Over the years, questions regarding the exact locations of homes in the Watseka Wonder story have arisen. Confusion stems from the Roffs having built two homes in Watseka. Thanks to extensive research on the issue, the exact locations of these homes and the timeline of ownership for each can now be established.
Research has shown the following:
LATE 1850s: Asa Roff, Mary Roff’s father, built the first wood frame home in Watseka, which was located on the corner of Fourth and Oak Streets. They lived in this home from the late 1850s to 1868.
1865: Asa Roff finalizes the purchase of the property on Sheridan where the brick Roff Home would be built.
1868: Asa Roff completes construction of the first brick home in Watseka, which is located at 300 East Sheridan Street. Asa and Dorothy Roff live there from 1868 to 1879.
c.1868: When Asa and Dorothy Roff leave their original wood frame home, they sell it to their daughter Minerva, who lives there for several decades with her husband Henry Alter.
1878: Lurancy Vennum moves into the Roff Home at 300 E. Sheridan for 100 days, from Feb. 10 to May 21, 1878.
1879: Asa and Dorothy Roff sell the home at 300 E. Sheridan and move to Kansas.
1885: The Roff parents return to Watseka. At that time, it may be possible that they move into Minerva’s home on Fourth and Oak.
According to the Watseka Wonder pamphlet, the Roff’s wood frame home, which is known to have been located on the corner of Fourth and Oak Streets, was the first to be built in Watseka.
“In March, 1858, they returned to Gilman and remained there and at Onarga, Ill., till the building of the Toledo, Peoria and Warsaw Railroad, when they returned to Middleport, November 8, 1859, and built the first house in the new town of South Middleport, which is now a part of the City of Watseka . . .” (Watseka Wonder pamphlet, p. 25)
Title documents show that Mary Roff’s father, Asa B. Roff, and his business partner Robert Doyle purchased the property on Sheridan in 1864. At the time it consisted of an 80-acre tract of land. In 1865 the two split the property into two 40-acre tracts of land, with each partner taking separate ownership of each. A newspaper article from the time period states that the Roffs completed construction of the brick home at 300 E. Sheridan by 1868. Title documents show that they owned this home and property on Sheridan until selling it in 1879.
(A full list of owners of the property on Sheridan can be found here. All information has been retrieved from title documents used to establish ownership over time.)
In a book from 1893, a writer makes reference to Asa Roff’s two homes in Watseka:
“Mr. Roff erected the first frame house on the site of Watseka, built the first fine brick residence in the town, and was at one time a large property owner.” (Portrait and Biographical Record of Iroquois County, Illinois, containing Biographical Sketches of Prominent and Representative Citizens, Lake City Publishing Co., Chicago, 1893, p. 620–621.)
Research into legal documents has shown that by 1878, Minerva (Roff) Alter, Mary’s sister, had purchased the original Roff home — the home of Mary’s childhood — and was living there with her husband. Lurancy, as Mary, visited her there and reminisced about their time growing up in the home. Minerva’s comments in her prologue to the Watseka Wonder pamphlet make this distinction clear.
“During Mary’s visit, she and I spent many happy hours in going over the events of our girlhood days, many scenes of which I had forgotten until they were recalled by Mary. I remember that during one of these long talks, we were seated by the kitchen window overlooking a stretch of the garden in which my sister had played years before, and which surrounded the house in which she had died. Suddenly Mary exclaimed: ‘Oh, Nervie! Do you remember the time when Cousin Allie Roff and I found an old hen with sore eyes under that currant bush—how we bathed her eyes in ointment, and did all we could to cure her?’ I had forgotten this prank, and many others that Mary likewise called to mind for me.” (Watseka Wonder pamphlet, 1908 edition, p. 68)
This reference makes sense when it is understood that Minerva had purchased the childhood home and that Mary/Lurancy was visiting her there.
In the 1908 edition of the Watseka Wonder pamphlet, Minerva (Roff) Alter writes a prologue reaffirming her belief in the visitation from her sister Mary. In it she makes several references to Lurancy staying with her parents at a separate home from her own:
“It was at the final solicitation of the parents of Lurancy Vennum, that she became a temporary inmate of my mother’s home; it was so desired by Mr. and Mrs. Vennum with the hope that they might avoid committing Lurancy to an insane asylum.” (Watseka Wonder pamphlet, 1908 edition, p. 66)
“On a certain morning, my Mother and I were seated in Mother’s bed-chamber, with Lurancy between us . . .” (Watseka Wonder pamphlet, 1908 edition, p. 70)
“Dr. Stevens has faithfully portrayed many events occurring in this wonderful history ; and I might and would add many more that did not come under his notice, did I not feel that so to do could not further strengthen the evidence of an angel’s visitation to my Father’s home.” (Watseka Wonder pamphlet, 1908 edition, p. 71)
Minerva accompanied Mary/Lurancy in her final walk from the Roff Home to Lurancy’s home. She describes leaving her father’s home, walking up the street, and stopping briefly at her own home:
“On the morning of the day that was named, I went, as instructed by Mary, to my parents’ home for a final leave-taking ; and from thence it was arranged that I should accompany Mary to my Father’s office, and that Father should escort her home. . . . The sadness of a farewell is too well known to all mothers and sisters. Leaving the home arm-in-arm, Mary and I started on what was to me a most marvelous journey. Then did I fully realize the wonder of it ; I knew that but few mortals could understand I was walking down the road in close companionship with a conscious intelligence that had dwelt in another world for twelve years. But it was very real to me. . . . Together we entered my own home, which we passed to reach my Father’s office, for the last time ; and after we had rested for a few moments, and crowded into that brief space all the love and endearments we had so sorely missed from each other in a separation of years, the final kiss was given and returned—and in a moment Mary had left us for the last time.” (Watseka Wonder pamphlet, 1908 edition, p. 71-72)
The Watseka Wonder pamphlet also makes reference to rooms in the Roff Home — rooms that only make sense in the context of the brick home. For example, there is a reference to Lurancy being able to look directly up Fifth Street from her room at the Roff Home. Likewise, there are references to the front parlor and the uniqueness of the windows in the home.
Throughout the Watseka Wonder pamphlet, there are clear references to the homes of both the parents and Minerva. Knowing that Minerva had purchased the childhood home makes sense of these references. It is clear from these references that Lurancy stayed with the Roff parents, and it is clear from title documents that at the time of the Watseka Wonder story, the parents lived at 300 E. Sheridan St.
Unfortunately for history, the childhood home was torn down long ago. For several decades it stood on the northeast corner of Fourth and Oak Streets. An apartment building was built in its place, which has also since been torn down. A supermarket now stands over where the original Roff Home once stood.
When the Roff parents left the home on Sheridan, they moved to Kansas, returning in 1885 to Watseka. At the time they were experiencing severe financial hardship. It is quite possible that they moved in with Minerva and her family due to their own financial limitations. This could have lead to the perception decades later that the Roff family had always lived at Fourth and Oak. However, research clearly shows that this perception is false. At the time of the Watseka Wonder story in 1878, Asa and Dorothy Roff lived in the home at 300 E. Sheridan in Watseka, and Lurancy Vennum stayed with them for 100 days in that home.