Join Carolyn Knox in re-discovering the life of a pioneer (for whom John Street is named) who cared deeply about the stable growth of Champaign-Urbana, Illinois.
When John Gardner Clark died in 1910, local obituaries noted him as a prominent citizen settling in Champaign in 1858, engaged in stock raising, descended from patriots of the American Revolution, a man married for fifty years, a member of the Congregational church, leaving two sons. A new, closer look reveals that in addition to owning over a thousand acres of farmland that is now Champaign, John G. Clark was a contractor with the Illinois Central Railroad managing hundreds of immigrant laborers, founding member of the First National Bank of Champaign and the Illinois Title and Trust, a pro-abolition supporter of Lincoln, a signatory of the Urbana and Champaign Institute whose building anchored the choice of Urbana for the University of Illinois, founding member of a utility company that lit the community for the first time. He donated a block of land to John Milton Gregory on Fourth Street, the property for South Side School, streets, and the park property (John G. Clark Park) nestled in a subdivision he designed to benefit commerce in Champaign.
Carolyn Knox is a research partner and accessibility specialist for the museum industry. Her grandparents, Jane and Professor Karl B. Lohmann arrived in Urbana in 1921 and began a legacy of interest in local history and visits to The Urbana Free Library. Karl Lohmann was a professor of Regional Planning, compiling the Historical Map of Champaign County and One Hundred Houses of Urbana.
This event will be recorded and available to view on The Urbana Free Library's Facebook page.
Co-Sponsored by the Champaign County Genealogical Society.
Conveniently located at the corner of Race and Green in downtown Urbana.
