Wayne County
History & Genealogy
Early Days of Jeffersonville
By John C. Lappin
Transcribed by Laurie Selpien
To begin with, I want to say that I found out what the legal name of Jeffersonville is. I thought I knew, but I have never had it confirmed. However, attorney Kelley A. Lay, assures me that the legal name is Jeffersonville. Folks in authority shortened the name to Geff. Why they put a “G” on there instead of a “J” I don’t know. There is a tradition that says the land on which the plot was laid out belonged to Jasper branch. It seems that he wanted to give a name beginning with that the same letter that his name began with. Why he chose Jeffersonville instead of something else, I do not know, unless he was an admirer of Thomas Jefferson. That might have been it, but the legal name is Jeffersonville.
I used to mention the name once in a while in class room where I taught in Enid, Oklahoma and the youngsters would say “Jeffersonville? Where’s that?” “Well!” I would answer, “Don’t you know where Jeffersonville is? It’s in Wayne county, Illinois. Its in the county that has more smart people to the square foot than any other county in the United states.” A smile would go around the room and they would challenge me to prove it. “You can prove it,” I said. “The next time you go through Wayne County, stop the first citizen that you meet, and repeat my statement, and ask him if it isn’t true. Every one of them will say that it is true.” I left it at that. I don’t know whether any one of them ever tried it or not.
SURVEYED IN 1853
The plot for Jeffersonville was surveyed in 1853 on land as I stated above, belonging to Jasper Branch, but the first building was not erected until 1869. That building was erected by a man by the name of Charles Wolf. There are very few people who remember him. It was a two story house and stood on a corner that is now vacant. It is just east of the Waterman Bestow home on the vacant lot next to the highway, on the north east corner of the public square.
The school in Jeffersonville began by meeting in a frame house built for a residence down near where the old Southwestern Dept stood for so many years, but the school didn’t remain there long. They transferred to what was called the warehouse, up along the railroad, and held school there for several months while preparing to erect a new building. However, the building wasn’t ready when cold weather came, so they carried the school up to one of the churches and met there for several months until the school building was finished.
The first real
school was a two story building. It had four rooms, two below and two above,
but only three of these rooms were used for school purposes. The forth room was
used by the mason Lodge. They taught of course only through the eighth
grade. We had some excellent teachers there. I can’t name all of them,
but I remember some of them very definitely. One was Chester Borah, said
to be one of the best teachers who ever taught in Geff. Another was J. H.
Kramer who was later known in Fairfield as one of its best citizens, and
there was D. O. Illous, a man who came from Clay County. He was one of
the kindest, and one of the most painstaking teachers that I have ever knew. In
later years there was Robert Pifer and a man by the name of Weems, and
another by the name of Bull. And I remember Minnie Frankel. She
was one of the most patient of teachers. I have a card of reward – I got
honorary mention one time while in grade school. You wouldn’t believe it, but I
did. I’ve got that card at home yet with Minnie Frankel’s name on it.
FIRST TEACHER
My first primary teacher was Miss Nettie Wright. She later married a man named Taylor. She is the mother of Roy Taylor who ran a garage in Geff and passed away some eight years ago. One time when I was in first grade, Miss Wright spent intermission time knitting on some red mittens. All of the children were anxious to know who those mittens were for, but she wouldn’t tell us. It wasn’t far from Christmas, and when we would ask she would always say that the mittens were for two of her little friends. Well when Christmas came, my brother Will had a pair of red mittens and so did I. I haven’t forgotten that, and I never will. Nettie Wright was a good patient, pain taking teacher, and she always meant a great deal to me. There were various songs that we sang at school for opening exercises. There was one that we especially liked It was “Coming through the Rye” We were in our adolescent age then, and why wouldn’t we be attracted with such a verse as that? “If a body kiss a body, should a body cry.” I’ve always wondered why that line was put in there - why the question should be raised at all. There’s nothing there to cry about that I could ever see. Of course we sang “Sweet Afton” “Sweet Adeline” and “My old Kentucky Home”. We all liked the music to that song. Occasionally we sang some church songs, and of course, “America and “The Star Spangled Banner.”
120 POPULATION
In Geff today there are 120 residences. They average 2.9 persons to the house. One of the surprising things to me is that out of the 120 houses 22 have only one person living in them. The population of the town is something like 350. This is a little out of the ordinary, but I found that the population of the cemetery is 750 as compared to the living of 350. Now at the present time in Geff there are: three filling stations, two lunch rooms, one barber shop, one general store, one grocery and meat store, one custard shop, one post office, one grain elevator, a Masonic Lodge, one insurance agency, one picture show, two garages, one pool room, one used furniture store, two used car dealers, two churches and one consolidated school.
