BINGHAMPTON
Before Amboy
Before the city of Amboy came into being, the
settlements of Binghampton, Shelburn, Rocky Ford, Temperance Hill,
Palestine Grove and Winnoski all sprang up in the same general area
but failed to survive any great length of time.
One of the first settlers in this vicinity was a
Frenchman by the name of Filamalee and the distinction of being the
first permanent white settler rests with John Dexter, who arrived in
May 1835. Dexter thought the area just to the south of the present
City of Amboy to be such a heavenly place that he called it Palestine
Grove. It seemed, to him, to be "a land flowing with milk and
honey."
Asa B. Searls, born in Chenago County, N.Y., in
1810, had been a classmate of Joseph Smith, the Mormon founder and
prophet. In 1837 he, with his family, came to the Palestine Grove
area and in 1840 was appointed postmaster of Winooski (the name given
by the federal government for the Binghampton post office). Later he
supervised the dividing of the village and it was named Binghampton
in honor of the city in Boone County, New York, the former home of
many of the settlers.
Altogether there were five early families that
played an important part in the founding and establishment of
Binghampton; the Dexters, Searises, Doans, Wassons and Badgers. In
May 1848 a plat was made of the proposed town that then contained
several homes, stores and businesses. Later, two hotels, the Reed
House and the Binghampton House, were started and even a plow factory
was put into operation.
Almost at the same time another little town
mushroomed along the Green River and was soon called Shelburn; a name
that didn't become popular as the title Rocky Ford had been used for
so long to refer to the place. A distillery, mill, stores and many
homes made up this village that lasted until about 1859 when a fire
destroyed the mill that had been the major business of the
area.
Temperance Hill, northwest of Rocky Ford, grew
into being. as its name might imply, due to a rebellion against the
old distillery and the use of liquor at Shelburn. Begun by Nathaniel
Lewis in 1843, it was here in 1846 that Owen Lovejoy, the celebrated
antislavery orator, addressed a meeting and formed an abolition
society 15 years before the Civil War.
It was the Illinois Central Railroad that brought
an end to the several small villages that had been started in this
central section of Lee County as they decided to build their railway
from Peoria north through Dixon, dissecting the area between Shelburn
and Binghampton.
By 1855, Amboy had a population of about 2,000
and the post offices at both these smaller villages were discontinued
and consolidated into the one at Amboy. The city of Amboy was
officially chartered in 1854 and the memories of the six or more
smaller but earlier villages are all that are left of their once
thriving beginnings.
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