USA > Illinois > Kane County > Commemorative portrait and biographical record of Kane and Kendall Counties, Ill. : containing full page portraits and biographicalsketches of prominent and representative citizens of Kane and Kendall Counties, together with portraits and biographies of the presidents of the United States > Part 15
USA > Illinois > Kendall County > Commemorative portrait and biographical record of Kane and Kendall Counties, Ill. : containing full page portraits and biographicalsketches of prominent and representative citizens of Kane and Kendall Counties, together with portraits and biographies of the presidents of the United States > Part 15
Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Part 15 | Part 16 | Part 17 | Part 18 | Part 19 | Part 20 | Part 21 | Part 22 | Part 23 | Part 24 | Part 25 | Part 26 | Part 27 | Part 28 | Part 29 | Part 30 | Part 31 | Part 32 | Part 33 | Part 34 | Part 35 | Part 36 | Part 37 | Part 38 | Part 39 | Part 40 | Part 41 | Part 42 | Part 43 | Part 44 | Part 45 | Part 46 | Part 47 | Part 48 | Part 49 | Part 50 | Part 51 | Part 52 | Part 53 | Part 54 | Part 55 | Part 56 | Part 57 | Part 58 | Part 59 | Part 60 | Part 61 | Part 62 | Part 63 | Part 64 | Part 65 | Part 66 | Part 67 | Part 68 | Part 69 | Part 70 | Part 71 | Part 72 | Part 73 | Part 74 | Part 75 | Part 76 | Part 77 | Part 78 | Part 79 | Part 80 | Part 81 | Part 82 | Part 83 | Part 84 | Part 85 | Part 86 | Part 87 | Part 88 | Part 89 | Part 90 | Part 91 | Part 92 | Part 93 | Part 94 | Part 95 | Part 96 | Part 97 | Part 98 | Part 99 | Part 100 | Part 101 | Part 102 | Part 103 | Part 104 | Part 105 | Part 106 | Part 107 | Part 108
They accordingly journeyed to Ottawa, where, hearing good reports of the Fox River Valley, they followed the course of that stream, and arrived April 1, 1834, at the Indian village occu- pied by Waubonsie, chief of the Pottawattomies, with a few hundred of his warriors, just north of the present site of Aurora, on the west bank of the river, on what was afterward known as the McNamara farm. This land was included in a tract ten miles square that had been an Indian reservation, and had just been purchased, by treaty with the Indians, by the United States Gov- ernment. Near this point is a small island in the river obstructing the channel, also a natural fall of the water. This formed the advantages of water power which they sought so long. Mr. McCarty immediately staked out a claim of about 360 acres on the east side, and made good his title by erecting thereon a log cabin 10x12 feet in size. Later, in order to secure the unquestioned right to the water power, he purchased a claim of 100 acres on the opposite side of the river, on which
Samuel ME Party
PHOTO BY D. C. PRATT.
195
KANE COUNTY.
a shanty was set up. These claims cover the ground on which Aurora was afterward built, and the-e cabins were the first habitations erected by white men within its present limits. The one ou the east side was built 150 to 200 feet northeast of the foot of Main Street, about 75 to 100 feet east of the old gristmill. During the summer of 1834 Mr. McCarty and his men occu- pied the one on the east side, doing their own cooking, except their bread, which was prepared by Mrs. Pierce, down the river, and carried home in flour sacks. In the meantime a dam had been commenced, and the timbers for a sawmill pre- pared, the neighbors within fifteen miles being invited to the "raising." It is stated that about a dozen responded to the old-time invitation to a frolic.
