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HISTORICAL REVIEW
OF
CHICAGO AND COOK
COUNTY
AND SELECTED BIOGRAPHY
A. N. WATERMAN, A. B., LL. D.
EDITOR AND AUTHOR OF HISTORICAL REVIKW
VOLUME I
ILLUSTRATED
THE LEWIS PUBLISHING COMPANY
CHICAGO NEW YORK
1 908
• TEE ^'
PUBLIC
2fl6294B
ASTOa, LEM'.JX aKB
â– SihOm FOUNDATIONS
PREFACE
The three vohimes which arc herewith presented to the pubhc
under the title of "Historical Review of Chicago and Cook County,
and Selected Biography," represent the results of the labors which
have been bestowed upon this undertaking since the plan was orig-
inallv announced.
In addition to the "Historical Review," the prospectus announced
the publication of a collection of individual biographies of citizens
whose attainments and positions give them a distinction that is
acknowledged without question.
The reader will find that this original plan has been broadened
with the progress of the work. Special articles are published on the
Chicago of today, and the scope of the entire work has been so
enlarged that the volumes might afford a commentary on the history
of this community that can be found in no other publication.
The high character of form and content, maintained throughout
the work, is in accordance with the original plan and is befitting the
general subject here treated. The mechanical features of the publi-
cation leave nothing to be desired. The volumes are bound in durable
covers of rich material, the engraving and typographical work are
high class, and the quality of excellence has been emphasized in every
phase of preparation.
The Publishers.
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
H Consideration of the Influences Chat f)a\>e Made
Chicago^ and the promise as to Its future
BY A. N. WATERMAN
So far as is known, Jean Nicollet, a native of Cherbourg, France,
was the first white man who sailed or looked upon the waters of Lake
Michigan. Nicollet had been some twenty years
Nicollet. in Canada, during the greater portion of which
he had lived with the Indians and become thor-
oughly habituated to their mode of life. Rumors of a strange peo-
ple without hair or beard who came from the West to trade at a
large village located upon the banks of Fox river in Wisconsin, had
reached the French authorities in Canada, and thither, in 1634, Nicol-
let, who had for a time been an interpreter at Three Rivers, was sent
as an ambassador with instructions to learn the character of the
people "without hair or beard who came from the West," and the
route by which they had voyaged to the large village upon the banks
of the Fox. The Canadian authorities thought the beardless traders
to be Chinese or Japanese, and Nicollet carried with him a ceremo-
nial robe of damask silk embroidered with birds and flowers. Leav-
ing Three Rivers, Canada, in July, 1634. that or the succeeding year
he passed across the northern waters of Lake Michigan and down
Green Bay to the mouth of Fox river, which he ascended to the
portage between it and the Wisconsin, from whence he may have gone
down to the Mississippi. He seems to have visited the Pottawato-
mies and the Illinois Indians, and to have made a treaty with the
Winnehagoes.
Vol. I— 1.
2 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
The Jesuits, whose zeal and courage as missionaries have never
been exceeded, in 1660 founded a mission at Keeweenaw Bay on Lake
Superior, but Chicago is not known to have been reached by any of
the indefatigable order or any white man until the coming of Mar-
quette in 1674. The fur traders of Montreal were equally energetic,
but far less scrupulous and actuated by different motives in their ex-
plorations and dealings with the Indians. Many agents of the trad-
ers adopted the life and habits of the Indians — lived with them in
their wigwams, journied, fished, hunted and intermarried with them.
Known as "Coureurs des bois", they were in most instances the first
white men who looked upon the lakes, rivers, plains and forests of
this great region. They found here a situation such as will never
again be presented to the gaze of man — a most fertile domain equal-
ing in extent half of Europe, without cultivation and unoccupied save
by a few thousand savages. That before the coming of Marquette,
some of these traders and adventurers, for whom the unexplored and
the unknown had the attraction which in all ages it has possessed,
may have wandered to, reposed or laid down to die upon virgin soil
now occupied by the city of Chicago, is not only possible, but prob-
able.
No complete history of any man or any region has been or will
be written. The mystery of the past, the uncertainty of the future,
and the incomprehensibility of the present are ever with us.
The written history of Chicago begins with the record kept by
Father Marquette, who, with Louis Joliet, starting from Montreal
and following the course of the Great Lakes, in the
Marquette, spring of 1673, arrived at the head of Green Bay,
Wisconsin. Thence up Fox river and from it by a
short portage to the Wisconsin, they sailed down the last-named to
the Mississippi, which they reached June 17, 1673. Turning south-
ward they voyaged upon the great river for more than a week, when,
perceiving on the west bank an Indian trail, they disembarked and
followed it until they came in sight of three villages. The Indians
treated them kindly and gave them a feast of four courses. The next
day six hundred of the natives accompanied them back to the Mis-
sissippi. Continuing their voyage down the "Father of Waters,"
passing the Illinois, the Missouri and the Ohio, they reached the Ar-
kansaw, where they were again entertained and warned by the In-
CHICAGO AXl) COOK COUXIA' 3
dians aj^ainst going farther down the river. Upon the 17th dav ui
July they began the tedious task of return, n^wing all day against
the swift current, and sleeping at night upon the low and unwhole-
some shore or in their canoes anchored upon the river. Reaching the
Illinois they entered its mouth — Marquette rightly conjecturing that
its ascent could be more easily made and thus the lake of the Illinois
(Michigan) more quickly reached. Near the present site of the city
of Utica they came to an Indian village then called Kaskaskla, con-
sisting of seventy-four lodges, whence they were escorted by a band
of young Indians to Lake Michigan and, pYoceeding northward, at
the end of September arrived at Green Bay.
October 2^, 1674, Marquette with two Frenchmen, Pierre and
Jacques, left the mission at Green Bay, intending to go again, as he
had promised, to the village of the Kaskaskias. Sailing southward
along the west shore of Lake Michigan, about the first of December,
they arrived at the Chicago river. Here they seem to have remained
until about December 12th. The good father, in the journal he kept,
says: "During our stay at the mouth of the river, Pierre and
Jacques killed three buffaloes and four deer. * * ♦ They con-
tented themselves with killing three or four turkeys out of many
which came around our cabin." At this time they seem to have been
"cabined" about five miles up the river and near where the street now
known as Ashland avenue crosses the west fork of the Chicago river.
Of this he says: "Being cabined near the portage five miles up the
river, we resolved to winter there, * * * being too much encum-
bered and my disability not allowing me to fatigue myself too much."
At this lime there seem to have been two Frenchmen, LaToupine and
another who styled himself a" surgeon, forty-five miles from where
IMarquette and his companions had built their cabin. These French-
men sent to the voyagers corn and buffalo meat, and in every way en-
deavored to be helpful to the black-robed priest. Marquette says:
"One may say they have done and said all that could be expected
of them: the surgeon having stayed here to perform his devotions."
It is evident the "staying" by the surgeon "to perform his devotions,"
gave Marquette greater joy than the food which the Frenchmen be-
stowed. March 23rd Marquette writes: "The Holy Virgin Im-
maculate has taken such care of us during our hibernation that we
have not been in want of provisions, having still a great bag of grain
4 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
left, some meat and some grease (lard and tallow mixed), we have
also lived very easily, my illness not having prevented me from say-
ing the Holy Mass every day; we have not kept Lent except Fridays
and Saturdays."
The foregoing appears to us to be in accordance with the prepon-
derance of the evidence. There are those who contend that Father
Marquette at no time went up the Chicago river and never made the
portage from it to the DesPlaines and thence reached the Illinois ; that
upon his return from his voyage down the Mississippi he visited a
large Indian village near Utica and was by the Illinois Indians guided
to the south end of Lake Michigan; that the succeeding year he en-
tered the Calumet river and ascended it for a distance of some five
miles. However this may be, the first written report we have of the
condition of any portion of the territory now occupied by the city of
Chicago is by the pen of Father Marquette.
At the time he visited these shores and for more than a century
afterwards, the Chicago river near to a place now known as the
southern end of Pine street, turned from its easterly course and ran
southward to the present line of Madison street, whence it proceeded
to Lake Michigan. North of the Chicago river, the land in the vi-
cinity of the lake was then to a considerable extent covered with tim-
ber, while to the west of the river there was a good deal of marsh.
For nearly a hundred years after the visit of Marquette and the voy-
ages to this region of Joliet, LaSalle, Tonti and other distinguished
Frenchmen, the country around Lake Michigan, as well as the terri-
tory stretching westward to the Pacific, was as unsettled and its few
inhabitants as uncivilized as when Marquette first looked upon these
shores. Many things contributed to this : First, there was here no
demand for lands to till, no push of settlers eager for homes. Most
important, perhaps, was the discovery that the Mississippi, instead of
turning to the west and emptying into the Gulf of California, contin-
ued its southern course and found an outlet in the Gulf of Mexico,
thus affording a water communication with Europe, uninterrupted
by the ice of a Canadian winter. This known, the Montreal traders
had either of two routes to the Father of Waters — the first discov-
ered, by way of Green Bay, the Fox and Wisconsin rivers to the
Mississippi; the second, a portage from Lake Erie to the Wabash,
down it to the Ohio and thence to the mighty, mysterious stream.
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 5
that, coming from tlie unknown northwest, seemed by the finger of
God designed to hold together the Canadian forests, the fertile west-
ern prairies and the warm lands of the south, for the use of the sub-
jects of His Christian Majesty, the King of France.
Regret is sometimes expressed that the Indian names of places
have not been retained. In great part they have. Beginning with
Ohio, nearly all of the northwestern states have Indian names. The
principal rivers retain the names given to them by the natives. The
French called the most easterly of the great lakes Frontenac, after
the great governor of Canada; all — save Superior — of the five great
inland bodies of water, have Indian names. The Indians knew noth-
ing of writing or spelling ; they had no rules for pronunciation. The
French gradually adopted some one of the various pronunciations
they heard and when they had occasion to write it out, used such let-
ters as represented to them the sound of the name given. Th.e vari-
ous writers may have heard different pronunciations and may not
alike have understood the spoken word. The most we know of the
Indian names as spoken by them, two and three hundred years ago,
is that our present pronunciation, probably, is a near approach to the
name by which many of the red men knew and called the rivers,
lakes and lands upon which they sailed and over which they wan-
dered before the coming of the pale face.
Chicago, in the old French maps, is most frequently spelled "Che-
cagou." The DesPlaines river is sometimes called the Chicago. In
Gontan's map of 1703, the name is spelled "Chegakou." Upon a map
of the discoveries of LaSalle, near the southwest shore of "Lac des
Ilinois" is "Cheagoumenan." Colonel DePeyster, a British officer,
in 1779. writing of the place, spells the name "Eschkagou." Lake
Michigan is frequently put down as ''Lac des Illinois," sometimes
with the addition "ou Missihigamin." On a map attached to a his-
tory of Canada, this lake is marked "Magnus Lacus Algonquinorum
sen Lacus Foetetium." Upon a map made in 1688 Lake IMichigan
is marked "Lac des Illinois ou Michiganin ou Lac Dauphin."
On a map made in 1688 by Raffeix, Ontario is called "Lac On-
tario ou De St. Louis," and beside it is "Lac Erie-Du Chat" ; on an-
other map Ontario is called "Lac Ontario ou des Iroquois." The
Indians seemed to have called the lake "Ontario" or "Skanidario"
(Beautiful Lake). Lake Erie is upon one map called "Lac Erie ou
6 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
de Conti." Ottawas was sometimes written "Outaouacs." Joliet,
when, in company with Marquette, he first saw the Mississippi,
called it Buade, in honor of the family name of Governor Frontenac.
Descending this to the Ohio, he found this known by the Indians as
the Ouabouskigou ; the Arkansas he named Bazire after a merchant
of Quebec and the Illinois, the Outrelaise, in compliment to a. friend
of the wife of Frontenac. The river St. Lawrence was known by
the Indians as Hochelage.
In 1498 on account of the discoveries made by the Cabots, Great
Britain claimed the territory now occupied by Chicago. Later on this
territory was claimed and settled by the "French. In 171 7 by decree
of the Royal Council, the country now known as Illinois was placed
under the government established by France for Louisiana. In 1765
the claims of Great Britain to this territory were confirmed by treaty
with France and a portion of the state of Illinois thus became a part
of the English colony of Virginia. In 1774 by the act of Parliament
known as the Act of Quebec, the state of Illinois would have become
part of the Province of Quebec, but that in 1662, under a charter
granted by Charles the Second, the colony of Connecticut was given
a strip of territory extending north and south substantially from the
41st to the 42nd degree of north latitude (this strip being the width
from north to south of the colony of Connecticut), and extending
from the west line of the present state of Connecticut to the Pacific
ocean, so far as Great Britain had power to grant. This grant in-
cluded the region now known as Chicago and extended as far north
as Evanston and south to the present south line of Kankakee county.
Under James the Second, an attempt was made to revoke the
charter of Connecticut. To prevent this, the charter was hidden in
the celebrated tree known as the "Charter Oak" of Hartford, Con-
necticut.
The territory now occupied by Chicago was also during and
after the Revolutionary war claimed by Virginia, on account of the
capture of certain English forts in Illinois and it is said the territory
was also claimed by New York on account of the victories by the
Iroquois over the Illinois Indians in and about the region now known
as LaSalle county.
Long after the discovery of this continent, all men in the new-
found world were divided into two classes — white men and Indians;
OLD STATE STREET BRIDGE LOOKING NORTH
mt K£W YORK
PUBLIC LIBRARY
TlLDr.W >OUWPATI©X«
"â– IHW 'iiiiiiiiiaiMiui
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 7
it was and is, therefore, quite correct to say, as the Indians did, that
the first white inhabitant of Chicago was a negro, Jean Bablisle
Point de Saible, described as a large man, a trader, and pretty
wealthy, said to have been born in St. Domingo and to have gone
from there to Peoria, living with the Indians until about the year
1779. when he came to Chicago and here built a cabin on the north
bank of tlie river, between where it turned to the south and its
mouth. lie is spoken of as our first landed proprietor — his cabin
appearing to have been the first house built in Chicago. After
living here seventeen years, he sold his cabin to one Le Mai, a French
trader, and returned to Peoria, where he died; the cabin was in 1S04
purchased from Le Mai by Mr. John Kinzie.
That Chicago was included in the treaty by which Great Britain
acknowledged the independence of her revolted colonies is due to
George Rogers Clark, who, in 1778, went from Kentucky to Vir-
ginia to obtain authority and assistance for wresting from the English,
Fort Chartres, Kaskaskia and Vincennes in Illinois, Patrick Henry,
then governor of Virginia, made him a colonel with authority to en-
list recruits, and supplied him with arms, ammunition and other nec-
essaries. Over the mountains Colonel Clark marched to the Monon-
gahela, whence he proceeded by boat to within a short distance of the
'Mississippi, where he disembarked and marched to Kaskaskia, halt-
ing a few miles above the town. July 4th, 1778, he advanced upon,
surprised and captured it in the evening after dark. The French
town of Vincennes surrendered to one of his lieutenants shortly aft-
erwards. Thus all of Illinois came for a time under the control of
the revolted colonies. Colonel Hamilton, the commander of the
English forces at Detroit, afterwards recaptured Vincennes, and
Clark, in February, 1779, marched from Kaskaskia to capture Ham-
ilton. In the evening of the 23rd, Colonel Clark marched into \'in-
cennes and firing began. In the afternoon of the next day the fort in
which Hamilton's force was entrenched surrendered. The posses-
sion thus acquired was recognized in the treaty of peace made at the
conclusion of the war and Chicago thus ceased to be British territory.
How many people know that Clark street, upon which the court
house of Cook county stands, was named after George Rogers Clark?
Ought not the state of Illinois to erect a monument to the memory of
8 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
the heroic soldier, but for whom its soil would have remained a part
of the empire of Great Britain?
In 1784 Virginia ceded to the United States her rights over the
territory northwest of the Ohio river, and in 1787, by act of congress,
a territorial government was created, the ordinance providing for the
future division of the territory into not more than five nor less than
three states. This ordinance, as affecting the destiny of Chicago, is
next in importance to the capture by Colonel Clark of Kaskaskia and
Vincennes, for in it was contained the provision that "there shall be
neither slavery nor involuntary servitude in the said territory other-
wise than in punishment of crimes whereof the offender shall have
been duly convicted."
There may have been a fort on the Chicago river prior to 1803.
Franquelin, a young French engineer in Quebec, in the seventeenth
century, from sketches and reports of early explorers, made a num-
ber of maps of the western territory claimed by France. One of
these, said to have been prepared in 1688, has upon the southwestern
border of "Lac des Illinois" (Michigan), at the mouth of a small
stream coming from the northwest and emptying into the lake, a
designation with the words "Fort Checagou."
An agent of the state of Pennsylvania, appointed in 17 18, seems
to have mentioned in his report a fort, not regularly garrisoned, at
the mouth of the "River Chicagou." By the treaty of peace made
at Greenville, Ohio, in August, 1795, the Indians ceded to the United
States various tracts and among others "one piece of land six miles
square at the mouth of the Chicago river emptying into the south-
west end of Lake Michigan, where a fort formerly stood."
At the building of Fort Dearborn, an Indian agency house was
built for the use of United States Indian agents, and in 1805 Charles
Jouett, a native of Virginia, an educated and for a time a practicing
lawyer, was appointed agent. He had been for a season, under ap-
pointment by President Jefferson, Indian agent at Detroit. He was
a man of great muscular strength and entire integrity, who enjoyed
the confidence of three presidents and was faithful to every trust re-
posed in him. The government of the United States instituted the
factory system of supplying the Indians with useful articles, with-
holding whisky from and giving to them a fair equivalent for the
furs they had to sell. In doing this the government was principally
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 9
actuated by motives of philanthropy and expediency. It was also
moved to the course it took by a belief that the white traders made
immense profits which could and should be received by the national
treasury. That governments can make money by going into mercan-
tile business has been for centuries and still is a cherished faith that
"springs eternal in the human breast." The United States govern-
ment could and did make laws designed to secure for itself a mo-
nopoly of the trade; it had unlimited capital and unequaled opportu-
nity for security in the carriage of goods to the red men and furs
from them to the markets in the far east; but it could not and did
not make the business pay expenses, not even by excluding the sal-
aries of agents from the item of expense. The system, after some
twenty years of trial, proved a failure.
In July, 1803, Captain John Whistler, with a company consisting,
December 3, 1803, in all of 69 men, came to the mouth of the "Chi-
cago river" and at a place then having no other
T^ name, in that year built "Fort Dearborn." At this
Dearborn. . , -^ . ^, . , , , .
tmie there were ni Chicago but four cabms; three
of these were occupied by French traders with their Indian wives.
Up to 1812 there \vas little change in the condition of this small
frontier post. In that year, on the i8th of June, under long-con-
tinued provocation, such that a renunciation of independence and
an incorporation into the British empire would have been prefer-
able to its endurance, the United States declared war against Great
Britain. The British government had long been expecting the declara-
tion, and its agents had been studiously ingratiating themselves
with the Indians, with a view to their assistance in the impending
war with the United States. The Indians had for some years been
under British influence and received presents from agents of the Eng-
lish authorities each year.
Reports of murders of settlers by Indians became frequent. Upon
a farm near to Chicago, two members of the Lee family were mur-
dered by Winnebagoes ; a son and an employe of Mr. Lee escaped by
pretending to be going to feed the cattle. That night all the settlers
around the fort remained within its walls. The Indians prowled
about for several nights, but nothing came of this other than the loss
of a few sheep. August 9, 1812, a special messenger brought orders
from General Hull for Captain Heald to dispose of the public prop-
lo CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
erty as he thought best, abandon the fort and march to Detroit. On
the 13th Captain WeHs, Indian agent at Fort Wayne, arrived with
thirty friendly Miamis for the purpose of assisting Captain Heald
on his march to Detroit. On the night of the 13th, all the ammuni-
tion and such muskets as could not be carried were destroyed; the
whisky on hand was thrown into the lake ; at the same time the stores
of blankets, broadcloths, paints, calicoes, etc., were distributed to the
Indians in accordance with a previous agreement that they would
furnish an escort of safety. At nine o'clock on the morning of the
15th the march began. Captain Wells, with fifteen of his friendly
Miamis, leading, the other fifteen Miamis being in the rear. The
women and children rode in wagons or on horse- back. Mr. Kinzie
marched with the soldiers. As soon as all were out of the fort, the
Pottawatomies rushed in, set the fort on fire and began to shoot the
cattle. The little band proceeded along the shore of the lake for
about a mile and a half, some four or five hundred Indians behind a
low ridge of sand to the west, accompanying the column. The women
and children had reached the place where Prairie avenue and Eight-
eenth street now are, when Captain "Wells perceived that an attack
was about to be made; an attempt to prevent this failed, the defen-
sive force was divided, the Miamis fled, and the Pottawatomies ob-
tained possession of the wagons and baggage. A hand-to-hand con-
flict ensued, the savages killing many of the women and children. A
remnant of survivors succeeded in gaining an elevation on the prairie,
to which the Indians did not follow. The Indians having made
signs for Captain Heald to come forward, he did, and an agree-
ment was made under which the whites surrendered upon a promise
by the Indians to spare their lives. Of the number who had left the
fort, only twenty-five men and eleven women and children remained;
the loss of the Indians was about fifteen. Captain Heald gives the
number of whites killed as thirty-eight soldiers, two women and
twelve children.
Whoever desires may now see at the corner of Prairie avenue
and Eighteenth street a beautiful bronze monument erected by the
late George M. Pullman to mark the"^pot where less than a hundred
years ago five hundred Indians nearly annihilated the entire white
population of Chicago.
Notwithstanding the promise to spare the lives of the remnant
CHICAGO AND COOK COUXT^'
II
that surrendered, the Indians i)ut to death every \v<juiided prisoner
save Captain and Airs. Heald, Lieutenant llehu and Mrs. liehn. The
American army suffered at the hands of the British and their In.han
alhes two defeats at substantially the same time, Detn^it having been
surrendered by General Hull upcjii the day Vovi Dearborn was
burned. The attack has been attributed t(^ the failure t<j turn over
to the Indians the ammunition and whisky at the fort. That an
agreement to do this was made seems incredible, and that upon con-
sultation it was determined not to put into the possession of the sav-
ages ammunition with which to kill whatever and whomever they
might see fit, or whiskey, under the influence of which they w«re
likely to become infuriated demons, was a wise resolution. As a
rule, the Indians who occasionally came to the fort were not un-
friendly to the garrison or the traders. They coveted whiskey, guns,
ammunition, colored cloths, blankets, shining trinkets and whatever
aroused their curiosity. But for the long-continued inlluence of
British emissaries, they would have been no more dangerous than
an equal number of Europeans living without the restraint of law.
The Indians were a flesh-eating people, and flesh eaters have a
natural desire to kill. They loved excitement, noise, revelry, the
chase. The young men were vehement, full of passion, vigorous,
ready for anything that gave full play to their love for fighting, that
offered an opportunity to scream, strike, subdue and triumph over a
fallen foe or an innocent animal. Whether Captain Heald, in the
abandonment of the fort, or in the disposition of his little force, took
the wisest course, it is impossible to say. Nothing is easier than,
after the event, to point out mistakes made before. Most military
historians are able to show how Napoleon could have won all the
battles he lost.
In July, 1816, after the termination of the war with Great Brit-
ain, Captain Bradley arrived at Chicago with two companies of in-
fantry, and built upon the site of the destroyed, a new Fort Dearl)orn,
which was occupied by United States soldiers until 18J3. "the fron-
tier" having been, by advancing settlements, pushed back to the Mis-
sissippi, the keeping of an armed force at Chicago was thought to be
no longer necessary. The new fort ha\ing been completed, the re-
mains of the victims of the massacre are said to have l)een gathered
and buried. Exposed as the corpses of the unburied dead for four
12 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
years had been, a prey for wolves and other carnivorae, how much
that could be identified as human relics, the snow and ice of winter,
the drifting sands of summer, torrential rains and furious storms had
left, no one knows. But what does it matter how the corse be shat-
tered, ground to powder, buried in the sea, or scattered by the winds
of heaven, when the soul that alone lifted it above the fate of com-
mon clay, has forever passed out of its clasp. There was an hour
when to the little band that stood between the sand and the lake,
these two companies of infantrymen would have seemed messengers
from heaven. The agony of that hour passed and four years there-
after not all the hosts that shook the earth at Austerlitz and Water-
loo could restore to life, heal a wound or stay a pang of the unburied
dead who perished in that fateful hour.
The fort in the fall of 1828 again received a garrison which re-
mained until the spring of 1831; and, in the terror consequent upon
the Black Hawk war, frightened settlers sought safety within its
walls. In June, 1832, a garrison was placed in the fort and it re-
mained, an occupied military post of the United States until Decem-
ber, 1836, when it ceased to be held by any portion of the army.
Inserted in the northeast corner of the warehouse opposite the
south end of Rush street bridge, is a tablet marking the spot where
the old block house stood.
In 1 8 18 IlHnois became one of the United States. In the division
of the state into counties, Chicago became a part of Pike county, and
John Kinzie was recommended for justice of the peace of the county.
By December, 1823, Chicago had been placed in Fulton county.
January 13, 1825, Peoria county, including Chicago, was set apart
from Fulton. In 1831 Cook county was organized and placed in
the fifth judicial circuit.
As to whether the circuit court of Cook county was opened and
the first trial before it had in September, 1831, or not until May,
1834, there is a difference of opinion as to which, owing to the great
fire of 1 87 1, neither pleader nor historian can bring the record of its
first proceeding into court or before the bar of public opinion, and
thus have settled the question when the circuit court of Cook county,
in which causes determined and pending have reached beyond the
number 286,000, was first convened and, 'being ready to proceed to
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 13
business, the case of John Doe vs. Richard Roe was called and put
upon trial.
Whoever takes time to look over papers and accounts relating to
mercantile transactions in Chicago from 1803 to 1S20 will have his
attention called to the prominent part which whiskey played in the
commerce of those days, as well as to the comparatively low price at
which it could then be obtained; while in a letter written Julv 17th,
181 7, complaint is made that "the best Indian corn will not command
over two dollars per bushel." Was this due to a trust combination of
distilleries. and railroads?
When, in 1809, the territory of Illinois was, by act of Congress,
set off from Indiana, it was divided into two counties, Randolph and
St. Clair ; the latter comprised the northern portion of the territory.
From time to time, as population increased, new counties were cre-
ated, and thus the district now known as Chicago has been within
one hundred years successively in the counties of St. Clair, Madison.
Crawford, Clark, Pike, Fulton, Peoria and Cook.
There was not in Chicago or Cook county a voting precinct until
1823. An election was ordered to be held on the last Saturday of
September, 1823, at the house of John Kinzie, to choose a major and
company officers of the Seventeenth Regiment of Illinois Militia.
The first election, of the actual holding of which an official record
remains, appears to have been held August 7, 1826, eighty-two years
ago, for the purpose of electing a governor, lieutenant-governor, and
a member of Congress; thirty-five votes were cast, all for the same
persons. The present political machines ought to ascertain how such
unanimity was secured. There may have been other elections be-
tween this and 1830; but if so, no certain account of them remains.
An election seems to have been held July 24, 1830, for the election
of a justice of the peace and constable, at which fifty-six votes were
cast. In August, 1832, Cook county included the region now known
as the counties of Will, McFIenry, Dupage and Cook, and had therein
three election precincts. At the first general election held after the
organization of the county of Cook, for congressional, state and coun-
ty officers, there were cast at the three precincts one hundred and
fourteen votes, of which the Democratic candidate for congress re-
ceived ninety-four and his competitors twenty.
The county of Cook was so named in honor of Daniel P. Cook,
14 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY ' '
who, as a representative in Congress from the state of IlHnois, brought
before the general government the subject of aid for a canal connect-
ing the great lakes with the Mississippi ; the result of which was the
granting in aid thereof of more than three hundred thousand acres
of land along the Illinois river to Lake Michigan, embracing a large
portion of the site of the present city of Chicago.
Beyond question, the construction of the Illinois and Michigan
canal, thus assured, was of great importance in the growth at Chi-
cago of a great city. Not only was attention thus called to this
place and the extraordinary fertility of the vast surrounding area,
but the means of communication thus to be opened up through the
great lakes to the Atlantic on the east and by canal and river to the
gulf on the south, constituting the longest line of inland waterway
transportation that mankind had ever known, fired the imagination,
enlisted the enthusiasm and inspired the hearts of myriads of adven-
turous spirits, for whom life had just begun, the world was all before
and hope stood at the helm. It was, moreover, an age of canals.
The New York and Erie canal, first suggested by Governor Mor-
ris in 1780, on the 26th of October, 1825, was made navigable
from tidewater on the Hudson to Lake Erie. On that day there was
telegraphed by continuous discharge of cannon along the route from
Buffalo to New York City, the news that the first barge, bearing
Governor Clinton and his coadjutors, had left the lake on its way to
New York City. No such message had ever before been announced
over such a distance in such a manner. The Erie canal opened up
boundless possibilities; it transformed immense regions, created cit-
ies, made fortunes; why should not the Illinois and Michigan canal
do the same? It did and was of first rank in creating the metropolis
at its eastern terminus. On the i6th of April, 1848, the canal was
formally opened and on the 24th a boat arrived laden with sugar,
shipped from New Orleans. This was transferred to the steamer
Louisiana and, by the lakes, arrived at Buffalo two weeks before the
spring opening of the Erie canal had enabled a boat from New York
City to reach that port.
In 1824 Colonel Rene Paul, of St. Louis, a very competent en-
gineer, was employed with a corps of men to make a survey and esti-
mate of the cost of a proposed canal connecting the Chicago river
with the Ihinois at LaSalle. This he did, completing the work in
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 15
1825. estimating the cost of five routes surveyed, the highest esti-
mate being $716,110, the lowest $639,946. In 1833 it was ascer-
tained that the cost of the work would be $4,043,000. After further
surveys, in 1836 an estimate of $8,654,000 as the cost of a canal
ninety-six miles long, sixty-six feet wide at the surface, thirty-six at
the bottom and six feet deep, was made, and July 4. 1836. amid im-
posing ceremonies, the great work was begun. Up to 1842 the canal
had cost $5,139,492.03, and was yet uncompleted. It was deter-
mined that the canal should be completed upon the shallow cut, or
cheap plan. A loan of $1,600,000 was effected, which was after-
wards paid out of the proceeds of a special two-mill state tax. A
few hundred thousand dollars more were expended, and the canal,
called completed, and opened as before stated. In 1852 congress ap-
propriated $30,000 for the dredging of the canal channel.
In 1823, eighty-five years ago, there was levied in Fulton county,
of which Chicago was then a part, the first tax upon property in the
settlement, from which was realized the sum of $14.42. August 4,
1830, a plat of the town of Chicago was made and published. The
population in 1833 amounted to between three and four hundred. In
that year the town was incorporated and in November rules for the
regulation of the ordinary affairs of the town were adopted. March
4, 1837, Chicago, by act of the legislature, became a city. The popu-
lation was rapidly increasing, so that at the first city election, March
31, 1837, seven hundred and nine votes were cast, the population
shown by the first city census, taken July i, 1837, being 4,170.
Although the actual construction of the canal was not begun be-
fore July, 1836, the donation of lands by Congress and the determina-
tion to build, as before suggested, turned attention to Chicago and
directed the western tide of emigration to this point. Coupled with
this was a wild speculation in lands and town lots, which arose in
1834 and came to an end in May, 1837. In the course of the land
craze, thousands of enterprising spirits were drawn hither, the adja-
cent country was visited, and knowledge of the vast domain of most
fertile lands in Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, Wisconsin and Iowa
ready for tillage, that could be had at one (hollar and a ([uarter an
acre, set in motion a tide of individual, peaceful emigration to the
garden spot of the world such as was never seen before and never
will be again.
i6 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
The canal was neither projected nor built to advertise Chicago,
to cause the expenditure here of large sums of money or to draw
hither a great number of laborers. It was inaugurated and carried
through as a commercial enterprise, the construction of an artery for
trade, a link in an inland waterway upwards of three thousand miles
in length. Opened in 1848, in 1854 the competition of the Rock
Island Railroad compelled the trustees to reduce the moderate tolls
first imposed.
In September, 1833, a so-called grand council of Indian chiefs
was assembled at Chicago to consider as to a treaty to be made
whereby the lands that for an unknown and unknowable time had
been roamed and fought over, hunted and fished upon by tribes called
by the whites Chippewas, Ottawas, Pottawatomies, Illinois, Winne-
bagoes. Sac and Fox Indians, should forever pass away from their
occupation, and they go across the Father of Waters to a country
far away, which they had never seen, and as to which they knew
nothing save that it was toward the sunset, where the great light is
lost and from which it never comes. Thus they were told the Great .
Father had said and thus it must be.
It is today easy to be sentimental over the wrongs and the fate
of the Indian. It was harder for our fathers to be just and kind to
him than it is for us to thus treat the negro. No superior race has
been just to an inferior, Man is naturally as devoid of sentiment as
the savage beast out of whose loins he sprang. Such sentiment as he
possesses has come through the influence of woman, who, perforce,
tender to her babe, develops a tenderness toward all things. The
fierce young warrior was kind neither to the dog he kicked, the mother
whom he neglected, the squaw who obeyed his command, nor the
enemy w^hom he scalped. He loved fire water, demanded whiskey,
coveted powder, guns, knives; hated restraint and labor. The five
thousand savages assembled at Chicago to negotiate a treaty they
could not refuse to enter into, had no sentimental feeling concerning
the opalescent lake, the green fields that ran thence to the Father of
Waters, or the graves of their ancestors. They did not like to be'
disturbed, to be driven away by hostile Sioux, fierce Iroquois or the
Great Father. They wished to be let alone. They called for fire
water and they got it. Fur traders and others of whom they had re-
ceived many things and promised much, got, for those days, a great
STATE STREET, MADISON TO WASHINGTON
^ THE NEW YORK
PUBLIC LIBRARY
ASTOK, LKNOX ANC
TILDJF.W l-OUjNPAnOK*
CHICAGO AND COOK COUX rv i
/
deal of money, more than a hundred thousand dollars. Altogetiier
tlie United States seem to have paid to and for the Indians about
eight hundred thousand dollars, of which $10,000 was equally di-
vided between two semi-civilized Indians, who had long lived with
the whites, $280,000 in annuities running through fourteen years;
$150,000 for the erection of mills, houses, the purchase of agricul-
tural implements, etc., and $70,000 for educational purposes. The
treaty was signed by the three white commissioners and over seventy
Indians, each of the latter signing by a mark. That the Indians
would sign the preparerl treaty was, of course, inevitable ; there was
no other thing for them to do. Nevertheless, they were treated with
a consideration precious to the savage heart. All came to the great
council. Not a squaw, papoose or dog remained away; and all feast-
ed royally day after day upon the bread and meat the Great Father
provided ; sung, danced, raced, gambled, howled, traded and squab-
bled until they were weary; and, by such persuasion, coupled with
furs sold to the traders, cloths and whiskey obtained therefor, they
reached the mental condition in which they could and did calmly listen
to what the Great Father had to say, deliberately consider the same
and freely agree thereto.
In volume I of Andreas' most excellent "History of Chicago." is
a letter written by an intelligent English traveler, Charles J. Latrobe,
who was present on this occasion. While it is too long to be repro-
duced here, it is something which no one who wishes to understand
the real character of the Indian, the whites with whom he mostly
came in contact, and the dealings of the government with each, can
afford to overlook.
The government would have been glad to have set off to each
Indian family one hundred and sixty acres of land, built a home
thereon and given therewith agricultural implements, seed and cattle ;
but this was not that for which the Indian was fitted or cared. They
would not have been desirable neighbors for the whites, and (juar-
rels between the two, leading to bloodshed, would have inevitably
followed. The Indian had back of him, running through unnumbered
centuries, a heritage of war, fishing, hunting and nomadic wandering.
To settle down upon a quarter section, cultivate and obtain his living
from it was entirely foreign to his thought. To him such a life
would have been slavery, an existence of which he had no real C(~>n-
voi. 1—2.
i8 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
ception. Nor would he steadily work for wages. His wants were
few — whiskey and a feast. His pleasures simple — hunting^ fishing,
fighting, athletic games, some dancing, much noise and a drunken
carouse. To this there were exceptions, but not enough to affect the
mass. Most Indians, without reflection, were thoroughly in touch
with the modern teaching that opportunity for play is to be contin-
uously sought, and that there is no danger of degradation in what is
called recreation.
Chicago is pre-eminently a railroad city, railroads having done
more to promote its growth and prosperity than any other agency.
The opening for traffic of the Liverpool and Manchester Railway in
England in 1829 first impressed upon the English public the fact
that a great transformation in the conveyance of men and merchan-
dise was at hand. There is reason for thinking that the first railway
in America upon which a steam locomotive proceeded along a track
drawing after it loaded cars was built in South Carolina. From 1830
there was in Massachusetts, Maryland, Pennsylvania and New York
a furor for the building of railroads, and before the Illinois and
Michigan canal was begun, the construction of a railroad from the
lake to the Mississippi was considered. Canals were old, had existed
for thousands of years; the operation of them was well understood.
The contemplated channel was to be a link in a continuous waterway
from New York City to the gulf, so that cargoes without shifting
might be moved from New Orleans to the Atlantic ocean. A canal
was therefore decided upon. By 1831 interest had been awakened
and steps taken looking to the building of railroads in Illinois. The
construction of a railroad to be operated in connection with the canal
was discussed. Judge Sidney Breese, in 1835, wrote recommending
that a railroad be built by the state extending from the junction of the
proposed canal with the Illinois river to the meeting of the Ohio and
Mississippi rivers. He estimated that its cost would be $7,000 a mile,
and that allowing fifteen miles an hour as the maximum speed, a train
leaving Ottawa in the morning would, upon the morn of the next
day, arrive at Cairo. In 1836 a charter for a railroad from Chicago
to Galena, known as the Galena and Chicago Union, was obtained.
Mindful of the reliability, as propelling powers, for thousands of
years, of the horse, ox, ass, reindeer, mule and dog, as well as the
great and uncertain cost of the contemplated railroad, the sagacious
CTITCAGO AND COOK COUNTY 19
incorporators obtained authority to operate the road by steam or ani-
mal power, and if necessary to increase the capital st(x:k from $100,
000 to $1,000,000.
In February, 1837, a survey was made of the proposed line run-
ning due west from the south end of North Dearborn street to tiie
DesPlaines river. In June, 1837, work ceased. In 1838 work was
resumed only to be, for want of funds, discontinued before the close
of the year. Nearly ten years elapsed before active construction
again began. In March, 1848, a contract for the building of the first
thirty-two miles from Chicago was let. Locomotives were purchased
and brought through the lakes by boat to Chicago. November 20th,
seventy years ago, a load of wheat was carried by rail ten miles from
the DesPlaines river to Chicago. How many million loads have since
come across the prairies to this city, no one knows. At this time no
other road had reached Chicago. The western terminus of the Michi-
gan Central had been, for the time, fixed at New Bufifalo, Indiana, an
extension to Chicago being contemplated. The first line to reach this
city from the east was the Michigan Southern and Northern Indiana,
now known as the Lake Shore, w^hich was completed to Chicago Feb-
ruary 20, 1852. Of all the railroads entering Chicago, the Illinois
Central is the only one to which for construction in Illinois a sub-
sidy was given. The United States gave to the state of Illinois a
strip of land 200 feet wide from LaSalle to Cairo, for road bed. side
tracks and stations of a central railroad, and in addition 2,595,000
acres of land in alternate sections lying near to the contemplated main
line of the road and its branches. This grant the state in 1851 gave
to the Illinois Central Railroad Company, upon the agreement of that
company to pay annually seven per cent of its gross earnings to the
state.
Epidemics of belief as well as epidemics of disease have occurred
in all ages. In 1837 there was in Illinois a wild enthusiasm for the
making of internal improvements by the state. There were then in
Illinois more than thirty million acres of most fertile land, ready for
the plow, waiting k»r cultivation. At a dollar and a quarter an acre
they were a drug in the market. And why? Because of lack of fa-
cilities for transportation. Upon the rich black loam of the prairies
a permanently good wagon road could not be built save at an expense
that rendered such an undertaking then impracticable.
