The Woodbine Park Priarie Estates area is full of history.  Numerous Native American artifacts have been found on the property and much has been written about various settlers and families that once called this place home.

Historical Information

Kickapoo Indians

The Kickapoos are original residents of Wisconsin and the upper Michigan peninsula. The name Kickapoo is a derivation of the Algonquin word meaning “he stands out” or “he moves about.” The Kickapoo speak an Algonquin language closely related to that spoken by the Sauk and Fox and the Shawnee. In fact, Kickapoo tradition asserts that they and the Shawnee were once one people.

The Kickapoo lived in permanent villages in the summer but split into smaller groups for the winter. The Kickapoo were hunters and farmers. Their principal crops were corn, squash and beans. Buffalo was the primary hunting target in the winter. They became skilled horse riders, using it extensively in the buffalo hunt.

During the 1750s the Kickapoo left Wisconsin and headed south to the prairies of Illinois and Indiana. Here they had better buffalo hunting as well as easier access to British traders. The Kickapoo eventually split into two separate bands. The Prairie Band lived in Northern Illinois and was allied with the Sauk and Fox. To the south, the Vermillion Band was friendly with the Illinois. The Prairie Band however, was hostile to the Illinois. During the American Revolution the Kickapoo tried to remain neutral. However, by the mid 1870s they engaged in an increasing number of raids on the Americans. Lacking cohesion and strong leadership, the Kickapoos were captured and forced west of the Mississippi onto Missouri, Kansas and Oklahoma reservations. Some of the Kickapoos escaped and their descendants now live in Illinois.

Abraham Lincoln and Macon County

In March 1830, Abraham Lincoln and his family began their 200 mile journey from their homestead in Indiana to Macon County Illinois. On their travel west, the Lincoln family passed through the site of the Ulery Farm which sits on the south end of Woodbine Estates. There, the family settled on uncleared land along the Sangamon River about ten miles west of Decatur.

The Lincoln family lived here only a year, discouraged by sickness and the harsh climate. The following spring, Lincoln moves to New Salem Illinois where he works as a clerk in the village store. He slept in the back of the store. In March 1832 he became a candidate for the Illinois General Assembly but lost the election in August of that same year.

In 1834 at the age of 24, Lincoln is finally elected to the Illinois General Assembly as a member of the Whig Party. Two years later, he earned his law license.

In 1837 Lincoln helped moved the Illinois state capital from Vandalia to Springfield where he eventually settled and became a law partner of John T. Stuart.

In 1846, Lincoln was elected to the U.S. House of Representatives and moved into a boarding house in Washington D.C. with his wife Mary Todd and his sons.

It wasn’t until November 6, 1860 that Abraham Lincoln was elected as the 16th U.S. president and the first Republican. He received 180 of 303 possible electoral votes and 40 percent of the popular vote. Less than six months after his election, the Confederates opened fire on Fort Sumter in Charleston, marking the beginning of the Civil War. Woodbine Estates holds a special connection to Abraham Lincoln. The Lincoln Heritage Trail runs by the Ulery Farm, moments from Woodbine Estates. In fact, Eli Ulery Sr. was friends with Abraham Lincoln.

Whistleville

Ft. Daniel Conservation Area takes its name from the legacy of Reverend Daniel Traughber. Between 1838 and 1861 Rev. Traughber became one of the most influential and beloved man in Macon County. He was the founder of many schools and churches throughout Macon County and served as the area preacher.

During the Civil War, Ft. Daniel harbored southern sympathizers which some suspect were led by Rev. Traughber. The group rode out by night to strike terror in the hearts of area Unionist farmers.

Whistleville, as the area is called, has traditionally been a mystery to the residents of Macon County. The first families migrated out of the forested mountains of Kentucky to settle amidst the beautiful oak and hickory trees from the Big Creek drainage. For more than a hundred yeas, this quaint self-sufficient community was to remain as a backwoods settlement.

Eli Ulery Farm

Since 1851 the Ulery family has been associated with Macon County, Illinois. Eli S. Ulery was born in Washington County, Pennsylvania on November 20, 1817. In 1841 Eli Ulery came to Illinois. For the next ten years he bought, fed and drove cattle to the eastern markets, much of the time to New York City where his brother Simon had a livestock commission business.

