Category: WCHS

Some months ago, Sam Lattuca, president of the Williamson County Historical Society reported a story to the Marion Star newspaper about how DeYoung Street in Marion got its name. As a short recap, in 1899 a man named Teunis DeYoung came to Marion with his wife, son and daughter in law and agreed to purchase over 150 acres of Marion near the Marion Cemetery with a Bond for Deed. However, an unknown change of plans a couple of years later changed that plan and the deal never completely went through. DeYoung was a Dutch immigrant, then living in South Holland, Illinois south of Chicago.

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The Williamson County Historical Society held its quarterly membership meeting on Sunday, July 28, 2024 at their museum/library at 105 S. Van Buren Street in Marion

During the meeting, Sam Lattuca, president of the historical society went over projects undertaken at the museum & library since the last meeting, discussed new items taken in, upcoming projects and the state of the museum in general.

The guest speaker was local historian, Darrel Dexter, who spoke about the research he did in his latest book release, “Pulling off the Sheets—The Second Ku Klux Klan in Deep Southern Illinois”. The program covered the origins of the Ku Klux Klan after the Civil Ware and spoke about how it compared to the second wave of the Klan from the 1920’s and how it impacted Southern Illinois.  Dexter is an engaging speaker and has done extensive research on the topic.

For those of you who missed the program, you can see Darrel’s program that was recorded by a D.A.R. chapter by clicking this link.

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The Williamson County Historical Society has recently released a publication that should be of interest to Marion residents with a taste for learning local history. The booklet entitled, “Historic Downtown Marion Walking Tour” is now available for sale. The publication includes a walking tour map that starts out at the corner of N. Market and W. Jackson Streets at the corner of the old First Christian Church building which is now the Market Street Music Conservatory.

Members of the Gallatin County Historical Society visited the Williamson County Historical Society museum/library on July 6^th, 2024. This is the second trip the Gallatin group has made to our museum, the last visit was a couple of years ago. They were treated to a tour of the museum by society president, Sam Lattuca where they were able to get ideas on what to do with their evolving museum. The Gallatin group also granted our society with a year’s membership in their organization.

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A cemetery preservation workshop was hosted by the Williamson County Historical Society on June 29^th from 9:30 till 4 P.M. at the museum/library at 105 S. Van Buren St. in Marion. The workshop was conducted by Dawn Cobb, an archeologist with the Illinois Department of Resources and John and Gena Heider who operate Restoration in Progress, a gravestone repair business.

The workshop started out at the historical society museum with a 2.5-hour program on understanding cemeteries and the laws that protect them as well as cemetery preservation. That was followed up by spending the afternoon at Barham Cemetery next to Rose Hill Cemetery with hands on training demonstrating  cleaning, repairing and resetting techniques to fix grave markers. Also discussed were the Do’s and Don’ts of cemetery preservation to help the attendees understand why some methods will work to preserve the gravestones and why other methods will damage them.

The workshop was limited to twelve participants and was sold out almost immediately after it was announced in March.

The WCHS has been in possession of original court records for years that date back to the origin of the county in 1839 and would like to make sure that these documents are preserved in case tragedy should strike. Grants occasionally arise making money available to get these documents scanned, so we need someone with grant writing skills to try and secure some funding to help us on that issue. If you can help or know of someone, please contact us at wchsmail@yahoo.com or call at 618-997-5863.

Debbie Lattuca, president of the Marion Garden Club presented WCHS president Sam Lattuca with a check on May 31, 2024. The garden club makes yearly donations including planting flowers in our planter at the museum as well as a cash donation. Shown in the photo are L-R, Debbie Lattuca, Lynn Love, Sam Lattuca and Sheila Dingrando.

The Daniel Chapman Chapter of the Daughter’s of the American Revolution (D.A.R.) held a meeting at the Williamson County Historical Society on Monday, April 13, 2024. The historical society hosted the meeting at the old Williamson County Jail at 105 S. Van Buren Street in Marion. The meeting was conducted by Regent, Doda Starkey and was followed by a tour of the museum. Docents for the tour at the museum were Sam Lattuca, president of the historical society and Sharon Vansaghi, curator/coordinator. The old county jail building was built in 1913 and operated as the counties 4^th county jail until the spring of 1972 when it was deeded over to the historical society to serve as a museum. The building is one of five locations on the National Registry of Historic Places in Marion. The museum and genealogy research library is currently open to the public from Wednesday through Saturday, 9:30 till 3 P.M.

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About 80 Washington School 5^th grade students visited the Williamson County Historical Society museum and library on April 25^th and 26^th and May 1^st and 2^nd, 2024. Washington school students from that school make yearly spring tours of the museum thanks to their teachers. The students were able to be given a guided tour of the museum and receive explanations about how people lived in earlier times and how early items of the times were used.

The museum is full of artifacts from Native American tools belonging to paleo-indians to items used by the pioneers and the students got to learn about all of that and more. The historical society museum is open to the public for tours from Wednesday through Saturday from 9:30 till 3 P.M. More information can be obtained by visiting our website at www.wcihs.org.

The Williamson County Historical Society at 105 S. Van Buren Street in Marion held its quarterly membership meeting on Sunday, April 21, 2024. President, Sam Lattuca updated the members on its membership levels, visitation to the museum/library and state of the building. He updated everyone on past programs that had been given by the museum and visitors who had recently toured the museum. He also brought them up to date on upcoming tours and events that are scheduled. Recent accessions and photos donated to the museum were reviewed.

The program for the meeting was “Revolutionary Soldiers of Williamson County” and was given by Leann Johnson. The program focused on John Ellis, a local revolutionary war veteran and man of color who made his home in New Dennison, Illinois southeast of Marion.

The museum is open Wednesday through Saturday from 9:30 to 3:00 P.M. and is open to the public.