Stewardson, IL

Stewardson is a Shelby County village in central Illinois, about twelve miles southeast of Shelbyville. The village grew at the intersection of the Toledo, St. Louis and Kansas City Railway and the Altamont branch of the Wabash, placing it in a grain and lumber region. The town's first century included an 1874 incorporation, a post office name change in 1883, and a quick rise in population during the late nineteenth century. Main Street and the old rail corridor still give the place its basic outline.

Stewardson's local history is carried by the cemetery, churches, stores, grain businesses, and railroad buildings that developed around the village. A 1900 description called it a center for the surrounding agricultural district, and the centennial history records the elevators, grocery stores, dairy, and other businesses that served nearby farms. Today it remains a compact village in the Shelby County prairie, with local roads running out into the same fields that shaped the town's first economy.