USA > Illinois > Cook County > Chicago > Discovery and conquests of the Northwest, with the history of Chicago, Vol. II > Part 17
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
The library contains 10,000 books and 11,500 pam- phlets, which may be consulted freely by visitors to the museum. The whole number of museum articles en- tered in the catalogue of accessions is 181,492.
The productive endowment is $702,000.
The income for the year ending September 30, 1899, from all sources, was $63,506.
The membership of the Field Columbian Museum, organized as a society, consists of the following : Corporate members 65
Patrons. . 5
Honorary members 4
Life members 81
Annual members 415
1
218
The Field Columbian Museum.
The officers for the current year, ending September 30, 1900, are : Harlow N. Higinbotham, president and chairman of the executive committee ; Martin A. Ryer- son, first vice-president ; Norman B. Ream, second vice- president ; George Manierre, secretary; Byron L. Smith, treasurer.
The museum staff consists of the following : Fred- erick J. V. Skiff, director ; G. A. Dorsey, curator, department of anthropology ; S. C. Simms, assistant curator, division of ethnology ; C. F. Millspaugh, cura- tor, department of botany ; O. C. Farrington, curator, department of geology; H. W. Nichols, assistant cura- tor, department of geology ; Elmer S. Riggs, assistant curator of palæontology ; D. G. Elliot, curator, depart- ment of zoology (except ornithology ) ; S. E. Meek, assistant curator ; C. B. Cory, curator, department of ornithology ; Elsie Lippincott, librarian; D. C. Davies, recorder.
The Field Columbian Museum, with Chicago's other great educational endowments, its university, its libra- ries, its institutions and its schools of art and science, gives to this city an eminence as a conservator of the most exalted humanities, fully consonant with her un- rivaled commercial position.
MODEL OF THE MOON.
THE YERKES OBSERVATORY OF THE UNI- VERSITY OF CHICAGO.
The establishment of the Yerkes Observatory is due to the liberality of Mr. Charles T. Yerkes, who up to the present year (1899), was for a long time at the head of the systems of city railway transportation in the west and north divisions of the city of Chicago. In October, 1892, after consultation with Prof. George E. Hale and President Harper, of the University, Mr. Yerkes gave the order for the 40-inch lens, then unfinished, in the possession of Alvan Clark, of Cambridgeport, Mass., and for an equatorial mounting for the same, to be con- structed by Messrs. Warner & Swasey. The mounting was prominent among the exhibits at the great World's Fair in 1893. Mr. Yerkes also agreed to pay for the erection of a suitable observatory building. The plans for the same were prepared by Professor Hale in 1893 and 1894, and the work of construction was begun in April, 1895, under the direction of the architect, Mr. Henry Ives Cobb. The operations of building, mount- ing and adjusting were completed in October, 1897, when the work of the observatory was formally inaugu- rated by a numerously attended congress of leading astronomers, an excursion party composed of many prominent citizens of Chicago and vicinity, and appro- priate dedicatory exercises. The total cost to Mr. Yerkes is understood to have been $66,000 for the big lens, $55,000 for the mounting, $45,000 for the dome and rising floor, $3,000 for a stellar spectrograph, and anunstated sum paid by him for the erection of a power house. The 30-foot dome on the southeast tower cost $7,000. The 26-foot dome on the northeast tower for- merly belonged to the Kenwood Observatory, the entire equipment of which, including the 12-inch telescope, solar spectroscope, concave grating spectroscope, astronomical clock, minor instruments, tools, machin- ery, etc., was given to the University of Chicago by Mr. William E. Hale, for use in the Yerkes observatory. Other instruments which have been constructed are a 31-inch transit telescope, a photoheliograph attached
(219)
.
220
The Yerkes Observatory.
to the large instrument, a spectroheliograph for photo- graphing the solar prominences and faculæe, a Michel- son interferometer, an interpolating machine, a micro- meter for measuring photographs of stellar spectra, apparatus for enlarging photographs of stellar spectra, a large spherometer, and various bolometers and acces- sory apparatus. In the optical laboratory a grinding machine, constructed in the instrument shop, has been used by Mr. Ritchey in making a 60-inch glass speculum for a reflector. Also an equatorial mounting has been constructed in the observatory workshop for a 24-inch reflecting telescope, with mirror by Mr. Ritchey. And Miss Catherine Bruce has made provision for supplying a photographic telescope of ten inches aperture to be mounted in a small building on the observatory grounds.
