Biohazard and Pathogen Disinfection in Maquon, IL

Maquon is a village in southern Knox County, Illinois, and part of the Galesburg Micropolitan Statistical Area.

Maquon began as the site of a Potawatomi village, and oral reports passed down by residents tell of a nineteenth-century battle in nearby Haw Creek Township after which the Potawatomi were forced away from Maquon.

Maquon was platted by Pernach Owen and Elisha Thurman in 1837 under the name Bennington, likely taken from Bennington, Vermont.

Maquon's first post office was established in 1837, with William McGowen serving as its first postmaster and also as the village's first justice of the peace.

Maquon's residents voted to incorporate on March 19, 1857, approving the measure 41 votes to 14.

In 1858 the village was renamed Maquon, from the Potawatomi word "Amaquonsippi," meaning "mussel river" or "spoon-shaped-shell river" — and the nearby Spoon River takes its name from that same meaning.

Maquon sits on a low bluff about a mile from the Spoon River along Illinois Route 97, roughly 16 miles southeast of Galesburg, the Knox County seat.

Maquon built a fine new schoolhouse in 1866 at a cost of about $9,000, a major investment for such a small village.

Maquon's population peaked at 548 in the 1880 census and has declined in nearly every census since.

The 2020 census counted 218 people in Maquon, living in 81 households, packed into just 0.16 square miles — a density of about 1,346 people per square mile.