The History of Peoria County, Illinois. Containing a history of the Northwest-history of Illinois-history of the county, its early settlement, growth, development, resources, etc., etc., Part 86

Author: Johnson & co., Chicago, pub
Publication date: 1880
Publisher: Chicago : Johnson & Company
Number of Pages: 932

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Between forty and fifty regular passenger trains arrive and depart over these ten lines daily ; and nearly a hundred freight trains, averaging from fifteen to twenty-five cars each.

Thus it is apparent that Peoria, the flourishing "Central City " of this grand " Sneker State," is one of the principal railroad centers, of the West; reaching out her many- fingered metallic arms toward all points of the compass, beckoning the artisan. the manufacturer, the merchant, and the capitalist, to come and participate in her grand " BOOM."

THE EXPRESS SERVICE.

The Express business, it is needless to say, is a big thing. As with the grain of mus- tard seed, the beginning of this great institution was very small indeed. At one time, in 1839, its capital was about sixty-two and a half cents. Now it is nearly sixty millions of dollars.

Peoria, and Illinois indeed, are as much indebted to express facilities for their wonderful prosperity, as New York and New England are. It ramifies, with its Insty and stirring life, throughout the entire country. How could we do without it ? Some people growl continually at the exactions of the express. A parcel is brought to a woman a thousand miles or more - subject to several entries and passed from one messenger to another, and again to another, and another, over the intermediate railroads-and she is charged only twenty-five cents for it ; and yet she will peevishly declare it exorbitant. A city porter would charge as much for carrying it a dozen blocks or less.

In old times when mail stages were the rule, the drivers used to do some similar work on a small scale ; but when the greatest innovation of the present century, the railway, shoved the mail conches aside, and the " tea-kettle on wheels " became the great

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HISTORY OF PEORIA COUNTY.

motor, a new want began to oppress the people. Who now, should carry their parcels and do errands between the cities and towns ?

William F. Harnden, of Boston, responded, "I will." At least, in March, 1839, (according to A. Stimson's " Express History ") he advertised the first express car ever known, and promised to make tri-weekly trips with it, and the help of the Long Island Sound Steamboats, between Boston and New York City. Really, his express was for a time limited to a hand valise - which Ben. Cheney, of the Hub still preserves - and The Original Expressman met with little encouragement, except as a carrier of orders.

Harnden was a little sallow-faced young man, with a brother just like him, each weighing one hundred pounds, and as they were often seen working together in the new business they were not inaptly called the " Harnden ponies." Both were shrewd and smart for all that. Perhaps a little smarter for being condensed. Wm. F., especially, was multum in parvo-much in a thimble-full.

He had been a railroad man, both ticket-agent and conductor, when there was but one passenger road in the country ; and knew the ropes. Hiring an office in Wall Street, New York, he made himself so useful to Bennett's Herald, and the other dailies there, in bringing them the latest news to be had, east, in these ante-telegraph days, that they, in turn, began to write up his business. That was his first best lever, and early in 1840 his enterprise seemed so sensible and promising, that P. B. Burke and Alvin Adams, also of Boston, started a competing express to New York.

Now the Boston papers had to write up Adams & Co.'s Express ; and it, too, attained to a position of usefulness. Neither, however, made any money for some years, and only the most unwearying cultivation of the business, made it yield them a good living.

A little later Henry Wells served Harnden as agent at Albany, and then associating with Pomeroy and Crawford Livingston, under the style of Pomeroy & Co. Express, " doing express " on the Hudson river only, laid the foundation of what resulted in the two express firms of Livingston, Wells & Co., and Livingston, Fargo & Co .; and in 1854, through absorbing Butterfield, Wasson & Co., the American Express Co. was organized, with himself as president and John Butterfield vice-president.

These successors, led some wealthy and enterprising New York State men to start about that time, what has been favorably known for a quarter of a century as The United States Express Company.

Henry Kipp, of Buffalo, N. Y., for some years a very active superintendent of the American, became superintendent of the new company, and by his superior business abil- ity and indefatigable energy, established its success, east and west, but more especially in New York and the Western States. A few years ago, he was elected its president, but he travels as much over the routes as ever, and his supervision is as untiring as it is thorough and perfect.

The brothers, Wm. G., Jas. C. and Charles Fargo, have been the life and soul of the American Express Company in the West, and probably no other three men have done more for Illinois than they have to accommodate and develop the business resources of the State, and they have been well paid for it, in the grand success of their Company in this magnificent section of the union.

