USA > Illinois > McLean County > History of McLean County, Illinois, Volume I > Part 17
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Bloomington is so situated on the lines of the Illinois Traction Sys- tem that excellent interurban service is afforded with connections to Peoria, Springfield, Decatur and St. Louis.
The first interurban car in service for Bloomington was the one run over the new Mckinley line from Bloomington to Decatur on June 30, 1906. The line to Peoria was opened on June 6, 1907.
Gas Companies .- The first public utility in the county was gas serv- ice furnished by the Bloomington Gas Light & Coke Company at Bloom- ington, which began operating a plant in 1857 and furnished street light- ing service from the Illinois Central railway tracks to the Chicago & Alton railway depot. The plant was located at Market and Oak Streets. It was abandoned in 1867 and a new one built by General A. Gridley.
The Union Gas & Electric Company of Bloomington as it exists to- day is the outgrowth of several previous attempts to construct and oper- ate successful gas plants in the city. The first of these was the Bloom- ington Gas Light & Coke Company, established in 1857, and owned mostly by Franklin Price through an incorporated company. The plant was at the northwest corner of Oak and Market Streets. After the property had passed into the hands of General Gridley, he constructed new works just west of the Alton railroad tracks and north of Washington Street. The gas company furnished the illumination for the streets of the city for
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several years prior to the introduction of electric street lighting. Bloom- ington was one of the first cities in the state to light its streets with gas. In 1882 a new gas company was given a franchise to use the streets of the city, and it tore up many of the streets for the purpose of laying its pipes. It was thought that competing companies would result in lower rates to consumers. But after the new company had done much work, a consoli- dation was effected and the gas business was again in the hands of a single company.
In the year 1901, the gas company decided to branch out into Normal, and secured a franchise from the town council to lay mains and otherwise use the streets and alleys for service. The franchise was secured in the name of James A. Wilcox, Duncan M. Funk, John T. Lillard, J. O. Will- son and Willard A. Parritt, who were the officers of the company in those days. The service was gradually installed and now covers Normal almost as thoroughly as it does Bloomington. Many miles of mains were laid in Normal.
In the year 1908 a New York syndicate acquired the franchises and capital stock of all the gas interests of Bloomington, taking over both the Bloomington Gaslight and Coke Company and the Citizens' Gaslight & Heating Company. This new concern at once began a new policy of modernizing and bettering the equipment and consequently the service. This policy has been steadily pursued to the present time.
J. A. Perkins was for several years the local manager under the ownership of the New York capitalists. He was succeeded by Ray Stretch, who remained in charge a few years. About three years ago Roy E. Chew became the local manager and is now in charge. Under his supervision the local property has been still further improved, until it is now one of the best of its size in the United States. A survey taken last year of the condition of gas properties in Illinois, one hundred in number, placed the Bloomington plant as second in point of modern equipment and efficient service.
The total valuation of the physical properties of the Union Gas & Electric Company is now about $1,600,000. There are 86 miles of gas mains in Bloomington and Normal, and 8,350 meters are in place, or one to about every four persons in the two cities. The company employs 75 people on an average, and at certain seasons when outdoor work is in
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progress, the lists run as high as 150 to 200 people. The annual payroll of the company is about $100,000.
This company produces annually 250,000,000 cubic feet of gas for illumination, heating and the many other uses to which the substance is now put. The company pays taxes of $20,000 yearly.
One of the most interesting features of this public utility is its policy of customer ownership. Several years ago it started out on this well- defined plan of interesting its patrons and other citizens in owning stock in the company. Up to date, there are about 400 people in the two cities who own stock of greater or lesser sums. These include nearly every employe of the company. The total investments represented by these resident stockholders is upward of $224,000. Thus while the nominal headquarters are in a distant city, the capital which controls its manage- ment is largely in the hands of the very people who use its product. The local directors and officers now include: C. F. J. Agle, vice-president ; Lee Rust, director; Dan Fitzgerrell, director; William Beasley, assistant secretary and treasurer; R. E. Chew, director and general manager.
