Clark County IL Archives History.....
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File contributed for use in USGenWeb Archives by:
Cindy McCachern mccachern@sbcglobal.net 2000


History on the Wabash, Clark County, Illinois
It was a busy place in Steamboat Days on the Wabash
Cyclone Recalls History
It is Retold by Arthur A. Holmes Postmaster of Sullivan

While Palestine has the honor of being the oldest town in the state of
Illinois, except Kaskaskia, whose site was long ago washed away by the
angry waters of the Mississippi and Kaskaskia rivers, York was a
settlement at a very early date, even before the state was admitted to
the Union in 1819.  It came into prominence as a river town and
shipping point during the days of steamboating on the Wabash, and for
50 years by the aid of river commerce, it had no trouble to hold its
own, until 1875, when the railroad was completed from Paris to
Vincennes, passing two miles to the west.  Then West York sprang up
and grew at the expense of Old York, the latter designation now being
laways used in referring to the place.  When West York was founded,
its promoters wanted to call it New York, but the government refused
to sanction the name because of the never ending conflict in mail
matters that would grow out of it.  York is surrounded by a rich
agricultural community on both sides of the river.  There are no finer
farms in the county than these near York, and the beautiful shaded
drive between the two Yorks effects the aristocratice instincts of the
big landed proprietors, the --- settlers and the merchants, who
entered and sold and got rich, through the medium of the steamboats in
the early days "befoah the wah."  
 
The Wabash in ante-bellum days was lined with a cordon of towns, of 
more or less importance, and all of them except Merom stood on the 
Illinois shore.  There was Darwin, York, Hutsonville, Merom and 
Palestine (Landing), all between Terre Haute and Vincennes.  The river 
was navigable as far north as Lafayette, but the larger boats never
ventured further than Terre Haute.  When the great war came, the
Wabash river trade grew to great dimensions.  Don't you older men
remember seeing the big Mississippi boats come up to York in the high
water time of the early spring?  And if you didn't see it, don't you
remember how the fellows who did would "stretch it" a little in
telling about the "time the big fellows had inturning around, when
they got to Hutsonville or York, and were unable to proceed further.
Do you remember that big boat called the Romeo whose whistle at
Hutsonville would line upon the banks every youngster in York to be in
readiness to see the antics, and hear the songs of its jolly crew?
How many of the old setlers in York are left, who can remember hearing
the deck hands of this monster singing, "Mollie's Gone to
Shawneetown?"
 
The farmers around York fed many soldiers and many horses during the 
war, for they supplied great quantities of wheat, corn and hay to 
Uncle Sam.  Sometimes the Government would sent its own boats up after
supplies, and even now the then small boy can recall the Stars and
Stripes flying from the mast as the craft rounded the Rock Bar
Bend.

York and Hutsonville were smark rivals in the days of that long ago,
but way back in the forties a family came to Hutsonville who turned
the balance in her favor--the Preston family.  It was said that they
struck the town with all their worldly possessions in a one-horse
wagon, and left it with a cool million.  York was permitted to ship
the hay and grain, but Hutsonville packed the pork and made the
whiskey, two industries that have long since been absorbed by the
trusts.  York is historic in its old buildings, and if they have been
razed by the relentless twister, it will be a source of sorrow.  There
is the home of Perry Murphy, where he was born in 1828, and where he
died ten days ago.  There was Hodge's store on the river bank, an old
red brick building that has stood there for generations.  Surely that
has not gone, for without it York will not look like the same.  It
will be like Hamlet, with Hamlet left out.  Hodge's was the sign board
of York's identity to the river pilot.  Here many a traveler to ...
from the ferry halted, during the sullen October days to barter for
two of York's famous edibles, pecans and ....  York got its name from
an old family.  Some think really from the Duke of York.  However that
may be it is presumabley of English origin.

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