The steel tube of the big "Yerkes" telescope is sixty-four feet long. Its center of motion is some 240 feet above the surface of Lake Geneva, and about 1,200 above the sea level. Its astronomical position is now being accurately determined. Approximately it is in north latitude 42° 34' 15", and longitude 5h. 54m. 14s. west from Greenwich. It is thirty-eight miles west from Lake Michigan, one-third of a mile from the shore of Lake Geneva, and more than a mile distant from the nearest railroad track. The site comprises an area of fifty- three acres, which was donated by Mr. John Johnston. The region is one where the mean annual cloudiness is small for this part of the United States. It has nearly the minimum of dust, and is not likely to be disturbed by the establishment of factories, while the summer residences on the shore of the lake are well removed from the site of the observatory. The nature of the soil is such that almost the minimum of ground vibra- tion is secured, and the site is not appreciably affected by atmospheric disturbances due to the small lake, as the prevailing winds at the observatory do not blow across much water surface. Hence the atmospheric conditions are really good. They compare well with those in the neighborhood of any other observatory in the United States, with the possible exception of those in California and Arizona. Experience shows that they are about as good as could be desired for work on the sun, which necessarily has to be prosecuted in the daytime, and which hitherto has formed the princi- pal subject of Professor Hale's investigations; while those of the night part of the twenty-four hours are
221
The Yerkes Observatory.
somewhat less good, for which reason the higher power magnifying eye pieces cannot be used quite so often as wished for. The principal difficulty of the present seems to be in the heavy wall of the tower under the big dome, which renders the equalization of external and internal temperature a slow process, causing annoy- ing air currents near the object glass. Otherwise the steadiness of seeing is superb, and the mechanism which moves the telescope to make it keep pace with a star, is almost perfect in its action.
The following are the magnifying powers of the dif- ferent eye pieces with which the big telescope is furnished ; 230, 280, 350, 400, 700, 940, 1,340, 1,700,
THE YERKES TELESCOPE.
2,080, 2,680 and 3,750. When the latter is employed the field of view is only twenty-eight seconds of arc in diameter, which is less than sufficient to show the whole of the disc of Jupiter at once, to say nothing of the moon. After allowing for loss of light, etc., as one has to allow for the loss of power by transmission through machinery, the highest effective gain that is possible with the Yerkes instrument, assuming perfect atmos- pheric conditions, is that the observer could see the moon through the telescope about as well as he could see it with the naked eye at a distance of 100 miles. For the planet Mars the corresponding naked eye dis- tance would be about 15,000 miles. From this it is easy to infer that the telescope will have to be vastly increased in power before any man can reasonably
222
The Yerkes Observatory.
hope to deal with the question of life on the moon, otherwise than in the most generally inferential way, while the difficulty in the case of any one of the planets is vastly greater. And there is very little ground for hope that the difficulty ever will be overcome, at least optically. The Yerkes telescope is the largest refract- ing instrument in the world, its aperture of forty inches being one-ninth greater than that of the Lick, and nearly two and one-sixth times that of the Dearborn instrument, which was the greatest refractor in the world at the time it was brought to Chicago in 1866. One of forty-eight inches aperture is being constructed in France for the World's Fair at Paris, but that will be far inside the above noted limits of possi- bility for the study of life conditions on the lunar sur- face. And it may be added that the advantages to be gained by a further increase of size are highly prob- lematical. Besides the trouble of manipulation and the loss of light by passage of the rays through greater thickness of glass, there is the important fact that the cure for chromatic aberration, which was invented by Dollond a century and a half ago, is not an absolute corrective for the big refractors that can be made now. There is a scattering of rays in the direction of the axis. In the Yerkes telescope the rays in the ultra violet portion of the spectrum come to a focus a at point which is fully six inches further from the object glass than is the point at which the yellow rays focus, and there is not any known means of obviating this diffi- culty, which increases with the area of the object lens.
It is impossible to tell what will be done at the Yerkes Observatory in the future. One may draw an inference from the following synopsis of what already has been accomplished, which is abstracted from a paper kindly furnished by Director Hale:
"Professor Burnham has employed the big telescope two nights in the week in the measurement of double stars, with the special purpose of preparing a catalogue of his own stars for publication. He has measured about 1,000 pairs, and discovered a few new doubles.
