USA > Illinois > Ogle County > The history of Ogle County, Illinois, containing a history of the county, its cities, towns, etc., a biographical directory of its citizens, war record of its volunteers in the late rebellion, general and local statistics history of the Northwest, history of Illinois etc > Part 21
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Under a strong mieroscope the grains of the white variety appear limpid and semi-translucent : those of the darker varieties appear as if coated over by rust. All the grains are round, similarly formed and simi-
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lar in size. The grains are quite small, and the mass is remarkably pure and homogeneous in character. These incoherent, chrystalline grains of transparent quartz owe their darker colors, where colored, to a solution of the coloring matter held in chemical combination ; but in most cases the color is caused by a formation over the surface of the silieions grains of sand.
Distinct stratification exists in most of the outerops, and even lines of cross stratification are not rare. Whitney failed to notice wave-marks in the Wisconsin onterops ; but there can be no mistake as to the wave and ripple-marks on the ferruginous layers of the Rock River outcrops. Some of the large masses present abrupt and strong dips ; but these are owing to local canses. No trace of organic life, either plant or animal, has yet been observed in these sandstones. The area of their deposition seems to have been a peculiar one. Great changes must have taken place as it was ushered in and as it went out.
A high axis of elevation runs along this heavy deposit. In either direction from the river it. dips away rapidly, and the overlying deposits come on in quick succession. Rock River runs along this anticlinal axis, having ent down almost or entirely through the formation.
The heaviest outcrop of the deposit now under consideration, in the whole area over which it is known, is the one along Rock River in Ogle County. The formation is thin and wide-extended, embracing a superficial extent in the Northwest alone, of more than four hundred miles in length by over one hundred in width. At Starved Rock, on the Illinois River, it is . about one hundred and fifty feet thick. In Calhoun County it outerops, in the Cap au-Gress Bluff's, to a thickness of about eighty feet. In Wisconsin and Minnesota its heaviest outcrops do not much exceed one hundred feet in thickness. In Ogle County, however, we think it reaches fully two hun- dred feet, and at the artesian well, in Stephenson County, it is, perhaps, considerably thieker. It is the identical same rock known in the Mis- souri Reports as the Saccharoidal sandstone, so extensively used in the man- ufacture of glass at Pittsburgh. As observed in Missouri, however, it is oftener of a light buff or brown color, and has less of the white, pure silicious sand in its composition than the same rock has in Illinois and fur- ther north.
Geologists seem to be greatly in the dark as to the origin of this curious, interesting formation.
THE LOWER MAGNESIAN LIMESTONE.
The Lower Magnesian limestone, or Calciferous sandstone of the New York gcologists, or its western equivalent, comes, we think, to the surface at several places in the bed of Rock River, between Oregon and Grand de Tour. The floor of the river in many places along these high sandstone bluffs, we are quite sure, is a harder, solider and altogether different rock. When doing field work in that part of the ground gone over by us, we had poor facilities for examining the river bed ; but at one locality on the north bank of the stream, five or six miles below Oregon, and just at the edge of rather low water, we found a stratum of stone, apparently in situ, which we believe to have been the top of this formation. We confess, however, that onr judgment as to the existence of the Lower Magnesian limestone along the river bed in this county is formed, at least partly, from analogy. appear- ances and the natural belief that the bottom of the St. Peter's sandstone is here reached. A proper examination of the river bed, or some shallow
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borings along its shores, would satisfactorily test the matter, and settle any existing doubt.
ECONOMICAL AND AGRICULTURAL GEOLOGY.
Most of our remarks upon the economical and agricultural geology of counties north of this one, would apply with equal correctness to Ogle. In physical features, geologieal formations and agricultural capabilities, they have much in common. There are some points of difference, however.
