This area now known as Bentley's Corners was originally known as
Clarendon Centre. It was settled in 1832 by William Mills. The name
of the township and the town was derived from the location of many
of the pioneers, Clarendon, New York. The town's current namesake,
Samuel Bently, arrived a bit later in 1851. He later built a
grocery store in 1857, building a new one in 1863. A post office
was opened in June 14, 1854 with Warren L Demming as its first post
master. Bently was appointed deputy who was accredited as perfoming
many of the tasks. In 1871, with the opening of the rail at
Clarendon Station two miles north of Clarendon Centre, the post
office was moved north and renamed Clarendon.
Other businesses in the town included a blacksmith shop opened
by Mr. Sylvestor. Shortly after opening his blacksmith shop, Bently
opened his own as well. Also noted were a saw mill, wagon shop, and
other blacksmith shops.
A Methodist Episcopal Church was formed around 1840 meeting in
one of the members homes until building its own structure around
1850. This new structure was built for community use for use of
funerals and religion services regardless of denomination. By the
late 1870s, the society has merged to Tekonsha and the building was
seldom used.
Schools were a bit late coming in this part of the township as
most of the settlers did not have children. As a result, the
schools were not located directly in town. The first school built
in this area was District No. 5 in 1845, which was located north of
the corners. No schools were further south for many years due to
lack of children.
This town showed a lot of promise, but when the railroad came
through, it followed a northernly route connecting Homer and
Marshall, which ended up bypassing the town of Clarendon Centre by
two miles.