"Professor Barnard has measured a number of double stars, including the most difficult pairs known, and determined the periods of several of the variable stars discovered by Professor Pickering in the cluster known as Messier 5. He has also triangulated the stars in several clusters by an extensive series of micrometer
223
The Yerkes Observatory.
measures. During the summer of 1898 he made a series of measures of the diameters of Venus and Mercury, and was unable to find any traces of the linear markings recently described by several observ- ers, though the vague markings seen by him at Mount Hamilton were visible through the Yerkes glass. He has frequently observed the fifth satellite of Jupiter, discovered by him in September, 1892, and determined its period of revolution to be 11h. 57m. 22.652s. He has measured the satellite of Neptune many times, taken a large number of measures of the position of the little planet Eros, which at times comes nearer to the earth than any other body except the moon and meteoroids, has studied the markings on the surfaces of Jupiter and Saturn, and made many measures of positions of comets and nebulæ, with dimensions of the latter.
"During the last three years Professor Barnard has made a large number of photographs of stars and nebulæ with portrait lenses of various dimensions, some of these being taken for the purpose of testing trial lenses so as to secure the best type of portrait lens for the Bruce photographic telescope. He and Messrs. Ritchey and Ellerman observed the Leonid meteors the night of November 14, 1898. They deter- mined the greatest hourly rate (105) to be between three and four o'clock A. M., and the position of the radiant to be 9h. 56 m. of right ascension, and 24° of north declination. Since July, 1898, Professor Frost has devoted most of his observing time to determining the velocities of stars in the line of sight. Some important improvements in the apparatus for perform- ing this work are being made as the result of these experiments.
"Director Hale, assisted by Mr. Ellerman, has studied the spectrum of the solar chromosphere, and discovered a large number of bright lines that are new to the observer, including the bands due to carbon vapor. They have made a number of experiments in photographing the sun, and hope by the close of this year to be systematically at work with a large spectro- heliograph which is nearing completion in the work- shop of the observatory, made from designs by Director Hale. These gentlemen have undertaken a photographic study of stars of Secchi's fourth type, and found it possible to use a dispersion train of three prisms, even with the faintest of the stars, which range
224
The Yerkes Observatory.
down to less than the eighth magnitude. They have measured several hundred lines in the spectra, and the radial velocity has been sufficiently well determined to permit the wave lengths to be corrected for motion. A study of the photographs has led to the conclusion that these stars of the fourth type contain bright lines, and that there can be no doubt of an intimate connection between stars of the third and fourth types. Mr. Ellerman has obtained spectra of Jupiter and Saturn, the latter affording the best of evidence that the heavy Saturnian atmosphere is far less dense or altogether lacking on the rings. Professor Wadsworth has pho- tographed the spectra of several double stars, includ- ing some photographic binaries, for the purpose of determining the relative displacement of lines that are common to both spectra. He also has published a series of papers dealing with the optical theory of the telescope and other instruments, and these investigations have led to important developments of the theory of the resolving power of spectroscopes.
"During the summer of 1898, Dr. E. F. Nichols, of Dartmouth College, made an important study of heat radiation from the stars. The sensitiveness of the radiometer used by him was such that a deflection of one-tenth of a millimeter corresponded to the heat that would be received from a candle fifteen miles away, if there were no loss by atmospheric absorption. He obtained deflections of six times this quantity for the heat radiation from Arcturus, and a little less than half that from Vega. Mr. J. A. Parkhurst, of Marengo, Ill., devoted several nights to observations of variable stars, and was able to set an upper limit to the minimum magnitudes of nine variables. Satisfactory photo- graphs of the moon have been obtained with the aid of the great Yerkes telescope, though the instrument is not intended for photographic work."
The staff of workers at the Yerkes Observatory in June, 1899, included George E. Hale, director; S. W. Burnham and E. E. Barnard, astronomers; E. B. Frost, astrophysicist; Ferdinand Ellerman, assistant, and G. W. Ritchey, optician. Prof. F. L. O. Wadsworth has accepted the directorship of the Allegheny observatory. No permanent endowment has been secured for the observatory, but Miss Catherine W. Bruce, of New York, has given $15,000, to be used in paying the salary of one member of the staff for a term of years.
COMMERCIAL HISTORY OF ILLINOIS.