Stone for Economical Uses .- All the limestones form a good build- ing stone. The seminary buildings at Mt. Morris, and the new public school at Polo, are fine examples of the building materials furnished by the Blue limestone quarries. The rock is not only strong, easily worked, con- venient to obtain, but when properly laid up of blue, or mingled buff and blue colors, the architectural effeet is beautiful. The thin-bedded top layers furnish a good stone for the lighter industrial uses. The heavy-bedded, dull-colored buff is more used for the heavier kinds of masonry. The Galena, in this county is a rough, thiek-bedded stone, used in cellar walls, bridge foundations and the common stone work necessary on the farms abont its outerops. In a few places the St. Peter's sandstone has crystalline layers of sufficient tenacity to cut into window and door eaps, build into eellar walls and dwelling houses; and in one instance, at least, is used for the culverts in a small railroad bridge. It is easily hewn into shape, and · seasons into greater hardness and tenacity.
Certain layers of the Blue limestone also burn an excellent common lime. The kilns above Dixon, in Lee County, turn ont an abundance of as good lime for ordinary building purposes as need be desired. The sub- erystalline layers of the Galena are well adapted for lime production, and are inchi used for that purpose. On Pine Creck, timber is abundant; stone from both these divisions is easily obtained, and of good quality; and lime can be made in any desired quantity.
It is generally believed that some layers of the Buff might be burned into a good hydraulic lime, but this is not known by the test of experiment.
Peut .- On the Killbuck Creek, on section 30, in the Township of Monroe, there is a long, narrow, irregularly-shaped peat bed containing about fifty aeres. In the deepest parts the deposit is perhaps twelve feet thiek. The peat is the result of the decay of the usnal grasses, sedges and mosses, but is rather grass peat than moss peat. Compared with the Cat- tail beds of Whiteside County, it is more porous, fibrous and unripe. It is available already as a fertilizer, and like the rest of our small prairie, un- ripe beds, will some day be used largely for that purpose. Its value as a fuel depends upon the snecess of the peat experiments now being tried in many places.
Clays and Sands .- Banks of common yellow sand, suitable for mortar making and plastering, may be found almost any where in the banks and sand-bars of Rock River. The sub-soil clays under the thin oak soils. and in faet most of the sandy sub-soil, may be molded into a good article of common red briek.
According to all our western geologists, the white rocks of the St. Peter's sandstone furnish the very best material for the manufacture of glassware. The Pittsburgh glass manufactories obtain tons of their sand from the saccharoidal deposits of Missouri, a rock identical with our St. Peter's sandstone. Our sandstone, however, is white, pure, limpid and
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free from foreign matter ; theirs consist more of the yellow and brown- stained varieties. The sugary, white sandstone of the Upper Mississippi is a pure silica. If the statements of the learned Dr. Owen are true, only about two tenths of one per cent of extraneous matter, as shown by chem- ical analysis, enters into the composition of the snow-white sands of this formation.
Thousands of tons of the sand could be cheaply transported down the river to the Rock Island coal fields ; or, when the contemplated railroad up the Rock River Valley is completed, for the purpose of connecting the lum- ber regions of the north with the coal fields of Illinois, the coal could be easily run up from Rock Island to the Oregon or Grand de Tour sand cliff's, and glassware for the whole Northwest be cheaply and successfully manu- factured. These facilities for moving the coal and sand together will exist at no distant day. It will then remain for capital to invest in this remunerative branch of manufacturing industry.
Soils and their products .- The dark-colored loams are underlaid by a light-colored, clavey or gravelly sub-soil. The loam is largely composed of vegetable elements. If not made up of it, it is at least greatly enriched by the successive growth and decay, for ages. of our common prairie grasses. This is the soil of our prairies. The timber soils are the usual clayey deposits of the oak ridges, underlaid by a close, compaet, yellow sub-soil. Hungry, sandy soils are seldom met with. Leachy, loamy, fat soils, well adapted for the best farming lands, cover most of the county. The soils in this portion of the state are composed of silica, or the earth of flints ; alumina, or fine, impa'pable clays ; carbonate of lime, or calcareous materials, making marly soils ; and various other materials, such as the oxide of iron, organic matter, and the like. The first two are the basis of all our soils. The last gives them fertility. No soil is composed of a single one of these élements ; but the mixture or chemical combination of all these, and some times many other elements, exist in the same soil, making clay soils, clay loams, loamy soils, sandy soils, vegetable molds, marly clays or sands, and many other kinds of soils, well known to agricultural chemistry.
