(Reprinted from The Bloomington Pantagraph, Feb. 20,1886)
By Ira Eugene Stone
The Village
of Kappa, situated in the extreme southeast corner of the County of Woodford,
plays a not important part in the History of this County, for which Hanover
(now Metamora) and Walnut Grove can claim settlers at an earlier date than
the immediate vicinity of Kappa, yet many years before the cities of El
Paso and Minonk had been evolved from the womb of time, --THE HIBBS, THE
SLOANS, THE AMRINES, THE MESSERS, THE DIXONS, THE COONS, AND THE BIGGERS,
were hunting deer, killing rattle snakes, eating cracked corn, shaking
with the "ager" and otherwise enjoying life at and near the site of the
present VILLAGE OF KAPPA. Long before most of the towns of Woodford County
appeared above the grass and flowers of the Prairie, KAPPA was running
three large stores and dealing extensively in grain. The name was given
to this town by the management of the Illinois Central Railroad, and is
the Greek letter K, being the tenth letter in that alphabet. Why this particular
town is one of those things, that no "feller" can find out. The first
building
erected in the immediate vicinity of the present site of KAPPA was a house
built by THOMAS DIXON in 1833. JOHN HIBBS in 1835, built one northwest
of KAPPA, on land owned by CUSHING JONES. In 1836 DAVID HIBBS built a small
house where THE ERSKINE'S boys now live, and in 1837 WILLIAM HIBBS erected
a little log hut on which is now known as the Champion land in front of
the WAUGH Farm. These three brothers came from Ohio
in 1835.
Besides the HIBBS, there were then just nine buildings between Lexington
and Bowling Green. When William Hibbs built his house here his nearest
neighbors were THOMAS DIXON who came from Ohio in 1826 and who had been
running a little grist mill (corn cracker they called it
then)
on the Mackinaw, some distance below the present
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