[2] It drains northwest toward the West Fork of Sugar Creek, a southwest-flowing stream within the Sangamon River watershed.

A rival town, Wilkesborough, just over a mile to the east, was laid out by James O. Barnard on June 3 of the same year.

[5] Like many other new places laid out in the 1830s, the original plan of the new town was designed around a central public square.

In effect, this unusual feature of the plan made it possible to subdivide the square into four smaller rectangles.

One of these rectangles has always been a park, but the other three have been put to different civic uses, including locations for the library, fire station, water tower, and school gymnasium.

[9] In the late 1850s and 1860s, farmers began moving into the prairies around the newly renamed town, which became the center of an exceptionally productive agricultural district.

In the 1850s the Illinois Central and the Chicago and Alton railroads had both passed through McLean County, but neither came close to Danvers.

Many other communities in the state were taking similar action, something most of them came to regret: the bonds were quickly sold in Europe or the East, and the taxpayers of towns and townships were forced to pay for railroads that often provided indifferent service.

A great public picnic was held, and large amounts of chicken, oysters and coffee were consumed.

[10] Scheduled rail service would continue until December 1982, and the last special train stopped in Danvers in August 1984.

The Illinois Traction System operated long after similar electric railroads in other areas had closed.

In 1942 the interurban tracks were threatened when the government scoured the country for surplus metal for war needs, but citizens protested that the electric railroad was vital to local people and saved great amounts of gasoline.

Much of this increase in population was due to a substantial number of people who found the town a pleasant residential base when working in Bloomington-Normal or Peoria.

In the late nineteenth and twentieth centuries, Danvers was the home of Dr. F. J. Parkhurst's distinctive alcohol treatment facility, the Willow Bark Institute.

Beginning in 1880 the doctor sought to treat addiction to strong spirits by administering small amounts of alcohol, followed by a stiff dose of foul-tasting willow-bark extract.

[15] The village is currently home to a cooperative grain elevator, two bars, a bank, and a gas station.