20 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
It was perceived that railroads would solve the problem. A Mace-
donian cry for railroads went up. But capital was timid — it always
is — "Why wait for capitalists to be convinced?" "Relief today is
what we need, not twenty years hence when we may be in our
graves." "In no other country can railroads be so cheaply built."
"There are neither mountains to climb, rocks to pierce, nor forests to
fell." "Let the state, with its unbounded credit, build the roads we
need, obtain the immense revenue such roads will yield; our lands
thus not only be freed from taxation, but their value increased a hun-
dred fold," were arguments addressed to the people and to them
appeared unanswerable.
In August, 1836, an internal improvement convention was held
which devised a scheme of internal improvements at the expense
of the state to be, as was stated, "commensurate with the wants of
the people." The governor, at the meeting of the legislature in Janu-
ary, 1837, recommended a general and uniform system of internal im-
provements, in which the state might take a third or half interest,
which would secure to her a lasting and abundant revenue, to be ap-
pHed upon the principles of the plan proposed, "until the whole coun-
try shall be intersected by canals and railroads and our beautiful prairies
enlivened by thousands of steam engines drawing after them lengthened
trains freighted with the abundant productions of our fertile soil."
On the 9th of January the committee on internal improvements, by
its chairman, Edward Smith, presented a report twelve pages in
length, in which among many other equally eloquent and forcible ar-
guments for the object which the governor and the committee had at
heart, it was said : "That it was the legislator's duty, by his example
to calm the apprehensions of the timorous and meet the attacks of
calculating opposers of measures which would multiply the population
and wealth of the state. * ^' * That the practicability of removing
obstructions to the navigation of our rivers could not be doubted ; that
a general system of internal improvements was then, within the policy
and means of the state, demanded by the people as expressed by their
highly talented representatives lately assembled in convention ; * * *
that the cost of building railroads * >i< * by analogy with similar
works in other states could be calculated with the utmost precision
without previous surveys, $8,000 per mile being the estimate."
February 27, 1837, the act "to establish and maintain a general
CHICAGO AND COOK COUXTY 21
system of internal improvement" was approved by Governor Duncan.
This act appropriated $10,200,000, of which $400,000 was "toward"
the improvement of the Great Wabash, lUinois, Rock, Kaskaskia and
Little Wabash rivers ; $200,000 to counties throug^h which no road
or improvements were projected, and $9,650,000 for railroads. At
the meeting of the legislature in 1839, Governor Duncan in his final
message declared the internal improvement system by the state im-
politic, and that the mistake already made must be corrected or dis-
aster would surely follow. The incoming governor, Thomas Carlin,
in his inaugural message, said : "The signal success which has at-
tended our sister states in the construction of their extensive systems
of improvements can leave no doubt of the wise policy and utility of
such works. * * * ji-, the principles and policy of this plan
contrasted with that of joint stock companies and private corpora-
tions, I entirely concur." The new legislature made, for internal im-
provements, specific appropriations amounting to about $1,000,000.
The governor was also authorized to negotiate a loan of $4,000,000
to carry on the work on the canal, while the committee on internal
improvements reported that in its opinion — "It is inexpedient for the
legislature to authorize corporations or individuals to construct rail-
roads or canals calculated to come in competition with similar works
now in course of construction under the state system of internal
improvements."
For an undeveloped state, the population of which then was about
250,000, the appropriations were enormous and the undertaking most
injudicious. Only the projected road from Meredosia on the Illinois
river to Springfield was completed. The actual construction of this
road cost the state $1,000,000. It did not pay running expenses and
after having been operated for five years at a loss, was in 1847 sold
by the state for $21,000. By December, 1839. Governor Carlin had
seen a great light, and on the ninth day of that month, by his order,
the legislature was convened in special session, he having ascertained
that the debt of the state already amounted to $14,000,000, and unless
it halted in its career, the state would soon be confronted with a debt
of over $21,000,000, the interest upon which would annually amount
to more than $1,300,000, while its yearly revenue did not exceed
$200,000. The truthfulness of the statement made by the governor
was apparent, and the legislature, largely composed of the same per-
22 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
sons that, with unbounded confidence in the wisdom of the system
of state creation and ownership, by a vote in the house of 8 1 to 25,
inaugurated in 1837, in 1840 repealed the act of 1837. Alas! that
acknowledgement and repentance of folly does not terminate its
effect.
The vast system of internal improvement paid no revenue; it was
for a time impossible for the state to discharge its obligations, and
it became a defaulter. The state banks in which it held a controlling
interest failed. Nevertheless there was never a time in which the
majority of the people favored repudiation and as soon as possible
payment was resumed and in time the entire debt paid off. The finan-
cial difficulties, the loss and ruin caused by the embarking by the state
in the business of transportation and banking, could not and did not
fail to affect private business in Chicago. With the bonds of the
state selling, as for a time they did, at fourteen cents on the dollar,
capitalists were unwilling to invest in any Illinois enterprise. Gov-
ernor Ford, who succeeded Governor Carlin, afterward said, "It is
my solemn belief that when I came into office I had the power to
make Illinois a repudiating state."
Undoubtedly the influence of Governor Ford was potent for hon-
est and full payment in accordance with the letter and spirit of the
state bonds, and it might have been equally powerful if exerted in the
opposite direction. But the people, disappointed as they were by the
utter failure of the state internal improvement undertaking, and
weighted with a debt incurred therefor equal, relatively, to $500,000,-
000 at the present time, neither lost hope nor integrity.
The men in control at Chicago from 1837 to 1848, the Ogdens,
Kinzies, Hamilton, Scammon, Dole, Caton, Knight, King, Manierre,
Rumsey, Stone, Bronson, Temple, Dyer, Fullerton,
„ Eagan, Turner, Foster, Carpenter, Collins, Boone,
Butterfield, Burley, Jones, Hoynes, Smith, Eastman,
Peck, Gooding, Pearsons, Gale, Hogan, Calhoun, Bates, Blodgett,
Brown, Balestier, Wentworth, Kingsbury, Stewart and others, who
understood and felt the honor involved in a promise to pay
whether given by a state or an individual, the confidence re-
posed in the integrity of a promisor, and theii dishonor of a breach
of plighted faith, had never a thought of repudiation. The incom-
ing tide to the northern and middle counties was composed of men
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY j;,
and women and families seeking for land on which tu build homes,
lands to till, farms to own, an honest, God-loving, high-minded, up-
right community in which to dwell; desiring schools in which their
children should be taught, churches at which they might gather for
worship; demanding a reign of law, the preservation of order, pro-
tection of life and property, the fulfillment of obligations, peace and
security; Illinois rose, like a giant refreshed by sleep, lifted the bur-
dens folly had gathered, and paid to the uttermost farthing the debt
delusion had incurred.
Before Caesar crossed the Rubicon, ere Euphrates heard the
plaintive song of Israel, when the foundation stones of the pyramids
were in their native beds, the wild bird flew, the red deer fed undis-
turbed by the hunter's rifle and the green grass grew on the prairies
untouched by the iron plow that was in time to rend its sward; the
western world was young, as 'twill never be again, but it was no
longer unknown. They were coming, coming, not the devouring
hordes of Alaric or devastating Huns, but a mighty host of Christian
men, women and children, to turn wild lands into fruitful fields.
When the great migration from the east began there were no
railroads leading into Illinois or any western state. Our fathers
knew little of the iron horse, and if they had known more could not
have waited for the building of a way suited to its whirling feet.
They devised the prairie schooner, a two-horse wagon, having a
raised canopy covered with sail cloth, which carried all their belong-
ings and in which, when it rained, the family slept. The emigrant
seldom patronized hotels; first, because inns were few and far be-
tween, second, he could not afford to do so. A coffee pot and a
frying pan, a wash dish, a half dozen cups and plates, a few knives,
forks and spoons, some bedding, a few towels and a chair or two.
constituted the traveling equipment. Flour and meat could be pur-
chased from settlers who were to be found all along the route each
ten to twenty miles, and in the eastern portion more frequently. Salt,
pepper, vinegar, molasses, saleratus and dried yeast cakes they took
from home. The roads were neither very good nor very bad; at
seasons of long continued rain the procession had to halt. These
sturdy pioneers had never heard that all who toil must go to the sea
side or the mountains in summer and to California or the south in
winter. The absolute necessity for vacations to toilers was a gospel
24 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
that had not been preached to them. Along every main road that led
westward through New York and Ohio, the prairie schooners moved.
Tidings of a land where it was not necessary to cut down and burn
up heavy timber, devote years to uprooting and dragging away
stumps and pick stone for a lifetime in order to have a good farm,
had come to them, and this land they were getting to as fast as the
condition of the path and the strength of men and horses would
permit. "What sought they thus afar?" Not "the spoils of war"
nor "freedom to worship God." Spoils they thought not of; free-
dom to worship God they had in New England, for which they
cherished an ardent affection. They sought for better lands and
easier conditions under which homes could be created; they hoped
for gain, for wealth acquired by honest toil and self-denying fru-
gality. They toiled and they saved and because they did, Chicago is.
The town is a great convenience to the country; the country an
absolute necessity for the town. We who ride in automobiles and
Pullman cars think the journey of these emigrants must have been
dreadful. Years afterward, old ladies, young in heart, who well
remembered the trip, spoke of it as the pleasantest experience they
ever had. It was the spring-time of life; they looked upon new
scenes, the air was fresh, clear and invigorating. Hope stood at the
helm and love rode in the wagon. It may be that sometimes as the
caravan halted at a stream they were to cross in the morning, these
church-going, psalm-singing homeseekers, stood on the bank and sang :
"On Jordan's rugged banks I stand '
And cast a wistful eye
To Canaan's fair and happy land
Where my possessions lie.
"Oh, the transporting, rapturous scene
That rises to my sight :
Sweet fields arrayed in living green,
And rivers of delight !"
The toil, economy and success of the frugal souls who came west
neither riding in chariots nor driving furiously like Jehu, enabled
the state of Illinois to gird up its loins, pay its debts and Chicago to
become the metropolis it is.
TMI MEW TORC
PUBLIC UBRARY
ACTOR. LXNOX AM«
T1LDF.M f'OUMVATiVMS
mm^immmmmmma^^^^^
COOK COUNTY COURT HOUSE BEFORE THE FIRE OF 1871
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 25
Chicago was made a city, and as such, at its first election in 1837,
Wilham B. Ogden was chosen mayor. No abler or more useful man
has ever been at the head of the city government ; nevertheless there
was during his incumbency in Chicago, as elsewhere, a great financial
depression. Merchants, banks and manufacturers failed in all parts
of the country; real estate and much other property greatly declined
in value. Yet, although according to public opinion, the population
of the new city fell from 4,180 in 1837 to 4,100 in 1838, the United
States census of 1840 showed an increase to 4,479, while the com-
mercial statistics were — imports for 1837, $373,667; 1838, $579,-
174; 1840, $562,106; of exports, 1837, $1,008,297; 1838, $785,504;
1840, $1,813,468. In 1838 thirty-nine bags of wheat were exported
by steamer; in 1839 the export was 16,073 bushels, and in 1840,
304,212 bushels.
For some years there was a public well in Kinzie's addition, at
which those who lived in its vicinity could obtain water; others were
supplied by peddlers, wlio brought water from the lake and sold it
by the gallon or bucket; so that although there may have been in
those days thirsty souls who did not get what they desired to drink ;
neither the laborer nor the good housewife looking at the river and
the lake exclaimed "Water, water everywhere, and all the boards
did shrink; water, water everywhere, nor any drop to drink." In
1842 there was put into operation a steam pump and water raised by
it was conveyed through bored logs to residences and business houses.
In the early part of the nineteenth century, immigration into the
southern portion of the state was largely from Tennessee, Kentucky
and Virginia, and in great part composed of persons favorable to the
institution of slavery. Indeed, the immigrants in many instances
brought a few slaves with them and continued to claim and hold them
as such notwithstanding the provisions of the ordinance in 1 787. The
influence of these immigrants was such that at the admission of the
state and the making of the constitution of 1818, it is probable a
majority of the people favored the introduction of slavery and the
creation of a slave state. The ordinance of 1787, however, stood
in the way, and the convention limited itself to a constitution which
in effect recognized slavery as already existing and providing that it
should not thereafter be introduced into the state. A statute made
26 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
in 1807, while Illinois was a territory, provided that owners of
negroes and mulattoes above the age of fifteen years, or any citizen
of the United States purchasing the same, might bring them into the
territory, provided that within thirty days the owner or master
should take them before the clerk of the court and have an indenture
between the slave and his owner entered upon record ''specifying the
time which the slave was compelled to serve his master." This stat-
ute also provided that, "The children born in this territory of a
parent of color" (thus — either parent) "owing service or labor by
indenture should serve, the males until the age of 30 and the females
until the age of 28 years." The existence of slavery in this state was
also recognized by section three of article six of the constitution of
1818. There- were at all times in the southern and middle part of
the state manj^ persons determinedly opposed to slavery, while in
the north the great majority of all immigrants looked upon human
bondage with abhorrence; particularly was this the case in Chicago
and the immediately surrounding country.
There was in 1842 a state statute forbidding any black or mulatto
person to give evidence against or in favor of any white person, and
providing that no black or mulatto person should be permitted to
live in the state until he should produce to the county commission-
er's court, where he or she is desirous of living, a certificate of his
freedom; nor until he should have given bond with sufficient security
in the penal sum of one thousand dollars that he would not at any
time become a charge to said county or any other county in the
state, as a poor person; and providing further that if any person
should harbor such negro or mulatto not having such certificate, or
should hire or give sustenance to such negro or mulatto not having
such certificate of freedom and given bond, he should be fined in the
sum of five hundred dollars ; and providing further that every black
or mulatto person found in this state, not having such a certificate,
should be deemed a runaway slave or servant, and that it should be
lawful for an inhabitant of the' state to take such black or mulatto
before some justice of the peace, whose duty it should be to commit
him to jail, and in three days advertise him at the court house door
for hire from month to month for the space of one year; and further
providing that if any slave or servant should be found at a distance
of ten miles from the tenement of his or her master or the person
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 27
with whom he or she hves without a pass * * * from his or
her master, employer or overseer, it should Ijc lawful to apprehend
him or her and carry him or her before a justice of the peace to be
by his order punished with stripes not exceeding thirty-five; and
further provided that if any slave should presume to come and be
upon the plantation or at the dwelling- of any person whatsoever, with-
out leave from his or her owner, it should be lawful for the owner of
such plantation or dwelling house to give or order such slave or
servant ten lashes on his or her bare back. These laws remained
upon the statute book until 1865.
In 1842 an industrious colored man, a member of the Chicago
Methodist church, while working in a field for wages, became in-
volved in a quarrel with a fellow workman in which impolite and
offensive language was used by both. Whereupon a white man
had the colored laborer arrested, charged with being a negro in the
state of Illinois without a certificate jDf leave from his owner or of
freedom from court. The negro thereupon was put in jail, and
for six weeks duly advertised for sale. At the appointed time the
sheriff appeared with his prisoner and offered him for sale. A large
crowd was present. The negro, thinly clad, shivered in the cold
November air. The sheriff called for bids, stated his duty under the
law. For some reason there was not a ready response to the invita-
tion to buy a man sold because he was a negro found in the state
of Illinois without a written permit from his owner or a certificate
that he was a free man issued by the county commissioner's court.
The sheriff explained that if no bid was received the law compelled
him to return the man to jail ; that he was required to sell the negro
to pay the expense of his arrest and imprisonment. Finally Mahlon
D. Ogden bid twenty-five cents; no other bid was made and the
industrious negro, a member of the Chicago Methodist church, was
on the fourteenth day of November, in the year of our Lord one
thousand eight hundred forty-two, and of the independence of the
United States the sixty-sixth, struck off and sold to Mahlon D. Og-
den for twenty-five cents. Mr. Ogden paid the money, and turning
to his property said : "Edwin, I have bought you ; you are my slave !
Now go where you please."
In no part of the United States was the feeling with respect to
the fugitive slave law and the other compromise measures of 1850
28 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
deeper than in Chicago. Yet in Chicago at the presidential election
of 1852, Franklin Pierce received 2,835 votes; Winfield Scott, 1,765;
John P. Hale, 424; Democratic majority over all was 646.
Illinois had nearly always been a Democratic state and Chicago
a Democratic city. The people justly felt a pride in the command-
ing position which Douglas had acquired in the senate and in the
party of which he was a distinguished leader; yet, when in 1854,
Douglas succeeded in carrying through Congress the measure known
as the Kansas-Nebraska bill, by which the Missouri Compromise of
1820 was set aside and Kansas and Nebraska with all the territory
lying westward opened to the introduction of slavery, the anti-
slavery sentiment of the new and already great emporium, speaking
with wrathful vehemence, carried all before it.
September ist, 1854, Senator Douglas was by appointment in
Chicago to defend his course in introducing and urging the passage
of the Kg.nsas-Nebraska bill. A great crowd assembled on Michigan
street in front of a building then known as North Market Hall.
Douglas began to speak to a most unsympathetic and hostile audi-
ence, if an assemblage which refuses to hear can be called an
audience. Statements made by him were disputed with such bitter-
ness, such malignant criticism of his conduct and such opprobrious
epithets as clearly indicated not only an unwillingness to listen, but a
determination that he should not be heard. Undoubtedly there were
present very many adherents of the American, styled by its opponents
the Know Nothing party, who disliked the senator because of the
vigorous attack he had recently made upon that nascent organization,
but the bitter hostility of the great mass of the throng was the result
of long and deeply settled conviction of the fundametal truth that
all men are born free and equal, that no man's child could right-
fully be torn from him or held forever in slavery because its father
was a slave, a negro or mulatto, and that the Kansas-Nebraska act,
opening, as it did, to the introduction of slavery territory supposedly
forever consecrated to freedom, was a crime against humanity.
Nevertheless the refusal to hear cannot be justified. No one was
obliged to go to the meeting; everyone had a right to go. The right
of each person who wished to hear the senator, as well as his right
to speak, was trampled upon. True it is that Elijah Lovejoy had
been killed in Alton by a mob for daring to publish an anti-slavery
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 29
paper in that city; but the greater wrong done at Alton in 1837 was
no justification for a denial of the right of free speech at Chicago in
1854. One wrong does not justify another. The courageous con-
duct of Douglas in for two hours facing a mob determined to howl
him down, made him friends, in many quarters and helped not at all
the anti-slavery sentiment by which it was principally inspired.
At the congressional election held in tlic fall of 1854, the true
feeling of Chicago upon the question of slavery was expressed at the
polls by a vote of 3.448 for James H. Woodworth, the Free-soil can-
didate, contrasted with 1,175 ^^r his Democratic opponent.
The refusal to hear Douglas had an effect not expected by the
howling mob, the senator, his friends or any person. It at once
focused the attention of the political world upon Chicago and Illi-
nois. The Prairie state had been known as reliably Democratic ; it
had not been carried away by the panic of 1837, the log cabin cam-
paign of 1840, or the brilliant record as a commander of General
Taylor, under whom Illinois soldiers had fought and won imperisha-
ble laurels at Buena Vista. Douglas was the leader of the young
Democracy, the champion of his party upon the great issue which
men felt was now to the fore and upon which for years political
action would turn. That he should have been refused a hearing,
repudiated in the chief city of the great west; that Illinois with an
infamous slave code as a part of its statutory law should have turned
against the most brilliant and the most influential man it had sent to
Congress, was indeed startling. Boston ! Boston indeed ! had held a
great meeting in Faneuil Hall, the Cradle of Liberty. Eloquent men
had spoken and excited crowds had attended the so-called hearing of
Simms and the assumed hearing of Burns, peaceable colored men
who had lived and toiled for years in the metropolis of Massachu-
setts; but Simms and Burns had been consigned to slaverv and car-
ried through the streets of the capital of Massachusetts to lifelong
bondage, without trial by court or jury, under a fugitive slave law,
so-called because it authorized a commissioner appointed by the
circuit court of the United States to, upon satisfactory proof of the
escape of a slave and a declaration upon oath of the identity of the
person arrested with the escaped slave, deliver up the alleged slave
to his owner or his agent; it being specially provided that in such
proceeding the testimony of the party accused of being an escaped
30 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
slave should not he admitted. Chicago, which the untamed Indians
had possession of twenty-one years before, had risen in holy wrath
and refused to listen to its representative who had voted for the fugi-
tive slave law under which any man white or black could be seized
and sent south to be there tried upon the allegation that he was a
slave; and had contemptuously spurned its senator who had brought
about the setting aside of a solemn agreement dedicating a vast do-
main to freedom. What will Chicago do, was henceforth a question
in the mind of the millions of anti-slavery men who thenceforth for a
quarter of a century shaped the destiny of America. What, in the
contest with the slave power, would Chicago do next? It brought
about on the 17th of June, 1858, the nomination by the Republicans
of Abraham Lincoln for United States senator and of Stephen A.
Douglas by the Douglas Democracy. The Democratic administra-
tion of Buchanan, because of the refusal of the Little Giant to sup-
port the Lecompton constitution, attempted to be imposed by force
upon Kansas, was no longer in harmony with Senator Douglas, and
the party in Illinois was divided into Administration and Douglas
Democrats; the Administration being composed almost entirely of
federal office holders and their immediate followers. These nomina-
tions were followed by a joint debate between Lincoln and Douglas,
the most important and in its influence the most far-reaching public
discussion that has ever taken place in this country, if not in the
world. The debate was not concerning the tariff, the regulation of
inter-state commerce, the free coinage of silver, the making of green-
backs a legal tender or the creation of a great navy. It was con-
cerning liberty, the fundamental rights of man, equality before the
law, the selling into hopeless bondage of men, women and children;
our duty to millions of slaves, husbands and wives to whom the law
gave neither protection nor assistance in their desire to live together
and love each other; the discussion had reference to children liable
to be sold at any hour away from parents because of the whim, the
interest, passion or misfortune of the owner, laws that make it a
crime to teach a black person, woman or child, to read; that by sol-
emn pronouncement of constitution and statute doomed four millions
of human beings to unending ignorance; that closed and barred the
door to hope and blotted out opportunity; that put before aspiration
an impervious wall high as heaven and deep as hell, and in all this
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNT \
31
fair land left but one light to which the down trodden slave could
look with hope, the North Star. Fondly let us hope and fervently
pray that no such discussion again arise from the denial to men,
white or black, of rights we claim for ourselves.
Having become the political focus of the nation, Chicago was
naturally selected as the place for holding the Republican convention
to nominate a candidate for president. The conven-
tion met in May, i860. A temporary building had
been erected on the south of Market between Lake
and Randolph streets. The side wall of a brick block extending
from Lake to Randolph street formed the south or rear side
The
Wigwam.
The Wigwam
of the structure. In September, 1859, the country had been greatly
stirred by the killing of David C. Broderick, United States sen-
ator from the state of California; Broderick had been killed by
one David S. Terry, a noted pro-slavery politician of San Francisco.
Broderick lived, after receiving the fatal stab, long enough to say :
"They have killed me because I was opposed to slavery and a cor-
rupt administration." Upon the rear wall of the Republican Wig-
32 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
warn, facing the entrance and the vast audience, were cartoons of
heroic size having pohtical significance. One of these was a portrait
of the martyred Broderick; written underneath were his dying words.
At such a time, on such an occasion, few things could have .been
more impressive. The convention, to the more thoughtful, was the
first held by the Republicans that seemed to have in its control the
namJng of the next president and the inauguration of an administra-
tion determined to prevent further extension of the area devoted to
slavery. Subsequent events have shown it to have been a gathering,
the importance of which no convocation of men has exceeded. The
balloting began on the third day of the convention. Abraham Lin-
coln having received the nomination for president, the selection of a
candidate for vice president was taken up in the afternoon. The
wide street in front of the Wigwam was filled with an immense
crowd unable to get in the building. Upon its flat roof were a num-
ber of active young Republicans to whom a statement of the vote of
each state as announced was passed up through a skylight directly
over the seat of the chairman. This report was passed along to the
front of the roof from which it was given to the throng in the street.
Among the zealous young Republicans thus engaged was a rough
and ready speaker, quick witted, possessed of a keen sense of humor ;
somewhat of a horse trader generally known as "Horse Eddy."
Eddy commented upon the votes as announced. The tide was run-
ning in favor of Hamlin. Massachusetts cast her vote for him,
whereupon Eddy said, "Yes, Abe Lincoln and Hannibal Hamlin
are the boys that will build a fence round the Democracy over which
they never can jump."
In American political oratory the voters are always "boys,"
whether they are twenty or eighty years old. Of the names pre-
sented to the convention, Seward was most widely known and had
longest stood in the public estimation as a typical representative of
the anti-slavery feeling of the north. Lincoln was nominated because
of his availability, the belief that he would receive many votes in
Illinois, Indiana, Pennsylvania and New Jersey, that Seward could
not obtain. The friends of Seward were greatly disappointed;
nevertheless he and they most loyally supported the nominees of the*
convention.
CHICAGO AND COOK COUxXTV ^t^
Fnmi aljout the year 1856 the Weekly New York Tribune, under
the !iianai;ement of Horace Greeley, was politically the most important
paper in America. It had the largest circulation of any secular weekly
and conduced more to the development of opposition to the further
extension of slavery than any other jou,rnal.
Not from freedom loving Boston but from commercial New
York went forth the clarion voice that aroused the north.
During the canvass preceding the convention of i860 the New
York Tribune advocated the nomination of Bates of Missouri instead
of Seward, the leader of the Republicans of New York.
There is little danger that any will overrate the work done by
Horace Greeley in arresting the march of slavery and dedicating this
land to freedom, nor can one speak too strongly of his devotion to
the cause of the Union in the great struggle that followed tlie
election of Abraham Lincoln.
He was not a soldier nor in any way capable of advising as to
military movements. Tlie unfortunate result of the first battle of
Bull Run, following as it did, his urgent cry of "On to Richmond,"'
shook the confidence of the north in his judgment — a confidence
never fully restored. From thence to the present time, with the
exception of a few years during which the Chicago Tribune under
the direction of Horace White, ceased to act in harmony with the
Republicans and supported the Democratic candidate for president,
the press of Chicago has been and now^ is politically more influential
than that of any other city in the United States.
Before the lapse of four years, all anti-slavery men as well as all
friends of the Union were convinced that the convention did wisely
in selecting Lincoln. The contest was from the outset serious in
purpose, method, discussion and view of the future. Many of those
about to cast their first vote realized that the country stood upon
the brink of the most terrible of civil wars; that we were steadily
marching toward an ocean whose currents, rocks, perils and havens
no man knew ; that in the red waves of this unsailed sea we shoulil
all be wdielmed, and who would survive the storm, who successfully
buffet the waves, who reach a peaceful if barren shore — none could
tell. Would the country we loved and served remain? The Hag
beneath whose folds we marched and fought survive as an emblem
Vol. 1—3.
34 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
of liberty or go clown in the conflict of contending armies and the
clash of hostile ideals? Of only one thing did young, ardent an^
sober-minded men feel assured. The contest is inevitable; in the
nature of things it is impossible that this land should remain a coun-
try based upon the highest liberty, equal opportunity and hope for
some, slavery and no stepping stone to higher things and no hope for
others. That for whites all avenues of knowledge should be open,
and it a crime to teach negroes to read the Sermon on the Mount,
the Lord's Prayer or the Commandments given at Sinai. And these
said, "Let the great battle for equality of every one before the 1-aw
come, if come it must, while I am able to bear a part in the fight, to
carry a musket and help hold freedom's banner up." Peaceful sub-
mission to the popular will all hoped for; many believed this would
be, some did not.
Lincoln having been triumphantly elected, there was in Chicago
as elsewhere the customary rejoicing over the victory. March 4th
he took at Washington the oath of office and became president.
April 15, 1 86 1, in consequence of the attack upon and capture of
Fort Sumter he called for 75,000 volunteers and Congress to meet
in extra session on July 4th.
The expected and the unexpected had happened. Chicago was a
commercial city. War deranges, interrupts, frequently destroys com-
merce. In modern times the influence of commercial interests, mer-
chants, manufacturers, bankers, carriers and lawyers is always for
peace. Wars are less frequent, not so lightly entered upon as in by-
gone ages, because commercial interests forbid. Nevertheless Chi-
cago responded with alacrity to the call to arms, proffered all it had,
its business, its money and its sons to enforce 'the law, maintain the
Union. For more than four years there was in Chicago, as else-
where, the sundering of ties, the disruption of business, the failure of
enterprises the success of which depended upon peace; and there were
thousands of faces weary and wan wishing for the war to cease, the
ever present fear of disaster and death at the front. The history
of the war or of Chicago's part therein will never be told; it is writ-
ten in a thousand burial fields; it lies in ocean depths, by the moun-
tains and the sea; on the furrowed faces and the bending forms of
a vanishing host; in tenderly cherished mementoes, and built into
CHICAGO AND CUUK COUXTV 35
stately nionumciUs that shall lor ages withstand the gnawing tooth
of time.
By the stern arhilranient of war, there was graven upon the
Constitution of the United States :
"Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for
crime wiioroof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist witliin the
United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction."
"Congress sh;ill have power to enforce tliis article by appropriate legislation. "
"All persons born or naturalized in the United States and subject to the juris-
diction tliereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they
reside. No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges
or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any
person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law, nor deny to any
person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws."
"The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or
abridged by the United States or any State on account of race, color, or previous
condition of servitude."
"The Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legis-
lation."
It cost six thousand million dollars, five hundred thousand lives,
infinite pain and sorrow to write those words there.
To him who recognizes the indescribable toil and effort, the love
that passeth understanding, hope deferred that maketh the heart
sick, and return of good for evil, charity that endureth all things, work-
ing together through unnumbered reons past, building out of barbarism
a civilization beginning to embrace the world and clasp in its arms
all mankind, asking for no one a right under the law not given to all
and despising none because of conditions which involve neither merit
nor demerit, those lines, the fruit of striving for noble things since the
morning stars sang logether, are significant as to what was the
strife and the suffering which made the writing of them in tlie
Constitution possible.
The national convention for 1864 of the Democratic party was
held in Chicago, beginning August 29th. Horatio Seymour, gov-
ernor of New York, was selected as presiding officer. Mr. Seymour
was not known as an anti-slavery man or a war Democrat; ne was
a polished gentleman, a fine orator and perhaps politically the strong-
est man in the Empire state. He made an earnest anti-war address,
but he was not guilty of any breach of good manners. The conven-
tion drew to Chicago not onlv the elected delegates, but a great num-
36 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
ber of intensely pro-slavery men, eager to publicly proclaim their
abomination of anti-slavery men and measures, and also of all done
in the prosecution of the war or in the lifting of the negro oul of
bondage. Such persons spoke with unrestrained violence of Lincoln,
the Republicans, the Union soldiers and all done by the north to
suppress the rebellion. The assassination of Lincoln at the moment
of victory gave to his life and work so pathetic a finish, that of all
men who have led contending parties in times of intense bitterness,
when society was being upheaved to its foundation, realms laid
waste, great numbers reduced from affluence to poverty and multi-
tudes slain, he has been and is the most universally beloved and kindly
spoken of. The generation born since the close of the war know
little and those who are to come are not likely to know at all how
bitterly he was assailed during the war, not merely in the south, but
throughout the country. There is hardly an • opprobrious epithet
that was not applied to him, and few great crimes of which he was
not openly accused. He was called a thief, a robber, an embezzler
of the public money, a murderer and a gorilla ; indeed ! gorilla seemed
to many the word that most clearly expressed the speaker's idea of
the president's character. Those who spoke to the Democratic con-
vention in 1864 for the most part, observed parliamentary usage in
the choice of words, but those who harangued the multitude at street
corners, in the lobbies and parlors of hotels and before bars in saloons,
gave vent to the long pent-up feeling of their angry hearts. Among
the milder of these utterances were remarks by C. Chauncey Burr of
New Jersey, who said : "We had no right to burn their wheat fields,
steal their pianos or jewelry. Mr. Lincoln had stolen a good many
thousand negroes; but for every negro he had stolen ten thousand
spoons. * * * The South could not honorably lay down her
arms, for she was fighting for her honor. Two million men had
been sent down to the slaughter pens of the south and the army of
Lincoln could not again be filled, neither by enlistments nor conscrip-
tion."
Henry Clay Dean of Iowa said : "For over three years Lincoln
had been calling for men, and they had been given. But with all
the vast armies at his command, he had failed, failed, failed ! Such
a failure had never before been known. * * * ^^d still the
monster usurper wanted more men for his slaughter pens. * * *
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 37
Ever since tlie usurper, traitor and tyrant had occupied the presi-
dential chair, the Repubhcan party had shouted 'War to the knife
and the knife to the hilt.' Blood had flowed in torrents; and yet
the thirst of the old monster was not quenched. His cry was for
more blood."
The platform adopted by the convention contained among other
things the following: "Resolved, that this convention does explicitlv
declare, as the sense of the American people, that, after four years
of failure to restore the Union by the experiment of war, during
which under the pretense of a military necessity higher than the Con-
stitution, the Constitution itself has been disregarded in every part,
and public liberty and private right alike trodden down, and the
material prosperity of the country essentially impaired, justice, hu-
manity, liberty and the public welfare demand that efforts be made
for the cessation of hostilities, with a view to an ultimate convention
of all the states or other peaceable means to the end that at the
earliest practicable moment peace may be restored on the basis of
the Federal Union of the states."
There was published in Wisconsin during the war a newspaper
that acquired an inter-state reputation and circulation by the viru-
lence and savageness of its assaults upon Lincoln and his work. For
the most part the people of Chicago made no reply to the disloyal
utterance of those in attendance upon the convention. Chicago was
host, and guests are privileged persons; but when the trumpeting had
ceased and the guests were gone, the people of Chicago had some-
thing to say. Among those who spoke was Long John, as he was
familiarly known to everybody. John Wentworth had been repeat-
edly elected to Congress and mayor of the city. Lie is the man of
whom the story was first told that when he w^ent into the country to
speak, instead of having him stand upon a stump so that all the
audience could have a view of him, he was so tall that they dug a
hole for him to stand in, so that all might have a good look at his
face. Long John said, ''During the convention I met a man who said
to me that we could not destroy slavery because God would preserve
it." "Well," said Long John — no one who has not seen and heard
him can imagine the ugliness of the grin, the size of the mouth or
the stridencv of tone with which "Wei!" was uttered — "I said to him
38
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
that's right, leave it to God, and when a nigger runs away, let
him run till God takes him back."
In October,. 1 87 1, there occurred in Chicago a fire which in extent
of the devastated area, nmnber of people rendered homeless and
value of property destroyed, was the greatest that to that time had
afflicted man. The night following the twenty-four hours during
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View Northeast fkom Harrison and Clark Streets Over Burned District
which the fire, directed by the wind, moved steadily along, till it reached
a place where there was nothing to burn, one hundred thousand peo-
ple slept beneath the stars upon the uncovered prairie. The fire had
not ceased before relief organizations, far and near in city and vil-
lage, country and town, were organized and relief to the stricken
people was on its way. Nor was sympathetic action confined to this
country. There was hardly a city of importance in Europe from
which relief was not sent. By mail and by telegraph came sympa-
thetic messages and practical help.
"From underneath the severing wave
The World, full handed, reached to save."
To the suggestion that as their property had been destroyed, the
business obligations of Chicago debtors should be wiped out, the
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 39
merchants and manufacturers replied, no; we will perform our prom-
ises; there will be no repudiation. And so Chicago rose, not like
the fabled Phoenix out of its ashes, but out of its courage and its
integrity, which no fire could destroy.
Along in the seventies there was constructed on Monroe near
Market street, a large auditorium for the use of Moody and Sankey
as evangelists. Dwight L. Moody had been for some time a Metho-
dist minister preaching in Chicago. Ira D. Sankey was a singer
having a remarkably melodious voice, an enunciation so distinct that
every word he sang was understood by all within the great space
to which his tones extended. The multitude love to hear such sing-
ing and are profoundly moved by it. Moody was an eminently
earnest, practical Christian ; faith without works was of no conse-
quence to him. He said to the women who hung upon his words
and were enthusiastic over his mission : "Look to your homes and
your household duties first." "Don't come here until you have made
your home as pleasant and as comfortable as you can." "When all
you ought to do there is done, we shall be glad to see you here."
To the men who came forward expressing a desire to help in the
good work, he said : "You cannot be true to God unless you are true
to man. You must acknowledge your faults, confess your sins and
repent." "Repentance is of no consequence unless it is accompanied
by reparation as far as it is possible for you to make it." "If you
have cheated or defrauded any one. you must make him whole, put
back all that you have unjustly obtained." "All now, if you can; if
not all now, a portion and little by Httle until all is paid." "Nothing
is yours that you have improperly obtained from another." From
America, Moody and Sankey went to England, and in that country
met with the success and did good and blessed work like unto that
they had done in Chicago. Mr. Moody, when he first came to
Chicago, had charge of a small chapel located very near a Catholic
neighborhood. The windows of the chapel were broken and at-
tendants annoyed, Mr. Moody thought, by children of Catholic par-
ents. So Mr. Moody called upon the Catholic bishop, and telling
him of the trouble, asked if he would not use his inllucnce; the
bishop said he would, and that as he and Mr. Moody prayed to the
same God and were servants of the same Master, they could and
40 . CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
would pray that they and their parishioners dwell together in unity.
"Yes, yes," said Mr. Moody, "and no time like the present. Father,"
and down upon his knees he fell and together the Methodist clergyman
' and the Right Reverend Bishop prayed earnestly for the entrance of
Christ into the hearts of all men.
General Grant having been president from 1868 to 1876, after
the conclusion of his second term, went upon an excursion around the
world. He returned to this country in 1879. Prior to his home com-
ing a movement to make him in 1880 the Republican nominee for a
third term had begun. Conkling, the United States senator from
New York, Logan, senator from Illinois, and a senator from Penn-
sylvania, were most earnestly for the nomination of Grant. There
was for him a strong feeling in every state, and nowhere any per-
sonal hostility to him. The arguments made use of by those opposed
to his nomination were — the inadvisability of a third term for any
man, and the alleged baneful influence of those by whom he was most
closely in touch and most immediately surrounded. As to the nom-
ination, the divided opinion of Chicago resulted in the most vigorous
contest before or since waged in Illinois over the selection of dele-
gates to a convention to nominate presidential candidates. During
the afternoon upon which the primary election to select delegates to
the state convention which was to choose the delegates to the national
convention, was held, a violent thunder storm came on, amid which
long lines of Republicans stood in line in the streets waiting for their
turn to vote. A majority of the delegates chosen to the county con-
vention were opposed to the nomination of Grant. The minority
favorable to Grant was large enough to make the composition of the
convention doubtful if a number of delegates whose election was
disputed were denied admission. Vigorous contests were presented
to the convention when assembled. The first clash was over the
organization of the assemblage. A majority of the county central
committee, being opposed to the nomination of Grant, selected for the
temporary j^residing oflicer, Elliot Anthony, an old resident of Chi-
cago, afterwards judge of the superior court. To this the Grant
forces strenuously objected, and when Mr. Anthony went forward
to preside, the minority under the leadership of Lieut. Richard S.
CHICAGO AND COOK COUXTV 41
Tuthill, a gallant soldier of the Civil war, and a personal friend of
General Grant as well as of General Logan, left the hall, went to the
Palmer House and in its great parlor organized another convention,
which selected as delegates to the state convention some ninety persons,
all the county was entitled to ha\e. The convention from which the
Grant men hroke away selected an equal numher and thus a few days
later there were presented to the state convention at Springfield con-
testing delegations eipial in numbers, each insisting that its members
were alone entitled to act for the Republicans of Cook county. The
contest in the other counties of the state resulted in the election of
such a greater number of delegates favorable to Grant that the dele-
gation which should be admitted from Cook county could make a
majority favorable to or against him. There w'as at Springfield be-
fore the committee and the convention a vigorous contest. In the
convention Emory A. Storrs, a brilliant lawyer and orator, spoke
for the Grant men; Kirk Hawes, a lawyer, afterwards a judge of the
circuit court, represented the opposition ; with the result that the state
convention admitted of the supporters of General Grant a number
proportionate to the delegates which the Grant forces would without
contest have obtained from the Chicago convention, and did likewise
with the opposition to the general. The result being that while the
opposition to the nomination of General Grant had, in the state con-
vention, a majority of the delegates from Cook county. General
Grant had in the entire convention a majority of the delegates, thus
giving to such majority the power to select delegates to the national
convention, all of whom were favorable to the nomination of General
Grant, which was done.