Telephone Systems .- The Central Union, or otherwise known as the Bell Telephone System, was the pioneer commercial line in this county, although attempts to build telephones had previously been made, but they proved little more than toys so far as utility is concerned. Fred Beckman, still in the business after 44 years, came to Bloomington in 1880 from St. Louis, where he had just learned the rudiments of the then rather crude business, as a lineman. Mr. Beckman helped to construct the first sys- tem of Bell telephones here for the few years following 1880. When the business expanded and grew to large proportions, Mr. Beckman was made superintendent of the local plant, a position which he retained until its consolidation with the Kinloch system in 1920. He is still in charge of the long distance business of the Bell company in Bloomington and Mc- Lean County.
The Bell Telephone Company owned the only telephone system in Bloomington until about 1895, when James B. Taylor and H. S. Bower organized an independent company called "Home Telephone Company" with a limited number of telephones.
After three or four years John T. Lillard, John J. Pitts, C. P. Soper, Lyman Graham and V. E. Howell furnished additional capital, acquired
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the system and owned it until about 1902, when A. B. Cotton and Hart F. Farwell purchased the system. Mr. Farwell soon after sold his inter- est to Mr. Cotton. A. B. Cotton, about 1905, sold the Home Telephone Company plant or system, to a group of people who are still the principal owners, and who then formed a new corporation, the present Kinloch- Bloomington Telephone Company. From 1905 to date the list of subscrib- ers has grown from 1,200 to 10,000.
About 1912 the McLean County Telephone Company which had been conducting an independent toll business, sold its toll lines to Kinloch- Bloomington Telephone Company.
In January, 1922, the Bell Telephone Company sold their local plant to Kinloch-Bloomington Telephone Company, the Bell Company retaining its toll lines and long distance traffic. All Bell, also all independent toll lines throughout the country, are connected with the Kinloch-Blooming- ton exchange.
John T. Lillard has been president of the Kinloch-Bloomington Tele- phone Co. since its organization; Hart F. Farwell has been vice-president and general manager during all said time. The rates charged by the Bloomington telephone company are the lowest rates charged by any similar plant in the State of Illinois, and perhaps as low as any similar plant in the United States.
In 1902 when Home Telephone Company was acquired by Mr. Far- well and Mr. Cotton it occupied the second floor in the building at 216 West Jefferson Street; the office of the company was about that time moved to the north end of the Evans Building, fronting on Main Street, just north of the Corn Belt Bank Building.
In 1920 the telephone company purchased the three-story and base- ment building 513-515 North Main Street, together with the lot 517 next north of same; a total frontage of 72 feet and depth of 100 feet. The entire building, 513-515, was rebuilt for the uses of the company, new switchboards and new apparatus were placed in the building and under- ground conduits and cables were constructed to and in the newly acquired property.
In January, 1922, the exchange and all equipment was moved from the Evans Building where it had been located for 15 years, to the Lillard Building. The company now has 9,500 subscribers in Bloomington and Normal, or about one to three people. This is an unusually high percent-
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age of service. Connected with the Bloomington exchange are about 9,000 instruments operating through the many exchanges located in dif- ferent towns of the county. The company employs 110 people in all ca- pacities from operators at the exchange to linemen and other workers on the outside.
Thomas C. Ainsworth has been superintendent of the Kinloch plant here for about twelve years. He is known as one of the best telephone men in the country.
CHAPTER XVII.
INDUSTRIAL DEVELOPMENT.
MANUFACTURING - RAILROAD SHOPS -TELEGRAPH COMPANY - EWING AND FLAGG-PLOW FACTORY-BRICK AND TILE-COAL MINE-PORK PACKING- MEADOWS MANUFACTURING COMPANY-AMERICAN FOUNDRY AND FURNACE COMPANY-PAUL F. BEICH COMPANY-MaGIRL FOUNDRY-BLOOMINGTON CANNING COMPANY-WHOLESALE GROCERS-NURSERIES.
