NEKOMA Is a small village east of Woodhull. It was laid out by M, Z. V. Woodhull, of Washington City, July 21, 1809. In 1854 there was strong talk about building "the American Central Railroad," or "the Great American Air Line," as it was also called. This roaa was to run west from Galva and so the Bishop Hill colonists obtained the concession of a depot on the present site of Nekoma. A few houses were built and a postoffice instituted. But the proposed railroad did not materialize as was expetcd, and Nekoma began to sink into oblivion. Ten or twelve years, however, after the railroad had been graded, the Chicago, Burlington & Quincy Railway, bought that part which was finished and completed the rest. The first train went through in January, 1869. Nekoma then began to pick up. On July 21, 1869 , the villagewas laid out by Maxwell Woodhull, of Washington City . The streets running east and west bear the names of trees—Oak, Elm, Beech and Maple—while those extending north and south are numbered avenues. Although containing less than a hundred inbabitants it has ever been an important center for the marketing of grain, and contains two grain elevators-There are two general merchandise stores which do a good business. There is a Methodist church in the village. The school children attend school in adistrict school just south of the corporate limits. The Swedish Methodist Episcopal church of Bishop Hill, Illinois , was organized in the fall of 1864, with about twenty members. The records give onlya few names but it is to be presumed that their wives and some children also joined. These are the names: Eric Bengtson, Jonas Engstrom, Eric Soder, John Walstrom, John Erickson. The church edifice was built in 1869 and remodeled 1900. The membership is now one hundred and thirty. Its present pastorRev. A. T. Strandell, who came here in October, 1905. History of Henry County © Wini Caudell and Contributors All Rights Reserved Illinois Ancestors
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