Information excerpted from History and Genealogy of the Harlan Family Gateway Press Originally printed, 1914
Moses Harlan #676, farmer, Friend, b. in Fayette Co, PA., 8, 5, 1786; died in Peoria, Ill, 9, 2, 1842; buried there in cemetery at Radnor; m. near (now) Ridgeville, Warren Co, Ohio., Ohio, 1, 28, 1813, Ann Jennings, b. place unknown, 8, 28, 1791; d. in Warren Co., 8, 25, 1824; bur. in Friends’ Burying Grounds, Miami Meeting House, near Waynesville; dau of John and Sarah (Hopkins) Jennings.
Issue:
2286. George Baker, b. 9, 27, 1813; d. 11, 15, 1885; m Sara Cornelison.
2287. Sarah Hopkins, b. 3. 2, 1815; living, 1899; m. Aaron G. Wilkinson
2288. John, b. 12, 30, 1816; living, 1887; m. Caroline Please
2289. Phebe, b. 6, 14, 1818, in Warren Co., Ohio, m. David D. McMillan
2290 Milton, b. in Warren Co., Ohio, 11,14,1819; d. in Peoria Co. 9, 19, 1884
2291. Lewis, b. 8, 17, 1823; m. Eveline Chapin
Moses Harlan m. again in Warren Co., 7, 2, 1827, Mary Butler, b. in Jefferson Co., VA., 8, 9, 1797; d. in Henry Co, Ill., 11, 21, 1876
2292 Joseph, b. 10, 6, 1830; d. 5, 11, 1911; m. Araminta Hadsell.
2293. Thomas, b. in Peoria Co., Ill., 9, 23, 1834; m Sarah E. Sterns
2294. Mary Ann, b. in Peoria Co., Ill., 9, 7, 1837; unm., 1912.
2295. Margery in, b. 3, 7, 1840; living. 1912, m. Ross F. Schoonover
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Information Excerpted from
Historical Encyclopedia of Illinois and History of Peoria County
Volume II
Chicago and Peoria: Munsell Publishing Company, 1902
CHAPTER XIV.
RADNOR TOWNSHIP.
BY NAPOLEON DUNLAP.
Looking over the past for a period of sixty years we are filled with amazement at the changes that have taken place. Then the deer and wolves were plenty and prairie chickens were common game. Steam power was in its infancy, the telegraph and the telephone were unknown, electricity as a mechanical power had not been dreamed of, and weeks, or even months, were consumed in traveling a distance now accomplished in a few hours or days at the farthest.
Of this the early settlers of Radnor, who came mostly from New York, Massachusetts, Ohio, and other Eastern States, had a rich experience, many of them coming overland by emigrant wagons, consuming weeks in making the journey. One of the earliest, if not the first settler in the township, was Erastus Peet, who came in 1834. His little daughter of four years, having become lost, and a fire having swept over the prairie in the night time, she perished in the flames and her body was discovered the next day.
Robert Cline came in 1835, from Oswego County, New York, and, after remaining two years at Hale's Mill, settled on Section 35, and two years later on Section 13. He was killed by lightning on April 21, 1849. William Gifford, who came from Barnstable, Massachusetts, in 1836, erected the first frame house, on the south half of Section 28.
Moses Harlan settled on Section 22 in the same year. He was County Commissioner in 1838, and two years in the Legislature, 1838-40. His son, George B. Harlan, settled on Section 2 in 1836. He was a Justice of the Peace for some years and a member of the Board of Supervisors for one or two years, besides holding other local offices.
William Knott settled on Section 26 in the same year; also John L. Wakefield, who came from Butler County, Ohio, to Peoria County in 1834, but settled on Section 18 in Radnor in 1836. Aaron G. Wilkinson and his brother, Abner Russell, Calvin Blake, Charles, Richard and George Wilkins, Anson Bushnell and his brothers, Horace and Alvin, Thomas Shaw, James ————— and his brother in-law, Griffith Dickinson, all came about the year 1837.
Mary J. Peet, who was burned to death on the prairie, was the first person to die in the township, and Henry Martin the next, on November 10, 1836, John Harlan was the first child born, October, 1836, and died February 1, 1847.
The first election in Radnor was held at the house of Alva Dunlap in 1842. It was then Benton Precinct, composed of Radnor and Kickapoo townships. An election had previously been held in the woods in Kickapoo, north of where the village now is. At this election in Radnor Smith Dunlap, father of the writer, was elected Justice of the Peace, and continued to serve in that capacity until the adoption of township organization. The first annual town meeting of the Town of Benton (afterwards named Radnor) was held at the residence of Jonathan Brassfield. Alva Dunlap was chosen Moderator and Nathaniel T. A. Shaw, Clerk; Jonathan Brassfield was elected Supervisor; Nathaniel T. A. Shaw, Town Clerk; Lewis Harlan, Assessor; Jonathan Brassfield, Griffith Dickinson and William Wilkinson, Commissioners of Highways; Phineas R. Wilkinson, Collector; Lorennes Shaw, Overseer of the Poor; George B. Harlan and Smith Dunlap, Justices of the Peace; John M. Hendricks and Phineas R. Wilkinson, Constables. Fifteen dollars were appropriated for contingent expenses and fifty dollars for road purposes.
HARLAN, HARRISON; Farmer; born in Radnor, February 12, 1842. His grandparents were Moses and Jennie Harlan. He is the son of John Harlan, born in Warren County, Ohio, December 30, 1816, and Caroline (Pleas) Harlan who was born in Loudoun County, Virginia, November 15, 1820, and died March. 19, 1856; they were married November 14, 1839. Moses Harlan came to Radnor Township in 1833 and purchased land from the Government on Section 22, the title deeds of his land having been signed by President John Tyler. Moses Harlan was an old line Whig, and served as a member of the Legislature and a County Commissioner.
