USA > Iowa > Jones County > The history of Jones County, Iowa, containing a history of the county, its cities, towns, &c., biographical sketches of citizens history of the Northwest, history of Iowa > Part 9
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Could we sell the coal in this single State for one-seventh of one cent a ton it would pay the national debt. Converted into power, even with the wastage in our common engines, it would do more work than could be done by the entire race, beginning at Adam's wedding and working ten hours a day through all the centuries till the present time, and right on into the future at the same rate for the next 600.000 years.
Great Britain nses enough mechanical power to-day to give to each man, woman, and child in the kingdom the help and service of nineteen untiring servants. No wonder she has leisure and luxuries. No wonder the home of the common artisan has in it more luxuries than could be found in the palace of good old King Arthur. Think, if you can conceive of it, of the vast army of servants that slumber in the soil of Illinois. impatiently awaiting the call of Genius to come forth to minister to our comfort.
At the present rate of consumption England's coal supply will be exhausted in 250 years. When this is gone she must transfer her dominion either to the Indies, or to British America, which I would not resist; or to some other people, which I would regret as a loss to civilization.
COAL IS KING.
At the same rate of consumption ( which far exceeds our own) the deposit of coal in Illinois will last 120,000 years. And her kingdom shall be an everlasting kingdom.
Let us turn now from this reserve power to the annual products of
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HISTORY OF THE STATE OF ILLINOIS.
the State. We shall not be humiliated in this field. Here we strike the secret of our national credit. Nature provides a market in the constant appetite of the race. Men must eat, and if we can furnish the provisions we can command the treasure. All that a man hath will he give for his life.
According to the last census Illinois produced 30.000.000 of bushels of wheat. That is more wheat than was raised by any other State in the Union. She raised In 1875, 130.000,000 of bushels of corn-twice as much as any other State, and one-sixth of all the corn raised in .the United States. She harvested 2,747,000 tons of hay, nearly one-tenth of all the hay in the Republic. It is not generally appreciated, but it is true, that the hay crop of the country is worth more than the cotton crop. The hay of Illinois equals the cotton of Louisiana. Go to Charleston, S. C .. and see them peddling handfuls of hay or grass, almost as a curiosity, as we regard Chinese gods or the cryolite of Greenland; drink your coffee and condensed milk ; and walk back from the coast for many a league through the sand and burs till you get up into the better atmos- phere of the mountains, without seeing a waving meadow or a grazing herd ; then you will begin to appreciate the meadows of the Prairie State, where the grass often grows sixteen feet high.
The value of her farm implements is 8211,000,000, and the value of her live stock is only second to the great State of New York. in 1875 she had 25,000,000 hogs, and packed 2.113,845, about one-half of all that were packed in the United States. This is no insignificant item. Pork is a growing demand of the old world. Since the laborers of Europe have gotten a taste of our bacon, and we have learned how to pack it dry in boxes, like dry goods, the world has become the market.
The hog is on the march into the future. His nose is ordained to uncover the secrets of dominion, and his feet shall be guided by the star of empire.
Illinois marketed 857,000,000 worth of slaughtered animals-more than any other State, and a seventh of all the States.
Be patient with me, and pardon my pride, and I will give you a list of some of the things in which Illinois'excels all other States.
Depth and richness of soil ; per cent. of good ground ; acres of improved land ; large farms-some farms contain from 40.000 to 60.000 acres of cultivated land, 40,000 acres of corn on a single farm ; number of farmers ; amount of wheat, corn, oats and honey produced ; value of ani- mals for slaughter ; number of hogs; amount of pork ; number of horses -three times as many as Kentucky, the horse State.
Illinois excels all other States in miles of railroads and in miles of postal service, and in money orders sold per annum, and in the amount of lumber sold in her markets.
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HISTORY OF THE STATE OF ILLINOIS.
Illinois is only second in many important matters. This sample list comprises a few of the more important : Permanent school fund (good for a young state) ; total income for educational purposes: number of pub- lishers of books, maps, papers, etc .; value of farm products and imple- ments, and. of live stock ; in tons of coal mined.
The shipping of Illinois is only second to New York. Out of one port during the business hours of the season of navigation she sends forth a vessel every ten minutes. This does not include canal boats, which go one every five minutes. No wonder she is only second in number of bankers and brokers or in physicians and surgeons.
