In the middle to late 1800’s the village of Manito flourished. The reason for this high increase of population was because of the railroad. When first building the railroad, it ran every Monday and Thursday between Egypt Station (now Manito) and Pekin. The Illinois River Railroad Company established the railroad on July 22, 1869 and its purpose was to link Jacksonville to Peoria. It took around twelve years to complete this two hundred thirty four mile railway that zigzagged across the state of Illinois. Three and a half years after it was built, the railway started having problems and it went bankrupt. Peoria Jacksonville and Pekin then bought it, and also failed financially.

Years later, after many economic problems, Samuel Insull bought the railroad in 1922. He then named it the Chicago and Illinois Midland. As other transportation developed, the use of passenger trains slowly decreased. Manito then began building paved roads and people began driving automobiles in place of the passenger train. On May 8, 1953 Manito experienced its last passenger train ride. Today it is now known as Lost Creek Pottery and is owned by Larry and Debbie Kruzan who bought it in February 2005.