Category Archives: Uncategorized

Zedekiah “Z.W.” Mitchell, though a resident of Springfield for only a few years, was the controversial leader of the movement that eventually created the city’s Douglass Community Center, a social and cultural agency that served African-Americans for 30 years. See … Continue reading →

About 250 club-wielding coal miners allied with John L. Lewis’ faction of the United Mine Workers of America attacked members of an anti-Lewis splinter group, the “Save the Union” movement, at Springfield’s Old West Mine on April 24, 1928. See … Continue reading →

Roy Jones’ alleged Communist sympathies in the 1920s and ’30s got him in trouble with both with law enforcement and more conservative wings of the labor movement. See Hunger march blockade, 1933.

Springfield activist George Voyzey’s radical sympathies got him in trouble with both local authorities and some other labor union leaders. See Hunger march blockade, 1933.

A lack of liquor meant a quiet New Year’s Eve a century ago in Springfield. City residents had voted in April 1917 to ban saloons and alcohol, and the Illinois State Register reported on the consequences for New Year’s revelry on … Continue reading →

“The ague” was the common term for malaria, which infested Sangamon County during most of the 19th century. See Malaria in early Sangamon County.

Frank W. Tracy (1833-1903) was president of the First National Bank and an investor, alderman, school board member and civic leader. See First electrified home.

Roland and Isaac Diller, father and son, were friends with Abraham Lincoln and the Lincoln family as well as mainstays of the Old Settlers Society of Sangamon County for more than 60 years. See Old Settlers Society of Sangamon County.

“Capt.” Thomas S.W. Kidd published the Sangamo Monitor, later renamed the Morning Monitor, from 1873 until 1898. See Sangamo Monitor.