County Past
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Cass County, Illinois

Historic newspapers, landmarks, and county history layers for genealogists and local historians.

47newspaper titles
0digitized titles
2historic places
1800earliest paper
1837formed
13,042pop. 2020
137cemeteries
—CW battlefields

At a glance

Summary

The Library of Congress U.S. Newspaper Directory lists 47 newspaper titles published in Cass County, Illinois, with the earliest starting in 1800. None of these titles are currently digitized on Chronicling America. The National Register of Historic Places includes 2 listed properties in the county, first listed in 1975. Most listings are in or near Beardstown, Virginia.

Summary generated automatically from the source data on this page.

Newspapers published in Cass

Library of Congress
47 newspaper titles
TitlePlaceYears
Cass County DemocratBeardstown1800–1883
Cass County Weekly DemocratBeardstown1800–1999
The AdvanceArenzville1800–1999
The Beardstown EnterpriseBeardstown1800–1999
The Central IllinoianBeardstown1800–1883
The Illinoian-StarBeardstown1800–1909
Beardstown Chronicle and Illinois Military Bounty Land AdvertiserBeardstown1833–1999
Beardstown GazetteBeardstown1845–1852
Illinois ObserverVirginia1848–1999
Beardstown GazetteBeardstown1850–1999
Beardstown and Petersburg GazetteBeardstown, Petersburg1852–1859
The Cass County TimesVirginia1856–1999
Daily Central IllinoianBeardstown1859–1999
The Beardstown DemocratBeardstown1859–1999
The Cass County DemocratVirginia1866–1999
Cass County TimesVirginia1867–1999
The JeffersonianVirginia1870–1999
Daily ReporterVirginia1871–1999
The Cass County CourierVirginia1871–1899
Beardstown HeraldBeardstown1872–1873
The Beardstown ChampionBeardstown1875–1999
Ashland EagleAshland1876–1999
Cass County JournalChandlerville1876–1999
The Ashland Weekly EagleAshland1876–1876
The Cass County MessengerBeardstown1876–1899
Chandlerville IndependentChandlerville1877–1889
Harper's Weekly HeraldVirginia1878–1999
Daily AdvertiserVirginia1879–1999
Lou's Young AmericaVirginia1881–1999
Beardstown IllinoianBeardstown1883–1999
Illinoian-DemocratBeardstown1883–1883
The Ashland SentinelAshland1884–?
The Arenzville AdvocateArenzville1885–1886
Arenzville ArgusArenzville1889–1999
The Evening StarBeardstown1892–1999
Chandlerville TimesChandlerville1898–1971
Cass County RepublicanVirginia1916–1917
Arenzville EnquirerArenzville1922–1999
The Cass County Democrat and the Weekly EnterpriseVirginia1926–1926
The Enterprise-GazetteVirginia1926–1929
Illinoian-Star DailyBeardstown1982–1993
Illinoian StarBeardstown1993–1997
Cass County Star-GazetteBeardstown1998–?
Arenzville IndependentArenzville?–
Christmas CourierBeardstown?–
The Arenzville TimesArenzville?–
The Illinoian-StarBeardstown?–

Source: Library of Congress U.S. Newspaper Directory. “Digitized” links lead to page images on Chronicling America.

Coverage timeline

Newspapers

Each bar is one title’s publication span. brown = digitized on Chronicling America Open-ended runs extend to today.

18001856191319692026

National Register of Historic Places

NPS NRHP

1 of 2 listings mapped; some locations are restricted by NPS to protect sensitive sites.

2 listed properties
PropertyCityTypeListed
Beardstown Grand Opera HouseBeardstownBuilding2000
Cunningham, Andrew, FarmVirginiaBuilding1975

Source: National Park Service, National Register of Historic Places. Property links open NRHP nomination files at the National Archives.

County formation

Newberry AHCB

Cass was formed in 1837 (1837-04-17) from Morgan.

CASS created from MORGAN.

Source: Newberry Library, Atlas of Historical County Boundaries.

Population by decade

Census

Cass County population from 1840 to 2020 (Census historical series).

18k10k2,9811840188019201930196020002020
18401860188019001920194019501960198020002020
2,98111,32514,49317,22217,89616,42515,09714,53915,08413,69513,042

Sources: U.S. Census Bureau historical county population (Forstall 1790–1990) and public-domain / CC0 county population series through 2020.

