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"This is no time for tricks of diplomacy, but a time for bold, decisive and frank action, as all must see. There is but one endowment of $600,000 to be granted, and that will soon be over."-Gazette (Urbana), December 16, 1864.
(1)"The Board of Supervisors, pursuant to the call published last week and, by singular una- nimity, determined to use every means in the power of the county necessary to secure the lo- cation of the State Agricultural College in this county. To this end, the proposition of Messrs. Stoughton & Babcock, to convey the building to the State, upon receiving a subscription of $24,000 from the county, was readily accepted, and other appropriations demanded by the oc- casion readily made. A committee consisting of W. D. Somers, Dr. Scroggs, C. R. Griggs, W. N. Coler, T. R. Webber, A. B. Condit, Washington Nebeker, J. S. Busey, J. C. Stoughton, A. H. Bai- ley, M. L. Dunlap and Dr. W. A. Conkey, was
this action of the County Board no word of criticism was heard from all the county, although the action contemplated great outlays of the people's money at once, with the pros- pect of possible unknown outlays in the future. Never were a people more in earnest, and never did the people of this county act with greater harmony and unanimity. The ear- nestness everywhere shown was like that of a hotly contested political campaign, but prac- tically all were upon one side.
Two motives actuated the people. Some saw only the outcome in money which they sup- posed was to come to them in the increase of values, and perhaps this was the larger class; while others saw, and were moved by the intellectual and social advantages to ac- crue to the county and its people by the coming of an educational institution backed by a large endowment and the State of Illinois.
Thus fortified and reinforced, the "lobby" from Champaign County promptly met the law-makers at Springfield at the session of 1865 in force.(1) Every influence available had previously been invoked in favor of this location, and much confidence was felt. Early in the session the bill, prepared by the Bloom- ington convocation of the previous autumn, was introduced and duly referred to the proper committee. To this committee the offer of Champaign County was made; but little notice was taken of it there, and the bill, with a sec- tion providing for the location of the institu- tion to be made by a commission, included therein, was reported back to the House.
Here a friend whose services our people had secured, moved to strike out the section of the bill providing for the location of the institution by a commission, and to insert in its place, a section making it the duty of the Board of Trustees of the institution, to be appointed by the Governor, to locate it at Urbana, whenever the county of Champaign should convey or cause to be conveyed to the
appointed to secure an act of the Legislature legalizing the issue of bonds and the subscrip- tion to the Seminary; it is also. expected that this committee will use all the moral suasion under their control to influence the location of the Agricultural College here.
"A good day's work has been accomplished bv the Supervisors, the wisdom of which, we trust, the future of our county will fully sustain."- Gazette (Urbana), December 23, 1864.
(1)"The 'Lobby' members have gone to Springfield to take their seats."-Gazette, Jan. 6, 1865.
780
HISTORY OF CHAMPAIGN COUNTY.
Board of Trustees, free of all encumbrance, the Urbana and Champaign Institute and other property named in the offer of the county in accordance with the written proposal made by W. D. Somers, T. A. Cosgrove and C. R. Moor- house, the committee and agents named by the Board of Supervisors. This motion, greatly to the surprise of those who had prepared the bill and in their own minds had fixed the loca- tion elsewhere in one of the old counties, was carried by a handsome majority, and the bill, as thus amended, was advanced towards final action under the rules of the House. Here opened a storm, the like of which has rarely come before a legislative body, and which kept up the agitation for two years, until final legislative action was had upon the bill, and even for years thereafter.