Indeed both Companies have done nobly, and even the Adams' Express Company, though behind both in its entrance here as a competitor, and still very limited in its area of service in Illinois, is a valuable help to mercantile communities in which it operates.

The capital stock of these Companies - the only ones operating in Illinois -is as follows: American, $18,000,000 ; Adams, 12,000,000 ; United States, $6,000,000. The Southern Express Company, Henry B. Platt, president, has an office at St. Louis, and connects with Cairo ; but its stock is owned entirely in " Dixie, " where it is a power.

The express business of Peoria is coeval with the existence of railroads, though there was, perhaps, some expressage by steamboats anterior to that, but very limited in quan-

532

HISTORY OF PEORIAA COUNTY.

tity. With the increase in the number of local railroad lines the express business has grown, until it now requires ten office men and twenty-four messengers running out over the various roads. The establishment of a local office by the United States Company antedated a number of years that of the American, and the first of September, 1877, for the sake of economy, the two Companies consolidated their offices, the American agent retiring, and turning over the entire business to the management of C. C. DeLong, whose experience of eleven years in the Chicago office of the United States Co., and twelve years as agent in Peoria, together with his innate gentlemanly qualities, admirably adapts him for the responsible position he so worthily fills.

TELEGRAPH BUSINESS.

The " harnessed lightning " which now cuts so prominent a figure in Peoria's commer- cial and general intercourse with all parts of this country, and indeed with other countries, and the click of whose coming and going sounds to a visitor in the general office like a whole toy shop of rattle-boxes turned loose, was first brought into requisition in the city nearly twenty-two years ago. On the 16th of June, 1848, Mr. R. Champion opened the first office of Mr. O'Riley's telegraph line, and the first message of greeting was sent and received over the wire from Springfield at four o'clock in the afternoon of that day. About nine o'clock, P. M., the editor of the Peoria Register sent respects to the Whig press of St. Louis, through the editor of the St. Louis Republican. These commu- nications were sent and received by the sound of the magnet, without the aid of a regis- ter, which was considered a remarkable feat. The opening of this highway for thought travel was a proud day in Peoria's history. It is preserved, as an achievement worthy of record, that on the 8th of November following, the result of the Presidential vote cast in Boston the day before, was received in Peoria at 11 A. M. And it is also a matter of historic record that President Taylor's message was received at Peoria for the Daily Champion, the first arriving in one hour and thirty-five minutes after its delivery in Washington. In 1850, Peoria had become the headquarters of O'Riley's telegraph line in the State, and the center of three States. During the month of May, that year, 750 messages were sent, and the gross receipts of the office were $178.94 ; and in November and December they ran over $200 each month. Francis Voris was then president of the board of the State, and Lewis Howell, now president of the Second National Bank, was vice president, and Eli Chadwick, " telegrapher." Mr. O'Riley constructed a system of telegraph lines connecting the principal cities of Illinois, Missouri and Iowa, which was named the "Great Atlantic, Lake and Mississippi Range" of telegraph lines. During the decade between 1850 and 1860, there was but a moderate development of the tele- graph business in Peoria. Soon after 1860 the Western Union Telegraph Company ob- tained possession of the lines in the Western States, and by shrewd management gave a great impetus to the telegraphing business in all parts of the country. Prior to 1863, Richmond Smith had charge of the Peoria office for some years. At that date Mr. J. E. Ranney, formerly manager at Bureau Junction, took the control of the office in this city, which position he still worthily and satisfactorily fills. All the telegraphic business from Peoria was then done over a single wire, there being then no other outlet. The messages were sent to Bureau Junction, there re-transmitted to Chicago, and thence to other desired points. Mr. Ranney and a night operator, with one messenger boy, did the entire work, and five to seven dollars a day receipts, was considered a fair business. The office at Pekin, at that time did not do enough to pay the salary of the operator. From 1865, the growth in telegraphing has been very rapid, both in the volume of busi- ness, the corresponding increase in the number of wires, and the improvements in instru- ments. There are now leading out of Proria fifteen wires, and one of these is equipped with quadruplex instruments, making it equivalent to four wires with ordinary instruments. Besides the main office in the Chamber of Commerce, there are four regular branch offices.

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HISTORY OF PEORIA COUNTY.

and an office for railroad work at each of the depots, from which regular messages can also be sent. The main office employs six operators, six messenger boys and a book- keeper; and each of the branch offices requires one man.

