USA > Illinois > Bureau County > History of Bureau County, Illinois > Part 54
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the disastrous peace came, he, like most other Southern men, was a bankrupt. But still defiant, he would not surrender, and he be- came a fugitive from the country and turned up soon after in Mexico, where he entered the service of that country, and was in com- mand of a force at Saltillo when it was be- sieged by the enemy. When he found the garrison about to starve, he called for volun- teers to follow his lead and cut their way out. At the head of a small band he sallied out and at the very gateway of the walls, almost alone, he was killed, his body being literally riddled with bullets. The end of a feverish, brilliant, dashing life.
CHAPTER XXXIV.
ODDS AND ENDS-RETROSPECTIVE-PATHS, INDIAN TRAILS AND RAILROADS-BLESSINGS RECEIVED AND EXPECTED FARMERS AND THEIR FUTURE EDUCATION-THE BUFFALO AND THE IN- DIAN-NATURAL PLACES FOR GREAT CITIES-DOUGLAS, BREESE AND THE IDEA OF THE ILLINOIS CENTRAL RAILROAD, ETC., ETC.
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THE migrating buffalo once made their well beaten paths all over this part of Illinois. They were the real first road en- gineers, aud a most curious thing in the his- tory of this country is that the buffalo and then the Indian following were the unfailing dis- coverers of the natural sites where were founded all our great cities. They seem to have migrated in the early times from a northwest to a southeasterly course, and upon the great lakes and rivers there were certain points where these animals would annually meet in immense droves, and as it were go into camp for a spell. Their peculiar man- ner of crossing the great streams, perhaps, first had something to do in fixing this habit. They seemed to understand the topography
of the country, and when on their voyage they would meet on the banks of a large river, and after all had gathered at that point for a wide range around, they would, after eating bare the ground in the immediate vicinity of their camp, commence to prepare for the plunge to cross the river. Then they would gather in a close bunch near the bank and move in a circle, and every time they came opposite the water those on the inner circle would press the others a little closer toward the river, and thus around and around, and closer and closer to the water, until finally some would be pushed into the deep water, and then these would turn and boldly face the stream, and start for the other shore, when all would fol- low. The spots where they would thus bivouac would become famed places among the Indians, and eventually they followed the buffalo and made their camps and crossings at the same places, and they found in their migration that in passing over the wild coun- try, the buffalo had pointed out the best ronte and the best crossings of the great rivers. Thus, the cunning of the savage and the in- stinct of the beasts were really superior to all the skill and science of the world's engineers, in fixing the places that were natural points for a dense population and for great cities; and the history of our country is full of dem- onstrations of these observations. How many times have skilled engineers come here from Europe and fixed upon certain spots, ignorant of the signs and tokens left us by the buffaloes and Indians, and, therefore, . were not guided by them in their selection, and in no single instance was their choice a wise one, but were invariably fruitful sources of failure and bankruptcies to the wealthy corporations or companies that had sent their learned engineers to pilot them to the mag- ical spot. It is enough to verify what we say
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to refer to old Kaskaskia, Cairo, Shawnee- town and Alton.
There is history then, history that now dug up and elaborated with reference to the marvellous development of this country, reads almost like the finger-boards of destiny, planted along our great national highways, that had its great beginnings in the buffalo paths that once threaded their way over this entire country.
Sac and Fox Trail .- We have already re- ferred to this ancient Indian highway, where it was crossed at right angles by the Peoria and Galena stage route. It entered the coun- ty in Mineral, Section 30, and passed through J. G. Reed's farm, and crossed Coal Creek at the railroad crossing west of Sheffield; then through Pond Grove; crossed West Bureau in Section 4; passed through J. Thurston's land; crossed Big Bureau near Elliott's Mill; then through G. H. Bacon's farm, passing a little north of Malden, through Berlin Cen- ter and Lost Grove, and passed out of the county near the southeast corner of Clarion, running nearly straight through the county in a northeasterly direction.
Indiantown Trail passed up the bluff through Tiskilwa, and into the prairie near Dorr Hill; thence to Boyd's Grove and toward Spoon River.