In October, following, he built a more conven- ient log house, 14x18 feet in dimensions, and had it just completed when his brother, Samuel, ar- rived in the settlement. Some weeks previous Joseph McCarty had sent him a glowing account of the prairies, where he had pitched his tent, and he had immediately settled his business as a mill- wright in Chemung County, N. Y., and taking the most direct route for Illinois, had arrived at the Waubonsie Reservation November 6, 1834, three weeks from the day of his departure from home. His conveyance was by canal to Buffalo, by lake to Detroit, and the remainder of the way by stages. Previous to his arrival his brother had pur- chased for him, of a squatter, a claim of 400 acres south of his own, for $60. At this time the future city contained seven inhabitants, viz .: the two McCartys, one Foreacre, Mr. and Mrs. Aldrich, who kept house for them, and two children. On his arrival, Samuel, by purchase, became half owner of his brother's claims, and both being practical mechanics and millwrights, assisted by others of the settlement, soon completed the mill and dam. An old account book shows that the first sawing was done for Mr. Wormly, of Oswego, Ill., June 8, 1835. In the fall of this year the original plat of the city was laid out by the Mc- Cartys. It was surveyed by Col. Hitt. This was in the early part of the winter of 1835-36. The ground, as stated by Samuel McCarty, being
frozen so hard that some difficulty was experienced in driving the stakes. The first plat extended from Flag Street on the north to Benton on the south, and back some six blocks from the river. Samuel McCarty's present residence, on the corner of Lincoln Avenue and Main Street, is very near its center. In this plat two acres were donated by the proprietors for park purpose, and is now known as Lincoln Park. In 1835 the Mc- Carty brothers sold their claim on the west side to Zaphna Lake, for the sum of $500. In the fall of 1836 they built a bridge across the east channel of the river, and it was paid for by the McCartys, except a small part. This important improvement was swept away the following spring. In the early part of the year 1838 a subscription paper was started, proposing to build a new bridge to cost $2,000. The McCartys headed the list with $500, and Samuel McCarty built it. This struct- ure was also swept away by high water and ice, and was rebuilt by Samuel McCarty in 1843, also by subscription. These bridges were all erected on one site, with approaches at the foot of Main Street.
In 1836 the McCarty brothers built a grist- mill adjoining the sawmill, grinding the first grist February 7, 1837. During 1834 and 1835, in addition to their own enterprises, they built a sawmill and gristmill for other parties on the Big Vermillion, south of Ottawa. In 1838 they built on their own account a sawmill, twelve miles west of Aurora, in Big Rock Township.
To the McCarty brothers and their enterprise, perhaps, more than any others, is Aurora indebted, for not only her fortunate location, but her rapid and. substantial growth. One notable instance of this, and very important to the prosperity of the place, is a matter of history. Until 1836 the old State line road from Chicago to Galena, crossed the Fox River at Montgomery, and in consequence all travel, together with the mail stages, passed that way. Samuel McCarty realized the importance to Aurora of building a road intersecting the State line road, both to the east and west of Aurora, so as to change the mail route, and also turn the tide of "prairie schooners " with their hundreds of immigrants, seeking homes, through Aurora; know-
196
KANE COUNTY.
ing full well, that many of them, on viewing the natural advantages of the place, would stop and locate. With this idea in view, he, with some of his men opened a road, building necessary bridges, etc., from Naperville to Aurora, and west to Big Rock. After doing this he had to induce mail stages to pass through Aurora, instead of as hereto- fore by way of Montgomery. He offered to board the proprietors, four horses and the drivers for a month, free, if they would make the change. These terms were accepted, and soon afterward, in March, 1837, the first regular postoffice was established at Aurora.
