USA > Illinois > Cook County > Chicago > Stories and sketches of Chicago; an interesting, entertaining, and instructive sketch history of the wonderful city "by the sea" > Part 4
Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11
I was born in Scipio, Cayuga County, N. Y., in 1802. I left Chicago in 1836, and have resided in Joliet and vicinity ever since. I had the acquaintance, when in Chicago, of Col. Richard J. Hamilton, Thomas Owen (Indian Agent), Geo. W. Dole, John Wright, P. F. W. Peck, Philo Carpen- ter, John S. C. Hogan, Col. John B. Beaubien, Mark Beau- bien, John H., Robert A., and James Kinzie.
I will now give you the names of some of my scholars: Thomas, William, and George Owen; Richard Hamilton; Alexander, Philip, and Henry Beaubien; and Isaac N. Har- mon, now a merchant in Chicago.
I remember Stephen R. Beggs, who sometimes preached in Father Walker's building where I taught school.
Mr. Watkins is still residing at Joliet.
The First Drawbridge Across the Chicago River-Sketched by the Builder.
Nelson R. Norton came to Chicago November 16, 1833. He says: Soon after I arrived I commenced cutting the lumber for a drawbridge on the land adjoining Michigan avenue, afterward owned by Hiram Pearsons. In March, 1834, I commenced building it, and I think it was com- pleted by the first of June.
The first steamboat that passed through it was the old Michigan, with a double engine, commanded by Capt. C. Blake, and owned by Oliver Newberry, of Detroit.
The bridge had an opening of 60 feet, with a double draw. I think the length was 300 feet. This is the best of my recollection. The width was 16 feet. It was located at Dearborn street.
[68]
BAKER- CO
OLD DEARBORN STREET(OLD POINT) BRIDGE
69
FIRST THINGS.
Credit me with building the first vessel at Chicago. I built the sloop Clarissa in the spring of 1835. This was the first sail vessel launched on the west side of Lake Michigan, if not the first on the lake.
The first freight taken down the lakes was in 1834, being a lot of hides, from cattle that had been slaughtered for the Government troops.
I was born at Hampton, Washington Co., N. Y., on November 8, 1807.
The First Sunday-School in Chicago-Sketched by the Rev. Arthur Mitchell. D. D.
Dr. Mitchell, now pastor of the first church organized in Chicago (First Presbyterian), in a recent historical dis- course thus describes the first Sunday-school:
Several months before the schooner's arrival from Fort Brady (which brought the Rev. Jeremiah Porter to Chi- cago), before there was either school-house, or church, or minister in the settlement, four earnest workers had started a Sunday-school. Its first session was held (so I learn from Mr. Porter) in alog house at the Point, on the west side of the south branch of the river. There were fifteen scholars, mostly children of the French and half-breed residents. They were untutored little urchins, and had to be collected each Sabbath by the teachers.
Mr. Philo Carpenter, a druggist, a member of Dr. Be- man's Presbyterian Church, in Troy, N. Y., was the Su- perintendent. This was the first Sunday-school established in Northern Illinois, except one opened by that heroic Home Missionary, Rev. Aratus Kent, (known as Father Kent), in a dram-shop in Galena. The Sunday-school (in Chicago) was opened August 19, 1832.
-
01
STORIES AND SKETCHES OF CHICAGO.
In April, 1833, Father Walker, an aged Methodist minister, came to Chicago to reside. He lived in a log cabin on the west side of the river, near the North Branch, and preached there on the Sabbath. The Methodists are the pioneers. The first minister to preach the gospel in Chicago was a Methodist. He had about thirty days' start of Mr. Porter.
The Sunday-school in its first two years of labor had been moved from the log house on the Point, first to Father Walker's house, then to the Fort, then to the second story of one of the three frame buildings used as stores. This stood at the corner of La Salle and South Water streets, then the business part of the village. Mr. Carpenter was still Su- perintendent, and John Wright Secretary and Librarian, "the library being comfortably carried "-so writes Dr. Humphrey-" in a silk handkerchief. It soon became nec- essary, however, to substitute a basket for the silk hand- kerchief," Mr. Joseph Meeker having arrived in July, '34, with great spoil-a quantity of second-hand books, which had been used in a Sunday-school in the city of New York.
Chicago's First Minister and First Church -- Sketched by the Pastor.
