Jesse W. Fell

Jesse W. Fell
Personal details
Born	November 10, 1808(1808-11-10) Chester County, Pennsylvania, U.S.
Died	January 5, 1887(1887-01-05) (aged 79) Normal, Illinois, U.S.
Spouse(s)	Hester Vernon Brown

This article is about the Illinois businessman. For the discoverer of a new process for coal combustion, see Jesse Fell.

Jesse W. Fell (1808–1887) was a Bloomington, Illinois businessman and land owner instrumental in the establishment of communities throughout Central Illinois and for the founding of Illinois State University. A close friend of Abraham Lincoln it was Fell who urged him to challenge his opponent, Stephen A. Douglas, to their famous series of debates ^[1].

Life

Fell was born in rural southeastern Chester County, Pennsylvania to Quaker parents of modest means. He attended local Friends schools as well as a private boy's academy and briefly taught in local public schools before migrating to Ohio to study law in 1828. In 1831 Fell moved to Illinois, opening Bloomington's first law offices and beginning his career in real estate. Fell was especially active during the Illinois land boom in the late 1830's; with James Allen, Fell co-founded the town of Clinton, Illinois and worked to create DeWitt County arranging for his brother, Kersey Fell, to become the clerk responsible for organizing the new county. He established Livingston County, which he named, and backed the founders of Pontiac, Illinois, which he also named. Fell invested in lands in Bloomington, Chicago, Milwaukee, Danville, and other places in central and eastern Illinois.^[2]

Fell also founded Bloomington's first newspaper, The Bloomington Observer and McLean County Advocate in 1837 and, after several years running a fruit orchard in Adams County, returned to McLean County and work as an agent for the former Alton & Springfield Railroad to secure the right of way through McLean County. He helped found the town of Towanda and with his brother founded the town of Dwight.^[3] and later defeated an effort to have the railroad bypass his extensive land holdings in Pontiac.^[4] He sold lots in Decatur, Lexington, Clinton, El Paso, Joliet, and LeRoy and in 1855 he purchased timber land and began operation a sawmill near Ullin in southern Illinois.^[5]

In 1854 Fell arranged for the Chicago and Mississippi Railroad to cross the Illinois Central Railroad north of Bloomington where he had founded the town of North Bloomington. In 1860, Illinois State Normal University relocated there from a site in downtown Bloomington, resulting in the town being renamed Normal in 1865. Fell was an enthusiastic arborist who developed an extensive park around his home, and was known for planting trees in his real estate holdings. ^[6]

Death

Fell died at his home in Normal, Illinois on February 25, 1887. The Normal Town Council declared that through his "untiring and disinterested efforts" he had secured the crossing of the two railroads and they passed a resolution thating that, "Normal without Jesse Fell is comparatively like a family without a father."^[7]

Legacy

• Many place names in Normal reflect Jesse W. Fell. Fell Park in Normal is located on land he set aside for public use in the 1850s.^[8] There is also a Fell Avenue extending from Bloomington to Normal. Hester Street in Normal is named for his wife Hester Brown Fell. Fort Jesse Road in Normal takes its name from the nickname given by the Fell family to their isolated rural home during the early years in Illinois.

• Co-founded, along with James Allen, the city of Clinton, Illinois. With Charles W. Holder he co-founded the town of Towanda Illinois. He was one of five men who founded Dwight, Illinois. He was deeply involved with the founding of Pontiac, Illinois and in the creation of Livingston County, Illinois. Fell Park in Pontiac is named in his honor.

• Illinois State University has an aboreteum covering its main quadrangle known as the Fell Arboretum (in Jesse W. Fell's honour).

• Fell's granddaughter married Lewis Stevenson, making him an ancestor of the Illinois political family, including Democratic presidential candidate Adlai E. Stevenson II his great-grandson.^[9]

References

1. ^ http://www.mrlincolnandfriends.org/inside.asp?pageID=41&subjectID=3 Mr. Lincoln and Friends: Jesse W. Fell
2. ^ Frances Milton Moorehouse, The Life of Jesse W. Fell (Urbana: University of Illinois, 1916) pp 1-29.
3. ^ Moorehouse, 1916, p.32.
4. ^ History of Livingston County Illinois (Chicago: LeBaron, 1878) p. 326.
5. ^ Moorehouse, 1916, p.33.
6. ^ Moorehouse, 1916, pp. 106-11.
7. ^ William D. Walters, Jr. A Brief History of Fell Park, Normal, Illinois (Normal: Town of Normal, 2003) p.5. His remains were interred at Evergreen Cemetery in Bloomington.
8. ^ Fell Park
9. ^ Ancestry World Tree Project: Boss Family Tree

External links

• Jesse W. Fell at Find a Grave
• Life of Jesse Fell
• Role with Lincoln Bio
• Lincoln Autobiography written for Jesse Fell

Persondata
Name	Fell, Jesse W.
Alternative names
Short description
Date of birth	1808
Place of birth	Chester County, Pennsylvania, U.S.
Date of death	1887
Place of death	Normal, Illinois, Illinois, U.S.