The Republican national convention, which met in Chicago, se-
lected for its presiding officer Senator Hoar of Massachusetts, who.
amid the strenuous contest that followed, presided with such impar-
tiality and manifest fairness as to satisfy all parties. For the first
time in the history of the party, the convention was unable to finish
its business in one week. Senator Conkling in nominating General
Grant, delivered a great oration. Garfield in presenting the name of
Senator Sherman received well merited applause from everyone.
Grant and Blaine had together a large majority of the delegates, and
the friends of each were glad to show their regartl for Senator Slier-
42 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
man, each hoping that his supporters would eventuahy turn to the
candidate, the probabihty of whose nomination was much greater.
The prolongation of the convention into a second week gave
time for much consultation as to what could be and had best be done ;
the result being that in spite of the protests of James A. Garfield he
was nominated for president; the delegation from New York uniting
in putting forward for vice president Chester A. Arthur of that state,
Garfield and Arthur were nominated. General Grant was the soul
of loyalty, loyal to his country, to principle, to party and friends;
he did not seek a nomination, in fact, never sought either of those
under which he was elected. His friends put him forward for a
third term and he yielded to their importunities.
Following the explorations of Jean Nicollet in 1634 there were
within the following two hundred years civilized men, priests, en-
gineers, soldiers, hunters, traders and adventurers who visited the
western wild, sailed upon the great lakes, along the majestic rivers,
and looking upon the fertile prairies did not fail to recognize the
possibility that this vast domain would in time become the home of
millions and the seat of an empire the equal of any the world had
known. Of things material or spiritual man sees only those to
which his mind is open. To all else he is deaf and blind. The early
explorers saw a vast extent of most fertile land ready for the plow;
they realized that these lands could be made to furnish food for mil-
lions ; they were to them a most valuable agricultural domain ; there is
nothing tending to show that they thought of them as the future seat
of a manufacturing industry such as the world had never seen. They
do not seem to have observed indications of coal and if they had they
would not have realized their importance. Mineral coal was then
little used; the civilization of the world, since said to rest upon coal,
alcohol, sulphuric acid and iron, certainly did- not then rest upon a
quartette of which coal was one.
Chicago may have been and probably was regarded as a future
place of exchange, a halting spot for the boats, which, coming from
the east through the lakes, would by a short canal from the Chicago
to the DesPlaines river descend to the Gulf, and th'us might become
an important port in the exchange of commodities.
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 43
There is reason for thinking- that the pre-histnric inhabitants of
England found coal cropping out and made use of it to a small ex-
tent. Coal has been regularly mined in China for
Industrial „ -t^i /- 1 , ' ^ , .
Chicago '^°° years. 1 he Greeks knew of and made some
use of it two thousand years before the Christian
era. Theophratus, a contemporary of Aristotle, speaks of it
as being found in Liguria and Elis on the way to Olympias,
over the mountains. He called it "lithos anthrakas." In i_'59
a charter was granted to the freeman of New Castle to dig lor coal,
and thereafter coal was carried thence to London; from whence arose
the phrase descriptive of useless efifort — "Like carrying coals to New
Castle." Coal continued to be used for warming the houses and
cooking the food of London people. Yet when Marco Polo, the first
European who visited China, returned to Venice in 1292 and told
that in Cathay (China) a kind of black stone was found in the moun-
tains which the people dug out and which burned like wood, and
which the people preferred to wood because the stones burned better
and cost less, the Venetians for the most part did not believe him ;
and as they felt sure he lied about this they concluded that all the
tales he told of where he had been and what he had seen were ecjually
false; and so they were — one was as false as the other, no more so.
The steam engine could not have so revolutionized human intlustry
had it not been for the existence of mineral coal.
The development of the steam engine and the discovery of the
vast coal fields close to Chicago, have made it one of the greatest of
manufacturing centers. Many years ago the villager who trans-
formed cows into beef, pigs into pork, sheep into mutton, and sold
to his neighbors the transformed product was termed a butcher, yet
although his calling was thought to induce in him cruelty, his social
standing was the same as that of other tradesmen, he l)eing the ol)ject
of neither envy, malice nor contempt. Thus Archibald Clybourne.
a worthy man, in 1827 was the proprietor of a slaughter house in
Chicago, built for the killing of such cattle as were recpiired for
the garrison at the fort. The dawn of a higher station and a more
attractive name for this useful calling was in 1S32. when George
W. Dole "packed," mark you! — not butchered, killed or slaughtered —
but packed one hundred and fifty-two head of cattle for Oliver New-
berry of Detroit. Thus the record runs and only between the lines
44 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
do we infer that the cattle were killed before they were packed. The
packing business has grown — somehow everything in Chicago does
— even taxes mount upward. In 1907 there were received at the
Chicago stock yards 7,717,280 hogs; of these 6,092,159 were there
dressed or packed. The value of the hogs received was $102,918,041.
During the same year there were received 4,218,115 sheep; 3,305,314
cattle; the total value of hogs, horses and cattle received being $319,-
202,239. In 1905 there was employed in the business of slaughtering
and meat packing in Chicago the sum of $69,880,273 ; there were em-
ployed therein 22,391 persons. The Chicago Union Stock Yards
were opened for business in 1866; from then to the year 1908 the
value of stock received at these yards was $7,595,009,593.
And what of the packers by whom all this has been done? They
dwell in palaces upon the boulevards, have numberless automobiles
and steam yachts ; mansions in the country and cottages by the sea ;
their daughters are sought by the nobility ; ducal coronets and prince-
ly crowns are cast at their feet. They are munificent in their chari-
ties, bulwarks of financial institutions, devoted to civic improvement.
Their wealth is established by the fact that next to the Standard Oil
magnates and the railway kings they are as much envied, reviled and
maligned as any people in America.
In 1833 Ashael Pierce finished the long and tedious journey from
Vermont to Chicago. Being a native of the Green Mountain state,
Ashael had of course the strength and love of hard- work required of
a blacksmith. John G. Saxe said that Vermont was famous for four
things,
"Men and women, maple sugar and horses;
The first are strong, the last are fleet;
The second and third are sweet.
And all are uncommonly hard to beat."
Therefore young Mr. Pierce started to build a blacksmith shop.
There was a forest near, but no lumber, and our first Tubal Cain
had to go forty miles away, to Plainfield, now a part of Will county,
to obtain suitable lumber. He was an enterprising man and not afraid
to buy tools, build a shop, don his leather apron and launch away.
The ringing of his anvil attracted the attention of John T. Temple
& Co., and this firm employed him in January, 1834, to iron the first
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 45
stage that ran between Chicago and St. Louis. Reguhir conimunica-
tion was about to be opened up with a city founded in 1764, situated
at the confluence of the Mississippi and Missouri. Chicago had to
become acquainted with its neighbors. In that year we began to
manufacture plows, then known as the "Bull i'low." There are men
now living who can remember when nearly all the plows used by
farmers were made by country blacksmiths. Lifting our eyes above
the commercial side of the matter, there are to be seen social reasons
why it is to be regretted they are not so made today. But coming
back to earth and business, what is a "Bull Plow," or what was it
in Chicago in the spring of 1834? The board of education doubtless
sees that Chicago children are taught that a bull is the male of the
genus bos or of any large cattle; the children are doubtless also made
to understand that on the board of trade and the stock exchange a
bull is one who is endeavoring to raise the price of articles, and
that bull is the name of certain letters, edicts or briefs issued by the
Pope, but are they informed what kind of an article the first plow
made in Chicago was?
In 1835 David Bradley came here and worked for Wm. H. Stow
in the building of a foundry, and so in the years 1832 to the panic
of 1837, numerous manufacturing establishments were erected. Chi-
cago had in 1837 what those whose business depends upon the flow
of water call a set-back ; a set-back being, among river men, a dam-
ming up, a stoppage of the usual flow, so that the water sets back,
accumulates on low lands. The demand for manufactured products
of Chicago as well as for town lots fell off in 1837, but the growth
of Chicago, checked for a brief space, soon went on.
In 1905 there were in Chicago 8,159 manufacturing establish-
ments, making use of capital to the extent of $637,743,474, employ-
ing 241,984 persons, to whom there was yearly paid the sum of
$136,404,696.
In 1833 Ashael Pierce had to go forty miles to get lumber to
build a blacksmith's shop in Chicago. In 1907 there were received
in Chicago 2,479,458,000 feet of lumber and 2,362,856,000 were
shipped away. How the market has changed !
46 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
The real history of a people is that of their progressive thinking,
the development of opinion, the sentiments by which they have been
moved, the soul manifested by their deeds.
Some frontier towns were long known as drinking, gambling,
fighting places. Chicago never was; not but that it had evil resorts
and bad men, but from the period of its first organization as a mu-
nicipality, it has substantially always been under the influence and
control of the honest, peaceable, sober, industrious and orderly por-
tion of its inhabitants. Its religious institutions have been many,
and its religious people active in every good work. As to what was
wisest and best, and as to what now is, there have been and are
widely variant opinions ; nevertheless there has been working for
the same end, an uplifting spirit, a feeling that the great, the en-
during triumphs of nations and people are in the realm of spiritual
aspiration.
Chicago has been not so much a center to which religious in-
fluences converged as a center from which religious influence has
gone out. Chicago was discovered, made known
-r to mankind by a religious man ; an exalted soul,
Influence. i i , , . . ' ,,.,.'
supremely devoted to proclannmg the glad tidmgs
of a risen Saviour, through whom all might become partakers of a
great salvation, enter into an eternity of rest and a peace that passeth
understanding.
Not to obtain lands, not to gain wealth, not that he might be
remembered as a discoverer of new countries and strange peoples, not
as a seeker after knowledge came the good Marquette, in whose jour-
nal is preserved a record of the first ordained function known to
have been performed in the territory now included in -this city. Not
as a ceremonial dedicating the waters and fields around to the ex-
alted purpose they have since served; not with thought of the lofty
structures in time here to stand and the millions here to dwell, did
the good father say the Conception Mass; but in truth this simple
ceremonial in a little hut on a winter's day in 1674 reached the throne
of the infinite and dedicated this spot to God as truly as if the Pope,
foreseeing what has come, had in the presence of all the hierarchy
of the Catholic church, amid salvos of artillery, the solemn peal of
the organ and the voices of St. Peter's choir, proclaimed this spot
consecrate to the Most High.
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 47
It is quite true that the faith of the cliildren is not that of the
fathers; that in 1908 reh'gious teaching is not couched in the lan-
guage of 1836. Churches arise and fall; creeds come and go; re-
ligion remains. Man loves many things; he does not worship that
which he completely understands, fully comprehends. Thunder is
no longer to us the voice of God, because we know whence it cometh
and what it is. From the cradle to the grave we are encompassed
by the unknown and the mysterious. The increase of knowledge, so
far as making us acquainted with, revealing all things, has enlarged
the bounds, deepened our comprehension of the realm concerning
which we know nothing. Of not a single atom of the universe have
we complete and definite knowledge. Neither Lord Kelvin, the
greatest scientist of the nineteenth century, nor any other man. has
solved the riddle of matter or of existence, material or spiritual.
Every attainment of knowledge opens our eyes to the vastness of that
concerning which we know nothing. Nothing is more obvious than the
apparent rising of the sun in the east, its passage along the sky and
setting in the west. This daily perception of mankind from the be-
ginning of time having been proved to be erroneous, upon what ob-
servation of our senses can we absolutely rely? Is death a reality
or an appearance? Upon what ground do. scientists proclaim that
death is an eternal blotting out of the conscious, willing, loving soul?
By what evidence do they limit spiritual existence to the conditions
under which it is manifested here? The worm that lives in the
earth and cannot endure the light of day has reason to think life
with exposure to the fierce rays of the sun an impossibility. In the
centuries immediately preceding the birth of Christ, faith in the
long-accepted religious belief of Greece and Rome had been pro-
foundly shaken. An age of skepticism arose, of which cities were
the centers. Groves ceased to have their divinities. Rivers and
springs were no longer the abode of spiritual beings possessed of su-
pernatural power; but men did not cease to be religious beings. The
heathen (countrymen) and the villagers (pagans) became Chris-
tians. The faith of men was changed; the religious instinct was not
destroyed nor the desire for communion with the source of life
ended. In trouble and in joy, in sunshine and darkness, with hope
and fear, men looked to forces they did not understand, powers they
could not control, praying for guidance and help — and these they
48 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
found; not, perhaps, as they hoped and prayed; but guidance and
help to better things. A general of the Civil war, noted for his
roughness and his profanity in dealing with subordinates, being taken
to task for this, said : "1 know it is all wrong, indecent, horrible,
but I can't help it. I deserve to be killed for it and I expect I will
be; but do you know? — profane and vile as I am, I never close my
eyes to sleep without reciting a little prayer my mother taught me."
The religious influence of Chicago is neither stayed nor dimin-
ished ; it has sought new channels and its activity finds outlet in ways
once not thought of.
The effort to spread the Gospel, make known Christian truth,
necessarily changes with the conditions of life. The impulse by
which man is moved, the thought dominant in his mind, the dreams
he has in youth and the determined purpose of maturer years vary
from generation to generation. There were centuries in which
Europe, impelled by an overmastering passion, moved mighty armies
to the East in an attempt to rescue the Holy Sepulcher from the
grasp of the infidel.
Six hundred years ago the Crusades came to an end. The Chris-
tian world has today but to stretch forth its hand to possess that for
which millions died in vain. Today Europe is indifferent to the rule
of the Mohammedan at Jerusalem. Is Christian faith less earnest
and Christian zeal less strong than it was a thousand years ago?
Not so. We have learned that Christianity abideth not in lands
nor dwelleth in the mountains of Galilee, but in the hearts of men.
The possession it now seeks is dominion over the soul. To this end
it adapts its methods to the varying conditions of mankind. In an
age when everyone can read and the question is not how can books
to read be obtained, but how shall a wise selection be made, and
how, in the multitude of teachers, the variety of entertainments and
the eager solicitation of those who seek only their own gain, shall
young and old, maidens and matrons, boys and graybeards be led
into paths of pleasantness and peace. This is a problem presented
in what we are pleased to call the intellectual age. In New England,
a century ago, everyone went to church. How much wiser and bet-
ter they were than the toilers of today ! Let us not be too sure about
this. Really, they had no other place to go. It is, perhaps, to be
deplored, but the truth is, the idea that salvation cannot be obtained
CIITCACO AX I) COOK COUXTV 49
outside the structure we call the House of flixl is not in the atmos-
phere of most of the places where men now live and toil. The
modern spirit therefore says. "If, unfortunately, there be those who
will or do not go to church antl there hear what Christianity is. let
us take Christianity to a place where they will go." This is what
has been done in Chicago. In 1858 the Young Men's Christian As-
sociation of Chicago was organized. It was useful and helpful from
the first. It endeavors to let it be known throughout the United
States and British America, that any young man contemplating com-
ing to Chicago will, upon application, be by its agents directed to
respectable places where he can obtain room and board. He will
find pleasant reading rooms in which to pass such leisure time as he
has; pleasant surroundings, good companionship; an opportunity to
study and to learn, which he may not have had ere he came here.
He will find sympathetic friends, people capable of giving good ad-
vice, who take an interest in his welfare and wish to see him succeed.
He will not be neglected nor alone in a great city. He will have an
opportunity to be at all leisure hours in a place where his father and
his mother would be glad to see him. He will, without bitter expe-
rience, learn how to avoid the perils and the pitfalls of a metropolis.
He will, if he desires, be made acquainted with members of any
church in the city. He will be left in freedom. Liberty is essential
to progress, and he will be shown how to make use of the liberty he
has.
The association has now four buildings and property valued at
over $2,000,000. It obtains from subscriptions an annual income of
over $100,000, all of which is devoted to the work above described.
Chicago is young, strong, vigorous; the pulsations of life are in
every fibre of her ])eing; she is ambitious, reaching out not for worlds
to concjuer, men to enslave or trample on ; but for people to help,
communities with which to make fair exchange of things she has to
sell, for goods they desire to dispose of. She understands that pros-
perity of buyer and seller is essential to the welfare of each, that in
the earth there is no toiler wdiose life and whose work may not and
ought not to be beneficial to all; that the day when the life of any
nation can depend upon or be helped by devastating armies and de-
stroying fleets if not already al an end. is speedily passing; that the
aim of men and nations should now. and assuredly in time will be. to
Vol. 1—4.
50 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
help all, the despised black, the ignorant savage, the timid bushmeii
and the proud, imperious, conquering Caucasian.
In so far as the age of chivalry was an age of war in which the
highest aim of man was to fit himself for knightly deeds of battle,
Chicago is not chivalric, but, inasmuch as by chivalry is meant truth,
honor, courtesy, gentleness to the weak, forbearance under provoca-
tion and courage to stand for right, Chicago is chivalric; her spirit
. is that of justice and helpfulness to all.
Will Chicago endure? The laws of nature fix a period beyond
which man cannot hope to live, but there is no law natural or human
which so much as suggests when a city will die. This is a utilitarian
age; we are striving to find and to preserve the useful. So long as
that purpose rules and Chicago continues to be useful it will endure.
Usefulness, so far as the existence of cities is concerned, is deter-
mined by the judgment of mankind. If the consensus of opinion
shall come to be that the highest end and aim of nations is to build
and maintain the largest and most destructive ships of war, in those
halcyon days Chicago cannot rival New York.
Rev. Isaac McCoy, a Baptist minister, appears to have on October
9, 1825, through the kindness of Dr. Wolcott, preached the first ser-
mon delivered in English in Chicago. In 1825 Rev. Isaac Scarritt,
on a Sabbath day at the house of a Mr. Miller, delivered a discourse.
The Rev. Mr. Scarritt seems to have sent word to the lieutenant at
the fort that if it were his wish he would preach to the soldiers and
others at such place as the lieutenant might appoint, to which the
lieutenant replied that he should not forbid the preaching nor would
he make arrangements for it. Whereupon the minister declined
going "to the garrison" and made an appointment for preaching at
Mr. Miller's. The lieutenant would seem to have been David 'Hun-
ter, afterwards general of the United States army.
In 1833 there were three church organizations in Chicago; Cath-
olic, Presbyterian and Baptist. Chicago was then a portion of the
territory under the spiritual administration of the reverend bishop
of Bardstown, Kentucky, who, having granted to the bishop of St.
Louis power so to do, the latter, April 17, 1833, deputed Mr. John
Irenaeus St. Cyr priest to the mission of Chicago and adjoining
region within the state of Illinois.
CTITCAGO AXD COOK COUNTY 51
Today there are in Chicago over a thousand churclics represent-
ing many denominations, numerous faiths, (hvers heUefs and creeds;
yet dwelHng in liarmony and earnestly striving to make mankind
happier and better. Denominationally, the numbers run from over
250 Roman Catholic to one Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day
Saints, one Dunkard Brethren, with many Methodist. Presbyterian,
Baptist, Congregational, Episcopalian, Lutheran. Spiritualists, Chris-
tian Science, New Jerusalem, more than fifty Jewish, three Greek
and others, as well as a great number called Reformed, Free or Inde-
pendent; indeed, Freedom, Independence and Reformation seem to
have a strong hold upon worshipers in Chicago .
The eleven hundred congregations concerning many of whom,
reading the record of four centuries past, it mighj; well be said :
"These are they which came out of great tribulation." live in one city
portraying the Scripture which saith : "Behold how pleasant it is
for brethren to dwell together in peace." They have a common pur-
pose and seek a common end, the uplifting and salvation of mankind.
Man is a social being, indeed ; the animal creation out of which he
has been evolved is largely social, covets society, feeds in herds;
by multitudes wanders over earth and sea, finding in companionship
not only pleasure but opportunity to obtain food. Chicago is in no
sense typical of the huge marsupials of primitive time. Chicago is
quick in conclusion, rapid in action, looks upon the unsalted sea and
builds upon the rocks beneath its strand. Those who go away from
their native habitat to live in a new home feel the need of compan-
ionship. Chicago is the resting place, the home of wanderers; its
people are. therefore, eminently social. Inhere are now here more
than three thousand social societies having a recorded existence and
home. As their number is legion, so are their various names. None
existing by forced contribution, all living upon voluntary donations,
they must give comfort and be useful to a mighty host, else they
would not be. The titles they bear are seldom an index to the work
they do. Catholic is defined by lexicographers as "one who accepts
the creeds wdiich are received in common by all parts of the orthodox
Christian church." And forester is said to be "one who lives in a
forest; one who has charge of the growing limber on an estate, an
ofificer appointed to watch a forest and preserve the game." It is
52 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
easy to see that the Cathohc Order of Foresters answers to the defi-
nition of CathoHc, but surely the uninitiated and unadmitted world
knows that the Chicag-o members of the order do
^ "^ ^ ~ not dwell in a forest and it sees no reason for think-
ing they have charge of growing timber or pre-
serve game. To the outside world they seem to be very good
people who meet in a spirit of fraternity and together conduct
a mutual insurance organization. Nor, so far as those who- have
not the password can see, do Masonic lodges lay brick or mix
mortar. "Odd Fellows" are seemingly as even as other men,,
while "Modern Woodmen" deal in iron, crockery, dry and wet goods,
buy and sell almost everything but wood. The names of the societies
mentioned are framed from words in common use. If titles so made
up are no indication of the "work" done, or purpose in view, what
shall we conclude is the work of "The Improved Order of Red Men?"
The American Indian is commonly spoken of as "the red man." Is
the "improved order" a society of cultivated "red Indians?" What
are we to think as to the history, character and purpose of "the An-
cient Arabic Order of the Nobles of the Mystic Shrine?" Is not
every American a nobleman ? Do we not all delight in mystery ? Do
we not revere the ancient and is there not enshrined in our hearts
a love of the beautiful, especially if it come in the shape of a lovely
woman? Does the position of such sentiments qualify us for admis-
sion to the "Mystic Shrine?" In what respect does a "Knight of
Equity" differ from a solicitor in chancery? And a "Knight of
Honor," is he more than a valiant soldier who fights for his country?
"The Ancient Order of Hibernians," what do they do that entitles
them to be called "ancient?" Are not all Irishmen ever young and
courageous, possessed of the generosity and ardor of youth? An
Irishman, like a lawyer, works hard, lives well and dies poor. He
may be wrinkled and gray, but he is not ancient. No more old than
the babbling of brooks, the singing of birds or a lover's lute. Alas !
Irishmen sometimes die, but they meet death with faith in their
hearts, peace in their souls, and a smile on their lips.
And why "Blue Lodges of Colored Masons?" Blue has a mel-
ancholy significance. A poet once sighed "for a lodge in some vast
wilderness," but he did not ask to have it blue. As a color, blue is
most attractively placed in the eye of a sweet young girl of sixteen;
CHICAGO AXl) COOK COUNT V 33
there it is irresistible; but for the decoration of a lodge or any
sleeping apartment it is out of place. What is the "Mystic Order of
the Sacred Twelve?" riicre were twelve disciples; there are twelve
months, it is said a dun-decimal system of ncjtation would be much
superior to the decimal. Does this order keep tab on the twelve
hours into which day is divided? Has it anything to do with twelfth
night or twelfth cake or the arms from which arose the saying that
"each English archer carries twelve Scotchmen under his girdle,"
or the twelve tables of the Roman law? Finally, not that by any
means incomprehensible titles are exhausted, but because time and
tide not only do not wait for any man, but will not tarry for an ex-
planation of names; what is the solemn business of the "Ancient and
Honorable Order of the Blue Goose?" Rome is said to have been
warned and saved by the cackling of geese from a night attack of
a hostile force; therefore geese, called sacred, were kept in one of
the temples of the city. Goose eating at Michaelmas was once com-
mon. There is a tradition that Queen Elizabeth on her way to Til-
bury Eort, having eaten of goose, gave as a toast "destruction to
the Spanish Armada," that hardly had she spoken, than a messenger
arrived announcing the destruction of the fleet by a storm. Where-
upon the queen called for a bumper saying, "henceforth shall a
goose commemorate this great victory." There are many stories
and many epigrams which turn upon the goose, some of which may
have caused the existence in Chicago of the "Ancient and Honorable
Order of the Blue Goose."
Of these three thousand social organizations more than three-
fourths are not only based upon religious faith and teaching, but a
portion of the time of each regular meetmg is devoted to religious
exercises.
Chicago has two of the largest universities in America, the North-
western and the Chicago, the attendance of students at these and
other colleges in the city being over ten thousand. It has five theo-
logical seminaries, the students of which number one thousand. It
has. besides the libraries of the universities, that of the Institute of
Technology, as well as those of the theological, medical, law. dental,
scientific, engineering and other schools; three of the largest public
libraries in the United States. The oppi.rtum'ty here afforded for
54 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
the study of music and the fine arts is equal, if not superior to that of
any other city in America. Chicago has numerous orchestras, one
of which, the Theodore Thomas, is conceded to rank with any in the
world.
From 1852 to 1861 the New York Tribune was undoubtedly,
politically, the most influential journal in the United States. Its
utterances upon the subject of slavery carried conviction to the hearts
of millions ; it spoke upon these topics not with the voice of authority,
but as if an inspired prophet had arisen crying "Prepare ye the way
of the Lord; make His paths straight." From 1880 to the present
time the public press of Chicago has, in political matters, been the
most potent of any in this country.
At the time of the greenback craze in 1876 there was not great
danger that the country would be carried away by it. The distinc-
tion between coin and a paper currency, not at all
-r -r^ ^ times promptly redeemed on demand, was one of
In Jtolitics. .
which the country had large experience. But the
movement to retain the practice inaugurated in the administration
of Washington, followed certainly until 1853 and, so far as the
statute spoke, until 1873, was one which appealed to the com-
mon man, especially as the change of the statute in 1873, by
which silver money was made a legal tender for only small sums,
attracted in 1873 neither attention nor discussion among debtors or
creditors, in financial circles, among politicians or throughout the
country, because it was not then thought to be a measure of great
importance. As a consequence the great majority of the people, if
in 1873 t^^y ^^^*^ o^ heard of the change in the statute, forgot all
about it, and when, by the development of silver mining and the
comparatively enormous production of silver, it declined in price so
greatly that the silver dollar was salable in the markets of the world
for from sixty to seventy cents only, the statement was made and
believed by multitudes that the money kings had, in 1873, brought
about a surreptitious demonetization of silver for the purpose of in-
creasing the relative value of money, adding to the wealth of the cred-
itor and increasing the burdens of the debtor class. Creditors are never
popular at the hustings, before juries, in novels or with the people.
Creditors are few, debtors many. Besides, reasoned the people, why
should the practice of nearly a century have been changed without
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 55
discussion or a popular demand? That from the beginning of the
government up to the year 1873 there had been coined only 1,439,437
standard silver dollars, and that by act of Congress such coinage had
ceased in 1853 without noticeable effect upon the price of gold, silver
or any other article, was not in the hot passion of the time generally
considered or understood.
July 14, 1890, Congress, by a law known as the Sherman act,
repealed the law known as the Silver act of 1873, and the secretary of
the treasury was ordered to purchase at the market j>rice each month
four and a half million ounces of silver bullion and to issue treasury
notes of the United States in payment therefor. For a month or
two after the passage of the act, the price of silver bullion advanced
rapidly and in August, 1890, was worth in the market $1.21 per
ounce. After September a decline set in which continued until Janu-
ary, 1 89 1, when silver bullion was salable at about one dollar per
ounce. The decline continued and by the close of the year 1892 the
price had gone as low as eighty-five cents per ounce. June 26, 1893,
the authorities of India closed the mints of that empire to the free coin-
age of silver. The signs of a financial panic in this country appeared
and President Cleveland called an extra session of Congress to take into
consideration, as he said, the "perilous condition in business circles —
largely the result of a financial policy embodied in unwise laws which
must be executed until repealed by Congress." November i, 1893,
in accordance with the president's recommendation, the Sherman act
was repealed. As a consequence from thence until after the presi-
dential election of 1896, national politics turned largely upon the
question of the single or gold standard as distinguished from the
double or gold and silver standard.
The situation was for the government, for business and for the
people, the most serious presented since the close of the Civil war.
India, Japan, Mexico, and other countries were contemplating an
adoption of the gold standard and consequently having great quanti-
ties of silver to dispose of. The proposal that every person might
go to the United States mint and there have all the silver he brought
transformed, freely coined, into standard silver dollars, made a legal
tender for all debts, public and private, without reference to whether
the 412 grains of silver put into the dollar could be bought in the
markets of the world for fifty or seventy cents, seemed to those op-
56 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
posed to such free coinage a measure fraught with disaster not only
to our monetary system, but to ah pubhc and private business. On
the other hand it was urged that the free coinage of silver would
not only increase wages but the price of corn, cotton, beef and all
farm and manufactured products; that the business depression then
existing would disappear and prosperity come to all save the con-
spiring money kings, some of whose ill-gotten gains would be re-
turned to the people.
The issue made in the campaign of i860 was largely sentimental,
involving the fundamental rights of man. The issue in 1896 was
one of conceived self-interest, but the changes and counter changes
of the campaign made it, in the judgment of millions, a struggle
against fraud and iniquity, a battle to throw off the tyrannical chain
of a single, the gold scandard, for measuring values. This thought
was most graphically expressed by Bryan in the speech delivered by
him at the national Democratic convention held in Chicago in the
summer of 1896.
Upon other things Mr. Bryan said : 'T come to speak to you in
defense of a cause as holy as the cause of liberty — the cause of hu
manity. In this contest brother has been arrayed against brother,
father against son. The warmest ties of love, acquaintance and asso-
ciation have been disregarded. We are fighting in defense of our
homes, our families, and posterity. We have petitioned and our
petitions have been scorned; we have entreated and our entreaties
have been disregarded ; we have begged, and they have mocked when
our calamity came. We beg no longer; we entreat no more, we pe-
tition no more. We defy them.
"My friends, the question we are to decide is upon which side will
the Democratic party fight; upon the side of the idle holders of idle
capital, or upon the side of the struggling masses?
"Having behind us the commercial interests, the laboring inter-
ests, and the toilers everywhere, we shall answer the demand for a
gold standard by saying to them : 'You shall not press upon the brow
of labor this crown of thorns; you shall not crucify mankind upon
a cross of gold.' "
Throughout the convention the forty-eight votes of Illinois,
through the influence of Governor Altgeld, of Chicago, were stead-
ily given for Bryan, who was nominated upon the fifth ballot. That
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 57
the platform was in direct opposition to the views of Grover Clove-
land, then president of the United States, he having- been, as the
nominee of the Democratic party, elected to that office in 1892, was
well known.
The Republican conventitjn met at St. Louis, July 16. That
McKinley would have a majority of the convention and be nominated
for president was assured before the convention met ; the only con-
test, therefore, was as to the position to be taken upon the monev
question. The platform adopted after much discussion was plainly in
favor of the gold standard. When it was evident that such action
would be taken, Henry M. Teller, who for twenty years had been
a Republican senator from the state of Colorado, in part said : *T
contend for silver because I believe there can -be no proper financial
system in any country that does not recognize this principle of bimetal-
ism. I contend for it because in this year of 1896 the American
people are in greater distress than they ever were in their history.
I contend for it because I believe the civilization of the world is to
be determined by the rightful or wrongful solution of this financial
question." The platform with its declaration in favor of the single
gold standard having been adopted, Senator Teller and the delegates
acting with him retired from the convention and thereafter supported
the nominees of the Democratic party.
Each platform was creditable to the convention by which it was
made. Each fairly stated the issue, and voters were not misled by
declarations designed to curry favor with all by misleading some.
Chicago, lying midway between the Atlantic cities, wherein the
^oanable capital of the country was more largely held, and the Rocky
Mountain region, in which were situated nearly all the great silver-
producing mines, was eminently debatable territory and each ])art\
made strenuous efforts to control the influence that should go out
from the metropolis of the northwest.
The Democrats brought into the city great numbers of speakers
accustomed to address audiences of a few hundred persons, to go
among the people, talk individually with as many as possible and by
personal converse, force conviction upon voters. The Republicans
brought here substantially all the orators of national reputation
friendly to the gold standard. The influence of Chicago was strongly
for the i?"ol(l standard.
58 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY '
The vote of Cook county in 1892 had been Republican, Harrison,
111,254; Democratic, Cleveland, 144,604.
In 1896 the vote was Republican, McKinley, 221,893; Demo-
cratic, Bryan, 151,910.
The slowly-turning wheels of the prairie schooner have ceased
to bend down the verdant grass of Illinois. The white-covered wagon
of the immigrant is seen no more; the home seekers rest, some in
beautiful habitations they reared and hold as the fruit of much toil;
some beneath the sod they looked upon when sixty years agone they
journeyed westward, seeking lands to own, till, improve, enjoy and
hand down to descendants then unborn. Counted by the years of
geologic time man is new to earth; only in recent ages have his foot-
steps marked the soil or his hand marred the forest. Robinson Cru-
soe, when he beheld in the sand the print of a human foot not his
own, knew that to the lonely isle upon which he had been cast, an-
other man had come, another, kin to him, a voiceful creature to
whom he could speak, perhaps with whom he must fight; for from
bitter experience of an unmeasured past the human has inherited an
apprehension, a feap of, often an aversion. to his kin, the man whose
hei"ght, complexion, speech, manners are strange to him; and the
unknown competitor or undesired presence he slays or flees from.
The fruit of the dragon's teeth sown by Kadmos instinctively seeks
to kill. Only by association with woman has man been tamed,
through her love has been begotten and men taught to dwell together
in peace. Barbarian hordes seeking for lands have usually slain a
great portion of those they found in possession and enslaved most of
the rest.
Perhaps not so ruthlessly expressed but in effect the creed of
nomadic land-seekers has often been like that of Jenghiz Khan, "to
sweep away cities as haunts of slaves and luxury that his herds might
freely feed upon grass whose green was free from dusty feet." The
homeseekers, who increased not the fertility but the fruitfulness of
the prairies a hundredfold, were not a horde nor were they barbar-
ians. They would gladly have made the lives of the Indians a
thousand times nobler and happier, if the Inidans had been willing
to be taught. There yet remain for homeseekers vast tracts of fruit-
ful soil in North and South America, some likewise in islands of the
TBI WEW TORI
PUBLIC UBRART
AITOR, LIMOI AW»
â– IW
OLD POST-OFFICE
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
59
sea. A good deal is being done to increase the area of cultivable
land by the drainage of swamps, the irrigation of barren tracts,
reclamation of deserts, the preservation of forests and an increase of
the fertility of soils long made use of. Of all the money now being
expended by governments, none is more wisely or will prove to have
been more profitably expended than that laid out in adding to the
area and fertility of the habitable regions of the earth. Fleets and
armies do not make flowers blossom, fruits ripen or fields to bring
forth some forty, some sixty and some an hundredfold. The onward
sweep of drifting sands overwhelming fruitful lands has never been
arrested by thunder of cannon or charges of cavalry. Not all the
armed fleets that reddened the sea at Salamis and Trafalgar or
stirred the mighty deep at Santiago and Tsushima have made fertile
soil of one desert acre or redeemed and made fit for habitation of
man one rood of miasmatic swamp.
Up to a century ago the chief occupation of man might well have
been said to be to prepare for and carry on war. The most universally
approved of political maxims was 'Tn time of
T^ peace prepare for war." The duty of loving: one's
Knowledge. ^ ^ ^ , . .,,.,..
country was correlative with that of hating its
enemies. The retired English naval officer who, too infirm to
longer sail the sea, took great delight in killing flies because
they reminded him of Frenchmen, was, a century ago, typi-
cal of much national feeling. We are yet under the spell of the
inherited suspicion of and aversion to the stranger. 'Twas only yes-
terday that we began to become acquainted with the world, to know
mankind. There are now eacli" year more globe trotters, people who
travel for pleasure, than there were in the hundred centuries that
preceded the nineteenth. Having met the Frenchman in his vine-
yard, the German at his beer garden, the Englishman in his shop,
and the Arabian in the desert, we know by ocular inspection that they
breathe, move, and act very much as we do. They did not carry us
to a dungeon or hurl us into the sea. They sold us goods and seemed
pleased to do so. That mighty lever, the Press, not only moves the
world, but kicks its component parts into obedience to its behests and
association with each other. Today every ten-year-old school boy
knows more about the different peoples that make what we call man-
kind than anybody did two hundred years ago. In tlie fourteenth cen-
6o CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
tury the most learned geographers of the eastern hemisphere knew as
Httle of the western as we do of that which is upon the reverse side of
the moon. Today by the hand of the omnipercipient, omniscient and
omnipotent Press, there is laid upon our table each morning news of
every sensational and important thing that within twenty-four hours
has happened, not only in Chicago, New York, Washington, Havana,
Manila, Buenos Ayres, Paris, Tokio, London, Berlin and Rome, but
in the Hindu Kush, Alaska, Australia, Algiers, Bankok, Caucasia,
Chhindwara, Civita Castellana, Faizabad, Gottingen, Kandahar, Mo-
rocco, New Zealand and Nicaraugua. The reader will be likely to
have his attention called to the fact that the daughter of his neighbor
is to take a trip to Kalamazoo, also that the alderman of the 'steenth
ward has been sent to Kankakee ; the president has caught a black bass
weighing twelve pounds; Gans is out of condition and cannot fight;
the pitcher of the Cubs has sprained his ankle and cannot pitch, and
that the bull dog of the Duke of Westmoreland has taken a prize
and also bitten the Count of Graffenburgh. By virtue of the
omnipresent Press, every man is made acquainted with and conse-
quently interested in each. Our knowledge is thus increased and our
sympathy extended. The ends of the earth are coming to know more
of and despise each other less.
When English has became the universal language and the speech
of no man is a jargon tO' any; when no race and no people can think
they have a monopoly of culture; when the merits and demerits of
all are understood, a leader of a great party in a great nation will not,
as a representative of the people, say these laws which as you urge
tend to enslavement, "were not made for foreigners but for negroes."
The feeling out of which has grown the unwillingness to act justly,
the denial to others of rights claimed for ourselves, the assumed su-
periority of our ways and our civilization over those of the stranger
is passing away. When, under the influence of a better understand-
ing, the character of all has been changed and the moral status of
each raised, it will not be necessary that our frontier bristle with
cannon and our harbors be surrounded by ships of war.
The true spirit of Chicago for freedom and justice to all will in
time prevail throughout the world. The Press, Commerce and Asso-
ciation are mightily helping to bring this about ; not, perhaps, because
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 6i
they wish so to do, but because they cannot help it. None now hving
may remain to see the day, but it will come and Chicago will continue
to be a factor in establishing the reign of peace, good will and equal-
ity of all before the law. It was an American poet who wrote :
"Then brother man fold lo thy lieart tliy brotlier,
For where love dwells, the peace of God is there;
To worship rightly is to love each other;
Each smile a hymn, each kindly deed a prayer."
Something over a century ago the philosophy of evolution began to
be promulgated in Europe. With this philosophy the name of Dar-.
win is most intimately associated. Darwin did not claim to have first
taught the new thought — indeed, no one man can with truth be said
to have first called attention to the evolutionary method by which the
earth, men, animals and plants have arisen, been transformed, passed
away and succeeded by those now here, under natural laws of
birth, growth, transformation and decay applicable to all earthly
and material existence. It is now generally conceded that not only
has there been an evolution of plants and animals but that opinions,
ideas and civilizations have arisen and been transformed in accord-
ance with natural and spiritual laws. It is not conceded that the
natural or spiritual laws now existing are the result of evolution.
