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History · Banner

Banner’s post office opened in 1874, and 14% of its homes were built before 1940

Below: maps from 1930 on and the census since 1940.

1874first post office
0on the National Register
14%homes built before 1940
Add an old photoShare a memory
Photo: formulanone from Huntsville, United States · CC BY-SA 2.0
Quick answers

How Banner began

When was Banner founded?

1874

The Banner post office opened in 1874, the earliest record of the town by name.

First census: 172 in 19402020 census: 169152 years
Founding year: the first Banner post office (Blevins & Helbock, CC0).

What stands out about Banner’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 Banner are in the public archives yet. The rest are in attics and albums.Boom and bustPeaked at 247 in 1960; 169 people lived here in 2020.
★ What stands out · Help out

Start Banner’s collection

The first neighbors to add old photos shape how Banner’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

Banner, census by census

010020019401960198020002020Peak: 247

Peaked at 247 in 1960; 169 people lived here in 2020.

9 censuses, 1940–2020.

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

The story so far

Banner, in brief

Wikipedia doesn’t have a history of Banner yet. The photos, dates and memories neighbors add here are how it gets written.

Banner is a village in Fulton County, Illinois, United States. The population was 169 at the 2020 census. The current President of Banner is Ronald Test. The former President of Banner for 28 years was Kenneth Fuller.

Its first post office opened in 1874. Between the 2010 and 2020 censuses its population fell from 189 to 169 (-11%).

Intro from Wikipedia. Population: U.S. Census Bureau.

From the old history books

What they wrote about Banner in 1879

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

1824. Garland is believed to have been a brother-in-law of Kinney, the man who with Mr. Swan laid off Canton. Joseph Anderson settled upon the northwest quarter of section 35 in 1<S23. Anderson was the first settler in Banner townshij) and resided near Utica prior to his coming to this township. He…
History of Fulton county, Illinois1879 · page 517Read the page →
Read the text

1824. Garland is believed to have been a brother-in-law of Kinney, the man who with Mr. Swan laid off Canton. Joseph Anderson settled upon the northwest quarter of section 35 in 1<S23. Anderson was the first settler in Banner townshij) and resided near Utica prior to his coming to this township. He had been a soldier in the British army during the war of 1812, but, being taken prisoner by the American forces under General Scott, had concluded to cast his fortunes among his captors. He was a thoroughgoing,

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.

Timeline

Banner, 1874 to 1960

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

  1. 19th century
  2. 1874Post officeThe Banner post office opens
  3. 20th century
  4. 1918Post officeThe Banner post office closes
  5. 1930On the mapFirst mapped by the U.S. Geological Survey
  6. 1960CensusPopulation peaks at 247
By decade

No old photos in the archives yet

Weddings on Main Street, storms, parades, school pictures, the old store. If it’s in your family album, it belongs here.

Be the first to add onePhotograph a print flat, in daylight, no flash.
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On the map

Banner on the map, 1930 to 1982

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

Banner on the 1930 USGS mapBanner on the 1948 USGS mapBanner on the 1982 USGS map1930Glasford 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 Banner.

Places that used to be

Lost post offices, places now gone and burying grounds

Banner had its own post office from 1874 to 1918.

Banner
1874–1918
18701950today
Gone or out of use
Banner Schoolschool
1cemetery inside Banner
Banner

US Post Offices dataset (Blevins & Helbock, CC0). Places and cemeteries from the USGS Geographic Names Information System (2021).

Questions about Banner’s history

What year was Banner founded?

The Banner post office opened in 1874, the earliest record of the town by name (U.S. post office records).

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 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.