USA > Illinois > Cook County > Chicago > Historical review of Chicago and Cook county and selected biography, Volume I > Part 5
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Chicago may have been and probably was regarded as a future place of exchange, a halting spot for the boats, which, coming from the east through the lakes, would by a short canal from the Chicago to the DesPlaines river descend to the Gulf, and thus might become an important port in the exchange of commodities.
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There is reason for thinking that the pre-historic inhabitants of England found coal cropping out and made use of it to a small ex-
tent. Coal has been regularly mined in China for
INDUSTRIAL 2,500 years. The Greeks knew of and made some
CHICAGO. use of it two thousand years before the Christian
era. Theophratus, a contemporary of Aristotle, speaks of it as being found in Liguria and Elis on the way to Olympias, over the mountains. He called it "lithos anthrakas." In 1259 a charter was granted to the freeman of New Castle to dig for coal. and thereafter coal was carried thence to London; from whence arose the phrase descriptive of useless effort-"Like carrying coals to New Castle." Coal continued to be used for warming the houses and cooking the food of London people. Yet when Marco Polo, the first European who visited China, returned to Venice in 1292 and told that in Cathay (China) a kind of black stone was found in the moun- tains which the people dug out and which burned like wood, and which the people preferred to wood because the stones burned better and cost less, the Venetians for the most part did not believe him; and as they felt sure he lied about this they concluded that all the tales he told of where he had been and what he had seen were equally false; and so they were-one was as false as the other, no more so. The steam engine could not have so revolutionized human industry had it not been for the existence of mineral coal.
The development of the steam engine and the discovery of the vast coal fields close to Chicago, have made it one of the greatest of manufacturing centers. Many years ago the villager who trans- formed cows into beef, pigs into pork, sheep into mutton, and sold to his neighbors the transformed product was termed a butcher, yet although his calling was thought to induce in him cruelty, his social standing was the same as that of other tradesmen, he being the object of neither envy, malice nor contempt. Thus Archibald Clybourne, a worthy man, in 1827 was the proprietor of a slaughter house in Chicago, built for the killing of such cattle as were required for the garrison at the fort. The dawn of a higher station and a more attractive name for this useful calling was in 1832. when George W. Dole "packed," mark you !- not butchered, killed or slaughtered --- but packed one hundred and fifty-two head of cattle for Oliver New- berry of Detroit. Thus the record runs and only between the lines
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do we infer that the cattle were killed before they were packed. The packing business has grown-somehow everything in Chicago does -even taxes mount upward. In 1907 there were received at the Chicago stock yards 7,717,280 hogs; of these 6,092,159 were there dressed or packed. The value of the hogs received was $102,918,041. During the same year there were received 4,218, 115 sheep; 3,305,314 cattle; the total value of hogs, horses and cattle received being $319,- 202,239. In 1905 there was employed in the business of slaughtering and meat packing in Chicago the sum of $69,880,273 ; there were em- ployed therein 22,391 persons. The Chicago Union Stock Yards were opened for business in 1866; from then to the year 1908 the value of stock received at these yards was $7,595,009,593-
And what of the packers by whom all this has been done? They dwell in palaces upon the boulevards, have numberless automobiles and steam yachts; mansions in the country and cottages by the sea ; their daughters are sought by the nobility ; ducal coronets and prince- ly crowns are cast at their feet. They are munificent in their chari- ties, bulwarks of financial institutions, devoted to civic improvement. Their wealth is established by the fact that next to the Standard Oil magnates and the railway kings they are as much envied, reviled and maligned as any people in America.
In 1833 Ashael Pierce finished the long and tedious journey from Vermont to Chicago. Being a native of the Green Mountain state, Ashael had of course the strength and love of hard work required of a blacksmith. John G. Saxe said that Vermont was famous for four things,
"Men and women, maple sugar and horses; The first are strong, the last are fleet; The second and third are sweet, And all are uncommonly hard to beat."