Civilization has arisen out of barbarism. The savage state was and,
where now existing, largely is communal, socialistic. With the ex-
ception of a little personal clothing, a few weapons and rude imple-
ments, the savage has no individual property. The occupancy and
possession of huts, lands, boats, etc., are in common. There are
neither employers nor employed, masters nor servants, rulers nor
ruled except as strength at the moment of contest determines and
except as the exigencies of war may have created leaders and, as a
result of combat, men have been enslaved. Progress upward has
always been coincident with a recognition of private ownership, of
property in lands, cattle, houses, fruits, crops, utensils, tools, money
and incorporeal things, such as patents, copyrights, heirships, dower,
homesteads; a right to order, to have neighborhoods quiet and or-
derly as well as to the enjoyment of many other things deemed con-
ducive to good order, happiness and freedom. No state of society,
no form of social order, no kind of government has given complete
satisfaction and none ever will. Man is an imperfect being, toiling
62 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
with imperfect hands, seeing with imperfect eyes, hearing with im-
perfect ears, remembering and reasoning with an imperfect brain.
All that he does partakes of his imperfection. Disappointed in his
endeavors, weary with effort that fails of the success hoped for, men
in all ages have sought to find peace in withdrawal from the strife
of life. To this end there have existed for thousands of years and
stih exist great numbers of communal societies in which such prop-
erty as the commune has belongs equally to all and no person has ex-
clusively anything, save the mere clothing he wears and makes use
of. Communal societies, the membership of which has been care-
fully selected and wherein there is complete separation of the sexes
or the membership is composed of persons past the child-bearing and
child-begetting age, have existed in the old world for thousands of
years, were existent in Mexico and probably in South America at the
advent of the Spaniards, and have been doing good work in the
United States and Canada for two centuries. With a carefully-
selected membership living under the conditions before mentioned,
with rules of conduct, generally cheerfully obeyed and always en-
forced, these organizations have brought peace, happiness, freedom
from want, pleasant companionship, home and contentment to in-
numerable souls. Into some one of the thousands of these beneficent
societies any person of good habits and character, in fair health, able
to make him or herself useful, willing to work and obey the rules of
the order can obtain admission. If any such person, content to sink
his or her individuality, desires to lead a life entirely social in which
all that is done is for the benefit of and to serve the purpose of the
commune, he or she can do so. The socialism of which this genera-
tion hears so much, out of which so much advertising and glory is
obtained, is not of the kind above described. The effort of today
is not to give opportunity to those who wish to lead a socialistic life,
but to destroy individual effort for individual success and to compel
all to enter the commune. By means of bolts and bars, by the aid
of soldiers and policemen, sheriffs and baihffs we are all to be driven
into the socialistic life. Of course all this is not to be accomplished
at once, but as much as possible, to this end, is to be set in motion to-
day and the remainder is to follow as speedily as conditions permit.
It was once the case that all roads led to Rome. Today all ideas
come to Chicago. Thus we have in this city all grades of opinion,
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 63
all kinds of theories as to government, society, morals, business, prop-
erty and religion. The metropolis of the Northwest is considered
fruitful soil for the growth of all theories. Naturally, the doctrine
that all law is tyranny, capital an oppression, individual property
robbery, governmental restraint of personal will to do what it
pleases, a form of slavery, and that it is the duty of freemen to rise
and overturn the effete theory and practice of the present, came to
Chicago. Anarchistic societies were organized and the propagation
of an anarchistic creed undertaken by which oppression was to be
ended and a new reign created under which there would be neither
pain nor poverty, ungratified desire nor unsatisfied longing.
Anarchistic newspapers came into being and great quantities of
literature designed to help pull down the structures reared by years of
toil and prudence and to scatter the savings of long-
Anarchy. continued struggle and economy were circulated
throughout the city. A portion of this was :
"A revolutionist's duty is to himself. * * * The whole work
of his existence — not only in words, but also in deeds — is at war with
the existing order of society, and with the whole so-called civilized
world. With its laws, morals and customs, he is an uncompromising
opponent. He lives in this world for the purpose of more surely de-
stroying it. * * * Between him and society reigns the war of
death or life; publicly and secretly but always steady and unpardon-
ing.
"All weak sentiment toward relation, friendship, love and thank-
fulness must be suppressed through the cold passion of revolutionary
work. * * * Equally must he hate everything that is anti-revo-
lutionary. So much the worse for him if he has in the present world
ties of relation, friendship or love. He is no revolutionist if these
ties are able to arrest his arm."
Tuesday, May 3, 1886, there was an attempt by a large body of
men to drive away the men working at McCormick Reaper Works;
the factory was attacked and men working there were beaten. Two
police officers endeavoring to protect these workingmen were also
badly injured. Upon the arrival of reinforcements of police, a fierce
contest ensued ; the riotous crowd being finally driven away. The
following day numerous hand bills containing the words "Revenge,
Revenge," and a call to arms were distributed in the city and notice
64 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
of a meeting at 7 130 in the evening, at Haymarket Square, was given.
The notice of the meeting contained also the foHowing : "Working-
men : Arm yourselves and appear in full force." Tuesday, dynamite,
bombs were distributed to various conspirators. The police were
aware of the preparations that had for some time been in progress
to attack at the same hour a number of police stations by throwing a
bomb therein and shooting the police as they came out. At the meet-
ing on Tuesday evening, a number of violent speeches were made, one
speaker, among other things, saying : ''You have nothing to do with
the law except to lay hands on it and throttle it until it makes its last
kick. * * -* Throttle it. Kill it. Stab it. Do everything you
can to wound it — to impede its progress." He concluded his address
by waving his hat and crying : "To arms, to arms, to arms !"
The speaking continued until after 10 o'clock, and was of a
very inflammatory character. A large force of police had been as-
sembled, and shortly after the conclusion of one of the most violent
harangues, a platoon of police, occupying the entire width of Des
Plaines street, upon which the speaking was, advanced. Captains
Ward and Bonfield marching in front. At the command of Captain
Ward, the platoon halted; he then, stepping forward to within three
feet of the truck wagon from which, as a speaker's stand, the speak-
ing had been, said :
'T command you in the name of the people of the state immedi-
ately and peaceably to disperse."
At once, from the midst of the crowd, in the vicinity of the
southeast corner of the alley on the east side of DesPlaines and north
of Randolph street, a burning fuse was seen; the bomb to which it
was attached was thrown forward and fell, exploding in front of the
police, seven of whom were killed, sixty being wounded. The re-
mainder of the force were amazed and stunned for a moment only.
Officer Fitzpatrick, in a loud, clear voice, called out, "Close up, form
line and charge." The police immediately advanced, firing their re-
volvers. The crowd fled in all directions. Upon the following day
a number of persons charged with having been engaged in the manu-
facture of bombs, the circulation of incendiary literature, advising as-
saults upon and killing of the police, the destruction of private prop-
erty, attacking stores and warehouses and armed resistance to the
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 65
enforcement of the law, were arrested, eight of whom were after-
wards tried ; seven of these the jury found guilty.
An attack upon the police, the destruction of authority and the
breaking up of organized society by the use of dynamite had long
been deliberately planned and preparations therefor had been made.
The actual assault by dynamite was the first ever made upon a
regularly organized and disciplined force. Dynamite has since been
extensively used in war, A review of the evidence presented and the
proceedings had upon the trial is set forth in the first 266 pages of
the 122nd volume of the reports of the proceedings of the supreme
court of the state of Illinois. The trial was not only in many re-
spects the most important ever had in Chicago, but it attracted
throughout the civilized world the most attention ever given to a
judicial proceeding in this country.
Men and peoples have ever been accustomed to take notice of
and celebrate the anniversary of great events. We take note of our
birthdays until we have arrived at the years at which we dislike to
be reminded how old we are. Nations, in their own esteem, are never
old; the active, pushing, ruling part of the people are the young;
therefore states always like to call attention to the small beginning
of that which has come to be so great, or whose career has been so
glorious.
Outside the domain of religion, in the history of mankind, the
most important event is the work of Columbus in making the two
halves of the earth known to each other. In the eastern world em-
pires had risen, ruled and passed away. There were mighty men in
the ancient days of the old world. Architects whose structures we
strive in vain to equal ; lawyers whose judgments live in every volume
of the common law ; philosophers whose reasoning was as acute and
whose reflections were as profound as any in the days since man
learned to print and thus spread abroad his learning; prophets, the
reverberation of whose voices past the centuries and o'er the seas
admonish uur souls and stir our hearts today.
We know less of the past of America, because, perhaps, it reached
its apogee ere Caesar's conquering legions stood on Britain's shores.
We do know that at the coming of the European there were here
civilizations whose condition, government, art, knowledge and re-
voi. 1—5.
66 CHICAGO .AND COOK COUNTY
flection indicated an immeasurable past as well as a study of the
universe, in its results, equal to anything known of it at the begin-
ning of the Christian era.
The apostle to the Gentiles, standing upon Mars Hill, said : "Ye
men of Athens, I perceive that in all things ye are too much given
over to superstition. For as I passed by and beheld your devotions
I found an altar with this inscription — 'To the unknown God.' Whom,
therefore, ye ignorantly worship, him declare I unto you."
More than a thousand years after Paul thus spoke to the Greeks,
the unknown God was revealed to a great soul in the western world.
Before the discovery of America by Columbus there ruled over
the empire of Mexico a monarch possessed of a religious soul and a
philosophic mind. After a reign of half a century, in the closing
years of his life he wrote :
"All things on earth have their term; in the most joyous career
of their vanity and splendor their strength fails and they sink into
the dust. All the world is but a sepulcher and there is nothing which
lives on its surface that shall not be hidden and entombed beneath it.
Rivers, torrents and streams move onward to their destination. Not
one flows back to its pleasant source. They rush onward hastening
to bury themselves in the deep bosom of the ocean. The things of
yesterday are not today, and the things of today shall cease, perhaps,
on the morrow. The cemetery is full of the dust of bodies once
quickened by living souls, who occupied thrones, presided over as-
semblies, marshaled armies, subdued provinces, were puffed with vain-
glorious pomp, power and empire. But these have passed away like
the smoke that goes out the throat of Popocatapetl, with no memorial
of their existence save the record on the page of the chronicler. The
great, the wise, the valiant, the beautiful — alas ! where are they now ?
All mingled with the clod; and that which hath befallen them shall
come to us and to those that come after us.
"Yet let us take courage, illustrious nobles and chieftains, true
friends and loyal subjects— ^let us aspire to that heaven where oil is
eternal and corruption cannot come.
"The horrors of the tomb are but the cradle of the sun and the
dark shadows of death are brilliant lights for the stars."
In spite of the idolatrous worship of the Aztecs, there remained
with them an inheritance from the ancient religion of the Toltecs, and
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 67
the hope expressed in the conckiding sentences of the monarch's re-
flections indicate a behef in a future existence. Having, after much
reflection and prayer, come to beheve in one all-powerful, unknown
God, the creator of the universe, he built a temple to the deity he wor-
shiped and dedicated it to "The unknown God, the cause of causes."
No image was allowed in the building, images being thought un-
suited to a temple to the "Invisible God." The people were forbidden
to profane the altars of the temple with blood or any sacrifice other
than the perfume of flowers and sweet-scented gums.
Severed by waters that felt no keel, by waves that saw no sail,
the eastern and the western continents remained divided from the
beginning of measured time till the son of Genoa.
Columbus crossing the mysterious and mighty deep, made the
AND Four world one. The tale Columbus and his compan-
Centuries. ions told was denied, doubted, believed. And well
might there be doubt, for the report he made shook
the foundations of every school of learning in Europe. Yet, in time,
only the geographical understanding of mankind was much changed
by the finding of another world. Had there been in Europe the
means of communication, the railroads, mills, steamships, telegraphs,
education, enterprise, industrial activity and the press there is now,
Europe would within the next century have been half depopulated.
As it was, some towns in Spain lost most of their young men. All
adventurous souls longed to see the strange country that held nobody
knew what. There was an opportunity, an awakening, the charm of
novelty and mystery such as mankind will never see again.
As the four hundredth anniversary of the landing of Columbus
drew near, there was in the United States a feeling that appropriate
notice should be taken of the event and the measureless consequences
that followed therefrom. It was determined that an exhibition call-
ing attention to the mighty changes wrought in the four centuries
past should be held, and to this all the world should be invited. Chi-
cago, that within sixty years had risen from an unorganized settle-
ment of some three hundred souls to a city of over one million
people was, as the most conspicuous example of rapid civic trans-
formation and development, selected as the place to which all should
be asked to come, consider and examine the wonders that had here
been wrought in less than one lifetime.
68 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
Under the general superintendence of Mr. Daniel H. Burnham,
a plan for the exhibition buildings and grounds was agreed upon and
the work was begun of creating a fitting place for the meeting of the
nations, a gathering of the tribes of men — the polished European, ac-
customed to the courts of kings, the tent-dwelling Bedouin of the
desert, the reflective-minded sons of eastern and southern Asia, upon
whose soil civilization seems to have first appeared, those who dwell
in the isles of the sea and all who live in America, whether descend-
ants of Europeans, Esquimaux, children of the Incas, Aztecs, Toltecs,
Cholutecs, or of the nomadic wanderers of the wild, whom the fol-
lowers of Columbus, in their belief that there had been found, not
a new continent, but only a before-unknown shore of the old, called
"Indians."
Under the inspiration of this thought there were made in Jack-
son Park, beside the waters of the great lake, for the nations, peo-
ples and tribes of earth who should hither come, houses, gardens,
walks, built, in truth! with hands, yet verily! eternal in the heavenly
memories of the myriad souls who, looking upon the stately temples
of industry and art, the lofty minarets and towers, the long colon-
nades arrayed in glistening white, the green grass and the beautiful
flowers, enraptured turned to see the white-capped, emerald-hued
waves of Lake Michigan hastening to kiss the shore upon which
stood a realization of the inspired love which has made water every-
where the parent of life.
The Fair opened May ist and closed October 31st, 1893. The to-
tal paid attendance was 21,480,141; the free and paid admissions
27'539.430-
Why the anniversary of the great fire of 1871 should have been
selected as Chicago day, it is difficult to say. That a time in which
many lost their lives, multitudes the hardly-saved earnings of many
years, others were reduced from affluence to poverty, an innumerable
number of tenderly-cherished records and mementoes were destroyed,
and more than a hundred thousand people rendered homeless, should
be set apart for remembrance and honor, is past explanation.
Somehow, years before the great exposition was talked of, the
Monday of the calamitous fire had come to be known as Chicago day.
Therefore, October 9th was published as the day upon which the
people of Chicago were especially expected to be at the Fair. The
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 69
expectation was realized. October 9th the paid attendance was 716,-
881 ; free admissions, 45,061 ; total attendance. 761,942.
Estimates of the number of persons in a crowd, on the street or
at a great meeting are continually made. Such estimates, when the
number is thought to be over one hundred thousand, are a mere guess
and entirely unreliable. 1 hat the recorded number of paid admis-
sions October 9th is not excessive is very certain, as the entrance
gates mechanically registered all who w^ent in and the cashiers are
not likely to have charged themselves and paid for more half dol-
lars than came into their hands. There is thus a very high degree of
certainty that 716,881 persons entered at the paying gates. The
45,061 free admissions are not extraordinary. So far as is with any
considerable degree of certainty known, the multitude that was at
the Fair October 9, 1893, was the largest voluntary assemblage with-
in enclosed grounds, for pleasure, up to that time known in the his-
torv of mankind. In so far as such a matter can be determined by
expression and appearance, the exposition afforded great happiness
to great numbers of people. The commendation of buildings,
eround and exhibits was enthusiastic and universal. The influ-
ence of the Fair was civilizing, instructive and promotive of peace.
The ends of the earth were brought together. The dwellers upon
the mountains and prairies of the west ate bread prepared by Moors
and Berbers after the manner of the desert. Artists from Berlin,
Paris and Boston listened to and enjoyed the simple plaintive har-
monies of the Javanese. There were exhibitions of the toil, the
dancing, the feasting, the household gods, belongings and daily liv-
ing of people in all quarters of the globe. Every kind of instrument
by which man yet cultivates the soil and every means of conveyance
yet employed were illustrated by examples or models. A large build-
ing was devoted to an illustration of methods of transportation. In
this, seemingly, copies of all the rafts and boats, save the ark, by
which man has sailed upon the water were shown; and likewise the
kind of trappings, harness, bridles, yokes and saddles under which
beasts of burden have staggered, groaned, run and danced since neo-
lithic man made the horse his companion and Balaam's ass saved
and reproved its rider. One looked at these, the drags, harrows,
ploughs, sleds, sledges, wagons, carts, they have drawn; the iron bits
forced into tender mouths; the wooden saddle trees bound to lacer-
70 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
ated backs; the heavy yoke carried upon weary necks; the hard har-
ness chafing sore bodies; the sharp spur plunged into bleeding sides;
the heavy lash descending upon quivering flesh ; the faithful dog,
enduring all suffering, facing all danger, gladly dying to save or
serve his master; the patient, uncomplaining ass, toiling through the
day, thankful for a thistle at night ; the ungainly camel, providing for
man a highway in the desert; the huge elephant that searches the
spot whereon he is to step, lest he crush something dear to man; the
beautiful, buoyant, intelligent horse, and recalling how these, the
uncomplaining dumb, have suffered at the hand of the human, one
was almost compelled to say, if man was made but little lower than
angels to what depths of hell must he not since have fallen.
The Fair was such a place for finding that the activity of the mind
exceeds the endurance of the body. There was so much to see, to
study, to come to know well; it was such a school and the time for
attendance so brief. Six months — six years would have been too
short. People looked, listened, studied, and in the midst of the beau-
tiful and the interesting found themselves fagged out. The states
each had houses of rest equipped with lounges and easy chairs —
blessed havens they were for the visitor weary with delight. One
met such interesting people. Dignified Parsees with their queer hats
and their serious conversation. Small Japanese excelling in every-
thing. Dark-skinned Hindoos, overrunning with metaphysical ideas
and recondite philosophy. Brahmans who considered ten thousand
years a small portion of the time since Brahm was made known to
man. Egyptians as ready to bargain as were their ancestors when
they bought Joseph from the Midianites and sold corn to his breth-
ren. Hindoos exhibiting and selling all kinds of filigree work'. Na-
tives of Oceanica, termed by Europeans semi-civilized, whose man-
ners and politeness were superior to ours, although their knowledge
of machinery and books was less. Esquimaux, paddling their kayaks
about the lagoons. Scandinavians who came every inch of the way
from Europe to Chicago in a replica of a boat used by the Vikings.
Icelanders, hoping to dispose of old Norse silver.
Our fierce democracy, for the nonce, let down its barriers and
welcomed to its homes lords and princes, dukes and earls. No rude
churls we in those hospitable days; but gentle folk, to the manner
born, who bowed low to and made way for the stranger of exalted
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 71
rank and hit;h degree as graciously and courteously as though we
were merchants seeking trade or candidates for office looking for
votes, and he a hind who homeward drove the loitering kine.
Mirabile dictu! Wonderful to see. "Prophets and kings desired
it long, but died without the sight." We had a Parliament of Relig-
ions, to which people of all religions were invited, ca})ic and were
HEARD. Not since the untutored savage, dazzled by the lightning's
flash, asked the God whose awful voice shook the earth, to spare him
and his kin, nor since the primitive Iranian, shivering beside the dy-
ing embers of his camp fire, turning uneasily upon the ground on
which he lay, prayed for the coming of God — the Sun from whence
proceeded warmth and light; to the opening of the Parliament of
Religions in Chicago on the nth day of September, A. D., 1893, had
there been such a gathering, nor such a communion as wdien, in
Chicago, at the request of a communicant of the Chicago Church of
the New Jerusalem, the American cardinal of the Roman Catholic
church, arose and before the vast audience, who stood with bowed
heads, repeated the universal prayer. To Mr. Charles C. Bonney,
a lawyer of Chicago, is due the fact that such a parliament was.
With untiring zeal and discretion he labored to bring his conception
into being. As president of the parliament, his conduct and his wis-
dom were such that in reference to it he came to be called and con-*
sidered "the indispensable Mr. Bonney." In his opening address he
said :
"Worshipers of God and Lovers of Man: Let us rejoice that
we have lived to see this glorious day; let us give thanks to the
Eternal God, whose mercy endureth forever, that we are permitted
to take part in the solemn and majestic event of a world's congress
of religions.
"If this congress shall faithfully execute the duties with which it
has been charged, it will become a joy of the whole earth and stand
in human history like a new Mount Zion, crowned with glory and
marking the actual beginning of a new epoch of brotherhood and
peace.
"For wdien the religious faiths of the world recognize each other
as brothers, children of one Father, whom all profess to love and
serve, then, and not till then, will the nations of the earth yield to
the spirit of concord and learn war no more.
72 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
"In this congress the word 'religion' means the love and worship
of God and the love and service of man. We believe the^ Scripture
that 'of a truth God is no respecter of persons, but in every nation
he that feareth God and worketh righteousness is accepted of Him.'
"The program of this General Parliament of Religions directly
represents England, Scotland, Sweden, Switzerland, France, Ger-
many, Russia, Turkey, Greece, Egypt, Syria, India, Japan, China,
Ceylon, New Zealand, Brazil, Canada and the American states, and
indirectly includes many other countries. This remarkable program
presents, among other great themes to be considered in this congress.
Theism, Judaism, Mohammedanism, Hinduism, Buddhism, Taoism,
Confucianism, Shintoism, Zoroastrianism, Catholicism, the Greek
church, Protestantism in many forms, and also refers to the nature
and influence of other religious systems.
"This day the sun of a new era of religious peace and progress
rises over the world, dispelling the dark clouds of sectarian strife.
This day a new flower blooms in the gardens of religious thought,
filling the air with its exquisite perfume. This day a new fraternity
is born into the world of human progress, to aid in the upbuilding
of the kingdom of God in the hearts of men. Era and flower and
fraternity bear one name. It is a name which will gladden the hearts
of those who worship God and love man in every clime. Those who
hear its music, joyfully echo it back to the sun and flower.
"It is the Brotherhood of Religions.
"In this name I welcome the first Parliament of the Religions of
the World."
There were also conventions of teachers, philosophers, musicians
and kindred arts, mathematicians, metallurgists, engineers, philolo-
gists, etc.
In 1894 manufacturing, mercantile and transportation interests
throughout the country were greatly depressed. The business of all
these fell off to an extent that imperiled the solvency of many. As a
consequence large numbers of salaried workingmen lost their places.
The price of manufactured articles declined so that as to many they
could not be sold at what it cost to manufacture them, and wages
were lowered.
Eugene V. Debs and others had for years been endeavoring to
CHICAGO AND COOK COUX'IA' 7;,
form so large an organization of railway employees as to render the
railroads completely dependable upon tlie services of its members and
thus put the Railway Union in a position to dictate to the transporta-
tion interests, wages, hours of labor, rules of service, etc.
In 1894 the organization included 150.000 railway employees. In
the summer of 1894 a large number of the employees of the Pullman
Company struck because of dissatisfaction by them with the wages
offered by the Company. The Pullman Company was not engaged
in the business of transporting freight or passengers. It merely manu-
factured cars and sold or leased them to railroads. Nevertheless 4.000
of its employees were admitted into the American Railway Employees
Union. In the summer of 1894 a convention of this Union was held
in Chicago, which convention on the 22nd of June ordered that unless
the Pullman Company should before noon of June 26th adjust the
grievances of its employees, the members of the Union should after
that date refuse to handle Pullman cars and equipment.
Eugene V. Debs, president of the Railway Employees Union, in
an affidavit by him made subsequent to his arrest, said :
''The railway employees, members of the Union, in obedience to
the order of the convention of the Union, on the 26th of June refused
to haul Pullman cars. The switchmen in the first place refused to
attach a Pullman car to a train, and that is where the trouble began;
and then when a switchman would be discharged for that, the switch-
men would all quit, as they had agreed to do. One department of
the railroads after another was involved until the Illinois Central was
practically paralyzed, and the Rock Island and other roads in their
turn. After the strike had been in progress five days, the railway
managers, as we believe, were completely defeated. Their immediate
resources were exhausted, their properties were paralyzed and they
were unable to move their trains. That was the condition on the 30th
day of June and the ist day of July."
The strike resulted not only in stopping to a great extent the trans-
portation of passengers, mails and freight in Chicago, but throughout
the country. Business was very seriously interrupted from Chicago
to San Francisco; indeed! the strike extended over the greatest extent
of territory, involved the largesi number of employees and caused the
most serious interruption to business of an}- strike, before or since.
Passengers were in some instances, through the abandonment of trains
74 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
by the railway employees in charge, at small stations in the mountains
and on semi-desert plains, put for days to most serious inconvenience
and annoyance, as they could neither go forward to their destination
nor return to the homes from which they had come.
Grover Cleveland, president of the United States in 1894, concern-
ing the railroad riots and the action of the government, wrote :
"As early as the 28th of June, information was received at Wash-
ington by the postoffice department that on the Southern Pacific
Railway system between Portland and San Francisco and between
Ogden and San Francisco, the carriage of the mails was completely
obstructed.
"July 6th six hundred freight cars with their contents were burned
in railway yards at Chicago. July 3rd a mob of two to three thousand
rioters held possession of a crossing of the Rock Island Railroad in
Chicago and prevented passenger and other trains from passing. July
5th a mob of two thousand persons gathered at the Union Stock
, Yards, obstructed the movement of trains and overturned twenty-eight
cars, which obstructed the passage of all trains, freight, passenger and
mail, in the vicinity of the stock yards. July 6th, of the twenty-three
railroads centering in Chicago, only six were unobstructed. Thirteen
were entirely obstructed, and ten were running only passenger and
mail trains. A party of rioters went from 14th to 44th street and
Stewart avenue, throwing gasoline on all freight car-s. in that section
of the city."
July 5th and July 7th Governor Altgeld sent letters to President
Cleveland, protesting against the sending and use of federal troops
in the state of Illinois, sajdng that the state was able and ready to
maintain order and enforce the laws, and offered to furnish troops
to afford the federal authorities all assistance it might need in enforce-
ment of the laws elsewhere.
The Supreme Court of the United States long afterward held that
the action of the president of the United States in sending troops to
enforce the federal laws against obstructing the mails, interfering with
interstate commerce, was justifiable.
In Chicago the destruction of property by the burning of cars and
their contents amounted to more than a million of dollars, the loss of
which extended to owners throughout most of the states.
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 75
Man's earthly education begins with birth, is ended by death. So
long as he is content with the instruction given by the pitiless rain, the
biting frost, winter's snow, summer's heat, hunger and thirst, disease
and pain, love and hate, he remains a savage. Such teaching is forced
upon him by the Universe of which he is a part. If despite this he
will not toil save when pain compels, nor la}- by in summer food for
winter, he perishes, gives way for creatures more teachable.
Out of barbarism he can arise, has arisen only by the aid of sys-
tematic instruction. To the toil and the restraint of this he is averse.
Nevertheless they are the inevitable concomitant of civilization.
The real upbuilding of Chicago began with the organization of its
first school. Whether the instruction given in 1810 to John H. Kinzie,
a boy of six, by Robert Forsyth, a lad of thirteen, the educational
facilities afforded in 1 816 by William L. Cox to seven or eight chil-
dren in a log cabin near the place now known as the intersection of
Michigan and Pine streets, the teaching by Stephen Forbes in June,
1830, in a structure near where Randolph street and Michigan avenue
now meet, or, the town of Chicago having been created and organized
on the 5th day of August, 1833, the school opened by John Watkins
in a house on the North Side, half way between the lake and the
forks of the river, the first term of which was attended by twelve
pupils, only four of whom were white, is to be reckoned as the
first organized school in Chicago; the educational uplift of Chicago
began with its beginning and has kept pace with its growth.
In the fall of 1832, there were twelve pupils, one school and one
teacher; in 1908 there were in. the public schools 292,581 pupils and
6,107 teachers. The expenditure for the maintenance of public schools
in 1898 was $10,044,271.71. In addition to the taxes they paid for
the support of public schools, the parents of 74,196 children volunta-
rily paid for their instruction in parochial schools.
The influence, the teaching of common learning such as reading,
writing, mathematics, grammar, geography, natural philosophy and
the natural sciences, is always good ; coupled with this, there is some-
times in the atmosphere of schools a spirit of exclusion, a disdain for
others not so fortunately situated or nobly born, which is pernicious.
The schools of Chicago ha\e ever been remarkably free from this.
Notwithstanding the long existence of statutory laws denying to black
men the common rights of lunnanity, statutes intended to keep the
76 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
negro in hopeless ignorance; the free PubHc Schools of Chicago have
always been open to white and black alike, without attempt at ex-
clusion or segregation based upon color; they have been kept in the
front rank of educational work and have fitted millions for the
struggles of life without which mankind cannot go forward to better
things or higher civilization.
The Greeks of a few centuries before the Christian era are regard-
ed as the greatest of artists. The temples built by them are looked
upon as triumphs of art. The builders of today are continually asked
to construct edifices as beautiful as were the Greek temples. There
are in Chicago neither replicas of Greek temples nor attempts at imita-
tion. Our architects have wisely refrained from this. A Greek temple
needs space. It should stand alone, upon an eminence, apart from
the shops and dwellings of men, beyond sound of the hammers and
wheels of commerce, above the dust of the street, outside the route
of the crowd, the playgrounds of men ; beyond reach of the cries of the
caller and noise of the tramping feet of the multitude. It ought not
to recall or suggest strife, labor or decay, impassioned oratory or
sound of the lute and the viol. It should seem the embodiment of
eternal peace and everlasting beauty; shine like the stars of Heaven
and be changeless as they. Outlined against the sky it should look
upon the world with the calmness and the dignity of a superior crea-
tion, bidding men rise above the fixed earth upon which they tread to
the spiritual realms set on high, boundless as space, constant as time,
eternal as law, holding in its grasp and clasping in its arms all souls
that have been, are and shall be.
A Greek temple was built as the dwelling place of a god, not for
the haunts of men. It was not made light, so that people could read or
write therein ; nor for the assemblage of multitudes or the gratification
of the curious and the stranger. It was a holy place, the shrine or
casket of a god. Fronting to the east, the beams of the rising sun
passing through the open doorway revealed the image of the divinity
dwelling therein.
The problems presented to a Chicago architect were never pre-
sented to the builders of Greek temples. The accomplishments of one
cannot be compared with the other. The Greek architect did not have
to consider cost, space, lighting or heating, ventilation, room for vis-
itors, or an audience; he thought not of acoustic properties or ease
MONROE STREET, EAST FROM LA SALLE STREET
1
TIX KEW TORI
PUBLIC LIBRARY
ASTOR, LBNOX AM»
TILDSH Kog«©AT10J<»l
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY y-
of access. Created as Chicago was and existing as it does because of
man's devotion to the peaceful arts of commerce, upon its extended
plain there is no place for a Greek temple. Chicago architects have
wisely refused to attempt to here construct one. Chicago architects
have grappled with the problems presented by the needs of a great
commercial city standing upon loose earth ; have bored seventy feet
down to bed rock, and built cement piers to meet the steel columns
they have devised to carry the entire building, walls as well as interior.
Chicago architects revolutionized the practice in regard to the support-
ing strength of commercial edifices. Thanks to their ingenuity, these
are now like the human body in which the hard skeleton carries the
flesh and all the working parts as v/ell as the burdens placed upon the
shoulders. The great commercial structures of Chicago are thorough-
ly built, well arranged, commodious, handsome buildings, erected with
a view to utility and income therefrom; they respond to the demands
of a great commercial city as well as the edifices of any place in the
world and, thanks to the sense of fitness possessed by Chicago artists,
none of them are so tall that they scratch the feet of the man in the
moon when it passes over our city.
Chicago is a modern city; it has no place where a Cock Lane Ghost
appeared; no Doomsday Book, although after the great fire of 187 1 it
was suggested that she should have one ; no public square in which
witches were formerly burned ; no antiquities, no people old enough
to be called aged. She is yet young and growing fast — how fast was
well told just before the World's Fair. A Chicago journal had an
item describing the capture of an escaped wolf in one of the city streets.
The New York papers took notice of this and declared that in Chi-
cago wolves were numerous and were frequently seen in the streets.
Whereupon the Chicago paper replied that this was true, the fact being
that Chicago was growing so fast the wild animals couldn't keep out
of the way. Chicago is so confident and hopeful of the future that
it has ever relished a joke at its expense. Some years ago, by annexa-
tion, considerable territory devoted to farming was taken into the city.
Shortly after this Chicago was selected as the place for holding the
Columbus Memorial World's Exposition. A few days thereafter an
Iowa banker visited New York, and on his way home calling upon
his Chicago correspondent, was asked what New York said about the
action of Congress in locating the World's Fair. "Oh." he replied.
78 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
"they say Chicago is a great city, a wonderful place ; a merchant said
to me, 'Do you know they raise more hay in Chicago than in any other
city in the World.' "
Since the beginning of the present century, the franchises of the
street railways having lapsed, the city was enabled to dictate terms to
the operating companies, which it did with the result that universal
transfers are now given and one can ride to any point in the city for
five cents, which may be a distance of about twenty-five miles. The
city also receives fifty-five per cent of the net revenue. The transpor-
tation is certainly as good as that of any surface system in the world.
Under the central or downtown portion of the streets, tunnels for the
transportation of mails and merchandise have, within a few years past,
been completed so as to relieve in some degree the overcrowded
surface. The constructive work is yet in progress and doubtless will
in time revolutionize the transportation of bulky freight between the
railroad depots and warehouses ; if not, the carriage of small parcels
and passengers.
Of the multitudinous mechanical devices the twentieth century has
brought forth, there has been in Chicago less attention paid to and less
work done upon flying machines than in any other place of equal im-
portance. The spirit of Chicago is eminently practical and as to
aeronautics, like other matters, it asks, "what will it profit." In what
way is the lot of man to be made easier ? What can be accomplished
by such flying in the air as is practicable ? Three hundred years before
the Christian era, Archytas, a Greek, one of the first who applied geom-
etry to mechanics and built machines on mathematical principles, it is
said constructed a wooden dove . which, by means of air enclosed
therein, would fly. In 1783 the Montgolfier brothers constructed a bal-
loon capable of holding about half a million cubic feet of air; this hav-
ing been heated by the fire of burning straw, the balloon carried seven
gentlemen to a height of about 3,000 feet and brought the aerial voy-
agers safely back to earth. Hydrogen gas was already known to be
seven times lighter than air, and its substitution for heated air as a
lifting force speedily followed. From the ascension of the seven
Frenchmen to the present time, voyages by balloon have been frequent
and endeavors to devise means for navigating the air constant in most
civilized countries. Balloons have long been made use of by meteorolo-
gists. The governments of the great nations haVe entered the field and
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expended large sums in attempts to make navigation of the air prac-
ticable. Much has been accomplished, and it is now evident, that for
amusement, excursions may be made at small or great heights, and
that for the purposes of war, airships will be useful; but in the one
hundred twenty-five years since the seven Frenchmen were carried by
Montgolfier's balloon to a height of 3,000 feet, not a pound of freight,
not one bag of mail or a passenger has been transported commercially;
meantime the hard, heavy, unromantic locomotive for rapid progress
and great distances has throughout the civilized world supplanted the
uncomplaining ox, ass, horse, llama, as well as the wailing camel ;
while everywhere on the sea the white sails of commerce are giving
way to white puffs of steam. Chicago for the present will remain
upon the earth; it is not nebulously inclined; it does not attempt to set
bounds to the imagination or the ingenuity of aerostaticians ; it thinks
it best that its investments rest upon firm foundations, and does not
regard air as in that class.
What of the future of Chicago? To what goal are we moving?
In the Universe no thing is at rest. Cities, nations, the world, man-
kind, individuals, ideals and ideas are ever becoming. Chicago is
unique, among other things, in that she presents an example of devel-
opment, growth, progress, such as in. the same period of time has
never been equaled. Toward what is she tending and to what will
she come?
Within the past century man has arrived at an understanding of
the material forces of nature, the processes of growth and decay
which have revolutionized the science of medicine and bid fair to
transform methods of cultivation. Of material things we know
vastly more than did the generations that preceded the discovery of
America. With infinite toil and patience secrets, seemingly purposely
hidden, ha\e been wrung from unwilling nature and methods by
which mountains and moles, leviathans and lice, men and monkeys,
are built up and torn down, constructed and destroyed, have been
revealed. In the search no trace of the fabled monsters who swal-
lowed continents and drank up seas has been encountered. On the
contrary we have ascertained that by the infinitely little has change
been wrought. The vegetable and animal kingdom are prod-
ucts of small things. These are they over which man has
8o CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
ruled, creations he has shaped, moulded and multiplied. The
laws of the Universe are eternal. As in the beginning
they remain. Our hope is to find them out and accommodate
ourselves to their action. Man is a natural and a spiritual being; he
has aspirations that are not limited by time nor bounded by space;
faith in and hope of an existence after the end of his earthly life; a
faith and a hope which have in all ages profoundly influenced his
conduct, been in trouble and sorrow the greatest of consolations,
raised the humblest to an equality with the highest, made the weak
strong, the timid courageous, lifted the slave, crouching beneath the
scourge of his master, to contemplation of a realm where for every
cruel blow there would be endless recompense and joy ; said to the
mother with her lifeless babe in her arms, it has gone to God, whither
you will go and where you will find your child.
Not all the constitutions and laws declaring the equality of men
as citizens, subjects, rulers and ruled, have practically, to the under-
standing of the common man, come home, given to him a thousandth
part of the sense of equality, the joyful knowledge of his importance,
and the infinite care with which he is guarded, that have the promises
contained in the words, "Are not two sparrows sold for a farthing?
and one of them shall not fall on the ground without 3^our Father.
But the very hairs of your head are all numbered. Fear ye not there-
fore, ye are of more value than many sparrows. For as many as
are led by the Spirit of God they are the Sons of God. Ye have re-
ceived the Spirit of adoption, whereby we cry, Abba Father. The
Spirit itself beareth witness with our spirit, that we are the children
of God. And if children, then heirs, heirs of God and joint heirs
with Christ. And we all know that all things work together for good
to them that love God."
Science is to the fore in these days. We naturally, perhaps ra-
tionally, conclude that those who by diligent search have established
that organic life is everywhere dependent for its nourishment, growth
and activity upon bacteria and protozoa, and have by knowledge, thus
acquired, pointed out the way to stay the march of pestilence, banish
plagues and greatly lengthen the average length of human life, must
know more than did our fathers concerning all that enters into
human life; and when they tell us that we are immortal only
as the human race is immortal, that "every one of us began his
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 81
life Willi llie 1)cginning- of all life upon earth"; that is lived, -in the
immeasurable past, in the protozoan and the primal bacterium, mag-
got and megatlierium, monkey and man, and will continue to live so
long as life upon the earth endures; we are staggered by the presen-
tation of this to us as immortality. We were taught to understand
immortality as a soul life after death of the body, with a preservation
to some extent and for some time of our natural memory so that we
could meet and hold converse with loved ones gone before. It is this
faith which in ages past has been and yet is to myriads a solace in
trouble and affliction, such as no philosophic reflection can give and
no earthly communion affords. It is nevertheless the case that belief
in life after death of the body is much less universal than it was in
the eighteenth century. Skepticism as to inspiration of the Scriptures,
a real life beyond the grave and the existence of God as a loving,
thinking, helping Father, taking note of the children of men, under-
standing their condition, knowing their wants, w^eakness and hope,
and meting out to each that which most tends to bring him into
communion with heaven is far less universal than it was when north
of Springfield there were in Illinois no dwellings that could properly
be spoken of as more than huts.
The generation of today may well ask, What doth it profit that
the treasures of earth are laid at our feet if hope of Heaven has for-
ever fled? Man is an aspiring being. He is not content to walk the
earth and think of it alone. His thoughts rush to the stars, take in
the visible and invisible Universe of which he is a part. Since a
period back of which there is no record, he has been a religious being,
believing in God, in angelic hosts, in the existence and influence of
unnumbered multitudes, who, having once lived, as now doth he, have
passed into higher and purer realms from whence they look down
upon and sympathise with him in his effort to rise above the bonds
which hold him close to material things.
Long ago it w^as asked, "What shall it profit a man if he gain the
whole world and lose his own soul"? In considering what Chicago
is to be, we are compelled to take note of the trend of ideas, beliefs,
opinions and their influence upon conduct. The Greeks of the age
of Pericles carried understanding of and devotion to art far higher
than have the centuries since Greece fell before the arms of Rome.
There is reason for thinking the happiness of the Japanese people,
Vol. 1—6.
