Bellefontaine House

In front of Bellefontaine House, at 700 Church Street in Old Waterloo, a historical plaque indicates that “La Belle Fontaine” (The Beautiful Fountain) was one of the first settlements in what is now the State of Illinois. It is in the vicinity of this well preserved early American house, built at another time, that the colonization of Waterloo began in the Illinois Country of New France.

The site of La Belle Fontaine on the height of a natural elevation of the Mississippi riverbank was ideal for establishing a colony on account of the fact that the river’s low-lying grounds were often submerged by floodwaters, particularly in the spring. Moreover, for practical reasons it was important for the small French-speaking colony to be close to Fort de Chartres, the region’s government house. The first residential homes of Waterloo in the sunny Illinois Country were erected at the beginning of the 18th century.

One of the rare remains of the authentic King’s Highway can be seen from the lawn of Bellefontaine House (operated by the Monroe County Historical Society) looking south toward the trees of Breezy Hill Cemetery. The ground exposes the ruts of the numerous carriages drawn by horses which circulated in both directions on the King’s Highway in the 18th and 19th centuries.