Thursday, June 27, 2024

Scott County Courthouse

 

The Scott County Courthouse is a government building in Winchester, the county seat of Scott CountyIllinoisUnited States. Completed in 1885, it is the third courthouse in the county's history.

 Scott County's first settlers arrived in 1820, one year after the Indians ceded the region to Americans. A pair of local shopkeepers decided to start a town on Sandy Creek in 1830, and one of them chose to name it for his hometown, Winchester, Kentucky.

 Winchester became the county seat, as local residents offered to donate land and money for a courthouse and jail.


 The new county's officials operated out of temporary facilities for just two years before the first courthouse was completed. This square two-story brick building served for forty-four years before the construction of the current courthouse. 

 County officials chose the St. Louis firm of James Stewart to design their new courthouse in 1885.When the building was completed, Scott County had spent approximately $35,500. The finished building is a two-story brick structure that rests on a stone foundation.

 Rather than conforming to a single architectural style, the courthouse combines elements of different styles to an exceptional degree; in 1977, an Illinois Department of Conservation historic preservation report remarked that the courthouse "is so uniquely eclectic as to defy categorization.


 Square sections with a single rounded-arch window on each story are placed on the building's corners, while the remaining portions of the sides feature several similar windows spaced closely together. A stone stringcourse visually separates the stories. Above the entrance rises a three-story tower topped with an exceptional onion dome. In 1917, the county converted the tower into a clock tower.

 

In 1979, much of Winchester was designated a historic district, the Winchester Historic District, and listed on the National Register of Historic Places.The courthouse is the largest building within the district's boundaries, and also one of the most critical of the district's contributing properties.

 

 

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Tuesday, June 25, 2024

Deck's Drugstore

 

The history of Decks drugstore began on March 7, 1884, when it was purchased by Lewis C. Deck and B.F. Clark. A few years later Lewis Deck became the sole proprietor. At this time the store sold drugs, groceries, and hardware. The store was dubbed the “white drugstore” as it was the only building front on Girard Square that was painted white. The second floor was used as a doctor’s office by Dr. George Hill and later by Dr. John Sharp.

Thursday, June 20, 2024

Morgan County Court House

 

Morgan County built their first county courthouse, a frame building, in 1825. Prior to this, court proceedings were held at various log cabins outside of Jacksonville- in fact Jacksonville had not yet been founded.

In 1828, the county built its second couthouse, constructed out of brick, on the Jacksonville square. It was the first of its kind and was completed in 1830. Abraham Lincoln argued the case of Selby vs Dunlap at the second county courthouse in 1854. By 1868 the second couthouse was torn down and the town square was left open.

G.B. Randall, a Chicago architect, designed the current couthouse in 1867 and the building was completed in 1869.

The design is considered unusual among county courthouses, as counties generally preferred more traditional designs. Randall's design features an arched loggia surrounding the building's southern entrance, asymmetrical towers at the southern corners with mansard roofs and bracketed cornices, arched dormers within the towers' mansards, and an assortment of round-head and bulls-eye windows.

 One of the towers houses a 4,000 pounds (1,800 kg) bell, which was intended to be part of a clock that was never installed.

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