USA > Illinois > Lee County > History of Lee County, Illinois, Volume I > Part 44
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P. J. Schoenholz operates the first and oldest store, a general one, and Carl C. Fisher, the other. My genial old friend, H. D. Riley presides at the anvil and forge of Scarboro's solitary black- smith shop and it pleases me to note that he is doing a prosperous business.
The freight receipts at this station are said to be as large as those of any other village in the county of twice its size. Mr. Wil- liam H. Webber, one of Viola's biggest farmers, tells me that as a live stock shipping point, it does a splendid business. Two large elevators here care for the grain. Shearer Brothers of Steward. forseeing the inroads Searboro was likely to make in their Steward business, promptly built an elevator in Scarboro. The Neola peo- ple have the other.
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The Evangelical church about which we have read in other pages found itself located right in the midst of the village when Scarboro was laid out. This is a beautiful church, built with every arrangement for comfort. A perfect kitchen has been built in the basement which also includes the added features of a dining room and in this admirable room suppers are given frequently. Last Fourth of July, when the Scarboro folks held a big celebration, the ladies of the church fed large numbers and did it in a man- ner altogether astonishing. And a better dinner never was served. The Scarboro school stands just to the south. About half a mile, farther to the south, one of the beautiful Twin Groves stands. Through it Willow creek runs and there picnics and gatherings just like the one on the last Fourth, are held. It is an ideal spot.
In this beautiful little bit of a village, you will find the very highest specimens of the builder's art, improved with every modern convenience. Electricity, steam heat, baths, hot and cold water, in the houses; cement sidewalks; and all the village sur- rounded with lands which can hardly be valued. Only a little while ago, Mr. Henry B. Cobb, of Viola, living just a little way to the west, learned that a certain farm might be bought. It lay near his big tract of Viola land and he bought it without regard to price. Three hundred dollars per acre was the price ; over fifty thousand dollars and the money, cash in hand, was paid down. Verily prosperity dwells around Scarboro, possibly the smallest village in the county. At all events, the youngest, yet one of the richest and prettiest. And it is located in Willow Creek township; old Twin Groves!
PUBLIC SCHOOL, PAW PAW
OLD LOG CABIN BUILT IN 1837, PAW PAW
CHAPTER XXXVIII
WYOMING TOWNSHIP
Third from Dixon on the old Chicago road came Paw Paw Station, named from the paw paw grove of the early days.
This township probably contained more Indians in the year 1834, when the whites began to penetrate Lee county, than any other township in the county. Of course then there were no town- ships. I speak of the six mile area, which subsequently constituted the Government township.
When the treaty of Prairie du Chien was negotiated July 29, 1829, by Gen. John McNeil, Col. Pierre Menard and Caleb Atwater, with the Pottawatomie Indians, a considerable portion of the lands granted were located in and near Wyoming township. First of course comes our old friend, Shabbona, called in the treaty, Shab- ch-nay. He was given two sections "at his village near the Paw- paw Grove." This grant was over the county line into DeKalb county, just a little ways.
Madeline Ogee, wife of Joseph Ogee, was given "one section west of and adjoining the tract herein granted to Pierre Leclerc, at the Paw-paw Grove." The Leclere tract granted was, "To Pierre Leclerc, one section at the village of the As-sim-in-ch-Kon, or Paw-paw Grove." Thus we get therein the Indian name for the grove. By some misconception the grant always has been called the LeClere or LeClair section. The statutes from which I quote, plainly enough spell the name several times "Leclerc."
The Ogee section, its acreage and its fate already have been stated in that portion of this work devoted to Ogee.
By reason of its early association with Indians, particularly Shabbona, Paw Paw, in the eye of the author always has possessed a sort of romantic life. His boyhood associations. just over the line into DeKalb county, in Paw Paw township, too, have tended to
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make him regard Paw Paw village with that affection which, ger- minated in childhood, never loses its hold in after years.
At the organization of the county, Wyoming was in Inlet pre- cinct. Paw Paw Grove attracted the settlers. The native forests of giant oaks in this township presented to the eye of the settler a never ending supply of fuel. With the beginning of townships in 1850. it was named Paw Paw, and so it should have remained, but owing to the imaginary confusion, which was feared would result from the adjoining town in DeKalb county, bearing the same name, it was changed to Wyoming. Tradition says lots were drawn to see which town should have it.