82 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
farmer, merchant and noble, the security of life and property, in the
beautiful isles of the Eastern sea, far greater before Japan came un-
der the baneful influence of European ideas and foreign culture than
for many ages it will be again. Rome, having conquered the world,
fell before the march of barbarians she had long despised. If our
cities become waste places and our civilization be whelmed by hordes
rude as the destroying hosts of Jenghiz Khan, it will not be by dark
skinned races coming across seas or over mountains. If the civiliza-
tion of which we boast is blotted out, Chicago laid in the dust, the
destruction will be wrought by forces evolved out of conditions here
created. The opinions of mankind as to conduct, what should be
done by governments and society, what is right and what wrong, are
in the long run determined by self interest, that is, by what appears
to man to be most likely to bring to him that which he most desires,
whether that be honor, fame, peace, security, wealth, power or other
earthly or spiritual pleasure. Comparatively few desire great wealth,"
for riches bring not only great care, but the man known to be rich is
the prey and servant of multitudes, as well as an object of hatred and
reproach to many. All long for opportunity, a chance to make their
way in the world, to show what great and good stuff is in them, live
comfortably, be free from poverty and secure from want in old age.
Slaveholders were wise when they made it a crime to teach slaves
to read, for if the fountains of knowledge were opened to men to
whom the door of opportunity was shut, what would come of it! We
have not only thrown open the fountains of knowledge, but compel
the children of all to drink thereat. Not alone by schools, but in a
thousand ways is knowledge thrust upon all. This is the age of
schools and machinery. We are fed, clothed, housed, transported,
educated, amused, soothed, doctored and buried by the aid of ma-
chinery. To produce things cheaply, they must now be produced in
great quantities. Combination is for success the order and the neces-
sity of the hour. A century ago the manufacturer and the merchant
who had a dozen employees, were each large employers of labor and
did what was then considered a great business. Between such em-
ployer and his employees there was such personal relation, acquaint-
ance, sympathy and understanding as is impossible when a master
gives work to a thousand laborers. Formerly each workman did and
reasonably might hope to in time have his own shop, control his own
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 83
force and in the sea of eoninieree push nut as an uwner. T(-)da\" this
not only seems, hut for the threat majority is, impossible. The social
station of master and ser\ant was not then widely variant; they lived
in the same parish, attended the same church, mingled in the same
society and were buried in the same yard. Today they are as severed
as are the clouds that pour out life-giving rain, from the fruitful earth
upon which it falls. As a consequence in a period of the greatest com-
fort and i)rosi)erity ever known, there is widespread dissatisfaction
and discontent, with organized effort to overturn the entire commer-
cial, political, social and economic order. Discontent has become a
cult. There has always been discontent and always will Ijc , things
cannot be arranged so as to suit all. In times past business discontent
boded no ill to the community; it sought not destruction but upbuild-
ing, was not based ui:)on hatred or despair, I)ut upon a desire for the
happiness and prosperity of all. Today the feeling of the majority
of wage earners is that they can ne\er l)e employers and consecjuently
they have little sympathy with a class to which they cannot hope to
ever belong. The Shepherd of Salisbury Plain said that on the mor-
row the weather would be such as pleased him, because it would be
such as pleased God, and whatever pleased God, pleased him The
laborer of today does not believe that the modern business order is
such as pleases God. He sees that not by force of constitution or
statute, but by the trend of events he is practically denied an oppor-
tunity to be anything but a laborer, and he would like to see the trend
reversed, and is ready to grasp at shadow^s if they seem to be thrown
by a real substance. The comniercial structure of today was not
created by base men or with base ends in view; it is a natural, an
orderly evolution, a product of human effort and human genius. In
its building nobody foresaw that the doors of opportunity were being
sealed up. They must, they will, be opened, wisely, God ])lease!
surely beyond question, and ultimately, surel\' without the destruc-
tion of indi\-idualit}', or individual propert}-.
In ages past the wage worker earned and sa\ed less than he does
now, but he better kept his savings. Quite frequently they were buried
in the earth, hidden in stockings or trusted to the lord of the manor.
Seldom did he get interest upon his coin. The custom of taking in-
terest upon barren gold has become universal and honorable in mod-
ern times. The rei)roach of usurv is a relic of days when only pro-
84 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
fessional lenders took interest. Today the man who has money to
invest is more eagerly sought for than was the Holy Grail. Circular
letters come to him by ever)^ mail. Periodicals are filled with adver-
tisements calling his attention to schemes of every nature. Agents
darken his door and invade his home. It is vehemently urged that
the government should guarantee the payment of all bank deposits.
The loss by investors in governmentally authorized issues of stocks
and bonds is a hundred times greater than the loss by depositors in
banks. Why should not the state supervise and control all corpora-
tions as well as all advertisements offering bonds and stock for sale,
and also exact the making and publication each month of verified re-
ports of liabilities, assets and condition, similar to those now required
from insurance companies. The stock broker, note shaver and the
banks can take care of themselves in these matters ; the ordinary citi-
zen, the laborer, the widow to whom has come the product of a life
insurance policy, the devisee who has received a small bequest and the
recipient of damages for personal injury, as a rule, have neither
knowledge of such matters nor information as to where it can be ob-
tained. It is the business of the state to give to the public knowledge
as to these matters. Not only he who has wife and child, but he who
has acquired an estate has given bonds to society. Those who would
destroy our social order, who wish for the coming of anarchy, rejoice
at the loss which the imprudent investor sustains. The enemies of
civilization are alert. The humble, the feeble, the unsuspicious and
the busy toiler must not only have the door of opportunity kept open
for him, but be warned and guarded against the wiles of the vision-
ary and the falsehoods of the untruthful. Each age and each nation
has its perils and its duties. Holland has not only successfully kept
back the threatening billows of the North Sea, but, advancing upon
the stormy waves, pushed her coast line into the waters waste, and
made fruitful soil of space the ocean in its wrath had devoured. The
wooden walls of England have for centuries kept invading armies off
her fields. The pestilence that walketh by noon has been banished
from the civilized earth. The foes that threaten us today are the
products of our own age, the creations of our genius, the fruit of our
industry. It is said, "he that ruleth his spirit is better than he that
taketh a city." Will we be able to rule our spirit, to accommodate
ourselves to new conditions ? To govern and to protect all ; to accord
CHICAGO AND COOK COUX 1 ^ 85
to each that which the law declares to be his right? not merely to
the high and the learned, the popular and the handsome, the enter-
taining and the instructive, the elocjucnt and the strong, but to the
hated and the despised, the ugly of form and feature, the negro and
the mongolian, the Greek and the Jew, the ignorant and the stupid;
to all the ecjual protection and opportunity which the constitution we
boast of awards. lie who answers this can tell what the future of
Chicago, America, the World, will be. Steam and electricity have
bound the world together, henceforth no people can live alone. The
tinie \\\\\ come when not in Timbuctoo nor London, in Chicago or an
isle of the sea, not on the arid plains of Arabia, or the snow-capped
mountains of Hindoostan, shall man be thrust aside, cast out and
trampled on because of racial antipatliy. The day is at hand when
neither in Turkc}- nor Russia, within shadow of the Pyramids or be-
neath the folds of the American flag, shall a human being, though
accused of the most dreadful of crimes, be denied a trial, and in de-
fiance of law, burned at the stake, without a thrill of horror encir-
cling the earth, and the blush of shame mantling the face of each of
us. Five thousand American citizens lynched since the close of the
Civil \\?i\\ and nobody punished therefor. Five thousand constitu-
tionally guarded human beings defiantly murdered by mobs and the
subject not thought worth}- the attention of political conventions, leg-
islatures. Congress or presidents. There was in 1865 a president
who said, "But if God wills that the contest go on until every drop
of blood drawn by the lash shall be paid by another drawn by the
sword, * * * j^g ^y^g g^}(^ three thousand years ago, so still it
must be said, .'The judgments of God arc true and righteous alto-
gether.' "
Shivering beside the dying embers of his camp fire, primitive
man wearily turning upon the ground on which he lay, prayed for
the coming of God, the glorious, warmth-giving Sun. To his appre-
hension, with the reddening east, his prayer was answered.
In the evolution of civilization, no influence has been more con-
stant than that of religion. If belief in God as a conscious, working,
willing and lo\ing Father is to pass away or be supplanted by a name
for an unconscious force deaf to prayer and blind to tears, which
controls all and cares for none ; man but a bubble on the ocean of
eternity, tossed by its billows, dissolved in its waters and lost in its
86 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
immensity; it is impossible to say what the effect upon mankind will
be. Impossible, because no such situation has hitherto existed.
Peoples, nations, cities, faiths, arise and pass away; religion re-
mains. Of the great cities of Europe, Rome is the only one that was
relatively of commanding importance at the beginning of the Chris-
tian Era. In times past, cities, being fortified places, were not infre-
quently besieged and destroyed as a measure or a result of war. They
were sometimes made the spoil of a victorious army or given to the
flames for the purpose of blotting out their commercial rivalry. A
notable instance of this was the destruction of Carthage by Rome.
The prosperity and riches of their former military and political rival
inspired the Romans with the idea that only by a total destruction
could the rivalry of the Carthagenian merchants be overcome. Carth-
age, was by order of the Roman senate, fired by its soldiers, and
burned for seventeen days, at the end of which the ashes of the ex-
piring flames concealed the site of what had been the greatest com-
mercial emporium laved by the waters of the Mediterranean. As the
historian Mommsen truly said : "Where the industrious Phoenicians
bustled and trafficked for five hundred years, Roman slaves hence-
forth pastured the herds of their distant masters."
Such barbarism is not likely to be hereafter repeated, because self-
interest forbids. The ties that now bind the business world together,
the extent of credits and co-operation through corporations and other-
wise, is such that no section and no city can be destroyed without the
loss thus occasioned extending to the antipodes. The Germans dur-
ing the Franco-Prussian war, might have destroyed Paris, but its de-
struction would probably have caused the failure of half the banks
in Berlin.
When the representatives of South Carolina were in Washington
threatening secession and boasting of the consequent greatness of the
south, a northern member of Congress said to them: "If South
Carolina sets at naught the authority of the United States, I will raise
corn in the streets of Charleston" ; a threat which is said to have after-
wards been actually carried out, although in a manner that involved
the barbarism only of a useless humiliation. . â–
Mankind, possibly, may in time reach an intellectual and moral
standard so great that men will endeavor to uphold or bring about
conditions opposed to that which as individuals they desire, hope and
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY S7
seek for themselves, 1)iit ik) siicli Inimans ha\e llius far appeared.
Prosperity, ach'ancement, opportunity, must appear to be coming to
all and must in reality come to most, or our civilization will be sub-
merged by an advancing flood of the myriads who do not perceive
gain to them in the rise of stocks, bonds and lands.
Savings banks, as now existing, are most useful institutions, and
would be more so if depositors not only received interest, but, on
deposits kept for certain times, a share in the profits of the bank. In
England, value of the railroads is represented, principally, by railroad
stock; in America such value is mostly represented by bonds. In
England elections do not turn upon and parties are not organized
with a view to hostility to railroad investments; in America they
largelv are.
If in the United States there were five million individual owners
of dividend-paying railroad stock, we should hear upon the hustings,
in newspapers, magazines and legislative halls no more of railroad
barons, lawyers, legislators and governors than we now do of farmer
barons, lawyers, legislators and governors.
A store with six thousand employees, in which may be purchased
everything desired for a cottage with a family of three, as well as
all needed for a hotel capable of accommodating a thousand guests is
at once a con\-enience, an exhibition and a delight to the people who
take pride in showing its wonders to strangers; but one thousand
small stores such as our grandparents purchased the w^edding outfit
and the family belongings in, would be far more useful socially,
politically and, in the coming years, commercially.
At present, in Chicago and Illinois, we seem to be entering upon
an era of oppressive taxation, and may have to stagger for many
years under the burdens thus created ; the people will in time, as some
seventy years ago they did, call a peremptory halt upon visionary
schemes and reckless expenditure. Each generation inherits the sav-
ings of the past. If man in ages past had consumed all he produced,
we should be shivering in the nakedness, groping in the darkness and
toiling in the ignorance of our barbarian ancestors. The greatest
benefactors of the race are those who ha\e taught man to accumulate
and hand down to his successors.
In all lime useful and harmful things have been done and said.
Those wli<» s])c'ak and thyse who write are always to the fore, they
88 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
magnify their work, have the ear of, and influence the understanding
of mankind.
He who has turned one rood of desert land into fruitful soil, re-
deemed one acre of miasmatic swamp and made it a garden, as he
who has builded a home and left it for those who shall live after him,
has beyond question done something to justify his having been.
Many men serve God without knowing it. Those who made Chi-
cago what it is, those who shall keep it a place where the door of op-
portunity is opened wide to all, all, all, to the sons of Ham, the sons
of Shem and the sons of.Japhet; the children of the free and the
descendants of the bondman, will not only deserve the thanks of mil-
lions yet to be, but above the scroll that holds their names, the Re-
cording Angel will write, "Blessed are the dead who die in the Lord."
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Civic Development of Chicago
The material development of Chicago has taken its place as one
of the striking facts of history, having long since outgrown even
national distinction. Its civic development could not, of necessity,
keep pace with the expansion of its commerce, trade, industries and
territorial expansion, since men must live and thrive before they will
pay close attention to the higher duties of citizenship. Although the
civic spirit, or local patriotism, has always been pre-eminent in Chi-
cago, the strong development of its municipal institutions has been of
comparatively recent date, and the subject in its entirety has received
little attention. As is usual in all movements of special force its
beginnings and its early progress have centered in certain personalities.
who have possessed in an unusual degree those traits which call forth
from their associates that enthusiasm which is founded on confidence,
and which is proof against obstacles and adversity.
The first dawnings of civic life in what is now the city of Chicago
shine around the sturdy person of John Kinzie, the father of the Fort
Dearborn settlement and known for nearly a quar-
J^^^ ter of a century prior to the legislative creation of
Chicago as the "good friend of the Indians." A
Canadian by birth and an Indian trader over the line, as well
as a noted silversmith of Detroit, Mr. Kinzie had an estal>
lished reputation, both among the red men and his white co-workers,
before he settled outside of Fort Dearborn, the crude stockade com-
pleted during the previous year. Here he again established himself
as a trader, and, with the passage of years, it became evident that he
was one of the enduring men of the world, who seldom turn back for
long after they have once set their shoulders to the tasks before them.
When. ]\Ir. Kinzie first came to this new field of work the war depart-
ment had established an Indian agency at Fort Dearborn. This was
one of the first authoritative recognitions of the geographical impor-
tance of the locality, and when the energetic, fair-minded trader and
silversmith was appointed a sub-agent in 1816 the government did a
wise act; for not only was Kinzie a thorough Indian linguist and a
good judge of the savage character, but his straightforward dealings
90 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
as a trader had secured him the confidence of the savages and as long
as he held the position the settlers outside the fort had little fear of a
repetition of the massacre of 1812. His son-in-law, Dr. Alexander
Wolcott, was afterward appointed Indian agent, and Mr. Kinzie was
retained as sub-agent.
In 1823 what is now Chicago was embraced in Fulton county, and
the settlement was then for the first time recognized as a voting pre-
cinct. But the dwellers in the few huts outside the stockades required
no civic org'anization ; a military company was more applicable to the
conditions and the times. On September 2, 1823, an election for a
major and company officers of the Seventeenth Regiment of Illinois
Militia was ordered to be held; and there was only one place to hold
it — Mr. Kinzie's log house, which in comparison with the other huts
was a most commodious polling place. The Fulton county authorities
gave the order, but there is no record of- the election. The first one
recorded as having been held in Chicago, was that of August 7, 1826,
-when a solid vote of thirty-five was cast for Ninian Edwards for
governor, and Daniel P. Cook for congressman. Most of the voters
were French half breeds, traders and others connected with the fort,
or in government employ; but John Kinzie was the chief judge of the
election and it was held at his house, so he still continued to be the
principal civic functionary of these parts. In July of the previous year
he had been appointed justice of the peace^ for Peoria county, and in
the latter portion of the same year (1825) agent of the American
Fur Company. In 1827 he took final leave of the old house, in which
had so long resided the foremost Indian trader and peace-maker of
this section ; and in which had been born a crude governmental organi-
zation, guaranteeing judicial and civil protection to the few white men
who possessed the hardihood to make their homes along the reedy
and swampy Chicago river. At the time of his death in 1828 Mr.
Kinzie was residing with his friend. Colonel Beaubien, a fellow spirit
in the life of those times. Without basing his actions on any religious
motives, John Kinzie was the William Penn of Illinois, and the esteem
in which he was held by the Pottawatomies is shown by the treaty
made with them in the September following his death, in which they
gave "to Eleanor Kinzie and her four children by the late John Kinzie,
$3,500, in consideration of the attachment of the Indians to her de-
ceased husband, who was long an Indian trader, and who lost a
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 91
large sum in the trade, by the credits given them, and also by the
destruction of his i)roperty. The money is in lieu of a tract of land,
which the Indians gave the late John Kinzie long since, and upon
which he lived." It may not be too much to say that to tliis deep affec-
tion of the Pottawatomies for Mr. Kinzie, more than to any other
cause, was due the fruitless efforts of Black Hawk and his emissaries
to arouse their enmity against the settlers of Chicago. Thus he was
the primary agent in founding the proper conditions of peace for
the material and civic development of the infant town.
But the actual placing of Chicago on the maps of the world, whicli
is the customary preliminary to the task of giving a community a
civic organization, was due to a delicate, but intense
p p character, who was a pathetic antithesis to the robust
and aggressive John Kinzie. Daniel P. Cook was
the man — the brilliant Kentucky lawyer, four times a congress-
man from Illinois territory, its first attorney general, the admired
associate of Clay and Calhoun, Adams and Alonroe, and the
beloved son-in-law of the state's first governor, Xinian Edwards. He
lived the thirty-three years of a burning consumptive, evincing a re-
markable brilliancy of both mind and practical achievements. His
accomplishments were so great in his comparatively brief career as
a congressman that his friends could not but believe that he foresaw
his early end and was possessed with a feverish desire to do all within
his power within the short time allotted to him. The last five years
of his life brought him especiall}^ close to the hearts of the settlers
around Fort Dearborn, and the final act of the general government
providing a generous grant to aid in the construction of the Illinois
and Michigan canal was the culmination of his earthh- labors. The
act, which was passed on the 2nd of March, 1827, granted the alternate
five sections of land on each side of the canal, amounting to more
than 300,000 acres of land, and embraced the site of the city of Chi-
cago. Before its final passage its earnest, able author, had been con-
fined to his bed, and, after a vain attempt to find health in Cuba, (lied
at his old Kentucky home October 16, 1827. He certainly earned the
honor of oivino- Cook countv his name, four vears later, and to him
Chicago owes its location on the map, and its consequent creation as
a civic body. L'nder authority of the congressional act. which he so
faithfully fathered, the commissioners appointed by the state legisla-
92 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
ture located the canal, laid out towns and sold lots to obtain funds
for the construction of the work. As one of these towns, Chicago was
surveyed on section 9, township 39, range 14; the plat was filed August
4, 1830, and although work upon the canal was not inaugurated until
six years thereafter, Chicago was a town upon the map. It was
backed by something substantial and its further civic development
depended upon settlement and local initiative.
In 1830, the year prior to the organization of Cook county, elec-
tions were held at the house of James Kinzie (son of John) for justice
of the peace and constable and for state officers. The county was
named and created in January, 1831, its territory then embracing
what are now Lake, McHenry, DuPage and Will counties. The only
voting place within this extensive area was Chicago, the county seat.
A political organization was not effected until March, 1832, when
three commissioners were elected, two of whom were residents of
Chicago, which thus early dominated as the governing power of Cook
county.
It appears that the dominant personal force in the affairs of the
county, as centered in Chicago, resided with one Samuel Miller, one of
the three county commissioners. His urban associate was Gholson
Kercheval, connected with the Indian agency, and the third member
of the board resided on DuPage river and seems often to have been
absent from the sittings of the court. Mr. Miller had married a
daughter of John Kinzie, was proprietor of a log hotel on the north
side, part owner of the ferry and soon after his election to the county
commissionership built the first bridge in Chicago over the north
branch. The first public building ever erected in Chicago was called
the "pen," a small, roofless wooden structure used in the sobering
of obstreperous citizens, and Mr. Miller completed this structure,
under contract, for twenty dollars ; but the commissioners induced him
to accept twelve dollars, charging that he did not do his work accord-
ing to contract. A couple of years later a more metropolitan log jail
was built, under other than the Miller auspices.
Chicago appeared in 1833 as a specific civic body, albeit only in
the form of a town. It was an epochal year in many respects. Its
slaughtering industry was then inaugurated, its harbor improvements
commenced and the Indians who still held lands in northeastern Illi-
nois relinquished them for the government reservations of the Indian
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 93
Territory. The central figure in the final act by which the In-
„, dians ceased to have a claim to Chicago and the adja-
^ â– â– â– cent territory, was Colonel Thomas f. V. Owen, for
UWEN. 't 1- , . :
three years Indian agent at this point. The treaty
was signed by as many of the leading men of the United Na-
tion of Chippewa, Ottawa and Pottawatomie Indians as could
be gathered, and, with the departure of the last named from the
Chicago region also went nearly all the half-breed families, leaving
a goodly stock upon which to build the future citizenship of Chicago.
This exodus has been anticipated by immigrants to the west, who in
the spring of 1833 poured into the muddy streets of the
settlement, and during the building season nearly one hun-
dred and fifty frame structures added to its importance. It
was obviously fitting that such a vigorous young community
should have a civic body. In the August preceding the
signing of the Indian treaty, its citizens voted in favor of furnishing
it with one, and the town election on the loth of the month resulted
in the election of five trustees, of which body Colonel Owen became
president. It seems historic injustice that our popular friend, who
ushered the Indians out of the country and ushered in the new town
of Chicago, should not have survived long enough to really enjoy the
sight of any civic development, for he only lived until October, 1835.
For two years after the incorporation of the town and the opening
of the Pottawatomie lands to settlement a flood of emigrants poured
into Chicago, greatly stimulating its trade, building powers and indus-
tries. In 1835 the government opened a land office in Chicago, in
1836 the first ground in the actual construction of the canal was broken
in the towm. real estate took a tremendous boom in the place and
Chicago became the seething center of the land craze which swept over
this western country, and culminated in the panic and crash of 1837.
For about three years Chicago was an Oklahoma City at its best —
and worst.
It will be readily conceived that such a congested condition of
afifairs would as seriously strain the unorganized civic body of Chi-
cago as its hotels, lodging houses and general living accommodations.
In fact, it w^as found entirely unequal to its seething and straining
population, its bridges, sidewalks and streets, at best only temporary
makeshifts for a small, quiet populace, were as straw and paper against
94 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
the wear and tear of such a torrent, and the town authorities were at last
forced to the unheard of expedient of borrowing money to- make neces-
sary pubHc improvements. On October 2, 1834, they voted to borrow
sixty dollars, the first authorized loan on the faith of the corporation.
But that was a drop of what was really required. An engine house was
built and a hose company equipped, and as all the bridges were worn
to things of shreds and patches, it was evident that if public improve-
ments were to keep pace with the rapid strides of population the day
for trying the credit of the town on a lalrger scale had arrived. There-
fore in July, 1836, the trustees resolved to borrow $50,000 to be ex-
. pended on public improvements. The president of that body applied
to the Chicago branch of the State Bank for half the loan, which was
refused. The civic pride of Chicago was stirred, and in its indignant
extremity it turned to one of its most notable newcomers, William B.
Ogden, who was made the fiscal agent of the town with full authority
to negotiate the loan, and, with corporate sanction, to make the neces-
sary expenditures. The records of the town show that he accom-
plished his purpose, and a week after obtaining the loan purchased two
more fire engines. A new street was also at once projected from the
town to the fort. Chicago had now a population of about four thou-
sand, and Mr. Ogden was to be the leading figure in its new municipal
era for many years to come.
At this intermediate period between the development of Chicago
from a town to a city, William B. Ogden was a young New Yorker of
thirty-one, with a head as fine as his body was ath-
^ " letic. He had already served a term in the lesrisla-
Ogden. . °
ture of the. Empire state, and had been a strong ad-
vocate of state aid to the New York and Erie canal. Naturally
attracted to a locality which was seeking development along the
same line, he sought an even wider field for his practical activities
in a locality whose future was bright with unmeasured possibilities.
In the midst of the land craze he located in Chicago as the representa-
tive of a number of eastern capitalists who were making large invest-
ments in this locality. Here he. established a loan and trust agency,
-and as his fellow townsmen came within the radius of his influence
they instinctively gave him their confidence and recognized in him a
born leader. As has been already seen, he was appointed fiscal agent
of the town, and, doubtless through his eastern connections, secured
CHICAGO AXU COOK CUUXTV 95
the loan which was necessary to start the corporation alon.i;' the hroad
highway of pubHc improvements and civic development. In this ca-
pacity he pnrchased the two engines and the thousand feet of hose,
which was the first practical step in the founding of something more
than a "paper" fire department. Heretofore, the department had con-
sisted only of ordinances passed by the town board and acts by the
state legislature. The police department consisted of one constable,
and the public school system had made but little more progress. It is
true that various private schools had been taught from a period ante-
dating the massacre of 1812; that Stephen Forbes and his good wife
had a school of some proportions at the corner of Randolph street and
Michigan avenue in 1830, and that in 1833 Colonel Richard J. Hamil-
ton, commissioner of school lands for Cook county,- had collected a
fund of $39,000 by the sale of lands in the congressional township
now covering the business district of Chicago. Four blocks were
reserved from the sale. Had the entire township been held and its
title been vested in the city school board, the public educational system
of Chicago would have been the wealthiest municipal institution of the
kind in the world. But the town needed the money badly then, and it
is easy, in the light of the present, to see what a gigantic financial
blunder was made seventy-five years ago. In 1835 a special school
system (on paper) was established for Chicago, and late in the year
the town was divided into four districts; at wliicli time three public
and four private schools were taught in town. But with the coming
of the city, under the mayoralty of William B. Ogden, a new era of
municipal development, all along the line, was in store for Chicago,
although it was to be brought about through the travail of deep de-
pression and disorganizing panic.
The widespread craze for land speculation in the west, which was
in reality a reflection of the general speculative mania which possessed
the cqDitalists of the east, was even stimulated (if that were possible)
by the vast system of internal improvements inaugurated by the state
in 1837, and which embraced not only the expansion of the scope of
the canal scheme but the construction of railroad lines throughout the
state. Currency of uncertain value flooded tlic west, all values were
inflated and everything was at high pressure prior to the inevitable
reaction of panic, depression and gloom. As the metropolis of the
new west. Chicago felt the effect of the re-action more sevcrclv than
96 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
any other locality, and when Mr. Ogden went into office in the spring
of 1837 it was like walking into a graveyard to attend his own funeral.
The municipality itself seemed but a storehouse of buried hopes, and
his own business as a land agent hopelessly crushed. In this crisis the
man's gigantic nature came to the relief of the new-born city, and more
than any other personal force sustained its drooping courage for the
succeeding five or six years of critical struggles. He was not only
untiring and courageous in his official position, endeavoring especially
to place all public improvements on an enduring basis and make Chi-
cago something more than a make-shift city, but proved his faith in
the ultimate founding of a substantial municipality by paying for
street improvements out of his own pocket, or from the purse of those
associated with him in local real estate. In the midst of the deepest
gloom of this period, a cry for relief, for repudiation of what seemed
like unbearable financial burdens, went forth from the citizens of Chi-
cago, and even from the city as a municipal body. In the city a meet-
ing was held by frightened debtors to repudiate the municipal debt.
Mr. Ogden arose in the midst of the despondent and inflammatory
speakers, and with calm, manly eloquence, championed the city's honor.
"Above all things," he proclaimed and advised, "do not tarnish the
honor of our infant city." As the first mayor of Chicago, and its
foremost citizen, he then and there saved the civic honor from debase-
ment, and his spirit was reflected throughout the state to other com-
munities whose temptations had also almost overpowered their virtues.
More than this ; the highest standard of civic honor in regard to finan-
cial obligations was fixed by William B. Ogden for all time, and,
within the intervening seventy years since he did this great work, in
all financial crises when the cry of Repudiation has gone forth some
strong, brave man has risen to still it with the inherited spirit of Chi-
cago's first mayor.
With the coming of the city charter the common council, was given'
the power to re-organize the educational, police and fire departments,
which it proceeded to do. Heretofore the fire department had elected
its own chief and the schools had been loosely connected with the
county administration. The police department was the most back-
ward in development of all the municipal divisions, and for nearly
twenty years consisted only of a high constable and an assistant for
each ward. Although Mr. Ogden was only mayor for one term, i1
CHICAGO AXn COOK COUX'IA-
97
was the Ogden spirit which (loiiiinated civic affriirs and sustained the
city (hirini^ the tryini^- period which cuhiiiiiatcd in the coHapse of the
State bankint^- system in 1843. ^1'*-' canal improvement, with con-
tinut)us expenthtures thereon and sales of land at the land-ollice, was
about the only material force which sustained and encourag-ed the city.
At a still later day. when the building of railnjads had come to mono-
polize the public and especially the Chicago mind, it was Mr. Ogden,
then dominant as the Railway King of the West, who illustrated
methods of straightforward "promotion'' which earned him the friend-
ship of farmers and citizens throughout the state and might well serve
as an example for the masters of these days. He virtually founded
the forerunner of the Chicago & Northwestern Railway, the father
of Chicago's vast system. In 1868 he retired from the presidency of
the road, having personally sustained it during the panic of 1857. He
spent the later years of his life at liis beautiftil estate on the Harlem
river. New York, from whose repose he was again called to be a pillar
in upholding- the civic spirit of the victim of October, 1871. The day
after the Chicago fire he started to view the ruins of his lumber inter-
ests in Peshtigo, Wisconsin, and do his great part in the alleviation of
the terrible suffering of that region. In August, 1877, he died at his
country seat, Boscobel, on the Harlem. Guizot, the French historian,
said of him, when looking tipon his i)ortrait, "This is the representa-
tive American, especially of the mighty west; he built Chicago."
Many great men have been engaged in the building of Chicago and
the west since Guizot spoke these words, but William B. Ogden will
remain tln-ough all time as the man who gave Chicago its first broad
outlook into the field of public improvements and established it on
a high and endin*ing plane of civic honor.
Dr. Levi D. Boone was elected mayor of the city March 8. 1855,
the first few months of his administration being largelv concerneti
with determined enforcements of ordinances recpiir-
„ ' ing saloons to close on Snndav and retail liquor
Boone. , , ,. , : r^ n-,
dealers to pay a license advanced to $300. I lie op-
position was composed almost entirely of the German element, and
Mayor Boone's trouble with the saloon keepers commenced soon after
his induction to office, when he issued a proclamation notifying them
that he should strictly enforce the Sunday-closing provision. . The
manifesto appeared on Saturday. March 17th. and many who were ar-
voi. 1—7.
98 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
rested for its violation, on the following day, claimed insufficient no-
tice. On the following Sunday the saloons were generally closed.
Several of the saloon cases were tried, however, before Justice H. L.
Rucker, of the police court, although the defendants denied his juris-
diction. While these trials were progressing the city council fixed the
liquor-selling license at $300 until July i, 1856, when the prohibitory
law was to go into effect if the voters so willed at the June election.
Some dealers paid the fee and others carried their protest tO' the
courts, while frequent meetings of saloon keepers, brewers and allied
representatives, were held in opposition to the enforcement of both the
Sunday-closing and license measures. A large number of the cases
were to be tried before Justice Rucker on Friday, April 20th, and, by
prearrangement, before the time for the assembling of the court on that
day about one hundred malcontents marched to a position on Ran-
dolph street, opposite the court house. Upon learning that Justice
Rucker was out of town, however, they dispersed, but on the follow-
ing day, as they rounded the corner of Clark and Randolph to as-
sume their former position, they were met by the police, who ordered
them to disperse. This they not only refused to do, but some of the
more hot-headed of the rioters fired into the crowd before them. The
policemen returned the fire. The result was the killing of a rioter, and
the wounding of two policemen and peaceful citizens. Some seventy
of the rioters were arrested, of whom fourteen were brought to trial
between June 15-30, before the recorder's court. For several days
after the riot the local militia and artillery, with a squad of special
policemen, patrolled the streets, but there was no more bloodshed. The
liquor dealers, as a body, denied that they had countenanced opposi-
tion to the laws, except through the courts, which was doubtless true;
but the trial of the actual rioters resulted in the acquittal of all but
two of' the fourteen, and they were Irishmen who had been imperfectly
defended. Each was sentenced to a year in the penitentiary, but,
although a new trial was granted them, they were never again brought
into court for a rehearing. The "beer riots," as they are known in
local history, marked the real commencement of the fight between the
saloon and anti-saloon elements in Chicago, which also reappeared
with marked intensity in the administrations of Mayors Medill and
Colvin, and is not yet concluded.
CHICAGO AM) COOK COUNTY 99
About a year after Mr. Ogden came to Chicago from New Wnk,
as a man of the early thirties who had ah-eady estabhshed a pubhc
reputation in his native state, a dusty giant from
VVentworth. ""^^^^ Hampshire tramped along the streets of Chi-
cago, with his name and his fortune yet to make.
John Wentworth had passed his majority some months before, was a
Dartmouth College graduate, and had probably attained his physical
growth — something like six feet, four inches. In these particulars he
was complete; otherwise quite raw and unformed. Some talent as a
politician had already been discovered in him, according to the letter
which he bore in his pocket from the governor of New Hampshire,
and he had always evinced both literary and oratorical abilities. But
he had walked from Michigan City during two dry October days, and.
although he was a giant in physical and mental mold, his talents did
not shine outwardly. But he soon met friends from the east and made
new ones in Chicago, commenced to study law and was promptly side-
tracked by his stanch admirers into the editorial office of the Chicago
Democrat. His pungent, yet sturdy editorials, met the approval of
the home people, and he was induced to remain with the paper and
furnished the means to purchase it outright. Under him Chicago's
first newspaper became a power in sustaining honorable currency and
honest civic measures. One of his first public appearances was at a
citizens' meeting called to consider whether application should be made
to the legislature, then sitting at Vandalia, for a municipal charter.
His voice rang loud and true for municipal honor, and in the spring-
election of the following year he was one of William B. Ogden"s
strongest supporters, both personally and through the columns of the
Democrat. Within the succeeding ihree years Mr. Wentworth made
his paper widely known for its denunciation of "Wildcat Currency,"
and its earnest advocacy of more s}Stematized educational measures.
He founded a daily edition, completed his law studies, and was admit-
ted to the bar in the fall of 1841. In August, 1843, ^^^ ^^as elected to
Congress from the fourth Illinois district, being the youngest member
in that body, and was re-elected to succeed himself, as well as for the
session commencing 1848, which was the year of the admission of
Wisconsin into the Union as a state. Before his election to Congress,
Illinois had had no representative of the lake district, and until the
admission of Wisconsin he continued to be the only member of Con--
100 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
gress who resided on the shores of Lake Michigan. As the generous
grant of lands to IlHnois for the encouragement of the Ilhnois and
Michigan canal was the first formal admission on the part of the gen-
eral government of the importance of the northwest, so Mr. Went-
worth's election to Congress for three successive terms was a formal
acknowledgment on the part of the state of the civic and political im-
portance of Chicago ; and notwithstanding that he was quite untried in
the halls of Cohgf^s he proved a masterly representative in advocating
the city's best interests and maintaining her reputation for enterprise
and public spirit: What Mr. Ogden had done on home ground ten years
before, Mr. Wentworth continued in the legislative arena at Washing-
ton; and no public man who ever lived in Chicago more thoroughly
enjoyed a vigorous fight as a champion of his city, or of what he be-
lieved to be a righteous cause. During his earlier political career some-
of his acts were perhaps open to criticism, and his great ambition may
have overstepped dehcate scruples, but when it came to a question of
upholding Chicago as a municipality, and of attempting to improve
her organizations and public polity, John Wentworth could always be
depended upon, whether in Congress or in municipal office. In 1847
he served as chairman of the committee which called the National
River and Harbor Convention, and, with such men as William B.
Ogden, Isaac N. Arnold, Grant Goodrich, J. Young Scammon and
George Manierre, of this city, was the means of practically starting
the movement for the improvement of the Chicago harbor and river,
which was to supplement the work of the canal in establishing the
city as the grand emporium of the great lakes and valleys of the United
States. Mr. Wentworth served one more term in Congress prior to
his election as mayor in 1857, and in his official capacity was present at
the inaugurations of Presidents Polk, Tyler, Fillmore and Pierce. He
was also present when John Quincy Adams fell in his last illness on
the floor of the house of representatives, and was one of the com-
mittee appointed by the speaker to escort the remains of the venerable
statesman to his home in Massachusetts. Mr. Wentworth was elected
mayor on a fusion ticket, and previous to the casting of the ballots
publicly announced that if elected he wished it distinctly understood
that he should enforce all the laws of the city. He stated that he did
not desire the salary; that he could not attend to the duties without
encroaching upon his private business, and that the main consideration
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY loi
which imhiced him to accept the nomination was that he beheved the
great mass of citizens who ouglit to take it were deterred from doing
so from the certainty that thev wonld thereby STeatly increase their
enemies. But, of all considerations, this would have the least weight
with him. Those who knew the man best were inclined to believe
that this consideration, if anything, would lead him the more enthusi-
astically to accept.
John Wentworth assumed the mayoralty at as critical a period in
the history of the municipality as did William B. Ogden twenty years
before. It is a coincidence that the year of his induction into office
was also clouded by deep depression and financial panic. His watch-
words therefore became Liberty and Economy ; and yet, although he
was obliged to cut expenditures to the quick, in many departments,
he inaugurated numerous improvements of radical importance. While
he cut down the police force to such a measure that he was severely
criticised, despite the hard times, one of his first acts was to call a
board of engineers together and establish the present street grade.
He introduced the first steam fire engine into the city in 1858, and
replaced the old-time, loose-jointed volunteer department with the paid
system ; and this in spite of mobs and persistent opposition from the
ancient regime. It was during his second term in 1859 that the first
street railway was laid along State street. Mr. Wentworth's election
was bitterly contested ; there were riots and bloodshed at the polls ;
and, from his inauguration in the spring of 1857 until the close of his
second term four years later, he was the storm center of the munici-
pality. He stood by his promise to enforce the laws, establishing a
civic bureau to hear complaints regarding their violations and to devise
prompt action against wrong-doers. He did not rest with the starting
of the machinery, but delighted to personally direct the onslaught.
With the hard times and the throwing upon the streets of idlers and
tramps, crime was on the increase, and it was still further encouraged
by the reduction of the police force. But the month following his elec-
tion Mayor Wentworth put himself at the head of a body of policemen,
and during the following two days a disreputable district on the north
side, near the lake, was literally depopulated — the shanties and houses
which harbored the most degraded characters being either torn down
or burned. Raids on gambling houses were of almost daily occurrence,
and probably no occupant of the mayor's chair has been more feared
102 . CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
and hated than John Wentworth. He even raided the merchants
who persisted in obstructing the sidewalks, or placing their signs be-
yond the legal line, and although this respectable element complained
at his severity the nuisance was abated.
Mr. Wentworth left the mayor's chair with a reduction of current
expenses and the municipal debt to his credit, and with the honor
of having instilled a wholesome respect for the law. He taught the
municipality a lesson which it has yet to thoroughly learn, but which
is being assumed as a subject by civic organizations outside the munici-
pality, viz. — that it is the duty of every good citizen to either enforce
living statutes or kill them legally. With the coming of better times,
however, the citizens petitioned the state legislature for better police
protection through an expansion of their existing system. This was
obtained in February, 1861, by the passage of a legislative law creating
three commissioners of police, to be first appointed by the governor
and afterward elected by the people. In 1861 Mr. Wentworth refused
a re-nomination, withdrew from the newspaper field, acted as a dele-
gate to revise the state constitution, was chosen a member of the city
board of education, and after serving in that capacity for three years
was appointed a police commissioner. As police commissioner he was
one of the dominant forces which destroyed the conspiracy for the
liberation of Confederate prisoners at Camp Douglas, afterward served
another term in Congress and four more years on the board of educa-
tion, and throughout his entire career, until his death in 1888, was one
of the most picturesque figures of physical and mental energy and
massiveness which Chicago and the west have ever seen. He accom-
plished all his work either for himself or the city by downright power.
