Babylon Bend is one of those places. One of those places that when standing on its soil, and looking around, you have the feeling that there is something much bigger here. While there are now just a handful of residents living on a dead end road, it’s not over yet. Something remains.
On Saturday, Oct. 24, I went looking for a place to go along with my story on the Hubbell Circus Troupe. I needed a physical place to go with the documentation, just for my own curiosity mainly. What I found did not disappoint, in fact I can’t get it out of my mind. Babylon Bend is nothing short of beautiful. I was delighted to see that the 1890 bridge made of steel and iron is still there, both ends barricaded with steel girders and dirt. The fabulous bridge, which is, or was, on the National Registry of Historical Places, still stands but is not safe for any traffic, walking or automobile, and I stress that. When one reaches the closed bridge, you must turn around in private driveways. But to be honest, the bridge is outstanding and worth seeing. It spans the Spoon River proudly and one can easily imagine the traffic it carried from 1890 into the 2000s.
I hesitate to give out much geographical information on this forgotten tiny community.
Wesley Salathiel "Jake" Hubbell, head of the Hubbell Circus Troupe, who later became a Ringling Brothers superstar.
I’m sure the residents don’t want the traffic and lookers and a sign at the entrance to Babylon does indeed say “No Through Traffic Local Residents Only.” But, if you must see it, please be respectful.
That’s all I can say about that. Don’t trespass and stay away from the bridge. I took a friend with me who was a Fulton County mail carrier for many years. She took notes, helped navigate, and took pictures. She was as enraptured with Babylon Bend as I was. Thank you, Terry Cummins for riding shotgun on our trip to the town that time forgot.
My research on the Hubbell Circus Troupe that resided in Babylon Bend in the early 1900s has proven to be fascinating. I mainly wanted to go to Babylon to see not only the bridge, but to try to figure out where the famous HILL was that the Hubbells lived on. Descriptions in reference books only say that the family lived about two-thirds up the south side, and that they strung wires amongst the trees on the hill to practice their trapeze acts.
We looked and looked at every hill in Babylon near and far, trying to figure out if it could have been the one. Finally, a nice gentleman walked up and I told them what I was looking for. He said to follow him and we only had to walk a matter of a few yards and he pointed to the hill right next to the narrow road where we were standing. A long sweeping hill with a gentle slope overlooking the Spoon River. A stone well cover still remains. He pointed to a clump of trees about two thirds of the way up and said “That’s where the house was.
This is where your Hubbells lived.” What we had been looking for was right in plain sight. I was standing in Hubbell's front yard.
The Genius of Jake and Ike Hubbell While Part 1 of my story talked mainly about the Hubbell sisters and their national circus accomplishments, it soon became clear that the force behind the Hubbell Family Circus Troupe was another family member: Jake Hubbell.
The young man was not only a circus performer, he possessed many talents. And I can safely surmise, Jake Hubbell was a fascinating, entertaining man and a force of nature. I would love to have met him.
Wesley Salathiel “Jake” Hubbell was born in Fulton County on Aug. 25, 1882, son of Frank and Melissa Sprague Hubbell. On March 4, 1911, he married Marjorie Pudney, and she preceded him in death in 1962.
Those who knew Jake Hubbell say he was a perfectionist, never missing at anything. Whether it be his trapeze act, his paintings, his wood carvings, or airplane building, Jake Hubbell was good at everything he did.
Harold Fouts, who lived in the area, recalls seeing Jake suspended over the Spoon River, hanging from his knees, waiting for his partner to do a double flip after swinging from the other side … Jake was to catch him.
Fouts recalls Jake would make his partner keep at it until he was finally in Jake’s hands, but not with at least 1,000 falls into the river.
While it sounds like the Hubbells were never injured or had close calls, the circus was a dangerous business.
After Jake retired in later years, his trapeze partner crashed to his death during an act. He didn’t have the perfectionist Jake Hubbell to catch him.
Jake’s father ran a mine in Babylon Bend and a mine in Middlegrove, a small, unincorporated community in Fulton County situated on Illinois 116 west of Farmington. As a young man, Jake worked at the mines in the winter, but when summer came around, he was off to the circus. Jake’s brother, Ike, seemed to always be an accomplice to his sibling’s doings.
In 1908, no doubt inspired by the 1903 flight of the Wright Brothers at Kittyhawk, NC, Jake and Ike decided they wanted to build an airplane and fly it.
According to Fouts, who was all of eight years old, the Hubbells’ flight was the same year as Halley’s Comet. Fouts remembers his mother stuffing rags around the doors and windows to keep out poisonous gases. Fouts remembered his family hooking up the surrey and traveling two miles to watch the Hubbells’ maiden flight.
People had come from all over the country in horse and buggies and sat along the roadside waiting. And waiting. And waiting. Finally here come the Hubbells, carrying the plane on a hayrack. They had scraped away a runway with something, making it maybe 25 feet wide. Everyone was clapping and screaming, Fouts recalled. They lit torches, probably cattails, that lined both sides of the runway.
Then there was absolute silence as people held their breath. The plane rolled down a slope then disappeared. The Hubbells claimed the plane did become airborne, and the test was deemed successful.