Over cast, partly in Lee county and partly in DeKalb county, there was erected the village of East Paw Paw, once the most promising and prosperous place between Dixon and Chicago. In Wyoming township, the present village, west of the grove, was called Paw Paw Grove or West Paw Paw, and on Aug. 1, 1871, it was platted as Paw Paw Grove.
One other village, in section 24 on the DeKalb county line, sprang up, designated South Paw Paw or LeClair Postoffice, though it never was platted. Thus it will be seen that a multiplie- ity of Paw Paws had sprung up. To simplify the matter, James Goble, of that township, subsequently sheriff, suggested that beeanse so many of the early settlers came from the Wyoming valley in Pennsylvania, that Wyoming be adopted as the name. Accordingly, Isaac Harding, Warren Badger and Lorenzo Wood, constituting the county commissioners court, changed the name to Wyoming, and on May 14, 1851, the board of supervisors officially ordered that "the township formerly called Paw Paw, shall here- after be called Wyoming."
The paw paw grew luxuriantly here in early years. This tract of timber covered over two thousand acres then. Much like Pal- myra township, the grove contained thousands of black walnut trees, hard maple oak, hickory, cottonwood, butternut and svea- more, plums, blackberries and gooseberries grew plentifully. On the east side not far from the county line, was a beautiful spring of rare water. At the northwest corner was another. This latter fed Paw Paw creek which runs from the northwest corner in a south- easterly direction and joins Indian creek, which flows on into the Illinois river.
In the winter of 1833-34, Levi Kelsey with Joel Griggs made a elaim and built a house in Paw Paw Grove. But fearing he might
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be on one of the Indian reservations, Mr. Kelsey in March, 1834, left and went on to Troy.
When later David A. Town came along in the fall of 1834, he went down to see Kelsey about the claim. Mrs. Kelsey came out in September, 1834, and she has related many stories about the Indians.
The Indians induced Griggs to cut many trees with the expecta- tion of finding honey. When after many failures he declined to continue, they tried to induce Mr. Kelsey, but he declined peremp- torily. For his decision, he was dubbed "good she-mo-ka man," while Griggs was called "she-mo-ka man, ishoba," no good. Kelsey came before Griggs, but they built the house together. The two were partners and by a subsequent look at Kelsey's diary, it has been found that he located there Jan. 20, 1834.
Tracy Reeve of Princeton, in May, 1834, went to the grove with three other men, to locate claims, but believing it all to be included in the reservations, they slept in Indian hunts over night, during which a fearful storm raged. Next day they went to Troy Grove, the nearest settlement. This party did not meet a solitary person, red or white, at Paw Paw Grove.
I suppose some little detail of past history about these two, Kelsey and Reeve, might be interesting especially about Kelsey. His wife wrote that Mr. Kelsey came west in the fall of 1828. He peddled clocks in Mississippi, Arkansas, Louisiana and other southern states. During his travels he was taken sick many times. Once at Alexandria, a man in bed beside him died. He went on to St. Louis, where he was quite ill all winter. At Palmyra, Illinois, he studied with a physician. Gravitating back to St. Louis he found himself in miserable health when the cholera broke out in 1832. When well enough, he took a peddler's pack and started to peddle Yankee notions for a St. Louis firm. He was in that employment when he entered Paw Paw Grove and became its first squatter.
On the return of Reeve, he attempted to cross a creek swollen by the floods. In this effort his wagon tipped over and he turned a somersault over the dashboard.
Next morning when desiring to pay his tavern bill he found his money, about eight dollars in.silver, had disappeared. Retracing his course, he found it and was about to return to Troy Grove when a band of about thirty Indians overtook him.
Mr. Reeve was not the man to lose his nerve. He said "Good morning" to them in the Indian language, after which the Indians
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with a hearty laugh, permitted his departure in peace. They told him in expecting to scare him, they had anticipated a rare treat. But he did not scare, and that ended his effort at settlement in Lee county.
In characterizing a person as the first settler of a community, actual and continuous settlement should be considered. The man who enters a country first and tarries a brief period and then leaves, might be called more properly, a discoverer or visitor.
To Daniel A. Town belongs the distinction of becoming the first settler of Paw Paw Grove; it was in the autumn of 1834. He built his log house on the southeast side of the grove ; a 16x18 affair, with the door in the east end, a six-light window in the west end and a big chimney and fireplace in the north end. The chimney like all the first ones was built on the outside, of split sticks, laid cob fashion, plastered between and lined inside with mud or clay.
