Legal Law

A Brief History of Richmond, Illinois

Richmond, Illinois is a very small and picturesque city on the border of Illinois and Wisconsin. Its population is now around 1,500, but new housing developments will quadruple the number of homes in the next 10 years. It’s called “The Old Town” because it has many Victorian-style houses and an interesting variety of antique shops.

William A. McConnell is credited with founding the town of Richmond.

Also known as “The Squire,” McConnell was a 27-year-old carpenter and farmer living in Pennsylvania. He dreamed of independence and rode to the Richmond area in 1837. In his biography, McConnell stated that there were only two neighbors in the area. He staked a claim to 480 acres of land and bought it when he went on the market in 1840 under the Blackhawk Treaty. Family lore has it that McConnell spent his first night under a young oak tree across the street from what is now Richmond Elementary School. That very mature tree is still standing. Bo McConnell, a great-grandson, calls it “the little oak tree”. At the time, the Richmond area was mostly prairie with patches of oak trees and was still part of Lake County, Illinois.

In 1838, McConnell and his new wife, Elizabeth, built a 16′ x 18′ log cabin in which their family lived for 15 years. It was located just west of what is now Grace Lutheran Church and was the first residence built in Richmond Township.
A mill was built at Nippersink around 1840 and that area is now occupied by the Doyle’s Restaurant.

In 1852, McConnell built a house in the Greek Revival style across the street from the log cabin. He and his family lived in this house for 20 years and raised three children. In 1872 the house died to his son, John.

Over time, McConnell purchased approximately 1,400 acres from the government. The city limits were established in 1844 and Richmond was named after him in a contest for the man who climbed the highest when the new mill was built. That man was Isaac Reed, who chose the name of a town he remembered from his childhood in Vermont.

McConnell participated in many local activities. He was on the railroad commission, legislator in Springfield, elected McHenry County Commissioner, Richmond’s first justice of the peace, its first postmaster, and associate justice for 16 years. He belonged to the first temperance group in McHenry County.
McConnell opened the first cheese factory about a half mile west of town. The Old Bank Building on Broadway was owned by McConnell’s son, George. “That’s Uncle George’s bank. That’s what we would call it,” recalled Bo McConnell, great-great-grandson of William A. McConnell.

What was Richmond called?

Theodore Purdy bought the log house from Charles A. Noyes in 1937. Purdy planned the town in 1844 with Charles Cotting, who settled in Richmond in 1844. Together they built a mill on Main & Mill Streets.

A contest was organized so that the person who climbed the highest in the new mill could name the town. Isaac Reed won the contest and named the village after Richmond, Vermont, where he lived as a child.

richmond grows

In the mid-1840s, Richmond looked like a small town with a hotel, a lumber mill, a wagon maker, a doctor, and a lawyer. McConnell built a cheese factory (possibly the first in McHenry County) west of town.
Officially incorporated on September 2, 1872, Dr. Fillmore Bennett was elected the first town president. The first head of the graduate school, Fillmore wrote religious poems and hymns. “In the Sweet Bye and Bye” was the most famous.
Railroads made their appearance in the 1850s. McConnell was one of the directors of the railroad. The first train crossed Nippersink in 1855.
memorial hall

Charles DeWitt McConnell donated $10,000 to the village “to be used for the purpose of erecting a town hall or town hall, the same to be called Memorial Hall, to be used when required by ecclesiastical societies and school functions free of charge, and not for be used for immoral displays or immoral shows…” The village president, EC Covell, purchased the land where Memorial Hall now stands from Charles Kruse, owner of the hardware store on the corner in the center of town on Broadway and Rt. 12. The Story Hardware Store later became the Emporium Antique Store and the name “Kruse” can be seen etched into the top of the front wall today.

Memorial Hall was built in the early 1900s. It contained an auditorium with a balcony and a stage where the JB Rotnour Players performed for many years.

The Richmond Police Department occupied part of the base along with two jail cells.

Town board meetings were held in Memorial Hall until the new town hall was built in 1993. This building is now shared with the police department. This left the hall vacant until Chris Gallagher secured a grant from the Illinois Arts Council in 1992 to create the Nippersink Center for the Creative Arts. Founding members include Christina Gallagher, Yvonne Cryns, Carolyn Janus, Donna Karolus, and Nancy Richardson. Many local groups donated money to the organization. The Center for Creative Arts lobbied to make Memorial Hall the landmark historic building it is today.

The public library used the room beginning in the 1930s. In the 1940s, the library moved to a portion of the pharmacy building at Broadway and Main. But on July 7, 1972, the library moved back to Memorial Hall before moving to its own building in 1990.
In addition to the work of the village government, Memorial Hall hosted school plays and graduations. Basketball games were played there beginning in 1908.

Other basement activities included meetings held by the Boy and Girl Scouts, the American Legion, and a group of seniors known as the Pioneers. This is where the local polling place resided.

Richmond Fire Department

Founded in 1926, the first meeting of the Richmond Volunteer Fire Department was held in Memorial Hall and led by Mayor JG “Curly” Stevens.

Richmond Post Office

The post office has been in service for more than 150 years. Appointed in 1940, William A. McConnell served as the first postmaster for six years. In the early years, settlers in the area found great comfort in the post office, which brought news of events from their hometowns. As late as the 1960s, the post office delivered the Chicago Tribune. Farmers needed honey bees which were also delivered by the post office and sent eggs to the big city.

Until 1946, trains carried mail to Richmond. Since 1946 mail has been delivered by truck. The current postmaster is William L. Schaeppi since 1988.

The new mayor of Richmond, Illinois is Laurie Olson. Olson’s family has a long history in Richmond. Olson was a homemaker and volunteer member of the fire department before she was elected mayor in 2004.

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