John Harlan, who succeeded to this property, was an energetic and patriotic man. He came to the Township with his parents, where he held the offices of Assessor and School Director. He served as a soldier in the War of the Rebellion, in Company H, Forty-seventh Illinois Volunteer Infantry, 1861-63, in the Western Army under Rosecrans, and was at Iuka and the second battle of Corinth. He was for some time in a hospital at St. Louis, where he was discharged for disability. He is now living in Newton, Harvey County, Kansas, at the age of eighty-five years.
Harrison Harlan enlisted in Company A, Thirty-second Illinois Veteran Volunteer Infantry, in October, 1864, and served till the close of the war. He was with Sherman in his "March to the Sea," being mustered out June 17, 1865. His brother, Perry, was also a soldier, in the same regiment with his father, having enlisted at the second call for three hundred thousand men, and was detailed as clerk at division headquarters. Mr. Harrison Harlan married Hannah L. Gordon in Radnor Township, November 6, 1862. They are the parents of twelve children: Ida M., born October 30, 1864, married Charles T. Harwood, and died January 17, 1899, leaving three sons: Frank E., born November 9, 1866; Cora Ann, born November 27, 1868, wife of Andrew J. Dunlap; Amy I., born January 4, 1871, wife of John Shehan: John, born December 2, 1872; Laura E., born October 28, 1874. wife of Harvey Sturm; an infant, born and died October 29, 1876: Harry, born March 25, 1879, died August 19, 1880; Fred, born December 7, 1880; Elmer, born February 2, 1883, died March 4. 1883; an infant unnamed; and Elsie Caroline, born November 12, 1889. Seven children and seventeen grandchildren are now living.
Mrs. Harlan was born in Radnor Township, July 10, 1847, the daughter of Samuel Gordon, of North Carolina, and Hannah (Bush) Gordon, of New York. Samuel Gordon first came to Radnor Township, where he married and lived for many years. He was born January 6, 1787, and died August 8, 1885. Hannah Bush Gordon was born November 29, 1803, and died October 31, 1869. She came to Peoria County with her family and settled in Jubilee Township; she had two brothers and three sisters. Mr. Harlan has a fine farm of two hundred and eighty acres and good buildings. He is a Republican, and served as Assessor one term, Supervisor three terms, and has been School Director for many years.
MOSES HARLAN 1835-1895 (Grandson of Moses Harlan #676
Whether as a progressive and successful agriculturist or as a broad-minded, disinterested holder of responsible political positions, Moses Harlan has impressed his forceful personal worth upon the community of Radnor Township, and is esteemed as one of the most helpful of the early pioneers. A native of Park County, Indiana, he was born June 13, 1835, the son of George B. Harlan, who was born in Warren County. Ohio, in 1813, and died in Wyoming, Stark County, Illinois, in 1866, and Sarah (Cornelison) Harlan, who was born in Preble County, Ohio, in 1817, and died on the old homestead in Radnor Township in 1868. The paternal grandparents were Moses and Ann (Jennings) Harlan; on the maternal side the grandparents were named Marsh and Elizabeth (Crooks) Cornelison, the former born in North Carolina. As early as 1836 George B. Harlan came to Radnor Township, settling on Section 20. where he cultivated a fine farm from the crude land, and where he raised his children to be useful men and women. The last three or four years of his life were spent in Wyoming, Stark county, where he was practically retired from business activity. As a youth Moses Harlan worked on his father's farm, and while still quite young, helped to break up the wild prairie and convert it into profitable farming land. May 21, 1878, he married Lavina P. Jackson, born in Radnor Township October 30, 1852, the daughter of John Jackson, who was born in Yorkshire, England, August 10, 1807, and came to America with his parents when seven years of age.
The family located in Newcastle County, Delaware, where he lived until eighteen years of age, after which he removed to Radnor Township in 1837. This continued to be his home until his death, May 5, 1895, at the age of eighty-seven years. His wife, whom he married in Radnor Township, and who was formerly Mrs. Elizabeth (Jordan) Aukland, a native of Lincolnshire, England, survived him until January 27, 1898, being at the time seventy-seven years old. To Mr. and Mrs. Harlan have been born six children: Ernest J., born December 26, 1880; Clarence W., born March 18, 1882; Luella P., born May 22, 1884; John R., born September 13, 1887; George B., born November 8, 1889; and Carrie Elizabeth, born June 27, 1892.
In the last year of the Civil War (February, 1865). Mr. Harlan enlisted at Peoria, Illinois, in the Seventh Illinois Volunteer Infantry, and joined the command at Raleigh, North Carolina. The vicissitudes and dangers of war were not meted out to him to any appreciable extent, for on account of physical disability he was sent to the hospital at Louisville, Kentucky, and discharged from the service in July, 1865. As a stanch believer in Republican institutions, Mr. Harlan has conscientiously filled many positions of trust within the gift of the people of his township, by whom he is regarded as a leader. Few men have, for so long a time, held continuous offices, or have, to so great extent, retained the confidence and approval of the people. For twentyfive consecutive years he served as Constable, fifteen years as Commissioner of Highways, fourteen years as School Director, eight years as Justice of the Peace, one year as Supervisor, two terms as Collector, and one term as Assessor. Fraternally he is associated with the Masons at Alta. and with his wife is a member of the Eastern Star,
Moses Harlan # 676 Ancestry
George Harlan #3;
Aaron Harlan #8;
George Harlan # 37;
George Harlan #180
Moses Harlan #676;
John Harlan #2288; _____ Lewis Harlan #2291
Harrison Harlan #5862;-------Marion Harlan #2291-4
Fred Harlan #5862-9;--------- Pearl J. Harlan Hullinger #2291-43
Harold V. Harlan#5862-94 Clifford Harlan Hullinger #2291-431
Junior F. Harlan #5862-942 Craig Harlan Hullinger #2291-4311
Bret Schaller Hullinger #2291-43112
Information excerpted from History and
Genealogy of the Harlan Family
Gateway Press Originally printed, 1914
2291. Lewis Harlan, farmer, b. in Warren Co., Ohio 8, 17, 1823; when last heard from (1887) was residing in Lathrope ?), Ia,; m. in Peoria Co., date unknown, Eveline Chapin, b. in Erie Co., N.Y. ; a dau of Joseph Chapin, farmer in Peoria Co., and Mary M. Blakely. Lewis Harlan had moved with his parents to Park Co., Ind., in 1829, and to Peoria Co., Ill in 1836.