There is little doubt but that this maneuver was the turning point in the early history of the city, and was the controlling influence in securing settlers and establishing the infant town on a firm and growing basis. It will be seen that the McCartys were not only the first white men to build habitations and start the machinery of civilization, where are now the homes and great factories of Aurora, but that they also, by their keen foresight and liberal enterprise, con- tributed largely to bring to it those advantages that were destined to make it a prosperous, rich and thriving city. Joseph McCarty, however, only lived to see the embryo city become a hamlet. In August, 1838, he was suddenly prostrated by an attack of bleeding of the lungs, and, being ad- vised to seek a more genial climate, he traveled South, where, after wandering in vain in search of health and strength, he died the last of May, 1839, near the center of the State of Alabama. He never married, and was accompanied on the trip by his friend, Enoch Terry, who remained with him to the last. He was buried where he died, and there he remained until 1875, when his brother, Samuel, went South, disinterred the remains and brought them to Aurora, placing them in Spring Lake Cemetery. From 1838 Samuel McCarty assumed control of the McCarty interest in the young settlement, and from liberal inducements offered by him to actual settlers, in many cases charging just enough for a building lot to pay for recording the papers, the town began to grow rapidly. At this time he was joined by his young- est brother, Daniel, who had inherited part of
Joseph's property, and they became partners in the mills and other property in and about Aurora. A few years afterward they divided their interests, and each had the control of his own separately. Afterward Daniel removed to Iowa, and became a farmer. He is now retired from active operations, and is a resident of Chicago.
Samuel McCarty was ever an uncompromising temperance man in theory and practice, and always refused to sell a lot on any terms that he knew would be occupied for the sale of liquor, and therefore for a long time there was very little, if any, of this traffic in the village. Until 1842 he had held only pre-emption titles to his land. It then came into market, and he perfected his titles from the United States Government for sixty-nine acres, a part of which is that comprised in the first plat of the village. He had previous to this sold off all others of his claims. He donated the land on which the First Methodist Church and parsonage was built, and contributed largely in the erection of that and the subsequent edifice.
He also donated the land on the northeast corner of his present residence lot, on which was erected
the Presbyterian Church, which afterward became famous as being the place where the Republican party received its baptismal name, and where the first Republican State convention was held. This building has since been removed, and a Baptist Church erected. For many years after the estab. lishment of Clark (now Jennings) Seminary he was president of its board of trustees, and a large contributor toward its erection. He is, and has been from young manhood, a member of the Meth- odist Church, and has acted as president of its board of trustees, and class leader for many years.
He continued the milling business until 1858, and since then he has devoted his time to hand- ling real estate in Aurora and Chicago, where his wife owns a lot on the southeast corner of Clark and Randolph Streets, on which he erected a $40,000 building; this was destroyed by the great fire. He also built the first substantial frame house ever erected in Aurora, located on Broad- way, a little north of Main Street; the first store building on the corner of Main and Broadway;
197
KANE COUNTY.
also his present residence, in 1842, which was the finest and most substantial brick house erected, to that time, in the county; he also built the Tremont House (hotel), and various other buildings in the city. And briefly, it may be said that he has been identified with nearly every enterprise that was calculated to benefit, materially or socially, the city that he and his brother had founded. After a long life spent in its midst, he is now one of its most honored and respected citizens, as well as the earliest settler, and for a longer time a resident than any one now residing within its limits. He is now seventy-six years old, and active for a man of his years.
Samuel McCarty was married March 26, 1837, to Miss Phœbe Stolp, who died May 18, 1839, aged twenty-two years and seven months, leaving an infant, who also died, aged five months. January 6, 1847, Mr. McCarty was married to Miss Emily Wheeler, of Chicago, and by this union there were two children: Marion, who died in infancy, and Helen, a bright and talented young lady, who, while attending the Female College at Pittsburgh, Penn., died in 1867, aged nearly eighteen years. His wife died September 14, 1850, and April 13, 1853, he was united in marriage with Mrs. Emily A. Davis, nee Dent, of Chicago. Their children are Eva Dent, born April 30, 1854, now the wife of N. H. Johnson, of Aurora; Edgar J., born August 29, 1856, and died aged six years; Sidney George, born June 3, 1858, married, and a resident of Chicago; Emily E., born May 8, 1860, died January 19, 1885, and Charles S., born May 17, 1863, living in Aurora. Mr. Sam- nel McCarty and family reside on the northeast corner of Main Street and Lincoln Avenue, in the brick house which he erected, and has occupied since 1842.
