Greenville, Illinois

For other places with the same name, see Greenville.

Greenville is a city in Bond County, Illinois, United States, 46 miles (74 km) east of St. Louis. The population was 6,955 at the 2000 census. It is the county seat of Bond County.Template:GR

Greenville is home to Greenville College, a private Christian college.

History

Greenville had a post office from 1819 and was incorporated as a town in 1855 and as a city in 1872. At one time, it had neighborhoods called New Jerusalem, Piety Hill, Cobtown, and Buzzard Roost. A few possible reasons have been put forth for the naming of the town. Some think the town was named after Greenville, North Carolina, which had been named after Revolutionary War general Nathanael Greene. Others say that Greenville was named by early settler Thomas White because it was "so green and nice." A third possibility is that Greenville was named after Green P. Rice, the town's first merchant.

During the 1840s, some Bond County residents conducted slaves to freedom on the Underground Railroad. Slaves were often spirited from Missouri, sometimes through Carlyle to Bond County. Rev. John Leeper was able to disguise his Underground Railroad activities due to his milling business. Dr. Henry Perrine practiced medicine near Greenville and helped with the secret railroad activities. Rev. George Denny's house was found in the 1930s to conceal a secret chamber that had been used in the Railroad.

Greenville College was founded as Almira College in 1855. In 1941, college president H.J. Long "declared the founding of Almira and Greenville ran parallel, for both were founded on prayer."

When Abraham Lincoln and Stephen Douglas gave speeches in Greenville in 1858 during a campaign for the United States Senate, Douglas said: "Ladies and gentlemen it gives me great and supreme gratification and pleasure to see this vast concourse of people assembled to hear me upon this my first visit to Old Bond." The Illinois State Register reported of the occasion: "I've seen many gatherings in Old Bond county but I never saw anything equal to this and I never expect to."

On November 21, 1915, the Liberty Bell passed through Greenville on its nationwide tour returning to Pennsylvania from the Panama-Pacific International Exposition in San Francisco. After that trip, the Liberty Bell returned to Pennsylvania and will not be moved again.

The Greenville Public Library was established as a Carnegie library and is on the National Register of Historic Places. Hogue Hall at Greenville College also appeared on the National Register (it was demolished in 2008).

On April 18, 1934, during the Great Depression, a group of 500 protesters marched to the Illinois Emergency Relief Commission to lodge complaints about the delivery of emergency supplies from the state and federal governments.

Ronald Reagan visited Greenville on the campaign trail in 1980 and gave a speech on the street in front of the courthouse; his visit is commemorated by a plaque. Barack Obama, the junior Senator from Illinois elected as President in November 2008, also visited Greenville while campaigning for his Senate seat in 2004, in a visit hosted by the Bond County Democrats. Women in Bond County could vote for the first time in 1914.

On one of his tours across America in his motorhome, sportscaster John Madden stopped in Greenville and enjoyed his time at a truck stop so much that he declared it the "John Madden Hall of Fame." The truck stop has since been torn down.

Education

In addition to Greenville College, Greenville is home to Bond County Community Unit #2 High School (usually known as Greenville High School), home of the Comets, who in 2007 made it to the Final Four in the IHSA Class 3A state football playoffs and fell to the Columbia Eagles 39-40. Students from the neighboring towns of Pocahontas and Sorento attend high school in Greenville.

Greenville Junior High, home of the Bluejays, and Greenville Elementary School, home of the Rockets, round out Greenville's local schools. As of the 2006 school year, Greenville Elementary was selected as a NASA Explorer school.

From 2004 to 2007, Greenville also had a private Christian school, Greenville Christian Academy, run by Smith Grove Baptist Church. However, the school closed due to lack of enrollment in May 2007. Other nearby private school alternatives are Vandalia Christian Academy and Mater Dei in Breese.

Local businesses

Greenville has passed laws providing for two Tax increment financing districts in the hopes of drawing more businesses. Greenville had been a "dry" town- with no alcohol allowed to be sold within the city limits- until November 2008, when a referendum overturned the ban on alcohol, 1,646 to 850. The City Council had supported the vote overturning the ban, contending that the alcohol ban was preventing businesses from moving to Greenville and therefore blocking further economic development. Since the ban was lifted, the City Council has been approached about hosting a beer distributorship in the city.