When Champaign County appeared upon the scene as an applicant for the honor of furnishing a location, and locally caring for the proposed Industrial University, great surprise was felt by the people of the older and more thickly settled portions of the State, where matters of State interest and the allotment of State offices had been usually settled without consulting the thinly settled and less known counties. Heretofore Champaign County had been an unknown quantity politically, not to be reckoned with in matters of general interest. It had, for nearly twenty years, but one representative in the General Assembly-Hon. John S. Busey, who was elected in 1862. No State officer had ever been chosen therefrom, and its political leaders had been but so many pawns in the settlement of State affairs. Its vote for either political party had always been but small, and it had, in fact, counted for but little in all State affairs; and even now, it was represented in both Houses by gentlemen resi- dent in other counties. So it was thought presumptuous on the part of this county to enter the contest for this prize, and the effect of its appearance in the arena was somewhat stunning. Our county, while unrepresented in either House by one of its own men, had there a strong lobby of its citizens and others who adhered to its cause. Open house was kept at one of the principal hotels, where all com- ers were made welcome and friends from counties, as obscure as ours, were rapidly won over. What our people much wanted was that a committee of the House be sent here to investigate and report, and this they succeeded
in having appointed. A visit was made by the committee to the county and a favorable report secured, so far as the suitableness of the location and the good faith attending our offer was concerned. (1)
(1)This report, as an important item in the history of the final location of the University, we here append:
"Your joint committee appointed to visit Ur- bana, find the proposition of Champaign County substantially as represented in the bill contain- ing the proposition of said county.
"The general appearance of the country is unsurpassed in the West for the beauty of its landscape, the richness and variety of its soil, interspersed with fine groves of timber and streams of pure water. Champaign County is located about the center of the State, north and south, and about midway between Bloomington and the State line on the east, is remarkably healthy and long celebrated for its fine cattle and abundant harvests. It is included in the great coal field of the West, and at a depth of less than two hundred feet, as is shown by actual experiment, are found rich veins of the best bituminous coal.
"The Illinois Central Railroad runs through the county from north to south, and the Great Western Railroad runs from east to west. The cities of Champaign and Urbana are connected by street cars, and contain a population of about eight thousand.
"The Urbana and Champaign Institute is a substantial brick building with stone foundation, standing on a beautiful elevation, about one- half mile from the Illinois Central Railroad at Champaign City, and about an equal distance from Urbana, the county-seat of Champaign County. The whole structure is beautiful in its architectural proportions and very imposing in its appearance. The main building is 125 feet front by 40 feet in depth, and five stories high. From the center a wing projects 44 by 70 feet, four stories high. The front wall has a projection eight feet by forty, with pilasters and towers ornamenting the corners. The stor- ies are from 10 to 14 feet in height. The in- side of the building is unfinished, and may be somewhat modified from the original plan, if desired, as to size and number of rooms.
"The original plan contemplates some 85 or 90 dormitories, or students' rooms, 10 by 15 feet each, with suitable rooms for Principal and Professors; large and commodious recitation and society rooms, with basement kitchen and cellar; halls and storage rooms-amounting in all to one hundred and seventy or eighty rooms, with accommodations for from four to six hundred students. Accommodations for a much larger number of day students could easily be provid- ed by reducing the number of dormitories. The walls are without a crack or blemish, and the whole structure is very substantially built. The building is under contract to be wholly finished. complete and entire at the expense of the county in the early part of the coming summer. "The farm of one hundred acres is contiguous to the building, and is a handsomely elevated tract of land, with a stream of living water running through it.
"We have examined the abstract of title to these grounds, and find the title perfect and in a condition to be conveyed unincumbered.
"The buildings and grounds are admirably adapted to the purposes of the Industrial Uni- versity, and the surrounding country is most charming. This offer to the State indicates the thrift and enterprise of the people.
"In the opinion, therefore, of the Committee, the proposition of the County of Champaign is a most generous and liberal one, and the loca- tion most desirable. Yet, while your Commit-
7
SCENES ON THE CAMPUS-UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS
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LIBRARY OF THE SIONIIT J9 AMBasnika
781
HISTORY OF CHAMPAIGN COUNTY.
The report of this committee was all that could have been expected by the friends of Champaign County, and was influential in turning the tide in our favor. The bill, as amended, passed the Lower House and went to the Senate for its concurrence.(1) The opposition, to this stage, had been ineffectual to accomplish anything but delay, but this de- lay was sufficient to prevent action upon the bill in the Upper House. The Legislature ad- journed without action, leaving the whole question open for future action.