There was a floor in this cabin, made of boards split from logs and dressed by a broad-axe. The roof was made of shakes, split, about three feet long and four or five inches wide and laid double. Poles laid lengthwise held them up, and poles outside held them down. O. P. Johnson, later of Brooklyn, helped make this house and he says he and three others built it in a day and a half.
That fall, Mr. Town broke about twenty acres of prairie and sowed it to winter wheat.
Later he bought part of the Ogee section of Mrs. Alcott in the manner set forth in the chapter devoted to Ogee. On this claim, he built his second house at the north end of the grove.
With Mr. Town came his wife, and four children: George, Martha, David A., Jr., and Sarah. It is said of him that when applied to for the sale of seed grain at a high price, he would refuse, saying, "Yon are able to buy elsewhere ; I have needy neighbors to whom I must give this."
He was a large, powerful man; a leader; wanted to be recog- nized as such ; tippled very moderately ; resolute and fearless.
Once a stranger came to him to ask the direction to a certain place. Given him, the stranger took the opposite direction. This Mr. Town did not like; so he overtook the stranger, wormed the story out of him that he was a counterfeiter; took away his dies, and got him sent to the penitentiary.
David A. Town was the terror to horse thieves and the banditti, and for that more than any other reason, early Paw Paw was not mich disturbed. Inlet to the west and East Paw Paw to the east
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were the places most frequented by them. When the township was organized, Mr. Town became its first supervisor.
Very soon the Harris, Butterfield, Ploss and Wilcox people came along, all related or intermarried. They came in one colony from Michigan with Rev. Benoni Harris, then over seventy, as its head. Eight adult children of the latter came too.
Mr. Town died in 1861 and he and Mrs. Town are buried in the cemetery half a mile south of town.
The dwelling occupied by those colonists, was a double log cabin, built on their arrival. Later, Mr. Harris built the first frame house at the grove. Mrs. Harris was the first to die in this new settlement.
In the spring of 1835, Edward Butterfield, who married one of Mr. Harris' daughters, came to the west end of the grove and made a claim on the southeast of 10 and thereon he built a cabin, on the south side of the Chicago road. It was the first house on the west side: it was located on the first claim; it was the home of the first married couple ; it was the first store and it was the first house to be burned.
John Ploss, another son-in-law of Reverend Harris, made the first settlement on the south side of the grove ; but he did not remain long. In the autumn, he returned to Michigan. His settlement was called South Paw Paw.
The first stage house and tavern was built on the Chicago road, about midway between the two Paw Paws, east and west, by Isaac or Asahel Balding. This man soll it to William Rogers; he to Dick Allen ; he to John Sims, who mortgaged it for $400 to get out of the Chicago jail, his son John, who was held there for passing bogus money.
At this point the Ogee and Leclere sections may as well be noticed and then passed up. In 1836 Job Alcott located and built his cabin on the south side of the Chicago road not far from East Paw Paw. After his marriage with Madeline Ogee, he sold the west half of the section to David A. Town for $1,000 in silver, and later he sold the east half to William Rogers. After great trouble, William McMahan found the witness trees marked OG and forth- with he platted the land. Before that time Willard Hastings had płatted it, but because it had not been recorded, no end of trouble was encountered.
Charles Morgan, from Virginia, settled just west of East Paw Paw. Like so many others, he was a powerful man : more powerful
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than any of the others. He lived here until about 1850. He opened a tavern in his house which was located next west of Aleott's place. Alcott by the way, was from Ohio. After Alcott had remained a few years he sold his place to a man named Mussehnan, who built the famons Hallow Honse on the premises, noted for years, for its dancing house and bar.
Alcott then went with his wife Madeline to Missouri where the Pottawatomie Indians were located.
By a letter dated Sept. 19, 1913, signed by the commissioner of Indian Affairs, I am told concerning Alcott's deeds, "One of the deeds conveying part of this reserve, was signed by Job Alcott, as the husband of Madeline. In the other two deeds, he signs by mark as Iob P. Alcott, the husband of Madeline. These three deeds which were all approved April 17, 1844, conveyed 620 acres."
Thus after long research, I have solved the Ogee-Alcott mysteries. Ogee was alive in 1838 at Dixon's Ferry. He died soon after and was buried, first near the corner of First street and Peoria avenne (southeast corner) ; then many years afterwards when his bones were discovered, they were interred in Oakwood cemetery.
