News Progress

The Arrival of the Pattersons •August 12, 2026• by Janey Roney James Patterson, one of three Revolutionary War veterans buried in Moultrie County, joined his local Carolina Patriot militia when he was 16 years old. His very detailed 1836 pension application showed that he kept re-enlisting until the end of the war. He was a man who took action to rectify wrongs. Even after the war was officially over, James was involved in some continued fighting between the Tories and Patriots near his home in the Carolinas. But when local Tories burned down Patterson’s father’s house in the early 1790s, Patterson, … Read More

1966 Route 121 was closed for traffic August 22 until the following fall for construction of a new bridge across the West Okaw. Cost of the construction was paid by the U. S. Army Corps of Engineers as part of the development of the Kaskaskia River Reservoir project. The State of Illinois supervised the work. Two teachers were hired by the Sullivan School Board. They were Mrs. Wilma Hollonbeck, who would teach in the junior high school, and James H. Bales, who would teach business courses. Two insects, the corn leaf aphid and the bean leaf beetle had been causing … Read More