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Taken from the History of Warren County, Iowa
HARLAN, LEWIS [# 2291], farmer, Sec. 23; P. O. Felix; born August 7, 1823, in Marion county, Ohio; parents moved to Pikes county, Indiana, in 1828, and to Peoria county, Ill., in 1836; here he lived till 1854, when he came to this county and settled where he now lives; he owns a farm of 120 acres, and the first house he built on it was of hay, straw, and mud; helped to organize the township, and voted at the first election; has been assessor; he enlisted in Co. D, 34th Iowa Infantry in August, 1862, as a private, and was promoted to Sergeant, January 5, 1863; he served to May 20, 1863, when he was discharged on account of injuries received in left arm, while in the line of duty; was in the battles of Haines' Bluff and Arkansas Post, and many other skirmishes; he was married October 8, 1846, to Evaline, daughter of Joseph Chapin, now a resident of this township; they have had ten children: Geo. E., Ruth, Joseph, John, Martha, Marian, James, Infant, Willie, and Ray; Geo. E., John, James and Infant are deceased.
Information Excerpted from
Historical Encyclopedia of Illinois and History of
Peoria County
Volume II
Chicago and Peoria: Munsell Publishing Company,
1902
Joseph Chapin–our GGGG Grandfather in Radnor Township, Peoria County
The same winter, or in the early spring, a log school-house was built on Section 13, in which Anna McKnight and Sarah D. Sanford taught, and William Gifford in the winter of 1843. The school-house was then moved to Section 22, on the wood-lot now owned by George B. Taylor. This was as near the center of the town as the condition of the ground would permit. Within a radius of two miles there were ten or twelve large families. They were in the woods or near the edge of the timber. Their cultivated fields were along the Kickapoo bottoms or near the edge of the prairies—the object at that time being to get where they would be sure of having timber.
There was much strife in locating the school-houses, and they were frequently moved to get them to the most central point. In 1842 there were three school-houses built; the one just mentioned, a small frame on Section 2, and a log one on the northeast ;quarter of Section I. The first teacher in the last named was Catharine J. Jamison, who began on May 10, 1842, her school consisting of seven Blakesleys, five Wakefields, four Chapins, three Van Camps, two Gordons, two Rogerses, one each of Hall, Gilkinson, Hatfield and Slaughter. The Directors who signed her certificate were Parley E. Blakesley and Joseph Chapin. The next term was taught by Deborah L. Woodbury, the same year. In 1843 a man by the name of Elisha Barker taught in a log school-house on Section 22, built in 1842. In the winter of 1843-44 William Gifford taught in the same house.
The office of Trustee having now became elective, Griffith Dickinson, Horace Bushnell, Joseph Chapin, Jonathan Brassfield and Nelson Bristol were the first to be elected, Trustees before then having been appointed.
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Excerpted from Memories and Milestones
John F. and Pearl Harlan Hullinger June 28, 1969
The Chapin family story should fit in here. It is strange that I have the most information about my Grandmother Evaline Chapin Harlan's mother Mirabah Maria Blakesley Chapin. It may be because she followed the Harlans to Iowa. She is in a picture that I am in also, as a baby of three months taken in 1895, and she died that fall. She is sitting in a chair that I saw in Seattle, Washington, in the home of a cousin a few years ago. This cousin gave me Maribah's picture taken when a young woman. She was the daughter of Stephen and Clissora (Blakesley) Chapin and was born in Onondaga County, N. Y., in 1808. She was married to Joseph Chapin, but no date for that.
They moved to Peoria County, Illinois, when my grandmother was a small child and it would seem that they came before the Harlans. We have a dictionary that belonged to Joseph Chapin that was printed in Edinburg, Scotland, in 1776. Does this mean they were Scotch? And when did they come to America? If any of you are curious, there are probably records in Onondago County, N. Y. The picture I have is said to have been taken in 1831 and looks to be an expensive one.
The family story has it that Great Grandfather Joseph was prosperous but lost all his money in a money panic, or rather that his paper money was worthless, and history tells of money troubles in 1832 to 1835. At any rate they moved to Illinois when Evaline was a little girl and I have heard first-hand stories about hard times. Her father, Joseph, when the snow was so deep, had to haul flour on a hand sled to feed his family. Evaline couldn't eat corn meal and got thin and pale.
Evaline Forsakes Education
It seemed they had more prosperous relatives in Chicago, which was only a small village at the time, who offered to take her to give her schooling and promised her a fancy doll if she would come. She did go and then I have heard that her father came to see her and she clung to him and cried, "My pretty Pa, my pretty Pa," and went home with him and that ended the education or whatever it was.
