Guest, Sign inJoin

Post to Andover

We’ll email a one-tap link to publish your post. No password, and nothing is public until you click it.
Already a member? Sign in
–Not graded
History · Andover

Andover dates to 1835, and 36% of its homes were built before 1940

Its Register listings are the Lind, Jenny, Chapel, the Andover Chapter House and the August and Margaretha Rehnstrom House. Below: maps from 1937 on and the census since 1880.

1835founded
3on the National Register
36%homes built before 1940
1famous people
Add an old photoShare a memory
Quick answers

How Andover began

When was Andover founded?

1835

Andover dates its founding to 1835 (Wikidata and Wikipedia’s history agree). The census first counted it in 1880.

First census: 302 in 18802020 census: 555191 years
Founding year: Wikidata; Wikipedia’s history section gives the same year. First post office: 1837.The full story ↓

What stands out about Andover’s past

Read from the archive, the National Register and the record. The page puts what stands out first.

A history waiting to be writtenNo old photos of Andover are in the public archives yet. The rest are in attics and albums.Shrank, then grewLost a third of its people between 1880 and 1930, then more than doubled.Deep rootsEstablished in 1835: 191 years of Andover.
★ What stands out · Help out

Start Andover’s collection

The first neighbors to add old photos shape how Andover’s history is told.

Decades since 1900 with photos
00s10s20s30s40s50s60s70s80s90s
0 of 10 decades. The empty ones are waiting for someone’s album.
Share a family photoSign in to add one+10
People over time

Andover, census by census

010020030040050060018801900192019401960198020002020302 in 1880Low: 197

Lost a third of its people between 1880 and 1930, then more than doubled.

15 censuses, 1880–2020.

U.S. Census Bureau decennial counts, from the census table on Andover’s Wikipedia page.

Timeline

Andover, 1835 to 1980

Woven from the archive, old maps, post office records, the National Register and the people born here.

  1. 19th century
  2. 1835
    FoundingAndover is established
  3. 1837Post officeThe Andover post office opens
  4. 1851BuiltLind, Jenny, Chapel is built
  5. 1852Born hereCharles O. Lobeck is born here
  6. 20th century
  7. 1937On the mapFirst mapped by the U.S. Geological Survey
  8. 1980CensusPopulation peaks at 612
The story

How Andover came to be

From Wikipedia’s history of Andover.

Read it all →

Andover is the oldest community in Henry County. Andover was the first area to be settled as a town within the county and the first mill was built in 1836–37. Andover soon became a hub of wagon trails.

Andover was founded in September 1835 by the Reverend Ithamar Pillsbury, as an agent for the Andover Colony. Pillsbury, who had been a corporal in the War of 1812 attached in the New Hampshire military, narrowly escaping death in the war which had convinced him to become a Presbyterian minister.

Text from Wikipedia, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0.

From the old history books

What they wrote about Andover, 1877–1885

Passages that mention Andover, cut from the printed page as they were published.

m 575 village of Andover and music in both Cambridge and Andover, and the following spring opened anewfarm on the prairie in the township of Osco. In 1857 he removed to Cambridge and passed eight years there in business. He then bought a farm of 140-acres, situated southeast of the village, and on
Portrait and biographical album of Henry County, Illinois1885 · page 575Read the page →
Read the text

m 575 village of Andover and music in both Cambridge and Andover, and the following spring opened anewfarm on the prairie in the township of Osco. In 1857 he removed to Cambridge and passed eight years there in business. He then bought a farm of 140-acres, situated southeast of the village, and on

Text read by machine from the scan; it may contain errors.
A. Clementson, on the northeast corner of Sec. 18 ; but later services were held in a smxll school house in Andover, until 1852, when they occupied the basement of their first church, which was finished a few months later, at an expense of $2,000. The formal organization of the church was effected …
The history of Henry County, Illinois1877 · page 526Read the page →
Read the text

A. Clementson, on the northeast corner of Sec. 18 ; but later services were held in a smxll school house in Andover, until 1852, when they occupied the basement of their first church, which was finished a few months later, at an expense of $2,000. The formal organization of the church was effected March 18, 1850, and among the communicants may be mentioned Rev. Lars P. Esbjorn and wife, Samuel Johnsson and wife, Jonas Anderson and wife, Anders Peter Larsson, Nils P. A. Peterson and wife and Olof Nordin.