Cemeteries & historical places

USGS GNIS

137 cemeteries and 3 historical populated places (ghost towns / former settlements) recorded in USGS GNIS for this county.

Cemeteries — 80 of 137 listed
NameLatLon
Arenzville East Cemetery39.877-90.36595
Arenzville North Cemetery39.88734-90.37486
Armstrong CemeteryNoneNone
Ashland Cemetery39.88785-90.02115
Beard Cemetery40.0131-90.34179
Beard Cemetery39.90853-90.16395
Beardstown Catholic CemeteryNoneNone
Beardstown City Cemetery40.00021-90.40175
Bell Cemetery40.00017-90.12782
Berry Cemetery39.88875-90.1841
Bethlehem Cemetery39.9031-90.23512
Bethlehem CemeteryNoneNone
Black Cemetery39.89717-90.14779
Black Oak Cemetery39.94108-90.45686
Bode-Kolbert CemeteryNoneNone
Boyd CemeteryNoneNone
Buck Cemetery39.95964-90.33205
Bush Cemetery39.89396-90.50098
Campbell-Downing CemeteryNoneNone
Carr Cemetery40.0227-90.28072
Cauby Cemetery39.98525-90.25843
Centenary Cemetery39.93199-90.0515
Chandlerville Cemetery40.04359-90.14828
Charles Robertson CemeteryNoneNone
Clark Cemetery39.94639-90.27446
Cole CemeteryNoneNone
Cooper Cemetery39.87404-90.03661
Cownover CemeteryNoneNone
Crow Cemetery39.87388-90.04637
Davis Blur Buck CemeteryNoneNone
Dick CemeteryNoneNone
Dirreen CemeteryNoneNone
Dunn CemeteryNoneNone
Dupes Cemetery39.98329-90.30318
Early-Freeman CemeteryNoneNone
Edward Davis CemeteryNoneNone
Edward Fletcher CemeteryNoneNone
Epler CemeteryNoneNone
Fielden CemeteryNoneNone
First Lutheran CemeteryNoneNone
Foster CemeteryNoneNone
Freeman CemeteryNoneNone
Garner Chapel Cemetery39.95261-90.08904
Gatton CemeteryNoneNone
Gebhardt CemeteryNoneNone
George A Bristow CemeteryNoneNone
Green Krohe Cemetery39.92449-90.3654
Grigg CemeteryNoneNone
Grigg CemeteryNoneNone
Hackman Cemetery39.89915-90.39352
Hager Cemetery40.02949-90.2929
Harbison Cemetery40.0532-90.11205
Harding Cemetery39.87782-90.12594
Hickey Cemetery40.06106-90.03294
Hicks CemeteryNoneNone
Holler CemeteryNoneNone
Holmes Campground Cemetery39.9641-90.15375
Hopkins Cemetery39.94826-90.14104
Horrom CemeteryNoneNone
Huffman Cemetery39.9356-90.29151
Huppe CemeteryNoneNone
Immanuel Lutheran Cemetery39.89117-90.51484
Indian Burial GroundNoneNone
Indian Creek CemeteryNoneNone
James Davis Cemetery39.93417-90.28288
James H Richards CemeteryNoneNone
James Taylor CemeteryNoneNone
Jockisch Cemetery39.95067-90.33823
John Epler Taylor Cemetery39.87917-90.17272
John Ream CemeteryNoneNone
John Robertson Cemetery39.94255-90.15929
John Seeman CemeteryNoneNone
Krohe Cemetery39.94206-90.35147
Kuhlman CemeteryNoneNone
Lee Cemetery39.97528-90.34841
Leeper CemeteryNoneNone
Levi Springer Cemetery39.93921-90.17151
Little Indian CemeteryNoneNone
Little Shepherd Cemetery40.01845-90.0459
Lydda CemeteryNoneNone
Historical populated places — 3 of 3
NameLatLon
Cass39.9681-90.26929
Gurney39.89922-90.05011
Sylvan39.98505-90.07123

Source: USGS Geographic Names Information System (public domain). Cemeteries from the 2021 NationalFile archive; historical places from GNIS HistoricalFeatures topical extract.

Historical markers

HMdb link

Marker text and photos from the Historical Marker Database (HMdb) are not embedded here. HMdb allows non-commercial reuse with attribution, but commercial/compensated use needs written permission; this is a commercial site, so we only link out.

Search HMdb for Cass County, Illinois

Terms: hmdb.org/copyright.asp. Linking is encouraged by HMdb.