Therefore young Mr. Pierce started to build a blacksmith shop. There was a forest near, but no lumber, and our first Tubal Cain had to go forty miles away, to Plainfield, now a part of Will county, to obtain suitable lumber. He was an enterprising man and not afraid to buy tools, build a shop, don his leather apron and launch away. The ringing of his anvil attracted the attention of John T. Temple & Co., and this firm employed him in January, 1834, to iron the first
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stage that ran between Chicago and St. Louis. Regular communica- tion was about to be opened up with a city founded in 1764, situated at the confluence of the Mississippi and Missouri. Chicago had to become acquainted with its neighbors. In that year we began to manufacture plows, then known as the "Bull Plow." There are men now living who can remember when nearly all the plows used by farmers were made by country blacksmiths. Lifting our eyes above the commercial side of the matter, there are to be seen social reasons why it is to be regretted they are not so made today. But coming back to earth and business, what is a "Bull Plow," or what was it in Chicago in the spring of 1834? The board of education doubtless sees that Chicago children are taught that a bull is the male of the genus bos or of any large cattle; the children are doubtless also made to understand that on the board of trade and the stock exchange a bull is one who is endeavoring to raise the price of articles, and that bull is the name of certain letters, edicts or briefs issued by the Pope, but are they informed what kind of an article the first plow made in Chicago was?
In 1835 David Bradley came here and worked for Wm. H. Stow in the building of a foundry, and so in the years 1832 to the panic of 1837, numerous manufacturing establishments were erected. Chi- cago had in 1837 what those whose business depends upon the flow of water call a set-back ; a set-back being, among river men, a dam- ming up, a stoppage of the usual flow, so that the water sets back, accumulates on low lands. The demand for manufactured products of Chicago as well as for town lots fell off in 1837, but the growth of Chicago, checked for a brief space, soon went on.
In 1905 there were in Chicago 8,159 manufacturing establish- ments, making use of capital to the extent of $637.743-474. employ- ing 241,984 persons, to whom there was yearly paid the sum of $136.404,696.
In 1833 Ashael Pierce had to go forty miles to get lumber to build a blacksmith's shop in Chicago. In 1907 there were received in Chicago 2.479.458,000 feet of lumber and 2.362,856,000 were shipped away. How the market has changed !
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The real history of a people is that of their progressive thinking, the development of opinion, the sentiments by which they have been moved, the soul manifested by their deeds.
Some frontier towns were long known as drinking, gambling, fighting places. Chicago never was; not but that it had evil resorts and bad men, but from the period of its first organization as a mu- nicipality, it has substantially always been under the influence and control of the honest, peaceable, sober, industrious and orderly por- tion of its inhabitants. Its religious institutions have been many, and its religious people active in every good work. As to what was wisest and best, and as to what now is, there have been and are widely variant opinions; nevertheless there has been working for the same end, an uplifting spirit, a feeling that the great, the en- during triumphs of nations and people are in the realm of spiritual aspiration.
Chicago has been not so much a center to which religious in- fluences converged as a center from which religious influence has
RELIGIOUS gone out. Chicago was discovered, made known
INFLUENCE. to mankind by a religious man; an exalted soul, supremely devoted to proclaiming the glad tidings of a risen Saviour, through whom all might become partakers of a great salvation, enter into an eternity of rest and a peace that passeth understanding.
Not to obtain lands, not to gain wealth, not that he might be remembered as a discoverer of new countries and strange peoples, not as a seeker after knowledge came the good Marquette, in whose jour- nal is preserved a record of the first ordained function known to have been performed in the territory now included in this city. Not as a ceremonial dedicating the waters and fields around to the ex- alted purpose they have since served; not with thought of the lofty structures in time here to stand and the millions here to dwell, did the good father say the Conception Mass; but in truth this simple ceremonial in a little hut on a winter's day in 1674 reached the throne of the infinite and dedicated this spot to God as truly as if the Pope, foreseeing what has come, had in the presence of all the hierarchy of the Catholic church, amid salvos of artillery, the solemn peal of the organ and the voices of St. Peter's choir, proclaimed this spot consecrate to the Most High.