Text read by machine from the scan; it may contain errors.
distant, there was the fort on Rock Island, with the small settlement then called Stephenson, in its vicinity ; on the south, the little colony of Wethersfield had just started, while a few miles west of the present toAvn of Cambridge was the still earlier colony of Andover ; at Henderson's Grove, …
The history of Henry County, Illinois1877 · page 507Read the page →
Read the text

distant, there was the fort on Rock Island, with the small settlement then called Stephenson, in its vicinity ; on the south, the little colony of Wethersfield had just started, while a few miles west of the present toAvn of Cambridge was the still earlier colony of Andover ; at Henderson's Grove, forty miles away, in Knox County, was an old " Sucker " settlement, with the Galesburg colony hovering under the border of its forest in the famous " Log City ;" on the east was the village of Princeton, settled in 1831 b_y a colony from Northampton, Mass.; towards the .

Text read by machine from the scan; it may contain errors.
he returned to England, where he remained six months; then returned to Rock Island County, where he remained four years. He came thence to the township of Andover, in Henry County, and bought 160 acres of land, which he managed seven years previous to purchasing, with profitable results.
Portrait and biographical album of Henry County, Illinois1885 · page 662Read the page →
Read the text

he returned to England, where he remained six months; then returned to Rock Island County, where he remained four years. He came thence to the township of Andover, in Henry County, and bought 160 acres of land, which he managed seven years previous to purchasing, with profitable results.

Text read by machine from the scan; it may contain errors.

Scans and text from the Internet Archive. Books published in 1930 or earlier, which are in the public domain.

By decade

Andover, decade by decade

Today2 recent
Jenny-lind-chapel2009Jenny-lind-chapelILMap-doton-Andover2006ILMap-doton-Andover
On the map

Andover on the map, 1937 to 1991

Every edition of the U.S. Geological Survey’s map of Andover. Tap a year, or press play to watch the town change.

Andover on the 1937 USGS mapAndover on the 1953 USGS mapAndover on the 1991 USGS map1937Orion sheet · 1:62,500

U.S. Geological Survey historical topographic maps (public domain), via Esri’s collection of the scans. The red ring marks the center of Andover.

On the National Register

3 historic places in Andover

The country’s official list of buildings and places worth saving.

places listed
3
National Historic Landmarks
0
none yet
historic buildings protected
3
each building in a district counts
first listed
1975
Lind, Jenny, Chapel
Lind, Jenny, Chapel, built 1851Andover Chapter HouseAugust and Margaretha Rehnstrom House
Buildings

Architectural styles listings

Prairie School1
Greek Revival1
Lind, Jenny, ChapelBuilt 1851
Andover Chapter HousePrairie School
All 3 listings
August and Margaretha Rehnstrom HouseBuilding · listed 2008

National Park Service, National Register of Historic Places. Photos from Wikimedia Commons, credited on each place’s page.

Questions about Andover’s history

What year was Andover founded?

In 1835, according to Wikidata and Wikipedia’s history of the town. Andover’s post office opened in 1837, and the census of 1880 counted 302 people here.

What is on the National Register in Andover?

Three places: the Lind, Jenny, Chapel (listed 1975), the Andover Chapter House (1980) and the August and Margaretha Rehnstrom House (2008).

Memory lane

What the archives can’t tell you, neighbors can.

Town Square →
Start a conversation
Sources

Where this page comes from

Founding dates: Wikidata, Wikipedia, the U.S. post office records of Blevins & Helbock (CC0) and the Census. Homes by year built: Census ACS 2020–24. National Register of Historic Places: National Park Service (list of May 22, 2026). Old photos, postcards and papers: Wikimedia Commons, the Library of Congress and other public archives, credited on each item’s page. Maps: U.S. Geological Survey historical topographic maps (via Esri) and Sanborn fire-insurance maps (Library of Congress). History text and census tables: Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0). Places that used to be: USGS Geographic Names Information System (2021). How TownRatings grades history →

From Wikimedia Commons (2), Wikidata (2), the National Register of Historic Places (3), Wikipedia, Wikidata and Wikipedia for famous people, U.S. Geological Survey historical maps, U.S. Census counts (via Wikipedia), the US Post Offices dataset (Blevins & Helbock), the USGS Geographic Names Information System and old county and town histories (Internet Archive). Archive images are copied here with their credits and licenses, shown on each photo’s page. Refreshed monthly.