She lived in our home for three years until I was eight, but too young to ask for the priceless stories she could have told. I remember about a pet fawn that would hide in the fireplace when strangers came, and that the wolves were bad in the timber in Illinois. She talked of panthers screaming, too. She had a little walnut table (that Irene now has) for a desk, and she was always writing letters to relatives in the east somewhere, so she did learn to write.
She read everything available, too.
After Grandfather Lewis came to Iowa the Chapins came also and lived in a little house on the farm, east of Milo, Iowa. Joseph probably died in the late '80's. Their children, as I remember, not in the correct order, are Lorinda (Wilson), George, James, enlisted in 1861 and died of wounds in Rome, Georgia, 1864, Evaline (HarIan), Jane (Hines).
Lorinda (Aunt Nin) lived near us in the little town of Prole and was a widow with one child, Eddie. The story was that Aunt Nin had carried him every day, so that when he was a man she could still lift him. I remember she was very kind and sad and that she wrote in an autograph album of my father's: "May the Lord keep you from temptation and son, and accept the kind wishes of your Aunt Nin." I still have the album. Uncle George also lived there and seemed to be kind of a family joke. Also he DRANK. I can't think it was very much but in a family like that, a little went a long way. He was the youngest child and very spoiled, they said. But one son was killed in the war and George had broken a foot when a little boy and after many years and much suffering, it was amputated. I remember him with a wooden peg for a leg, so it was understandable if he was spoiled. He was married late to an "old maid" and they adopted a baby about my age. The baby, Park, grew up and was killed in the First World War.
They had moved to PeEll, Washington, and Uncle George had died there so Aunt Jennie was left alone. She wouldn't spend any of the money from the government for his insurance, but hid it everywhere in her little house and worried everyone. I don't know why I am telling this except it seemed such a pathetic story and there is no one left to hurt. Uncle George and Aunt Jennie are buried in the PeEll Cemetery.
Lewis and Evaline Come to Iowa
When Lewis and Evaline came to Belmont Township, Warren County, Iowa, in 1854, they brought two children, Ruth and Joseph. I will copy from the Warren County History in 1879 . . . "Lewis Harlan owns a farm of 120 acres. The first house on it was built of hay, straw and mud. He helped to organize the township and voted at the first election and was elected assessor." He had been assessor in Illinois, too, one note says. "He enlisted in Co. D, 34th Iowa Infantry in August, 1862, and was promoted to Sergeant, January 5, 1863. He served till May 20, 1863, when he was discharged for injuries received in the line of duty. He was in the battles of Haines Bluff and Arkansas Post."
I think of Evaline left with little children to take care of during the war. My father, Marion, was born in 1861 and Martha was older so there were four. But she had relatives living near, I think. I remember one story. Some one was at their home (they had built a better house and part of it is still there) talking for the South or making a remark of some kind. She took a chair and threatened him and said she would have no Rebel talk in her house.
Six children of the ten born lived to grow up --- Ruth (Wilson), Joseph, Martha (Crow), Marion, Willie and Ray. Some of Ruth's descendants are the Butlers of Lacona, Iowa. Joe's daughter is the Rose who visited here and now lives in Seattle --- the only child left.
THE FAMILY OF JOHN AND DOCIA MILLER.
From a reminiscent letter written by William Logan
Miller in 1912, at age of 84 years, residing at
DeWitt, Saline County, Nebraska.
In September, 1912, Mr. Miller received Volume I of "History and Reminiscences" and wrote to the publishing committee making a correction for the article in Vol. I on Christian Miller family, as follows:
"I like the book very well; but I was born in Kentucky, Rockcastle County, in 1828. Jacob Miller and Sally Ann were born in North Carolina. I will write up my coming to Illinois in the year of 1834 as well as if it had been yesterday,"
In December, 1912, Mr. Miller wrote the following historical letter, all in his own hand:
118
To the Publishers of the Old Settler's Book:
I will try to give a history of my introduction as an old settler of Princeville. I moved with my father and mother in the year of 1834. We moved in April, the 4th. We crossed the Illinois River at Peoria, then called Ft. Clark. There were four children of us, Sally Ann, Jacob L., William L. and Catherine. My father's name was John Miller; my mother's name Docia Miller When we crossed the river at Ft. Clark there were Erastus Peet, Aunt Polly his wife, George McMillen, Rice McMillen, Frye Garrison and Erastus Peet settled on Kickapoo. Father came to Prince's Grove; moved into a log cabin close to where Vaughn Williams' old place is (home of James Williams in Akron Township in 1912). Old John Morrow lived on the old Bouton Place. Daniel Prince lived on the old Tebow place where Slane lives. Father tended a crop on old man Morrow's. Mr. Morrow's son Josiah got his foot badly cut with Prince's breaking plow and was laid up all summer. Then my father took the team that Josiah used. Mr. Morrow had a bound boy, his name DeWitt Franklin. He and father tended the place. They had a good crop of potatoes. My brother Jake and I dug the potatoes; we all dug them. They were so good I can almost taste them now.
Well there were 80 acres of land on Kickapoo. My father went down there and Mr. Peet showed him the 80 acres. He took it up, built a cabin on it and we moved on it the next spring, in 1836. Mr. Peet broke 15 acres. We put it in sod corn and melons, pumpkins, beans and all sorts of stuff. In the fall of '36 Moses Harlan moved in from Indiana with a large family. Then they had to build. They took up land south of father. There were three families: Aaron Wilkinson was a son-in-law of Moses Harlan, George Harlan was a Justice of the Peace. John Harlan was a young man; and there were also Lewis and Thomas. There was one young lady Rice McMillen married; her name was Phoebe Harlan.