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It is quite true that the faith of the children is not that of the fathers; that in 1908 religious teaching is not couched in the lan- guage of 1836. Churches arise and fall; creeds come and go; re- ligion remains. Man loves many things; he does not worship that which he completely understands, fully comprehends. Thunder is no longer to us the voice of God, because we know whence it cometh and what it is. From the cradle to the grave we are encompassed by the unknown and the mysterious. The increase of knowledge, so far as making us acquainted with, revealing all things, has enlarged the bounds, deepened our comprehension of the realm concerning which we know nothing. Of not a single atom of the universe have we complete and definite knowledge. Neither Lord Kelvin, the greatest scientist of the nineteenth century, nor any other man, has solved the riddle of matter or of existence, material or spiritual. Every attainment of knowledge opens our eyes to the vastness of that concerning which we know nothing. Nothing is more obvious than the apparent rising of the sun in the east, its passage along the sky and setting in the west. This daily perception of mankind from the be- ginning of time having been proved to be erroneous, upon what ob- servation of our senses can we absolutely rely? Is death a reality or an appearance? Upon what ground do. scientists proclaim that death is an eternal blotting out of the conscious, willing, loving soul? By what evidence do they limit spiritual existence to the conditions under which it is manifested here? The worm that lives in the earth and cannot endure the light of day has reason to think life with exposure to the fierce rays of the sun an impossibility. In the centuries immediately preceding the birth of Christ, faith in the long-accepted religious belief of Greece and Rome had been pro- foundly shaken. An age of skepticism arose, of which cities were the centers. Groves ceased to have their divinities. Rivers and springs were no longer the abode of spiritual beings possessed of su- pernatural power; but men did not cease to be religious beings. The heathen (countrymen) and the villagers (pagans) became Chris- tians. The faith of men was changed; the religious instinct was not destroyed nor the desire for communion with the source of life ended. In trouble and in joy, in sunshine and darkness, with hope and fear, men looked to forces they did not understand. powers they could not control, praying for guidance and help-and these they
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found; not, perhaps, as they hoped and prayed; but guidance and help to better things. A general of the Civil war, noted for his roughness and his profanity in dealing with subordinates, being taken to task for this, said: "I know it is all wrong, indecent, horrible, but I can't help it. I deserve to be killed for it and I expect I will be; but do you know ?- profane and vile as I am, I never close my eyes to sleep without reciting a little prayer my mother taught me."
The religious influence of Chicago is neither stayed nor dimin- ished; it has sought new channels and its activity finds outlet in ways once not thought of.
The effort to spread the Gospel, make known Christian truth, necessarily changes with the conditions of life. The impulse by which man is moved, the thought dominant in his mind, the dreams he has in youth and the determined purpose of maturer years vary from generation to generation. There were centuries in which Europe, impelled by an overmastering passion, moved mighty armies to the East in an attempt to rescue the Holy Sepulcher from the grasp of the infidel.
Six hundred years ago the Crusades came to an end. The Chris- tian world has today but to stretch forth its hand to possess that for which millions died in vain. Today Europe is indifferent to the rule of the Mohammedan at Jerusalem. Is Christian faith less earnest and Christian zeal less strong than it was a thousand years ago? Not so. We have learned that Christianity abideth not in lands nor dwelleth in the mountains of Galilee, but in the hearts of men. The possession it now seeks is dominion over the soul. To this end it adapts its methods to the varying conditions of mankind. In an age when everyone can read and the question is not how can books to read be obtained, but how shall a wise selection be made, and how, in the multitude of teachers, the variety of entertainments and the eager solicitation of those who seek only their own gain, shall young and old, maidens and matrons, boys and graybeards be led into paths of pleasantness and peace. This is a problem presented in what we are pleased to call the intellectual age. In New England, a century ago, everyone went to church. How much wiser and bet- ter they were than the toilers of today! Let us not be too sure about this. Really, they had no other place to go. It is, perhaps, to be deplored, but the truth is, the idea that salvation cannot be obtained
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outside the structure we call the House of God is not in the atmos- phere of most of the places where men now live and toil. The modern spirit therefore says, "If, unfortunately, there be those who will or do not go to church and there hear what Christianity is, let us take Christianity to a place where they will go." This is what has been done in Chicago. In 1858 the Young Men's Christian As- sociation of Chicago was organized. It was useful and helpful from the first. It endeavors to let it be known throughout the United States and British America, that any young man contemplating com- ing to Chicago will, upon application, be by its agents directed to respectable places where he can obtain room and board. He will find pleasant reading rooms in which to pass such leisure time as he has; pleasant surroundings, good companionship; an opportunity to study and to learn, which he may not have had ere he came here. He will find sympathetic friends, people capable of giving good ad- vice, who take an interest in his welfare and wish to see him succeed. He will not be neglected nor alone in a great city. He will have an opportunity to be at all leisure hours in a place where his father and his mother would be glad to see him. He will, without bitter expe- rience, learn how to avoid the perils and the pitfalls of a metropolis. He will, if he desires, be made acquainted with members of any church in the city. He will be left in freedom. Liberty is essential to progress, and he will be shown how to make use of the liberty he has.
