What’s New

Some physical changes have occurred at our museum building in the last month. The building served as the county jail and sheriff’s home from 1913 until early 1972 when the last of the inmates were moved to a new jail. Obviously, the building has endured over a hundred years of storms and bad weather and requires some TLC periodically.

In the month of September we had several locations in the brickwork tuckpointed as well as many of the joints in the limestone plinth stones that serve as the foundation for the building. In addition, three of our concrete entry steps were torn out and replaced and the stairwell to the south entrance had new concrete caps stones replaced that were deteriorating.

To make way for masonry repairs, we had the old north side wooden access ramp torn down so that the masons could do their work and the ramp was replaced with a new aluminum access ramp. Thanks to a grant from the city of Marion, half of the masonry work was covered and split the bill in half for us.

On October 16th, 2025 the local DAR chapter held their meeting at the WCHS museum/library. Front roll: Daniell H Brush Chapter of Carbondale and Marion, Illinois NSDAR #1 Gloria Spinks,1^st Vice Regent, #2 Elizabeth Casten Regent, #3 State Regent Marria Blinn she is out of the Swallow Cliff Chapter NSDAR in Palos Heights, Illinois

Second Roll left to Right: Black Shirt Marilyn Beltz, Treasurer, Black Shirt #2 Judith Goodman, Chaplin, behind Marria’s shoulder is Debra Borecky, member,  next gold outfit and sandals is Joy Upton, she is our Linage Research Committee Chair, 3^rd roll, hidden gray hair Dona Lach, Membership Chair you can’t see her, green dress tall blonde Christine Brewer, Member, Half head Amber Hewette, Member Last gray pants and flowered jacket is Jenne Bierman, District VII Director, she is from the Beaucoup Creek Chapter out of Pinckneyville and DuQuoin Chapter.  

The Marion Carnegie Library staff of 17 employees toured the historical society’s museum and library on Monday, October 13th, 2025. The function of the visit was to make library staff aware of the assets available at the historical society’s library and museum, since visitors come to both the society and the public library for historical and genealogical questions.

The Williamson County Historical Society will be holding a membership meeting on Sunday, October 26^th , 2025 here at the museum/library at 2:00 P.M. During the meeting we will be going over projects undertaken at the museum & library since the last meeting, accessions taken in, upcoming projects and the state of the museum. The program will be by historian, Darrel Dexter, and the topic will be,” Ulysses S. Grant in Egypt”, about Grant’s time in Anna, Cairo and Mound City during the Civil War.

During the meeting we will be voting on a new officers for the year 2026 and there will be one open position of director. Anyone interested in serving on the board for next year should contact us here at the museum prior to the meeting. Also, we need a volunteer to serve as librarian to replace our current librarian.

The Williamson County Historical Society has just published the book, ”Old Marion Cemetery, a.k.a . Aikman Cemetery.” The book was just released by author Helen Lind and contains the names of 590 people. The first burial in the cemetery was John A. Aikman, son of Samuel and Henrietta Aikman in 1845. As time moved on, more members of the Aikman family were buried there and eventually all sorts of burials occurred there, including cholera victims of Marion from 1866. The cemetery became a city Cemetery, but that all changed in 1883 when the new city cemetery we know today was created at Rosehill. Many of the burials in the old cemetery were moved to the new cemetery after its creation.

The book if fully indexed, spiral bound, sells for $10 and is available at the historical society.

The Williamson County Historical Society held a membership meeting on Sunday, July 27^th, 2025 at their museum/library at 2:00 P.M. During the meeting society president, Sam Lattuca, went over projects undertaken at the museum & library since the last meeting, accessions taken in, upcoming projects and the state of the museum. The program was given by retired history teacher and local historian, Darrel Dexter. The program topic was,” George L. Burroughs:  Using the Illinois Central Railroad as an Underground Railroad.” He explained that the I.C. Railroad system was periodically used by runaway slaves to reach the north. At one time, the railroad was attempted to be sued on such an occasion.

Six members of the Gallatin County Historical Society were present and Cindy Decker and Janet Householder presented a quilt put together by one of their members in commemoration of the underground railroad.

The Williamson County Historical Society will be holding a membership meeting on Sunday, July 27, 2025 here at the museum/library at 2:00 P.M.

During the meeting we will be going over projects undertaken at the museum & library since the last meeting, accessions taken in, upcoming projects and the state of the museum. The program will be by historian, Darrel Dexter, and the topic will be,” George L. Burroughs:  Using the Illinois Central Railroad as an Underground Railroad.”

With the Miss Illinois Pageant taking place in Marion this week, it has attracted a lot of visitors to Marion and a portion of them have filtered through the museum. On Friday, June 27th, 2025, junior police officer, Declan Tobin from St. Charles, Illinois got a chance to check out our old cell block in the jail. Declan also spent some time with the Marion Police Department and by the time he arrived here he was sporting a utility belt complete with hand cuffs and Marion PD patches.

Our museum and library will be closed Friday, July 4th, 2025 in observance of our nation’s independence. We will be open the following day, Saturday, July 5th.