He had few of the genial and lovable traits which gave Mr. Ogden his
greatest influence, and although Johm Wentworth had many friends,
in their attachment to him there always seemed to lurk a certain sub-
stratum of fear ; and his enmities were so bitter — often life-long — that
this feeling was justifiable. Judged as a contributor to the civic devel-
opment of Chicago, the public owes him much; but no greater grati-
tude than because of his dramatic, and perhaps often selfish demon-
stration, that just laws may always be enforced if citizens in authority
will evince the same bravery in civic matters that they would on the
field of battle, were their country endangered. By precept and ex-
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 103
ample, he preached that they had no excuse to be cowards at home,
when their city was endangered by violators of the law in any form.
The period of the Civil war witnessed a grand outflow of patriot-
ism from Chicago, which both expanded and elevated its civic spirit.
In i860 the national Republican convention had been held which had
nominated Lincoln, the typical man of the west, in opposition to Sew-
ard, the favorite of New York and the east. It had been the first time
in the history of American politics that a great party had conceded
the importance of the territory tributary to the Mississippi valley, and
the selection of Chicago was an acknowledgement that she was the
natural metropolis of that vast region. It was the beginning of her
career as a convention city, in which she has never been found wanting
as a gracious, generous and enthusiastic hostess. Selected by the Re-
publicans in i860, 1868, 1880, 1884, 1888, 1904, and 1908; by the
Democrats in 1864, 1884, 1892 and 1896, and by the Greenback, Anti-
Monopoly, Socialistic-Democratic, Prohibition and other minor parties
in other years, the city of Chicago has fairly earned its title. These
gatherings of public men from all over the country have served to
stimulate civic pride and spirit, by placing the city and its institutions
under general and close inspection. During the Civil war, however,
her development in this direction was comparatively slow, and it was
not until the latter part of 1865 that the paid fire department and the
commencement of the present system of water works had fairly ma-
terialized. Something was done in the building of new bridges, but
little in the improvement of the streets. As Chicago merchants and
manufacturers participated in the vast work of maintaining the Union
armies in the field, commerce and trade were stimulated to the fever
pitch.
The most beneficial effect of the Civil war upon the civic develop-
ment of Chicago, was an elevation and expansion of sentiment, which
found expression in some of the noblest of works and the most benefi-
cent of institutions for the relief of the soldiers at the front. It is
difficult to specify when so many were unsparing of their strength
_ _ and means, and when Chicago was fairly alive with
T B .
^ â– â– able and patriotic citizens, but it certainly could give
Bryan. .r â– â– . rr â– .1
no offense to mention with affectionate reverence the
names of the late Thomas B. Bryan and Mark Skinner, and of Mrs.
Mary A. Livermore and Mrs. A. H. Hoge.
Mr. Bryan, that stanch little Virginian gentleman, whose cheery
I04 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
presence was but lately removed by death, was the author of Bryan
Hall, erected by him the year preceding the war. There were held
those great popular meetings, which stirred the blood of patriots, not
alone in Chicago, and which first gave assurance to the country that
while her lusty children might fight among themselves the civic spirit
would always sustain the constituted powers which stood for a united
country and equal rights. Early in her career she had refused to
besmirch her honor by the repudiation of her just debts; that was
local patriotism : now, as a city, she upheld the honor of the country
and stood as the champion of a broader patriotism. She poured her
wealth and the strength of her people into the work of the great sani-
tary commissions, of which Mark Skinner and Thomas B. Bryan,
Mrs. Hoge and Mrs. Livermore, were leading figures. Fairly worn
out by his tremendous labors as president of the commission from 1861
to 1864, Judge Skinner was obliged to retire in 1864, Mr. Bryan con-
tinuing in the harness. He was president of the great Northwestern
Sanitary Fair of 1865, and founded the Chicago Soldiers' Home large-
ly out 'of his private means. The untiring heroines of this era
also endured until the last gun was fired, .relinquishing their connection
with the work in July, 1865.
At the close of the war, which was a period of such local, as well
as national disorganization, the public works and public departments
of Chicago assumed signs of distinctive development. The first lake
tunnel of the water works was pushed to completion, and by March,
1867, water was flowing through the pipes and hydrants to the grate-
ful citizens; the long-neglected streets and sidewalks were repaired,
and the first tunnel (Washington street) was thrown under the river
to relieve the congested condition of the bridges ; harbor improve-
ments were resumed ; more commodious and beautiful houses of
amusement were erected, and the general character of all new build-
ings was more substantial and metropolitan. At a later period prior
to the Great Fire, the city hall was enlarged, the park system much
extended, many new school houses erected, and determined prepara-
tions made to place Chicago on a metropolitan basis. But the retard-
ing and disorganizing effects of the "Civil war were only partially re-
paired when the city was called upon to meet the greatest crisis
through which a municipality has ever passed.
The world knows the history of the Chicago fire of 1871. but it
CHICAGO AND COOK COUXTV 105
is (l(nibtful whether the people of the city fully appreciate how imich
it has contributed to their hi^h ci\ic reinitation for unconcjuerahle
spirit. It showed to the world that Chicago was not an accident, but
that her geographic location in relation to the producing sections and
the great channels of transportation predestined her to assume vast
power; it also demonstrated to Chicago that, despite the jeers and
rudeness of other municipalities, deep in their hearts they kept a
warm place for their young brother. Xe\er l)efure has there been
such an outpouring into the lap of a stricken city ; and from that time
the rancor against Chicago's pretensions commenced to abate. Her
newspapers, especially, voiced her spirit, as illustrated by these words
which came from the ruins of the Chicago Tribune: ''In the midst
of a calamity withmit parallel in the world's history, looking upon the
ashes of thirty years' accumulations, the people of this once beautiful
city have resolved that Chicago shall be rebuilt. Chicago must rise
again. The worst is already over. In a few days more all the dan-
gers will be past, and we can resume the battle of life with Christian
faith and western grit. Let us all cheer up." This trumpet blast to
action came from Joseph Medill, one of the giants
, , of the west, who, more than any other man, had
Medill. ^ , r , t • 1 , • 1 - , ,
brought forth Lmcoln to his historic work, who
had saved his party during the war by pushing forward that legis-
lation wdiich legalized the votes of soldiers in the field, and who. in
the month following the fire, was elected mayor of the shattered city.
Within two years he accomplished a large part in the work of re-
organization, and lived to see the rebuilt city which he prophesied.
The following from Munsell's "History of Chicago'' is a resume
of the situation which confronted Mayor IMedill and of what was
accomplished during his administration : "The task set before the
new executive was indeed beset with difficulties well nigh insuperable.
A new city hall, school houses, engine houses and police stations were
to be erected, burnt bridges and viaducts to be replaced, miles of
sidewalk to be rebuilt, and fire apparatus, hydrants and pipes to be
purchased. To meet these requirements, all of them essential to the
city's rehabilitation, required the expenditure of large sums of money,
and the mayor found himself confronted with a depleted treasury.
The rescinding by the last council of $1,442,790 of the taxes of 187 J
on account of the fire, and the provision by law for rebates on de-
io6
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
stroyed property, involving large sums in the aggregate, deprived
the new administration of half its resources. And to add still fur-
ther complications to a situation already surcharged with difficulties,
the newly organized supreme court of the state, overruling all for-
mer precedents, had lately decided several cases, in which parties
were resisting the payment of taxes on special assessments involving
$790,000, adversely to the city. The assumption by the state of the
city's canal debt, amounting to $2,955,340, however, a large portion
Joseph Medill.
of which was paid in December, enabling the mayor to provide for
interest coming due and to meet other pressing obligations, afforded
great relief. Retrenchment in the city's outlays and needed reforms
in administration were insisted upon by the mayor, and measures to
that end were adopted by the council with so little friction that the
action was practically unanimous. By, March, 1873, the work of
rebuilding the bridges and viaducts destroyed by the fire was about
completed at a cost of $526,921 for the former, and $189,573 ^^^ ^he
.latter. Commendable progress had also been made in street im-
provements and in replacing other public losses by the fire." The
direct effect of the fire upon Chicago as a city was to obliterate for
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 107
all time wooden fire traps from its business district ; to replace make-
shift buildings by substantial structures of steel, brick and stone; to
increase the efficiency of the fire department ; to extend the congested
business district much further to the south, and to make a recur-
rence of a conflagration on ar greatly extended scale a virtual im-
possibility. The city thereafter was to develop along the lines of a
great metropolis, and could no longer be designated "an overgrown
village."
The clearing away of so much that was temporary, unsightly
and disgraceful by the fire of 1871 seemed also to have a purifying
and stimulating effect upon the civic spirit of the city. Without
entering upon the merits of the ordinances relating to the closing of
saloons on Sunday, it is material to a delineation of the civic de"-
velopment of Chicago to notice that it was during Mayor Medill's
administration that the Law and Order and the People's parties
were formed, and that upon the initiative of the former he attempted
to enforce the law. He believed, with John Wentworth, that as long
as statutes were alive they should be enforced. The attempt was a
failure, and the situation was full of peril. Meanwhile Mayor Medill
went to Europe, and Mr. T. L. Bond, an alderman, taking his place
as acting mayor, continued the general policy of Mayor Medill. but.
as to tlie Sunday closing law, not to the extent^ of precipitating a
contest in which the entire police force, constabulary and militia of
the state would probably have been involved with disasters to busi-
ness and other crimes that it was impossible to tell. Thus matters
continued until the approaching election. Under the circumstances,
it being evident that the election would turn entirely upon the ques-
tion of Sunday closing, neither of the political parties made any
nominations for city officers other than aldermen. Those in favor of
a determined effort to close the saloons on Sunday nominated T. L.
Bond, the then acting mayor. Those opposed to such action nomi-
nated H. D. Colvin, manager of the United States Express Company.
The closed and open Sunday parties each made nominations for city
attorney, city clerk and city treasurer. A very vigorous contest fol-
lowed with the result that the open Sunday ticket was elected by a
majority of ten thousand. The message of the incoming mayor was
most conciliatory, and rather a departure from the policy inaugurated
by Mayor Wentworth, continued by Mayor Aledill and generally ac-
io8 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
ceptecl by present-day students of municipal government as the part
of practical wisdom, viz. : to enforce strictly the laws upon the books,
thereby proving either their wisdom or undesirability, or to repeal
them in their entirety. He spoke of the ordinances as representing
the opinion of "a comparatively small and homogeneous population
at the time of their enactment," but as having ceased to be in con-
sonance with public opinion since Chicago had, "by the harmonious
co-operation of citizens belonging to the different nationalities,
grown from a village to the rank of one of the greatest cities in the
world. For a series of years," he continued, "it has been the prac-
tice of our municipal administration to treat those ordinances as
obsolete, and to refrain from enforcing them. It is not intended to
denounce that practice, but merely to state that within the past year
they have become distasteful to a large portion of the community.
* * * jf |-]^g common council in its wisdom, and having" un-
doubted full power upon the subject, should determine either to re-
peal or modify the Sunday prohibitions and Sunday clause in the
license law,-or to fully secure the religious exercises of a portion of
our citizens from all disturbance, without interfering with the harm-
less enjoyments of other citizens, it will do no more than its duty
toward the majority of the people of this city." The first part of
Mayor Colvin's administration was signalized by the talk of repu-
diating nearly a million dollars of city script which had been issued
beyond the legal limit and based upon unlawful assessments; but
the old Ogden spirit came to the rescue of the city's financial honor,
a mass meeting of citizens pledged themselves to see that the script
was paid dollar for dollar, and the legislature legalized the tax levy.
A compromise on the saloon question was effected by the passage
of an ordinance providing for the closing on Sunday of all doors and
windows of saloons which opened upon any street. Such legislation
was interpreted as a virtual concession to criminal license, and the
administration was what in later-day phrase was denominated "wide
open." The spoils of office were generally conceded to the Demo-
cratic party which had formed the basis of the People's organization.
Through the quarrels of the leaders the latter party was disrupted,
and the groundwork was laid for the installation of the strongest ma-
chine which the local Democracy of Chicago, or perhaps any other
city in the country, has ever founded. In 1875 the people of Chicago
CHICAGO AXl) COOK ^^)l^\T^•
109
adopted* the general incorporation act of the state, and under the
act of reorganization the old board of police and fire commissioners
was abolished and the distinctive departments created as at present. In
1876 the health department of the city was reorganized, with a com-
missioner at its head, and that loose division of the civic body, which
had been constantly changing and, at times, non-existent, was found-
ed upon its present basis. From this time on, the chief features of
the municipality were fixed, and the development of the service was
along the lines of efficiency and strength and in harmony with ex-
panding ideas of educators and humanitarians. The Colvin admin-
istration was succeeded by two Republican mayoralties, during which
occurred the railroad riots and the first forcible exposition to the city
of the danger to the public peace of the unchecked promulgation of
forci'g'n communism.
The four succeeding administrations of Carter II. Harrison were
in many respects the most remarkable in the civic history of Chicago.
The personality of the chief executive was unique, and a remarkable
combination of practical, earnest, brilliant, humorous and imaginative
powers which perhaps have never had another counterpart in the
country except in the person of the late Robert G. Ingersoll. His
speech, his acts, were all dramatic, and yet it often happened that.
in \iew of the elements upon which he depended for the furtherance
of his policies, his only hope of advancing the best interests of the
city seemed to be to play the demagogue. He was a Kentuckian,
polished, widely traveled, finely educated, a lawyer, and the inheritor
of broad abilities and ambitions from such as William Henry Harri-
son, Thomas Jefiferson and John C. Breckenridge. With a broad,
massive head, strong features, a fine eye, and a military bearing, al-
though a man of only medium stature, Mr. Harrison was a man of
striking appearance, and instinctively won favor before he put into
action his elo(|nence and wonderful magnetism. He was a born
leader and politician, and seemed instinctively to understand the
winniu"- of men in whatever ranks of life thev walked. Inheriting
money, he invested it in Chicago real estate in tlic fifties, and had
*The effect of aceepting the general incorporation act was to ^xteud for several
months the term of mayor, treasurer, cit-y clerk ami i^'ity attorney elected by the
open-Sunday partv. and this liad an iiiMuence in the discussion as to whether the
city should accept the general incorporation act.
no CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
amassed a fortune before he entered politics, which was about the
time of the great fire, as a member of the first board of county com-
missioners. His creditable service therein was followed by a term
in Congress, during which his brilliant oratory in behalf of such
measures as the six-year presidential term and the centennial gained
him a wide distinction. As a humorist, also, he came from Congress
with a reputation second to no public man. Other extended seasons
of European travel preceded his first election to the mayoralty in
1879, ^n*i before the conclusion of his third term he was nominated
by the Democracy as governor of Illinois. Although not elected, he
succeeded in reducing the normal Republican majority about two-
thirds. ■•
When Mayor Harrison became head of the municipality, he was
the chief representative of a great city of half a million people, a
majority of whom were foreigners or of recent foreign descent,
many of whom had not yet been educated to discriminate between
freedom and license. For the first time in many years the Democracy
had elected its entire ticket, and by the executive ability of the mayor
was soon- welded into one of the strongest political machines which
ever dominated the municipal government. Through it he succeeded
himself repeatedly, being in office longer than any other occupant of
the chair, and Mayor Harrison's fine abilities were given an op-
portunity to work out many beneficial results which materially
redounded to the civic development of Chicago. He reduced salaries,
wiped out a floating city debt of nearly $2,500,000 within three
years ; saw to it that the inferior city script was paid off ; erected the
city's half of the combined city and county building,* and introduced
the telegraph, telephone and patrol to the administration of the police
department. He also caused the removal of the unsightly and dan-
gerous telegraph poles, and substituted the underground system; and
improvements of the streets, sidewalks and the sewers were constant
and generous. It was during- the last term of his administration that
the historic Haymarket riot occurred, and that public and civic sen-
timent came so sternly to the support of law and order, teaching the
* By agreement the exterior design of the buildings was alike. The county
was then under control of a board of county commissioners, a majority of whom
were corrupt, and a number of these were sent to the penitentiary. The city
building was honestly built, and cost considerably less than the east half of the
building.
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY iii
advocates of anarchy, disorder and bloodshed the first real chapter
in the lesson which they are yet to leani in its entirety.
But, although local conditions and abuses were always to be the^
direct forces operating upon the civic development of Chicago, the
reform and growth of the municipal body were really an accompani-
ment of the national movement tending to improve the civil service
of the general government. In the first formal discussion at Wash-
ington calling the country's attention to the necessity of keeping the
public service from the clutches of politics, Webster, Clay and Cal-
houn, in the midst of their acrimonies of 1835, agreed that "some-
thing must be done." When assuming his tumultuous ofiice in i860,
Lincoln found what it was to be a martyr to the spoils system. The
great southern question pressed upon his heart for solution, but the
ofiice-seekers would not let him alone, and he cried out : 'T am like
a man so busy letting rooms in one end of his house that he cannot
stop to put out the fire in the other." In the late seventies came
the threatened disruption of the Republican party, because of a pro-
test against the spoils system by such men as Sumner, Greeley and
Schurz, and in 1881 Garfield was assassinated by Guiteau, an office-
seeker. The latter tragedy was also a keen thrust at the vitals of the
system, and fully aroused the sentiment of the country in support of
civil service reform within the national government. President Ar-
thur, the successor of Garfield, signed the act which established the
merit system in the civil service of the United States, in direct oppo-
sition to the spoils system, and Grover Cleveland unqualifiedly en-
dorsed it, and even improved upon it. Thus Republican and Demo-
cratic administrations formally endorsed the principle, and to a large
extent the influence of politics upon the civil service has been elimi-
nated. In 1884 laws founded upon the federal statutes were extended
to New York, Massachusetts, Wisconsin and Illinois — the state laws
of Illinois under which the civil service of Cook county and the city
of Chicago was organized were passed in 1S95.
The intervening period had embraced three of the eight years of
the notoriously political Harrison administration; the administration
of John A. Roche, during which a vigorous attempt was made to
enforce the ordinances against gambling and midnight closing of the
saloons; the Cregier regime, also partisan, during which 128 square
miles of the city's present area of 190 square miles, were added, and
112 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
V
considerable advances made in the movement toward municipal own-
ership of the gas and transportation systems of the city; the Wash-
burne term, during which was inaugurated the work of elevating the
railroad tracks within the municipal limits, and the final administra-
tion of the elder Harrison, culminating in the assassination of the
mayor by one who imagined that he had been unjustly treated.
In the early nineties the public sentiment of the country in favor
of civil service reform in the general government had become strongly
reflected upon the county and city administrations,
„ and the present statutes providing for the merit rule
were passed by the legislature in 1895, going into'
force on July ist of that year. As to the county, the law places under
the merit rule all employes, except appointive heads of departments,
that come under the jurisdiction of the board of commissioners. The
amendment of 1905 simplifies the removal of employes whose service
is unsatisfactory. The attending staff of physicians and surgeons
and the internes of the Cook County Hospital are also placed under
the merit rule, and by the amendment of 1905 the probation officers
of the juvenile court are also placed under the civil service act.
Public sentiment strongly supported civil service reform both in
the administration of county and city governments, and, perhaps
as much as any one man, Merritt Starr, the widely-known legal au-
thor and lawyer, was concerned with the crystallization of the move-
ment into definite legislation and organization. A liberally educated
man, both in literature and the law, he had been engaged in the com-
pilation and annotation of the state statutes for many years, as well
as enjoyed a professional association with such leaders of the bar as
George R. Peck and John S. Miller. He was president of the Chi-
cago Law Institute for two terms. He fathered the general state law
providing for the introduction of the merit system, and assisted in
its passage, as well as in the enactments bringing Cook county and
the city of Chicago within its provisions. He personally drafted the
city civil service law, followed it faithfully through the state legisla-
ture, was afterward a leader in the charter for a so-called Greater
Chicago, and has unquestionably been one of the strongest and most
consistent agents in the formation and development -of a high civic
spirit, and the promulgation of practical reforms of the many earnest
and able citizens who have participated in such municipal movements.
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 113
The first Civil Ser\ice Comniission of Chica^'-t) \v:is apiKjiiUcd hy
Mayor George B. Swift, aiul consisted of the following menibcrs:
John M. Clark, president; Rollin A. Keyes. secretary, and W. K.
Ackerman, chairman of the general board of examiners. In the
classification of offices and the formulation of the rules, the commis-
sion was greatly assisted by John T. Doyle, secretary of the Na-
tional Civil Service Commission, who visited Chicago for about five
weeks for that purpose. On August 26, 1895, the law, classification
and rules went into effect. During the first day 2,000 blank applica-
tions for positions were filed, and up to December 31st 20,500 formal
applications had been made, of wdiich 14,000 were for official serv-
ice and the balance for labor service. At this formative period of the
commission, it was necessary to put in force some efifective system
for physically examining applicants for the fire and police depart-
ment, and after a thorough investigation of the matter the method
adopted was that devised by Dr. A. H. Brown of New York City,
who came from the eastern metropolis himself to supervise the first
examinations. This, of itself, was a large task, as just prior to the
taking effect of the law 700 patrolmen had been discharged from the
city service on purely political grounds. Although the police and fire
departments were in most pressing need of the application of a law
which applied the tests of special fitness, moral character and general
intelligence to the civil service of the municipal departments, all were
honeycombed and weakened by politics and ''pull." When the com-
mission first entered upon its duties it found 40,000 applications for
office on file in the different city departments. Of course, under the
old regime, this horde of office-seekers swarmed around the harassed
mayor of the city; under the civil service rules the slate was wiped
clean, and as stated by the commission: "The effect of the adoption
of the Civil Service law and rules has been to relieve the mayor and
heads of departments from the pressure of applicants for ofiice, thus
leaving them to attend to their more important duties." The origi-
nal rules made forty-five years the age test for entrance to the civil
service of the city, but this proxiso was soon abolished. The com-
mission also eliminated from the examinations purely educational
tests, as the end was olniouslv to ascertain the applicant's practical
ability to till the position for which he is a candidate rather than his
scholastic accomplishments. The prime object in an exanynation
Vol. 1—8.
114 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
for the civil service is to bring out the individual qualifications, expe-
rience and resources of the applicant, and for this reason, in those
employments which do not require special technical education the
items of examination known variously as "knowledge of duties,"
"knowledge for position," etc., have gradually been raised in im-
portance. The service both of the city and county is divided into
three classes — official, skilled labor and labor (common). In order
to be eligible to the examination, the applicant must have resided in
city or county for a year, and be twenty-one years of age, if a man,
and eighteen years old, if a woman. Good moral character, tem-
perance and sound health are also given as requisites.
Reverting to the main features of the examinations for the civil
service, it may be remarked that they are based on the method long
prevalent in the colleges and universities of the country. The exami-
nation for each office is divided into several heads, which total from
ten to fifteen points, or "weights." For instance, out of a total of ten
weights given to the examination for the medical service, technical
knowledge . counts four and experience two, for the reason that the
education of a physician, or other employe of that department who
would be valuable, would necessarily be largely technical, while one
of broad and long experience would not be likely to apply for such
a position. Seven out of the ten points for a civil engineering ex-
amination are covered by technical knowledge and mathematics, and
the same items embrace six points in the examination for electrical
engineering. On the other hand, the applicant for a position on the
fire or police department is required tq have a practical knowledge
of the duties which he seeks, and in his position six of the ten points
are covered by this heading. The educational test is light, and could
be passed by the average graduate of the public school. In the ex-
amination of engineers, pilots and stokers, who desire to be admitted
to the city service, six points are given to "knowledge of duties" and
five to physical qualifications (out of a total of fifteen points), the
latter also being an important consideration in the case of. the would-
be fireman or policeman. In the examinations for positions under the
classification, skilled labor, practical tests as to qualifications count
three out of the five points and technical knowledge two; when the
applicant takes the examination for a foremanship, which position
calls for the making out of various reports, spelling and arithmetic
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 115
count one point each, technical knowledge five and experience two,
out of a total of nine points. In considering the necessary qualifica-
tions for clerks, stenographers and employes of the public library,
on the other hand, penmanship, spelling and letter-writing are natur-
ally raised in "weight."
Although the above gives but a general idea of the development
and present status of the civil service of Chicago, it is sufficient to
counteract the scoffing attitude of many well-meaning but imperfectly
informed citizens, who are disposed to deride civil service examina-
tions as the invention of impractical enthusiasts. The system still
has its defects, but it is a vast improvement over the old spoils sys-
tem of political influence and personal "pull" as the chief motive
powers for advancement in the civil service. The public, in fact, is
being educated to the idea that these forces are fast vanishing. All
employes of the city and county, under the law, are now protected
from political persecution, or from discharge on political grounds.
Political assessments are no longer a part of the system. A perma-
nent tenure of office or position is ensured during good behavior,
and promotion is based on merit after examination. This certainly
indicates a very encouraging development of the civic service and
the idea of civil service reform. At the present time the most no-
ticeable defect appears to be the grading of positions based on com-
pensation. The great inequality of salaries, even paid to those in the
same department whose duties differ little in responsibility or quali-
fications, is the constant cause of much dissatisfaction and friction,
and as stated by the commission, "it is here that favoritism does its
most harmful work." But the defect is so plainly evident that the
civil service commission is taking up the matter in a practical way
with the common council, so that this bald defect in the civil service
will be soon remedied.
The firm position which the Chicago Civil Service Commission
has attained as an agency in the most advanced forms of civic devel-
opment is largely due to the favorable attitude and the sustainuig
power of the courts, which, in all test cases, have decided that the
findings of the commission, or its auxiliary trial boards, are final,
unless there is some valid question as to jurisdiction. The board
of education even submitted to the decision of the state supreme
ii6 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
court, some eight years ago, that all its employes except teachers
were subject to the civil service law and commission.
Outside of the Chicago Civil Service Commission, the most pow-
erful force working toward municipal reforms is the Civic Federation,
which, although a corporation of private citizens,
is really the father of the official commission it-
self ajid of several other reformatory bodies. Al-
though there are such as the Civil Service League, Civil Service Reform
Association and the Citizens' Association of Chicago, the earliest and
still the strongest public sentiment for the advancement of all move-
ments in the interest of law and order, purity of politics, simplicity
and economy of government and for a Chicago both greater and bet-
ter, has found expression and practical action through the Civic Fed-
eration. The work of the federation began in the winter of 1893^
during the "hard times" of that year, when thousands of men were
out of employment, and hundreds crowded the corridors of the city
hall in the day and the rank jails of the city at night. It was at this
critical time that it organized the Central Relief Association, which
raised and expended $135,000 for the relief of the homeless. At the
close of the winter the federation continued the organization, and
permanently established it as the Bureau of Associated Charities,
bearing all its expenses for the first year. On the third of February,
1894, the federation received its incorporation certificate from the
department of state, in which it is stated that its objects are "local
municipal improvement and the betterment of civic conditions, the
promotion of efficiency in the public service and the furtherance of
wholesome legislation." In its early years the federation had its de-
partments of political action, philanthropy, moral improvement and
legislation. Each of these had standing committees which did ef-
fective work, but it was soon found that they seriously conflicted with
each other when conducted by the same controlling body. It was
because of this that the Bureau of Charities (already mentioned) and
the Municipal Voters' League were organized, the latter having since
its organization in 1896 been devoted to the good work of posting the
Chicago voter on the moral and official qualifications of the city al-
dermen.
It is impossible to treat in detail of the work of the Civic Federa-
tion, for the reason that there is no movement of any consequence
CHICAGO AND COOK COUMA' 117
which has liad a bearing on the civic development of Cliicago in
which it has not been either the prime mover, or an active partici-
pant. A brief account of its work is therefore all tiiat can be given.
In the first year of its incorporation it organized the Associated Bu-
reau of Charities from its original committee on philanthropy ; convict-
ed and sent to the penitentiary several thugs who had committed frauds
at the city polls and assaulted election judges and clerks, and (after the
great railroad strike) called a conference on arbitration, attended by
representative men from every section of the United States, and which
resulted in the present state arbitration law. In the following year
(1895) a joint committee organized by the Civic Federation and
composed of representatives of the leading clubs of the city secured
the drafting of the present civil service law, secured its passage and
afterward organized the campaign which resulted in its popular adop-
tion by a majority of over 50,000. It did not stop there, but put a
corps of detectives on the trail of those who attempted to violate the
law. and sent them to jail. Cases of violation are constantly being
taken before the Civil Service Commission by the federation's com-
mittee on civil service, and in many instances prosecuted in the courts.
With the courts, the Civic Federation of Chicago is the great support
of civil service reform in Chicago. In the line of economics the
federation demonstrated, in i8g6, what could be accomplished by an
organized body of earnest and honest citizens. For six months of
that year it cleaned the down-town streets for $10 per mile (the city
liaving been paying $18.50 per mile for worse service). As long
thereafter as the contract system was in force the figures did not
exceed $10.50. During 1896, also, it organized the Municipal \'oters'
League out of the federation committee on political action and in-
aue'urated the movement for vacation schools, conducting the first
one through its educaticMial committee. In 1897 it organized the
citizens' committee, which drafted the new revenue law and began
a campaign for its adoption. It also organized a campaign for pri-
mary election reform, and founded the Penny Savings Society, of
which Rev. R. A. White is the special author. The federation gave
the society office room for tw^o years, the project was officially en-
dorsed by the board of education, and the society has now numerous
stations and thousands of depositors among the school children, news-
boys and bootblacks of the city. During ihc Spanish-. \merican war
over 900 families of soldiers at the fnnU were cared tor by the Armv
ii8 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY ,
and Navy League of Illinois, which was organized by the philan-
thropic committee of the Civic Federation, and in the same year it
inaugurated the first national conference on primary election reform,
which was held in New York City in January and resulted in radical
legislation in Ihinois, New York and other states. The question of
parental schools had become of such general interest that eight or ten
organizations had been formed to consider the problem, all working
for the same general result but along slightly different lines. In 1898
the federation succeeded in unifying these various organizations into a
joint committee, which eventually secured the desired legislation. In
co-operation with the Chicago Real Estate Board, in 1899, the fed-
eration secured the passage of a much-needed revenue law, and the
following year it defeated the proposed issue of $1,500,000 in bonds
for the remodeling of the court house. Through its continuous ef-
forts the legislature passed a revised primary law in 1901, and in
the same year placed upon the statute books the township consolida-
tion law, the much-needed measure applying to seven townships lying
wholly within the city and whose officials for years had been saddling
an unnecessary expense upon its tax payers. The movement for a
new Chicago charter was also inaugurated by the federation in 1902,
by organizing the first convention to consider the subject, which was
composed of delegates from twenty-three civic bodies, boards and clubs.
The president and secretary of the federation, Joseph Powell and
Thomas J. Corcoran, respectively, were made chairriian of the cam-
paign committee and permanent secretary of the convention. In the
main the federation conducted the campaign for the adoption of the
new charter constitutional amendment, and was at the back of the
Chicago charter convention, held in December, 1905, the main pur-
pose being to frame a comprehensive, elastic and yet simple frame-
work for the municipal government. The convention was composed
of delegates representing the mayor, city council, governor, legisla-
ture, board of education, sanitary trustees, county board, public li-
brary and park boards. The completed charter was taken to Spring-
field in the early part of 1907, and, although the legislature made
several radical changes in it, such as the substitution of the old pri-
mary system for the one proposed, the measure was passed in May
of that year. Although the charter provided for a much-needed con-
solidation in the municipal government of the powers vested in vari-
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 119
oiis other bodies, when it was submitted to popular vote at the special
election of September 17th it was defeated by the decisive vote of
121,935 to 59,786. The provision providing for municipal ownership
of public utilities, including railroads, telephones, telegraphs and
lighting, heating, refrigerating and power plants, was considered by
the mass of citizens of doubtful practical value, and was doubtless
one of the chief causes for the defeat of the charter. The new
Municipal Court bill was voted upon favorably, however, and the
justice system closed forever. In the meantime, also, the federation
had organized an investigation of the meat and milk inspection con-
ducted within the city limits, and in 1904 appointed a health and
sanitation committee. This committee published bacterial analyses
of three hundred samples of milk gathered from twenty-three wards
of the city, and the published results of its secret service work showed
the general worthlessness of both the milk and meat inspection in
Chicago. Of late this movement has taken the special form of pro-
tecting the health of children, as the health authorities have ascer-
tained that fully a quarter of the infant mortality in the city is
the result of impure milk. A commission was originally organized
by the Children's Hospital Society for the rehef of the children of
the poor, but it is now an independent body, its supplies of sterilized,
modified and absolutely pure milk being distributed from twenty or
thirty stations located in the poorer districts of the city.
Perhaps the two subjects in which the Civic Federation is at
present most deeply interested and most earnestly active are those
relating to a revision of the state revenue laws and the proposed
formation of a new park commission, or what is popularly known as
an Outer-Belt Park Board. In the interest of the former it has entered
into an investigation of the tax systems of various states, and ap-
pointed a revenue committee which has recommended the creation
of a special tax commission to make a thorough study of the subject ;
also advised an amendment of the revenue article of the state consti-
tution so as to make the desired changes possible. The Special State
Tax Commission has been recommended by the legislature and vetoed
by the governor, but the federation has prepared another bill which
it believes will be acceptable to the chief state executive.
The above very brief review of the work of the Civic Federation
but faintly indicates its power in the civic development of Chicago.
I20 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
As its working members virtually comprise the cream of Chiacgo's
citizenship, it would be obviously impossible to ^select one man, or
even half a dozen figures, around which its numerous reformatory
movements have revolved, and yet it is probable that none will take
exception to a kindly and enthusiastic mention of the name of John
M. Clark, the first president of the commission, a pioneer citizen of
balanced, rounded character, who, in his old age, has the same eager
interest in the highest development of the civic spirit and municipal
'institutions that he possessed as a young and vigorous civil engineer
and soldier. Of a younger generation are Robert A. Waller and
Alexander H. Revell, and when the last word shall be spoken re-
garding the civic development of Chicago, the names of the late W.
K. Ackerman and John W. Ela will stand well to the fore. West-
ern Starr, also, the brother of Merritt Starr, who drafted the original
act, had a large share in the establishment of the merit system as
the basis of the civil service of Chicago, both from his identification
with the Civic Federation and the Civil Service League. But the
movement is now so general and is supported by such variety of abil-
ity and strong personality that the individual is almost absorbed in
the importance and intensity of the work.
From the general subject, as it is presented today, the two work-
ing bodies which stand out most prominently in the civic development
of this city are its Civil Service Commission and the Civic Federation
of Chicago. The former is the formal endorsement of merit, as
against politics and the personal influence of those already in author-
ity in the administration and development of the municipal service;
the latter is a federation of private citizens in which is crystallized
the most advanced civic spirit of Chicago — a body not only produc-
tive of original and virile ideas, but working for practical reforms,
whether originating within or without its organization. In a word,
these two bodies are the most signal births of the civic spirit which
has done more than all else to make Chicago a great city.
In the midst of his wide popularity and manifold successes,
whether in his office, at the banquet table or in private intercourse,
Mr. Bryan never forgot that he was a gentleman.
Thomas B. -rj • ,• r ^i i w ^r • •
^ He was a projection of the old-time Virginia gen-
tleman into the raw, bustling life of the great west-
ern city, and in young manhood, middle age and as a wiry, bright-
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY ui
eyed, vencral)Ie man of nearly eighty, held his own for over half a
century with the al)lest, most energetic, most polished characters
which Chicago brought into the activities of her brilliant history.
Up to the day of his death, the citizens of the western metropolis
who had known him so well and loved him so much, although his
hair was white, refused to think of him as an old man. To almost
the last, his step was sprightly, his word was cheery and he looked
the world in the face, and particularly the Chicago part of it, with
head erect and eyes full of hope and confidence that all things were
working for the best. One of the most marked, the strongest, most
lovable and inspiring traits in the many-sided character of Thomas
B. Bryan was his optimism, and this firm faith in the triumph of
good was the means of removing difficulties in his pathway which
seemed at first sight mountainous and immovable.
As stated, Mr. Bryan was a Virginian, born at Alexandria. De-
cember 22, 1828, and was the son of Daniel and Mary (Barbour)
Brvan. His father served in the senate of Virginia, and tw^o of his
mother's brothers, James and Philip Barbour, held such government
positions as cabinet minister, speaker of the house of representatives,
judge of the United States supreme court, minister to England and
governor of the Old Dominion. As blood will tell, it is not strange
that Thomas B. Bryan should have naturally come by his high abil-
ity and unfailing courtesy. In 1848 he was graduated from the law
school of Harvard University, and shortly afterward entered upon
the practice of his profession at Cincinnati, Ohio, in partnership with
Judge Hart of that city.
In 1852 Mr. Bryan came to Chicago, and. although it had been a
city in name for fifteen years, it was still little uK^re than an over-
grown and unformed village. He soon became a member of the
firm of Mather, Taft & Hatch, which was successively changed to
Bryan & Borden and Bryan & Hatch. The most of his period as a
practitioner in Chicago, however, was passed as an independent of-
fice counselor, and in this capacity his standing was unapproachable
by any member of the profession. \\'ith the exception of several
years spent in Washington, Colorado and in European travel, he
also made the city his home for the greater portion of half a century.
He succeeded Governor Shepherd as executive of the District of Co-
lumbia, and his administrati(^n was marked by (he same ability, lion-
122 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
esty and conservative financing which always characterized his man-
agement of other interests entrusted to him. At his resignation a
memorial was presented to him as a farewell testimonial, expressive
of deep regret at his departure and warm appreciation of the high
character of his administration. It was signed by all the prominent
citizens of the district, being headed by the philanthropist, Corcoran.
Finding that the old cemetery, which now forms a portion of
Lincoln Park, was becoming undesirable, in view of the encroach-
ment of the north side population, Mr. Bryan founded Graceland
cemetery, now one of the most beautiful and majestic homes of the
dead in the United States. He purchased the original tract of land
on which it was plotted, and was at one time its sole proprietor. He
also built Bryan Hall on the present site of the Grand Opera House,
and within its walls were held some of the most notable gatherings
of the Civil, war period. Bryan Hall, in fact, became a synOnym for
Chicago and western patriotism. Altliough a southerner, Mr. Bryan
was in mind, heart and soul a Union man, and his attitude was so
pronounced that in 1865 he was chosen president of the great North-
western Fair for the relief of Union soldiers. As a direct result of
his masterly management and wise direction of its affairs over $300,-
000 was passed over to the invalid soldiers' fund, and for years after
those who were widowed and orphaned as a result of the war looked
upon Mr. Bryan as their special benefactor. The Soldiers' Home
was also built under his direction and with money advanced by him,
he was for many years its president and never failed in his loyalty
to it, to the full extent both of his time and means. It was to Mr.
Bryan's forethought and enterprise that Chicago owed the Fidelity
Safe Depository, which survived the fire of 1871, and saved many-
millions to the people of this city.
At the time of the energetic contest between New York and Chi-
cago for the location of the World's Columbian Exposition Mr.
Bryan was in his sixty-third year — an age when most men, who had
labored as hard and accomplished as much as he, would have sought
repose. But the occasion seemed to arouse in him the vigor and
versatility of youth, and his eloquent appeals, both by speech and
pen, brought him forward as Chicago's most masterly champion.
When the final contest was fought before the senate committee at
Washington, Mr. Bryan had as his opponent Chauncey Depew, con-
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 123
siderecl par excellence the most seductive and polished advocate before
any legislative body in the country. But Mr. Bryan's wit, humor
and sarcasm, his thorough knowledge of the merits of his case, and
his compelling earnestness and straightforwardness, carried the day.
He was afterward chosen first vice president of the exposition, and
until the triumphant conclusion of the great fair his services were
secpnd to none for faithfulness, effectiveness and tact fulness. If
any one man is to be selected as the father of the World's Colum-
bian Exposition it is probable that the majority of the votes will be
cast for Thomas B. Bryan.
In 1850 Mr. Bryan married Miss Byrd Page, of Virginia, and
the issue of the marriage w^as a daughter and a son — Charles P.
Bryan a well-known journalist and litterateur, who served in the leg-
islatures of Colorado and Illinois, and most creditably upholds the
splendid name of his father.
