USA > Illinois > Livingston County > Historical encyclopedia of Illinois, Volume I Pt 1 > Part 40
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HISTORICAL ENCYCLOPEDIA OF ILLINOIS.
ing material, some of the rock being susceptible of a bigh polish and making a handsome durablo marble. About seventy feet are exposed near Thebes, in Alexander County. All through the Southwest this stone is known as Cape Girardeau marble, from its being extensively quarried at Cape Girardeau, Mo. The Cincinnati group immediately succeeds the Trenton in the ascend- ing scale, and forms the uppermost member of the Lower Silurian system. It usually consists of argillaceous and sandy shales, although, in the northwest portion of the State, Magnesian lime- stone is found with the shales. The prevailing colors of the beds are light blue and drab, weathering to a light ashen gray. This group is found well exposed in the vicinity of Thebes, Alexander County, furnishing a durable building stone extensively usel for foundation walls. Fossils are found in profusion in all the beds, many fine specimens, in a perfect state of preser- vation, having been exhumed.
UPPER SILURIAN SYSTEM .- The Niagara group in Northern Illinois consists of brown, gray and buff magnesian limestones, sometimes evenly bedded, as at Joliet and Athens, and sometimes coneretionary and brecciated, as at Bridgeport and Port Byron. Near Chicago the cells and pockets of this rock are filled with petroleum, but it has been ascertained that only the thirty upper feet of the rock contain bituminous matter. The quarries in Will and Jersey Counties furnish fine building and flagging stone. The rock is of a light gray color, changing to buff on exposure. In Pike and Calhoun Counties, also, there are out- croppings of this rock and quarries are numerous. It is nsually evenly bedded, the strata varying in thickness from two inches to two feet, and break- ing evenly. Its aggregate thickness in Western and Northern Illinois ranges from fifty to 150 feet. In Union and Alexander Counties, in the southern part of the State, the Upper Silurian series consists chiefly of thin bedded gray or buff-colored limestone, silicious and cherty, ilinty material largely preponderating over the lime- stone. Fossils are not abundant in this formation, although the quarries at Bridgeport, in Cook County, have afforded casts of nearly 100 species of marine organisms, the calcareous portion hav- ing been washed away.
DEVONIAN SYSTEM. - This system is represented in Illinois by three well marked divisions, cor- responding to the Oriskany sandstone, the Onon- daga limestone and the Hamilton and Corniferons beds of New York. To these the late Professor Worthen, for many years State Geologist, added,
although with some hesitaney, the black. shab formation of Illinois. Although these comprises an aggregate thickness of over 500 feet their exposure is limited to a few isolated outeroj ping. along the bluffs of the Illinois, Mississippi and Rock Rivers. The lower division, called "Clear Creek Limestone," is about 250 feet thick, and is ouly found in the extreme southern end of the State. It consists of choit, or ingmri fin., and thin-bedded silico-magnesian limestones, rather compact in texture, and of buff or light gray to nearly white colors. When decomposed by atmospheric influences, it forms a fine white clay, resembling common chalk in appearance. Some of the cherty beds resemble burr stones in poros- ity, and good mill-stones are made therefrom in Union County. Some of the stone is bluish-gray. or mottled and crystalline, capable of reciving a high polish, and making an elegant and durable building stone. The Onondaga group comprises some sixty feet of quartzose sandstone and striped silicious shales. The structuro of the rock is almost identical with that of St. Peter's Sandstone. In the vicinity of its outerop in Union County are found fine beds of potter's clay, also variegated in color. The rock strata are about twenty feet thick, evenly bedded and of a coarse, granular structure, which renders the stone valuable for heavy masonry. The group has not been found north of Jackson County. Large quantities of characteristic fossils abound. The rocks composing the Hamilton group are the most valuable of all the divisions of the Devonian system, and the outeropscan be identified only by their fossils. In Union and Jackson Counties it is found from eighty to 100 feet in thickness, two beds of bluish gray, fetid limestone being sepa- rated by about twenty fort of calcareous shales. The limestones are highly bituminous. In Jersey and Calhoun Counties the group is only six to ten feet thick, and consists of a hard, silicious limestone, passing at some points into a quartzose sandstone, and at others becoming argillaccous, as at Grafton. The most northern outerop is in Rock Island County, where the rock is concretion- ary in structure and is utilized for building pur- poses and in the manufacture of quicklime. Fossils are numerous, among them being a few fragments of fishes, which are the oldest remains of vertebrate animals yet found in the State. The black shale probably attains its maxinmm development in Union County, where it ranges from fifty to seventy-five feet in thickness. Its lower portion is a fine, black, laminated slate. sometimes closely resembling the bituminous
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shales associated with the coil seams, which cir- cumstance has led to the fruitless expenditure of much time and money. The bituminous portion of the inass, on distillation, yields an oil closely resembling petroleum. Crystals of iron pyrites are abundant in the argillaceous portion of the group, which does not extend north of the coun- ties of Calhoun, Jersey and Pike.