When I left Jeffersonville in 1900 there were three general stores. Mr. Decker had a store and also Jacob Logan. Another was run by Mrs. Rapp grandmother of Peter G. Rapp, of Fairfield. We all called her Mother Rapp, and I remember especially Mother Rapp’s store. I remember it for several reasons. I remember the stick candy up on the shelves: In those days stick candy came in glass jars. The yellow candy was lemon and the peppermint had red stripes running around , and other flavors had different stripes. Up to this day I have never seen anything that had looked so petty as that candy did in those glass jars.
I remember one Christmas as we sat digging into the candy, thinking it was all candy, I noted an object down there wrapped carefully in tissue paper - one in each box. a one blade Barlow knife. Mrs. Rapp had been thoughtful enough to put a knife in each box for “her two boys”
MRS. RAPP”S STORE
I remember especially Mrs. Rapp’s store in Jeffersonville. Mother Rapp we called her. She was the grandmother of Peter G. Rapp of Fairfield. That was the store my brother Sam worked in – the brother who lives in Bedford, Indiana. In the late 1800’s sugar came in barrels. They had granulated sugar, brown sugar and dark brown sugar, The dark brown sugar often became caked down in the bottom of the barrel and had to be chopped out with a hatchet. Sam was very short in stature – is yet, but especially was then. One day when he was chopping out the bottom of one of those barrels with his toes just barely touching the floor behind him, those toes both slipped at the same time and Sammy went in the barrel on his head. For a time after that he was known all over the community as “Sugar Barrel Sammy”.
Before 1900’s there were no stock laws. Everyone’s cows
could run out and go wherever they could find pasture. I remember yet how the
milk cows came trudging up the road from the east past the Lily mill every
evening. Those cows were all turned loose about the same time every morning.
They would go leisurely, single file, down the road into the Marin Creek
Bottoms where there was plenty of pasture. They seemed to know just when to
come back. They all came back at one time, single file from the bottoms.
LILY MILL
I don’t know why the mill was called the lily Mill. It was operated by various people through the years. The Morgan family had it for awhile Si Morgan and his son Walter, with Warren and Bestow running the mill between these two owners. I believe, and at one time it was operated by William Whitaker and his brother Stephen. There was only one saloon that ever came to Jeffersonville. It was before my time – before the Civil War at least, but that saloon was short lived. There was a group of men in Jeffersonville who called themselves the Sons of Temperance. They saw to it that that saloon got out of town. There has never been another one there since. When I lived in Jeffersonville as a boy there was a group of men that ordered beer out of St. Louis. Got it every Saturday. They took it up along the railroad where the ties were piled on the right of way, and they would stay right there until that beer was all gone. There was one man of whom they said could drink more beer than any three men in the whole crowd. That man became very devoted , and a very effective gospel minister. I wouldn’t recommend beer drinking as a prerequisite to the ministry, but this happened to turn out that way that time.
ADDITIONAL INFORMATION FROM
ILLUSTRATED AND DESCRIPTIVE SKETCH BOOK
OF
Wayne County, Illinois
By Paul F. Campbell 1903
OWNER JEFFERSONVILLE ROLLER MILLS
Waterman Bestow, better known as “WAT” was born in Meigs County, Ohio, December 5, 1846; he is the son of John C. and Mrs. Frederick Bestow and came to Wayne County at the age of fifteen years. Mr. Bestow has been for a number of years engaged in the milling business at Jeffersonville and has established an enviable reputation as manufacturer of a superfine wheat flour and buckwheat flour, and through the latter has gained the reputation of the buckwheat King of Southern Illinois. This flour is sought for all through the southern counties of the state, and we agree that nothing is nicer to finish the morning meal with than good buckwheat cakes and real maple syrup. Mr. Bestow is a prominent member of the Christian Church of Jeffersonville and a citizen whose influence in his town is for advancement and progress.
GENERAL MERCHANT
Mr. Decker is German by birth and nativity. He was born in Echelscheim, Germany, January 22, 1830 and came to America with his parents, when a child seven years old. His father settled in Posey County, Indiana and Mr. Decker our subject made his home in that county until 1884, when he moved to Jeffersonville and engaged in the sale of general merchandise. He began on a much smaller plan than that which represents his business at present, but by constant and assiduous effort and fair and square dealing with the people he has established his business through merit. His store room is spacious, measuring 75 x 22 feet, and is stocked to repletion with dry goods, notions, clothing, boots, shoes, groceries, glassware, queenaware, hardware etc. In fact a line of goods properly adapted to the local trade will be found here and at prices that will meet any competition.
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