Joseph Medill, mayor of Chicago for the two supremely critical
years succeeding the great fire, spent nearly forty-five years of his
life as a founder and guiding spirit of the Republi-
^ can party and as the inspiring and molding power
which brought the Chicago Tribune from the ob-
scurity of a failing enterprise to the rank of one of the greatest news-
papers in the world. He was honorable, sturdy, versatile, wise and
brilliant, born of Scotch-Irish parents on the 6th day of April, 1823.
in the city of St. John, New Brunswick. There the family remained
until 1832, when it emigrated to Massillon, Stark county, Ohio. The
little city of Canton was only sixteen miles away, and after the youth
had' grounded himself in the common branches he commenced to
walk thither, on Saturday afternoons, for the purpose of studying
Latin, logic and natural philosophy under the guidance of a Meth-
odist clergyman of that place. He completed his education in the
village academy of Massillon, from which he graduated in 1843. and
in the following year cast his first vote for Henry Clay and began
the study of law with Hon. Hiram Griswold. Admitted to the bar
in 1846, he was for some time the partner of George W. Mcllvaine.
afterward chief justice of the supreme court of Ohio. After an
association of three years with that gentleman, several considerations
induced him to abandon the law for journalism. Since early boyhood
he had taken an intense interest in the great questions which stirred
124 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
such men as Webster and Clay, and with the undoubted reahzation
of his own knowledge and strength he longed to participate in the
stir and molding of public policies. There were also three younger
brothers in the family whose welfare he generously assumed, and
one of his earnest desires was to place them in the way of honorable
advancement. In 1849 ^'^^ became the proprietor of the Coshocton
(Ohio) Whig, and thus commenced the realization of both his per-
sonal ambition and his brotherly desire. His brothers became com-
positors and job printers, valued assistants in the mechanical progress
of the enterprise, while Mr. Medill devoted himself to the further-
ance of its editorial policy and general development. At the outset
he changed its name to the Coshocton Repviblican, stating that this
was the proper appellation both of the party and its organs. In
1852 he sold his business and founded the Daily Forest City at Cleve-
land, giving his support to Scott and the Whig cause which was so
overwhelmingly defeated. The unfortunate outcome of this presi-
dential campaign upon a platform which he considered little short
of cowardly convinced him that the time was ripe for the formation
of a new Republican party, which should take its stand on the prin-
ciples of equal rights, anti-slavery, the sovereignty of the general
government and protection to American industries. In 1853 ^^ ^^'^'
solidated his interests with those of John C. Vaughn and Edwin
Cowles, the former publisher of a Free-soil organ known as the True
Democrat, and the latter a skillful job printer. The result was the
Cleveland Leader, a highly successful newspaper. Mr. Medill con-
tinued to advocate the formation of a new party with the name
Republican, abandoning forever the English cognomen of Whig, and
commenced a general correspondence with party leaders over the
proposed change. Horace Greeley replied to one of his letters : "Go
ahead and get it adopted in Ohio; it is too soon for us in New York
to advocate the name. We must first suffer another bad defeat."
In 1853 the conservative wing of the Whig party suffered a disas-
trous defeat, the liberal candidate of the party taking the guberna-
torial chair, solidly backed by a 60,000 majority and the strong in-
fluence of Mr. Medill's paper. In April of the following year a
number of prominent anti-slavery Whigs, Democrats and Free-soilers
met at the editorial office of the Cleveland Leader and organized a
new party under the name of National Republican, with opposition to
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 1J5
slavery as its corner stone. In January, 1855. Mr. Medill sc^kl tlie
Leader io Edwin Cowles and in company with Mr. \^au^-hn and Dr.
Ray, of Galena, Illinois, bought the waning Chicago Tribune. With-
in a few years Mr. Medill was its editor and proprietor, and from
that time until his death kept pace with Chicago, and even led it
in the race. He was not only the watch dog of details, but brought
everything into conformity with some well-arranged general pLan
or policy. He drew Lincoln to his editorial office by his power and
practical wisdom, and the country lawyer while in Chicago spent
many hours with him in the discussion of slavery and the issues in
which they were to co-operate so closely and effectively in the few
years to come, each in his exalted station before the people. No one
influence in the country did more to make Lincoln president than the
Tribune, under the steady guidance of Joseph Medill. The plan bv
which Union soldiers were authorized to ballot in the field was also
his. and upheld the president's conduct of the war by again placing
him in office with a decisive majority. The system was generally
adopted by the northern states, and under it the governor appointed
special commissioners to go to the front, receive the soldier ballots,
which were sealed and not opened and counted except in the resident
districts of the voters. The editor of the Tribune was even nidre
radical than the president on the slavery question, insisting from the
first tliat emancipation without remuneration was the only possible
solution of the problem. Mr. Medill also fought, through his paper,
for the constitutional amendment enfranchising the ex-slaves, and,
with the partial settlement of the most pressing national issues, gave
more of his personal and editorial attention to the affairs of the city
and state. In 1869 he was unanimously elected a member of the
constitutional convention of Illinois, being the only delegate to be
thus honored. Among other important provisions which owe their
origin to him is that of minority representation in the legislature.
In 1 87 1 he was appointed a member of the first national civil service
commission by President Grant, antl in November of the same year
was elected mayor of Chicago by a three-fourths' vote. The stress
of those times immediately succeeding the fire were ttio much toi
even his strong constitution, and in September. 187^^. he resigned the
oftke and went to Europe for a year's recreation. In the meantime
the ceaseless and unusual expansion of the Tribune in all its depart-
126 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
ments had necessitated the infusion of outside capital, but upon Mr.
Medill's return to Chicago in November, 1874, he purchased a con-
trolHng interest in the estabHshment and reorganized the business
as the Tribune Pubhshing Company. He resumed active control
of its editorial policy also, and at once infused into it the vigor and
momentum of the old times. One of the local measures which he
advocated with unfailing earnestness during the later years of his
life was an increase in liquor licenses, and the effect of his work is
largely seen in the present law, which has placed millions of dollars
of revenue in the city coffers and helped sustain the cause of popular
education, as well as other beneficial institutions. Mr. Medill's death
occurred at San Antonio, Texas, March 16, 1899. As an editor and
a molder^ of public sentiment, he was one of the greatest which the
country has produced, and for many years the Chicago Tribune
stood in the west much as the New York Tribune in the east, both
dominated by masters of journalism and masters among men.
Carter H. Harrison, four successive terms mayor of Chicago,
and after an interregnum of three administrations, assassinated dur-
ing his fifth incumbency of the ofhce, was a
-rj * native of Lexington, Kentucky, born on the
15th of February, 1825. His great-great-grand-
father was the ancestor of President William Henry Harrison,
and his grandfather a cousin of Thomas Jefferson, he himself being
a cousin of John C. Breckenridge. The fever of politics was there-
fore in his blood. His father dying when he was eight months of
age, he was left to the sole care of his mother, a daughter of Colonel
William Russell, of the United States army, and one of the pioneers
of the northwest. The home of the half-orphan was a log house and
it is said that his first cradle was a sugar trough; but, despite this
rude entry into the world, the brilliant and versatile traits of such an
ancestry were evident in his character at a very early age. Most of
his education before he entered Yale College as a sophomore was ob-
tained under Dr. Marshall, brother of the chief justice and father of
Tom Marshall, the great orator. Graduating therefrom in 1845 he
commenced the study of law, but did not enter practice at once, de-
voting himself rather to his mother, for whom he always evinced the
deepest affection and whose strong and inspiring character was, per-
haps, the leading force which, in his early manhood, brought him
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 127
into the front rank of the emancipationists of Kentucky. In 1851
he went abroad, travehng for two years in Europe, Asia and Egypt,
and in 1855, after a prospecting tour through the northwest, selected
Chicago as his residence. He at once invested his means in real
estate, and his ventures in this line proved so profitable and such an
absorbent of his time, that he abandoned his intention of becoming
a practicing attorney, and when he actively entered politics, in 1870,
he was a citizen of fortune. Tn 1871 Mr. Harrison was elected a
member of the first board of county commissioners, holding that
ofiice until December, 1874, when he took his seat as congressman
from the second district of Illinois. He spent the summer recesses
of 1874 and 1875 ^^ Europe with his family. He was elected mayor
of Chicago in 1879, 1881, 1883, 1885 and 1893, but was defeated
for the governorship in 1884, although he cut down the normal Re-
publican majority from 40,000 to 14,500; he found, on the whole,
that he was not as strong a candidate among the agricultural and
interior classes as with the city populace. The mayor is known to
have aspired to the presidency and was often mentioned by his party
as a promising candidate for the vice presidency, but, even under the
circumstances, his defeat for the governorship seriously checked his
national advancement as a politician.
Mayor Harrison was a choice spirit in the initiation and develop-
ment of the World's Columbian Exposition, and his last public ap-
pearance was at Music Hall, Jackson Park, on All Cities' Day of the
World's Fair (October 28, 1893), when he was the central figure
among the chief executives of the American municipalities, and, with
characteristic mannerisms and magnetism, delivered an address of
welcome which could not have been more typical of the Chicago
spirit of unbounded faith in the future, based upon the great achieve-
ments of the past. Although he was in his sixty-ninth year, those
who were present will never forget his stalwart and inspiring appear-
ance upon the stage, as he exclaimed "There is a city that was a mo-
rass when I came into the world sixty-eight and a half years ago. It
was a village of but a few hundred when I had attained the age of
twelve years in 1837. What is it now? The second city in America.
The man is now born — and I myself have taken a new lease of life,
and I believe I will see the day when Chicago will be the biggest city
in America and the third city on the face of the globe. I once heard
128 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
Tom Corwin tell a story of a man who was about to be put on the
witness stand over near the eastern shores of Maryland. He was
fifty years old. He said he was thirty-six. 'But,' said Mr. Corwin,
'you look fifty.' Whereat the witness answered 'During fourteen
years of my life I lived in Maryland, and I don't count that.' I don't
count except from the past year, 1892, the four hundredth anniver-
sary of the discovery of America. I intend to live for more than half
a century, and at the end of that half a century London will be trem-
bling lest Chicago shall surpass her, and New York will say 'Let us
go to the metropolis of America.' "
From that brilliant scene, to whose life and significance he had
contributed so much. Mayor Harrison went to his beautiful home,
modeled after the generous and open architecture of the south, and
after his evening meal with son, daughter and a sweet woman whom
he was soon to wed, he retired to an upper room for his accustomed
nap. Soon the servant summoned him to see a visitor on important
business, and descending to the vestibule he met the advancing figure
of a young man with outstretched hand. Both from policy and tem-
perament Carter Harrison never resisted the promptings of courtesy
and proffered friendship, but no sooner had he held out his hand
than four pistol reports echoed through the mansion and he fell bleed-
ing to the floor. The man turned, ran into the street, eluded his
pursuers and within an hour surrendered himself to the police. Pat-
rick Eugene Prendergast, the assassin, was what is vulgarly called
a "ward heeler," and in the past had done some work for the party
which, he imagined, should be signally rewarded by the chief execu-
tive of the city. No benefits had come to himi, so he purchased a re-
volver and shot the mayor to his death. A city paper, commenting
on the act, says : "The assassin of Mayor Harrison is almost' an
exact counterpart of that of President Garfield. A vicious system
pursued to its logical conclusion poisoned the mind of a man not too
wise under favorable conditions, destroyed his sense of responsibil-
ity, exaggerated his ideas of the wrongs he had suffered, until to his
distorted fancy murder seemed not a monstrous remedy for his imag-
inary injuries." As the murder of President Garfield hasiened the
inauguration of the merit system in the civil service of the general
government, so did the assassination of Mayor Harrison emphasize
the evils of the spoils system as entrenched in the civil service of
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 129
Chicago-. Mayor Harrison was twice married, his first wife, who
died in Europe in 1876, being Miss Sophy Preston, a lady of distin-
guished southern family. Their son, the present Carter H. Harrison,
whose education and training were parallel to those of his father,
was also mayor of Chicago for four successive terms — elected in
1897, 1899, 1901 and 1903. The two cases furnish a unique illus-
tration of personal strength and family popularity in the history of
municipal politics in the west.
Vol. 1—9.
I30 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
educational Influences and Institutions
It was to be' expected that a city of so democratic a spirit as Chi-
cago would show marked and original development in its public edu-
cational system, whose remarkable outward growth has been con-
sidered as but a natural index of its general advancement. It seems
a prodigious stride from half a thousand scholars and half a dozen
teachers, in the early forties, to nearly a third of a million pupils and
six thousand teachers of the present. But the sixty intervening years
has made such a magical transformation of Chicago as a whole that
the special strides of its public school system are merged in the gran-
deur of the general forward movement. The same is true, in large
measure, of those independent influences and institutions, which have
tended toward the education and culture of the people, through their
mental activities, their aesthetic tastes and their moral sensibilities.
The tendency of the intellectual and educational movements in
Chicago was fixed quite early in its history; for the Lyceum, founded
in 1834, and the Mechanics' Institute, organized in 1837, were de-
signed to encourage the talents of the cultured, as well as to diffuse
useful knowledge and found institutions for the benefit of the working
classes. They both had libraries, and some of the successful agricul-
tural and mechanical fairs held in Chicago during the fifties were con-
ducted by the Institute. But, while such destructive forces as the panic
of 1857 and the fire of 1871 all but scattered the Mechanics' Institute,
the Chicago Lyceum passed its library and its good will into the keep-
ing of the Young Men's Association, and the movement thus inaugu-
rated developed, in about a quarter of a century, into the great public
library of Chicago. Organized in 1841, the Young Men's Associa-
tion first opened a reading room at the northwest corner of Lake and
Clark streets, the nucleus of its little library being furnished by Walter
L. Newberry, its first president. Prominent citizens
p made continuous donations to it ; the Lyceum collec-
j tion of 300 or 400 volumes was absorbed in 1845;
the panic of 1857, which seriously crippled the Me-
chanics' Institute, brought important accessions to the shelves of the
Association library, and by 1866 the collection had reached 9,000 vol-
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CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
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umes. In 1868 the Young IVIen's Association was rc-organized as
the Chicago Library Association, both to distinguish it from the
Young Men's Christian Association and to give it a name descriptive
of its chief object. In its earher years the Hbrary was supported by
membership dues, voluntary contributions and the proceeds of lecture
courses. The depletion of its membership as a result of the war
brought acute financial embarrassment upon the association, and
shortly before the fire of 1871 strenuous attempts were made both to
unite with the Young Men's Christian Association and to transform
the collection into a free library supported by the public revenue's.
So that although the fire destroyed the property and the corporation
of the Chicago Library Association, it did not even retard the move-
ment already under full headway for the establishment of a public
library.
For from proving an obstacle to the movement, the great fire
hastened the realization of a free city library and was the direct cause
of its founding. The destruction of the only considerable collection
of books in Chicago (18,000 volumes) strongly appealed to the sym-
pathy of Queen Victoria and many noble men of letters in England.
Thomas Hughes, then a member of parliament, led the movement
among his associates to collect from the authors, publishers and book-
sellers of the British Isles the nucleus of a Chicago public library, and
an appeal for contributions, headed by the queen, was signed by such
authors as Spencer, Carlyle, Disraeli, Gladstone, Tyndall, Tennyson,
Hughes, Sir Charles Lyell and Sir John Lubbock. The responses
were so prompt and generous that within a few weeks authors, socie-
ties, publishers, book-sellers and libraries had contributed something
like 7,000 volumes. The British Museum, Oxford University, the
British government and Queen Victoria personally were well repre-
sented in the list of donors. The Queen contributed "The Early Years
of the Prince Consort," with her autograph appended to the inscrip-
tion ''Presented to the city of Chicago toward the formation of a pub-
lic library, after the fire of 1871, as a mark of English sympathy, by
her majesty, Queen Victoria." In January, J 872, prominent citizens
of Chicago held a meeting in old Plymouth church to discuss the
enterprise, at which Mayor Medill presided and Thomas lioyne was
appointed chairman of a committee to prepare a free library bill and
present it to the legislature. This measure became a law March 7,
132 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
1S72, although there is some dispute as to whether the Hoyne bill
was the first one introduced into the Illinois legislature for the estab-
lishment of free libraries in the state. As the books were received
from England, they were stored in an iron tank, around which was
built the temporary city hall, or Rookery, corner of LaSalle and
Adams streets. In the second story of this building a public reading
room was opened January i, 1873, with addresses by Mayor Medill,
President Hoyne and others, and placed in charge of William B.
Wickersham, the secretary of the board. Mr. Wickersham, who died
in October, 1908, had held that office continuously and was the
Nestor of the officials connected with the Chicago public library.
In October of that year Dr. William F. Poole was called from Cin-
cinnati, whose public library he had established and developed for
the four previous years, and placed in charg-e of the Chicago enter-
prise. His talents as a librarian had been evinced even when he was a
student at Yale, when he also laid the foundation of "Poole's Index to
Periodical Literature." He afterward served for thirteen years as
librarian of the Boston Athenaeum, whose collection was the largest
in the Hub, and at the conclusion of that service established himself
as an expert in the organization and management of libraries. In
this capacity, during the five years which preceded his noteworthy
Chicago career, he had organized, re-arranged or catalogued the
Brown library at Waterbury, Connecticut, the Naval Academy library,
at Annapolis, Maryland, the Newton and Easthampton libraries of
iVIassachusetts, the Athenseum library of St. Johnsbury, Vermont,
and the Cincinnati public library. He entered upon his duties in this
city on the ist of January, 1874, and retired August i, 1887, to give
the balance of his life to the founding of the Newberry library of
Chicago. When the public library was first thrown open it contained
about 17,000 volumes, and when Dr. Poole retired thirteen years later
it had on its shelves, or in general circulation, not far from 125,000.
Both scholarly and genial in temperament, a master of both the prac-
tical details and the science of library administration, he received
the strong support of the intelligent and wealthy men of the city, as
well as of the great reading public. And while this splendid enter-
prise was thus progressing under his guiding hand and brain, the
services of Dr. Poole as a consultant were in demand everywhere in
the United States where libraries were to be founded or improved.
CHICAGO AND COOK COUXTV 133
and his writings on the organization and management oi pnhlic H-
braries are still standards of the world. lie was honored with the
presidency of the American Library Association, received the degree
of LL. D. from the Northwestern University, and when he passed
directly from the librarianship of the city institution to that of the
Newberry library he was one of the foremost of his profession in
the world. At the time of his death, March i, 1894. he had placed
the latter great collection of reference literature on a practical work-
ing basis, and Chicago is indebted to him more than to any other one
man for the broad and free facilities now enjoyed by its people in the
acquisition both of solid knowledge and intellectual culture.
From the old Rookery building the city library was removed in
1874, to rooms at the corner of Wabash avenue and Madison street;
after several years it was again transferred to the Dickey building.
Lake and Dearborn streets; in 1887 to the fourth story of the new
city hall on LaSalle street, and ten years later (October 11. 1897) to
the magnificent structure on Michigan avenue, occupying the site of
the old Dearborn park. It was erected at a cost of more than $2,000,-
00b, and both in its interior embellishments and practical arrange-
ments is considered one of the American models. Dr. Poole's resigna-
tion occurred soon after the library had been fairly established in its
city hall quarters, his successor being Frederick H. Hild, who had
also entered the library service in 1874, and who had been assistant
librarian for many years. Mr. Ilild is still its head and during his
twenty-one years of able and popular administration the library has
increased three-fold, now numbering over 350,000 volumes. To fa-
cilitate the delivery of books, seventy stations have been established
in various sections of the city. There are also ten branch reading
rooms and a branch library (Blackstone memorial) at Forty-ninth
street and Lake avenue.
The Newberry library was founded on the munificent gift of
$2,149,000 made by the laic Walter L. Newberry, who died Novem-
ber 6, 1868, leaving one-half of his estate for the
Newberry r . 1 i- 1 • r 1 1- n ^ »u^
J purpose of cstabhshmg a free public library on the
north side. Various legal proceedings by the heirs
made the bequest unavailable until the final decision, February, 1880,
of the state supreme court in favor oi the trustees of the estate.
134 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
When Mrs. Newberry, the widow and only surviving heir, died in
1885, the executors commenced active steps to carry out the pro-
visions of the will. As the larger portion of the estate was in real
estate, the available fund has constantly increased in value. On the
ist of July, 1887, the trustees laid the ground work of the institution
by christening it the Newberry library, and decided that its books
should be for reference only and be consulted solely on the premises.
Although steps were taken for the. erection of a permanent building
in 1888, the library occupied temporary quarters on the north side
for six years. Its present site on Walton place, opposite Washington
square, was the historic "Ogden block," and was selected in 1889.
A massive building of gray granite was commenced in the fall of
1890 and virtually completed three years later. It is four stories in
height, covers half a block, and houses books and pamphlets to the
number of nearly a quarter of a million. It is particularly rich in
historical and art literature. For years it also contained a large
medical department, but this is now installed in the Crerar library.
Dr. Poole, who had conducted the work of collecting and organizing
the library through its various removals and other discouragements
of the preliminary steps, lived happily to see the completed structure
in all its grandeur and completeness. As his experience and thorough
knowledge extended to the construction of library buildings, the
Newberry structure (and to a great extent the Public library build-
ing) was mainly his creation, as well as the systems by which its
contents were classified and catalogued. Dr. Poole was succeeded
by John Vance Cheney, the present librarian, who, although born in
New York, where for a year he was a practicing attorney, had been
for seven years librarian of the San Francisco public library and a
litterateur of standing before he made a reputation as a librarian.
He has since increased his reputation in both fields. The president
of the Newberry library is E. W. Blatchford, who was one of the
original trustees of the Newberry estate. He was a personal friend
of the founder and from first to last has stood by the enterprise, his
ceaseless work and his wise counsel having always been esteemed as
among its strongest assets.
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 135
The third of the free piibHc Hbraries to be estabHshed in Chicago
was founded upon the $4,000,000 bequest made by the late John
Crerar, who died in 1889. In its formative stages
P the Crerar Hbrary passed through much the same
experience as the Newberry, its advancement being
retarded for two years by the efforts of the heirs to break the will.
The decisions of the circuit, appellate and supreme courts sustained
its validity, aiid the library has since steadily increased in size and
working efficiency. Like the Newberry library, it is purely for refer-
ence, but its collection of some 220,000 volumes and 50,000 pamphlets
relate chiefly to social and physical subjects, and the natural and
medical sciences. The department of medical science, long a strong
feature of the Newberry library, is now a portion of the John Crerar
library, being logically related to the designed scope of the latter
institution. The quarters occupied by the Crerar library in the
Marshall Field building have always been considered temporary, and
there is every likelihood that its permanent home will be on the Lake
Front and stand in Grant park as a companion piece to the Art Insti-
tute and the Field Museum of Natural History.
The Chicago Historical Society is one of the oldest organizations
in the city, established with the primary purpose of founding a
librarv and contributing to the , knowledge and
CHICAGO education of the public. As its name implies, its
Historical „ . r 1 , • .• ,
c collections of books, maps, pamtmgs and memen-
toes arc designed to chietly refer to local history,
but with the expansion of Chicago from a small to a great city and
from a metropolis to cosmopolis, the scope of the society which would
fairly represent it broadened in proportion. Organized April 24,
1856, its original constitution allowed considerable latitude for future
developments, providing for not only the collection of material illus-
trating the settlement and growth of Chicago and the investigation
of the aboriginal remains within the state, but for the founding of a
general collection of books, manuscripts, docmiients, relics and an-
tiquities. The most prominent citizens of Chicago were connected
with it, and many of them gave it their liberal support. Walter L.
Newberry, one of its earliest members, furnished a large room in a
building belonging to him at the corner of Wells and Kinzie streets,
and its 13,000 volumes were stored therein during 1858. The col-
136 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
lection constantly increased during the following decade, both from
local donations and outside accessions. Among its most liberal gifts
was the bequest from the estate of Henry D. Gilpin, of Philadelphia,
made in i860 and rendered available in 1892, by the death of Mrs.
Gilpin. The entire fund had then reached an amount exceeding
$115,000, the accrued interest of $60,000 being applied toward the
construction of the present building on the corner of Dearborn
avenue and Ontario street. Another bequest, which greatly facili-
tated the erection of the building' now occupied, was that of John
Crerar, one of its members, amounting to $25,000. In 1868 the
Chicago Historical Society took possession of its first building,
erected on the corner of Dearborn avenue and Ontario street, at a
cost of $60,000. This was destroyed by the fire of 1871, with its
library of 60,000 volumes, nearly 2,000 files of newspapers and
many thousand valuable manuscripts, in the last named class being
the original draft of President Lincoln's emancipation proclamation.
Although stunned by this blow, the society gathered the nucleus of
another library within the succeeding three years, only to lose it in
the fire of 1874. All that was then left of its original treasures
comprised a catalogue of the books, and a few portraits and records.
Under the presidency of Hon. Isaac N. Arnold, the enterprise was
revived and fifteen members of the society contributed funds for the
erection of a temporary building on Dearborn avenue, which was
occupied from October, 1877, to August, 1892, when it was demol-
ished to make room for the present building. The nucleus of the
society's third library consisted of about two hundred books, which
were removed from the ofBce of E. H. Sheldon, its former president
and faithful patron, to the Ashland block, and after being stored
there for some time were transferred to the old building on Dearborn
avenue. In 1878 the society received a remarkable addition to its
collections as a bequest from Mrs. Elizabeth E. Atwater, a former
resident of Chicago, who died at Buffalo, New York. The so-called
Atwater collection consists of books and pamphlets, medals and
badges, coins and paper currency and other relics, relating chiefly to
the American wars. It is one of the most unique in the country.
In 1879 Miss Lucretia Pond, a parishioner of Rev. William Barry,
first secretary of the society, bequeathed eight valuable lots on the
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 137
corner of Superior and Market streets and many rare books, maps
and paintings. The proceeds from the sale of this real estate added
nearly 1,500 volumes to the library. The most imposing work of
art in the rooms of the society is the allegorical painting of the
Chicago fire, which was presented to the city shortly after the fire
by the London Graphic. With the opening of the fine granite edifice
on the corner of Dearborn avenue and Ontario street, in 1894, the
collections . were re-catalogued and re-arranged, and now form not
only a remarkably complete exposition of local and northwestern his-
tory, but an attractive museum and portrait gallery, all free to the
public. The library proper now comprises 40,000 volumes and 75,000
pamphlets, and a large collection of maps, views and manuscripts cov-
ering much of Americana outside of northwestern history.
There are libraries scattered throughout the city of a less public
character than those mentioned. The Academy of Sciences library
in Lincoln park is rich in the literature of the natural sciences,
especially zoology, while of the university libraries that of the Uni-
versity of Chicago takes the lead; in fact, with its 460,000 volumes
and 170,000 pamphlets, it is the largest in Chicago. A good scientific
library is connected with the Field Museum at Jackson park, and the
Ryerson library, although primarily for the students of the Art
Institute, is practically a free reference library on fine art. The theo-
logical, law and medical libraries, connected with various institutions
and societies, are more exclusive in their character, although often
consulted by the non-professional. The library connected with the
Chicago Law Institute, comprising 40,000 volumes, is one of the
most complete in the country, but is exclusively for the use of the
legal profession. The Western Society of Engineers also has a good
library, being principally for its members, but opened to the public
during the day.
The Chicago Academy of Sciences, to which reference has been
made, is one of the oldest of the Chicago institutions founded in the
cause of education. The original society of 1857
Academy of • , 1 1 1 .1 • ^ " 1 • • ,.
c; . was organized, largely by the promment physicians
oCIENCES. . . , t • , • ^1
of the citv, who were also enthusiasts in other sci-
ences than their own, and by several public-spirited business men. in-
cluding E. W. Blatchford. whose record as a supporter of the higher
138 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
educational movements in Chicago has not been excelled. The pioneer
members subscribed about $1,500 toward the establishment of the
Chicago Academy of Sciences and a room was engaged in the old
Saloon building, but tlie panic of 1857 and the hard times of the
succeeding two years put a temporary quietus to the ambitions of the
institution. In the meantime a new force in the person of Robert
Kennicott, son of Dr. John A. Kennicott, had come into the affairs
of the Academy. Since early boyhood he had shown a burning enthu-
siasm and a decided genius for investigations in natural science, and,
as he had been consistently encouraged by his scholarly father, his
exploring expeditions had increased in range and importance. By
the time he was twenty-four he had largely traveled over the north-
west and had done a great work in arranging and classifying his
specimens. It had long been a favorite idea with him to build up a
museum of natural history in Chicago, and it was largely through
his valuable contributions, in connection with the improved financial
conditions, that the enterprise was firmly established. In the year of
its incorporation under its present name (1859) Mr. Kennicott led
an exploring expedition into British and Russian North America,
under the auspices of the Smithsonian Institution. The field of his
three years' work stretched from Hudson's Bay to Bering Strait,
and, under an agreement with the Smithsonian Institution, he pre-
sented the Chicago Academy of Sciences with a full series of these
remarkable specimens. Under the impetus of this generous- donation
the academy was re-organized under a new charter, in 1862, and Mr.
Kennicott was appointed the first director of its museum. The speci-
mens were arranged by him in rooms provided for the purpose in the
old Metropolitan building, corner of Randolph and LaSalle streets,
and, with constant additions made by the members of the revived
academy, within the three succeeding years, formed a very respectable
basis for a museum of natural history. In the original collection was
also included Mr. Kennicott's specimens so broadly representative of
the northwest, this feature of the museum having been continuously
developed. To Professor Agassiz is also due much of the credit for
the establishment of the Chicago Academy of Sciences, as he was
present during one of its critical early meetings soon after Mr. Ken-
nicott's return from his first northern expedition, and spoke in such
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 139
warm terms of the value of the latter's labors that $60,000 was at
once raised to make them a part of the history of the Academy. In
March, 1865, Mr. Kennicott headed a party of naturalists for an
expedition into Alaska, under the auspices of the Western Union
Telegraph Company, the museum being placed in charge of Dr. Wil-
liam Simpson, who was also secretary of the Academy. While
engaged in this work Mr. Kennicott suddenly died on the banks of
the Yukon river, and Dr. Simpson assumed his labors in Chicago as
a permanent director. Before coming to Chicago, Dr. Simpson had
been connected with the Smithsonian Institution for many years and
his authority was especially high on questions of zoology. He died
in 1872. During his term of office the academy met two serious
reverses. In 1866 a portion of its collection in the jMetropolitan
building was destroyed by fire, and two years afterward it erected
what was considered a fire-proof building on Wabash avenue, north
of Van Buren. So secure was this building supposed to be that it
became the favorite depository of special collections and private
libraries, generally relating to the natural sciences. The result was
that when the structure was crumpled and destroyed like paper by
the fire of 1871, Chicago was almost drained of its educational re-
sources in that field. The loss and the shock were so great to Dr.
Simpson that they are thought to have hastened his death, which
occurred in the following May.
After the fire of 1871 a new building was erected on the old site,
but financial embarrassments brought about its sale in 1883. and for
several years thereafter its collections were stored in the Inter-State
Exposition building on the lake front. They remained in that build-
ing until its demolition in 1892 to provide for the building of the new
Art Institute. But the Academy of Sciences was not long to be without
a permanent home, for Matthew Laflin donated $75,000 in that year,
to which the Lincoln Park commissioners added $25,000, and with
these sums as the basis of a Iniilding fund the cornerstone of the pres-
ent imposing structure (which fronts the main entrance of the park)
was laid on the 9th of October, 1893. The subsequent progress of
this institution has placed it among the strong educational forces of
the city, and all those who are especially interested in the natural his-
tory of Illinois and the northwest make a generous use of the library
and museum of the Chicago Academy of Sciences.
140 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
The Field Museum of Natural History was established in 1894
in the former fine arts building of the World's Columbian Exposition.
It was founded upon a gift of $1,000,000 made by
the late Marshall Field, and the basis of its exhibi-
MUSEUM. . . , 1 ■1 • 1 r Tisr 1 1' T- •
tion material was laid m purchases 01 World s tair
exhibits. Since the original organization of the museum, many expe-
ditions have been dispatched to all parts of North America and other
countries for the purpose of obtaining material for deposit and ex-
change, and many donations have been received from institutions en-
gaged in similar investigations. The museum proper embraces col-
lections of mammals and birds reaching many thousand specimens, a
taxidermy two stories in height, a section devoted to North American
ethnology, a herbarium of 260,000 sheets, and fully equipped labora-
tories and assaying rooms. That the title of the institution is not
fairly descriptive of its scope is also evident from the fact that it has
a remarkably complete library of 50,000 titles, and a well equipped
printing office from which issue the publications devoted to the in-
vestigations and expeditions conducted under its management. The
four grand divisions of the museum are those of anthropology, bot-
any, geology and zoology. The Field Museum is, in many ways, a
development of the World's Columbian Exposition, this being espe-
cially true of its management. Harlow N. Higinbotham was presi-
dent of both the Exposition and the Museum, and Frederick J. V.
Skiff, still secretary and director of the Museum, was at the head of
the department of mines and mining of the Exposition, as well as
deputy director general. He has since been the great organizing and
developing power behind the Chicago institution, and has also become
the greatest exposition manager in America. The superb building
for the Museum, projected as one of the features of the Lake Front
park, will be erected as a result of another princely gift from the late
Marshall Field, who at his death in 1906 bequeathed $8,000,000 to
it. Of this sum $4,000,000 is to be expended in the erection of a
building and $4,000,000 for endowment.
The Art Institute of Chicago, as founded upon its present basis,
is even rhore an outgrowth of the World's Columbian Exposition than
the Field Museum, and is accomplishing for stu-
dents and lovers of art what the Academy of Sci-
Institute
ences and the Field Museum are accomplishing for
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 141
those interested in the natural sciences. It has been one of the
strongest of the local forces ever put in operation to dispel the delusion
entertained by an ignorant few that Chicago virtually has no life ex-
cept that which centers in its worship of mammon and its contribu-
tions to commerce, trade and the industries. Charles L. Hutchinson,
for twenty-six years president of the Art Institute and since boyhood
a resident of the city, once president of the Chicago Board of Trade,
prominent as a banker, and also a cultured patron of education and
art, speaks of this subject with the authority of wide experience in
both fields. "Chicago," he says, "is a metropolitan city; therefore
it is the center of many influences. Some of them are evil, but many
of them are good. Morally the city is no ]:)etter or no worse than
other large cities of the world. In speaking of Chicago one is more
apt to associate it with things commercial than with things educa-
tional or artistic. You may assert without dispute that Chcago is a
center of finance, a great railway center and a center of manufactures.
You may also add that it is a center of agitation for the whole coun-
try. But there are those who would hesitate to call it a great educa-
tional center, or a center of art.
"Nevertheless, it is a fact that no citv in our countrv is of sfreater
importance as an educational center than Chicago. When you take
into consideration the unique position of Chicago and the great popu-
lation tributary to it, you cannot overestimate the importance of all
that is done in the city, be it in the world of commerce, politics, re-
ligion or art. You may also justly assert that Chicago is a center of
art. An art center is a place where people come for inspiration and
education; a place from which an artistic influence radiates; where a
professional artist may gain a livelihood by following his profession ;
where there are collections of artistic objects, and a considerable num-
ber of people who appreciate the good in painting, sculpture and ar-
chitecture. Chicago possesses all these qualifications. I think all will
admit that the center of art in Chicago is the Art Institute."
Although the Chicago Academy of Design was formed some six
years prior to the organization of the Art Institute, in 1879. its mem-
bership was confined to the artistic element and
Academy of , ., , ^ ^, ^ , ^ .
.p^ failed to secure the support and management of
citizens both of wealth and culture. While the for-
mer languished as a public educational force, the An Institute from
142 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
the first has joined both elements in its organization with the result
that it has accomplished the double purpose of inspiring and instruct-
ing both students and the people at large. In the conduct and de-
velopment of this institution two men have stood from its organiza-
tion as the foremost of its official workers in the practical and every-
day management of its artistic and business affairs. William M. R.
French has been director of the Chicago Art Institute since its incor-
poration May 24, 1879, and during the first three years also per-
formed the duties of secretary. A Harvard graduate, he had prac-
ticed his profession of civil engineering and landscape gardening for
twelve years in the east before coming to Chicago (1877) and becom-
ing connected with the School and Museum of Art. When he as-
sumed his official duties in connection with the Art Institute he was
thirty-six years of age, and his assistant was Newton H. Carpenter, a
young man his junior by a decade, who had received a military educa-
tion at West Point, but had abandoned his ambitions in that direction,
and for three years before joining forces with Mr. French had been in
the employ of the Academy of Design. With the expansion of the
institute's affairs, in 1882 the duties of the directorship and secretary-
ship were divided, and since that year Mr. Carpenter has devoted every
waking hour to the latter office. Broadly speaking, for more than a
quarter of a century Mr. French has practically directed the purely ar-
tistic affairs of the institute and Mr. Carpenter, those matters relating
to its executive and business details. In both instances the well-being
of the Chicago Art Institute has been the main purpose of their lives,
and its fine standing is largely a monument to their faithfulness and
ability. During the entire period of its life, which covers nearly three
decades, the Art Institute has had but three presidents — George Ar-
mour, L. Z. Leiter and Charles L. Hutchinson, Mr. Armour serving
but one year and Mr. Leiter only two years. It is Mr. Hutchinson's
remarkable combination of business judgment, administrative ability,
diplomatic tact and artistic culture which has generally directed the
Art Institute along such an unvarying upward course that the 660,000
people who visit its museum represent the largest attendance of any
other art museum in the country, not excepting the Metropolitan Mu-
seum of Art in New York City. New York and Philadelphia only es-
tablished a school of art and design earlier than Chicago, and this fea-
CHICAGO AND COOK COUx\tTY 143
ture of the Art Institute is perhaps the most comprehensive, as it is cer-
tainly the largest, in the United States. The school of instruction in-
cludes departments of painting, sculpture, decorative designing and
architecture. There arc classes for beginners and advanced pupils and.
depending upon their occupations and objects, the 2,500 students are
divided into day, evening and Saturday classes and the summer school.
For the first three years of its existence the Art Institute occupied
rented quarters at the southwest corner of State and Monroe streets,
but in the spring of 1882 land was purchased at the southwest corner
of Michigan avenue and Van Buren street. During the same year a
brick building containing exhibition galleries and school rooms was
built upon the rear of the property, fronting on Van Buren street, and
in 1887 was completed the four-story building on Michigan avenue,
which, four years later, was sold to the Chicago Club. The Art In-
stitute had entered into an agreement with the directors of the World's
Columbian Exposition to erect a permanent building in Grant park,
on the lake front opposite Adams street, the city having contributed
the site. Of the original cost ($785,000) the Exposition paid $200.-
000, the first, but only temporary, use of the structure being for the
holding of the World's Congresses of Religions. The ownership of
this palace of art was vested in the city of Chicago until 1904, when
it was turned over to the South Park commissioners; its use and oc-
cupancy are vested in the Art Institute so long as it shall fulfill the
purposes for which it w^as organized. A special provision was also
made for throwing it open free to the public, three times a week —
Wednesdays, Saturdays and Sundays. Until the transfer of the
building to the park commission the support of the institute, amount-
ing to some $100,000 annually, was derived wholly from dues, mem-
bership fees and voluntary contributions, but since that time that
body has, by legislative authority, levied a tax iov that purpose, as
well as for the maintenance of the Field Museum of Natural His-
tory, to be permanently located in Grant Park south of the Art In-
stitute. This has been of great advantage, as the entire income has
since been applied to the purchase of works of art alone. It will
thus be seen that the Art Institute is largely a city institution, and
constitutes by far the greatest artistic influence in Chicago.
144 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
A new force of real power has appeared in the Municipal Art
League, incorporated in 1901 and including in the membership of its
board of directors, the m.ayor, or the commissioner
of public works, three park commissioners, three
Art League. / , 1 • . , 1 • ^,
sculptors, three architects and three pamters. ihe
league is merely advisory and is not vested with any municipal au-
thority, its objects being to promote the beautifying of streets and
public buildings and grounds, as well as to stimulate civic pride among
private property owners, and bring about a general artistic improve-
ment of the entire city. Since its incorporation the league has been
a real inspiration along these lines, both to the municipality and the
individual. All the efforts of private citizens, organizations and the
municipality to keep the public thoroughfares clean are in line with
the v/ork of beautifying Chicago, and have received the hearty sup-
port -of lovers of the city. One of the most practical reforms (unfor-
tunately of short duration) was the placing of boxes along the chief
business thoroughfares for the reception of newspapers and other
litter.