The industrial and manufacturing interests of Bloomington are cen- tered largely in the repair and machine shops of the Chicago & Alton Railroad, which form the largest single industry of the city. These shops were established in Bloomington soon after the road was built through the city, in 1853. Col. R. P. Morgan, the superintendent, and Jesse W. Fell, rode horseback from Bloomington to Joliet looking for the most available site, and finally chose Bloomington. The road was poor and its first group of buildings were temporary wooden structures, located "way out of town." In 1857 they employed 180 men. On Oct. 31, 1867, the shops burned down. Should they be rebuilt? Some of the directors favored having their repair work done in Chicago, but a committee of Bloomington citizens headed by Judge David Davis and Jesse Fell urged on President Timothy B. Blackstone the claims of Bloomington to such good effect that the shops were again built in Bloomington, after the citizens had voted $55,000 in bonds to aid in acquiring land for enlarge- ment of the plant. The decision in favor of the bonds was practically unanimous. The rebuilt shops were much better than the old ones had been, and these remained almost unchanged until the next great enlarge- ment campaign of 1910, when the citizens subscribed $165,000 to buy
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ground for additional shops and tracks, and the railroad company spent on its part nearly $1,000,000 for erecting modern and strictly up-to-date plant.
The Western Union Telegraph Company first established its lines into Bloomington about the time the Alton Railroad came. This was another factor in transforming the village into a city.
The rebuilding of the Chicago & Alton shops into the modern plant which the road possesses was accomplished by the action of the citizens of Bloomington in 1910, when by voluntary subscriptions in a campaign of 17 days' duration the sum of $165,000 was raised by the citizens, to be used in the purchase of additional land on which the Alton officials were to expand and rebuild their plant. In April, 1910, the then vice- president of the road, George H. Ross, submitted to the Business Men's Association of Bloomington a written proposition in which the company promised to expend approximately $1,000,000 in improvements and en- largements of its works in Bloomington, providing the citizens would donate the ground which the enlarged plant would occupy. This proposi- tion was taken under advisement by the board of directors of the Business Men's Association, and after carefully laying out plans for its public campaign, it set the date of May 16 to begin the actual canvass. On the day before this date, the newspaper published details of the proposed plans, giving Vice-President Ross' proposition verbatim and telling the people that it would require the sum of $156,000 to purchase the desired lands.
Alonzo Dolan was president of the Business Men's Asociation at that time, William Schmidt the secretary, and the offices were located in a single room on Jefferson Street, the west part of the Illinois Hotel Build- ing. Here the headquarters of the campaign was located, and E. B. Cole was engaged as a special accountant to keep track of the subscriptions as received. The special committee appointed for the Business Men's Association to conduct the campaign was composed of Paul F. Beich, Ben- jamin F. Harber, Oscar Mandel, Henry Behr, Howard D. Humphreys, Edward Holland and Theodore S. Bunn.
Solicitors, both men and women, were appointed for every precinct in the city and a house to house canvass was conducted from May 16 to the night of May 31, it being stipulated that the proposition of the Alton company must be accepted before June 1st. It was considered that the
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acceptance of this proposal and the completion of the enlargements would forever set at rest any fear that the Alton shops would be removed to any other point along its lines.
The campaign was carried on with increasing intensity from day to day, and on the night of May 31, the officers of the Business Men's Asso- ciation sent a telegram to Vice-President Ross, stating that his proposi- tion was accepted and the money had been raised. The proposals em- bodied in the statement of the Alton company were as follows:
First-Erect a 44-stall roundhouse equipped with the new Sturte- vant system. Second-Build new machine shop opposite present one, ex- tending east from boiler shop with 20 stalls, increasing capacity of erect- ing shop by one-half. Third-Enlarge boiler shops by additions south and west which will double the capacity of that department. Fourth- Enlarge wheel and axle and freight repair shops. Fifth-Add to size and capacity of other shops. Sixth-Enlarge switching yards, shop yards and roundhouse yards, rearranging entire shop plant system of tracks. Sev- enth-Enlarge main yards, laying third main from Bloomington yards through Normal. Eighth-Construct new union station to cost $75,000, to be used in upper stories for general offices for operating department.
It was estimated that the cost of the enlarged shops would be $750,000; of the necessary subways and viaducts at Chestnut and Seminary Avenue would be $75,000; of the new union station $75,000, and of the enlarged trackage $50,000, making the whole improvement cost close to $1,000,000.