Though failure attended the attempt first made by our county to win the prize, our peo- ple were in no manner disheartened. The lessons of the failure were rich in suggestions for the future, for few of those engaged in the work of trying to influence the Legislature had any experience in that kind of work. Many friends from other parts of the State were secured, and a public sentiment in the State in favor of our claims was created. No one was discouraged, but a strong feeling in favor of a presentation of the claim of this location, at the next meeting of the General Assembly, everywhere prevailed.
Meantime the opponents of Champaign County were neither idle nor silent. With the dying away of the din of the battle at Spring- field, were many unkind and erroneous re- marks from those who had attempted to stem the current which was setting in our favor. They treated the claims of our county as most preposterous and presumptuous. The story was told that, in the building and grounds offered for the use of the University by the people of the county, was something of which they wished to be relieved; and so, in speaking of the offer made, our opponents called it "the Champaign Elephant," as if we were endeavor- ing to rid ourselves of an unwelcome load. -
tee admit all this, we do not desire to com- promise any one to the proposed location."- (Signed) W. Bushnell, Chairman; A. J. Hunter; John H. Addams, D. K. Green, John B. Cohrs, W. T. Hopkins, O. W. Bryant, J. T. Springer, R. F. Dunn, Scott Wike, Leander Smith, George H. Dikeman.
(1)"Industrial University .- The Industrial Col- lege bill, as amended by Mr. Cook of Cook county, passed the house Monday by a vote of 45 to 34. This bill makes a division of the fund, locating one department at this place and one at Chicago. It also provides for the loca- tion of a branch in the southern part of the state, whenever that portion signify their desire by furnishing suitable buildings, etc. If the bill fails in the Senate the matter will be in- definitely postponed."-Gazette (Urbana), Feb- ruary 17, 1865.
As before said, up to this date Champaign County had attracted but little attention in State matters, was among the last to be settled and was not considered to be in the line for promotion or for receiving favors. The promot- ers of the movement for industrial education lived and operated elsewhere, and it was but natural that they should seek to control the location of their institution. It may be also said that it was but right that the control of an institution, for the creation of which they had done so much, should have been left to these eminent gentlemen. Champaign County has now no word of reproach for them and unites in swelling the praise of those who did 60 much for the State.
The period elapsing between the adjourn- ment of the General Assembly of 1865 and the election of its successor, was by no means a period of idleness with either party to this controversy. Our people made ready to renew their offer and to increase it, if necessary; meanwhile a close observation of the move- ments of their opponents was maintained. During the autumn of 1865, a call for an "Industrial Convention," to be held at Bloom- ington on December 14th, was put forth by the promoters of the movement, and largely pub- lished by newspapers throughout the State. Of this our people took notice and caused the county to be represented in the persons of three citizens: Dr. W. H. Pierce, C. R. Griggs and J. C. Sheldon. The convention was con- trolled, as it had been called, by the oppo- nents of the movement for locating the insti- tution here. The bill, as introduced in the last Legislature, was endorsed, and it was resolved to have members to be elected to the next, pledged to its passage as introduced. The "Champaign Elephant" was remembered and came in for much condemnation.
This, with other movements less conspicu- ous, only put our people upon their guard and fired them to meet and overcome their oppo- nents. The chief thing to be accomplished at home was the election of a Champaign County man as a Representative in the Lower House. Early in the year the public choice centered upon Hon. C. R. Griggs, of Urbana, as the man most likely to accomplish the work in hand. He was nominated by the dominant party, supported by men of all parties in this
782
HISTORY OF CHAMPAIGN COUNTY.
county and elected by a large majority. (1) At the coming together of the members of the General Assembly in January, 1867, among whom were many of the members of the prior Legislature, they met the "Champaign Lobby," as before, with the offer of this county made larger to meet the emergency of divers offers made by other counties. This time at the head of the body of citizens was their chosen leader, Hon. C. R. Griggs, now a member of the Lower House, and destined by his experi- ence, tact and affable manners, to become one of the most influential of that body of law- makers. A suite of eligibly situated rooms was taken at the principal hotel and, as be- fore, the liberal hospitality extended to all made friends of men from all parts of the State; especially was this so when aspirants
(1) Clark Robinson Griggs was born in Mas- sachusetts on March 6, 1824. He continued a resident of that State until about 1859, when he removed to this county, having a year or two before then, as one of a colony of families from that State, taken up considerable land in Philo Township, in the neighborhood of what is now known as "Yankee Ridge," from the circumstance of this choice.
