Chaddock College: The Rise and Fall of a Local Institution

In 1853, a small group known as the German and Methodist Academy began meeting in the basement of Quincy’s Vermont Methodist Church to discuss theology and literature. As this group enlarged and widened its inquiry, it built a 14-room building on Spring Street between 3^rd and 4^th and named it “Methodist College.” James F. Jacquess, a minister and non-practicing lawyer with ties to Abraham Lincoln, became the college’s first president. Before his arrival in Quincy, Jacquess was the first president of the Illinois Female Academy, which later became MacMurray College. During the Civil War, he commanded the 73^rd Illinois Volunteers, known as the “Preacher’s Regiment” because so many officers were Methodist ministers. And his Methodist College dovetailed academic pursuits with housing Union soldiers and serving as a hospital.

By February 1874, the college had amassed large debts and Adams County Sheriff, George W. Craig, closed it and threatened to sell the building to pay creditors. Later that year, in an effort to stay afloat, the college merged with Johnson College of Macon, Missouri, and became known by that name in Quincy. Johnson College offered a diverse range of subjects: from primary ones like spelling, reading, writing, arithmetic,  and grammar to academic ones like ancient history, philosophy, and ethics. Technical training included surveying, navigation, and mensuration, the measurement of geometric objects.

Hopeful for future growth but against the board of directors’ wishes, college President Rev. Edwin Walter Hall sold the building, which later became Jefferson School, and purchased the John Wood Mansion, known as the Octagon House, at 11^th and State Street for relocating the college. The former Illinois governor had gone deeply into debt and sold the home to pay taxes.

Builders revamped this once stately mansion to include a chapel and study rooms as it shifted from a private residence to an academic institution. Due to financial restraints, President Hall received only half of his expected salary during his nearly four years of leadership. His commitment for maintaining religious higher education began to turn prospects around. In 1876, Charles Chaddock, a benefactor from Astoria, Illinois, donated $30,000, equal to about $884,000 in today’s currency, and the board renamed the school “Chaddock College.”

This college began flourishing and in its first decade included a law school, a medical department, a Biblical Institute, and a school of music. Chaddock College also established a business school in the Powers Building on the southeast corner of 6^th and Maine Street.

While only males were initially enrolled, the college also established a female department headed by Sophie Naylor Grubb, later a prominent suffragist, temperance leader, and founder of the Freedmen’s Aid Society. This department included courses in domestic arts, crafts, and elocution or dramatic reading and recitation. Cora McCullom taught elocution, and her students often performed this art for public entertainment.

Chaddock College became well-respected and attracted students from several states and a few foreign countries, with some of its graduates achieving widespread prominence. Melvin Jones became an insurance executive and founder of the International Association of Lions Clubs. A statue of Jones stands in front of the Lions Club headquarters in Oak Brook, Illinois. A bank president earlier in life, William H. Wheat served for five years as a U.S. Representative from Illinois. Charles E. MacMurray graduated from Chaddock’s College of Law and later served on its faculty before becoming an Illinois state senator. MacMurray College in Jacksonville was named in his honor.

Chaddock College held great hopes for the future, and its leaders believed it would reach an enrollment of 1,000 students. To meet this expected need, it used a large donation from benefactor Howard J. Vickers to build a dormitory near its main campus. Bishop John J. Hurst of Des Moines, Iowa, spoke at this building’s dedication. “The endowment of denominational schools means the cheapening of education, and it makes possible for worthy but poor young men to become preachers or successful businessmen.”

When Dr. A.M. Danley became the college president in 1898, the Quincy Morning Whig reported: “Dr. Danley has been a very successful Methodist minister and is considered an excellent financier. The trustees expect the college to flourish under his skillful guidance.” This confidence in the institution’s direction weakened as the economic depression set in motion by the Panic of 1893 spread across the nation. Most historians believe this depression, the greatest in American history to that date, arose from several factors. These included the McKinley Tariff that raised import taxes as high as 50 percent; a run on gold and the hoarding of coins considered more valuable than paper currency; and the trade protection policies of President Benjamin Harrison. Unemployment in Quincy and the surrounding region reached an all-time high and foreclosures and bankruptcies dramatically increased.

Chaddock College’s enrollment dropped to 60 students, then 30. This foreshadowed the eventual demise of this once prominent school. When the college debt reached a breaking point, the Methodist Episcopal Deaconesses Society came to Quincy and began a campaign to pay off bills and chart a new direction for the school. After a few years of diligent effort, officials publicly burned the mortgage and the now defunct Chaddock College became Chaddock Boys School. Large renovations took place in the mansion as it changed from a college to a boarding school for much younger students.

Plans were soon underway to find a more suitable location for this school. Trustees sold its property (Chaddock College’s dormitory eventually became St. Peter Catholic School) and bought 25 acres of land and the 12-room residence of Charles T. Dazey on 24^th Street just south of Madison Park for $25,000, the equal to about $690,000 in today’s money. Widely known as “The Farm,” and with Rev. William T. Beadles acknowledged as its founder, Chaddock Boys School required military dress uniforms, daily marching drills, and church attendance. The school’s mission became the reforming of boys from broken homes with moral instruction and character building, along with vocational training to prepare them for life outside of this cloistered setting.

Joseph Newkirk is a local writer and photographer whose work has been widely published as a contributor to literary magazines, as a correspondent for Catholic Times, and for the past 23 years as a writer for the Library of Congress’ Veterans History Project. He is a member of the reorganized Quincy Bicycle Club and has logged more than 10,000 miles on bicycles in his life.

Sources:

Blue Book of the State of Illinois. Springfield, IL: Illinois Secretary of State 1921, 903.

Costigan, David. A City in Wartime: Quincy, Illinois and the Civil War. Bloomington, IN: iUniverse, 2021, 40.

Costigan, David. “James Frazier Jaquess: A Quincyan to Remember.” Quincy Herald-Whig, August 25, 2013, 19.

Landrum, Carl A. Quincy in the Civil War. Quincy, IL: Historical Society of Quincy and Adams County, 1966, 58-60.

Lions International Melvin Jones Memorial Home Page. web.archives.org

“New Dormitory Building.” Quincy Daily Whig, April 24, 1883, 8.

“The Vermont Street Episcopal Church.” In Quincy and Adams County: History and Representative Men. David F. Wilcox, ed. Chicago: Lewis Publishing Co., 1919.

Watters, Mary. “Grubb, Sophie Naylor, Address to Alumnae, 1873.” In The First Hundred Years of MacMurray College. New Salem. IL: Williamson Print & Publishing Co., 2022.

“Will Be New President of Chaddock College.” Quincy Morning Whig, April 8, 1898, 3.

“William H. Wheat.” In Biographical Directory of the United States. Washington, D.C.: U.S. Government Printing Office.