It was a scene of rare excitement at the Business Men's Association rooms in the evening of May 31, when a final report was expected. Presi- dent Alonzo Dolan reported that on the previous day the pledges had to- taled $140,000, and about $15,000 had been turned in during the day. Then a gift of $2,000 was reported from Miss Susan Loehr, aged 94 years. Increases from previous subscribers brought the total to $162,500, and there it seemed to stand, until a letter from George P. Davis was read pledging another $2,500 additional to his previous gift of $1,500. The Davis pledge brought the total subscriptions to the $165,000 point, and then a great celebration broke loose. Cheers rang for several minutes, and then a round of speechmaking and felicitation was indulged in.
The money was payable in three years, but a large part of it was paid during the summer of 1910. The Business Men's Association at once began the work of buying up the many parcels and lots of land which
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had to be acquired. Secretary William Schmidt carried on this work during that summer, and soon had many of the houses removed from the land, the titles turned over to the Chicago & Alton Company. Construc- tion contracts were awarded in June and for the next year the shops site was one of the busiest building places in the state. The Alton car- ried out its part of the contract, the new three-story union station and general offices being erected on the site of the old. The new roundhouse and machine shops were mammoth affairs. A foot subway under Chest- nut Street was erected, and a steel and concrete viaduct over Emerson Street, instead of at Seminary Avenue as at first proposed. A great new concrete and steel viaduct was built over the Alton tracks at Front Street, at the south end of the new union station. Finally several years after, and not part of the original plan, a subway under the tracks was con- structed at Division Street.
Aside from the Chicago & Alton shops, one of the most important factory operations carried on in Bloomington in the early days was that of Ewing and Flagg, located between Main and East Streets, where the Big Four station now stands. Before railroads came to this section, this concern, owned by John W. Ewing and William F. Flagg, employed 125 to 150 men in manufacturing a reaping machine and other kinds of agri- cultural implements. The reaper was a forerunner of the famous McCor- mick reaper, and in fact it was proved in a lawsuit that the Bloomington machine was in part an infringement on McCormick patents. Most of the raw materials for this factory, as well as its finished products, were carried by team to and from the Illinois River.
A kindred industry was the plow factory of Lewis Bunn and Abram Brokaw, which occupied the lots where the People's Bank now stands. These industries made their way in spite of the absence of railroads to aid them in marketing their output. If the railroads had come ten years earlier, the city might have become a factory town.
Brick yards were among the earlier industries of the growing city of Bloomington. The first one was where the German Lutheran Church now stands. Later the famous Heafer brick and tile yards were estab- lished in the southeast part of the city and turned out hundreds of thou- sands of brick for many years. In addition to the many brick buildings erected from 1850 to 1870, the railroads built many of their bridges and culverts with brick arches. One such, supporting a span of the Illinois
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Central road north of Bloomington over Sugar Creek, caved in during a flood season in 1858, and dammed the creek. The overflow of the bottom lands threatened serious consequences for a time, but the flood finally broke through the temporary dam. When the first building of the Nor- mal University was under construction, there was a brick yard in opera- tion just east, where the Normal Public School now stands.
Bloomington is credited with having laid the first brick pavement in the United States, this being done by Napoleon B. Heafer in 1877, on the south and west sides of the public square. Of late years, the brick put down in the pavements of Bloomington and Normal all came from other places where a better quality of clay for pavement brick existed.
Tile making as allied to brick making flourished as an industry in this city for many years, and the Heafer tile works in Bloomington em- ployed many men and shipped hundreds of thousands of feet of drain tile. Nearly all the swampy farm lands of McLean County were thus tile drained in the period from about 1880 to 1900.
The making of tile had a large influence on the management of the farms of McLean and adjoining counties. There was much wet land in the prairie sections and these were thoroughly drained in the era when tiling was the principal business of the farmer. It is estimated that hun- dreds of miles of tile drains are still in use on the farms of McLean County. There were tile factories in several of the other towns of McLean County outside of Bloomington, and one of the last of these to continue in operation was the Tillbury plant at Towanda. Fenstermaker & Co. long operated a factory of this kind at Ellsworth. Pike & Castle ran a plant at Chenoa. One of the early tile factories was located at Funk's Grove and there was another south of Heyworth along the Illinois Cen- tral. The work of tiling added millions of dollars to the values of McLean County farm lands.