Notable businesses in the town include Nevco Scoreboards, the largest privately held manufacturer of scoreboards in the world. DeMoulin Bros.[1] is one of the world's largest makers of band uniforms; the company's collections were visited by the magician David Copperfield.[2] Other large employers include Carlisle-Syntec, Bass-Mollett Publishers, and Federal Correctional Institution Greenville, a federal prison.

In October 2006, Kansas-based Alternative Energy Sources Incorporated announced that they would locate an ethanol plant in Greenville. The plant will be built on 100 acres (0.40 km²) in the John W. Kelsey Business & Technology Park.[3] Nevco announced in late 2006 that it would move its headquarters from its location on Harris Avenue to an area within the Kelsey Technology Park.

Greenville Regional Hospital, called Utlaut Memorial Hospital until 2005, has consistently been ranked by Solucient as one of the top 100 best small hospitals in the nation. Greenville also has an assisted living facility, the Glenwood.

The town's media includes "The Best Country in the Country," radio station WGEL, and the Greenville Advocate, a newspaper which is printed twice-weekly.

Greenville Airport and Governor Bond Lake serve the hobbyists in the area.

Historical businesses

Historic Greenville businesses include the Helvetia Milk Condensing Company, which later became the Pet Milk Company. The condensing plant, built in 1899, was the oldest in the world for many years until it was torn down in the early 1990s. Pet also maintained in Greenville its research and testing center. Many products including Instant Pet, Pet-Ritz pies, Seygo diet foods, and Old El Paso products were developed there along with the first use of food irradiation to increase the vitamin D content of milk. The remaining research buildings and warehouses were sold to Mallinckrodt Chemical in the 1990s and are now operated by its Covidien division to make medical supplies.

Other historic business include shoe manufacturer Mayer and Bannister, cigar manufacturers Thomas D. Scheske and H.H. Wirz, and glove factory the Greenville Glove Manufacturing Co. In the early 1900s, Greenville had its own power company, Greenville Electric Gas and Power Company, which later was bought by Illinois Power and Light Service.

The Watson family operated a pharmacy in Greenville for over 125 years, since 1881; it was sold in 2006, but still maintains the name Watson's Drug Store. Greenville once had a silent movie theatre, the Lyric, and now has a first-run movie theatre, the Globe.

While Greenville once hosted three newspapers, The Item, The Sun, and The Advocate, it now has only the twice-weekly Advocate.

Events

Greenville is the site of the annual Agape Music Festival, a Christian music festival. It also plays host to the World Powered Parachute Championships as "Chute-Out on the Prairie."

Greenville conducts the Bond County Fair every August; 2007's events took place August 1-7. In 2008, the Vietnam Veterans' Memorial Moving Wall visited Greenville to coincide with the fair activities.

Notable residents

Nobel Prize-winning biochemist Edwin G. Krebs lived in Greenville from the age of six to 15. Noted astronomer Alfred Harrison Joy was a prominent member of Greenville society and the son of the former Greenville mayor and merchant F.P. Joy.

Greenville is the birthplace of the sixth governor of Colorado, Job Adams Cooper. Cooper married his wife, the daughter of a prominent local preacher, in Greenville.

Noted horticulturalist Dr. Henry Perrine lived in Greenville and practiced medicine for five years in the 1820s; he met his wife in the area and then was appointed to a post by the federal government in Mexico.

Anti-boxing activist Manuel Velazquez retired in Greenville and died in 1994.

The Christian band Jars of Clay went to school and formed at Greenville College, which is noted for its Contemporary Christian music program. The popular alternative band Augustana also began at Greenville College.

Noted environmental activist Howard Zahniser went to Greenville College and later wrote the Wilderness Act of 1964. He taught English at Greenville High School.

Local resident Dr. Robert E. "Ish" Smith served as the president of the International Baseball Federation for 12 years (1981 to 1993) and the United States Baseball Federation for nine years (1981 to 1990). After he retired from the presidency of the IBA, he served as President of Greenville College.

Country music star Gretchen Wilson is a native of the nearby town of Pocahontas and attended Greenville High School but did not graduate. Who deleted my junk?