We think the general proposition is true, that where large tracts of country are underlaid by the same or closely related geological formations, the soils will have some resemblance to those formations. They are undoubtedly, in part, derived from them ; and in many cases, in this part of the state, as we have already intimated, the soils and sub-soils seem to show their origin from these subjacent rocks. But this remark must be received with considerable allowance. The transporting, sorting and sifting agency of water, the ice action of glaciers and icebergs, and the evidences that other geological forces have been at work all over this region, leads us to greatly modify the statement just made, and to believe that our soils are, in part at least, derived from many sources-some of them remote from their present localities. The same is true, we think, of the sub-soils and finer materials of the drift. These, originally, perhaps, were all alike; but chemical and atmospheric agencies, and the growth of vegetation, changed the surface clays into rich, fat soils ; the sub-soils received less of these influences but still felt them, and were further changed by the percolating, saturating surface waters ; but the deep lying clay and sand beds received no change from these agencies. Even the acids of the air could not pene- trate to them, and they remain unchanged.
Ogle County shows more evidences of a transported soil than Western Stephenson or Carroll County.
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Geology, engaged in investigating these phenomena, is thus the hand- maiden of agriculture, and ought to be encouraged and studied by the farmer. He should not be slow to learn that all branches of human knowl- edge are bound together like the links of a chain ; all the arts of life sus- tain to eaeli other dependent relations, and all cultivators of soil or seience ought to be bound together by the bonds of a common interest.
But, however derived or made up, the soils of this county are generous and fertile in a high degree. Indian corn, wheat, oats, hay, potatoes. barley, rye, the produets of the kitchen garden, the hardier fruits of garden and orchard, are here raised in bountiful profusion. Vine culture has not yet attracted much attention, not for the want of suitable localities in which to try the experiment, but simply because attention lias not yet been directed to this branch of horticultural industry.
In speaking of these noble soils-the Edens of agriculture in these Western States-we may as well make some remarks here, which apply with equal force to the agricultural policy of this and all the neighboring coun- ties, and to the practice of prairie farming generally. We mean the unsci- entifie, slovenly and wasteful modes of' cultivating the virgin soils of our broad prairies. The unripe peat and muck remain undisturbed in their beds ; trenching and sub-soil plowing are never resorted to ; annual fires consume the surplus stubble and stalks left from the last year's crop; ashes, bones, lime, the barn-yard and stable manures, if disturbed at all, are raked into some convenient, out of the way place ; and the farmer generally cul- tivates so much that he ean not half eultivate anything at all.
Geology and chemistry, and the experience of older countries, all cry out against this wrong done to our generous soils. In the first place, the farmer ought to study his soil, ascertain what element is wanting, or what it has in excess, and intelligently supply the one or counteract the other. Instead of scratching over a large amount of soil, if he would go deeper, and throw up a little sub-soil, the kiss of the roving winds, the rain and the sunshine would enrich these, and his soil would grow deeper instead of becoming hungry and exhausted. Composts should yearly be made of every available substance, and scattered with a profuse hand over his meadows and grain-producing fields. Perhaps some water-soaked bog, and some unproductive ridge, lying side by side, and both worthless, have in them the complements of the best producing soils, and only need a little mingling to make them the most valuable traets in the field or on the farm. A little mind employed in cultivating the earth is better than much manual labor, aided though it be with all forms of labor-saving machinery.
Against this wasteful system of farming, every industrial interest should ery out. Our soils, when new, used to return average crops of forty bushels to the aere; now fifteen is a good erop on the older cultivated lands. In the corn field, seventy, eighty and one hundred bushels to the acre was not an unusual yield ; now thirty-five or forty is oftener the excep- tion than the rule. At this rate, our land will rapidly become exhausted. Good husbandry, good farming, if not able to keep the soil up to its prim- itive fertility, ought, at least, to prevent its rapid deterioration.
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HISTORY OF OGLE COUNTY.
INTRODUCTORY.