N ATHAN C. SIMMONS is one of the most popular business men of Aurora. He has prospered here in business, and has earned success by his enterprise, natural shrewd- ness, and his well-established reputation for integ- rity. He was born in Bridgewater, Susquehanna Co., Penn., January 31, 1838, a son of Solomon
and Ann (Patterson) Simmons, who were born in Pennsylvania and New York City, respectively. The ancestors on the Simmons side were from Eng- land, but were originally of Irish extraction. They settled, on coming to this country, on the shores of Connecticut, at an early day in colonial times. Like many of the first immigrants to this country, they were a distinctive, strong race of men, who impressed upon their long line of numerous descendants many of the admirable characteristics of their nature. Descendants of this early stock are scattered across the continent, from the Atlan- tic to the Pacific.
The childhood of young Simmons was under the care of an aunt, on the father's side, Mrs. George Keeler, of Montrose, Penn. In this home he grew to young manhood, and had completed his apprenticeship to the boot and shoemaker's trade under his uncle's training. All this he had done by the time he was eighteen years of years. Of course he could not in that short period have spared much of his time in attendance at school; but he had doubtless learned at that age more about clothing the feet than of the quillets of the brain, that once were supposed to be covered under the Latin and Greek verbs that so long have echoed along the corridors of the schools. What the lad had learned was entirely practical, and here he had been thorough. Mr. Simmons came to Aurora to make his fixed home in 1857. He found immedi- ate employment in the shop of C. A. Mallory, as a journeyman on the shoemaker's bench. His skill and diligence were recognized by his employer, and in six months after entering the shop he became foreman, thus continuing until January 1, 1864. The firm of Reising & Simmons (Leonard Reising), having been agreed upon, went into effect on that day. This continued two years, and then he formed a partnership with Joseph Reising, his pres- ent partner. Now, for twenty-one years this firm has carried on an extensive business in the boot and shoe trade, the two men constituting a strong and safe firm. From the day they threw open their doors to the public to the present hour they have been eminently successful. Mr. Simmons is noted for those genial manners that insure a per- sonal popularity, that is a fair capital for a young
198
KANE COUNTY.
man starting in trade. Success seldom fails to come when it is entirely deserved. Surely it has not in this case. Wealth and friends have been given unto him, and he enjoys these all with no trace of that offensive ostentation that has so often shaded the lives of other men. It is a pleasure to bear willing testimony to real worth. This last testimony voices the sentiments of this entire com- munity. Mr. Simmons was married, in August, 1874, to Hortense Mix, daughter of Russell Mix (deceased), who for a long time was a prominent and much respected citizen of Aurora. By this marriage, there is one child, a son, named Russell, aged eleven years.
H ON. ISAAC G. WILSON, one of the oldest and most highly respected citizens of Kane County, has been a member of the bench and bar of the State of Illinois for the past fifty years, and, with one exception (Hon. Judge Sheldon), has occupied the bench longer than any other judge in the State. He is the only son of Hon. Isaac Wilson, one of the earliest and much honored settlers of western New York, and who was the first member of Congress from Genesee County, in that State. Judge Wilson's grandfa- ther, as also his father, filled judicial stations, the former in Vermont, and the latter in the State of New York, having been first judge of Genesee County for many years, a position which he re- signed on coming to Illinois in 1835. The present Judge Wilson was born in Middlebury, N. Y., April 26, 1816. He had six sisters, all of whom lived to adult life, but no brother. At the age of twelve he was sent to the academy at Wyoming, and remained in school and as clerk in a store until 1834, in which year he entered Brown University, Providence, R. I., then under the presidency of Dr. Wayland. Among his classmates were Charles S. Bradley, afterward chief justice of Rhode Island, and law lecturer at the Cambridge Law School; the late Thomas A. Jenckes, for many years a member of Congress from Rhode Island, and author of the "Bankrupt Act of 1867;" Ezekiel G. Robinson, now president of Brown University, and G. V. N. Lothrop, the eminent Detroit lawyer, now
minister to Russia. Upon graduating in 1838, Mr. Wilson came to Illinois, whither his father's family had preceded him three years, and became a stu- dent in the office of Butterfield & Collins, at that time the leading law firm of Chicago, if not of the Northwest. In the spring of 1840 he again went east, and entered the Cambridge Law School un- der the instruction of Judge Story and Prof. Greenleaf, from which he graduated the following year with the degree of Bachelor of Laws in the class of which James Russell Lowell and W. W. Story, the sculptor, were members; and he was admitted to the bar of Massachusetts, at Concord, in July, 1841.
