Woodlawn, Illinois: A Railroad Village on Two Lines
Illinois
Woodlawn is a small incorporated village in Jefferson County in southern Illinois, established in eighteen seventy-six where the Louisville and Nashville Railroad crossed through Shiloh Township. A second rail line, the Chicago, Burlington and Quincy, ran through the northern edge of the village, giving it two connections to larger markets. That combination of rail access made Woodlawn a modest local hub in the farm country west of Mount Vernon.
The village sits near the border where Jefferson County meets Washington County to the west, in the gently rolling terrain that characterizes the Mount Vernon area. It has remained a small community, its fortunes tied to the agricultural economy of the surrounding bottomland.
