USA > Illinois > Grundy County > History of Grundy County, Illinois > Part 17
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"wooden-nutmeg Yankee wagons," as they were called, prevailed.
This prairie country undoubtedly of- fered opportunities to the pioneer occupant, far superior to those of a timbered eonntry, but the early settlers, imbned with the log- ieal deduetions of their early experiences, looked with distrust upon the open prairie. The general impression was that only the timber belts would ever be inhabited; the prairie swept by the fires of summer, and by the piereing blasts of winter, seemed little better than a desert, and for several years there was not a eabin in Grundy County built more than one hundred yards from the timber. The necessity of the early eabins similar in size, style and ma- terials, confirmed this impression, and made it a convietion.
The pioneer having seleeted a site on some prospeeting tour, or being attraeted to a certain region by the report of friends, came with all his worldly possessions on wagons, and making selection of a farm, chose a site for his eabin, and set at once to build it. Trees were felled; logs of the proper length ehopped off and drawn to the chosen site, and willing neighbors for miles about invited to the raising. Rnde as these struetures were it needed no little handieraft to rear them, and it was not long before the special ability of each mem- ber of the community, entailed upon him his special duty on these occasions. The logs trimmed, " saddled," and properly a :- sorted, were placed in the pen shape of the cabin; the gable ends were run up with regularity, shortening logs shaped at the ends, to allow for the slope of the roof; on these the long roof poles two feet apart, stretched from end to end, served as foun-
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HISTORY OF GRUNDY COUNTY.
dation for the roof, which was made up of clapboards, riven by the froe from bolts of oak laid in place and held secure by "weight poles" made firm by pegs or stones. Then followed the sawing out of the door-way and windows, the chinking of the cracks with picees of riven timber; the caulking with a mixture of mud and chopped hay; the construction of floors and a door from puncheons, and the build- ing of the chimneys of " cat and clay." Hinges were supplied from rawhide, and the wooden latch, reached from the outside by means of an attached leather latch- string passing through a hole in the door, was often the only protection against for- cible entrance. Later experiences intro- duced the use of heavy wooden bars, but the proverbial expression of early hospital- ity was the hanging out of the latch-string. The local characteristics of the early settlers found their expression in the construction · of the chimneys. Few early cabins were more than one story high, and the chim- ney placed on one side, was construeted in the case of the southerner or the Indianian on the outside of the cabin, while the rest built inside, the top in all cases scarcely reaching the height of the ridge.
The interior of the eabin was marked by the same general similarity. In each the wide fire-place shed abroad its genial warmth of hospitality or aided in the preparation of the table's cheer. The "crane," hung with iron pots and kettles, and the Dutch oven, half submerged in eoals, were in all cabins the "evidence of things not seen," and furnished forth, under the guidance of the deft housewife, a meal which is still sighed for as the "grace of a day that is dead." The "corn pone," or when so ex-
ceptionally fortunate as to be able to use flour, the hop-yeast or salt-rising bread, the "chicken-fixings," the game, the fresh, lus- eions vegetables,-are memories that more pretentious days have not dimmed in the hearts of the pioneers. The latter-day in- ventions of saleratus and baking powder had their prototype in the pearlash, which was prepared by burning the potash, so common then, npon the lid of the " bake kettle;" the sputtering, greenish flame produced by the process, in the meanwhile enforcing upon the childish minds of the household the stern doctrines of the here- after. The frontier cabin, as a rule, con- tained but one room, which served all the domestic and social purposes of the family alike, unehanged. Curtains arranged about the beds suggested the retirement of sleep- ing apartments, while the cheerful blaze of the fire-place afforded an unstinted glow to the whole establishment.
