Reavis, Logan U.

Born: 1831-03-26 Mason County, Illinois

Died: 1889-04-25 Saint Louis, Missouri

Alternate name: Revis

Logan U. Reavis was a farm hand, teacher, journalist, newspaper publisher, and Republican. He was orphaned at a young age and grew up poor. At age twelve, he relocated to Bond County, Illinois with a guardian. In 1840, he attempted an overland journey to California via St. Louis, Missouri, but his party was forced to turn back. Although he had limited access to education, he attended at least some high school. He worked as a farm hand and a schoolteacher from 1851 until 1855, when he began working at the Gazette in Beardstown, Illinois. He eventually purchased this newspaper as part of a joint stock company of fellow Republicans. They changed the name of the paper to the Central Illinoisan, and Reavis managed the paper until the fall of 1857. He moved to the Nebraska Territory for two years, then returned to Beardstown and resumed publication of the Illinoisan sometime in 1860. He married and had at least two children. He sold his interest in the paper for the final time and moved to St. Louis after the Civil War.

Franklin William Scott, Newspapers and Periodicals of Illinois, 1814-1879, vol. 6 of Collections of the Illinois State Historical Library (Springfield: Illinois State Historical Library, 1910), 19; James Grant Wilson and John Fiske, eds., “Reavis, Logan Uriah,” Appletons’ Cyclopaedia of American Biography (New York: D. Appleton, 1888), 5:202; The Saint Louis Republic (MO), 26 April 1889, 3:5.