While buying cattle in Sangamon County he became ill with malaria and was cared for by 12-year-old Mary Elizabeth. Three years later, Eli Ulery returned to Sangamon County and married the young girl. This same year, Ulery acquired about 600 acres of rich farm land in Mt. Zion.

In the early 1860s, Eli Ulery built a weathered, brick house for his wife Mary. The beautiful brick home originally contained ten rooms with four double chimneys and a fireplace in every room. The house also had a summer kitchen and bunk house at the rear. The fireplace in the east, or formal parlor, was of white marble, the one in the west parlor was of gray marble, and the remaining ones were made of wood. The ornate front door opened into a rather narrow hall which extended the full length of the house with a curving stairway leading upstairs. The upstairs hallway resembled an open balcony surrounded by a banister which was a continuation of the balustrade of the stairway. Four large bedrooms with closets opened off the upstairs hall. One of the interesting features of the house was a glass enclosed observatory on the top of the house. The windows of the observatory showed miles of prairie land of central Illinois, including the small glaciated lakes that have since been drained to irrigate surrounding farmland. Early histories of Illinois said that Mr. Ulery used to go up to the observatory to watch his field hands at work and to check his cattle. Originally the house had an Italianate porch on the front. This porch had a balcony with a door leading from the upstairs hall on to the balcony. Since the original porch and balcony are gone that door is now boarded up. When the house was built Eli Ulery planted pines leading from the rock and hitching post out on the road (which was the stagecoach road from Terre Haute to Springfield and the route the Lincoln family used on their journey to Illinois in 1830) up to the front door. Other pines were planted as windbreak around the house. The house originally had both inside and outside shutters. These shutters were decorative as well as functional and were adjusted several times a day, especially the inside shutters, to control both light and heat from the sun.

Eli and Mary Ulery had seven children but only three of them lived to maturity. Mary herself passed away in 1864. Eli Ulery never remarried and was left to raise his three children, Donna, Gertrude, and Eli Jr. on his own.

In 1880, Mr. Ulery’s oldest daughter was married to Charles Fletcher (no relation to developer Dr. David J. Fletcher), a farmer who resided in the Mt. Zion area. One hundred and fifty guests from Decatur and Mt. Zion Township gathered at the Ulery home for the festive occasion. The ceremony was held in the east parlor. Guests danced in the parlors and halls to the music of Goodman’s band from Decatur.

By the time Donna was married Gertie had finished her schooling at Monticello Seminary and was living at home to serve as hostess and housekeeper for her father and brother. On December 14, 1881, she was married in the home of her father to Washington Stoner Smith, a prominent farmer and grain dealer of Mt. Zion Township. After their marriage he and Gertie continued to live in the home. It was there that their first child, Mary Gladys (Mrs. Dean S. McGaughey) was born.

Eli Sr. continued to make the farm his home except for his buying trips and summers spent in Colorado. Gertie and her family lived there until her brother Eli Jr. (Ely) was married to Fannie Gibson Bell in the spring of 1885. At that time the Smith family moved to Decatur and lived there in a home on West William Street until they returned to the village of Mt. Zion in 1894.

Eli Jr. took over management of the farm and raised his family there until his death in 1921. His youngest child, Mary Wilson, inherited the property but sold it along with 200 acres to Grover Patton of Decatur.

At present G. Patton Penhallegon, Grover’s grandson resides in the old house and farms 200 acres of land. Robert Crossman, grandson of Eli Ulery Sr. and now living in Tucson Arizona, has some of the original furniture from the house.

It is of special significance to the descendants of Eli Ulery Sr. that Pat Penhallegon has become so attached to the house that he restored some of the rooms to their original slendor. He applied for the house to be on the National Register of Historic Homes and in October 1979 it was accepted as a National Historic Landmark.

Woodbine Chautauqua – 1917

Woodbine Park was a wooded area owned by Eli S. Ulery. For many years it was a recreational area families visited during the summer. The Ulery family had a log cabin on the grounds which they used as a summer home. In 1915 Mr. Ulery began the Woodbine Chautauqua. It was a ten day festival combining entertainment and recreation during the latter part of August, drawing anywhere from ten to twenty thousand visitors every summer.

Entertainment was the highlight of the Chautauqua. Before the afternoon and evening programs the Dalton City orchestra played rousing marches as campers assembled for the main attraction.