The Peoria office is a distributing office, where messages are received over the dif- ferent lines from various places, and are re-transmitted to the numerous points of desti- nation. The company only have one distributing office in a distance of one hundred or one hundred and fifty miles. The distributing messages average over three hundred and the total business from seven hundred to eight hundred messages per day, received and sent. The gross receipts from the business in the principal office and branches, amount to an average of about $3,000 a month.

THE TELEPHONE.

This little instrument, which is working such a revolution in business and social communication in the cities and towns of the civilized world, is but little more than three years old. It consists, as is well known, in a new application of electricity-a new harness fitted to a tried and useful steed. Prof. Alexander Graham Bell, who is doubt- less entitled to priority of claim to the invention of the speaking telephone, received his first patent ou the speaking telephone on March 7, 1876. His articulating telephone and Mr. Gray's musical telephone, were exhibited at the International Centennial Exposition on June 25, 1876.

Sir William Thompson in his official report, thus refers to these exhibits :

" Mr. Alexander Graham Bell exhibits apparatus by which he has achieved a result of transcendent scientific interest, the transmission of spoken words by electric currents through a telegraph wire. This, perhaps the greatest marvel hitherto achieved by the electric telegraph, has been obtained by appliances of quite a home-spun and rudimentary character. With somewhat more advanced plans and more powerful apparatus, we may confidently expect that Mr. Bell will give us the means of making voices and spoken words audible, through the electric wire, to an ear hundreds of miles distant."

Mr. Bell received his second patent on his speaking telephone January 30, 1877, and he and his associates began to manufacture the instrument soon after. In May, 1877, the first telephones were leased to Messrs. Stone & Downer, of Boston, and this was the first instance of the practical use of electricity in transmitting vocal speech over wires in the transaction of business.

The renowned C. A. Edison commenced experimenting on the telephone in the Spring of 1876, after Mr. Bell's first patent had been issued, and some months later brought out his carbon transmitter, which was transferred to the Western Union Tele- graph Company in 1878, and has been controlled by it since until recently a consolidation has been effected by which the entire telephone business in the United States has passed into the hands of the National Bell Telephone Company, of Boston.

Both the Bell and the Edison instruments are represented in Peoria. The first put up in the city was the Bell, which was leased on the 15th of May, 1879. Others were soon added, and in August following the Western Union Company erected the first Edison instrument in the city. The Edison was leased at considerably lower price than the Bell, and has outstripped it in point of numbers. The proprietors of the Bell tele- phone in the city, Messrs. C. B. Allaire and W. S. Reyburn, have a franchise covering the city and a radius of five miles, together with the city of Pekin. Their office is on Washington Street, over Zell and Hotchkiss' bank, and the Edison office is in the Cham- ber of Commerce. There are 183 Bell and 271 Edison telephones now in use in Peoria ; and so rapidly has this invention grown in public favor, that it has already become a necessity to the business public. As intimated above, the arrangements for a consolida- tion of the two systems have all been made, except the formal transfer, which will take place at an early day, and the whole business will pass into the hands of the Bell Com-

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HISTORY OF PEORIA COUNTY.

pany. The charge for putting in the telephone, erecting the line, and a year's lease of the instrument, is $50.

PEORIA POST OFFICE.

In following the progress of a city there is no surer index of its prosperity than the increase of its postal business, and in this respect the advancement of Peoria has been most marked. A post-office was established at Peoria on the 15th of April, 1825, and John Dixon received the first appointment as postmaster. The receipts for the first quarter after the office was established were 88.23. Twenty-five years later the income of the office had increased an hundred fold, the receipts for the last quarter of 1850 be- ing $523. We have not the material at hand to give a detailed account of the office or of the various administrations under which it has passed. John L. Bogardus, who fig- ured considerably in early days, was at one time postmaster, and kept the office in a log cabin situated where Truesdale and Son's planing mill now stands. This was some time previous to 1834. From there the office was removed to the site now occupied by Perry Frazier's marble front building, and Dr. Cross appointed postmaster. It was afterwards located near the old Clinton House, on the corner of Adams and Fulton Streets, and at one time it occupied the basement of the Peoria House, Geo. W. Rainney being then post- master, and also editor of the Democratic Press. From here it was removed to the old Boston Building, on Main Street, and from thenee to rooms under Roner's Hall, where it remained until February, 1872, when the building now occupied was leased by the Government for a period of ten years and the office removed to its present quarters. The following gentlemen have held the position of postmaster of Peoria at various times : John Dixon, John L. Bogardus, Wm. Fessenden, Washington Cockle, Samuel B. King, Peter Sweat, G. W. Rainney, Geo. C. Bestor, Enoch Emery, Isaac Underhill, Gen. D. W. Magee, John S. Stevens, and after a lapse of thirty years Mr. Coekle has again been appointed and now occupies the position.