No nation or state ever rose high in the scale of civilization whose commercial relations with the outside world were lim- ited, and it may with truth be said, that nations rise in wealth and grandeur almost in proportion as they barter, buy and sell with other nations.
The progress of Illinois, in this direction, has been marked by many a change in the varied history of the country. Buf- falo hides were the first articles of merchandise ever shipped from the Illinois country; and the export of these began about 1720. They were sent down the Mississippi river to New Orleans, which had then just been laid out as a French vil- lage. A few years later wheat, flour, and other agricultural productions followed in the same channel. The French fur traders came into Northern Illinois as early as the winter of 1674-5,* and bought furs of the Indians for the Canada trade.
Shortly after the English took possession of Illinois in 1765, the British board of trade took the subject under consider- ation of turning the trade of their French subjects, here, away from the French of New Orleans to the lakes and the St. Lawrence river, but nothing was ever done to accomplish such a result; probably owing to the friendly relations be- tween the French and the Indians and the unfriendly rela- tions between the English and the Indians.
Spain purchased Louisiana of France in 1762, which country then included the territory west of the Mississippi river and New Orleans on its east bank. Shortly after the peace of Paris, in 1783, Spain closed the navigation of the
*See Marquett's Journal, written in "Chicagou," 1675, translated by J. G. Shea, and first published, in English, in Dawson's Historical Mag., New York.
(225)
226
Commerce of Chicago.
*Mississippi river against the commerce of the west, which cut off her only available channel of communication with the sea, for the whole of Northern Illinois was a desolate wild, and the shores of Lake Michigan could not be reached by the French of Illinois except by a long overland route across the prairies, over which neither roads had been built, nor had streams been bridged.
In 1795 Spain agreed by treaty, negotiated October 27th by Thomas Pinkney on the part of the United States, to yield to the latter power the free navigation of the Mississippi;t but her procrastinating policy in relinquishing her forts on the banks of this stream, at Natchez and other places, delayed its fulfillment till the Spanish government retroceded Louisiana to the French in 1800, by the secret treaty of St. Ildefonso. This treaty was not published to the nations till two years later, the next year after which Louisiana was purchased of the French by the United States, the treaty for which was ratified by congress October 21st, 1803.
From this time onward till the water craft of the lakes had reached Chicago, as common carriers, which was in about 1835, the export trade of Illinois went to New Orleans with- out hindrance, and even from this later date (1835) to the era of railroads, the Mississipi river was a more important chan- nel of trade to the State of Illinois than the lakes. Meantime the new motive power, destined to transcend both of the original channels of trade, was slowly and surely approaching the state from the Atlantic coast across the intervening country, studding its broad plains with towns in its course, and multiplying its wealth.
The legislature of Illinois was composed of men of am-
*When England conceded the Mississippi river as the western bound- ary of the United States, at the peace of 1783, she also transferred to the new government her rights of navigating this stream. When this treaty was signed at Paris, it was done without the knowledge of the Spanish minister, who claimed, for his government, all the territory between the Alleghanies and the Mississippi. Spain thus balked in her ambition to secure the valley of the Mississippi to herself, was smart- ing under the sting of having been humiliated by the able diplomacy of American statesmen, which was one of the causes of her waywardness in excluding the Americans from navigating the Mississippi. Her excuse for this course was that England had transferred a claim to which she herself had no right, which was perhaps true, but it was in vain that the Spanish government protested against the new order of destiny that the fortunes of war had brought.
+See Treaty of San Lorenzo el Real, Am. State Papers, 1795.
227
Commerce of Chicago.
bitious purposes, from the first, and this spirit seemed to gather strength as other states to the eastward set the example of building canals, and particularly railroads.
The first official act here in this direction took place Janu- ary 28th, 1831, at which time an act was passed by the gen- eral assembly for the survey of a route for a canal or railroad in St. Clair county. * Other plans for public transportation by means of canals, slack water navigation and railroads, were subsequently chartered by the state, some of which were premature, while others showed the wisdom and forecast of their architects. Of the latter sort the Galena & Chicago Union and the Illinois Central railroads were examples-the first as the pioneer east and west line through the state, and the last as the pioneer north and south line from the southern extremity of the state to its great commercial emporium on the lakes and to its northwestern tangent.
THE RAILROADS OF CHICAGO.
List of Railroads that enter Chicago on their own tracks August 1st, 1900, with date of their entrance into this city.