Jake left for the circus that summer, as he did every summer, and gave brother Ike $1,200 to improve the plane’s engine and get the plane flying. When Jake returned, the plane was in a thousand pieces. Ike had dismantled it.
Ike had, however, built a plane engine. It was made of brass ammunition cartridges and had four cylinders that ran on compressed air.
The fuselage was about 10 feet long and pointed on each end. Ike pumped the fuselage with a hand pump before each flight, and the propeller was about two feet long. It was quite impressive, but whether Ike got a patent is not clear.
Fouts remembered that Jake and Ike were not only circus stars, they were inventors. As a young boy Fouts, when walking through Babylon Bend, would stare at the blacksmith shop where the engine was being built, even walking backwards till it was out of sight. While young Fouts was fascinated by the Hubbells, the rest of the community wasn’t so sure about this odd, gypsy-like family. But that was okay, because the Hubbells bothered no one. They preferred to be left alone.
Jake and his wife watch their tight rope class in progress. From left are Jake, Louise Morse, Mrs. Hubbell, Ima Jean Pabst Page, Laverne Stockham, Eileen Morse Sheets and Audrey Elliott.
Fouts said Jake set up a trapeze and a tight rope on their hill overlooking the Spoon River, and the Hubbell Family Circus Troupe practiced there. Jake Hubbell was with the circus for 32 years. Fouts moved away, but saw Jake again at a mining reunion at Middlegrove many years later. Jake, who was in his 80s by then, had brought to the reunion a show troupe of girls he had trained and had them walk a tight rope for entertainment.
Then Jake proceeded to do a handspring and walk on his hands. Once a showman, always a showman.
While Jake had at first performed with local groups, he had then gone on to the big time of the Ringling Brothers and a Hagenbeck-Wallace, major circuses of the day. Jake Hubbell, from Babylon Bend, Illinois, was a superstar. Jake had married a circus woman from England and the two became famous for the ironjaw act. He was director and trainer and his wife was the star performer, suspended by her teeth from the Big Top. Jake trained his brother Ike’s daughters (Erma, Jessie and Mabel) and the three became famous on the tight rope. It was Ike’s daughter, Mabel, who married movie star Tom Mix.
When Jake retired he bought a 60-acre farm near Bagnell Dam, MO. For the first three years, the farm did well, then the crops burned up. Jake decided he was done with farming, went across the road and told the young boy and his sister and their parents that he was deeding the farm to them, house and all because he was leaving.
Jake had decided to return to his roots and moved back to Middlegrove. Jake continued to teach young girls to walk the tight rope. And he wasn’t done with life yet. He made professional quality violins and gave them away.
One violin he gifted was to his doctor in Peoria, who played in the Peoria Symphony. The doctor played Hubbell’s violin in performances and soon had orders for Jake, at $600 a piece.
Hubbell didn’t want the orders or the money, he said he just wanted his doctor to have a decent violin.
Jake was a carver/whittler. He carved a complete team of baseball players for Carl Hubbell, no relation, of the New York Giants, just because he admired the pitcher’s ability. He carved movie star and ice skating champion Sonya Henie a likeness of her skating. At first Henie was alarmed, fearing Jake was some nut.
But with her lawyer’s findings that Hubbell was just a nice guy, she wrote Jake a nice letter back.
Jake Hubbell still wasn’t done. He painted pictures of dogs, children, and mountain scenes, and one of his religious oil paintings of Jesus was said to hang in the Middlegrove Methodist Church. All of his paintings were given as gifts, he wanted no money. Marshall Fields in Chicago wanted to place an order, but Hubbell declined the offer.
Ike meanwhile lost his eyesight, but still continued to invent things. He created a mining bit that was the best in the world. A friend by the name of Morse served as Ike’s eyes. Morse, a former coal miner, had two daughters that the Hubbells taught to walk the tight rope. Morse and Ike sold the bits for $200 each, and immediately made $5,000. People all over the country were crying for them, but until the $5,000 was gone, Ike wouldn’t make any more. Ike could have become very wealthy on the drill bit invention alone.
Let this sink in. Jake and Ike Hubbell each had a sixth grade education. Morse would later state that both of the Hubbell brothers were geniuses, there wasn’t anything they couldn’t do. Ike was proficient in geometry, algebra, trigonometry and calculus - courses he had never had in a formal school. They could have both been millionaires, Morse explained, but for them it was never about the money.
It was about living life.
Jake’s obituary said he died in Middlegrove at age 83, the year being 1966. He was at the home of Charles Scott. Jake was survived by nieces and nephews. I have not found that Jake and his wife had any children.
His older brother Ike had passed away in 1962 at age 82. Jake’s funeral was held at Anderson Funeral Home in Middlegrove and burial was in Brunswick Cemetery. This writer will find his grave one day and leave flowers for this circus star from Babylon Bend.
Stay tuned for Part 3, Growing up in Babylon Bend: The Coopers/ Babylon Bend Today.
Credits: Dana Parson, resident of Babylon Bend Canton Daily Ledger History of Fulton County
