TOWNS
The McDonough County Courthouse is located at One Courthouse Square, Macomb IL 61455; phone: 309-837-2308.
Beginnings [1]
The first settlement of McDonough county of which we have record was in the spring of 1826. On admission of the State into the Union, what is now known as McDonough county was part of Madison. Afterward, by an act of Legislature, approved June 30, 1821, it was placed within the boundaries of Pike, and by subsequent act, approved February 10, 1826, its present boundaries were determined, and it was attached to Schuyler county for judicial and recording purposes. The county is about equally divided between timber and prairie, the eastern tier of townships being mainly prairie, while the western chiefly timber.
To William Carter and Riggs Pennington [†] belong the honor of the first settlement, about one mile southeast of the present town of Industry, in the south part of the county. The settlement was named in honor of Mr. Carter, who resided in the neighborhood for several years, when he removed to the State of Missouri. Mr. Pennington shortly afterward, removed also. He was the first Justice of the Peace residing in the county.
[†] Riggs Pennington left the county at a very early day removing to Knox County in this State, from which place he emigrated to Texas in the spring of 1837, and where he died some years since.
It is not known if any others settled in the county that year, but in the following year (1827) William Job and brother, John Vance, and others, settled near where the town of Blandinsville is now located, the neighborhood taking the same name, and being known for many years afterward as "Job's settlement." William Pennington, in 1828, located in the neighborhood now known as "Pennington's Point," in the southwest corner of New Salem township, where he remained about three years, removing to Spring Creek, in the north part of the county.