Moro, IL

Moro is an unincorporated community and census-designated place in northwestern Madison County, at the northeast edge of the St. Louis area's Illinois Metro-East. Bethalto lies to the southwest and Meadowbrook to the southeast, so Moro sits close to the region's suburban network while retaining a small-community footprint. The East Fork of the Wood River runs through the surrounding landscape, adding a waterway reference to a place otherwise defined by county roads and nearby towns.

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The first settlers, Zenas Webster and S.W. Paddock, arrived on December 11, 1820. A railroad reached Moro in 1853, and the town was platted two years later, tying its early growth to transportation across Madison County. The Presbyterian Church organized in 1848, one of the community's early civic institutions. Today, Moro's local context is practical: residents are near Bethalto and the wider Metro-East for larger-town services, while the name carries farther than the community's size because the Oregon city of Moro was named for this Illinois place.