On returning the following month to Chicago, where he had intended to locate, he found that, instead of there being room for more lawyers, many of those already there were leaving for other places, in consequence of the extreme depression in business which followed the financial crisis of 1837-38. He thereupon determined to try the country, and in August of 1841, opened a law office in Elgin, Ill., where he continued in the practice, doing a good business, riding the circuit with his books in his saddle-bags, as was then the custom, for ten years. In 1851 he was elected cir- cuit judge.
During the following sixteen years Judge Wil- son performed an almost incredible amount of judicial labor, not exceeded, perhaps, by that of any judge who ever presided in an Illinois court. He frequently held court ten and a half and some- times eleven months out of the twelve, and it was his custom to begin court at 9 and often at 8 o'clock in the morning, holding until 6 in the afternoon, with forty-five minutes intermission at noon; also holding evening sessions when necessary to keep up with the business. He was twice re- elected by the unanimous vote of all parties. Upon leaving the bench in 1867, he opened an office in Chicago, with Col. H. V. Vallette and Gen. Ben- jamin J. Sweet, of Camp Douglas fame, and upon the dissolution of that firm he formed a partner- ship with Hon. Emery A. Storrs, and subsequently with Sanford B. Perry, with whom he continued his practice, being confined mostly to the Federal courts, until 1879, when he was again elected cir-
Isaac & Wilson
201
KANE COUNTY.
cuit judge. Immediately thereafter he was desig- nated a member of the appellate court of Chi- cago, of which two years after he was made chief justice.
Judge Wilson has grown rapidly in the estima- tion of the bar since his elevation to the appellate bench. His education is varied, broad and liberal, and his published opinions are models of judicial writings, being logical, clear and polished. His associates on the appellate bench are Hon. W. K. McAllister and Hon. Joseph M. Bailey. He has twice been honored with the degree of Doctor of Laws, once by the Chicago University, and again by Brown University. He resides at Geneva, the county seat of Kane County, where he has an ele- gant house and spacious grounds, which are taste- fully cultivated.
In 1843 the Judge married a daughter of the late Scotto Clark, a prominent Boston merchant, a contemporary and friend of Amos and Abbott Law- rence. Mrs. Wilson was a lady of great accomplish- ments, of rare judgment, and much given to deeds of charity. She died in 1877, leaving three sons and two daughters, one of whom died not long after the death of the mother. Of the three sons, one, Frank I. Wilson, is a successful business man of Chicago; another, Charles S. Wilson, is a promi- nent lawyer in Colorado, and the third is Prof E. B. Wilson, the well-known scientist, and now at the head of the biological department of Bryn Mawr College, Philadelphia. His only daughter is the wife of Samuel N. Cooper, of Geneva.