The History of Ogle County is so intimately connected with the history of the northwestern part of the state, that a correct history of the former can not be written without reference to the early settlement of the latter, and indeed it would be a waste of time to attempt to write a history of either, without going back to the date of the first settlement of the territory now embraced within the limits of the State of Illinois, by Americans. in 1784. In entering upon this task it will be our purpose to draw upon such historical authorities as have received the sanction of accuracy and impar- tiality. In matters pertaining to the local history, we will refer to such of the pioneers of the county as have survived the storms and vicissitudes of life, and whose participation in the public affairs of the Rock River Valley renders their lives a part of its history.
A little more than half a century has passed since white men began to enter upon and occupy the northwestern part of Illinois on Fever (now Galena) River, at the galena mines, and forty-seven years liave been buried beneath the debris of time since the first voting precinct was established (under authority of the County Commissioners of Jo Daviess County) within the limits of Ogle County. It is a little more than that since Ogle, Chambers, Dixon, Ankeny and Kellogg came here to found homes, and, as a natural consequence, a great many early incidents of local importance at the time of their happening, are entirely lost to the memory of the oldest surviving settlers; or, if not entirely lost, have become so confused with the multiplicity of accumulating cares, that, to extricate an accurate account of them from time's rubbish and preserve them in printed pages so they will be seen now as they were scen then, will require the most critical exercise of mind and pen.
When the thirteen American colonies declared their independence of British rule, July 4, 1776, the magnificent valley of the Mississippi and its tributaries was under the jurisdiction of European powers. France had ceded to Great Britain that portion of the Province of Louisiana lying at the east side of the "Father of Waters." The first British governor, Cap- tain Sterling, took formal possession of Illinois and raised the English flag at Fort Chartres, ten years after the treaty of cession in October, 1765, and in 1766 by an act of Parliament known as the Quebec bill, the Illinois country was annexed to Canada, and remained under Canadian jurisdiction until 1778, a period of fourteen years.
In 1778, Col. George Rogers Clarke, a native of Virginia, who had wou military fame in conflicts with the Indians of Kentucky, Ohio and elsewhere, conceived the idea of an expedition to capture the British posts in the Illinois country. Patrick Henry, then Governor of Virginia, favored the enterprise, and aided by the advice of Thomas Jefferson, George Mason
0
Peter Smith ROCHELLE
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HISTORY OF OGLE COUNTY.
and George Wythie, directed the expedition. Col. Clarke raised four com- panies of Virginians, and through his wonderful skill and heroism the expedition was completely successful. The Virginia Legislature voted the thanks of the people to Col. Clarke, his officers and men, for their brilliant achievements, and in October, 1778, by act of the House of Burgesses, established the County of Illinois, embracing all the territory northwest of the Ohio River, and making Col. John Todd, Jr., its civil commandant. "Thus," says Mr. Miller, " Patrick Henry became the first American Gov- ernor of Illinois." The proclamation to its inhabitants is dated June 15, 1779.
At the close of the Revolutionary War, Great Britain formally ceded to the United States all her territory east of the Mississippi River, and in 1784 Virginia ceded to the Federal Government all the territory northwest of the Ohio River, her claim to the Illinois country being through a grant from James I. of England, and by virtue of conquest in 1778.
Notwithstanding the ordinance providing for the erection of the North- western Territory was passed in 1787, its provisions were not acted upon until 1788, when General Arthur St. Clair was made its governor. The capital of the territory was first established at Marietta, afterwards removed to Chillicothe, and in 1795 again removed to Cincinnati, and subsequently to Vincennes. From 1784 until 1790, when Gov. St. Clair organized the first county in Illinois (St. Clair), there was no executive, no legislature and no judicial authority exercised in the country. The people were a law unto themselves, and during these six years it is said that remarkable good feel- ing, harmony and fidelity to agreements prevailed. Previous to the division of the Northwest Territory, in 1809, there had been but one term of court having criminal jurisdiction in the three western counties of the territory, namely, Knox County (Indiana), and St. Clair and Randolph Counties (Illinois), the last named being organized by Governor St. Clair in 1795.
The Territory of Illinois was established in 1809, and Hon. Ninian Edwards, then Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of the State of Ken- tucky, was appointed governor, and Nathaniel Pope, Esq., of Kaskaskia, secretary of the treasury. Kaskaskia was established as the territorial capital. This had been a part of Indiana Territory from 1800, during which time the government was of two grades; first, the lawmaking power, consisting of the governor and judges; second, the territorial legislature, consisting of a house of representatives elected by the people, and a council appointed by the president and senate. Up to 1812 the Territorial Government of Illinois was of the first grade.
