Rensselaer Semi-Weekly Republican, Volume 19, Number 59, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 29 March 1898 — Why Clark Street is so Named. [ARTICLE]

Why Clark Street is so Named.

As most of our renders know, that part of the Poor Farm gravel road which is within the limits of the town or adjacent to the additions thereof was named “Clark Street,” some time ago, by the city council. This name was not, as many suppose, chosen in imitation of the famous, and also infamous street of that name in Chicago, but has a more honorable reason for its choice. The name was given in honor of Dr. Joshua Clark, grandfather of our town man, ll. r P. Benjamin. He became a resident of this comity in the thirties, and is said to be the first physician Jaspor county ever had. He lived for a time in a house near where is now the street named in his honor, a little beyond the creek that comes down through Benjamin & Magee’s addition. Later he kept a hotel for a long time in a building on the lots on Van Rensselaer street north of the White livery barn, and planted the cedar trees that grow there to this day. Ho wus a useful nnd much estoemod citizen nnd it is well and good that his name should be perpetuated, by one of the streets of our city.