Several of these Railroads had been operated for years before they were built into Chicago. Belt lines and Railroads that do not extend beyond Cook County are omitted, as also are omitted roads owned or controlled but not operated by the parent road.
Many of these roads have direct connection with other lines tending towards Chicago but have no tracks of their own entering the city.
Passengers can be ticketed from Chicago to all points in the United States by the admirable coupon system of tickets in universal use.
Galena & Chicago Union Railway Co .- Entered Chicago in the Fall of 1848. Consolidated June 2nd, 1864, with other Companies under the title of the Chicago & North-Western Railway Company.
Michigan Central May 21st, 1852.
Lake Shore and Michigan Southern May 22nd, 1852.
Illinois Central
· October, 1856.
*See paper read by W. K. Ackerman before the Chicago Historical Society, February, 1885.
1
228
Commerce of Chicago.
Chicago, Burlington and Quincy . ·
Chicago, Rock Island and Pacific .
·
1857.
Pitts., Ft. Wayne and Chicago
Nov. 10th, 1856.
Pitts., Cincinnati and St. Louis · March , 1856.
Chicago and Eastern Illinois
Chicago, Indianapolis and Louisville
Chicago, Milwaukee and St. Paul
Baltimore and Ohio
Nov. 17th, 1874.
Wabash
.
March 23rd, 1880.
New York, Chicago and St. Louis
.
Oct. 22nd, 1882.
Grand Trunk
.
Chicago Great Western
Sept., 1887.
Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe
Sept. 17th, 1887. .
Wisconsin Central
July, 1886.
Erie
April, 1883.
METHOD OF TRAVEL PREVIOUS TO THE INTRODUCTION OF RAILROADS.
GENERAL STAGEORLICE
FRINK, WALKER & CO
S. W. Corner Lake and Dearborn Streets.
May 20th, 1864. Oct. 1st, 1852.
Chicago and Alton
Oct. , 1869. Jan. 9th, 1882.
February, 1873.
Feb. 12th, 1880.
HISTORY OF THE CHICAGO TRIBUNE. BY PROF. ELIAS COLBERT.
The Chicago Tribune, like all the great newspapers of the United States, had a very contracted and humble origin. Its existence began on Thursday, June 10, 1847, in the third story of a building on the southwest corner of La Salle and Lake streets, a single apartment being sufficient for the counting room, printing office, and editorial "sanctum." The men who stood spon- sors for it at its birth were James J. Kelly, John E. Wheeler and Joseph C. K. Forrest. Messrs. Wheeler and Forrest were the principal writers. Mr. Kelly had been associated for two years previously with Thomas A. Stewart, as publishers of a weekly paper called The Gem of the Prairie, which was continued until 1849 as the weekly edition of the Tribune, and then separately till 1852. The Weekly Tribune, as a distinct issue, dropped out of existence in August, 1887.
The new paper was independent in politics, with free soil leanings. The name is reported to have been suggested by Mr. Forrest, and readily adopted by Mr. Wheeler, who previously had been on the staff of the paper "founded by Horace Greeley." Four hundred copies, worked off on a hand press, one of the pro- prietors acting as pressman, was the extent of the first edition of the Chicago Tribune. That was not far from being in the same proportion to the number of inhabit- ants of the city as an issue of 45,000 would be to-day.
The Tribune soon underwent a complete change of ownership. Mr. Kelly withdrew two weeks after the
(229)
230
History of the Chicago Tribune.
date of the first issue, and his interest was taken by Thomas A. Stewart. September 27 of the same year Mr. Forrest retired, drawing out his original invest- ment of only $600, which had been advanced by Jonathan Y. Scammon. From that time till August 23, 1848, the Tribune was conducted by Messrs. Wheeler and Stewart. Then Mr. John Locke Scripps purchased a one-third interest, and the firm name became Wheeler, Stewart & Scripps. May 22 of the next year, 1849, the office was entirely destroyed by fire, but the loss was nearly covered by an insurance for $2,100, and publication was resumed two days later. Several removals followed, and December 6, before a permanent location was secured, the publishers had completed arrangements for receiving news dispatches from New York, this mark- ing a long step forward in the history of Chicago jour- nalism. In May, 1850, the establishment was removed to the Masonic building, No. 173 Lake street, and the Tribune began to be prosperous. It was enlarged to the dimensions of 28x40 inches, and had a daily circula- tion of 1,120 copies.
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.