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Warren County, Iowa, (county seat- Indianola) history published about 1875
Clifford Harlan Hullinger
Its been interesting reading the correspondence between you two on our Harlan ancestors. I thought you might be interested in some info from the Warren County, Iowa, (county seat- Indianola) history published about 1875. The write-ups appear to have been submitted by the individuals themselves and they are arranged alphabetically by townships.
Page 636- HARLAN, LEWIS, farmer, Sec. 23: P. O. Felix, born August 7, 1823 in Marion county, Ohio; parents moved to Pike county, Indiana, in
1828, and to Peoria county, Ill,, in 1836; here he lived till 1854, when he came to this county and settled where he now lives; he owns a farm of 120 acres, and the first house he built on it was of
hay, straw, and mud; (note- last four words in italics) helped to organize the township, and voted at the first election; he enlisted in Co. D, 34 Iowa Infantry (note - my WW-II division!) in August 1962, as a private, and was promoted to Sergeant, January 5, 1863; he served to May 20, 1863, when he was discharged on account of injuries received in
left arm, while in the line of duty.
Was in the battle of Haines' Bluff and Arkansas Post, and may other skirmishes;
he was married October 8, 1846 , to Evaline, daughter of Joseph Chapin, now a resident
of this township; they have had ten children: Geo. E., Ruth, Joseph, John, Martha, Marian (note - probably Marion), James, Infant, Willie, and
Ray. Geo. E., John, James and Infant are deceased.
Page 555 - Lewis Harlan is listed as a Second Corporal in Co. D.
Page 559 - George W. Harlan is listed as Fourth Corporal in Co. B. (don't know about him)
Page 547 - Chapin, James C., enlisted October 24, 1861, veteranized (???) December 6, 1863, promoted Corporal, wounded at Kenesaw Mountain, died of wounds at Rome Ga., July 24, 1864 (believed to be a brother of Evaline.)
CHAPTER XIV.
RADNOR TOWNSHIP.
BY NAPOLEON DUNLAP.
Looking over the past for a period of sixty years we are filled with amazement at the changes that have taken place. Then the deer and wolves were plenty and prairie chickens were common game. Steam power was in its infancy, the telegraph and the telephone were unknown, electricity as a mechanical power had not been dreamed of, and weeks, or even months, were consumed in traveling a distance now accomplished in a few hours or days at the farthest. Of this the early settlers of Radnor, who came mostly from New York, Massachusetts, Ohio, and other Eastern States, had a rich experience, many of them coming overland by emigrant wagons, consuming weeks in making the journey. One of the earliest, if not the first settler in the township, was Erastus Peet, who came in 1834. His little daughter of four years, having become lost, and a fire having swept over the prairie in the night time, she perished in the flames and her body was discovered the next day. Robert Cline came in 1835, from Oswego County, New York, and, after remaining two years at Hale's Mill, settled on Section 35, and two years later on Section 13. He was killed by lightning on April 21, 1849. William Gifford, who came from Barnstable, Massachusetts, in 1836, erected the first frame house, on the south half of Section 28. Moses Harlan settled on Section 22 in the same year. He was County Commissioner in 1838, and two years in the Legislature, 1838-40. His son, George B. Harlan, settled on Section 2 in 1836. He was a Justice of the Peace for some years and a member of the Board of Supervisors for one or two years, besides holding other local offices. William Knott settled on Section 26 in the same year; also John L. Wakefield, who came from Butler County, Ohio, to Peoria County in 1834, but settled on Section 18 in Radnor in 1836. Aaron G. Wilkinson and his brother, Abner Russell, Calvin Blake, Charles, Richard and George Wilkins, Anson Bushnell and his brothers, Horace and Alvin, Thomas Shaw, James ————— and his brotherin-law, Griffith Dickinson, all came about the year 1837.
About the same time Alva Dunlap came on a prospecting tour from Sandy Creek, Oneida County, New York, and, having become satisfied with the place, returned the next season (1838) with his family. Leaving his home on the 11th day of August, with his father and mother, five children and a sister, he, with his brother, the writer, embarked at Sackett's Harbor on a little schooner of about one hundred tons for Chicago. Leaving his mother and sister, with a daughter residing at Chicago, for another trip, the rest of the party proceeded in wagons, which had been previously engaged, arriving at their destination on the northwest quarter of Section 14 on the 11th day of October, and took up quarters in a frame house, 16x24 feet, which Alva had erected the preceding summer from lumber hauled from Hale's Mill, then recently erected. Their nearest neighbor was an Englishman named John Jackson, a bachelor of about thirty years, with a lad of about fourteen years named George Scholes, "keeping bach" on the northeast quarter of Section 15. Jackson had arrived in 1837 and had broken part of his land, on which he raised a crop in 1838. Ira Smith, a native of Hampden, Maine, who had been a sea captain, had also come in 1837, and had paid Chloe Case $50 for a claim on the northeast quarter of Section 3, which he entered and afterwards, in 1849, sold to Adam Yates for $3,000. He was a very worthy man, an old-line Abolitionist, and believed in the Golden Rule. He removed to Peoria and went into the lumber trade.
J. J. Hitchcock, with his aged parents, had also settled on the northwest quarter of Section 3 in 1837. In the winter of 1838 he went with Alva Dunlap to Chicago, and assisted him in bringing the remainder of the goods, together with his mother and sister, to the new house. The country, at that time. was an unbroken prairie, and what houses there were were scattered along the streams and in the edges of the timber. On the larger prairies one could travel a whole day without seeing a house. The scarcity of timber for fuel, fencing and building purposes was a serious matter with the early settlers, and, if one could get hold of a piece of timber land, ;he was considered fortunate; and woe to him who having secured one would go off without leaving some one to guard it, for on his return he would likely find it all stumps. No one thought lumber could be shipped here in sufficient quantities to supply the needs of these vast prairies.