There was another trail passing near Stev- en's Mill, and passed over the bluff near where the road now runs, and struck the prairie near the present residence of Mrs. Arthur Bryant. Here it branched, one com- ing toward and through Princeton, and went in a northerly direction until it intersected the Sac and Fox trail near Malden; the other branch passed through the Musgrove farm, and then by Joel Doolittle's place, and it al- so intercepted and joined the Fox trail at East Bureau.
Another trail plainly to be seen and for a
long time frequented by the early settlers, passed west of Plow Hollow, down to Snach- wine Creek and the Indian village.
Another passed near the old Simon Kinney place, then to Bulbona and Menominee Groves and into the Fox trail near Sheffield. This trail forked, one branch going to the Green River country. And still another trail passed through the county north and south, from the Winnebago Swamps to Peoria.
The Railroads .- The old Illinois Central Railroad, that was commenced under the wild State internal improvement craze, was sur- veyed through Bureau County in 1839. There was a great deal of work done on this line at that time, but it never proceeded any further than cutting away strips of timber through the timber land, and a cut here and there, and dirt fills at many places. A great many ties were hewn out and piled up in the woods and along the track to rot in silent decay, when the whole scheme exploded. The survey of this old abandoned line en- tered the county in Westfield, Section 25, and passed out of the county in Section 2, La- moille, thus making nearly a straight line through the county. As described elsewhere, the end of this mad speculation was wholly demoralizing to the railroad enterprise of the people. The State and whole communi- ties were left bankrupt-stranded upon dirt embankments-that were worse than value- less, because they were enduring monuments of the general grief which came upon nearly one and all of the good people. But in the end the visitation was good and healthful. Like many real and supposed calamities, it distilled into men's minds a more conserva- tive mode of thinking about public affairs. It put them in the complete humor of in fu- ture the better to prepare themselves before seriously undertaking any very extravagant enterprises. It put bounds about their hopes
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and expectations in the near future, and, as a result, they would fully prepare themselves in the future as the first and most important step in the important affairs of life.
Railroad affairs lay dormant for ten years, and in the meantime immigrants and wealth were rapidly coming to Illinois, In 1850 Stephen A. Douglas had procured the passage through Congress of the present Illinois Cen- tral Railroad measure, and for the first time in the legislation of the country was inserted in the act the clause giving the alternate sec- tions for six miles on each side of the line to aid in the construction. This munificent donation amounted to about 3,000,000 acres. And in the face of the facts of the great steals that have since occurred, especially of the public domain, this measure was wise and a great public good-the most fruitful and permanent work in the settlement of the great Mississippi Valley. It was freighted with great results to the millions of peo- ple now here, and the many more millions to come after us. It was the culmination of a great idea, and, like all great ideas, it was born of no one brain, but was the work of many and of years of growth. And among the biographers of Judge Breese and S. A. Douglas, we notice that the respective writers are equally emphatic in giving all the credit of fatherhood of the original scheme to which- ever one of these men the writer happens to be eulogizing. There is truth and error in all of them. No one mind ever yet fully developed any one great idea. Often one mind has contributed a great deal, and the world is then generally ready to credit such person with the whole-not seeing the smaller or more obscure workers and toilers in the great highway of civilization.
In 1851 a railroad was projected from Chi- cago to Rock Island by way of Peru. Coun- ties along the contemplated ronte were called
on to subscribe stock. Bureau County was asked to subscribe $50,000. Never was the county more thoroughly canvassed on any proposition. Meetings were called and many speeches were made. The great advantages of the road were one side, and the horror of a big debt were the other side of the ques- tion. Every schoolhouse was time and again filled with disputants and listeners, and finally around nearly every fireside the mat- ter was talked over and over. When the vote was given, the subscription was defeated. One curious feature of the thing was that Princeton voted in favor of subscribing, and Tiskilwa voted against it, and Princeton did not get the road and Tiskilwa did. The road was completed in 1853, and at once took rank as one of the great roads of the State, and yet maintains this place among the roads of the country. The name of the road is the Chicago, Rock Island & Pacific Railroad. Its length of line in Bureau County is 45 miles and 112 feet.
Chicago, Burlington & Quincy Railroad. - The Chicago, Burlington & Quincy Railroad was completed through the county in 1854. The entire length of line in the county is 72 miles and 426 feet.
