Courtesy of the Henry News Republican, Henry, Illinois
November 6, 1924
Nash Garage on Hard Road Leased to Hennepin Man
Ray Warner, who has been conducting a Nash service station on the hard road just at the edge of town, has rented his garage to LaVon Clemens of Hennepin. Mr. Clemen's son Harry will conduct the business. The garage will be run on the same basis, but Mr. Clemens will not sell Nash cars. He is planning on putting in new oil pumps and making this a first-class service station for mechanical work and repairs of all kinds. Mr. Warner has not as yet decided what he will do, but was urged to give up this work on account of his health.
John Swaney School Burns
September 13, 1928
Mysterious Fires Ravage Swaney Edifices Sunday
Loss Estimated at $50, 000; Board of Directors contemplate Reconstruction
What was once the John Swaney Consolidated school building is now but a mass of ruins, fire of an unknown and mysterious nature destroying the building Sunday. The three-story structure, two miles south of McNabb, was razed to the ground when fire presumably started in the dormitory on the top floor sometime early Sunday aftenoon.
Plans for the reconstruction of the grade unit of the Swaney school which with the home of Superintendent G.E. Lowry was mysteriously destroyed by the fire, were begun by the board of directors Monday. The members of the school board can take no definite action in regard to rebuilding until an inspection is made. If an entirely new building must be constructed, the insurance on the old building will help materially toward paying for a new building, and there will no doubt be some salvage in brick and unburned timbers.
The work of an incendiary is hinted because of the strange cirumstances surrounding the blaze. It is also said that defective wiring in the building was the cause. A few minutes after the smoke was noticed coming out of the uper story windows of the school building, the home of Superintendent Lowry, half a mile away, was discovered to be blazing.
The Granville, Wenona and Henry fire trucks were rushed to the scene and all did excellent work, the latter succeeding in saving part of the residence with the water supply available. Lack of water in the adjoining wells, cisterns and creeks adjacent to the school building crippled the heroic efforts of the firemen and volunteers who swarmed from the countryside and surrounding towns when the alrm was sounded and the twenty-two year old structure is a mass of ruins, part of the walls standing, but the interior gutted by the flames, which had gained considerable headway when discovered.
The grade unit of the John Swaney school was erected in 1906 at an estimated cost of $50, 000. The home of Mr. Lowry was a modern residence and cost about $4,000. Insurance of $12,000 was carried on the school building, $3,600 on equipment and $2500 on the residence.
It was announced that clases will continue in the auditorium of the high school unit, and it is probable that some of the grade school students will be instructed in the old Grange building, near where the home of the superintenedent was burned. It is stated that although plans for reconstruction are already being made it is not probable that a new building will be erected immediately. Insurance adjusters were at once notified of the loss.
To date no definite explanation has been made for the simultaneous destruction of the two buildings. The defective wire theory has been somewhat eliminated, since it has been shown the fire started in the dormitory section of the school and where it is said the current had been turned off. Mr. and Mrs. Lowry were in Bloomington when the loss occurred, but their two children were home and at the scene. Much of the furnishings of the school and home were removed by those who gathered at the site of disaster.
Indian Burial Ground Become a Museum
Thursday, May 15, 1930
The Chief Senachwine mounds, "happy hunting ground" of Chief Senachwine, and hundreds of his Pottawatomie braves, who in the early nineteenth century dominated this section of Illinois, has been converted into a park which was opened to the public last week by Walter Winship and George Wheeler, owners of the land upon which the mounds are located, one-half mile north of the village of Putnam.
Between seven and eight acres of land are covered by the mounds, in which it is estimated that more than a thousand Indians are buried. Many of the mounds are from 12 to 15 feet high and contain scores of bodies superimposed upon each other in the grave. Mr. Wheeler has dug up 47 of the skeletons from the burial ground and one of them is on exhibition.
The owners of the Indian burial ground, both of whom are old residents of Putnam, have spent 35 years collecting Indian relics and during that time have amassed more than 5,000 specimens. These they have placed in a museum near the mounds, and may also be inspected. Included in the exhibit are 600 pieces of Indian money removed from Indian graves, arrows, spears, pipes, scalping knives, axes and many other relics of Indian life. There is a stone axe of perfect shape, which weighs 20 pounds, and a number of smaller axes which weigh 12 to 15 pounds. Mr. Wheeler and Mr. Winship have scoured the Illinois for a distance of five or six miles in either direction from Putnam in gathering their collection.
Hundreds of tourists have stopped at the mounds during the past few years and the owners have received so many compliments upon the spectacle that this year they decided to make the nominal charge of 25 cents for visiting the park and seeing the museum. Signs have been erected on the state highway near Putnam pointing out the direction to the mounds, which are open on Sunday and every day during the week.
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