Founding year: the first Mount Morris post office (Blevins & Helbock, CC0).The full story ↓
History grade
What drives Mount Morris’ History grade
On its age, its old homes and the National Register, Mount Morris is more historic than 95% of U.S. towns, #32 of 768 in Illinois. All 3 inputs are above most U.S. towns; its share of homes from before 1940 ranks highest and its age lowest.
A+
HistoryA character grade: shown, never part of Mount Morris’ overall grade.
Few Illinois towns list much on the Register (a typical Illinois town has 0.5 per 10,000 residents, the U.S. 2.4), so Mount Morris’ 99.0 sits above most of its state (93% of Illinois towns have fewer) while its 27 historic buildings outnumber those of 81% of U.S. towns.
How sure. Graded on any two of the three inputs instead, the letter would range from A to A+. The pre-1940 share is a Census survey estimate (±11.5 points). The founding year is the first post office, not a stated founding date.
Founding year: the first post office (other dates in Quick answers). Homes: Census ACS 2020–24. National Register: National Park Service, May 2026 list; each listing counted once (boundary changes and added documentation belong to their listing), and a historic district counts its contributing buildings. How TownRatings grades history →
What stands out about Mount Morris’ past
Read from the archive, the National Register and the record. The page puts what stands out first.
National Park Service, National Register of Historic Places. Photos from Wikimedia Commons, credited on each place’s page.
Every building
Mount Morris, building by building, 1893–1912
Fire insurance maps drew every building, what it was made of and what it was used for, so insurers could price the risk of fire. Pick a year, then a sheet.
Mt. Morris is home of the Illinois Freedom Bell, which is located in the town square. The area that is now the town square used to be the campus of one of Illinois' first institutes of higher learning, Mount Morris College. It was first a Methodist school and was later affiliated with the Church of the Brethren. The college closed due to hard economic times. The village's old Junior High School, while undergoing demolition, caught fire and burned forcing the school district to be merged with the Oregon School District in 1993. On February 12, 2004, the Rahn Elementary School was lost to fire. This resulted in the reorganization of the Oregon School District. The former Oregon city elementary and middle schools were merged into a single elementary school. The Mt. Morris Highschool has since been used as the middle school for the district. The town is also home of a very large group o…
authorized the company to " locate, construct and complete, maintain and operate a railroad from the town of Lane (now Rochelle), in the county of Ogle, to the town of Oregon in same county: from thence to the town of Mount Morris: from thence on the most eligible and direct route to or near the town of Mt. Carroll, in the county of Carroll; from thence to the Mississippi river." The company was also empowered to construct said railroad east from Oregon to the city of Chicago. The capital stock was fixed at one million dollars, divided into shares of one hundred dollars
Text read by machine from the scan; it may contain errors.
authorized the company to " locate, construct and complete, maintain and operate a railroad from the town of Lane (now Rochelle), in the county of Ogle, to the town of Oregon in same county; from thence to the town of Mount Morris; from thence on the most eligible and direct route to or near the town of Mt. Carroll, in the county of Carroll; from thence to the Mississippi river." The company was also empowered to construct said railroad east from Oregon to the city of Chicago. The capital stock was fixed at one million dollars, divided into shares of one hundred dollars
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
Mount Morris, 1841 to 1994
Woven from the archive, old maps, post office records, the National Register and the people born here.
The Mount Morris post office opened in 1841, the earliest record of the town by name (U.S. post office records).
How does Mount Morris rank for history?
Mount Morris is more historic than 95% of U.S. towns, #32 of 768 in Illinois. The History grade combines the town’s founding era, the share of homes built before 1940 and its National Register listings. It’s a character grade, so it isn’t part of the overall grade. How it works.
What is on the National Register in Mount Morris?
One place: the Mount Morris Downtown Historic District (listed 2022).
How old are the homes in Mount Morris?
33% of Mount Morris’ homes were built before 1940 (Census estimate, ±11.5 points), against a typical 11% for an Illinois town; the median home was built in 1953.
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).
From Wikimedia Commons (14), the National Register of Historic Places (1), 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, Sanborn fire insurance maps (Library of Congress) 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.
2012
2007
2007
2007
2007
2007
2007
2007
2007
2007
2007
2007
2007
2006