Chicago's first minister, the Rev. Jeremiah Porter, still lives, and all the way from his home on the Pacific Coast comes the following description of his first arrival and early labors in the city by the sea. Mr. Porter says: "On the arrival of Major Fowle at Fort Dearborn, on the 4th of May, 1833, in a schooner direct from Fort Brady, with his missionary pastor (Mr. Porter) on board, they found, in- cluding troops of the United States Army, some four hundred people at Chicago; but no minister or priest had
71
FIRST THINGS.
ever visited them so far as they could learn, except Father Jesse Walker, who as an itinerant Methodist minister had come once a month from his Indian mission on the Fox River, and gathered a few Christians in a log school house on the west side of the river.
But Philo Carpenter had preceded the army chaplain by a year, and had established a sabbath-school and a prayer- meeting. John Wright and his son, John S. Wright, were associated with Mr. Carpenter in these incipient Christian efforts, laying foundations for many generations. The elder Mr. Wright, by writing, had tried for months to secure a minister for Chicago, and when to his surprise on that Monday morning he met the minister (as he went to din- ner in his log boarding-house), whom he had known eight years before a student in Williams College, and learned from him that he had come with a part of a scattered church, he exclaimed with admiration:
"This is like the bursting out of the sun from the darkest clouds! Yesterday was the darkest day we ever saw. We were to lose one of our praying officers, and were expecting only godless men with the new troops, and Mr. Carpenter has gone back to New York for his spring goods."
With the aid of Major Fowle and his men, the carpenter shop at Fort Dearborn was changed into a house of wor- ship.
The first sermon, however, was preached in Father Walker's school-house, west of the South Branch, just over the bridge.
The first text of the new minister (Mr. Porter) was: " Herein is My Father glorified that ye bear fruit; so shall ye be My disciples .- (John xv., 8.)
No minister of any church, or priest, except Father Walker, was found north, south, east or west, within one hundred miles! Niles, Mich., east; Danville, Ill., south;
72
STORIES AND SKETCHES OF CHICAGO.
Galena, Ill., west; Princeton, southwest, and the Stock- bridge Indians, north, on the Fox River, Wis., were the only near churches!
During the month of June (the 26th), 1833, a Presby- terian Church was gathered, consisting of two officers of the army and their wives, three wives of soldiers and eleven soldiers, all from the church at Fort Brady. The cit- izens of Chicago who united at the organization were only four gentlemen and four ladies, all by letter from churches in New England, except Philo Carpenter, who was a native of New England, coming from Dr. S. S. Beman's church, Troy, N. Y., and Mrs. Charles Taylor, sister of the present General Orlando Wilcox, U. S. A.
From this acorn of a church, planted forty-seven years ago, have grown the oaks that now fill the fifth, if not the fourth, city of the American United States.
John Wright, Philo Carpenter, and Major De L. Wilcox. were chosen elders of the church and set apart by the pastor.
On the first Sabbath of July, 1833. the blessed Sacrament of the Lord's Supper was administered in the town that now has 500,000 inhabitants. And of those first communi- cants four continue to this day to testify of those days of small things: Mr. Carpenter, identified from that day with all the moral and spiritual interests of Chicago; Miss Taylor; Eliza Chappel, who two years afterwards became the pastor's wife, and is still; and himself."
1
The Rev. Arthur Mitchell, D. D., the present pastor of the church organized by the Rev. Jeremiah Porter, adds:
"In the first year of Mr. Porter's labors the church in- creased from twenty-six to sixty-seven members. Letters were presented twenty years old by persons who had passed all those years at frontier posts. The little church could not give a support to their pastor. He was sustained by
73
FIRST THINGS.
the Home Missionary Society; but steps were taken imme- diately by them and money raised to build a house of wor- ship.
On the 4th of January, 1834, that house was dedicated to God. It was a frame building, about forty feet in length by twenty-five in width, and cost $600. It would seat about two hundred; and the settlers, with the attendants from the garrison, filled it comfortably every Sunday.
The walls were simply plastered, the floor bare, the seats home-made benches, made of ordinary boards. It stood on what is now the alley of the lot at the southwest corner of Lake and Clark streets. "People wondered," so I have been told by an aged lady who worshipped in that primi- tive place, "what on earth Mr. Porter had put the church away off there for, out on the prairie!"
The young pastor evidently had faith in the future of Chicago. The building stood out in the open fields, with- out any fence around it. Several of the members lived on the West Side, where there were then three houses-but one of those houses, though only twenty feet by fourteen, accommodated that winter seventeen persons! For them it was quite a circumstance to reach the church.
The river had to be crossed by a sort of floating bridge, near what is now Randolph street, and they must then go skipping from one log to another across the swamps and bogs of the muddy prairie. Sometimes they were sadly bemired on the way, and more than once ladies liad to be picked up by strong arms and lifted across the black and treacherous holes."