She is third in colleges, teachers and schools ; cattle, lead, hay, flax, sorghum and beeswax.
She is fourth in population, in children enrolled in public schools, in law schools, in butter, potatoes and carriages.
She is fifth in value of real and personal property, in theological seminaries and colleges exclusively for women. in milk sold, and in boots and shoes manufactured, and in book-binding.
She is only seventh in the production of wood, while she is the twelfth in area. Surely that is well done for the Prairie State. She now has much more wood and growing timber than she had thirty years ago.
A few leading industries will justify emphasis. She manufactures $205,000,000 worth of goods, which places her well up toward New York and Pennsylvania. The number of her manufacturing establishments increased from 1860 to 1870, 300 per cent .; capital employed increased 350 per cent., and the amount of product increased 400 per cent. She issued 5,500,000 copies of commercial and financial newspapers-only second to New York. She has 6,759 miles of railroad, thus leading all other States, worth 8636,458,000, using 3,245 engines, and 67,712 cars, making a train long enough to cover one-tenth of the entire roads of the State. Her stations are only five miles apart. She carried last year 15,795,000 passen- gers, an average of 363 miles, or equal to taking her entire population twice across the State. More than two-thirds of her land is within five miles of a railroad, and less than two per cent. is more than fifteen miles away.
The State has a large financial interest in the Illinois Central railroad. The road was incorporated in 1850, and the State gave each alternate sec- tion for six miles on each side, and doubled the price of the remaining land, so keeping herself good. The road received 2,595,000 acres of land, and pays to the State one-seventh of the gross receipts. The State receives this year 8350,000, and has received in all about 87,000,000. It is practically the people's road, and it has a most able and gentlemanly management. Add to this the annual receipts from the canal, 8111,000, and a large per cent. of the State tax is provided for.
105
HISTORY OF THE STATE OF ILLINOIS.
Illinois is only second in many important matters. This sample list comprises a few of the more important : Permanent school fund (good for a young state) ; total income for educational purposes ; number of pub- lishers of books, maps, papers, etc .; value of farm products and imple- ments, and. of live stock ; in tons of coal mined.
The shipping of Illinois is only second to New York. Out of one port during the business hours of the season of navigation she sends forth a vessel every ten minutes. This does not include canal boats, which go one every five minutes. No wonder she is only second in number of bankers and brokers or in physicians and surgeons.
She is third in colleges, teachers and schools; cattle, lead, hay, flax, sorghum and beeswax.
She is fourth in population, in children enrolled in public schools, in law schools, in butter, potatoes and carriages.
She is fifth in value of real and personal property, in theological seminaries and colleges exclusively for women. in milk sold, and in boots and shoes manufactured, and in book-binding.
She is only seventh in the production of wood, while she is the twelfth in area. Surely that is well done for the Prairie State. She now has much more wood and growing timber than she had thirty years ago.
A few leading industries will justify emphasis. She manufactures 8205,000,000 worth of goods, which places her well up toward New York and Pennsylvania. The number of her manufacturing establishments increased from 1860 to 1870, 300 per cent .; capital employed increased 350
per cent., and the amount of product increased 400 per cent. She issued 5,500,000 copies of commercial and financial newspapers-only second to New York. She has 6,759 miles of railroad, thus leading all other States, worth 8636,458,000, using 3,245 engines, and 67,712 ears, making a train long enough to cover one-tenth of the entire roads of the State. Her stations are only five miles apart. She carried last year 15,795,000 passen- gers, an average of 363 miles, or equal to taking her entire population twice across the State. More than two-thirds of her land is within five miles of a railroad, and less than two per cent. is more than fifteen miles away.
The State has a large financial interest in the Illinois Central railroad. The road was incorporated in 1850, and the State gave each alternate see- tion for six miles on each side, and doubled the price of the remaining land, so keeping herself good. The road received 2,595,000 acres of land, and pays to the State one-seventh of the gross receipts. The State receives this year $350,000, and has received in all about 87.000,000. It is practically the people's road, and it has a most able and gentlemanly management. Add to this the annual receipts from the canal, 8111,000, and a large per cent. of the State tax is provided for.
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HISTORY OF THE STATE OF ILLINOIS.