Coal had not yet been developed to any considerable extent. Saw mills were erected along the streams, where there was timber and water with sufficient fall to obtain power. But the lumber secured in that way was very unsatisfactory for building purposes. When the Osage Orange was introduced for hedges, it was thought to be a great advance in the matter of fencing; but now, since the introduction of barbed wire, the Osage Orange is no longer planted and farmers would be glad to be rid of what they have. Jonathan Brassfield took two loads of wheat to Chicago and brought back finishing lumber.
Several others tried the same experiment, but no one went the second time. When the canal was opened in 1848 it brought great relief to those living within reach of the river. Timber is much more plentiful now than it was sixty years ago. Then it was short and scrubby on account of the fires; after that was cut off and the fires kept away from the new growth it became thrifty. Coal became the principal fuel and the inhabitants ceased, in a great measure, the use of wood for either fuel or fencing. But for the last few years many prefer to have the land for farming purposes, and are cutting off the timber, selling the wood so cheaply that the people
are again using it for fuel.
As the population increased the deer disappeared, but the wolves remained and are not yet entirely extinct, an occasional one venturing out from its hiding place. As corn fields increased the prairie chickens also increased, for a time into large flocks, and became very destructive to the corn, which, according to the custom of the country, was left in the field over winter; but when the prairies had become settled up and their nesting places invaded, they began to decrease in numbers until now they are nearly extinct. The rattle-snake was a common pest in breaking up the native sod, and was often encountered by the plowman. They were not considered dangerous, as they made their presence known by their rattle and were easily disposed of.
Cattle instinctively avoided them, but were sometimes bitten by them, which caused severe swellings, but seldom, if ever, death. They disappeared when the land became cultivated.
After the opening of the canal pine lumber in quantities began to make its appearance, the coal banks began to supply fuel and the people began to lose their fear of settling upon the broad prairies. The big prairie team, with four or five yoke of oxen and the huge breaking-plow, rapidly turned over the native sod; houses rapidly sprang up in all directions and a wave of prosperity seemed to have struck the country. The light steel-plow introduced by Tobey and Anderson, of Peoria, took the place of the wooden moldboard and heavy cast-iron plow brought from the East. The reaper took the place of the back-breaking cradle; the Brown corn-planter did away with planting by hand; the thresher, with its simple cylinder throwing straw, chaff and grain out together, displaced the flail and the tramping-floor, only to be displaced in its turn by the separator, which also took the place of the Nurse or Proctor tanning-mill formerly in use; the single shovel-plow, doing duty with one horse traveling first upon one side of the row and back on the other, was superseded by the two-horse riding or walking cultivators. The complete outfit for husking corn was one team, two men and a boy taking five rows, the team, and wagon treading down the middle one, which was the boy's share to pick up.
The first reaping machine known in Radnor —and perhaps in the county—was owned by Alva Dunlap, and was built by George Greenwood of Peoria. It was so constructed as to throw the cut grain directly back the width of the swath, which had to be bound up before the next swath could be cut. It did clean work and he used it for several years in cutting his own and his neighbor's grain. It was built about the year 1846, only seven years after Cyrus H. McCormick gave the first exhibition of his reaper on the farm of Joseph Smith, in Augusta County, Virginia. The next was a McCormick—the grain being raked off on one side. This was followed, in a few years, by the self-raker; and in about twenty years by the self-binder.
Through these improvements the hard labor of eight men was done away with, and the women of the household were relieved of the labor of boarding a large number of men during the heat of the harvest time. Before that time harvest hands would begin in the South, where the season was earlier, and work their way northward as the grain ripened. These traveling men were thrown out of employment by the self-binding reaper.
About the year 1839 experiments were made by Aaron Bushnell, J. J. Hitchcock and Alva Dunlap in making sod fences, consisting of a ditch two and a half feet wide by the same in depth, and an embankment on the side protected by the sods cut from the ditch. But the theory would not hold good in practice, for the cattle, getting into the ditch, would have a fine frolic in tossing the sods out of the place with their horns and so destroying the fence.
One of the serious problems with the farmers was to get their products to market. In the spring of 1841 John Jackson built two flat-boats and loaded them with ear-corn and bacon, for the purpose of coasting along the Mississippi and selling to the planters and negroes. As was customary, they were floated with the current. They had long sweeps or oars to guide them and keep them off the snags. To build them two large trees would be found (generally hackberry), which were hewn flat for the sides, and planks spiked on the bottom, the ends sloped like a scow. The roof, or deck, was made of boards sawed thin enough to bend across the boat, and thus make an arched roof. The crews of these famous boats were John Jackson, Elisha Barker, John Peet, Warren Hale, William Harlan and Napoleon Dunlap. The two latter went as far as Natchez, but, concluding they had had enough of the life of boatmen, they begged off and returned by steamer, working their way by helping to take on wood at the wood-yards along the way.
The first election in Radnor was held at the house of Alva Dunlap in 1842. It was then Benton Precinct, composed of Radnor and Kickapoo townships. An election had previously been held in the woods in Kickapoo, north of where the village now is. At this election in Radnor Smith Dunlap, father of the writer, was elected Justice of the Peace, and continued to serve in that capacity until the adoption of township organization. The first annual town meeting of the Town of Benton (afterwards named Radnor) was held at the residence of Jonathan Brassfield. Alva Dunlap was chosen Moderator and Nathaniel T. A. Shaw, Clerk; Jonathan Brassfield was elected Supervisor; Nathaniel T. A. Shaw, Town Clerk; Lewis Harlan, Assessor; Jonathan Brassfield, Griffith Dickinson and William Wilkinson, Commissioners of Highways; Phineas R. Wilkinson, Collector; Lorennes Shaw, Overseer of the Poor; George B. Harlan and Smith Dunlap, Justices of the Peace; John M. Hendricks and Phineas R. Wilkinson, Constables. Fifteen dollars were appropriated for contingent expenses and fifty dollars for road purposes.