The Bloomington Pressed Brick Company was established along in the '90's in a plant built alongside the McLean County Coal Mine. It used the shale from the coal mine to manufacture into a brand of pressed brick which was used both for building purposes and street pavement. The plant flourished for many years, but gradually other kinds of brick made in other cities got the edge of them and the use of the Bloomington pressed brick fell off. The plant was finally disposed of and the company went out of business.
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After years of experimenting and expenditure of thousands of dol- lars in fruitless borings, a paying vein of coal was discovered near the city in June, 1867, and this was another event counting for much in the future prosperity of the city. The first coal mine was started in 1867 near the present city water works, but it proved a failure on account of the trouble with water. The next year the McLean County Coal Company was organized with Matthew T. Scott as its main sponsor. A shaft was sunk near the Chicago & Alton depot, and this mine has been in continual operation since that time. For many years it employed between 200 and 300 miners, but of later years owing to the opening of many mines fur- ther south with deeper veins of coal and easier of working, the Blooming- ton mine had gradually decreased its output. However, it furnished a large part of the supplies of coal used by Bloomington citizens, and dur- ing the World War served as a lifesaver to the community when coal was hard to obtain from distant mines. This year (1923) there were somewhere near 100 men employed at this mine. Lyman M. Graham, who served as manager of the mine for many years, gave up the active man- agement during 1922.
For many years there was in operation in Bloomington a pork pack- ing plant, located on South East Street just south of the Big Four Rail- road. In the days of its prime, this plant bought and packed hundreds of hogs every day of the week, and its output in the course of the year amounted to hundreds of thousands of dollars in value. The buildings were later taken over by Campbell Holton & Co., the wholesale grocers, who now occupy them with several enlargements.
For the past fifty years or more Bloomington has had one or more stove factories. The Bloomington Stove Company occupied buildings along the Alton road south of Seminary Avenue for many years and did a big manufacturing business. A fire and other losses caused the plant to finally close down. On the east side of the city, at Empire Street, was long located the Co-operative Stove Company factory, now the Hamilton- Hayes Stove Company.
The latest important addition to the strictly industrial life of Bloom- ington was the establishment of the Meadows Manufacturing Company, which was secured through the activity of the Association of Commerce during the years 1921-22. The factory had its inception in McLean County, when the Rocke brothers first created a small shop for making
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grain elevators at the town of Meadows, east of Lexington. This grew until it was too large for the community of its birth, and it was removed to Pontiac, where a large factory building was erected and where it con- tinued to expand for several years. Then its Pontiac quarters having been outgrown, a proposal to locate the plant in Bloomington was taken up by the Association of Commerce, with the result that a tract of land in the southeast part of the city was acquired and deeded to the com- pany in consideration of locating the plant here. The company was re- organized with increased capital and erected on the land buildings cost- ing upward of $300,000. In 1923, owing to after-war conditions, the company went through a process of re-capitalization, and is now on a substantial basis and doing a very large business in manufacturing wash- ing machines, grain elevators and other articles of general use. The com- pany employs a large number of skilled mechanics and other workmen.
A district east of the Illinois Central Railroad in Bloomington devel- oped into an important territory of the city in an industrial way. The American Foundry and Furnace Company, established 30 years ago as the Soper Foundry, has become a well-established business of wide client- age. It was founded by Horace W. and Clinton P. Soper and was carried on by the second generation of Clinton Soper's family. Leroy G. Whit- mer is the president of the company, Horace A. Soper is the vice-presi- dent, and Guy Haley is secretary. The plant occupies a half block of buildings, and employs 100 men or more.
The other industrial plant in the same vicinity is that of the Portable Elevator Company, which has grown from small beginnings for the past twenty-five years, having taken over the factory formerly occupied by the W. R. White Gate Company. The Portable makes grain elevators and kindred products and has patronage extending from one end of the coun- try to the other. G. Burt Read is president of the company; W. S. Har- wood vice-president, and L. G. Whitmer secretary.
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