74
STORIES AND SKETCHES OF CHICAGO.
"Long John's " Story of an Early Chicago Wedding --- The Whole City Invited --- Stylish Outfits, and What Became of a Lock of the Bride's Raven Hair.
I remember attending the wedding of one of Lafram- boise's daughters. She was married to a clerk in the Post- office. The clerk was the one who delivered letters, and of course was well known to all our citizens, and was remark- ably popular.
He went to the printing office and had fifty cards of invitation struck off. But when people went for their letters they politely hinted that they expected a card of invita- tion to the wedding. So he was compelled to go to the printing office and have fifty more struck off. These did not last long, and he had one hundred more.
Then he said that tickets were of no use, and everybody might come; and about everyone did come. The ceremony was performed by Rev. Isaac W. Hallam, pastor of the St. James' Episcopal Church.
The house was of no particular use, as it was full and surrounded with people.
This wedding made a strong impression on my mind, as it was the first time I ever saw the Indian war-dance. Some of the guests not only had their tomahawks and scalping- knives, bows and arrows, but a few of them had real scalps which they pretended they had taken in the various Indian wars. Their faces were decorated with all the favorite pic- tures of the Indians. And some of our young white men and ladies played the part of the Indian so well that it was difficult to distinguish them from the real ones.
It has been a wonder to me that, while our professors of music have been inventing so many different kinds of dances, none of them have reproduced the Indian war-dance, which to me is much more sensible than nine-tenths of those which are now practiced at so many of our fashion- able parties. I presume that the trouble is that our ladies
"EXPECTATION."
[75]
76
STORIES AND SKETCHES OF CHICAGO.
consider that the Indian war-paint extemporized for the occasion would interfere with the original paint put on be- fore they left their homes, and which they wished to remain through the evening.
One of our young men claimed that at this wedding, amid the crowd, unperceived, he had clipped a lock from the bride's long, flowing, raven hair. Some of this hair he had put into a breast-pin, and very soon thereafter these Indian bridal breast-pins were about as thick as were the manufactures from our old court-house bell after the fire.
One man who had worn one for some years was suddenly taken sick, and expected to die. He called his wife to his bedside and told her he deemed it his duty to state to her that he had been deceiving her for years, and he could not die in peace until he had made a confession.
"I must tell you before I die that the hair in that pin I have been wearing so deceitfully is not the hair of that Indian chief's daughter, but your own."
With pitiful eyes he looked to his wife for forgiveness.
" And is that all that troubles you ?" said she; " what you have just revealed in your dying hour only confirms my opinion of you. I always supposed you thought more of me than you did of a squaw!"
And now I suppose you think that that man died in peace. But he did not. He is alive now. There is occasionally an instance where a man has survived a confession to his wife. But where, oh where, is there an instance of a woman who has survived a confession to her husband?
After the marriage of this Indian chief's daughter, several of our wealthy citizens (wealthy for those days) gave return parties. I remember attending a very elegant one given at the house of Medard B. Beaubien. I think the fashionable society of Chicago subsisted for about two months upon that wedding. Mr. Beaubien has given me several invita-
77
FIRST THINGS.
tions, as he has others of our old settlers, to visit him at his residence among the Pottawatomies. He told me that · I would be a big Pottawatomie! He gave as a reason for abandoning Chicago, where he was a merchant, that he would rather be a big Indian than a little white man. He has the reputation of being the handsomest man that was ever in this city. I met him at Washington, a few years ago, and he attracted great attention for his remarkable personal beauty.
St. James' Episcopal Church.
Concerning Chicago's first Episcopal Church and its early labors, the Hon. Isaac N. Arnold says:
John H. Kinzie and Mrs. Juliette A. Kinzie, with Gur- don S. Hubbard, may be considered, more than any others, the founders of St. James' Church. Others aided and con- tributed, but the Kinzie family took the lead. The parish was organized in 1834, and on the 12th of October, 1834, Rev. Isaac W. Hallam arrived in Chicago, and took charge of the parish.
The first regular services were held in a room in a wooden building standing on the corner of Wolcott (now N. State) and Kinzie streets, fitted up by Mr. Kinzie and others as a place of worship, and which afterward, being used in the Presidential campaign of 1840 as a place for political meetings, was named " Tippecanoe Hall."
