History · Mendon

Mendon’s history is
mostly unwritten

The public archives hold just one old photo of Mendon. The rest are in attics, shoeboxes and the historical society. Help start the collection.

1old images & papers
3recent photos
Mendon Depot 1910, 1910 · Wikimedia Commons

The story

from WikipediaRead it all ↗

Mendon was laid out a mile and a quarter from its current location in 1871 by Christopher Shupe. Shupe named it for his previous home place, Mendon, Illinois, which incorporated in 1867 and was named for Mendon, Massachusetts, incorporated precisely two centuries earlier, in 1667.

The Missouri area had been known as "Salt Creek", and businesses were in operation several years prior to the town plat actually being filed. Among the earliest was a general store built around 1865 by Mr. Bostich and Mr. Eastman. A Methodist church was erected in 1866. A sawmill was located five miles east of the town.

Text from Wikipedia, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0.

Timeline

built from the dates on the items below
1910Mendon Depot 1910Commons
1920–1999Nothing yet. Family albums go here.
Be one of the first

Start Mendon’s collection

The first neighbors to add old photos shape how Mendon’s history is told.

1 of 10 decades since 1900 have photos 🔁Retake an old viewMendon Depot 1910, 1910: stand where they stood+15 📦Share a family photoSign in to add one+10

Famous people close to Mendon

See all 20 →
By decade

Mendon, decade by decade

1920s–
1990s
Nothing in the archives for these yearsWeddings on Main Street, storms, parades, school pictures, the old store. If it’s in your family album, it belongs here.
📷 Add from your album
National Register of Historic Places

Nothing in Mendon is on the National Register yet

That’s true of most small towns. It doesn’t mean Mendon has no history, only that no one has written up a nomination. The closest listed place is Locust Hill in Brunswick, 10.6 miles away.

How a place gets listed

1Talk to the stateEvery nomination goes through the State Historic Preservation Office. Owners, towns and historical societies can start one.
2Try a local or state list firstMany states keep their own register with a shorter form, a common first step for old barns, halls and schoolhouses.
3Write it upA nomination covers the history, photos and a map. Locust Hill’s page links to a real one.
Know an old place in Mendon?A mill, a schoolhouse, a cellar hole, a church: add a photo of it to Mendon’s story, or a memory of it.
📷 Add a photo of an old place
National Park Service, National Register of Historic Places · photos from Wikimedia Commons

Then & now

No then-and-now pairs yet. Take a photo from the same spot as Mendon Depot 1910 (1910) and it appears here side by side.

🔁 Retake this view · +15

Stories next door

nearby towns’ history

From Wikimedia Commons (4). Images are copied here with their credits and licenses, shown on each photo’s page. Refreshed monthly.

We left the porch light on

Where to, neighbor?

You’re in Mendon, MOView boundary

Nearby

All towns & citiesExplore the map
Loading boundary…

Mendon is your selected town. The feed includes posts assigned to this town, not a distance radius or ZIP code.

Neighborhoods narrow the feed further, while townwide announcements, events, and issues remain visible.

Boundary source: https://tigerweb.geo.census.gov/arcgis/rest/services/TIGERweb/Places_CouSub_ConCity_SubMCD/MapServer/18 · 2025-01-01