USA > Illinois > DuPage County > A history of the County of Du Page, Illinois > Part 5
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EDUCATION, SCHOOLS AND ACADEMIES.
The more judicious laws of recent times, have done much for the interest of our schools. These laws have .
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been well observed by the people of Du PAGE County. We now have about seventy school districts, which are provided with good school buildings and good schools. Much of our advancement in this respect, is due to the indefatigable labors of our late school com- missioner, Rev. Hope Brown. From Mr. Brown's annual report of 1855, we give some extracts showing the state of our schools at that time :
" The whole number of school districts in the county is sixty-eight, sixty-four of which are provided with school houses. If we divide these houses into four elasses, we may reckon twenty in the first class, and call them extra; we may also reekon twenty in the second class, and call them good; we may reckon sixteen in the third class, and' eall them passable ; and that will leave eight for the fourth class, which may justly be called MISERABLE. Three new houses have been erected the last year, and preparations are being made for the creation of several more the present year. In relation to this subject, there is generally, throughout the county, a disposition to make progress in the right direction. No district is willing to have its school house reported year after year, as being miserably poor, and entirely unfit to be occupied for school purposes. Since I first began to visit our schools, five years ago, and to report the condition of the school houses in our county paper, thirty new ones have been erected, and several others have undergone important repairs ; and the prospect now is, that no distriet will be long without a house that they will be unwilling to have visited and reported just as it is. The whole number of pupils connected ·with our distriet schools the past winter, is not far from two thousand ; among this number, about twelve hundred have attended to arithmetic, five hundred have studied geography, two hundred and fifty English grammar, and about one hundred have attended to higher branches, such as algebra, natural philosophy, physiology, and the history of the United States.
"The schools have generally been taught fromn six to eight months each, during the year. In a few distriets there has been no school during;the winter. The wages of teachers have been, for females, from eight to sixteen dollars per month and board ; for males, from sixteen to thirty per month and board. It is an omen of good, that there is a
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disposition to give to teachers a better remuneration for their services, than they have received in years past. When good wages are offered, then good qualifications may be rigidly insisted upon. Of all cheap things, cheap teachers are the first to be repudiated. When, by the , special pleading of school directors, I am urged to give a certificate .to a teacher, whom I have good reason to regard as unqualified to instruct in each of the branches required by law to be taught in our district schools, I feel that I am asked to do that which will not be likely to promote the interests of education -in any sehool. The district that cannot afford to have a good teacher, should- not throw away thcir money by employing a poor teacher. In examining teachers, I may have been regarded as being unnecessarily strict, but I have at all times aimed to be governed by "law and evidence," and where I have refused a certificate, it has been because the applicant has not furnished evidenee on examination, that he possessed the qualifieations which the law requires. If, in respect to this important duty I have crred, it has been in being too lenient rather than in being too striet. If none but those who are well qualified, as the law requires, can be approbated, then none but sueh as regard themselves as well qualified, will be likely to apply for or eonsent to be employed in any school in our eounty. In visiting and examining our schools the past winter, I found them generally in a prosperous condition. To this general remark there may be three or four exeeptions; and where these exceptions apply, if school directors had been faithful in the diseharge of the duties devolving upon them as sueh, these sehools would no doubt have been much better than what they werc. As a whole, our distriet sehools may be regarded as doing much, very much, for the advancement of the prosperity of our eounty.
"In addition to our district schools, there are in the county threc incorporated academies, 'The Naperville Academy,' 'The Illinois Institute' and the 'Warrenville Seminary ;' the two former of which are in a prosperous condition, but the latter is suspended for the present. There are also six private schools in the county. In these schools and in the above named academies, there have been the past winter, about five hundred pupils ; so that in view of our academics and sehools, public and private, we may regard this eounty as well furnished with the means of education, or at least in a fair way to be well furnished. Let the same progress in respect to sehools be made in this county for five years to eome, which has been made during the preceding five years, and but few counties, either west or east, will be better furnished with the
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means of education than will Du PAGE County. School directors, in many instances, have been sadly delinquent in relation to the duty of visiting schools under their immediate supervision. It is believed that there are those who sustain this responsible office, who have not visited the schools legally under their care, even once during the entire year. Such do not magnify their office, nor docs their office magnify them. But a word to the wise may be sufficient."