The association has now four buildings and property valued at over $2,000,000. It obtains from subscriptions an annual income of over $100,000, all of which is devoted to the work above described.
Chicago is young, strong, vigorous; the pulsations of life are in every fibre of her being ; she is ambitious, reaching out not for worlds to conquer, men to enslave or trample on; but for people to help. communities with which to make fair exchange of things she has to sell, for goods they desire to dispose of. She understands that pros- perity of buyer and seller is essential to the welfare of each, that in the earth there is no toiler whose life and whose work may not and, ought not to be beneficial to all; that the day when the life of any nation can depend upon or be helped by devastating armies and de- stroying fleets if not already at an end, is speedily passing; that the aim of men and nations should now, and assuredly in time will be, to
Vol. 1-4.
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help all, the despised black, the ignorant savage, the timid bushmen and the proud, imperious, conquering Caucasian.
In so far as the age of chivalry was an age of war in which the highest aim of man was to fit himself for knightly deeds of battle, Chicago is not chivalric, but, inasmuch as by chivalry is meant truth, honor, courtesy, gentleness to the weak, forbearance under provoca- tion and courage to stand for right, Chicago is chivalric; her spirit is that of justice and helpfulness to all.
Will Chicago endure? The laws of nature fix a period beyond which man cannot hope to live, but there is no law natural or human which so much as suggests when a city will die. This is a utilitarian age; we are striving to find and to preserve the useful. So long as that purpose rules and Chicago continues to be useful it will endure. Usefulness, so far as the existence of cities is concerned, is deter- mined by the judgment of mankind. If the consensus of opinion shall come to be that the highest end and aim of nations is to build and maintain the largest and most destructive ships of war, in those halcyon days Chicago cannot rival New York.
Rev. Isaac McCoy, a Baptist minister, appears to have on October 9, 1825, through the kindness of Dr. Wolcott, preached the first ser- mon delivered in English in Chicago. In 1825 Rev. Isaac Scarritt, on a Sabbath day at the house of a Mr. Miller, delivered a discourse. The Rev. Mr. Scarritt seems to have sent word to the lieutenant at the fort that if it were his wish he would preach to the soldiers and others at such place as the lieutenant might appoint, to which the lieutenant replied that he should not forbid the preaching nor would he make arrangements for it. Whereupon the minister declined going "to the garrison" and made an appointment for preaching at Mr. Miller's. The lieutenant would seem to have been David Hun- ter, afterwards general of the United States army.
In 1833 there were three church organizations in Chicago; Cath- olic, Presbyterian and Baptist. Chicago was then a portion of the territory under the spiritual administration of the reverend bishop of Bardstown, Kentucky, who, having granted to the bishop of St. Louis power so to do, the latter, April 17, 1833, deputed Mr. John Irenaeus St. Cyr priest to the mission of Chicago and adjoining region within the state of Illinois.
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Today there are in Chicago over a thousand churches represent- ing many denominations, numerous faiths, divers beliefs and creeds; yet dwelling in harmony and earnestly striving to make mankind happier and better. Denominationally, the numbers run from over 250 Roman Catholic to one Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, one Dunkard Brethren, with many Methodist, Presbyterian, Baptist. Congregational, Episcopalian, Lutheran, Spiritualists, Chris- tian Science, New Jerusalem, more than fifty Jewish, three Greck and others, as well as a great number called Reformed, Free or Inde- pendent ; indeed, Freedom, Independence and Reformation seem to have a strong hold upon worshipers in Chicago .
