During our 2015 Tales Tombstones Tell, we highlighted some of the graves that shed light on disease and medicine through our community’s history. We ended the tour at the grave of Walter M McAuley who suffered from a common 19th century disease, tuberculosis. Walter McAuley was born in 1826 in New York to George and […]
Oakwood Cemetery’s Benefactors Featured in A Sense of Place Blog
As we approach the 26th year of Tales Tombstones Tell, the annual cemetery walk, we remember Dr. Joseph and Mary McConnell who gave the land for Oakwood Cemetery, our oldest cemetery in town. This story of the McConnell’s was featured in last year’s 25th Anniversary of the event. Joseph McConnell and his wife, Mary Thompson Fuller, came […]
New installment: A Sense of Place
Helen Hills The Hills family was a prominent family in the early days of West Chicago. The Hills have been featured over the years in City Museum exhibits and in our annual Tales Tombstones Tell Oakwood Cemetery walk. Albert Hills was an important man in the early days of our community. He worked as a […]
100 Years of Downtown Support: The Lellios Family
An immigrant from Albania, Michael Lellios first came to the United States in 1912. Within a couple of years he had moved to West Chicago and had purchased property on Main Street, eventually going into business with his brothers. Since that time, the family has continued to own property here and supported downtown business growth […]
Edgar E. Belding and the Belding Moving Company
The Belding family came west from Pennsylvania in 1854, and Edgar Belding was born the next year in Rock Creek, Illinois (Carroll County). He was one of the 10 children of Daniel and Harriet Blank Belding. When Edgar was 21, he married 16-year-old Caroline Holmes in 1875, and they moved to western Kansas with their […]
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