There were four other railroads chartered and built that touched or passed through a portion of the county, as follows: The Peoria & Bureau Valley Railroad was built in 1855. This had a line of nearly five miles in the county. The Rushville & Buda Railroad was built in 1870, and there is about seven miles of its track within the county. The Mendota & Prophetstown Railroad was commenced in 1856 and completed in 1870. There were nearly twenty-seven miles in the county. The Kankakee & Pacific Railroad was nearly all graded as early as 1871, and then the work was suspended. This line only touched about three miles of the county. These roads
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were incorporated into and became a part of the two great lines above named, and instead of six railroads, as the county once had, there are but two. There is a total mileage of railroad track in the county of 117 miles and 538 feet.
These are some of the great things that have come to the good people of Bureau County. While they are certainly among the greatest, they are not all. Each may bear as its coat of arms the insignia, " E pluribus unum." The good judgment of those who have shaped the destinies of the county can never be too highly com- mended. Their great aim has been to grow here a great, prosperous and intelligent agri- cultural people. They wisely did not attempt to force an unnatural growth of those indus- tries that would bring here the class of people that are found in cities with the large factories and foundries. They understood that they could accelerate the growth of wealth here by giving such premiums as would bring such things here. It is a singu- lar comment on the average man, who wants great wealth and that quickly too, that they could withstand these great temptations. But they did, and the fruit of their wisdom is already manifesting itself. They must have fully realized that here is everything to make this some day the richest agricultural spot in the world, and that the happiest and best people that it is possible to grow, is of such agricultural character. The mem- bers of such a community, other things being even, are the most intelligent, contented, moral and happy of any people in the world, and if not so now, the day will soon come when they will be. This is not a mere mean- ingless or groundless assertion, uttered in the spirit of fulsome praise. These assertions are made in the knowledge of the fact that the coming farmers will live the healthiest
life, the life of the most elegant leisure, in- dependence, and real manhood of any other class of men. Then, too, the great farmer will give himself, by his daily avocations, the very best education it is possible to obtain. When all its possibilities are developed, there will no longer be such things as the "higher professions," because the farmer will stand upon the highest possible pinnacle. Farming, in its higher development, will give the education that comes of the higher type of scientific education. For here the principles of scientific investigation will ever remain in full play. Even now, in all its phases, it is wholly a scientific process. So far it is the intelligent experimenter that be- comes in the end the best and most successful farmer. He does not call his experimental education scientific knowledge. But few realize that such is the fact, even, yet it is absolutely so. The most ignorant farmer can travel all over the country, and as he passes along he can easily tell the soils that are barren from those that are full of rich plant food. He has not learned this by chemical analysis, but by observation and ex- perience. A few already, and in good time all intelligent farmers, will gain a very accurate knowledge of the laws of climate, soils, geology and plant and animal life. Such a man could examine any strange country in the world, and tell exactly its qualities and capabilities; just how any given plant, tree or animal would grow and flourish there. A man thus educated would not have to wear out his life in costly and fruitless experiments before he could know what kind of farming could be made to yield profits in the new land. Something likethis is real education, and may answer the demand for those who tell us that their inferior chil- dren must content themselves with a little "practical education," while the family
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genius must be pushed into the realms of classical lore. And thus, in the struggle for life, the "inferiors" finally become the superiors. Here is the inviting field and the glorious opportunity for the farmers. They must make their own education, as they have now ceased to wail, as did their fathers, over the loss of "book larnin," which they saw the lawyer and the parson once proudly wearing, like the waving plumes of the knights of old. Then will the farmer be the educated man in his State and nation, the world's leading factor in that great struggle for existence that is as wide as the earth, and that will endure forever.
The supreme purpose of every rational life is the attainment of the greatest possible benefits and pleasures in this world. And the opposite of this is the other axiomatic truth, that all pains, penalties and sufferings are the direct or remote offspring of ignor- ance. Here are the two sources of all pleasures and all pains. And a bountiful nature has furnished the fountains of each with an exhaustless and infinite supply. The wise mau in so far as he can, will go to the one; the fool will go to the other and fill himself to bursting. One of the most endur- ing pleasures in life to every intelligent mind-really, to every tolerably intelligent mind-is the acquisition of new truths of the physical laws of the universe. This, and this only, is real knowledge. All else when called education is misnamed-is an illusion and a snare. The coming farmers will un. derstand this well, and the result of that understanding will be, they will become, not only the best educated people in the world, but the healthiest, happiest and best.
