Commerce and history have characterized the Buchanan Downtown Historic District. Since mill owner Charles Cowles settled here in the 1830's, McCoy's Creek supplied millraces and more than fifteen mills. The circa 1840 Day and Hamilton race supported William Bainton's 1857-58 flour mill which became Pears Mill. In 1863, business leaders John D. Ross and Lorenzo Alexander built the union block with it's third flour mill. The district was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 2009.
After a disastrous 1862 fire, merchants built more than twenty brick Italianate buildings in the historic district. In 1904 the Buchanan Improvement Association persuaded Chicago's George R. Rich Manufacturing Company to relocate here. Renamed Clark Equipment in 1916, it built employee housing during WWI and adjusted it's payroll practices to stabilize the local economy in 1930. It was a major Buchanan employer for decades and a Fortune 500 company.
Visit Instructions:Take a photo of your GPS at the marker. We'd prefer a photo of you with your GPS, but we realize that sometimes that's just not possible or preferable.
Also include a bit about your visit to the marker.
NEW: Instructions for logging Missing Marker Visits.
If the Marker is missing, but still listed here, you must provide a photo of you at the actual item historically honored. (This should be the waymark's "default" image). Indicate in your log that you took your photo at the Historical Location instead of the marker, because the marker was missing. Please also still include a bit about your visit to the site.