John and Johanna Kling, Swedish immigrants, settled in Cherry Valley, Illinois, in 1868. They built a home on South Mill Road and, after John’s early death at 32, Johanna and their sons moved to 313 Genoa Street. Charles Kling married Alma Dahlberg, whose parents, John and Lena Dahlberg, moved to Cherry Valley from Curtiss, Wisconsin, in 1908. The Dahlbergs built homes at 526 West State Street and later moved to 117 South Cherry Street. Their granddaughter, Viola Kling Green, married Homer Green in 1937. The Greens have lived at 117 South Cherry Street since then, operating an antique shop since 1950.
By Viola Kling Green
Paternal grandparents of Viola Kling Green, John and Johanna Kling, migrated from Sweden in 1868 with their two small boys, Charles and August, and shortly thereafter built the home which the Don Allens now own on South Mill Road. Some years after Mr. Kling’s sudden and untimely death at the age of 32, Mrs. Kling and her boys sold this property and bought the small home at 313 Genoa Street, where she lived until her death at age 96. Her son, Charles, also lived there until his death in 1938. His wife, Alma, continued to live on this property in a home which her son-in-law, Homer Green, built for her in 1939 until a few years before her death in 1974.
Maternal grandparents of Viola Kling Green, John and Lena Dahlberg, came to Cherry Valley from Curtiss, Wisconsin, in the year 1908 with the two youngest of their four living children, namely a son, Edwin, and the daughter, Alma, who in 1910 married Charles R. Kling.
After residing for a short time in a small house just west of the Cherry Valley School, (which long ago was torn down) Mr. Dahlberg built the home at 526 West State Street where the Clifford Schumaker family now lives, as well as the smaller home at the rear of this property now occupied by the Gordon Bode Family.
Several years before the Dahlberg’s deaths, they sold these two homes and bought the house at 117 South Cherry Street, where their granddaughter, Viola Kling Green and her husband, Homer Green, have resided since their marriage in 1937. They have operated an antique shop at this location since 1950.
Cherry Valley School Memories – “Then”, 1918 through June, 1928 -I especially remember the third floor, one flight up from the 7th and 8th grade rooms, and the “Principal’s” room where the Freshmen and Sophomore classes were held. This was the auditorium where programs were enjoyed. The programs consisted of renditions by family orchestras, vocal solos by those so talented, and a few lucky or unlucky children, as the case might be, who had taken elocution lessons and spoke their “pieces” with great gusto and profuse gestures with their hands and mouths as well, to the utter delight or even horror, at times, to the less fortunate children, like myself, who had never received the benefits of aforementioned elocution training.
In pleasant weather, we played games in the school yard such as “Pom Pom Pull-away”, “Hide and Seek”, and “Run Sheep Run”. “Fox and Geese”, a game played in the winter’s snow, amused us at recess time. Best of all, was the last day of school each spring when we were released from the miseries of our lessons for a long summer vacation. The only horror of that particular day was the quick “peek” at the report card to see if we had “passed”. Then came the school picnic with all the goodies, including the inevitable lemonade made from hand squeezed lemons: No frozen stuff in the cans in those long ago days!
Homer H. Green served in the United States Army in World War II in the South Pacific theater of operations from September 1943 through December 1945 with the 43rd Infantry Division.
Some time in the early 1870’s the Baptist church was built next to what is now the Homer Green’s residence on S. Cherry Street. Many years later, the Masonic Order purchased this building and it has been used by the Masonic Order as well as the Eastern Star to this present time.
As to places of entertainment, Sanborn’s Hall, located above the grocery stores which burned in the disastrous fire of the late twenties, must have been one of the best. This hall was in existence in the ’80s and ’90s In the winter months, oyster suppers which also featured home made pies, (“constructed” by the town’s best cooks), were held there, with dancing to fiddler’s music as well as card games to entertain the party goers after these luscious “goodies” were disposed of.
People who came out from Chicago on the Chicago & Northwestern Railroad and stayed for a holiday or perhaps a weekend at the hotel, which was located at the site of the present fire station, attended many of these affairs at Sanborn’s Hall.
There was also a McKee’s Hall here in the 1870’s, although I do not know for sure where it was located. I have an invitation to an open house held at this McKee’s Hall on February 4th, 1897, for a Rev. & Mrs. A. H. Schoonmaker in celebration of their thirty-fifth wedding anniversary.
In 1880, there was a cheese factory, a creamery, two hotels, a Post Office, two blacksmith shops and many other smaller houses of business in Cherry Valley.
In September 1897, the Cherry Valley Board of Trustees authorized the first board sidewalk. Prior to that time they used sand walks.
The board of trustees purchased 15 gas streetlamps in April 1900. F. 0. Peterson, a lamplighter for many years, was a familiar sight as he went down the streets each evening lighting the lamps, and then extinguishing them in the early morning hours.