Colp is a village in Williamson County,

Illinois Illinois ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Midwestern United States, Midwestern United States. It borders on Lake Michigan to its northeast, the Mississippi River to its west, and the Wabash River, Wabash and Ohio River, Ohio rivers to its ...

United States The United States of America (USA), also known as the United States (U.S.) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It is a federal republic of 50 U.S. state, states and a federal capital district, Washington, D.C. The 48 ...

. The population was 225 at the 2010 census.

History

Colp was established in the early 1900s and named for John Colp (1849–1920), whose mining company opened a mine in the area in 1901. The

Illinois Central Railroad The Illinois Central Railroad , sometimes called the Main Line of Mid-America, is a railroad in the Central United States. Its primary routes connected Chicago, Illinois, with New Orleans, New Orleans, Louisiana, and Mobile, Alabama, and thus, ...

extended a line to the mine in 1904. The village incorporated in 1915. The village was inhabited by eastern European immigrants who worked in the mines, including

Rusyns Rusyns, also known as Carpatho-Rusyns, Carpatho-Russians, Ruthenians, or Rusnaks, are an East Slavs, East Slavic ethnic group from the Carpathian Rus', Eastern Carpathians in Central Europe. They speak Rusyn language, Rusyn, an East Slavic lan ...

. Colp mayor Frank Caliper was one of the state's longest-serving elected officials. He served 52 years as mayor from 1935 until his death on March 28, 1987.

Mining

Several companies established coal mines in Colp: * Colp Coal Company * Pittsburg and Big Muddy Coal Company (purchased the Colp Coal Company in 1918) * Ernest Coal Company * Cosgrove-Meehan Coal Company

Geography

Colp is located at . According to the 2010 census, Colp has a total area of , all land.

Demographics

At the 2020

census A census (from Latin ''censere'', 'to assess') is the procedure of systematically acquiring, recording, and calculating population information about the members of a given Statistical population, population, usually displayed in the form of stati ...

,United States Census Bureau
/ref> the village had a population of 168 people, with 95 households and 94 families residing in the village. The population density was . There were 112 housing units at an average density of . The racial makeup of the village was 76.34%

White White is the lightest color and is achromatic (having no chroma). It is the color of objects such as snow, chalk, and milk, and is the opposite of black. White objects fully (or almost fully) reflect and scatter all the visible wa ...

, 21.43%

African American African Americans, also known as Black Americans and formerly also called Afro-Americans, are an Race and ethnicity in the United States, American racial and ethnic group that consists of Americans who have total or partial ancestry from an ...

, 0.89% Native American, 0.45% from other races, and 0.89% from two or more races. There were 103 households, of which 23.3% had children under the age of 18 living with them, 40.8% were

married couples Marriage, also called matrimony or wedlock, is a culturally and often legally recognised union between people called spouses. It establishes rights and obligations between them, as well as between them and their children (if any), and b ...

living together, 15.5% had a female householder with no husband present, and 40.8% were non-families. 33.0% of all households were made up of individuals, and 12.6% had someone living alone who was 65 years of age or older. The average household size was 2.17 and the average family size was 2.75. Age distribution was 22.8% under the age of 18, 10.3% from 18 to 24, 26.8% from 25 to 44, 21.9% from 45 to 64, and 18.3% who were 65 years of age or older. The median age was 38 years. For every 100 females, there were 89.8 males. For every 100 females age 18 and over, there were 86.0 males. The median household income was $14,722, and the median family income was $14,286. Males had a median income of $26,250 versus $11,875 for females. The

per capita income Per capita income (PCI) or average income measures the average income earned per person in a given area (city, region, country, etc.) in a specified year. In many countries, per capita income is determined using regular population surveys, such ...

for the village was $13,769. About 44.8% of families and 37.6% of the population were below the

poverty line The poverty threshold, poverty limit, poverty line, or breadline is the minimum level of income deemed adequate in a particular country. The poverty line is usually calculated by estimating the total cost of one year's worth of necessities for ...

, including 53.3% of those under the age of eighteen and 25.0% of those 65 or over.

References

{{authority control Villages in Williamson County, Illinois Coal towns in Illinois Populated places in Southern Illinois Rusyn-American history Villages in Illinois