"The women of those days ate not the bread of idleness. They were indeed the helpmates of father, brother and husband, and nowhere in the world did man prove such an unbalanced, useless machine as the unmarried pioncer in this western wild. While the man, with masterful energy, conquered the difficulties of a new country and asserted his sovereignty over an unsub- dued wilderness, it was woman's hand that turned its asperities into blessings, and made conquered nature the handmaid of civilization. The surplus product of the frontier farm sufficed to supply a slender stock of tea, coffee, sugar and spices, with an occasional hat for the man and a calico dress for the woman ;- all else must be de- rived from the soil. How this was accom- plished, the occasional relics of a flax-wheel,
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HISTORY OF GRUNDY COUNTY.
brake, spinning-wheel or loom, suggest. To card and spin, to dye and weave, were accomplishments that all women possessed. Honsekeeping was crowded into the small- est possible space, and the preparation of linen, of "linsey woolsey," and stocking yarn, with their adaptation to the wants of the family, became, to vary the catechism, the chief end of woman. Abont these homely industries gathered all the pride of womanly achievement, the mild dissipations of early society, and the hopes of a future competence; a social foundation, of which the prond structure of this great common- wealth bears eloquent testimony.
But with all this helpful self-reliance indoors, there was plenty to engage the vig- orons activity of the male portion of the family out of doors. The exigencies of the situation allowed no seeond experiment, and a lifetime success or failure hung upon the efforts of the pioneer. The labor of the farm was carried on under the most dis- couraging eireumstanees. The rude agri- eultural implements and the too often inadequate supply of these, allowed of no economieal expenditure of strength, and for years rendered the frontier farmer's life a hand to hand struggle of sheer musele and physical endurance with the stubborn difficulties of nature. The location of the cabins along the lowlands that formed the margin of the streams, exposed the early settlers at their most vulnerable point. During a considerable part of the year the almost stagnant water of the sluggish streams filled the air with a miasmatie poi- son that hung in deuse fog over stream and grove like a destroying spirit. The diffi- enlty experienced in seenring good water often rendered it necessary for the farmers
to drink from stagnant pools, "frequently blowing off the scum and straining the wigglers from the siekening, almost boiling, fluid through the teeth." That the " fever and agne " should stalk through the land, a veritable Nemesis, was inevitable under such eireminstances, and many a hardy pioneer was eowed and fairly shaken out of the country in the chilly grasp of this grim monster. But having withstood these dis- couragements and seenred a harvest, the greatest disappointment came in the utter laek of markets. After a year of labor, privation. and siekness, the moderate erop would hardly bear the expense of getting it to market. How this country was sett.ed and improved under such circumstances can be explained upon none of the settled principles of political economy. Retreat there was none; and that homely phrase, " root, hog, or die," was borne in upon the pioneer by his daily experience with a be- numbing iteration that must have wrought ruin to any class of people of less hardy mental and physical healthi.
In such a community where " The rich- est were poor and the poor lived in abun- dance," there was no chance for the growth of easte, and families for miles around were linked together as one neighborhood, by the social customs of the time, which in the spirit of true democracy, drew the line at moral worth alone. The amusements of a people taking their character from the natural surroundings of the community, were here chiefly adapted to the masculine taste. Hunting and fishing were always liberally rewarded, while log cabin raisings. the opening of court with its jury duty, and the Saturday afternoon holiday with its scrub horse race, its wrestling match, its
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HISTORY OF GRUNDY COUNTY.
jumping or quoit pitching, and perhaps a figlit or two, afforded entertainments that never lost their zest. It was a common re- mark, however, that " Illinois furnished an easy berth for men and oxen, but a hard one for women and horses."* Ontside of "visiting" and camp meetings, the diver- sions in which women participated at that early day were very few; husking and spinning bees, and " large" weddings where the larger part of the night was spent in dancing, did not have the frequent occur- rence so characteristic of the Eastern States, and nothing here seemed to offer any substi- tute. Solong as the community gathered here lacked easy communication with the outside world this state of things contin- med. There was a market at Chicago at this time, where a fair price could be had for the surplus crop, and the growth of the older settlements further south brought the advantages of civilization nearer to these outlying communities, but the lack of roads prevented the early enjoyment of these privileges.
