Anton Schott, Edward Abend, Adolph Engelmann, and Adolph Reuss were prominent German settlers of Shiloh Valley. A doctor of philosophy and religion, Schott had been a history professor before coming to the United States and settling in Shiloh Valley. His love of reading and learning led him to create the German Library Association of St. Clair County in 1836. First organized as a subscription library, it later became the Belleville Public Library. Schott served as librarian and kept the books at his farm, and members included Gustave Koerner, George Bunsen, Friedrich Engelmann, and Adolph Reuss. Abend settled on a farm in Shiloh Valley with the Engelmann family, and for a time Gustave Koerner was his teacher. He later moved to Belleville, where he promoted the toll road between Belleville and St. Louis, served as president of Belleville's first street railroad, led the Belleville Water Company, Belleville Brick Company, Belleville Gas Light and Coke Company, and the Belleville Savings Bank, became a major land developer, and served four terms as the city's mayor. Adolph Engelmann, the youngest son of Friedrich Engelmann, volunteered in the Mexican-American War, then returned to the German States to fight after the 1848 revolutions in Europe. Back in Shiloh Valley he took over the family farm. When the Civil War began, he again volunteered, serving with the 43rd Illinois Volunteer Infantry, later commanding the regiment and leaving service as a brevet brigadier general. After the war he continued to run the farm and also served as Belleville's postmaster. Reuss, a medical doctor who came to the United States in 1832 after training in Paris, Berlin, and Göttingen, bought a farm in Shiloh Valley and continued his medical practice. In 1865 he helped start the St. Clair County Medical Society. Known as a respected country doctor, he traveled the area's roads to serve his patients, and his personal library held volumes in the several languages he spoke while he was also an accomplished musician.