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1930 Map of Jerseyville

Name: 1930 Topographic Map of Jerseyville
Creator: U.S. Geological Survey
Published: 1973
License: https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/

USGS Topo · Published 1973

About this map

Jerseyville serves as the bustling commercial and transportation hub of Jersey County in this 1930 survey, where three major rail lines converge. The Chicago and Alton, Chicago and Northwestern, and Chicago Springfield and St Louis railroads define the local economy, connecting agricultural centers like Kane and Delhi to broader markets. The landscape is dense with one-room schoolhouses, such as Shakerag Sch and Green Persimmon Sch, illustrating the dispersed rural population of the era.

South of the county seat, the terrain transitions into the creek-carved hollows of Otter Creek and the South Fork Otter Creek. These valleys are home to the early settlement of Otterville and the Bethany Ch, while the County Farm sits prominently to the west. The map records a pre-industrial social geography, documented by surveyors J.A. Duck and R.F. Wilcoxon, where small communities like McClusky, Dow, and Newbern thrived along the rail corridors before modern highway consolidation.