The early lines of travel were along the Indian trails. These were clearly defined paths about a foot or eighteen inches wide, ent into the sod of the prairie, sometimes to the depth of ten or twelve inches. A portion of one of these trails can be seen now on the farm formerly belonging to Jacob Claypool, where it has been carefully protected by a furrow plowed up on either side of it. There were three of these fol- lowing the general course of the river through the county, and terminating at Chicago, which was at an early time a great resort of the Indians. One of these ran along the north side of the river, between
it and the present site of the canal up to near the five mile bridge then passing north of the line of the canal, but south of the Catholic cemetery, it crossed both branches of Nettle Creek near where the stone bridges now stand, thence recrossing the canal line near the Peacock bridge, and passing on the ridge through to the Protest- ant ecmetery, it crossed the An Sable be- low the aquednet, and thence through Dresden it took its course over the bluffs toward Channahon. Another on the bot- toms sonth of the river crossed the Wau- pecan Creek at the quarter corner of the east line of section 18, in Wanponsee township, thence nearly in a straight line, passing twenty rods north of the center of section 17, it continued to Spring Creek which it crossed at its mouth, and thence it led across the Mazon on section 16, and up the river, crossing the Kankakee one half mile above its mouth. There was a second trail on the south side of the Illi- nois river, which skirted the points of tim- ber, passed a little north of the present res- idence of Jonathan Wilson on section 4, 32, 6, and entered Wanponsee about the center of the west line of the southeast quarter section 20, continning thenee in a direct line and interseeting the first trail at the crossing of the Mazon River. There was a " high prairie trail" through Holder- inan's Grove north of Grundy County, which came to be an important line of travel.
There were of course no fences at first to interfere with the choice of road or to serve as guides, and these trails were followed until a wagon path, pretty clearly defined, made traveling between well established points no very difficult matter in the day-
*History of La Salle County
Schutz.
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HISTORY OF GRUNDY COUNTY.
time, or on moonlight nights. But the belated traveler on a dark night, or one a little nufamiliar with the fords, found it advisable to make an unexpected bivouac on the open prairie. Even some of the older settlers, when near at home, had some experience of this, as an incident related of Mr. Jacob Claypool, very forcibly illus- trates:
Hle and his boys, Perry A. and L. W., had husked eorn for Holderman, for one and a half bushels per day. Late in No- vember (1834) they set out from home with two teams, one of horses and the other of oxen, to bring home their hard earned corn. On their return they reached the Indian trail near the west line of section 7, 33, 7, just about dark. To add to the difficulties of the situation, a heavy fog arose as night set in, and knowing that there was no escape from an open air eamp, they made the best of their situation by carefully feeling their way along the trail to a point near the present residence of Isaae Hoge, where there were some hay-staeks. Here the party remained until about four o'clock in the morning, when the fog rising and the moon coming out, they started for the ford of the Illinois River, on the west line of section 8. Perry Claypool with the horses led, and fortunately striking the right place passed over safely, but the ox team failed to follow elosely, and becoming unmanageable, began to swim out of the difficulty with the wagon and passengers. By daylight the party reached their cabin home wet, cold and hungry, and worst of all, with one load of their hard earned corn floating down the river.
Such experiences were not nneommon and stimulated the pioneer to the earliest
possible efforts to seeure roads and bridges.
The northern part of the State had set- tled up so slowly that there was no thor- onghfare through Grundy County at all until about 1833. About this time the Bloomington and Chicago road began to be outlined by the droves of live stock going to market, and the return teams hanling salt and supplies. This soon be- eante the principal route of travel, and crossed the county through the northern part of Highland, passed old Mazon and crossed the Mazon River at Sulphur Springs, on section 6, Braceville. From this point it led to the Kankakee River at "Consin John Beard's ford," about a mile and a half from its month. This road was not officially laid out or worked until after the county of Grundy was formed, when the commissioners at one of their earliest meetings ordered it run out from "Lone tree point to Cousin John Beard's ford at the crossing of the Kan- kakee." It was subsequently worked, and in 1843 a bridge was erected over the Mazon, where the road crossed, but it was soon destroyed. It was the earliest and greatest thoroughfare of its time, but it did not reach the dignity of a mail route, and has long since been abandoned. In December of 1834, the commissioners of La Salle County appointed Henry Green, Benjamin Bloomfield and Sam'l S. Bullock to lay out a road from Marseilles toward Joliet. This was laid out as near as prae- tieable along the Indian trail nearest the north bank of the river. This was after- ward divided into three divisions, and Wm. Rnhey appointed supervisor of the western division, Wm. Hoge, of the middle division, and Joshua Collins of the
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HISTORY OF GRUNDY COUNTY.