LAWEB CARBONIFEROUS SYSTEM. - This is di- vissble into five groups, as follows: The Kinder- fick group, the Burlington limestone, and the Knkuk. St. Louis and Chester groups. Its "count development is in the southern portion f !! ^ State, where it has a thickness of 1,400 or 1 440 f. et. It thins out to the northward so rapidly that, in the vicinity of the Lower Rapids on the " toippi, it is only 300 feet thick, while it ... My disporir below Rock Island. The Kinder- . & sup is : triable in its lithological charac- .. ne sting of argillaceous and sandy shales, Th this Is. Is of compact and politic limestone, HA HA Imails into calcareous shales or impure The stone The entire formation is mainly a . or! Anicsl : Jiment, with but a very small por- Den of organic matter. The Burlington lime- stone, on the other hand, is composed almost ratirely of the fossilized remains of organic tr ings, with barely enough sedimentary material to act as a cement. Its maximum thickness Parcely exceeds 200 feet, and its principal out- "Tops are in the counties of Jersey, Greene, Scott, Calhoun, Pike. Adams, Warren and Henderson. 11.0 fork is usually a light gray, buff or brown limestone, either coarsely granular or crystalline n structure. The Keokuk group immediately .4 www. is the Burlington in the ascending order, with no well defined line of demarcation, the ... of points of difference between the two being o a bar and in the character of fossils found. At the upper part of this group is found a bed of estareur, illacrous shale, containing a great variety of psyles, which furnish beautiful cabinet ยก* viens of crystallized quartz, chalcedony, i unite andb iron pyrites. In Jersey and Monroe countless le Inf hydraulic limestone, adapted to the manufacture of cement, is found at the top of this formation. The St. Louis group is partly a fine-grained or semi-crystallized bluish-gray limestone, and partly concretionary, as around Aton. In the extreme southern part of the State the rock is highly bituminous and susceptible of receiving a high polish, being used as a black marble. Ro ls of magnesian limestone are found here and there, which furnish a good stone for foundation walls. In Hardin County, the rock
is traversed by veins of fluor spar, carrying galena and zinc blonde. The Chester group is only found in the southern part of the State, thinning out from a thickness of eight hundred feet in Jackson and Randolph Counties, to about twenty feet at Alton. It consists of hard, gray, crystalline, argillaceous limestones, alternating with sandy and argillaceous shales and sandstones, which locally replace each other. A few species of true carboniferous flora are found in the are- naceous shales and sandstones of this group, the earliest traces of pre-historic land plants found in the State. Outerops extend in a narrow belt from the southern part of Hardin County to the southern line of St. Clair County, passing around the southwest border of the coal ticld.
UPPER CARBONIFEROUS SYSTEM .- This includes the Conglomerate, or "Mill Stone Grit" of Euro- pean authors, and the true coal measures. In the southern portion of the State its greatest thick- ness is about 1,200 feet. It becomes thinner toward the north, scarcely exceeding 400 or 500 feet in the vicinity of La Salle. The word "con- glomerate" designates a thick bed of sandstone that lies at the base of the coal measures, and appears to have resulted from the culmination of the arenaceous sedimentary accumulations. It consists of massive quartzose sandstone, some- times nearly white, but more frequently stained red or brown by the ferruginous inatter which it contains, and is frequently composed in part of rounded quartz pebbles, from the size of a pea to several inches in diameter. When highly ferruginous, the oxide of iron cements the sand into a hard crust on the surface of the rock, which successfully resists the de- nuding influence of the atmosphere, so that the rock forms towering cliffs on the banks of the stream along which are its outcrops. Its thickness varies from 200 feet in the southern part of the State to twenty-five feet in the northern. It has afforded a few species of fossil plants, but no animal remains. The coal measures of Illinois are at least 1,000 feet thick and cover nearly three-fourths of its entire area. The strata are horizontal, the dip rarely exceeding six to ten feet to the mile. The formation is made up of sandstone, shales, thin beds of limestone, coal, and its associated fire clays. The thickness of the workable beds is from six to twenty-four inches in the upper measures, and from two to five feet in the lower measures. The fire clays, on which the coal seams usually rest, probably represent the ancient soil on which grew the trees and plants from which the coal is formed.