In 1835 or 1836 John H. Kinzie donated two lots on the southeast corner of Cass and Illinois streets as a site for the church edifice, and in 1836-1837 a brick church was erected thereon. On the 26th of March, 1837, the body of the church was first occupied for public service. The entire cost of the church, exclusive of the organ, was
78
STORIES AND SKETCHES OF CHICAGO.
$14,000. On the Monday following the first service most of the pews were sold at auction, and brought the sum of $13,862, which, with subscriptions and the proceeds of a fair, paid the cost of the church and left a balance of $4,000, which was used toward the erection of a rectory.
At the home of John H. Kinzie (standing on the north- east corner of Cass and Michigan streets) the Bishops and clergy of the Diocese of Illinois were always welcome. The Venerable Bishop Chase always found there a home and a genial welcome. Indeed, the hospitality of the Kin- zie family was proverbial all over the Northwest. In the reminiscences of Bishop Chase, published in two volumes, by James B. Dow, Boston, 1848, this family is spoken of.
In a letter on p. 389, dated Monday, July 26, 1837, the good old Bishop says: " The consecration of St. James' Church, Chicago, took place yesterday at half-past ten. The church was filled to overflowing, even before the Bishop met the wardens and vestry at the door. The Rev. Mr. Hallam read the morning prayers, and myself the ante- communion and sermon. Text: 'The Lord is in this place. This is none other than the House of God, and this the gate of heaven.' The whole number of communicants is now about thirty. I went to the Kinzies. Mrs. Magill, and all the young, and Mrs. K. were most attentive to my every want, etc."
Indeed, such was the prominence and activity of Mrs. John H. Kinzie in the early days of the Protestant Epis- copal Church of Illinois, that she was sometimes called " The Female Bishop of Illinois."
79
FIRST THINGS.
The First Daily Newspaper.
The first daily newspaper printed in Chicago was the Chicago Daily American, edited by Wm. Stuart, the first number of which bears date April 9th, 1839. The closing words of the editor's " salutatory" are as follows: " We now launch our humble bark on the great ocean of the world, with plenty of sheet, but still with no certainty of sale, and with what pilotage we may command, we must trust the destiny of its voyage to the winds and waves, the sunshine and the storm."
The First "Loafer" in Chicago.
The first " loafer" on record was Richard Harper. The city census of July 1st, 1837, gave the occupation of every citizen. In this instance the record reads, " Richard Har- per, loafer." This man, it is said, was "respectably con- nected" in the city of Baltimore, and, be it known, afterward reformed. He left the young city no doubt in disgust, and made his way back to his native place, and afterward became one of the six Washingtonian Reformers who started the great temperance reformation which spread over the country in 1840. So it is said.
Chicago's First Wedding.
The first wedding in Chicago-of which there is any record-occurred July 20th, 1823. Curiously enough, the contracting parties were a physician, Alexander Wolcott, M. D., and Ellen M. Kinzie, who was the first child born in Chicago. John Hamlin, J. P., who was returning from a business trip to Green Bay, Wis., to his home in Fulton
80
STORIES AND SKETCHES OF CHICAGO.
County, officiated on the occasion, and made them " husband and wife" by a very plain but solid-binding ceremony. All the prominent chiefs and braves of the Pottawatomies. and other tribes, were present at this first of the long and rapidly extending list of Chicago marriages. Miss Kinzie was the daughter of Mr. and Mrs. John Kinzie. She was born in the autumn of 1807, and was just "sweet sixteen " the year of her marriage.
Violets.
The first divorce suit in Chicago was brought in 1835.
The first " one-horse shay " to make its appearance was in 1834; Philo Carpenter, proprietor.
" Horse cars " made their appearance in the city, " as far up as Twelfth street," April 25, 1859.
The first Coroner was John R. Clark, and his first inquest was " over the body of a dead Indian."
Mr. Robert Fergus issued the first Directory of Chicago. It appeared in 1839, and contained 1.660 names.
The first church fair held in Chicago was given by the ladies of the Protestant Episcopal Church, June 18, 1835.
David McKee was Chicago's first blacksmith. He also in early days carried a monthly mail from Fort Wayne to Chicago.
The first white woman to make her home in Chicago from New England was Mrs. Hadassah Trask, who arrived May 26, 1826.
The first Justice of the Peace in Chicago was John Kin- zie, commissioned July 28, 1825, as shown by the records of Peoria County.
The first bank established in Chicago was a branch of
81
FIRST THINGS.
the State Bank of Illinois, in December, 1835, of which W. H. Brown was cashier.
The first lawyer who appeared on the Chicago horizon was Russell E. Heacock. He arrived July 4, 1827, and " still lives " in the city.
