Equality. Gallatin. Village (1851, 1872) ten miles east of Harrisburg. Founded about 1827 by Willis Hargrave, John Black, and Thornton Cum(m)ings. Formerly known as the Gallatin Salines, a tract of some hundred thousand acres set aside for the federal government’s salt works. The name is attributed to a French historian, Etienne Volney, who visited the salines in the winter of 1797 and suggested the name Equality as a reflection of one of the main principles of the American and French revolutions (Lawler, Gallatin County, 81; Miller, “Building Towns,” 53). Post office established May 24, 1812, as United States Saline; changed to Equality July 20, 1827.

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From Place Names of Illinois by Edward Callary