Before coming west he was chosen and served a term as a member of the legislative body of his native State.
For a year or two here he carried on farm- ing until, by an accidental injury, he nearly lost his right hand. From this he abandoned farming and engaged in trade, in a small way, in Urbana. At the breaking out of the War of the Rebellion he was appointed by Col. W. N. Coler as sutler for the Twenty-fifth Regiment which had been largely recruited in this county. This appointment employed him with the army during the war, at the close of which he re- turned home.
During his service in the General Assembly, as told in the text, he secured a charter for the construction of the Danville, Urbana, Blooming- ton & Pekin Railroad, which company had been organized under the statutory power the year before, and to the presidency of which he had been chosen ..
His career and great success as a member of our ยท Legislature gave him great prestige as a railroad man, and, during the next two years, he succeeded in organizing forces which accom- plished the construction and stocking of that road, which did so much for this county.
Since his connection with the above road, which, by successive reorganizations and changes of ownership has become known as the Peoria & Eastern Railroad-or one of the divisions of the Cleveland, Cincinnati, Chicago & St. Louis Railroad. Mr. Griggs, since leav- ing railroad life in this State, has been en- gaged upon the construction of several roads in the Eastern States, always with success.
No review of the history of this county which fails to name Mr. Griggs as the principal in- fluence in the location of the University, and in the construction of one of its principal lines of railroad, would be complete. Those who know of the legislative battle of 1867, which resulted in the passage of the charter of the Illinois Industrial University, will all unite in saying that, but for his knowledge and sagacity as a leader of men, the location of that institution would have gone elsewhere.
from other locations lacked many of the ad- vantages and precautions invoked by our people.
In pursuance of the policy which prevailed with the promoters two years before, the same bill which had then been introduced to charter the Industrial University, was again offered and again it went to the appropriate com- mittee. With the bill our friends found no fault whatever except with section 12, which, as before, left the matter of the location of the institution to a commission to be appointed by the Governor. They determined to follow the policy adopted two years before by moving a substitute for this section, which was suc- cessfully carried out. The substitute, as adopted, provided that it should be the duty of the Board of Trustees to permanently locate the University at Urbana in Champaign County, whenever the county of Champaign should legally comply with the offer of its Board of Supervisors, as made to the State, (1)
(1) The following is the text of section 12, and fully explains the offer of Champaign County made to the State:
"It shall be the duty of the Board of Trus- tees to permanently locate said University at Urbana, in Champaign County, Illinois, whenever the county of Champaign shall, according to the proper forms of law, convey, or cause to be conveyed, to said Trustees, in fee simple, and free from all incumbrances the Urbana and Champaign Institute buildings, grounds and lands, together with the appurtenances thereto belonging, as set forth in the following offer in behalf of said county, to-wit:
" 'The undersigned, a committee appointed by the Board of Supervisors of Champaign County. are instructed to make the following offer to the State of Illinois, in consideration of the per- manent location of the Illinois Industrial Uni- versity at Urbana, Champaign County, viz .: We offer the Urbana and Champaign Institute build- ings and grounds, containing about ten acres; also, one hundred and sixty acres of land ad- jacent thereto; also, four hundred acres of land, it being part of section No. twenty-one, in township No. nineteen north, range No. nine east, distant not exceeding one mile from the corporate limits of the city of Urbana.
""'Also, four hundred and ten (410) acres of land, it being part of section No. nineteen, town- ship No. nineteen, range No. nine east, within one mile of the buildings herein offered.