But I must not conclude without giving what the Lee county records show. Job P. Alcott and Madeline his wife, conveyed by warranty deed to William Rogers, "A certain tract or parcel of land known and described as the northeast corner of a certain tract of land given to said Madeline, a Pottawatomie woman, then the wife of Joseph Ogee, under the 4th article of the treaty of Prairie du Chien, of the 29th of July, A. D. 1829, containing eighty acres. This deed was dated Nov. 14, 1842: the consideration was $800; it was acknowledged Nov. 14, 1842, before Noah Leabo, a justice of the peace in and for Holt county, Missouri.
A certificate of magistracy was attached and the deed was recorded in book A of deeds on pages 397-9.
A modern description would read, the "East half of the north- east quarter." On the same date. Alcott and wife conveyed to the same party for $1.250, "the east half of said grant of one section of land, under said treaty exclusive of a lot of eighty acres of said half section of land already in possession of said William Rogers and this day by ns conveyed to him, it being the intention of the said Job and Madeline Alcott, to convey to said Rogers 220 acres more or less of said cast half of said land." 80 and 220 made 300 acres.
This deed bore the same date and was acknowledged as before
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noticed and was recorded in the same book A. The Town deed was recorded later. These deeds simply confirmed previous sales.
Town bought the other half. To repeat his conveyance would be tiresome. I simply give these dates to show that in 1842, Alcott had left Lee county and that at best he could not have lived more than six years in Lee county. But I think I have got the dates down still closer: Mr. David Smith who came to Willow Creek when six years old in the year 1837 says by letter dated Oct. 8, 1913, that in that year of 1837, Aleott was living on his claim near Paw Paw. That he believes Alcott and Morgan lived in the same house, and that Alcott's wife was an Indian woman. Mr. Smith also has the impression that Alcott and Morgan were related. Further than this, Mr. Smith is positive that Alcott left the next spring of 1838.
Mr. Smith never has made a mistake in his statements of early Lee county history, so that we may put it down that between 1836 and 1838 Alcott was Madeline's husband, and that in 1838 he left the country with his wife and was living with her so late as 1844, in Holt county, Missouri.
The Leclere section was surveyed in 1843 by Wheeler Hedges and the plat was recorded at once. Samuel JJ. Best and August Wiley are said to have purchased the LeClair or Leclerc section, at $2.25 per acre.
On July 4, 1836, Samuel MeDowell was married to Miss Delilah Harris. This was the first wedding and Shabbona, the Indian chief, was one of the invited guests. After the wedding the men went into the grove and cut a liberty pole and carrying it back, fastened a flag to it and erected it, the first function of the kind performed in Lee county.
The second wedding was that of George Town and Fidelia Saw- ver, Dec. 13, 1836. Some histories claim this was the first wedding celebrated in Wyoming: that the other was over the line.
A week later, Dec. 20, a remarkably cold day, Levi Carter was married to Mrs. Gillette, a widow.
Rev. Benoni Harris officiated at all of these weddings.
Wareham or Wiram Gates, dubbed " Bogus" Gates, frequented this Morgan tavern. What was called the box game was played there extensively. To quote an authority, "Supposing bogus money could be bought at a liberal discount, and an applicant would come for it. A sample box of the 'stuff,' which was good money, in layers of sand, would be shown, with the remark that the negotiation could be arranged and the price paid, but delivery of
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the base coin would only be made by being placed at the foot of a certain tree at 10 o'clock at night; but when the buyer came to the rendezvous in the darkness, confederates of the other party would cry out, 'Here he is ; now we'll fix him!' and discharges of firearms and other alarms would cause the person who came, to flee in terror, without getting what he bargained for."
Bogus Gates protested his innocence always, but some of the bad coin was found dangerously close to his house and too, two horse thieves, with the property in their possession, were caught at his premises.
In this township there are four cemeteries. Willard Hastings donated the ground for the first one. The Presbyterians own another called Cottage Hill. The Baptists at South Paw Paw own another, and near the old Lester Harding place is another. It is a sad commentary to notice the disaster time has wrought with many of the markers over the graves, although latterly, efforts have been made to repair them.