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HISTORICAL ENCYCLOPEDIA OF ILLINOIS.
When pure, these clays aro valuable for the manufacture of fire brick, tile and common pottery. Illinois coal is wholly of the bitumi- nous variety, the metamorphic conditions which resulted in the production of anthracite coal in Pennsylvania not having extended to this State. Fossils, both vegetable and animal, abound in the coal measures.
TERTIARY SYSTEM. - This system is represented only in the southern end of the State, where cer- tain deposits of stratified sands, shales and con- glomerate are found, which appear to mark the northern boundary of the great Tertiary forma- tion of the Gulf States. Potter's clay, lignite and silicious woods are found in the formation.
QUATERNARY SYSTEM .- This system embraces all the superficial material, including sands, clay, gravel and soil which overspreads the older for- mations in all portions of the State. It gives origin to the soil from which the agricultural wealth of Illinois is derived. It may be properly separated into four divisions: Post-tertiary sands, Drift, Loess and Alluvium. The first- named occupies the lowest position in the series, and consists of stratified beds of yellow sand and blue clay, of variable thickness, overlaid by a black or deep brown, loamy soil, in which aro found leaves, branches and trunks of trees in a good state of preservation. Next above lie tho drift deposits, consisting of blue, yellow and brown clays, containing gravel and boulders of various sizes, the latter the water-worn frag- ments of rocks, many of which have been washed down from the northern shores of the great lakes. This drift formation varies in thickness from twenty to 120 feet, and its accumulations are probably due to the combined influence of water currents and moving ice. The subsoil over a large part of the northern and central portions of the State is composed of fine brown clay. Prof. Desquereux (Illinois Geological Sur- vey, Vol. I.) accounts for the origin of this clay and of the black prairie soil above it, by attribut- ing it to the growth and decomposition of a peculiar vegetation. The Loess is a fine mechan- ical sediment that appears to have accumulated in some body of fresh water. It consists of marly. sands and clays, of a thickness varying from five to sixty feet. Its greatest development is along the bluffs of the principal rivers. The fossils found in this formation consist chiefly of the bones and teeth of extinet mammalia, such as the man- moth, mastodon, etc. Stone implements of primeval man are also discovered. The term alluvium is usually restricted to the deposits
forming the bottom lands of the river: aist smaller streams, They consist of irregul. : 19 stratified sand, clay and loam, which are fre quently found in alternate layers, and contain more or less organic matter from decong 1 animal and vegetable substances. When sitt ciently elevated, they constitute the richest and most productive farming lands in the State.
GEORGETOWN, a village of Vermilion C non on the Cleveland, Cincinnati, Chicago & St. Louis Railway, 10 miles south of Danville. It has a bank, telegraph and express office and a nows paper. Population (1890), 662; (1900), 988.
GERMAN EVANGELICAL SCHOOL, located at Addison, Du Page County; incorporated in 1:52. has a faculty of three instructors and reports 187 pupils for 1597-98, with a property valuation of $9,600.
GERMANTOWN, a village of Vermilion County, and suburb of Danville; is the center of a coal mining district. Population (1880), 540; (1890), 1,178; (1900), 1,782.
GEST, William H., lawyer and ex-Congress- man, was born at Jacksonville, Ill., Jan. 7, 1838. When hut four years old his parents removed to Rock Island, where he has since resided. He graduated from Williams College in 1860, was admitted to the bar in 1862, and has always been actively engaged in practice. In 1886 he was elected to Congress by the Republicans of the Eleventh Illinois District, and was re-elected in 1888, but in 1990 was defeated by Benjamin T. Cable, Democrat.
GIBAULT, Pierre, a French priest, supposed to have been born at New Madrid in what is now Southeastern Missouri, early in the eighteenth century ; was Vicar-General at Kaskaskia, with ecclesiastical jurisdiction over the churches at Cahokia, St. Genevieve and adjacent points, at. the time of the capture of Kaskaskia by C'ol. George Rogers Clark in 1778, and rendered Clark important aid in conciliating the French citizens of Illinois, He also made a visit to Vincennes and induced the people there to take the oath of allegi ance to the new government. He even advanced means to aid Clark's destitute troops, but beyond a formal vote of thanks by the Virginia Legisla- ture, he does not appear to have received any recompense. Governor St. Clair, in a report to Thomas Jefferson, then Secretary of State, dwelt impressively upon the value of Father Gibault's services and sacrifices, and Judge Law said of him, "Next to Clark and (Francis) Vigo, the United States are indebted more to Father Gibault for the accession of the States comprised
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in what was the original Northwest Territory than to any other man." The date and place of his death are unknown.