From 1795 to 1812, there were only two counties in the territory- St. Clair and Randolph. In 1812, Madison, Gallatin and Johnson Counties were erected, increasing the number to five.
February 14, 1812, Governor Edwards issued an order directing an election to be held in each county, on the second Monday in April, to enable the people to determine whether they would enter upon the second grade of government. The governor was clothed with full power to advance the territory to the second degree, but he chose to be guided by the popular will. The election was held, and the question was decided in the affirmative by a very large majority.
In September of the same year, Governor Edwards ordered an election to be held on the 8th, 9th and 10th days of October, to choose members of the council and house of representatives. This was the first election for
14
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members of the territorial legislature, and on the 25th of November, 1812, the first legislature assembled at Kaskaskia. The following named gentle- men were returned as members of the council: Benjamin Talcott, of Gal- latin County; William Biggs, of St. Clair County; Samuel Judah, of Madison County, and Pierre Menard, of Randolph County. George Fisher, of Randolph County; Philip Trommel and Alexander Wilson, of Gallatin County; John Grammer, of Johnson County; Joshua Oglesby and Jacob Short, of St. Clair County, and William Jones, of Madison County, were elected as members of the house.
It may not be out of place here -inasmuch as we are briefly tracing the history of Illinois, as a Territory and as a State-to go back one year and note an important event in the history of the country-a series of earthquakes that commenced on the night of the 16th of December, 1816, and which, according to Dr. Hildreth, continued until the following February. During the continuance of these earth-shocks, the town of New Madrid, on the Missouri side of the Mississippi River, was almost entirely destroyed. Lands were sunken for many miles around New Madrid, and down into Northeastern Arkansas. The writer has been told by reliable authority, that in the northeastern corner of Arkansas there is a tract of country known as the "sunken lands," that is an impassible bog or quagmire-that, in the centre there is a kind of island, that can be seen from the outer edges, but which has never been reached since the earthquake that occasioned it, but that as late as 1871-'2 there were evidences of animal life on the island, in the presence of deer, ete., that were supposed to have come from a parent stoek left on the island when the earthquake subsided. This assertion is not vouched for as a fact, but is given from what is believed to be relia- ble authority-the statement of a resident of Arkansas, whose acquaintance the writer enjoyed while living in that state, after the close of the war. But to return to Dr. Hildreth's statement: "The banks of the Mississippi in many places gave way in large masses and fell in the river, while the water changed to a reddish hue, became thick with mud thrown up from the bot- tom, and the surface, lashed violently by the agitation of the earth beneath, was covered with foam, which gathered into masses and floated along the trembling surface. Its vibrations were felt all over the valley, as far up as Pittsburgh."
Returning again to the territorial legislature, we find that from Jan- uary 11, 1811, to November 8, 1814, the revenue received from taxes was $4,875.45, of which there had been paid into the treasury, $2,516.89; remaining in the hands of delinquent sheriff, $2,374.47. As a matter of comparison for the curious, the following figures, taken from the last ae- cessible report of the State Auditor, are presented:
State tax receipts, 1874 $1.561,732 04 State tax receipts, 1875 1,759,916 03
-$2,321,648 07
Increase in state taxes since the state was organized-sixty-four years -$3,316,772.63.
As another item of comparison: the journals of the first State Legisla- ture show that a committee appointed for the purpose purchased a suffi- cient supply of stationery for the use of that body for $13.50. The amount paid for stationery for the use of the 29th session of the General Assembly was $1,650.
On the 18th day of April, 1818, the Congress of the United States
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passed an act, entitled " An act to enable the people of the Illinois Terri- tory to form a constitution and state government, and for the admission of such state into the Union, on an equal footing with the original states." Im- mediately following the passage, approval and publication of this act, an order was issued for an election to choose members to the constitutional con- vention. The constitutional convention assembled at Kaskaskia, in July of the same year, and on the 26th day of August following, signed and sub- mitted the constitution under which Illinois become a sovereign and inde- pendent state.
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