 By 1908 the growing town featured many new business spurred by the railroad including a hotel, lumber yard, photography studio, a bank, movie theater, flour mill, and several mercantile and hardware establishments.With this rapid growth residents felt it time to officially organize as a municipality and petitioned the Christian County court, which granted the request and appointed Clever's first Board of Trustees in February, 1909.In 1910 Clever's first documented population in the United States Census was 248.