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About Hillsboro Academy From: “Historical Encyclopedia of Illinois” edited by Newton Bateman, LL.D. and Paul Selby, A.M. and “History of Montgomery County” edited by Alexander T. Strange, Volume 11. Illustrated – Chicago – Munsell Publishing Company, Publishers, 1918.
Page 896: “In 1835 the people of Hillsboro united their purses and built what was then esteemed a most magnificent building. The architect was Dr. Shurtleff, later the founder of Shurtleff College of Upper Alton. The building was called the Hillsboro Academy, and it’s stock was bought by public spirited men of Hillsboro, the most prominent of whom was John Tillson, who not only gave the land and the largest amount towards its erection, but also guaranteed the teachers their full pay and presented the school with a fine set of philosophical apparatus, piano and other equipment. Among the other stockholders are found the names of…….Israel Seward….[about 12 names are listed]………..the academy opened the first Wednesday in November, 1937……. In 1841 Edward Wyman became principal………..” "In 1846…….. the trustees of the Hillsboro Academy sent in a petition to the senate asking consent to transfer their charter to the ‘Literacy and Theological Institute for the Lutheran Church of the Far West’……. The petition was granted in 1847, the name of the academy was changed to Lutheran College generally known as Hillsboro College.” “In 1852 the Lutherans, thinking Springfield a more favorable locality for their college, moved it to that city. …… the college, on being removed to Springfield, obtained a new charter dated June 21, 1852, creating a body for the founding and maintaining in or near the city of Springfield, Illinois an institution of learning to be know by the name of ‘The Illinois State University’……… Thus Hillsboro citizens and their friends practically founded the first Illinois state university.”
From: “Past and Present of Montgomery County Illinois” by Jacob L. Traylor (Illustrated), The S. J. Clarke Publishing Company, 1904. Page 695: “While the village of Hillsboro contained but two hundred and fifty inhabitants in 1834, it contained the elements of citizenship that were soon to make it an educational center for the people of this section of the state; accordingly in 1836, with John Tilson as moving spirit the Hillsboro Academy was projected…….. Professor Edward Wyman and Miss E.F. Hadley were selected as assistants………. To this institution of learning many of the boys and girls who received academic instruction in our county for the succeeding forty years are indebted to the ‘Old Academy’. The course of instruction provided was both classical and scientific. In fact, providing a basis for a course in any of the eastern institutions of learning. For many years the pride of Hillsboro was its academy, for it brought a most desirable class to reside here that their children might have the advantages of a higher education. ……… [Hillsboro Academy] was compelled, for lack of patronage, to close its doors some twenty-five or thirty years ago [calculates to about 1874-1879]. We will mention, however, that the old structure was used for high school purposes by the schools for some few years later. ……… I call attention to the desecration of the old college building [would have been about 68 years old in 1904], by using it as a horse barn and pig sty and that in a most public place, where every passerby who enters Hillsboro by the Vandalia road must view this old building put to shame. Far better had the torch been applied when the period of it usefulness was over. ……. Its massive columns, giving it the appearance of some ancient seat of learning, made us believe that really we had been to college.”
From: “History of Bond and Montgomery Counties, Illinois.” Edited by William Henry Perrin. Illustrated. Chicago: O.L. Baskin & Co., Historical Publisher, Lakeside Building. 1882. Pages 242-246: “Says Mr. Rountree, in his early reminiscences of Hillsboro: ‘It is a remarkable fact that Hillsboro, like Jacksonville, was a kind of Athens of Illinois. The early citizens, coming as they did from the older States, where education was the rule, the great mass of them were intelligent, well educated men and women’.” “The Academy. – About the year 1836, the people united together and built the Hillsboro Academy. At the time of its erection it was one of the most magnificent temples of learning in the State. John Tillson was the moving spirit in its construction and endowment, and to him, more than to any other single individual is the community indebted for the high reputation of the institution. Young men and boys came from all the surrounding country to receive academic and collegiate training at Hillsboro Academy, and afterward College. He brought …. [lists the first superintendent and several teachers]….. with Prof. Edward Wyman associate in the male department…… The first session commenced the first Wednesday in November, 1837 and was liberally patronized for years.” “The Academy was changed to a college and carried on several years as such by the Lutherans, but was abandoned by them in 1852, when they removed their institution to Springfield. The building then became the property of the common schools, and has since been used by the city as the high school department. It has lost nothing in this capacity from the high standard of excellence it occupied, and is still an educational institution of more that ordinary merit. It stands in the most pleasant part of the city, near the center of a gently rolling piece of ground, whose rich, grassy carpet is shaded with a profusion of fine old forest trees of a century’s growth. In a word, no city of its size and population possesses better facilities that Hillsboro for a good common-school education.” |