eastern. On July 3, 1839, the "Shaking Bridge " was erected near where the pres- ent stone bridge spans the west branch of Nettle Creek on Jefferson street in Morris. To raise this early bridge required the united energies of most of the men in the country about, and was probably the first bridge ereeted in the county. It was hoped that this road would prove to be the route for the north and south travel of the State, and upon such expectations Lovell Kimball of Marseilles laid out the village of Clark- son on the sontheast quarter 12, 33, 6, with a double log cabin hotel as a nucleus about which to gather the expected eity. This village aspired to eounty honors, until the construction of Grundy blighted all such hopes, and remained even then the princi- pal village in this region until the location of the county seat at Morris, when it rap- idly went to decay. . At Dresden, on the other end of this road in Grundy County, Salmon Rutherford erected a large " framed " hotel, where, by license of the court he was allowed to charge the follow- ing scale of priees:
"For each meal, common .. 25 cents.
.. 4 extra. .€
.371/2
lodging ..... .1214
" " horse or ox, hay over night. .1212 ..
- -
8 quarts corn or oats. ..= 5
" each glass of spirits ... 61/4
" " extra spirits. .1212
For this privilege he paid $6 and gave a bond of 8100 for the faithful performance of his obligations. Another of these early hostelries was erected about this time on the west fork of the Mazon, and was kept by James MeKean, and was for a consider- able time the resort of drovers on their way to market with stock.
The division of the large northern coun- ties and the demands of the local commu- nities led to great changes in these early
highways. Roads were run with some reference to the farmers who lived along the lines of these " through routes," which led, not withont an occasional serious struggle, to their abandonment. The result of these changes was to establish the main line of throngh travel along the high prai- rie trail by way of Holderman's Grove, etc., on which Frink and Walker subsequently established a line of coaches running be- tween Chicago and Pern. From four to eight four-horse coaches left each terminal point daily, connecting at Peru with a steamboat from St. Louis. Neil, Moor & Co., an Ohio firm, ran a line of coaches between the same points following a route south of the river, but it proved but a short-lived competition, though vigorons while it existed. The latter firm failed and withdrew its coaches in a short time. But with all these improvements, Chicago, which had become the market for this section, was too far off for the means of transportation possessed by the farmers. Everything was hauled in wagons and the roads were stern autocrats of the pioneer's destiny. The treacherous sod that covered the long stretch of swamp about the city would bear up only a moderate load, and thius restricted the amount of produce to be taken by a single wagon. Add to this the rude construction of the best roads and there is a sense of discouragement that might have worked despair if it had not incited to improvement. It may be noticed here that the civilization of the broad tread wagon and that of the narrow- tread, met at the eastern line of Grundy County. With all the other inconven- iences, the farmers of this section found that their wagons had a hard road to travel
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HISTORY OF GRUNDY COUNTY.
even where it was well constructed, one wheel being on the unbroken or unsettled roadway all the time. This was soon remedied by the adoption of narrow tread wagons, but the other difficulties still re- mained.
