County of town: Fulton County
Location of city: a little south of central in county; crossroads of US-24 & IL-97/100
County is central, and west of center in state
Elevation: 583 ft (178 m)
Population:
"This beautiful little city is the oldest town in the county, and the first with the possible exception of one, laid out in April, 1822, by Ossian M. Ross, and derives its name from Lewis W. Ross, his son, who was a small boy at the time. Stephen Dewey surveyed the town and erected the first house in the town.
"In February, 1823 the county commissioners selected Lewistown to be the county seat of the recently created Fulton County, which at that time included the territory east and west between the Illinois and Mississippi rivers and from a base line near where the city of Rushville in Schuyler county now is to the northern boundary of the state. It included all of the country where Rock Island, Galena, Peoria and Chicago now are.
"The first schools were taught in the log courthouse until the Masonic fraternity erected a hewn log school on the former site of the original Presbyterian Church.
"Lewistown in its early history had a hat manufacturing establishment until the second owner of that factory committed suicide and the hatter's art died out in Lewistown.
" When on August 17th, 1858, Abraham Lincoln, candidate for the United States Senate, mounted the speakers platform which had been erected in front of the massive native Spoon River stone columns on the Fulton County court house, he shared the platform with Judge Wm. Kellogg of Canton, Illinois. It was Judge Kellogg's privilege on that hot summer day to introduce the principal speaker, Abraham Lincoln, and this was no more than right since Kellogg was one of Lincoln's closest personal friends and political advisors ever since the Republican party came about in the state of Illinois.
"The speech given by Wm. D. Horsley at the Lincoln in Lewistown Centennial Celebration, today was re-created by necessity, as Mr. Lincoln very seldom spoke from a prepared text. He used notes, and spoke extemporaneously from them. Part of the speech given today, however, is verbatim from the report of the Chicago Tribune of August 21, 1858. This section is the closing of Mr. Lincoln's talk beginning with the words, "The Declaration of Independence was formed by..." Another section partly re-created and partly from the Tribune report is the one concerning Lincoln's remarks regarding Henry Clay and Douglas's false assertion of being Clay's successor and political ally." ~ Lewistown History