GIBSON CITY, a town in Ford County, situ- ated on the Lake Erie & Western Railroad, 34 miles east of Bloomington, and at the intersec- tion of the Wabash Railroad and the Springfield Division of the Illinois Central. The principal mechanical 'industries are iron works, canning works, a shoe factory, and a tile factory. It has two banks, two newspapers, nine churches and an academy. A college is projected. Popula- tion (1890), 1,803; (1900), 2,054: (1903, est.), 3.165.
GILL, Joseph B., Lieutenant-Governor (1893- 97), was born on a farm near Marion, Williamson County, Ill., Feb. 17, 1862. In 1868 his father settled at Murphysboro, where Mr. Gill still makes his home. Ilis academic education was received at the school of the Christian Brothers, in St. Louis, and at the Southern Illinois Normal University, Carbondale. In 1886 he graduated from the Law Department of the Michigan State University, at Ann Arbor. Returning home he purchased an interest in "Tho Murphysboro Inde- pendent," which paper he conducted and edited up to January, 1893. In 1888 he was elected to the lower house of the Legislature and re-elected in 1890. As a legislator he was prominent as a champion of the labor interest. In 1892 he was nominated and elected Lieutenant Governor on the Democratic ticket, serving from January, 1893, to '97.
GILLESPIE, a village of Macoupin County, on the Cleveland, Cincinnati, Chicago & St. Louis Railway, 10 miles southwest of Litchfield. This is an agricultural, coal-mining and stock-raising region; the town has a bank and a newspaper. Population (1890), 918; (1900), 873.
GILLESPIE, Joseph, lawyer and Judge, was born in New York City, August 22, 1809, of Irish parents, who removed to Illinois in 1819, settling on a farm near Edwardsville. After coming to Illinois, at 10 years, he did not attend school over two months. In 1827 he went to the lead mines at Galena, remaining until 1829. In 1831, at the invitation of Cyrus Edwards, he began the study of law, and was admitted to the bar in 1837, having been elected Probate Judge in 1836. 1Ie also served during two campaigns (1831 and '32) in the Black Hawk War. He was a Whig in polities and a warm personal friend of Abraham Lincoln. In 1840 he was elected to the lower house of the Legislature, serving one term, and was a member of the State Senate from 1817 to 1859. In 1853 he received the few votes of the
Whig membersof the Le , i: Inture for United Stat. Senator, in opposition to Stephen A. Douglas and, in 1860, presided over the second Republic av. State Convention at Decatur, at which clement were set in motion which ro ulted in the nam nation of Abraham Lincoln for the Presidency for the first time, a week later. lu 1861 he was elected Judge of the Twenty-fourth Ju ficial Circuit, and re-elected in 1867 for a second toem serving until 1873. Died, at his home at Edwards ville, Jan. 7, 1885.
GILLETT, John Dean, agriculturist and stor 1 .- man, was born in Connecticut, April 25, 1819: spent several years of his youth in Georgia, but. in 1838, came to Illinois by way of St. Low's. finally reaching "Bald Knob, " in Logan County. where an uncle of the same name resided. Here he went to work, and, by frugality and judicious investments, finally acquired a largo body of choice lands, adding to his agricultural operation the rearing and feeding of stock for the Chicago and foreign markets. In this he was remarkably successful. In his later years he was President of a National Bank at Lincoln. At the time of his death, August 27, 1888, he was the owner of 16,500 acres of improved lands in the vicinity of Elkhart, Logan County, besides large herds of fine stock, both cattle and horses. He left a large family, one of his daughters being the wife of the late Senator Richard J. Oglesby .