Chicago boasted of its first brick house in 1831, built by Caleb Blodgett on the North side of Adams street, between Dearborn and State streets.
The first railroad to run out of Chicago, was the "Galena and Chicago Union," which penetrated the distant village of Elgin (forty miles), in 1850.
Chicago's first City Clerk was Isaac N. Arnold, since a member of Congress, and now the Honorable President of the Chicago Historical Society.
The first census of Chicago was taken July 1st, 1839. It showed a grand total population of 4,170 persons, of whom 3,989 were white, 77 black, and 104 sailors.
The first large vessel that ever entered the Chicago River was the schooner " Illinois," which " sailed up " July 11, 1834, amid the acclamations of the citizens.
The first livery stable in Chicago was kept by Lathrop Johnson, now a resident of Ontonagon, Mich. He also " run " the first stage line between Chicago and Milwaukee.
The first arrival of passengers from the East by railroad was via the Michigan Southern line, Feb. 20, 1852, and the first train by the Michigan Central was May 21, 1852.
The first lady " schoolinarm " in Chicago is said to have been Mrs. Stephen Forbes, who opened a school in 1830 near what is now the corner of Randolph street and Mich- igan avenue.
The first Sunday Liquor Law was adopted Sept. 1, 1834, prohibiting the opening of any " tippling shop or grocery " on Sunday, under a penalty of $5. one half to go to the complainant.
6
S2
STORIES AND SKETCHES OF CHICAGO.
The first jail was built in the autumn of 1833, "of logs well bolted together," on the northwest corner of the public square. It was standing as late as 1853. when it gave way for the " New Court House."
The first Postmaster of Chicago was J. S. C. Hogan, who kept a " variety store" on South Water street. He was appointed in 1833, and once a week received a mail from Niles, Mich., brought on horseback.
The first side-wheel steamer, the "Geo. W. Dole," was built by that gentleman in 1840, at the junction of the two branches of the Chicago River, from timber that grew on the North Branch of the Chicago River.
The first male child born in Chicago was Merriweather L. Whistler, son of Lieut. Whistler. He was born in Fort Dearborn during the autumn of 1805, and at the age of about seven years was drowned at Newport, Ky.
The first white man hung in Chicago was John Stone- evidently a hard case-who was executed July 10th, 1840. on a gallows erected "back of Myrick's tavern," near the lake shore, in expiation of the murder of Mrs. Thompson.
The first sail-vessel that ever arrived in the Chicago port is believed to have been the United States schooner "Tracy," with Dorr for Master. It came around the lakes from Detroit some time in 1803, bringing Capt. John Whistler, who came to build a fort.
The first tax-list on record is for the year 1825, which shows the entire personal property-not including the American Fur Company-to have been valued at $4,047, on which the whole tax paid was $40.47, with only thirteen persons, all told, as the tax-payers.
The first " celebration " of any character took place July 4tlı, 1836, in honor of the removal of the first shovelful of dirt in the construction of the canal. It is said every man, woman, and child in good health in the village was present
83
FIRST THINGS.
on the eventful occasion. The temperance people had lem- onade, and others whisky; but finally, it is said, the two liquids got seriously mixed.
The first steam fire-engine was introduced by Mayor Wentworth, during his first term in 1857. It was appro- priately called "Long John." During his second term, in 1861, he introduced two more, and called them "Liberty" and " Economy," in honor of a favorite watchword of his.
The first steamers that stirred the waters of Lake Mich- igan in front of Chicago, were the "Sheldon Thompson' and "William Penn." They arrived July 8th, 1832, and had on board Gen. Winfield Scott and a lot of soldiers for the Black Hawk war. At that date there were only five dwelling houses in Chicago, three of which were made of logs.
The first public building in Chicago of which any men- tion is made was an "Estray Pen," erected on the southwest corner of the public square. The lowest bid for the con- tract was $20, put in by Samuel Miller; but failing to com- plete the structure according to specifications, he was paid only $12 by the Treasurer. This is supposed to be the first instance where a contractor failed to fulfill his contract.
The first street leading to Lake Michigan was laid out April 25, 1832. It commenced at what was then called " the east end of Water street," and is described by Jede- diah Wooley, the surveyor, as follows: "From the east end of Water street, in the town of Chicago, to Lake Michigan. Direction of said road is south 883 degrees east from the street to the lake, 18 chains 50 links." Said street was laid out fifty feet wide. The viewers on this occasion "also believe that said road is of public utility, and a convenient passage from the town to the lake."
Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.