"'Also, the donation offered by the Illinois Central Railroad Company of fifty thousand dollars worth of freight over said road, for the benefit of said University.
" 'Also, one hundred thousand dollars in Champaign County bonds, due and payable in ten years, and bearing interest at the rate of ten per cent per annum, and two thousand dol- lars in fruit, shade and ornamental trees and shrubbery, to be selected from the nursery of M. L. Dunlap, and furnished at the lowest cat- alogue rates, making an estimated valuation of four hundred and fifty thousand dollars ($450,- 000). Titles to be perfect, and conveyance to the State to be made, or caused to be made, by the county of Champaign, upon the permanent location of the Illinois Industrial University upon the said grounds, so to be conveyed as
783
HISTORY OF CHAMPAIGN COUNTY.
and put the bill in a condition highly satisfac- tory to our people.
As before, the gentlemen who acted as the promoters of this movement and those from other counties who appeared as claimants for their localities, were much disconcerted at what they termed the "audacity of the Cham- paign crowd," and resorted to all known means to work its defeat. Appeals to local pride and prejudice were loudly made, and insinuations questioning the ability of our people to deliver
according to their offer, were freely in- dulged in, but to no purpose. They found in Representative Griggs a man able to meet them, at every point, with facts and argu- ment. In that diplomacy which wins men and holds them he was a master operator, and he brought to bear upon the subject in hand his best arts, well aided and assisted by his neigh- bors of "the lobby."
At this juncture McLean, Logan and Morgan Counties came forward, each with tempting offers to the State of money and property for the location of the University at their. respec- tive county-seats, and neither lacked for able friends of their claims. Either place would have been preferred to Champaign County by the gentlemen promoters of the movement, and at times the combination of all against our claim threatened its success.
As before, the bill again passed the Lower House not very late in the session, and went to the Senate for its concurrence. Here the measure hung for several weeks, encountering . all sorts of dilatory attacks and propositions for amending the 12th section. Late in Feb- ruary, 1867, the bill passed the Senate by a good majority and, on the 28th received the sanction of Gov. Richard J. Oglesby, and thus became a law.
The local joy to which expression was given was great and often loud. Our people were very grateful for the opportunity given of fur- nishing a home to the feeble institution, but with big hopes for its future. The discussion and opposition encountered was not without its good effects. Immediately after the pas-
sage of the charter a supplemental act was offered and, within the shortest possible time, passed by both Houses and approved by the Governor. This act, which was embraced in one section, provided that, if the authorities of Champaign County should not by or before the first day of June, 1867, convey or cause to be conveyed to the Trustees of the Indus- trial University by good and unincumbered title, in fee simple, all the real estate men- tioned in the propositions of the county, and deliver all the bonds and other property offered by the county, then it should be the duty of the Trustees, without delay, to locate the Uni- versity in McLean, Logan or Morgan County- the county so selected to be required to fulfill and comply with the provisions of the offer before then made as inducement for the loca- tion of the University.
This law originated in no good feeling for Champaign County, and evidently with a pur- pose and hope to finally defeat the location of the institution at this point. However, it served a very different end. It gave our people timely warning to be ready in the minutest particulars and in everything, and all con- cerned at once set about the work.
An election was to be held in the county under the law that the people might vote upon the propositions made by the Board of Super- visors before a dollar of the amount promised could be legally paid out. The day for this election was fixed and notices published by the County Clerk, the utmost vigilance being observed in all the details, knowing that it would be subject to a searching investigation and criticism.
Vigilance was also necessary to secure, with- out fail, the defeat of a somewhat vigorous opposition which sprang up on the eve of the election among our own people, and which, from its activity, threatened the measure. Every neighborhood of the county was can- vassed by friends of the measure and, from school house to school house, did the local orators harangue the people in favor of an affirmative vote. The opposition, too, was heard from and lacked nothing in determination and action. The election day came and the vote in favor of the proposition carried by a respec- table and decided vote. (1)
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