THE RELIGION AND MORALS
of the State keep step with her productions and growth. She was born of the missionary spirit. It was a minister who secured for her the ordi- nance of 1787, by which she has been saved from slavery, ignorance, and dishonesty. Rev. Mr. Wiley, pastor of a Scotch congregation in Randolph County, petitioned the Constitutional Convention of 1818 to recognize Jesus Christ as king, and the Scriptures as the only necessary guide and book of law. The convention did not act in the case, and the old Cove- nanters refused to accept citizenship. They never voted until 1824, when the slavery question was submitted to the people; then they all voted against it and cast the determining votes. Conscience has predominated whenever a great moral question has been submitted to the people.
But little mob violence has ever been felt in the State. In 1817 regulators disposed of a band of horse-thieves that infested the territory. The Mormon indignities finally awoke the same spirit. Alton was also the scene of a pro-slavery mob, in which Lovejoy was added to the list of martyrs. The moral sense of the people makes the law supreme, and gives to the State unruffled peace.
With 822,300,000 in church property, and 4,298 church organizations, the State has that divine police, the sleepless patrol of moral ideas; that alone is able to secure perfect safety. Conscience takes the knife from the assassin's hand and the bludgeon from the grasp of the highwayman. We sleep in safety, not because we are behind bolts and bars-these only fence against the innocent ; not because a lone officer drowses on a distant corner of a street; not because a sheriff may call his posse from a remote part of the county ; but because conscience guards the very portals of the air and stirs in the deepest recesses of the public mind. This spirit issues within the State 9,500,000 copies of religious papers annually, and receives still more from without. Thus the crime of the State is only one-fourth that of New York and one-half that of Pennsylvania.
Illinois never had but one duel between her own citizens. In Belle- ville, in 1820, Alphonso Stewart and William Bennett arranged to vindi- cate injured honor. The seconds agreed to make it a sham, and make them shoot blanks. Stewart was in the secret. Bennett mistrusted some- thing, and, unobserved, slipped a bullet into his gun and killed Stewart. He then fled the State. After two years he was caught, tried, convicted, and, in spite of friends and political aid, was hung. This fixed the code of honor on a Christian basis, and terminated its use in Illinois.
The early preachers were ignorant men, who were accounted eloquent according to the strength of their voices. But they set the style for all public speakers. Lawyers and political speakers followed this rule. Gov.
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HISTORY OF THE STATE OF ILLINOIS.
Ford says: "Nevertheless, these first preachers were of incalculable benefit to the country. They inculcated justice and morality. To them are we indebted for the first Christian character of the Protestant portion of the people."
In education Illinois surpasses her material resources. The ordinance of 1787 consecrated one thirty-sixth of her soil to common schools, and the law of 1818, the first law that went upon her statutes, gave three per cent. of all the rest to
EDUCATION.
The old compact secures this interest forever, and by its yoking morality and intelligence it precludes the legal interference with the Bible in the public schools. With such a start it is natural that we should have 11,050 schools, and that our illiteracy should be less than New York or . Pennsylvania, and only about one-half of Massachusetts. We are not to blame for not having more than one-half as many idiots as the great States. These public schools soon made colleges inevitable. The first college, still flourishing, was started in Lebanon in 1828, by the M. E. church, and named after Bishop MeRendree. Illinois College, at Jackson- ville, supported by the Presbyterians, followed in 1830. In 1832 the Bap- tists built Shurtleff College, at Alton. Then the Presbyterians built Knox College, at Galesburg, in 1838, and the Episcopalians built Jubilee College, at Peoria, in 1847. After these early years colleges have rained down. A settler could hardly encamp on the prairie but a college would spring up by his wagon. The State now has one very well endowed and equipped university, namely, the Northwestern University, at Evanston, with six colleges, ninety instructors, over 1,000 students, and 81,500,000 endow- ment.
Rev. J. M. Peck was the first educated Protestant minister in the State. He settled at Rock Spring, in St. Clair County, 1820, and left his impress on the State. Before 1837 only party papers were published, but Mr. Peck published a Gazetteer of Illinois. Soon after John Russell, of Bluffdale, published essays and tales showing genius. Judge James Hall published The Illinois Monthly Magazine with great ability, and an annual called The Western Souvenir, which gave him an enviable fame all over the United States. From these beginnings Illinois has gone on till she has more volumes in public libaaries even than Massachusetts, and of the 44,500,000 volumes in all the public libraries of the United States, she has one-thirteenth. In newspapers she stands fourth. Her increase is marvelous. In 1850 she issued 5,000,000 copies; in 1860, 27,590,000 ; in 1870, 113,140,000. In 1860 she had eighteen colleges and seminaries ; in 1870 she had eighty. That is a grand advance for the war decade.