CHAPTER XXXV.
PRINCETON-WHENCE ITS NAME-FIRST SURVEY-FIRST ELECTION, WHO VOTED-OFFICIALS-ITS IMPROVEMENT, GROWTH, SOCIETIES -ETC., ETC.
A NY eulogistic description of the beau- tiful little city of Princeton would be a work of supererogation for the people of this generation, because, in the language of Daniel Webster, "she speaks for herself." Her grand avenues and elegant business streets, her neat cottages, splendid business blocks, her great rows of shade trees and rich lawns, and beautiful yards and parks are a panorama that are witching sights to the visitor as he drives over the smooth graveled streets in viewing the town.
Princeton is on Section 16, Town 16, Range 9. It was surveyed by B. M. Hayes, August 23, 1832, and the plat made by John P. Blake. Roland Moseley, John Musgrove and John P. Blake were the Trustees of the school land in the town named. They being advised the people desired to sell the school lands, proceeded to subdivide the same. The central, or that part between First and Third Streets and between Central Street and the south part of town, was divided into lots con. taining one acre and a fraction; the west part of the town was divided into four-acre and a fraction lots, and to the north line into four and eight-acre lots; the northeast quar- ter into thirty-seven-acre lots, and the east 200 acres into four, nine and eighteen-acre lots. The Trustees made a report of the division September 17, 1832, and acknowl- edged the same before John M. Gay, Justice of the Peace. This was the first recorded in- strument in what is now Bureau County. It was recorded the 22d of March, 1833, by H. Warren Hooper, Recorder, Putnam County.
The second recorded instrument was a deed
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from George Churchhill, of Madison County, Ill., to James McKinney, conveying the north- east quarter of Section 19, Town 14, Rauge 9. This tract of land had been sold by the State to Churchhill on the 19th day of Feb- ruary, 1830. The next real estate trans- action was a sale of the pre-emption right of Leonard Roth to Jesse Perkins, in which Roth quit-claims the east half of the south- east quarter and the east half of the north- east quarter of Section 24, Town 15, Range 9. The consideration was $600. This was dated November 13. 1833. On the same day David Jones sold to Jesse Perkins, for the sum of $50, a quit-claim to the east half of the northwest quarter of Section 19, Town 15, Range 10. David Jones signed by " his mark." On the 2d day of January, 1834, Gov. John Reynolds signed a deed to Lot 31, in Princeton, conveying it to Washington Webb, for the sum of $5. This lot is where the jail now stands The same year Wash- ington Webb sold the same to Jerry Parsons for $100. January 2, 1834, Gov. Reynolds deeded to W. O. Chamberlain Lot 30, Prince- ton, consideration $2.50. May, 1834, Cham- berlain sold the same to Fred Haskell for $30. In January, 1824, the Goveruor con- veyed to James Hays Lot 117, Princeton, containing eight acres and a fraction, for $20. Hays at the same time purchased Lot 118 for $20. September 17, 1834, Daniel Shelly and Susanna, his wife, conveyed to Brown and Job Searl his pre-emption to one-half of the southeast quarter of Section 3, Town 15, Range 10, for $125. John Mnsgrove bought Lot 2, Princeton, January, 1834, containing four acres, for $10. September, 1834, Aaron Gunn sold to Jonathan T. Holbrook, for $500, a quit-claim to the southwest quarter of Sec- tion 24, Town 18, Range 10.
July 14, 1834, the land office at Galena sold the first tract of land, the east half of
the southeast quarter of Section 33, to Elisha Wood.
The name, Princeton, was a matter of luck in a lottery, where the three above-named Town Commissioners each wanted to give it a name that would be suggestive of early as- sociation. When the three met and the ques- tion of a name came up, each one wrote a name on a slip of paper and agreed that an outsider should draw, and the first name drawn from the hat should stand as the choice. Mr. Musgrove was from Princeton, or near it, in New Jersey. He, of course, wrote on his slip "Princeton." And in the drawing this name appeared first. And thus the question was settled. And the writer of this can certify that since he has been here more than one letter has come to him plainly marked "Princeton, Illinois," and on the envelope was the mark of " Princeton, New Jersey; sent here by mistake "-although the writer has noticed hundreds of newspaper certificates floating around that New Jersey was not in the United States. And as there is a "Princeton" in nearly every State in the Union, yet " them literary fellers" in the Postoffice Department seem to generally think that all persons able to write and address a let- ter are, of course, from Princeton, N. J. So much a long communion tends to make us what we are.
