Biohazard and Pathogen Disinfection in Warsaw, IL

Warsaw is a city in Hancock County, Illinois, perched on bluffs above the Mississippi River near the state's westernmost point.

Warsaw began in 1814, when Major Zachary Taylor — the future U.S. president — founded Fort Johnson on the east bank of the Mississippi across from the mouth of the Des Moines River, and Fort Edwards soon followed on the bluff.

Warsaw became an important fur-trading post and one of the earliest American settlements in northern Illinois.

In the 1840s Warsaw was the center of opposition to the Mormon settlement at Nauvoo during the so-called Mormon Illinois War, and its newspaper, the Warsaw Signal, edited by Thomas C. Sharp, was a vocal anti-Mormon voice.

The mob that killed Joseph and Hyrum Smith at Carthage Jail in 1844 assembled in Warsaw.

Warsaw had a population of 1,510 at the 2020 census, down from 1,607 in 2010, with 651 households and 762 housing units.

Warsaw Township has been co-extensive with the city since November 15, 1855.

The Warsaw Brewery, founded by German immigrants, opened in 1861 and brewed for more than a century until 1971; it was renovated and reopened in 2006 as a bar, restaurant and microbrewery.

Warsaw's most famous son is John Hay, who served as Abraham Lincoln's personal secretary and later as Secretary of State under Presidents William McKinley and Theodore Roosevelt.

Local histories record that in 1869 Warsaw's leaders even aspired for their town to become the capital of the United States.