In 1850 Peoria was the center of an extensive mail system, radiating in every direc- tion, and the roads leading to Peoria village were made merry by the coachman's horn and the crack of the driver's lash of those good old coaching days of Frink and Walker.

The receipts of the office for the last quarter of 1850, '60, '70 and '79 were as fol- lows :

For fourth quarter. 1850 $ 823 00 For fourth quarter. IS70 $ 7.830 04

.. 1860. 4,076 50

1$79 13,849 93

A comparison of the years 1878 and 1879 show an increase of twenty-five per cent. in the business of the office during the latter year.

Money Order Business. - There were orders issued during the last year amounting to .... $110,657 56 Upon which fees were received amounting lo 1,129 44

Drafts were drawn upon New York for. 94.000 00

And orders paid amounting to. 205,892 96

There are employed at the office six clerks, at a cost of 85,000 per annum, and eight carriers, at an expense of 87,000. The postmaster's salary and expenses incidental to running the office, aside from clerk hire, amount to 85,940 per annum.

Registry Business, fourth quarter, 1879. - Letters and packages registered during the quarter. 700

Letters and packages received during the quarter. 1.440

Letters and packages in transit during the quarter 3.116

Letter Carriers. - Carriers employed 8

Local postal cards delivered 9.746

Delivery trips daily. 12 & 3

Newspapers, etc., delivered. 112,033

Collection trips daily . 12 & 3

Letters returned to the office. 65

Registered letters delivered.

1,015

Letters collected 124.104

Mail letters delivered

179.697

Postal cards collected 32.703

Mail postal cards delivered 59.484

Drop letters delivered. 11.108

Newspapers, etc., collected. 25,956

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HISTORY OF PEORIA COUNTY.

Mailing Department. - There are 218 packages of letter mail sent out from the Peoria office daily to as many lines of railway post-offices, cities and towns in the United States, many of these being sent out in through pouches by night express trains to distant places, and thus despatched with a rapidity and accuracy which is astonishing, and oftentimes mail is delivered before an ordinary traveler could reach the same points. The total number of pieces of mail sent out daily, by a careful count, is shown to be as follows : Letters, 3,667 ; circulars, 1,635; newspapers, 3,347; postal cards, 785; merchandise, 2,452 ; making a total of 11,886, or 4,338,390 pieces per annum.

There is sent out daily from this office fifty pouches and canvas sacks, while a like number is received. There are also a great quantity passing through in transit, of which no account is taken.

Under a complete system of checking errors, it is shown that of this enormous quan- tity of matter despatched from the Peoria office, there were but 110 errors made in dis- tribution, fourteen packages miss-sent, and not a single error in the sending of pouches the year 1879.

INTERNAL REVENUE.

The fifth district of Illinois, of which Peoria city is the center and substance, exceeds any revenue district in the United States, in the amount of revenue tax it pays to the government. This tax is derived almost entirely from the distillation of spirits manufac- tured by the eleven distilleries located in Peoria, which have a total productive capacity of 77,660 gallons of proof spirits per day.

The importance of Peoria as a spirit-producing center can not be more forcibly stated than by giving an exhibit of the figures kindly furnished by Collector Howard Knowles for this work, from the books of his office.

There were used during the year 1878, 3,001,308 bushels of grain, from which was produced 11,520,360.07 gallons of proof spirits. The following is a complete tabulated statement for the year 1879, which shows an increase of some thirty per cent. over any previous year, and conveys an idea of the immensity of the business in this district :

DISTILLERS.

Bush. used.

Proof Gall's Produ'd.

Av. per Bush.

C. S. Clark & Co

316,910

1, 196,923.83

3.81

Spurck & Francis.

418,265

1,605,410.44

3.84

G. T. Barker

493,585

1,981,399.17

4.01

Zell, Schwabacher & Co

763,140

3,017,678.83

3.93

Bush & Brown

187,914

721,734.99

3.84

Barton & Babcock

36,485

128,724.48

3.50

Woolner Bros

307,349

1,156,951.24

3.76

A. & S. Woolner.

450,426

1,724,061.06

3.83

Kidd, Francis & Co.

484,940

1,811,206.70

3.73

Kilduff & Hogue.

401,496

1,619,877.24

4.03

J. Woolner & Co

23,408

88,992.17

3.80

Total bushels grain used, 3,883,918.