This brings us to a record unsurpassed in the history of any age,
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HISTORY OF THE STATE OF ILLINOIS.
Ford says: "Nevertheless, these first preachers were of incalculable benefit to the country. They inculcated justice and morality. To them are we indebted for the first Christian character of the Protestant portion of the people."
In education Illinois surpasses her material resources. The ordinance of 1787 consecrated one thirty-sixth of her soil to common schools, and the law of 1818, the first law that went upon her statutes, gave three per cent. of all the rest to
EDUCATION.
The old compact secures this interest forever, and by its yoking morality and intelligence it precludes the legal interference with the Bible in the public schools. With such a start it is natural that we should have 11,050 schools, and that our illiteracy should be less than New York or . Pennsylvania, and only about one-half of Massachusetts. We are not to blame for not having more than one-half as many idiots as the great States. These public schools soon made colleges inevitable. The first college, still flourishing, was started in Lebanon in 1828, by the M. E. church, and named after Bishop MeRendree. Illinois College, at Jackson- ville, supported by the Presbyterians, followed in 1830. In 1832 the Bap- tists built Shurtleff College, at Alton. Then the Presbyterians built Knox College, at Galesburg, in 1838, and the Episcopalians built Jubilee College, at Peoria, in 1847. After these early years colleges have rained down. A settler could hardly encamp on the prairie but a college would spring up by his wagon. The State now has one very well endowed and equipped university, namely, the Northwestern University, at Evanston, with six colleges, ninety instructors, over 1,000 students, and 81,500,000 endow- ment.
Rev. J. M. Peck was the first educated Protestant minister in the State. He settled at Rock Spring, in St. Clair County, 1820, and left his impress on the State. Before 1837 only party papers were published, but Mr. Peck published a Gazetteer of Illinois. Soon after John Russell, of Bluffdale, published essays and tales showing genius. Judge James Hall published The Illinois Monthly Magazine with great ability, and an annual called The Western Souvenir, which gave him an enviable fame all over the United States. From these beginnings Illinois has gone on till she has more volumes in public libaaries even than Massachusetts, and of the 44,500,000 volumes in all the public libraries of the United States, she has one-thirteenth. In newspapers she stands fourth. Her increase is marvelous. In 1850 she issued 5,000,000 copies; in 1860, 27,590,000 ; in 1870, 113,140,000. In 1860 she had eighteen colleges and seminaries ; in 1870 she had eighty. That is a grand advance for the war decade.
This brings us to a record unsurpassed in the history of any age,
AN EARLY SETTLEMENT.
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1
THE STATE OF IOWA.
GEOGRAPHIICAL SITUATION.
The State of Iowa has an outline figure nearly approaching that of a ree- tangular parallelogram, the northern and southern boundaries being nearly due east and west lines, and its eastern and western boundaries determined by southerly flowing rivers-the Mississippi on the east, and the Missouri, together with its tributary, the Big Sioux, on the west. The northern boundary is upon the parallel of forty-three degrees thirty minutes, and the southern is approxi- mately upon that of forty degrees and thirty-six minutes. The distance from the northern to the southern boundary, excluding the small prominent angle at the southeast corner, is a little more than two hundred miles. Owing to the irregularity of the river boundaries, however, the number of square miles does not reach that of the multiple of these numbers; but according to a report of the Secretary of the Treasury to the United States Senate, Mareb 12, 1863, the State of Iowa contains 35,228,200 aeres, or 55,044 square miles. When it is understood that all this vast extent of surface, except that which is occupied by our rivers, lakes and peat beds of the northern counties, Is susceptible of the highest cultivation, some idea may be formed of the immense agricultural resources of the State. Iowa is nearly as large as England, and twice as large as Scotland : but when we consider the relative area of surface which may be made to yield to the wants of man, those countries of the Old World will bear no comparison with Iowa.
TOPOGRAPHY.
No complete topographieal survey of the State of Iowa has yet been made. Therefore all the knowledge we have yet upon the subject has been obtained fromn ineidental observations of geological corps, from barometrical observations by authority of the General Government, and levelings done by railroad en- gineer corps within the State.
