Paw Paw Township Park - Rollo, IL
N 41° 40.341 W 088° 53.420
16T E 342643 N 4615124
A small township park in the near ghost town of Rollo, Illinois
Waymark Code: WMM1N5
Location: Illinois, United States
Date Posted: 07/03/2014
Views: 1
At one time there were
three Paw Paws in this area: East Paw Paw in far southwestern DeKalb County; Paw Paw (now known as South Paw Paw), and Paw Paw Grove -- both in Lee County. When the railroad came through the latter in the 1870s (not the railroad you see here - that came later), many folks moved to it, and they even brought some of the buildings. The word Grove was dropped from the name, necessitating a change to the original Paw Paw to be called South Paw Paw. It is hard to imagine that there used to be a seminary at East Paw Paw. Now all that is there is a cemetery and a few houses.
There is an irony here. Both DeKalb County and Lee County wanted to call the area Paw Paw Township, but they both agreed that that could cause confusion, being in two different counties. So they drew straws or flipped for it or something. DeKalb County won the toss and ended up with Paw Paw Township. At least it has the name. The folks from the Lee County side were stuck for a name. Many of them had come from the Wyoming Valley of Pennsylvania; so they decided to name the township Wyoming.
This park is in the small town of Rollo in Paw Paw Township, DeKalb County. One must use a lot of imagination to think of it being on a side branch of the old stage coach line (from the Sandwich area toward Paw Paw and on to Galena), with a hotel, school and so on. There is little left of the town now.