Emergency Biohazard Cleanup Near West Chestnut Chestnut, IL

Chestnut is an unincorporated census-designated place in Aetna Township, Logan County, Illinois - a community counted by the Census Bureau but never incorporated as a village.

The town was laid out on April 24, 1872, by David Clark together with the directors of the newly completed Gilman, Clinton and Springfield Railroad, a line that later became part of the Illinois Central.

Chestnut was named in honor of one of the railroad's directors, identified in county histories as Logan B. Chesnut.

Chestnut replaced Allenville, a town platted on the same section just two years earlier, which was abandoned once Chestnut was laid out.

Chestnut promotes itself as the geographic center of Illinois, and a small monument marking the claim stands in a park near Melvin Street and East Olive Street - although the state's true center actually lies about eight miles southwest, on the far side of Mount Pulaski.

The 2020 census counted 220 people in Chestnut, down from 246 in 2010, when the community had about 99 households.

Chestnut covers only about 0.12 square miles along Illinois Route 54, so its few hundred residents live at a density of more than 1,700 people per square mile.