Pottawatomie, Kickapoo, and Winnebago tribes inhabited the region before settlers found mostly open prairie around Mattoon, where scarce timber, tall grasses, and wet marshy land later drained and cultivated in the latter 1800s proved extremely fertile. The town took shape from land purchases beginning with Ebenezer Noyes, who began farming nearby in 1834 and helped purchase the original town site in 1852, and from other early figures including Stephen Dexter Dole, Elisha Linder, and James T. Cunningham. Mattoon was named for William B. Mattoon, chief construction officer for the Terre Haute and Alton Railroad, though local stories differed on how the name was secured. Unlike most cities founded near water and timber, Mattoon emerged in 1855 from the crossing of two rail lines, which spurred commercial development, rising land prices, hotels for railroad passengers, and later broader growth based on rich soil and oil deposits.