The projeet of connecting the waters of Lake Michigan with the navigable waters of the Illinois River had been talked of sinee 1812, and urged from time to time on the ground of its military as well as its commercial importance, but it was not until July 4, 1836, that ground was first broken for its construction. The line sur- veyed for its construction, connecting with the eastern arm of the south branch of the Chieago River, followed the general line of the Desplaines and Illinois Rivers to Peru, where it was proposed to pass by locks into the river. The estimate of its eost varied from 8640,000 to $10,000,000, the latter being nearer the actual cost when con- strneted. There was an urgent demand for greater transportation facilities, and searcely a year passed withont a recommen- dation on the subjeet by State or national official, but here the matter seemed to end until 1825. In this year the " Illinois and Michigan Canal Association" was formed with a capital of $1,000,000, which received a charter granting most extraordinary priv- ileges. At this time Daniel P. Cook, the only Representative of the State in the lower House of Congress, was earnestly seeking to seenre a grant of public lands in aid of the canal, and he felt that this charter would defeat his plans. Ile there- fore used every effort to have it annulled, publishing an able argument against the association scheme and sending it through- out the State. The " Association" did not
seem to prize its privileges ; no stock was ever subscribed, and the charter was volun- tarily surrendered soon after its receipt. In 1827, came the grant of public lands, but this was not easily turned into money, and in 1833 the advisability of devoting the grant to the building of a railroad between the terminal points was seriously discussed. " Up to Jannary 1, 1839, the gross expendi- ture on the canal, derived from the various sources of loans, lot and land, amounted to $1.400,000. All of it, but about twenty- three miles between Dresden and Mar- scilles, was contracted, and the jobs let were roughly estimated at $7,500,000."* In the meanwhile the public and Legislature had been carried away with a vast scheme of public improvement, and the State involved in great financial embarrassment. After negotiating several loans on aeeount of the canal which involved the State's finances without proportionately aiding the canal, there was a general collapse. The breaking of the State bank in 1842 added to the general distress, and gave rise to an agitation in favor of repudiating the State debt, which then amounted to $14,000,000. It was about this time that the unlet section of the canal was contracted, Jacob Claypool taking section 126 abont where the aque- dnet is placed. The failure of funds, how- ever, brought the work here to an early close. The effort to secure a loan of $1,- 600,000 to finish the eanal was protracted through some three years, in which the work came to a standstill, but in 1843 its construction was renewed, and "finally, by the opening season of 1848, the Illinois and Michigan canal, a stupendous public work,
* Ilist. of Illinois, Davidson and Stuve.
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HISTORY OF GRUNDY COUNTY.
urged for thirty years, and in course of actual construction for twelve, after many struggles with adverse circumstances, was completed."
The influence upon Grundy County was felt at once; warehouses were erected, and a good market for grain of all kinds was bronght within easy reach, while goods and supplies of all sorts were as easily seeured. Its effect in another way was quite as marked. When the work ceased in 1843 a large number of those employed on the canal, thrown out of work, took up land here,and, industrionsly engaging in farming, have become well-to-do, and are still here, or represented by their descendants. During the progress of the work the transient Irish element outnumbered the residents of the county, and worked their will for a year or two at the polls. The village of Morris suddenly changed from a rather quiet town to a place " where whiskey and Irish were plenty," together with what such a combi- nation implies, but with the completion of the eanal this element passed away, leaving Morris and Grundy County to work out its own destiny untrammeled by outside in- fluences.
Closely related with the canal was a scheme for the construction of a railroad from Chieago to the month of the Illinois. But the completion of the former and its being placed in trust with all its property and revenues to secure the payment of the English capitalists who had loaned the $1,600,000, discouraged the granting of a charter for the upper part of such a road. The slight dependenee to be placed upon the river for through transportation had been demonstrated, and had proved very disappointing to the great expectations
entertained of the canal. Through freight shipped by the eanal was occasionally seriously delayed because of the inability of boats of ordinary draught to come up the river far enough to make connections. A charter had therefore been granted for a railroad from La Salle to Rock Island. The country through which it was proposed to build this road was not thickly settled, and capital was therefore slow in taking up this enterprise. In the meanwhile, as it languished, Senator Douglas, impressed with the advantage of a railroad from Chi- eago to Roek Island, began urging his views upon others, and among the rest upon Nor- man C. Judd, who then represented Cook County in the State Senate. He suggested that the charter for the La Salle & Roek Island road be amended, so as to allow an extension of the road to Chicago. Mr. Judd entered into the project at onee, and had no difficulty in enlisting the interest of Wm. Reddiek, State Senator from La Salle, Bu- rea, Livingston and Grandy Counties, and the late Governor Matteson, Senator from Will County. The citizens along the route of the proposed extension were easily en- listed in the cause, and frequent consulta- tions were had. At a conference of the supporters of this scheme, held in the old American House in Springfield, Senators Judd, Reddiek, and Matteson, with P. A. Armstrong as elerk, were appointed a com- mittee to prepare a bill for the purpose of amending the charter. This was imme- diately done, Armstrong drawing up the bill at Mr. Judd's dietation, which was then put upon its passage on the next day. It was obstinately contested by the English inter- est, but notwithstanding the apparent demands of equity, the bill passed both
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