William R. Hall, the 1875 Mayor of Marion, was born in Gallatin County, Illinois to John E. Hall (1814-1856) and Mary Hart Crenshaw (1818-1912) in 1844. Mary was the daughter of John Hart Crenshaw (1797–1871), owner of the old slave house located near Equality, Illinois and licensed overseer of salt production for the area. Continue reading
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Hartwell Hendrickson, Civil War veteran, clerk of the circuit court, alderman, postmaster and native of the county was born December 2, 1848, the son of Jesse Hendrickson (1822-1898) and Martha Ann Lewis (1823-1895), both natives of Tennessee. Jesse and Martha came to Franklin County, Illinois about 1830 where he served for many years as a Methodist preacher. Continue reading
Oliver Harper “Harp” Wiley was born in Cabarrus County, North Carolina November 30, 1807.
“Harp” Wiley married Matilda Krantz (1808 – 1891), daughter of Thomas Krantz and Elizabeth Kent. Matilda was a teen-aged orphan when she and her sister, Sarah, came from Cheatham County, Tenn. to Franklin County, Illinois with a Sanders family in an oxcart. Her sister, Sarah married Wiley Berry Chamness (1811-1882), founder of the Chamness settlement, now in the Wildlife Refuge. Continue reading
I have been aware of a Russian hacker attempting to get into user accounts for a few weeks. Their preference would be my administrative account so they could exploit the site, but secondarily they will attempt to hack your user account. Since this site is free, if they just wanted an account they could sign up for one. Since I intensively block spam posts in the comments, that wouldn’t work for them either. The only reason for them to try and get into user accounts is to get your password figured out in order to hack your email and look for account numbers and personal information. Continue reading
James William “Willie” Westbrook, the first President of the First National Bank and two term Marion Mayor, was born in Gallatin County, Illinois. On January 26, 1855 his father, Francis M. Westbrook married Paulina Lafferty and on November 8, 1855, gave birth to their first child, James William.
In January 1857, his family moved to Marion and on the following July his father rented a building off of Samuel Dunaway at 116 E. Main St. on the corner of Madison Street and opened a general store. Continue reading