GILLETT, Phillp Goode, specialist and edu- cator, born in Madison, Ind., March 24, 1833; was educated at Asbury University, Greencastle, Ind .. graduating in 1852, and the same year became an instructor in the Institution for the Education of the Deaf and Dumb in that State. In 1856 he became Principal of the Illinois Institution for the Education of the Deaf and Dumb at Jackson- ville, remaining there until 1893, when he resigned. Thereafter, for some years, he was President of the Association for the Promotion of Speech by the Deaf, with headquarters in Wash- ington, D. C., but later returned to Jacksonville, where he has since been living in retirement
GILLHAM, Daniel B., agriculturist and legis- lator, was born at a place now called Wanda, in Madison County, Ill., April 29, 1826-his father being a farmer and itinerant Methodist preacher, who belonged to one of the pioneer families in the American Bottom at an early day. The sub- ject of this sketch was educated in the common schools and at MeRendree College, but did not graduate from the latter. In his carly life he followed the vocation of a farmer and stork- grower in one of the most prosperous and highdy
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cultivated portions of the American Bottom, a few miles below Alton, but, in 1872, removed to Alton, where he spent the remainder of his life. He became a member of the State Board of Agri- eulture in 1866, serving eight years as Superin- tendent and later as its President; was also a Trustee of Shurtleff College some twenty-five years, and for a time President of the Board. In 1870 he was elected to the lower branch of the Twenty-seventh General Assembly, and to the State Senate in 1892, serving a term of four years in the latter. On the night of March 17, 1890, he was assaulted by a burglar in his house, receiving a wound from a pistol-shot in consequence of which he died, April 6, following. The identity of his assailant was never discovered, and the crime consequently went unpunished.
GILMAN, a city in Iroquois County, at the intersection of the Illinois Central and the To- ledo, Peoria & Western Railways, 81 miles south by west from Chicago and 208 miles northeast of St. Louis. It is in the heart of one of the richest corn districts of the State and has large stock-raising and fruit-growing interests. It has an opera house, a public library, an extensive nursery, brick and tile works, a linseed oil mill, two banks and two weekly newspapers. Arte- sian well water is obtained by boring from 90 to 200 feet. Population (1890), 1,112; (1900). 1,441.
GILMAN, Arthur, was born at Alton, Ill., June 22, 1837, the son of Winthrop S. Gilman, of the firm of Gilman & Godfrey, in whose warehouse the printing press of Rev. Elijah P. Lovejoy was stored at the time of its destruction by a mob in 1837; was educated in St. Louis and New York, began business as a banker in 1857, but, in 1870, removed te Cambridge, Mass., and connected himself with "The Riverside Press." Mr. Gilman was one of the prime movers in what is known as "The Harvard Annex" in the interest of equal collegiate advantages for women, and has written much for the periodical press, besides publishing a number of volumes in the line of history and English literature.
GILMAN, CLINTON & SPRINGFIELD RAIL- ROAD. (See Illinois Central Railroad.)
GIRARD, a city in Macoupin County, on the Chicago & Alton Railroad, 25 miles south by west from Springfield and 13 miles north northeast of Carlinville. Coal-mining is carried on extensively here. The city also has a bank, five churches and a weekly newspaper. Population (1880), 1,024; (1890), 1,524; (1900), 1,601.
GLENCOE, a village of Cook County, on the Milwaukee Division of the Chicago & Northwest-
ern Railway, 19 miles north of Chicago. Popu- lation (1880), 357; (1890), 569; (19001, 1,020.
GLENN, Archibald .1., ex-Lieutenant-Governor, was born in Nicholas County, Ky., Jan. 30, 1819. In 1828 his father's family removed to Illinois, settling first in Vermilion, and later in Schuyler County. At the age of 13, being forced to abandon school, for six years he worked upon the farm of his widowed mother, and, at 19, entered a printing office at Rushville, where he learned the trade of compositor. In 1844 he published.a Whig campaign paper, which was discontinued after the defeat of Henry Clay. For eleven years he was Circuit Clerk of Brown County, during which period he was admitted to the bar; was a member of the Constitutional Convention of 1862, and of the State Board of Equalization from 1868 to 1872. The latter year he was elected to the State Senate for four years, and, in 1875, chosen its President, thus becoming ex officio Lieutenant-Governor. He early abandoned legal practice to engage in banking and in mercan- tile investment. After the expiration of his term in the Senate, he removed to Kansas, where, at latest advices, he still resided.
GLENN, John J., lawyer and jurist, was born in Ashland County, Ohio, March 2, 1831; gradu- ated from Miami University in 1856 and, in 1858, was admitted to the bar at Terre Haute, Ind. Removing to Illinois in 1860, he settled in Mercer County, a year later removing to Monmouth in Warren County, where ho still resides. In 1877 he was elected Judge of the Tenth Judicial Cir- cuit and re-elected in 1879, '85, '91, and '97. After his last election he served for some time, by appointment of the Supreme Court, as a mem- ber of the Appellate Court for the Springfield District, but ultimately resigned and returned to Circuit Court duty. His reputation as a cool- headed, impartial Judge stands very high, and his name has been favorably regarded for a place on the Supreme Bench.
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