The only Post Office in the township before the building of the Rock Island and. Peoria Railroad, was kept by Enoch Huggins on Section 35. The mail was carried from Peoria three times a week. This office did not continue long. There was a mail-route from Peoria by way of La Fayette, through Medina and Akron, but most of the people received their mail at Peoria until the building of the railroad. In the first settlement of the country the wagon-road took a straight course from Mt. Hawley to Princeville; but, as the prairie became settled, every one would turn the travel around his own land, but was anxious to have it go straight through his neighbor's. An attempt was once made to open up a State Road from Peoria to Rock Island, but the opposition to its going diagonally through the farms was so great it had to be given up.
Mary J. Peet, who was burned to death on the prairie, was the first person to die in the township, and Henry Martin the next, on November 10, 1836, John Harlan was the first child born, October, 1836, and died February 1, 1847. The first school was taught in the summer of 1840 by Miss E. R. Dunlap, in a little frame house built on the northwest quarter of Section 13 in 1837 by a man who committed suicide, and it was never occupied except for schools or other public purposes. Horace Bushnell taught a singing school in it the same summer. The next summer Miss Dunlap taught in another vacant log house on the northwest quarter of Section 13. The first attempt to organize the school system was in December, 1841. Charles Kettelle, School Commissioner, then surveyed and laid off the School Section (16) into forty-acre lots, and had them appraised and offered for sale. Cyrus W. Pratt bid off three of these lots for $170. He made no payments, but gave a mortgage for the price with interest at twelve per cent. After making two or three payments of interest he failed to make any more, and the land reverted. About the same time trustees were appointed and Peter Auten was made the first School Treasurer. At their first meeting, April 4, 1842, they laid off the town into six districts and resolved that, inasmuch as the money in the treasury was depreciated paper of the State bank, and believing that it would recover its former value, the Treasurer should loan the same at par with interest at twelve per cent.—conditioned that money of the same bank might be received in payment of the loans.
The same winter, or in the early spring, a log school-house was built on Section 13, in which Anna McKnight and Sarah D. Sanford taught, and William Gifford in the winter of 1843. The school-house was then moved to Section 22, on the wood-lot now owned by George B. Taylor. This was as near the center of the town as the condition of the ground would permit. Within a radius of two miles there were ten or twelve large families. They were in the woods or near the edge of the timber. Their cultivated fields were along the Kickapoo bottoms or near the edge of the prairies—the object at that time being to get where they would be sure of having timber. There was much strife in locating the school-houses, and they were frequently moved to get them to the most central point.
In 1842 there were three school-houses built; the one just mentioned, a small frame on Section 2, and a log one on the northeast ;quarter of Section I. The first teacher in the last named was Catharine J. Jamison, who began on May 10, 1842, her school consisting of seven Blakesleys, five Wakefields, four Chapins, three Van Camps, two Gordons, two Rogerses, one each of Hall, Gilkinson, Hatfield and Slaughter. The Directors who signed her certificate were Parley E. Blakesley and Joseph Chapin. The next term was taught by Deborah L. Woodbury, the same year. In 1843 a man by the name of Elisha Barker taught in a log school-house on Section 22, built in 1842. In the winter of 1843-44 William Gifford taught in the same house.
Early in the spring of 1842 a small frame school-house was built on the southeast quarter of Section 2 by voluntary labor, of lumber sawed at the mill of Robert Bette's and William Bruzee on the creek in Section 23, a dry place now for a saw mill. Miss Margaret Artman taught there in 1842, her patrons being Ira Smith, J. J. Hitchcock, Anson Bushnell and his sons Alvan and Horace, Samuel and William Seely, William Moore, O. L. Nelson, Ira Hitchcock and ————— Goodell.
At the January (1843) meeting of the Board of Trustees, schedules of the following teachers were approved and the Treasurer ordered to pay them their respective shares of the interest arising from the School, College and Seminary Fund, viz.: District No. I, Margaret Artman; No. 2, Catharine J. Jamison and Deborah L. Woodbury; No. 3, Anna McKnight, Sarah D. Sanford and William Gifford, Jr. William Gifford received for three months, $40; Deborah L. Woodbury, for two months, $10.50; Catherine J. Jamison, for two months, $10; E. B. Dunlap, for three months, $24. The custom was to "board around."The office of Trustee having now became elective, Griffith Dickinson, Horace Bushnell, Joseph Chapin, Jonathan Brassfield and Nelson Bristol were the first to be elected, Trustees before then having been appointed.
A new valuation of the lands was made in 1845, when all the lots except four were valued at $1.25 per acre, two of the others at $1.50, and one each at $1.75 and $2.00. Between that time and May 22, 1847, they were sold at various prices, realizing, in the aggregate, $1,471.10.
No sooner was the free-school law in operation than the Trustees began to act under it. On April 26, 1855, they ordered the Treasurer to levy a tax of ten cents on the hundred dollars for general school purposes, and five cents for paying teachers and extending terms of school. The valuation of real estate for 1854 was $141,430, and of personal property $54,592; total, $196,022. This was the first attempt to sustain free schools by taxation.