The eleven hundred congregations concerning many of whom, reading the record of four centuries past. it might well be said : "These are they which came out of great tribulation," live in one city portraying the Scripture which saith: "Behold how pleasant it is for brethren to dwell together in peace." They have a common pur- pose and seek a common end, the uplifting and salvation of mankind. Man is a social being, indeed; the animal creation out of which he has been evolved is largely social, covets society, feeds in herds; by multitudes wanders over earth and sea, finding in companionship not only pleasure but opportunity to obtain food. Chicago is in no sense typical of the huge marsupials of primitive time. Chicago is quick in conclusion, rapid in action, looks upon the unsalted sea and builds upon the rocks beneath its strand. Those who go away from their native habitat to live in a new home feel the need of compan- ionship. Chicago is the resting place, the home of wanderers: its people are, therefore, eminently social. There are now here more than three thousand social societies having a recorded existence and home. As their number is legion, so are their various names. None existing by forced contribution, all living upon voluntary donations, they must give comfort and be useful to a mighty host, else they would not be. The titles they bear are seldom an index to the work they do. Catholic is defined by lexicographers as "one who accepts the creeds which are received in common by all parts of the orthodox Christian church." And forester is said to be "one who lives in a forest; one who has charge of the growing timber on an estate, an officer appointed to watch a forest and preserve the game." It is
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easy to see that the Catholic Order of Foresters answers to the defi- nition of Catholic, but surely the uninitiated and unadmitted world knows that the Chicago members of the order do not dwell in a forest and it sees no reason for think-
FRATERNAL- ISM. ing they have charge of growing timber or pre- serve game. To the outside world they seem to be very good people who meet in a spirit of fraternity and together conduct a mutual insurance organization. Nor, so far as those who have not the password can see, do Masonic lodges lay brick or mix mortar. "Odd Fellows" are seemingly as even as other men, while "Modern Woodmen" deal in iron, crockery, dry and wet goods, buy and sell almost everything but wood. The names of the societies mentioned are framed from words in common use. If titles so made up are no indication of the "work" done, or purpose in view, what shall we conclude is the work of "The Improved Order of Red Men?" The American Indian is commonly spoken of as "the red man." Is the "improved order" a society of cultivated "red Indians?" What are we to think as to the history, character and purpose of "the An- cient Arabic Order of the Nobles of the Mystic Shrine?" Is not every American a nobleman? Do we not all delight in mystery? Do we not revere the ancient and is there not enshrined in our hearts a love of the beautiful, especially if it come in the shape of a lovely woman? Does the position of such sentiments qualify us for admis- sion to the "Mystic Shrine?" In what respect does a "Knight of Equity" differ from a solicitor in chancery? And a "Knight of Honor," is he more than a valiant soldier who fights for his country ? "The Ancient Order of Hibernians," what do they do that entitles them to be called "ancient?" Are not all Irishmen ever young and courageous, possessed of the generosity and ardor of youth? An Irishman, like a lawyer, works hard, lives well and dies poor. He may be wrinkled and gray, but he is not ancient. No more old than the babbling of brooks, the singing of birds or a lover's lute. Alas! Irishmen sometimes die, but they meet death with faith in their hearts, peace in their souls, and a smile on their lips.
And why "Blue Lodges of Colored Masons?" Blue has a mel- ancholy significance. A poet once sighed "for a lodge in some vast wilderness," but he did not ask to have it blue. As a color, blue is most attractively placed in the eye of a sweet young girl of sixteen;
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there it is irresistible; but for the decoration of a lodge or any sleeping apartment it is out of place. What is the "Mystic Order of the Sacred Twelve?" There were twelve disciples; there are twelve months, it is said a duo-decimal system of notation would be much superior to the decimal. Does this order keep tab on the twelve hours into which day is divided? Has it anything to do with twelfth night or twelfth cake or the arms from which arose the saying that "each English archer carries twelve Scotchmen under his girdle," or the twelve tables of the Roman law? Finally, not that by any means incomprehensible titles are exhausted, but because time and tide not only do not wait for any man, but will not tarry for an ex- planation of names; what is the solemn business of the "Ancient and Honorable Order of the Blue Goose?" Rome is said to have been warned and saved by the cackling of geese from a night attack of a hostile force; therefore geese, called sacred, were kept in one of the temples of the city. Goose eating at Michaelmas was once com- mon. There is a tradition that Queen Elizabeth on her way to Til- bury Fort, having eaten of goose, gave as a toast "destruction to the Spanish Armada," that hardly had she spoken, than a messenger arrived announcing the destruction of the fleet by a storm. Where- upon the queen called for a bumper saying, "henceforth shall a goose commemorate this great victory." There are many stories and many epigrams which turn upon the goose, some of which may have caused the existence in Chicago of the "Ancient and Honorable Order of the Blue Goose."
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