The first schoolhouse built of poles, in 1836, on what later became the Meade farm, not more than 12x12, was taught by Emily Giles from Fox river. She received $1 per week and boarded round. Tuition was paid for by subscription. Mrs. Andrew Breese also taught there. This schoolhouse was located on the north side of the road. The first school, however, was held in a log house on the north side of the Dixon road. One of the teachers was a traveling Irishman who had been highly educated. He had a remarkable memory and could quote the poets ad libitum. But the poor fellow drank heavily like so many of the first itinerant school- masters.
Vacated cabins and private houses were used at one time and another, too, in which to hold schools. Among the early teachers were Robert Walker, Adams, Willard Hastings, Deacon Board- man, Walter Hyde, Basswood, Mary Harding, Mrs. Amasa Har- rington, Elisha A. Stanton, and Mrs. Andrew Breese, before her marriage. Walker who came here with May and Breese in 1841, taught in the Comstock blacksmith shop until about the year 1846.
The first frame school building was built as early as 1846 near the location of the creamery subsequently, in Paw Paw. About 1848 the country was divided into districts and about 1860, district No. 1 was graded.
Benoni Harris preached at different times as early as the winter of 1834-35, in his son's cabin. In 1839 the venerable Father Morris preached around in some of the different cabins. About the same
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time, the circuit preachers came along; among the first were Peter Cartwright, Elders White, Lumery, Alonzo Carter, and Batchel- der, all Methodists; and Elders Carpenter, Charles Harding, and Norman Warriner, who were Baptists. The appearance of the average circuit rider was about once in three months.
The first postmaster was William Rogers. The mail was carried along this route as early as 1834, but in 1837 a star route was established. Before an office was opened here, Somonauk, fifteen miles to the east, was the common postoffice for the settlers. Isaac Robinson was postmaster along about 1838 or 1839. In 1841, Willard Hastings was postmaster. He kept a store and tavern and carried the mail from Paw Paw to Princeton via the Four Mile grove. By reason of the junction of the roads at Paw Paw, the place enjoyed a considerable boom for many years. J. D. Rogers was another mail carrier. Among some of the other early post- masters were Hiram Wood, William H. Robinson, James Simons and John Colvill.
The first hedge raised in Lee county was grown in Wyoming township on the west line of section 21 and was grown by Ira Baker.
Wyoming was organized in 1850, like so many other townships, under the name of Paw Paw. The first town meeting to elect officers was held at schoolhouse number 5, at which 113 votes were cast. David A. Town was selected supervisor and John Colvill was elected town clerk. As already stated the name soon was changed to Wyoming.
George Town's house was built of hewn logs and was the second one to be built on the town site of Paw Paw, in 1837. Edward Butterfield's, built in 1835, was the first.
In 1841 the little grocery burned down and for a considerable period thereafter there was no store in Paw Paw. Peddlers during this period did a thriving business. So late as the spring of 1847, the place contained but half a dozen families and its business interests all were comprised in the smithy and a shingle mill. But beginning with this year the settlers came in rapidly and the place showed rapid improvement. The peddlers began to look elsewhere, although the peddler performed a useful mission in those days. One of them, William H. Field, traveled that territory from 1843. Among the first business men to locate in Paw Paw were John Colvill and Jacob Rogers, "Prairie," who ran the shingle mill. Dr. J. C. Heath, from Somonauk, was the first physician to locate there, sometime between 1846 and 1849. In the last named year, Vol. 1-32
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he was in the drug business. Subsequently he erceted two buildings in the village.
Field and Robinson put up a building and began merchandising in the fall of 1848. In a year or so they dissolved and Field erected a building of his own and went into business.
As early as 1841, Charles Pelcher burned brick at the east end of the grove and Mr. Hastings was the first to build a brick house from the produet.
Charles Pelcher erected four brick houses along about the years 1847-49.
Mechanics moved in. Here as in all other places, the black- smith was the prosperous man. Among the earlies were the Walton brothers. Sylvester Smith was a shoemaker and Eri But- ler was an early wagon maker. In 1849 Isaae Morris began his career as shoemaker. John Allen was an early carpenter. Alonzo Osborn and James Symonds built places and did a flourishing business in the manufacture of wagons and plows. As many as five fires were kept burning all the time. William Cole, Thomas Webster, Bunker, Leonard Bell and Major Morse all worked over the anvil there in early times. But L. H. Flagg was the most dis- tinguished. His voice was a deep bass, very sweet and he was a famous singer. For almost a lifetime he continued as justice of the peace in Paw Paw and between him and John Colvill all the legal papers of the countryside were made by them. After 1850 John Colvill was an active merchant. He built several buildings.
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