A brief notice of our incorporated institutions of learning will be found in the histories of the towns in which they are situated.
HIEALTII.
This county is proverbial for its healthfulness, but diseases of the inore acute form, as billions and typhus fevers, fever and ague, are not uncommon at some seasons of the year. The climate is mild and salu- brious. The heat of the summer is perhaps greater than it is in the same latitude of the eastern states, but our winters are far less severe.
THE COUNTY PRESS.
To write out the newspaper history of Du PAGE County, is but to record a succession of failures. The first newspaper was established at the county seat. Being situated on the principal route for transit be- tween the Rock river country and Chicago, Naperville had grown to be a considerable town, and in 1849 its citizens naturally thought that an organ, or newspaper, was necessary to give it position and honorable mention among its sister towns. Accordingly, with a liberality which was characteristic, its citizens offered to purchase a printing press and materials for any one who would
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undertake to publish a newspaper in Naperville. Unfortunately for them, their liberal offer was heard of by an adventurer named Charles J. Sellon, who hastened to Naperville, and early in November, 1849, struck a bargain with the citizens, and agrecd to pub- lishi a paper on the terms proposed. Sellon was wholly unknown to the people of Naperville, had no capital, and but little reputation, though he had but a short time previous been engaged in two or three unsuccessful and dishonorable newspaper speculations. However, the citizens were as good as their promise, and in two or three days raised the amount necessary, somnc $500, with which a second-hand press, a large quantity of type, which had previously been used on the Chicago JOURNAL, job type, and other necessary materials, were purchased, and brought to Naperville, aniid the rejoicings of the people. A room was pro- cured in the old Tarbox storc for an office, and after considerable delay in arranging everything, and setting up the press and fixtures, the first number of the DU PAGE COUNTY RECORDER was issued, if we mistake not, on or about the 1st of December, 1849, " by C. J. Sellon, Editor and Proprietor." The paper, in its commencement, was a decided success. It started off with a circulation of about 500. The business men of Naperville advertised largely, and furnished job work liberally. In fact, the establishment of the RECORDER marked an cra in the history of Du PAGE County ; for although the town did not in consequence grow in population, as some other towns had donc, yet it infused new life, new ideas, new ambition and energy into the business men, and the whole commnu-
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nity. But the success of the paper was doomed to be of short duration. Sellon proved to be a bad manager, lazy and extravagant, and the most liberal patronage could not long keep him up ; besides, he had no sta- mina, was full of wild chimerical schemes, and continually trying something new, most unfitting qualities for a newspaper publisher. The RECORDER having been started by the joint efforts of all parties, it was deemed proper that it should be neutral in politics. But Sellon's uneasy nature could not long rest under this state of affairs, and his means running low, he at last prevailed on one or two very susceptible politicians, who lived out of the county, to furnish him funds with which to change the RECORDER into a political paper. Accordingly, at the end of nine montlis, he discontinued-the RECORDER, and issued in its stead, the DEMOCRATIC PLAINDEALER. About the same time also, he commenced the publication of. a small weekly sheet called the DAUGHTER OF TEM- PERANCE, as he professed to be a great advocate of tlie cause of temperance. The change in the character of the paper gave great dissatisfaction to the men of both parties in the town. The printing of the two papers became very expensive, while there was a manifest falling off in patronage, and some time in November, 1850, Sellon started off on a tour for the ostensible purpose of obtaining subscribers for the DAUGHTER, but he never came -back, leaving $500 or $600 due creditors, and an interesting family wholly destitute. The whole concern, of course, came to a " dead lock," and the DEMOCRATIC PLAINDEALER and DAUGHTER OF TEMPERANCE abruptly and ingloriously terminated their
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existence, and were numbered among things that were, after a spasmodic existence of only three months.