CNET Executive Editor Tom Merritt was born in Greenville.

Places of interest

Greenville is notable for its old-fashioned downtown and many antique shops.

A large stone and plaque (placed by the Daughters of the American Revolution) marks the place where Abraham Lincoln and Stephen Douglas made speeches while running for the United States Senate in 1858. The city unsuccessfully applied for a grant from the Illinois Abraham Lincoln Bicentennial Commission to buy the property on South Fifth Street where Lincoln spoke to create a small Lincoln park. A statue dedicated to county veterans of the Civil War was dedicated on the courthouse lawn in 1903; the courthouse lawn has a Veterans' Memorial in honor of all county veterans.

Many Sears Catalog Homes-houses made from kits bought from the Sears and Roebuck catalog- are dotted around the town.

Greenville College is home to the only museum dedicated to the sculptures of Richard Bock, who was an associate of Frank Lloyd Wright and designed many of the sculptures for Wright-designed homes.

The American Farm Heritage Museum, a museum which aims to preserve agricultural history, is being built in Greenville. The museum will feature exhibits of tractors and other farm-related memorabilia and held an Outhouse Festival and a Fall Festival in October 2006. It held its third annual Heritage Days and was the largest Oliver Corp. equipment show in America in 2007, as the national Oliver show was held outside the US. In 2006, 500 tractors were on display for the event, and 5,000 people were in attendance. In 2008, the show was the site of the Cockshutt international equipment show.

Volunteer activities

Greenville hosts many volunteer activities, notably those benefiting local schools, churches or Greenville Regional Hospital.

Habitat for Humanity has a local Greenville chapter which has built four houses to date.

Many events are held by the hospital auxiliary to benefit Greenville Regional Hospital, including a book fair in June and a holiday bazaar in December, which has been held for 49 years. A Big Brother/Big Sister program runs through the Simple Room.

Government

Greenville has had a mayor and city council form of government since 1957. The first mayor, James Bradford, was elected in 1873. He was the owner of Bradford and Son bank, which is still in existence as Bradford National Bank. The current mayor of Greenville is Alan Gaffner.

During the first half of the 20th century, the Anti-Saloon Party was a player in local politics, with aldermen and mayors being elected from the ticket in 1911, 1913, 1917, and 1953. After the 1953 election, a "city manager" style of government was voted in, which provided for non-partisan city council members.

Geography

Greenville is located at 38°53′22″N 89°24′13″W (38.889537, -89.403618).Template:GR

According to the United States Census Bureau, the city has a total area of 5.2 square miles (13.5 km²), all of it land.

Demographics

As of the censusTemplate:GR of 2000, there were 6,955 people, 2,019 households, and 1,280 families residing in the city. The population density was 1,337.0 people per square mile (516.4/km²). There were 2,171 housing units at an average density of 417.3/sq mi (161.2/km²). The racial makeup of the city was 82.40% White, 15.44% African American, 0.62% Native American, 0.47% Asian, 0.37% from other races, and 0.69% from two or more races. Hispanic or Latino of any race were 2.46% of the population.

There were 2,019 households out of which 30.0% had children under the age of 18 living with them, 50.7% were married couples living together, 10.0% had a female householder with no husband present, and 36.6% were non-families. 33.4% of all households were made up of individuals and 17.7% had someone living alone who was 65 years of age or older. The average household size was 2.28 and the average family size was 2.90.

In the city the population was spread out with 15.9% under the age of 18, 18.1% from 18 to 24, 32.7% from 25 to 44, 18.7% from 45 to 64, and 14.6% who were 65 years of age or older. The median age was 34 years. For every 100 females there were 143.6 males. For every 100 females age 18 and over, there were 152.5 males.

The median income for a household in the city was $35,650, and the median income for a family was $45,557. Males had a median income of $26,105 versus $20,889 for females. The per capita income for the city was $17,326. About 8.8% of families and 11.8% of the population were below the poverty line, including 14.0% of those under age 18 and 9.9% of those age 65 or over.

See also

• Phyllis Holmes
• Ron Stephens
• Frank Watson
• Tom Merritt

External links

• Town of Greenville homepage
• WGEL, Greenville's radio station
• Bond County Community Unit #2 School District homepage
• Greenville Comets on 618 Football