In March, 1838, at an election on the question of incorporating the village of Princeton, twenty votes were cast, all in fa- vor of the proposition. The following were the voters: Andrew Smith, Stephen Wilson, William H. Wells, Noah Wiswall, Cyrus Langworthy, John Long, Robert C. Masters, Samuel Triplett, John Walter, Butler Den- ham, John Vaughan, E. H. Phelps, Oliver Boyle, Joseph Houghton, Joseph Smith, Rob- ert Stewart, John H. Bryant, Justin H. Olds, Thomas S. Elston, Robert T. Templeton.
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This was no doubt a complete roster of every living voter at that time in the town.
The earliest Justices in Princeton Town- ship were: Thomas S. Elston, Aquilla Trip- lett, Robert C. Masters and Joseph Waldo. Of the original voters of the town now liv- ing there are John Walter, E. H. Phelps, John H. Bryant, and Joseph Houghton, the last now in New Brunswick.
On the 6th of April, 1857, the first town council was voted for, in the just then incor- porated town of Princeton. Ebenezer White was elected President of the Council, and L. P. Estjon, E. Dee, Jedediah Paine, P. N. Newell and Daniel McDonald, Trustees. They were sworn into office by Levi North, Police Magistrate. At the first meeting the only business was to appoint Committees to secure a council-room and record-book. The first meeting was in Judge Ballou's office, and the next in J. I. Taylor's office. At the second meeting, George H. Phelps was elect- ed Clerk; P. N. Newell, Treasurer; David E. Norton, Supervisor and Marshal; George W. Stone, Constable. April 16, 1857, Estjon presented a petition for a four-foot side-walk on the north side of Putnam Street. April 16, 'David E. Norton, after ten days' service as Marshal, resigned, and William Vannatta was appointed. The Board of Health for the first year consisted of William Bacon, Dr. W. C. Anthony, Samuel Wood, Ephraim Fel- lows, and S. Fried, and the Fire Wardens, Charles S. Boyd, E. G. Jester, William Grant, Jacob Fetrow, and A. S. Chapman. O. G. Wilcox was appointed pound-master, Charles S. Allen, Prosecuting Attorney; N. Matson, Assessor; W. A. Fisher, Collector; and Alfred Johnson, John S. Miller, and James Corbett, wood measurers, and C. B. Clark and Douglas, coal weighers.
January 4, 1858, the Council voted "that an oyster supper be given the present mem-
bers of the Council and corporation officers, at the expense of the town." This was the last official act of this Board. The records give no account of the oyster supper. All probably retired "too full for utterance."
January 4, 1858, an election was had and the following were chosen: Benjamin L. Smith, President; William Carse, D. G. Salisbury, John S. Miller, Joseph S. Clark and A. J. Morton, Trustees. They met Jan- uary 8. James K. Rennick was elected Clerk; William Carse, Treasurer; Joseph F. Jones, Marshal; Joseph S. Clark, Street Supervisor. In January, 1858, an ordinance was passed prohibiting tippling houses in Princeton. The last meeting of this Board was Decem- ber 30, 1858. So far as the records show, unlike its predecessor, the individual mem- bers thereof went to bed oyster-supperless, at least, so far as the pockets of the city treasury was concerned.
January 3, 1859, an election returned the following: R. T. Templeton, President, and Jacob Fetrow, D. G. Salisbury, John Elli- ott, John S. Miller and William Mercer, Trustees, and George O. Ide, Police Magis- trate. The new Board met January 8. J. K. Rennick was again appointed Clerk; D. G. Salisbury, Treasurer; William Vannatta, Marshal; Henry W. Kelly, Constable; Joseph S. Clark, Supervisor; George H. Phelps, Town Attorney; Charles S. Boyd, Fire War- den, and John Walter, Peter Scott, Henry Adley and W. P. Smith, policemen.
In September, 1859, J. K. Rennick having removed temporarily from the town, Charles J. Peckham was appointed Clerk until the regular Clerk should return. He served out the term.
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