, Previous to leaving, Sellon had privately formed a partnership with H. S. Humphrey, a journeyman printer in his office, to whom he owed a considerable amount, in which he had agreed to sell him half the office, Humphrey turning his account in part payment. This gave Humphrey a lien or claim upon the office, and Keith and Barnes agreeing to become responsible to those of Sellon's creditors who were original sub- scribers, and still owned stock in the concern, for the payment of their claims, the office was again placed on a business footing, and early in January, 1851; the DU PAGE COUNTY OBSERVER, was issued under the management of Barnes, Humphrey and Keith. But the miserable failure and equivocal conduct of Sellon threw a " wet blanket" on the newspaper business of DU PAGE County, from which it has never yet reco- vered; and the OBSERVER never proved a money making concern.
Mr. Humphrey continued his connection with the paper until April 6th, 1852, when he disposed of his interest to Mr. Gershom Martin, who continued the paper two years more in connection with Barnes and Keith. In March, 1854, they transferred their interest to Mr. Martin, who continued. it alone until the first of the following September, when he suspended its publication, having at that time less than 275 subscri- bers. "Thus the OBSERVER, after a precarious existence of three years and eight months, expired. During the fall of 1854 Mr. Charles W. Keith, believing that a paper could be sustained in Du PAGE County, bought
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the office, procured a new and larger press, and in November, 1854, started the Du PAGE COUNTY JOUR- NAL, a large and handsome sheet, and a decided improvement on the former ones. The JOURNAL was continued successively by C. W. Keith; Keith, Edson & Co .; J. M. Edson, and E. M. Day, until thé great and disastrous freshet of February, 1857, when the entire office, and the building it was in, was carried away.by the flood.
Sometime in the summer of 1856, the citizens of Wheaton, a town which had grown up on the Galena railroad, believing the interests of their town demanded such an enterprise, procured a press, and commenced the publication at their place, of the Du PAGE COUNTY GAZETTE, J. A. J. Birdsall being the publisher. It was published about ten months, when it was discon- tinued. At present there is but one paper printed in the county. The NAPERVILLE NEWSLETTER is published at Naperville, by E. H. Eyer. It is a very respectable sheet and bids fair to rival its predecessors in perma- nence and usefulness.
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ORGANIZATION OF THE COUNTY, ETC.
. The law organizing the county was approved Feb- ruary -9th, 1839. The boundaries of the county, as specified in the first section of the act, embraced not only the present limits, but the north half of two townships of Will county. The same section contained a proviso, as follows :
" That no part of the county above described, now forming a part of Will county, shall be included within the said county of Du Page, unless the inhabitants now residing in said part of Will county shall, by a vote to be given by them at the next August clection, decide, by a majority of legal voters, that they prefer to have the said territory made a part of the said county of Du Page."
A vote of the inhabitants of the-two half townships was had at the election mentioned in the proviso quoted, and although great exertions were made to produce a different result, the proposition was rejected by one vote.
By the fourth section of the act, Ralph Woodruff, of La Salle county, Seth Reed, of Kane county, and II. G. Loomis, of Cook county, were appointed com- missioners to locate the county seat, and were to meet at the Preemption House, in Naperville, on the first Monday of June, 1839, or within thirty days there- after.
There was a proviso to the fourth section, as follows :
" The said commissioners shall obtain for the county, from the claim- ant, a quantity of land, not less than three acres, and three thousand
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dollars, for the purpose of erecting county buildings; which sum shall be seeured to the county commissioners, and paid out, under their directions, for the purposes aforesaid."
Naperville was selected as the county seat, and on the 17th day of June, 1839, a quit-elaim deed was executed to the county commissioners, conveying all the title one elaimant had (the undivided half) to the present public square. The county never had title to the other half as a claim.
As there are many in our county who have erroneous ideas in regard to the title of the county to the public square, upon which the county buildings stand, we here insert so much of the records as are necessary to give a correet understanding of its situation.
