26 October 1875

ROBERTS RAKINGS
Roberts, Ill., Oct. 26th, 1875.
ED. RECORD: -- As our Advocate has departed for greener pastures, and left us at it were without a mouth-piece, I send you a few items.
We last night received another portion of ague pura, which seems to have changed our beautiful fall weather into that of a colder quality.
Times continue very dull, but somewhat improved. Farmers have not yet completed their threshing, and oats and flax come in slowly, and sell at prices not calculated to please anybody very much. Some farmers have commenced cribbing corn, which promises to be a No. 1 crop.
The Litchfield, Ill., car works have put a new fangled corn dryer in the Star elevator of J. B. Meserve & Co., which have failed to give satisfaction, being unable to dry with sufficient rapidity to make it pay. Mr. Meserve has a plan for a drying apparatus which I think, from his explanation, would prove a success if put in operation.
There is a construction train with some thirty men now at work on the Roberts section of the G., C & S. railroad, grading up the low places. Landlord Newman is boarding most of the men . . . 

. . . A Congregational Church was organized in this place on Sunday last, by Rev. Dr. Roy, of Chicago. He preached to large audiences in the afternoon and evening.
Thompson and Lyman have bought the furniture of F. E. Pettit, and the building formerly occupied by Mr. P. has been fitted up for a dwelling and meat market by Myron H. Rice, of Wall, who is soon to remove to our town and furnish the citizens with fine roasts, steaks, and sausages, as companion for our nice cheap potatoes, which are only 25 cents per bushel at present . . .

 

--Paxton Record. 26 October 1875.

19 September 1872

 

--Paxton Record.  19 September 1872.

J. B. Meserve and family have at last become residents of Roberts.
Lyman Peck has commenced putting up a dwelling in town.
Another blacksmith and wagon shop in town.  Tinklepaugh and Tapp are the proprietors. 
L. J. Pfatt and F. E. Pettit have concluded that this place has been hotelless long enough, have secured a site, got material together, and men at work, and will push the building as fast as possible.
Another dwelling house in town, Van Antwerp from Buckley is the builder.

Magnolia House

Fred Pettit built the original hotel when Roberts was started in 1871. It was the only hotel or Magnolia House, as it was called, ever to be built in Roberts.
The land first belonged to Mr. Francis Alonzo Roberts. Then it was passed on to different families.
Some of the families that owned the hotel were P. J. Foster, Charles O. Hayes, Francis M. Hancock, O. M. Decourey, William H. Wilson and Oliver C. Dilks....
The hotel was once a very popular stopping place. Salesmen who came in on the railroad spent the night there and then used the Roberts livery stable services the following day to drive to Melvin and other nearby towns.
A dentist, Dr. E. D. Wilkenson, from Gibson City, had an office in one of the upstairs rooms. He would come to Roberts once a week. For several years, the Roberts telephone switchboard was operated in one of the rooms.
The hotel had 22 rooms, two dining rooms, and one bath. They used gas to light the rooms.
Sometimes when trains would go through, the sparks from the train would land on the roof of the hotel and start a fire.
Oliver C. Dilks was born in Thorton, Leicertershire, England. he came to the United States in January, 1893 and became a citizen in 1894. Mr. Dilks came, with his wife Catherine, to Roberts in 1912 from Ludingon, Michigan.
Mr. and Mrs. Dilks purchased the hotel building in 1918. They had five children: Katherine Dilks Johnson, Oliver C. Dilks, Arthur L. Dilks, (dec.) Sidney H. Dilks, Evelyn Dilks (dec.)
In 1918, Mr. Dilks was called to serve his country. On the morning of Nov. 11, 1918, he with other men, arrived at the Paxton depot to take the train to Chicago for their physical. Before they took the train, word was received that the Armistice had been signed. So, all were sent back to their homes.
In June, 1942, Mr. Dilks, Sr., was a member of the Selective Service of Ford County at Paxton.
Sidney H. Dilks, one of their children, was the youngest States Attorney to be elected in the state of Illinois. He also, as a young man, helped with the building of Route 115 in 1913 and 1917. One day he was run over by a load of bricks, but being a young man, he lived.
Jack and Katherine (Dilks) Johnson took over the hotel in 1941, but did not operate a hotel after the death of her parents. Mr. and Mrs. John (Jack) Johnson have one son, Arthur.

--Robert Area Centennial 1872-1972. 100 Years of Plowing, Planting, Progressing.  1972.