The village of Dunlap was laid out on June 12, 1871, on Section n by Alva Dunlap. Dr. John Gillette erected the first building in 1871. It stands opposite the railroad depot, and is now owned by B. C. Dunlap. It is a thriving village of three hundred inhabitants and is situated on the Rock Island and Peoria Railroad. It has six stores, two grain elevators, three churches and an Odd Fellow Hall, and a graded public-school building, erected in 1899 at a cost of $4,000. District No. 4, in which it is situated, has one hundred children of school age, of whom over eighty were in attendance in 1899.
The history of Prospect Presbyterian Church, now located at Dunlap, furnished one of the marked features, not only of Radnor Township but of Peoria County. In the year 1848 and 1849, a number of families from the Pan Handle section of what is now the State of West Virginia, settled in the townships of Akron and Radnor, and at first connected themselves with the church at Princeville; but. owing to the distance, of four to nine miles, and the fact that others were following them from their old home in the East, they decided to ask the Presbytery for a separate organization, which request was granted. Rev. Addison Coffee, of Peoria, Rev. Robert Breese, of Princeville, and Elder Henry Schnebly, of Peoria, as a committee of Presbytery, met the congregation on June 8, 1850, in the schoolhouse where they had been accustomed to worship, when the new church was organized with fifteen members, namely: From the Princeville Church, Joseph Yates, Sr., and Mary his wife, John Yates, Sr., and Eleanor his wife, Samuel Keady and Eleanor his wife, Thomas Yates and Mary his wife, John Hervey and Sarah his wife, and Mrs. Margaretta Yates; from the Church of West Alexandria, Pennsylvania, David G. Hervey and Jane his wife; and from the church of West Liberty, Virginia, Adam Yates and Sarah his wife. Their first house of worship, a frame building, 36x48 feet, costing $1,400, erected on a lot, containing about seven acres donated by Adam Yates, was dedicated in June, 1854.
When the Rock Island and Peoria Railroad was built, and the village of Dunlap laid out one mile south of the location of the church, the meeting place was removed to the village and a new church edifice erected at a cost of $5,100. The lots on which the church stands are 150 feet square. The old church was torn down and the land on which it stood added to the church cemetery, and the same is now known as Prospect Cemetery. In 1867 a parsonage was purchased at a cost of $3,000; but in 1878 it was sold and a new parsonage was erected at a cost of $1,700 on lots 100x150 feet adjacent to the village, donated by David G. Hervey. The following are the names and dates of pastorates of those who have served the congregation: Rev. David Hervey (stated supply), 1850-51; Rev. John Turbitt, 1853-55; Rev. Thomas F. Smith (stated supply), 1856-57; Rev. George Cairns, 1858-63: Rev. J. A. E. Simpson (stated supply). 1864-66; Rev. A. S. Gardner, 1866-71; Rev. John Winn, 1872-77; Rev. Silas Cooke, 1877-00; Rev. H. V. D. Nevins, D. D. (supply), 1891- 92 ; Rev. Harry Smith, 1893-96: Rev. R. C. Townsend, 1896 to the present time (1902).
Besides these, the congregation was served for short periods by Rev. Robert R. Breese and Rev. James K. Large. Two died in the service: Rev. James K. Large, March 18, 1858, and Rev. George Cairns, June 25, 1863. Their remains repose side by side in Prospect Cemetery; and near by is the grave of Mrs. Mary Winn, wife of Rev. John Winn. the pastor, and daughter of Mrs. Phoebe Hinsdale Brown, the author of that exquisite hymn, "I love to steal awhile away," etc. Mrs. Brown died at Henry, Illinois, October 10, 1861.
The spiritual power which this church has exerted cannot be better shown than in the number of its members who have gone into the ministry, including the following: Rev. George Dunlap, 1875; Rev. Thomas C. Winn, Missionary to Japan; Rev. William Jones, California; William Y. Jones, the son of the latter, Missionary to Japan; William Ayling, Kansas, Minister in the United Brethren denomination; Franklin Brown, Idaho—six in all.
From June 8th to 10th, 1900, this church celebrated its semi-centennial anniversary in a series of exercises of the most interesting character, a full account of which has been published in a small pamphlet of seventy-four pages. This publication, abounding as it does in rich historical facts and sprightly reminiscences, is worthy of a permanent place in the historical relics of the county.
The Methodists held services in this township as early as 1840. Before there were any school-houses the circuit riders held meetings at private houses. Their first church was built in the year 1860, about one mile west of where the village of Alta now is. It was called the Glendale Church. Its principal members were Wesley Smalley and George Divelbiss. In its pastoral relations it was connected with Kickapoo and Mount Heddining, in Hallock. After the village of Alta was laid out, the church was moved to that place, which is situated in Medina Township, the pastor making his home in Kickapoo.
In 1885 the church was built in Dunlap under the direction of the Rev. Webber, and the pastoral residence was changed to Dunlap. The church at Dunlap still remains in connection with the church at Alta. It has a membership of about one hundred.
In the year 1865 the Methodists built a church called the "Salem Church" on the northwest quarter of Section 16. near the school-house. The leading members of this church organization were Wesley Strain, A. J. Gordon and John Jackson. After ten or fifteen years it was abandoned for want of support on account of removals and deaths. The house was sold and another built on Section 18, near the line of Jubilee Township, called Zion Church, which is now connected with Kickapoo in its pastoral relations. The leaders in starting this church were William Rowcliffe and Daniel Corbett. The membership is small.
The Catholics have a strong church in Radnor called the St. Rose Catholic Church. Their church edifice was erected in the fall of 1879 by John Horine. The congregation contains many of the leading citizens of the place.
From Historical Encyclopedia of Illinois and History of Peoria County, Edited by David McCulloch, Vol. II; Chicago and Peoria: Munsell Publishing Company, Publishers, 1902.
Birth Date is inaccurate for Moses, but does show the parents of Ann Jennings
