71. In Northeast Winchester, It's Beech Grove, Not 'The Island'

Lynn Herald, August 1955
by Joe Hamilton

View of Main Street Winchester on the east side of the courthouse square.

  It was back in the year 1887, that two far-sighted local gents by the names CHENEY and WATSON somehow came to envision the industrial development that was to take place in Winchester about the turn of the century, and the subsequent more or less rapid expansion of the city's housing facilities. With factories coming to town more houses would be needed; and, with more houses building, more lots would be needed to build them on.
  Now these two astute gentlemen, Mr. Cheney and Mr. Watson, happened to be proprietors of a considerable tract of land lying east of Union street and north of the New York Central railroad, and joining up to the then boundaries of the City of Winchester. It was a beautiful tract of land--a broad meadow lush with bluegrass and studded everywhere with hundreds of lovely beech trees under which the wild flowers bloomed in the spring and the children gathered beechnuts in the autumn sunshine.
  Mindful of the city's growing need for additional housing space, and anxious, no doubt, to make a permanent contribution to the well-being of the growing city of their vision, Mr. Cheney and Mr. Watson set to work dividing up their lovely beech-studded meadow into lots and streets, streets and lots.
  And the lots were sold, and the streets were built, and the houses sprang up where the beeches were cut down. And Mr. Cheney and Mr. Watson became mindful of the fact that even sooner than they thought their lovely beech-studded meadow would be no more, and town would be in it's stead.
  And so it was that when Mr. Cheney and Mr. Watson went down to the courthouse to enter their new addition to the city of Winchester upon the town plat, and to give it a name, they remembered their lovely meadow as it was, and named it Cheney and Watson's Beech Grove addition.
  And so it also was that when I picked up a copy of this newspaper some weeks back and read a headline which referred to this part of town as "The Island," I raised an astonished, if not shocked eyebrow! And the article, moreover, described a most noble and charitable action on the part of the dwellers in northeast Winchester, but at the same time called them "islanders."
  To this writer the term "island" would indicate an area isolated for one reason or another, and not ordinarily accepted as part of the mainland proper. It is unthinkable that such a situation should exist in Winchester. Any self-respecting community would be most happy to include an area peopled by  such generous, charitable and community-minded folks as reside in northeast Winchester.
  In the past few years Winchester has become a city. Residents here enjoy such modern facilities as dial phones, organized garbage disposal, well-organized utilities, and many other modern improvements which but a short time ago were found only in larger places.
  Winchester has, moreover, expanded and spread out over more and more territory. Addition after addition has been added to the city, and time after time she has spilled out over her boundary lines, until today we have areas known by such names as Fairdale, Edgewood, Shaded Acres, Westview and Westwood Heights. And Winchester is justly proud of all her new-born additions just as she is her older areas such as Quaker Hill, Dogtown and Goose Pasture. And when the people of Winchester refer to these new additions they call them by their names.
  Why is it then, I ask you, when we refer to northeast Winchester, we don't call it Beech Grove, instead of "The Island?"
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Randolph County, Indiana 1818-1990
Commonly referred to as "The Red History Book"
Compiled by the Randolph County Historical Society, 1991, Second reprint 2003.

To obtain your own copy of "The Red History Book" stop in at The RCHS Museum Shop or send an email to arrange placing a mail order.

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