By reference to the proceedings of the county com- missioners, we find that on the 7th day of June, 1842, the following orders were entered on record by them, viz. :
"It is ordered by the court that Bailey Hobson be and he is hereby appointed a commissioner for the county of Du Page, to apply for, and obtain from the government of the United States of America, in pursu- ance of the act of congress in such case made and provided, a preëmp- tion to the following described quarter seetion of land, to wit: The south-west quarter of section 18, township 38 north, range ten east of the third principal meridian, the same being the quarter section upon which the seat of justice for the county of Du PAGE is located."
" Whereas, Bailey Hobson, by an order entered on the records of this court, has been appointed a commissioner to apply for and obtain from the government of the United States, a preemption to the south-west quarter section of section eighteen, township thirty-eight north, range ten cast of the third principal meridian for the use of said county of Du PAGE, and there being several persons who have a just and equitable claim to a part of said quarter seetion, it is ordered by this court that the said Bailey Hobson, commissioner aforesaid, be, and he is hereby
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authorized and empowered, for and in behalf of the said county of Du- PAGE, to convey, by good and sufficient deed, to all those persons, sev- erally, who have a just and cquitable claim to any part or portion of said quarter section, the several proportions which any such individuals may be justly entitled to, of said quarter section of land, upon condition that such individuals who have a just claim to any portion of said land shall pay to the said commissioner, for the use of said county, one dollar and twenty-five cents per acre for the several proportions they are entitled to, together with a further sum of money sufficient to cover and pay any and every expense which the county aforesaid, through their said commis- sioner, may have to incur in proving a preëmption to said quarter sec- tion, and all their expenses attending the conveyance of said land from the county to said individuals."
In compliance with the first order, a preemption was obtained under the Act of Congress of 1822, by Mr. Hobson, as commissioner for the county, to the S. W4 Sec. 18, T. 38 N., R. 10 E., and he, as such commissioner, received a "duplicate " for the land, which is recorded in the recorder's office, in book one, page 541. Whether the "patent" for the land has been obtained from the land office or not, we do not know.
In compliance with the second order of the county commissioner, all the land entered by the commis- sioner, except the public square, was conveyed by him to C. B. Hosmer and Lewis Ellsworth, the former receiving a deed for that portion lying north of the "Galena road," and the latter for that lying south of the road.
We might give a further history of the "claim," but as it is foreign to our intentions to state anything more than what is necessary to explain the situation of the county property, we forbear.
About $5,000 was subscribed by the citizens of Na- perville to erect a court house, which was built in 1839. The brick offices were subsequently erected.
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The county buildings, after a lapse of nearly twenty years, remain in statu quo, nothing having been done to beautify the grounds, or to improve their convenience or comfort. In view of the possibility of their removal, the citizens of Naperville filed a bond in the clerk's office, in April, 1857, which obligates them to enlarge and improve the appearance of the court house during the present summer. The citizens of the county are looking for a faithful execution of that bond. There being no correct view of the county buildings now extant, we are obliged to forego the pleasure of pre- senting our readers .with a representation of their massive proportions. Since the erection of the county buildings, the judicial courts have been held uniformly at Naperville. In the winter of 1857, the Legislature passed an act, authorizing an election to be held on the first Monday in May, which should decide the question of the removal of the county seat to the town of Wheaton. The election excited considerable agitation and feeling, but the attempt was unsuccessful. Local jealousies have grown out of it, but it is hoped that they will now cease, and the great object .be to elevate each town and the whole county. The circuit court holds its sessions semi-annually, on the second. Monday in April, and the third Monday in October. The present presiding judge of this court is Hon. J. O. Norton, of Joliet. The probate court holds its sessions on the first Monday in each month. The present judge of probate is Walter Blanchard, of Downer's Grove. The amount of litigation carried on in this county is very small in proportion to the population. The sessions of the circuit court seldom last more than
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two or three days. There has been but one execution in this county for capital offense. Patrick Doyle, a native of Ireland, was hung at Naperville, in 1854, for the murder of Patrick Tole.