Total gallons spirits produced, 15,052,960.15

Average yield per bushel for the entire district during the year, 3.88.

Total gallons spirits withdrawn from warehouse and tax paid. 9,527,536.

Total gallons spirits withdrawn for exportation

5,399,196.96

Total 14,926,732.96

The total collections for 1879, were $8,624,053. The production of spirits in Peoria during the year exceeded that of Chicago nearly five millions of gallons, and that of Cincinnati nearly four millions of gallons.

The prospect promises considerable increase of the business this present year - 1880. The " Monarch " distillery of Messrs. Kidd, Francis & Co., which was completed and went into operation on the 10th of July, 1879, and is the largest distillery in the world, increases the spirit-producing capacity some thirty-three per cent.

536

HISTORY OF PEORIA COUNTY.

The collections in this district for the last four months of 1879, averaged $1,077,000 per month, the largest amount of internal revenue tax ever collected in any district in this country within the same time.

BANKING INTERESTS.

It is somewhat remarkable that there were no banking facilities in Peoria until 1851, although it had been an incorporated town twenty years, had a population of nearly 6.000 souls, and must have done a considerable commercial business, from the fact that 1,236 vessels landed at her wharf during the year 1851. Still it is not so surprising that Peoria laeked the advantages of this modern business necessity, when the prejudice of the people, and especially the Democratic portion of them, against banks, is considered. The Democratic politicians repudiated all kinds of banks in their public speeches. And while the Whigs advocated a national bank, they only tacitly assented to the establish- ment or existence of State or individual banks.

Prior to 1850, there were but two banks of any considerable magnitude in the State, one at Shawneetown, called the State Bank of Illinois, and one at Springfield, named the Bank of the State of Illinois. Each of these was allowed by the Legislature to es- tablish sundry branches, but none was located at Peoria.

In 1850, nearly all the banks in the West having failed, including those in Illinois, the eireulating medium was very searee, being confined to a little specie and some New York and New England bank-notes. Chicago then had no regular banks of issue, but several brokers; and Peoria had not even these.

Nathaniel B. Curtiss came from Chicago to Peoria in 1851, and opened an office on the upper corner of Main and Washington Streets, which he dignified with the title of the Banking House of N. B. Curtiss & Co. Mr. Curtiss' establishment did a large busi- ness, and is reputed to have introduced into extensive circulation the notes of a Milwau- kee banking institution, known as the Marine Fire Insurance Company, and the paper of the Cherokee Bank, purported to be located in Georgia, and smaller amounts of paper from other concerns. None of these notes would now be considered worth par in gold. but in the absence of any thing better, the people and the banks were glad to receive them as good money. Mr. Curtiss made money so rapidly for a time that he became careless, and trusted out large amounts ; and finally becoming alarmed, suspended busi- ness in 1857.

In 1852, Messrs. William R. Phelps and Benjamin L. T. Bourland, of Peoria, and Gideon II. Rupert and James Haines, of Pekin, opened an office on the opposite corner of Main and Washington Streets, under the name of the Central Bank, which they con- dueted one year, and sold it to Gov. Joel Matteson and his son-in-law, R. E. Goodell. After three years' management of the establishment they failed.

Joseph P. Hotchkiss established an office of the same kind in the Fall of 1852, naming it the Bank of J. P. Hotchkiss & Co., and prosecuted the business until his death, in 1856. He provided in his will that Lewis Howell, his enshier, who had had principal charge of the establishment for some years, owing to the failing health of the proprietor -to continue the busines on a salary under the same name, for the benefit of the Hotel- kiss heirs. This was done for about four years, when Mr. Howell and others bought the establishment and ran the business under the firm name of L. Howell & Co., till 1864, when, under the law of Congress, it was organized into the Second National Bank of Peoria. Mr. Howell was elected its president, a position he still holds. Mr. J. B. Smith was cashier from 1860 till 1866. J. B. Hotchkiss succeeded him in that position until 1870. B. F. Blossom served as cashier from July, 1876 to 1878. George H. Mellvaine was elected its vice-president in 1873, and became cashier and netive manager, January, 1878, which position he now hohls.

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The History of Peoria County, Illinois. Containing a history of the Northwest-history of Illinois-history of the county, its early settlement, growth, development, resources, etc., etc., Part 86

Author: Johnson & co., Chicago, pub Publication date: 1880 Publisher: Chicago : Johnson & Company Number of Pages: 932

Author: Johnson & co., Chicago, pub
Publication date: 1880
Publisher: Chicago : Johnson & Company
Number of Pages: 932