In 1875 the Judge went abroad, visiting the principal cities and places of interest in England and on the continent, spending some time among the Swiss Alps, being a great lover of mountain scenery. In London, as was natural, he was chiefly attracted to the English courts, and was introduced to Vice-Chancellor Baker, who showed him gratifying attentions. His observations in France, where he spent considerable time, made him somewhat skeptical as to the stability of the present government; indeed, he came away im- pressed with the conviction that the masses of the French people are not yet fitted for a Republican form of government, and that the existing order of things, though in name a Republic, is in fact a
despotism. He regards the trials in the French courts of criminal procedure as a travesty of justice, the judge assuming the office of prosecutor, and not infrequently, through a mere pride of winning, coercing a finding of "guilty," pointing to the trepidations of the accused, which the judge him- self has produced by browbeating and superior intellectual strength, as evidence of guilt.
UDGE RICHARD G. MONTONY. This gentleman is distinguished as one of the oldest practicing lawyers as well as one of the ablest members of the profession of Northern Illinois. Thirty-eight years is a long professional life, and, when that period includes the briefless young lawyer, and records his career step by step, filling with distinguished merit every station of the way, both at the bar and upon the bench, and reaching the high point of every young lawyer's ambition, it becomes a record of general public interest. Mr. Montony has practiced law at the Kane County bar for more than thirty-eight years, except during the time he was on the bench, and has been a resident of Aurora since May 6, 1846. He is a native of New Jersey, born September 19, 1822, near Newton, a son of Isaac and Letitia (Garrabrant) Montony. Isaac Montony was born near Schenectady, N. Y., his parents being of French origin. Letitia Garrabrant was descended from an old New Jersey family, who were of German and Irish extraction, and whose ancestry settled there long before the Revolutionary War. In 1832 his parents removed to New York, locating near Elmira, where the father followed farming. The 'son remained at home most of the time until he was in his twentieth year, when he attended school at Hopewell Center, Ontario Co., N. Y., and in the spring of 1843 took charge of the school as its teacher, a position he held one year. He next became a student at the Canandaigua Academy, remaining there some time. In the summer of 1845, after the close of the spring and summer term, he started west, and arrived in Chicago, September 1, of that year, having spent about a month in the northern part of Ohio prospecting for a situation to teach, but, finding nothing sat-
202
KANE COUNTY.
isfactory, and being desirous of seeing the great West, he took a steamer at Cleveland for Chicago. From the latter place he went to Newark, Ill., and obtained the position of teacher of a school near that place, which he taught until the spring of 1846. Having in his possession excellent testimonials for scholarship and abilities as teacher, he had no difficulty in obtaining the position at once.
Leaving Newark on the 6th day of May, 1846, he arrived at Aurora the same day, and soon after began reading law in the office of O. D. Day, a prominent lawyer of that place, with whom he re- mained until he was admitted, except when absent teaching winter schools. In June, 1849, he was admitted to the bar by the supreme court of Illi- nois, and in October, following, he opened a law office in Aurora, where he has ever since been in practice when not on the bench. During his law studies he taught school in the winters of 1846-47, and in 1847-48 in Du Page County, and a select school in Aurora for one year, from the spring of 1848. He was attorney and counsel for the town of Aurora from the spring of 1850 to 1857, and until the towns of Aurora and West Aurora were, in February, 1857, incorporated into a city. At the charter election of 1858 he was elected city attorney and ex officio State's attorney in all crim- inal cases prosecuted in the court of common pleas of that city, and served one term. In February, 1863, he was elected by the cities of Aurora and Elgin judge of the courts of common pleas of those cities, and served until 1876, having been re- elected in 1867 and 1871. In 1873, while occu- pying that position, he opened a law office in Chicago with A. E. Searles, attorney and coun- selor at law, of Aurora, who was his partner when he went on the bench, and they practiced there together, while Mr. Montony was not holding court, until the fall of 1874, when the firm was dissolved, and Mr. Searles resumed practice at Aurora. Mr. Montony continued the practice in Chicago, when not holding court, until 1885, and after he left the bench, in 1876, he gave more or less attention to practice in the courts of Kane County. In the fall of 1885 he closed his office in Chicago, and since then has attended only to his home clientage, having an office at the corner of Broadway and Main Street.
Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.