Taking into view the facts that the highest point in the State is but a little more than twelve hundred feet above the lowest point, that these two points are nearly three hundred miles apart, and that the whole State is traversed by
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HISTORY OF THE STATE OF IOWA.
gently flowing rivers, it will be seen that in reality the State of Iowa rests wholly within, and comprises a part of, a vast plain, with no mountain or hill ranges within its borders.
A elearer idea of the great uniformity of the surface of the State may be obtained from a statement of the general slopes in feet per mile, from point to point, in straight lines aeross it :
From the N. E. corner to the S. E. corner of the State. 1 foot 1 inch per mile.
From the N E. corner to Spirit Lake 5 feet 5 inches per mile.
From the N. W. corner to Spirit Lake. 5 feet 0 inches per mile.
From the N. W. corner to the S. W. corner of the State 2 feet 0 inches per mile. From the S. W corner to the highest ridge between the two
great rivers (in Ringgold County ) ... 4 feet 1 inch per mile
From the dividing ridge in the S. E. corner of the State. 5 feet 7 inches per mile.
From the highest point in the State (near Spirit Lake) to the
lowest point in the State (at the mouth of Des Moines River) 4 feet 0 inches per mile.
It will be seen, therefore, that there is a good degree of propriety in regard- ing the whole State as a part of a great plain, the lowest point of which within its borders, the southeast corner of the State, is only 444 feet above the level of the sea. The average height of the whole State above the level of the sea is not far from eight hundred feet, although it is more than a thousand miles inland from the nearest sea coast. These remarks are, of course, to be under- stood as applying to the surface of the State as a whole. When we come to consider its surface feature in detail, we find a great diversity of surface by the formation of valleys out of the general level, which have been evolved by the action of streams during the unnumbered years of the terraee epoeh.
It is in the northeastern part of the State that the river valleys are deepest : consequently the country there has the greatest diversity of surface, and its physical features are most strongly marked.
DRAINAGE SYSTEM.
The Mississippi and Missouri Rivers form the eastern and western bounda- ries of the State, and receive the eastern and western drainage of it.
The eastern drainage system comprises not far from two-thirds of the en- tire surface of the State. The great watershed which divides these two systems is formed by the highest land between those rivers along the whole length of a line running southward from a point on the northern boundary line of the State near Spirit Lake, in Dickinson County, to a nearly central point in the northern part of Adair County.
From the last named point, this highest ridge of land. between the two great rivers, continues southward, without change of character, through Ringgold County into the State of Missouri ; but southward from that point, in Adair County, it is no longer the great watershed. From that point, another and lower ridge bears off more nearly southeastward, through the counties of Madi- son, Clarke, Lueas and Appanoose, and becomes itself the great watershed.
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HISTORY OF THE STATE OF IOWA.
RIVERS.
All streams that rise in Iowa rise upon the incoherent surface deposits, occupying at first only slight depressions in the surface, and scarcely percept- ible. These successively coalesce to form the streams.
The drift and bluff deposits are both so thick in Iowa that its streamis net only rise upon their surface, but they also reach considerable depth into these deposits alone, in some cases to a depth of nearly two hundred feet from the general prairie level.
The majority of streams that constitute the western system of Iowa drainage run, either along the whole or a part of their course, upon that peeulir deposit known as bluff deposit. Their banks are often, even of the small streams, from five to ten feet in height, quite perpendicular, so that they make the streams almost everywhere unfordable, and a great impediment to travel across the open country where there are no bridges.
The material of this deposit is of a slightly yellowish ash color, except where darkened by decaying vegetation, very fine and silicious, but not sandy, not very cohesive, and not at all plastic. It forms excellent soil, and does not bake or erack in drying, except limy coneretions, which are generally dis- tributed throughout the mass, in shape and size resembling pebbles; not a stone or pebble can be found in the whole deposit. It was called " silicious marl" by Dr. Owen, in his geological report to the General Government, and its origin referred to an accumulation of sediment in an ancient lake, which was afterward drained, when its sediment became dry land. Prof. Swallaw gives it the name of "bluff." which is here adopted; the term Laeustral would have been better. The peculiar properties of this deposit are that it will stand securely with a precipitous front two hundred feet high, and yet is easily excavated with a spade. Wells dug in it require only to be walled to a point just above the water line. Yet, compact as it is, it is very porous, so that water which falls on its surface does not remain, but percolates through it; neither does it accumulate within its mass, as it does upon the surface of and within the drift and the stratified formations.
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