolhouse was built on the site of Pleasant Grove Methodist
Episcopal church. It was of the pioneer type, log cabin with clapboard roof,
held on with roof poles. There are doubtless men and women now living in the
township who remember the old school-house of seventy years ago.
William
Tully built the first horse mill in 1836, and John Beck kept the first store. He
failed and went out of business in a short time. He began his store-keeping in
1851, at the house of Squire Siple.
On section 35 the early settlers
established a burying ground. It was used about fifteen years and then closed
for burial purposes. It was called Mound Graveyard.
This township was
among the first to introduce imported stock and has ever since kept the best
blood obtainable. Berkshire hogs were introduced in 1841; Durham cattle in 1840
by the Hite brothers; English draft horses by John Cunningham in 1852, and
Southdown sheep by Thomas White in 1856.
The first doctors were Thomas
L. Middleton, William Haynie, Doctor Baker, T. B. Lester and John Davenport, and
they traveled many miles in every direction. Their names will be found as the
first physicians in several townships. The post-office at Alma, established upon
the completion of the Central Branch Railroad, was the first in the township.
In 1841 John Hammers opened a coal mine six feet under ground by
stripping, that is, by removing six feet of surface to a coal vein two feet
thick, but when the railroad brought coal to Alma the mine was abandoned.
VILLAGE OF ALMA.
The village of Alma is on the northwest corner of
the township on the Chicago branch of the Illinois Central Railroad. It was
first laid out by John S. Martin, in 1854, and the Martin, French and Tilden
addition was platted about the same time. It was named Rantoul, after an officer
of the railroad, but another town in the state had appropriated that name, and
it was changed to Grand Mound City, but in 1855 the name was changed to Alma.
Doctor Hutton built the first store house in 1853, and was the first
postmaster. Smith and Hawkins conducted the first blacksmith shop and John Ross
the first grist and saw mill. Jefferson Hawkins was the first Methodist
preacher; John Ross, the first Christian preacher, and was instrumental in
building the first church in which he preached several years and from which he
was buried, by the writer, about eighteen years ago. The Methodist Episcopal
church was built in 1871. The first school-house was burned and the second was
built in 1866 and 1867. It was a two-room building, but it is not now used. Some
of the members of the Christian church conceived the thought of a Christian
college at Alma. The Rosses and others gave land and money and a good two-story
school-house, or college, was built and a college opened, but after a few years'
struggle the property was sold three years ago to the district for public school
purposes.
Alma has grown from a hamlet to a village of two hundred or
three hundred inhabitants and is incorporated as a village. It has many business
houses and enjoys the trade of a large part of this, Tonti and Foster townships.
On the 28th day of December, 1908, fire broke out in a large hay barn and
destroyed the entire business part of Alma. Several stores, warehouses, shops
and restaurants were burned and as all were of frame, the loss was total, but
with true American grit, the ashes were hardly cold before the debris was being
cleared away and preparations for brick buildings were under way. In the spring
of 1908 the large fruit cannery of Doctor Shrigley's was burned, also quite a
serious loss to the business of the village. Alma is one of the chief fruit
shipping points of the county. Thousands upon thousands of baskets of tomatoes,
peaches and other fruits are annually shipped, while the Alma gem melon requires
two or three cars per day during the season, and are the only rival of the Rocky
Fords on the markets.
BRUBAKER.
The station of Brubaker on the
Chicago & Eastern Illinois Railroad is an active little hamlet. It contains two
stores, a saw-mill, blacksmith shop and the Alma town house. It was laid out by
E. E. Brubaker, who built a two-story store room upon the completion of the
railroad in 1895, and he has conducted a flourishing business ever since. Much
produce is also shipped from here, and also live stock. The railroad company
just after the Chicago & Eastern Illinois took charge opened an extensive
ballast-burning experiment and acres of clay was dug and mixed with coal and
burned, but for some reason the work was stopped, and all that remains is a
considerable body of water, forming an artificial lake.
Red Lick Prairie
is also the scene in which is laid the "Stories of New Egypt," by Frank
Spittler, Esq., and the tale has a foundation in fact, which is as follows:
About 1830 or 1835, two brothers with a small amount of money were journeying
westward from Vincennes, when they fell in with a third young man, who had about
nine hundred dollars on his person. When in the vicinity of Red Lick, the older
brother killed the young man and the brothers appropriated the money and buried
the body. They settled near Red Lick Prairie and the older brother became an
active member of the band of cutthroats and horsethieves, with headquarters at
Cave-in-Rock, and operating all over Southern Illinois, and his house was a
regular stopping place for the thieves and their plunder. The suspicions of the
rapidly increasing population were directed to the elder brother and he
disappeared. The younger brother lived in the township and reared a large and
respectable family. Such is the tale handed down by the old men and women at the
fireside a generation ago, and doubtless there is some truth at the foundation
of the story. It is impossible to say how much.
Extracted 27 Mar 2020 by Norma Hass from 1909 Brinkerhoff's History of Marion County, Illinois, pages 198-201.