The following account of this murder is taken fromn the Du PAGE OBSERVER, of October 26, 1853 :
"On Monday of last week a most revolting murder was committed on the line of the Chicago, St. Charles and Mississippi Air Line Railroad, in this county. The particulars, so far as we have been able to learn them, are about as follows : Two brothers, Irishmen, named Tole, who had been employed upon the road, had received their pay in the morning, amounting to sixty dollars, and had quit work. They were indulging in a little 'spree,' and one of them became very drunk. An Irishman named Doyle, by some means was know- ing to the fact of their having the money in their possession, and it is supposed determined upon robbing them. He found an opportunity to make the attempt the same afternoon. It seems all three were traveling along together on the St. Charles and Chicago wagon road, and when near the residence of Mr. Clisby, one of the brothers Tole became so stupid from the effects of liquor as to be unable to proceed further ; in other words, he was dead drunk, and fell down in the fence corner. The sober brother stopped to move him, and assist him to proceed, and while thius engaged over him, Doyle, it would seem, conceived the fitting moment to have arrived, proceeded to the fence, gathered a fence stake, and returning to the two brothers, struck the sober one over the head, and con- tinued to beat him until he was senseless, literally
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knocking out his brains. He then rifled the pockets of the drunken one, and went on a short distance, to a house, where he got something to eat. The pocket book which contained the money was found a few rods distant from the murdered man, in the direction of the house where the murderer stopped. . . He then went down to Warren station, but not meeting the cars, proceeded to the Junction, where he took the Aurora train for Chicago. He was immediately pursued to the city, information and a description of his person given to the officers, and on Thursday afternoon, deputy sheriff S. E. Bradley arrested him as he was walking in Randolph street. Sheriff Smith was tele- graphed of his arrest, and started early on Friday morning and brought him to this place about noon of the same day: The grand jury had not yet adjourned, and an indictment was found against him. In the afternoon he was brought into court, it being still in session, and presented with a copy of the indictment. Having no counsel, the court assigned to him as counsel, R. N. Murray, Esq., assisted by N. Allen, Esq. After consultation with the State's attorney, it was agreed to allow the prisoner to plead to the indictment at the next term of the circuit court, upon which he was committed to jail to await his trial at that time. Coroner Hagemann held an inquest over the body of the murdered man, and the verdict of the jury was that he came to his death by being willfully murdered at the hands of Patrick Doyle. The name of the . deceased was Patrick Tole, and he is about 25 years of age. The prisoner is a thin, spare man, about 23 or 24 years of age. There does not appear to have
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been any feud or quarrel existing between the brothers and Doyle, whatever, nor do they appear to have been in any sort of an affray at the time the crime was committed, which makes the case look still more aggravated."
The following is a list of those who have served the county in the legislature of the state :
1836-Capt. JOSEPH NAPER, 1848-WARREN L. WHEATON,
1838-Capt. JOSEPH NAPER, 1850-WILLARD T. JONES,
1842-JEDUTHAN HATCH, 1852-Capt. JOSEPH NAPER,
1844-JULIUS M. WARREN, 1854-E. O. HILLS,
1846-Capt. E. KINNE, 1856-TRUMAN W. SMITH.
The following are the names of attorneys who have been connected with the Du PAGE County bar: Na- than Allen, P. Ballingall, C. B. Hosmer, O. B. Bush, James F. Wight, Allen McIntosh, A. R. Dodge, H. Loring, R. N. Murray, H. H. Cody, H. F. Vallette, W. Blanchard, S. F. Daniels, J. C. Waldron, L. E. De Wolf, M. S. Hobson, W. O. Watts.
We close this part of our history by giving the names of the officers of the county. from its organiza- tion to the present time.
LIST OF COUNTY OFFICERS.
The first election for county officers was held at the Preemption House, in Naperville, on the first Monday in May, 1839. S. M. Skinner, Stephen J. Scott, and
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L. G. Butler were, by law, appointed judges of elec- tion. The officers elected at this time served until the general election, Aug. 5th, same year. As the names of supervisors are inserted in the lists of town officers appended to the histories of the several towns, they do not appear in this list.
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