When Chicago is considered as an educator of the mind, without
reference to the esthetics of life; as a trainer for the scholastic and
professional activities, her standing makes her one of the greatest
centers of mental and practical force in the world, and her advance-
ment within the past twenty years has been marvelous. As a "uni-
versity town" the record commences with the establishment of the
Northwestern University, under the auspices of the Methodist con-
ferences of the northwest, in 1853. Although the first classes, under
Rev. Clark W. Hinman, of the Michigan conference, were taught in
Chicago, the following year (1854) the institution was removed to
the quiet of Evanston, still the home of its College of Liberal Arts
and its theological seminaries — Garrett Biblical Institute (founded in
1856) and the Norwegian-Danish and the Swedish Theological sem-
inaries. The school of music, the school 'of oratory. Dearborn ob-
servatory, Orrington Lunt library and other institutions are also in
Evanston. The schools of law, pharmacy, dental surgery and med-
icine are in Chicago, the three departments first named being installed
in the old Tremont House, and the last named (known as the North-
western University Medical School), with its affiliated hospital, is
on Dearborn street, near Twenty-fourth. Both the law and medical
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 145
scliools were founded in 1859, the former as a department of the
old Chicago University and the latter in affiliation with old Lind
University. In 1869 the Chicago Medical School became a depart-
ment of the university, and as the law school was under the joint
management of the Northwestern and the Chicago universities, from
1873 to 1891, it was known, during this period, as the Union College
of Law. The Woman's Medical School, founded in 1870, was finally
absorbed by the general medical department. The dental department
was opened in 1887. Northwestern University now stands eighth
among the great universities of the country, its total enrollment of
about three thousand six hundred students placing it in the same
class with the University of Wisconsin. The splendid settlement
work of the Northwestern University is mainly conducted in the
northern part of the city, with its four-story brick house, corner of
Augusta and Noble streets, as the center, 'lliis is in the edge of the
large Polish quarter and in the heart of perhaps the most densely
populated district in Chicago. Open reading rooms, medical and
legal bureaus, and all the other means provided for intellectual, social
and religious improvement, are conducted by the "resident group"
of the university, composed of educators and professional and public
men and women, who are giving the utmost of their lives to this
high phase of university work.
Lake Forest University, founded by the New School Presbyterians
in 1856, owns a dozen buildings and other valuable property at Lake
Forest, twenty-eight miles north of Chicago. In
TT Chicago it has schools of law and dentistrv. The
University,
University of Illinois has also located all its pro-
fessional schools in Chicago, because of superior facilities, a larger
field and a location convenient to its "main source of supply." The
former College of Physicians and Surgeons is now its medical de-
partment.
The University of Chicago is all that its name implies, its im-
posing array of massive buildings on the Midway Plaisance between
lackson and Washington iiarks being a concen-
UnIVERSITY fc> I o
^ trated exhibit of the city's educational ambition and
OF Chicago. , ^ . - , r , , • •
actual power. It is an outgrowth of the ambition
planted in (he young city by such men as its great mayor, William B.
Ogden, and llie great senator, Stephen A. Douglas, both of whom
Vol. I— 10.
146 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
were at the head of the old university during the last years of their
lives. Perhaps more than any other men, they stirred the mental
energies of the city and centered them on the project of founding an
institution of higher learning which should go far toward justifying
Chicago's claim that her people were by no means given wholly to
Mammon.
The first University of Chicago closed its work- in 1886, and
within a few months John D. Rockefeller, the most munificent
patron of the general education board, was considering the founding
of its successor on a scale befitting the city. Since he came to his
final determination to take up the enterprise, the university has fur-
nished one of the most striking examples in educational history of the
powerful combination of money and brains. In the fall of 1888
Mr. Rockefeller confided his project to Professor Harper, of Yale
University, for whom he formed a great admiration, and finally
entered into correspondence with Rev. F. T. Gates, secretary of the
American Baptist Educational Society. In December of that year
Mr. Gates brought the matter before the board of the society, which
heartily approved it, and at the annual meeting held in Boston, during
May, 1889, the society as a body resolved to take irrimediate steps
for the founding of a well equipped college for the city of Chicago.
Mr. Rockefeller at once subscribed $600,000 toward its endowment
fund, its paymen'' being provisional on the obtaining of pledges
amounting to $400,000 before June i, 1890. This was accomplished,
and on that date the society held its annual meeting in Chicago,
there adopting articles of incorporation for the University of Chi-
cago. On the loth of September it was chartered under its present
name, the incorporator? named in the charter being John D. Rocke-
feller, E. Nelson Blake, Marshall Field, Fred T. Gates, Francis E.
Hinckley and Thomas W. Goodspeed. Mr. Blake had been one of the
leading contributors to the old university. At the first meeting after
incorporation. Professor Harper was chosen president, entering into
his duties July i, 1891, and continuing them with a tireless assiduity
and a wonderful breadth of judgment until his death, January 10,
1906. His prodigious work in the promotion of the university both
in its material and educational development, brought him the admira--
uion and love of Chicago and the west, and earned him a high place
among the world's foremost scholars, not only in the broad sweep
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 147
of his learning, but especially in the field of comparative thcolog-v.
Professor Harper was a great, strong man, and a deep, lovable char-
acter, an American ideal of a university president, and the $22,cxxd,C)00
which John D. Rockefeller has piled into the treasury of the Uni-
versity of Chicago since its organization eighteen years ago is largely
a tribute to the personal worth of its late lamented president.
On July II, i8gi, the executors and trustees of the estate of
William B. Ogden announced that seventy per cent of the portion
devoted to benevolent purposes was donated to the University of Chi-
cago, and it is expected that from this source half a million dollars
will eventually be realized for the Ogden School of Sciences. Thus
does one of the founders of the old Chicago University hand down
his name and influence to the new and greater institution. Work
on the first building was commenced November 26, 1891, and when
the university was opened to students, October ist of the following
year, its structures consisted of Cobb Lecture Hall and the graduate
and divinity dormitories. Mr. Rockefeller's original donation of
$600,000 was followed by his gift of $1,000,000, by which the boy's
academy at Morgan Park was established and the Baptist Union
Theological Seminary became the university's divinity school. In
December, 1895, Miss Helen Culver of Chicago presented the uni-
versity wnth property valued at $1,000,000, the entire fund to be
devoted to biological sciences. The College for Teachers, now the
University College, was established in 1898, and March 19, 1901,
President Harper made announcements to the following effect : That
the Collegiate Institute, founded by Mrs. Emmons Blaine, was to be
the University School (School of Education); that the South Side
Academy was to be one of the secondary institutions, and. with the
Chicago Manual Training School, would be connected with the Uni-
versity School of Education, and that the two combined preparatory
schools would be designated the University High School. At the be-
ginning of the academic year 190 1-2 the freshman and sophomore
years of Rush jMedical College were transferred to the university,
and in October, 1902, the university law school was founded. At
the death of President Harper, in 1906, Dr. Harry Pratt Judson
was chosen acting president, and on February 20, 1907, succeeded to
The full title. In the discussion of Dr. Harper's successor, several
leading educators were mentioned who had not heretofore been con-
148 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
nected with the constructive work of the university; but Dr. Pratt
Judson had been one of the original faculty, as head professor of
political science and dean of the faculties of arts, literature and
science. He had evinced his abilities not only as a profound scholar,
but as a broad and practical administrator of university affairs, and
during Dr. Harper's last illness had faithfully and successfully carried
many heavy burdens upon his shoulders. The final decision of the
management, by which he became premanent head of the university,
was generally deemed an act of wisdom, justice and gratitude.
The activities of the University of Chicago are now so broad and
complex that it is impossible to more than hint at their character.
Its score of huge buildings on the Midway Plaisance cover twenty-
four' acres of ground, being generally constructed of limestone in
the Gothic style. It has more than five thousand students (nearly
half from Illinois), and the university is broadly divided into gradu-
ate, law, medical and divinity schools, senior and junior colleges and
the School of Education. The university management has always
paid much attention to the physical culture feature of education,
both men and women being included in its benefits. Bartlett gymna-
sium, Marshall field, and smaller grounds for outdoor sports and ex-
ercise, have given the University of Chicago a high reputation for
turning students into the world who are physically strong and de-
pendable. Its educational scheme also includes a paternal solicitude
for thousands of ambitious and poor students, many of whom have
supported themselves while pursuing their studies. The employment
bureau connected with the university furnishes such pupils with about
$30,000 worth of work yearly, their employment being in such insti-
tutions as department and shoe stores, newspaper offices and the post-
office. The university educates through such departmicnts as those
of philosophy, political economy, sociology, history, mathematics,
heusehold administration, the sciences, and languages and literature;
but its work is far broader, and therein it becomes an exponent of
the modern university idea. Its mental extension work is prosecuted
through its publications, its lectures and its correspondence study de-
partment. Original researches by its faculty in science, history, phil-
osophy and all other fields of scholarship, and explorations to the
orient and other ancient countries, have carried its name to the
educated of many lands. But one of the greatest features of the
CHICAGO AND COOK COUXTV ,^.^
university work is at home, and may be called a phase of its mora!
extension. It centers around the University settlement in the south-
west corner of the stock yards district. In that poor and stifling
Cjuarter it forms and conducts among the unfortunate classes study-
hour groups, kindergarten classes, dramatic clubs ; opens library and
social rooms ; encourages economy by introducing penny savings
banks ; furnishes the ignorant with redress through such organiza-
tions as the Legal Aid Society, and tones the physiques of tired
workers by founding gymnasiums in the small city parks and in
other localities. This phase of extension work is a part of the modern
idea as to what constitutes the province of the modern university,
and is most creditably illustrated in the Chicago institution.
Chicago has also a number of professional schools unconnecterl
with any university, and two technical schools of the first class, which
are, also independent institutions — Armour Institute and Lewis In-
stitute. The name of the Armour family, as identified with the moral
and educational benefactions of Chicago, was first consecrated by
Joseph F. Armour, younger brother of Philip D., and a man of
strong and lovable traits of character. At his death he bequeathed
$100,000 as a foundation for the Armour mission.
T A stronjj bond of affection existed between the
brothers, and Philip D., who was the executor of
the estate of the deceased, not only founded the mission upon his
brother's bequest, but more than doubled the amount from his private
means. He erected the Armour fiats, on Armour avenue, which
have proved a large source of constant revenue in support of the
family benevolences, but in 1892 personally furnished the means
for the founding of Armour Institute, at the corner of Thirty- third
street and Armour avenue. With Dr. Frank W. Gunsaulus. its active
president from the first, he was the great personal power behind its
development into one of the greatest technical schools in the country,
now enrolling eighteen hundred students and having ninety teachers
on its faculty. Its main building is a large five-story structure, at
the locality named, and the central feature of its organization is
a technical college, giving a four years' course in mechanical, elec-
trical and civil engineering, and empowered to grant degrees like
other similar institutions. It is provided with well equipped labora-
tories, an extensive library (twenty thousand volumes "> and n '{^^^^.^
I50 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
gymnasium, its outdoor athletics being conducted on Ogden field —
the grounds named being presented by J. Ogden Armour. Its depart-
ments also embrace an academy, or preparatory school, and schools
of music and architecture. With the growth of the institute its work
has expanded into several of the Armour flats, and two of its depart-
ments are conducted in distant parts of the city. The artistic and
technical branches of the architectural course are conducted at the
Art Institute, while the technical work of the course in fire protec-
tion engineering is pursued at the Underwriters' laboratory, on East
Ohio street, north side. Armour Institute â– also provides evening
classes and summer schools for those whose duties prevent them from
pursuing regular day courses, or who desire to perfect themselves in
certain specialties. During his lifetime Philip D. Armour expended
some $4,000,000 upon the institute, and in April, 1901, his widow
and son presented it with $1,000,000.
The main building of the Armour Institute was completed in
1892 and the work of instruction begun in September, 1893. In the
College of Engineering four years' courses in mechanical and elec-
trical engineering were first organized, and soon afterward a union
was effected with the Art Institute for the purpose of developing the
course in architecture, by which was established its School of Archi-
tecture. In 1899 the course in civil engineering was added, in 1901
that of chemical engineering and in 1903 that of fire protection en-
gineering. The engineering courses all lead to the degree of Bachelor
of Science. In September, 1902, the institute completed a massive
four-story building, machinery hall, whose name is sufficiently de-
scriptive of its purposes. Other buildings are the assembly and din-
ing halls, the latter being a red brick structure at the north end of
Ogden field. In view of the unusual development of Armour Insti-
tute and its great prominence as an educator of young men, an offi-
cial statement of its aims is here presented in an extract from its first
public announcement : "This institution is founded for the purpose
of giving to young men an opportunity to secure liberal education.
It is hoped that its benefits may reach all classes. It is not intended
for the poor or rich, as sections of society, but for any and all who
are earnestly seeking technical education. Its aim is broadly philan-
thropic. Profoundly realizing the importance of self-reliance as a
factor in the development of character, the founder has conditioned
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 151
liis benefactions in such a way as to emphasize both their vakie and
the student's self-respect. The institute is not a free scliool ; but its
charges for instruction are in harmony with the spirit which ani-
mates ahkc the founder, the trustees and the faculty, namely, the de-
sire to help those who wish to help themselves."
The Lewis Institute on the west side occupies much the same
field as Armour Institute, with the difference that provision is made
for the education of girls and women, both in the
literary and domestic courses. Eclectic courses are
-also offered, making the Lewis Institute the virtual
union of a literary, scientific and technical school. At the conclusion
of the preparatory course, or entrance from an accredited high school,
it offers either literary or scientific work for two years; or an en-
gineering course to the degree of M. E. ; or an engineering training,
during the first two years, with literary or scientific branches during
the balance of the course; or the literary student may pursue some
line of work not strictly in his course. This latitude of choice is cal-
culated to turn out broad-minded students, and, if they are undecided
as to the future, it enables them to make a thorough investigation
' and a test of individual abilities and tastes. The institute grants
the degree of Mechanical Engineer for four years of college work,
the title of Associate in Arts for a two years' course, and the acad-
emy certificate for four years in the academy.
Lewis Institute is the posthumous creation of Allen C.
Lewis, a generous, thoughtful and benevolent hardware merchant
of Chicago. The last years of his life were spent in a search
for health in this country and abroad, and as his thoughts
dwelt more and more upon the ambition to donate some
permanent benevolence to posterity he took into his confidence
and counsel his sympathetic brother, John Lewis. The last
three years of the invalid's life were spent in Holland, Belgium and
France, and in these countries, even more than in the United States,
he witnessed the bitter struggle for existence among those who had
enjoyed no special training in the mastery of practical vocations.
In the case of young women, this truth impressed him with especial
force. Upon his return to Chicago the plan of founding an educa-
tional institute to meet this demand commenced to take definite shape,
and, with the death of his wife, child and other near relatives, noth-
152 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
ing stood in the way of devoting virtually his entire fortune to its
reahzation. At his death in 1876 he thus disposed of nearly his en-
tire estate, valued at $600,000, his will providing for the investment
of that sum until it should be increased to at least $800,000. In
1894 the trustees appointed by the bequest found an available fund
of nearly three times the amount of the original gift, and after some
difficulty secured the present site on the southeast corner of Robey
and Madison streets. With an abundance of working funds the
erection of the building and the development of the educational
scheme progressed rapidly, few institutions of the kind in the coun-
try being able to show so marked a growth in a lifetime of little more
than a decade. The institute was opened in September, 1896. Its
departments of electrical engineering and household economics are
especially strong, and it has a fine library of about 15,000 volumes
and 1,000 pamphlets. Books are loaned only to students, but the
reading room is thrown open to the public. George N. Carman has
been director from the first. The total number of students is now
2,598, of whom 1,262 belong to the evening and 1,336 to the day
classes. Of the college students (319), 128 are men connected with
the engineering department and 131, both men and women, with the
department of science and arts. The academy students number 827
and the summer pupils 190.
Armour Institute and Lewis Institute are fine illustrations of an-
other modern development of the educational scheme — that by which
men and women are made cultured members of society, but masters
of the practical work upon which it rests. The Public library, the
Crerar library, the Newberry library, the great universities, and to
a large extent all the other institutions mentioned, all have their in-
fluence on the practical activities of life, elevating them to a higher
plane, and consecrating labor through the education of the intellect,
the imagination and the heart.
Music, as an educational influence, has manifested itself in man}
forms in Chicago. The Chicago Harmonic Society of 1835 was
short-lived, and although for fifteen years after-
^ ward various organizations for the cultivation of
f TTLTIJR"F
vocal and instrumental talents were formed, it was
not until the German element had acquired considerable strength that
a society of this character was supported enthusiastically and sub-
CHICAGO A XI) COOK COUXTV 153
stanti.illy. In 1850 Julius Dyrenfurth founded the I^hilharmonic So-
ciety which, for a number of years, was a favorite with lovers of
musir. In the early fifties Jenny Lind, Christine Nilsson, Adchna
Parti. Ole lUill and others scarcely less noted, sustained and strenj^th-
encil the local enthusiasm, and soon afterward Frank Lumbard com-
menced to organize societies and choirs as a Chicane) leader in the
field. He is best remembered, however, as the singer of patriotic
songs and the organizer of concerts during the Civil war. In the
summer of 1S71 Crosby's Grand Opera Mouse, standing on the site
of what was afterward Central Music Hall, was transformed into
one of the finest temples of art. music and the drama in the country,
and extensive preparations were made to open the season, on the
evening- of October 9th, with a series of grand symphony and popu-
lar concerts by Theodore Thomas and his orchestra of sixty pieces.
Hie world knows what happened that day; at night the beautiful
opera house was a fragment of the Chicago ruins. On the 7th of
October, of the following year, however, the Thomas Orchestra
opened the Aiken theater, on Wabash avenue and Congress street,
the second house of amusement to be erected after the o-reat fire,
and in 1874 Central Music Hall arose on the site of the Crosby
Opera House. The latter was somewhat a misnomer, as the hall was
de\'oted more to lectures and religious services than to concerts.
General steps in the progress of music in Chicago are marked by
such events as the Peace Jubilee concerts of 1873. ^^^ ^Y Gilmore's
band, with a musical background of one thousand voices; the sev-
enty-second saengerfest of the North American Saengerbund (18S1),
under the direction of Hans Balatka, one of the most famous leaders
and violinists in the countrv. and the May festivals of 1882 and
1884. The latter, conducted by Theodore Thomas, in the old expo-
sition building on the lake front, constituted an era in the luusical
historv of Chicago, as thev demonstrated not onlv
1 HEGDORE |,j^^ grand flexibilities of orchestral combinations.
^ ' but the impressive beauties of massed human voices
Orchestra. , , , r 1 .• . \ t •
and the wonders of such artists as Anna Louise
Gary, Madame Materna and Campanini. William L. Tomlins. as
a choral leader, and Clarence Eddy, as organist, were also established
for all time in the hearts of Chicagoans ; but it was Theodore Thomas
who henceforth became the greatest and most revered musical cd"-
154 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
cator in Chicago and the west. When the Auditorium hall was dedi-
cated December 9, 1889, the outpouring in honor of the elevated
cause which he represented was the impressive and brilliant climax of
what had alread}^ been acknowledged as a national event. Present
at the opening of this, the grandest of all the world's edifices de-
voted to music and drama, were Benjamin Harrison, president of
the United States; the governor of Illinois, Joseph W. Fifer; the
mayor of Chicago, DeWitt C. Cregier; Ferdinand W. Peck, the
founder of the temple; Adelina Patti, Frederick Grant Gleason, W.
L. Tomlins and Theodore Thomas. Here were foremost representa-
tives of the power of the state, and masters of the harmonies, sci-
ence and technique of music, in their highest impersonations. It
vv^as the strongest object lesson which Chicago had ever given to the
country at large that it had become a great musical center of the
nation. From this time for years, the Auditorium became the head-
quarters of the Thomas Orchestra, and the electric generator of a
superb inspiration which not only was a constant power during the
life of its noble founder and leader, but the current has been passed
onward in its full intensity through the management of Frederick
Stock, Mr. Thomas' friend, assistant and disciple. Theodore
Thomas died March 4, 1905. He Hved to see the raising of a grand
popular subscription (amounting to $750,000) for the establishment
of his orchestra, and his last acts as a conductor were in connection
with the dedication of the beautiful hall which has since been its
home. Sixty of the seventy years of his life were passed in America,
and, in the words of one of his long-time Chicago friends, "It is
easily within bounds to say that no other musician during these years
has done so much as he for the development of musical taste in the
United States."
Eliphalet Wickes Blatchford, for more than half a century a
prominent business man of Chicago and a leader, as well, in the de-
velopment and conduct of many institutions of en-
^ â– " noblins^ influence, is now retired from the most
1)1 ATPTTFORD
burdensome of the broad activities in which he was
so long one of the energetic forces. His keen, practical insight, his
sound judgment, and his disinterested counsel are still valued and
generally utilized, and his personality is strong, inspiring and ele-
vating.
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
i;
Dj
Mr. Blatchford was educated with the law in view, and but for
the accident of ill health in his earl}- manhood would undoubtedly
have made a mark in that field, as his mind is eminently logical and
judicial. He is a native of New York, born at Stillwater, on the
31st of May, 1826, and is a son of Rev. Dr. John and Frances
(Wickes) Blatchford. He 'is also a grandson of Samuel Blatchford,
D. D., who came from Devonshire, England, to New York in 1795.
He himself commenced a preparation for a professional career first
at Lansingburgh Academy, New York, and then at Marion College,
Missouri, finally graduating at Illinois College, Jacksonville, Illinois,
in the class of 1845, fi'^m which college in later years he received
the degree of LL. D. After graduating he was employed for sev-
eral years in the New York law offices of his uncles, R. M. and E.
H. Blatchford, men of distinction in their profession, but his health
becoming precarious on account of the confining office work, he re-
linquished his plans of professional life and returned to the west
in 1850, and engaged in the manufacture of lead in St. Louis. After
a time he associated himself with Morris Collins, of that city, and
in 1854 the firm of Blatchford & Collins founded a branch of their
prospering business in Chicago. Mr. Blatchford assumed the man-
agement of the business in this city, and with the dissolution of the
firm a few years afterward became a permanent resident of Chicago.
This was the commencement of an extensive manufactory of lead
pipe, sheet lead and shot, and linseed oil. to which other related
manufacturers were added. Since his retirement from the active
management of the business, Mr. Blatchford's younger brother, Na-
thaniel H., has been at the head of its affairs.
From being a stanch Whig in his earlier manhood, Mr. Blatch-
ford graduated to Republicanism, at the formation of that party in
1856, and during. the period of the Civil war was among the most
patriotic of Chicago's many patriotic citizens. A large portion of
his time was devoted to the northwestern branch of the United States
Sanitary Commission, of which he served as treasurer during the
war. The broad scope of his usefulness is indicated by an enumera-
tion of the offices which his fellows have called upon him to fill :
Trustee of Illinois College (1866-75) ; president of the Chicago Acad-
emy of Sciences; member and for seventeen years president of the
board of trustees of the Chicago Eve and Ear Infirmary; trustee of
156 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
the Chicago Art Institute ; executor and trustee of the estate of the
late Waher L. Newberry, and since its incorporation, president of the
board of trustees of the Newberry Hbrary; trustee of the John Cre-
rar hbrary; one of the founders and president of the board of trus-
tees of the Chicago Manual Training School; life member of the
Chicago Historical Society; for nearly forty-two years president of
the board of directors of the Chicago Theological Seminary; during
his residence in Chicago an officer of the New England Congrega-
tional church ; a corporate member of the American Board of Com-
missioners for Foreign Missions, and from 1885 to 1898 its vice
president ; a charter member of the Chicago City Missionary Society,
and of the Congregational Club of Chicago, and a member of the
Chicago, Union League, University, Literary and Commercial clubs,
of which last he has been president.
On October 7, 1858, Mr. Blatchford was united in marriage with
Miss Mary Emily Williams, daughter of John C. Williams, an old
and honored resident of Chicago, and the seven children born to
them are as follows: Paul, Amy (married Rev. Howard S. Bliss,
D. D.), Frances May, Edward Williams, Florence, Charles Ham-
mond and Eliphalet Huntington.
On the 19th of October, 1889, died John Crerar, successful mer-
chant and cultured gentleman, a Chicago citizen who left behind him
neither wife nor children to inherit his fortune. In-
r~r stead, he bequeathed a million and a half of dollars
Crerar. . ... . , . .
to various mstitutions of a religious, historical and
literary character, aside from the four million for a free public li-
brary. But, although he left no direct relatives, it was not in his
nature to forget his mother's cousins in New York and his numer-
ous friends. They were remembered in countless acts of affection
and practical helpfulness during his lifetime, and at his death found
that he had bestowed upon them the princely sum of $600,000. Chi-
cago and many Chicagoans have reached a higher plane of life
through the rich character and the wisely bestowed riches of junn
Crerar.
Mr. Crerar was born in New York in 1827, his father being a
native of Scotland who died in the American metropolis when the
son was only a few months old. Little of his early life in New York
City has come down to the local historian, but it is known that a
CHICAGO AND COOK CUUXTV 157
long and patient clerkship was at length rewarded Nvith a partner-
ship in the mercantile house of Jessup, Kennedy & C<». The training
of his business and intellectual faculties also appear to have always
progressed together, and while still a resident of New York he
served as president of the Mercantile Library Association. Mr. Cre-
rar came to Chicago in 1862, as representative of the railway supply
firm mentioned, and soon after established himself as head of the
house of Crerar, Adams & Co., engaged in the same line of business.
Pleasant and genial, Mr. Crerar was still a man, of decided views
and outspoken in their expression, although affable in their presen-
tation. His energy and broad judgment went far toward the build-
ing up of the great house which he founded, and he was also promi-
nent in the development of such institutions as the Pullman Palace
Car Company, the Chicago & Alton Railroad Company, the Illinois
& Joliet Railroad Company, the Illinois Trust and Savings Bank
and the Liverpool, London and Globe Insurance Company. As his
business and financial interests expanded, his higher nature also
broadened and found expression in his generous contributions of
both personal strength and means to such causes as are represented
by the Chicago Relief and Aid Society, Chicago Presbyterian Hos-
pital, Chicago Orphan Asylum, Chicago Historical Society and the
Young Men's Christian Association. The Second Presbyterian
church of Chicago also partook of his bounty and gained the advan-
tage of his counsels through his connection with it as trustee and
elder. The only public position which he ever held was that of elect-
or from the First district of Illinois at the presidential election of
1888. At his death, in the following year, his remains were interred
in Greenwood cemetery, Brooklyn, New York, where, also, were
buried his parents and two brothers. Upon the tablet which, marks
his grave is inscribed "A just man and one that feared God," but to
these characteristic traits of his Scotch character were added those of
a fine culture, which came from his deep study and enjoyment of
literature, art and music, and the broad sympathy possessed by one
whom the world had not soured but mellowed.
158 , CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
Bryan Lathrop was born in Alexandria, Virginia, on August 6,
1844. Alexandria was at that time in the District of Columbia.
His father, Jedediah H. Lathrop, was born in New
T Hampshire, but spent his early life in Buffalo, New
JLvATHROP i ' X J J
" , , " York, and his later years in Washington, D. C.
His mother, Mariana Bryan, was a Virginian. He was at Dinwid-
die's School preparing for the University of Virginia at the beginning
of the Civil war, and his subsequent education for several years was
under private tutors in Germany and France. .
He became a resident of Chicago in June, 1865, and was for some
years a partner of his uncle, the late Thomas B. Bryan, in the real
estate business founded by the latter in 1852. For many years his
attention has been given mainly to the management of estates as ex-
ecutor or trustee, and \o public interests.
Mr. Lathrop is president of the Graceland Cemetery Company,
president of the Chicago Orchestral Association and trustee of the
Art Institute, and of the Newberry library, and for two years was
president of the Chicago Relief and Aid " Society. In politics he is
a Republican, with independent tendencies, the only office which he
has held of a public nature being that of commissioner of Lincoln
Park.
Mr. Lathrop was married in Washington,, D. C, on the 21st of
April, 1875, to Miss Llelen Lynde, daughter of Judge Asa O. Aldis,
and resides at yy Bellevue place. He has served as president of the
University Club, and the Saddle and Cycle Club, of Chicago, and is a
member of the Chicago, Chicago Literary, Chicago Golf, Onwentsia,
the Cliff Dwellers and South Shore Country clubs of this city, as
well as of the Chicago Historical Society. He is also a member of
the Century Club, of New York, and of the Metropolitan Club of
Washington.
John Frederick Eberhart, A. M., LL. D., first superintendent of
schools for Cook county, perhaps the oldest -life member of the National
Education Association and now approaching his eightieth year, is
not only one of the most venerable figures in the
-J ' educational field, but one whose labors as a pioneer,
p TiK'R'R' A'RT
in all the gradations from kindergarten to normal,
have placed him among the real founders of the splendid educational
systems of the west. He was born in Hickory township, Mercer
c:::yoi7r^. J/ (J ch^7A,^Cc.^^'J
\
TMI IIW YGKi: I
ET
:ox AW©
nUKJDATiGKS
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 159
county, Pennsylvania, on the 21st of January, 1829, son of Abraham
and Esther (Amend) Eberhart.
Dr. Eberhart is the descendant of a very old European family, and
furnishes an excellent illustration of the value of good blood and
breeding. The genealogical records show that as early as 1266 an
Eberhart officiated as Bishop of Constance. On the 13th of March,
1265, was born Eberhart the Noble, who was the most daring and
successful warrior of Wurtemberg, was of royal family, and cstal>
lished the present kingdom, with Stuttgart as its principal city. After
the Thirty Years' war in Germany, many representatives of the family
came to America, and their descendants are now found in every
locality, with many variations in the spelling of the name, but a
strong similarity in characteristics and appearance. In l)oth Europe
and America, they have furnished many preachers and teachers, and
are leaders in every community where found. In 1727 Joseph Eber-
hart came from Switzerland and Settled in Pennsylvania, locating in
what is now Lower Milford township, Lehigh county, in 1742, and
becoming a prosperous farmer. Before his death, in 1760, he divided
his one thousand acres of land between his six sons. He was active
in organizing and sustaining the Great German Reformed church and
reached an advanced age.
When John F. Eberhart was eight years of age the family removed
to Big Bend, Venango county, and here his time was divided between
work upon the farm and at the winter school. At the age of sixteen
he commenced to teach his first school, which was located at the mouth
of Oil creek, on the site of the present Oil City, his salary there being
$8.50 per month, with "board" divided among his patrons. During
the following summer he took special lessons in writing and drawing,
thereby qualifying himself to teach those specialties, which accom-
plishments proved a valuable aid to him in working his way through
college. After spending two terms at Cottage Hill Academy, Ells-
worth, Ohio, he entered Allegheny College, Meadville. Pennsylvania,
and graduated therefrom July 2, 1853.
In the most strenuous and literal sense of the word, Dr. Eberhart
"worked" his way through college, but, notwithstanding this double
burden of hard study and self-maintenance, he took high rank among
more than three hundred pupils, both as a student and an athlete. A
proof of his standing in the latter capacity was that he was one of two
i6o CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
students who was able tO' lift a brass cannon in the Meadvilie arsenal
weighing nine hundred pounds. Among the alumni of this college
may be mentioned William H. McKinley, Governor- Loundes of Mary-
land, Postmaster General Gary and Judge Worthington, of Peoria.
On September i, following his graduation, he became principal of
the seminary at Berlin, Somerset county, Pennsylvania, and among
his pupils, who afterward attained distinction, was Hiram W. Thomas,
founder and many years pastor of the People's church, Chicago. To
the great mutual regret of principal and students, as well as the
management of the institution, Mr. Eberhart was compelled to resign
before the close of his second year and start for the west, on account
of ill health.
Mr. Eberhart arrived in Chicago April 15, 1855, but soon pro-
ceeded to Dixon, Illinois, where he spent the summer in hunting,
fishing and other out-door recreation. This started him on the road
to g'ood health, which he maintained in after years largely through
his custom of spending a portion of each season in out-door sports.
While at Dixon he edited the Dixon Transcript, and also bought an
interest in the publication, but soon abandoned the journalistic field
of politics. He then lectured for a time before various institutions of
learning on chemistry, natural philosophy, meteorology, astronomy
and kindred topics, after which he traveled for a year in the interest
of various school-book publishers, and then assurned the publication
and editorship of the Northmestern Home and School Journal, in
Chicago. During the three years in which he filled this dual position,
which so forcibly demonstrated his rare combination of executive
ability and scholarly acumen, he conducted many teachers' institutes
in Illinois, Iowa and Wisconsin, being employed in the Badger state
by Dr. Henry Barnard, then chancellor of the Wisconsin State
University, and afterward the first United States Commissioner of
Education. In Illinois he held the first institutes in many of the north-
ern and central counties, and assisted in establishing a graded system
in most of the larger cities. This work broug'ht Dr. Eberhart into
intimate contact Avith many distinguished educators of the west, and
also marked him for signal preferment in Chicago and Cook county.
Dr. Eberhart had become especially identified with the formula-
tion of free-school principles into the laws of Illinois. In 1855 he
first attended the state legislature to assist in the founding of the
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY i6i
present law, which was passed in the following year, and for sixteen
years thereafter was present at every session to further necessary
amendments and those required by the advancement of the times. He
was also present at the constitutional convention of 1870, in the same
faithful capacity, and, as he adds, "Legislation was always kept ahead
of public intelligence and sentiment, and thus served in itself as an
educator." In 1859, when the public schools were without either
system or efficiency. Dr. Eberhart was elected school commissioner
for Cook county, the title of his office being soon afterward changed
to superintendent of schools. This position he continued to hold
consecutively for ten years. Although there were twice as many
teachers outside of Chicago as within, there was little interest shown
in the country schools. The compensation of the new commissioner
was two dollars per day for one hundred days, but he took a horse
and buggy and commenced to make the rounds of schools, which had
been heretofore virtually neglected. At the end of the one hundred
days he found that his transportation expenses had eaten up his
salary, but he went right on with the good work. The second year
the board of supervisors made the compensation three dollars per
day for two hundred days. He was also allowed one dollar for each
certificate issued and two per cent commission on all school moneys
paid out. The supervisors, through the superintendent's persistence
and persuasiveness, also voted fifty dollars for holding the first session
of the Cook County Teachers' Institute at Harlem (now Oak Park)
on April 11, i860. It was attended by seventy-five teachers; another
institute was held in the fall, at Englewood, and thereafter two each
year. Frequent meetings of teachers were also held in dififerent parts
of the county ; a standing committee on education was appointed from
the members of the board of supenasors, of which Paul Cornell, of
Hyde Park, was first chairman, and, emboldened by his progress. Dr.
Eberhart finally asked the county board for $600 with which to
defray the expenses of a "three-months' teachers' institute." which
was but a familiar name for a County Normal School. The matter
was referred to the standing committee on education, and finally was
enthusiastically taken up by E. J. Whitehead, then a young attorney
who had been chosen to its chairmanship. The latter at length reported
to the board of supervisors a resolution for the appropriation of $2,500
per annum for two years to be applied to an experimental nonnal
Vol. I— 11.
1 62 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
school. Largely through the instrumentality of Heber S. Rexford,
Blue Island secured the location, and in September, 1867, the school
was opened with Professor D. S. Wentworth as principal. Two years
afterward the institution was transferred to Englewood, and in Sep-
tember, 1870, it took possession of the present Normal School build-
ing. The original intention of the institution had been to fit teachers
for the country schools, which formed the most lax portion of the
county system, but it soon became evident that it was destined to have
a wider field ; and the great credit for pointing out its broader destiny
undoubtedly lies with the head of the county educational system, Dr.
Eberhart, who retired from office in December, 1869. He had no
further ofhcial connection with the schools until 1878, when he was
chosen a member of the County Board of Education. As president
of that body, he found himself in a position to exert his influence
in favor of adding a kindergarten department to the Cook County
Normal School, and, with Mr. Wentworth, the principal, and Albert
G. Lane, county superintendent, as most worthy allies, he finally suc-
ceeded in the incorporation of the Chicago Free Kindergarten Train-
ing School as a part of the general normal system. Its first class
graduated in December, 1881. Dr. Eberhart was also instrumental in
amending the educational law of the state so that free kindergartens
could be established in connection with the common schools. So far
as known the first kindergarten founded under this provision was
that established at Chicago Lawn, Dr. Eberhart being at that time
president of the school board of directors. This closed a very impor-
tant phase of Dr. Eberhart's career as an educator, and it has been
thus characterized by Professor W. L. Steele, president of the Illinois
State Teachers' Association :
"The Hon. John F. Eberhart did valiant service for the cause of
education by carrying the gospel of the free school to those who had
never heard of it, by warming into life and activity those grown luke-
warm, by preaching the doctrine of union graded schools to the larger
towns where their educational energies were being dissipated by the
independent system, by organizing county institutes, and by his educa-
tional paper, the Northwestern Home and School Journal. A veritable
missionary was he."
The late Dr. Bateman, state superintendent of public instruction
in i867'-8, gives Professor Eberhart special praise for his work in
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 163
connection with the Cook County Normal School, speaking of the
Bine Island institution as "the pioneer," and concluding: **In thus
practically demonstrating the feasibility of this new and most suc-
cessful mode of increasing the supply of superior teachers. Cook
county has rendered the state a very eminent service." Orville T.
Bright, county superintendent of schools, in his report for 1896-8,
says : "Mr. Eberhart's entire time was given to the schools. He was
a college graduate and a man of great force of character. He estal>
lished regular and thorough examinations and conducted successful
teachers' meetings and institutes. Mr. Eberhart drafted the law
making possible the establishment of the county normal schools, and
toward the close of his last term secured action from the county
supervisors of which the Cook County Normal School was the result.
In 1862 the 'first report of the. Cook county schools by the commis-
sioner' was issued, and an interesting document it is, containing
thirty-five pages. The first report for Cook county, like the present
issue, pleads for school libraries and for the adornment of school-
houses. 'The schoolhouse should be made as much like the home as
possible, the children should love it,' sounds familiar enough now. It
was not so common forty years ago. And this : 'I am often beset by
persons requesting a third grade certificate for ^ome special district,
at the same time setting forth that the scholars are all small and
backward — they know they can teach them, etc. It is my honest con-
viction that it requires better qualifications to teach a primary school
well than it does to teach a more advanced school ; and had I the
employment of teachers, if I should make any difference in salaries,
it would be in favor of primary teachers.' This also was very advanced
ground forty years ago, and speaks volumes for the splendid work of
the first Cook county superintendent."
Among the other important works with which Dr. Eberhart was
identified while actively engaged in the educational field were those
which included his participation in the organization of the Illinois
State Teachers' Association in 1855; the drafting of the state law
authorizing the establishment of county normal schools; organization
of the State Association of School Superintendents in i860, of which
he was president; and his prominent identification with the American
Institute of Instruction and of the National Teachers' Association.
In its earlier years he was a very active member of the last nained
1 64 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
association, and in 1864 at a meeting held in Ogdensburg, New
York, with his Chicago friend and co-worker, S. H. White, he was
received as a Hfe member. At that convention he was chairman of
the nominating committee, and was appointed by the association to
respond to the address of welcome delivered by the eminent United
States Senator King in behalf of the citizens of Ogdensburg. Not
only Professor White, but others who joined at the time as life mem-
bers, have all passed away, and at the convention of the association
held in Cleveland, in June, 1908, Dr. Eberhart was the Nestor of
those present at the proceedings.
It is also due to Dr. Eberhart to state that the school section (640
acres) in township 38, range 13, Cook county, was not sold at from
$10 to $20 per acre, as was the case with other school lands in the
county, and that the beautiful grounds of the Normal school consist
of twenty acres, instead of the one and one-half acres which were
originally offered.
At different times during his educational career Dr. Eberhart
received offers of important positions, such as professorships or presi-
dencies of leading institutions. In 1855 he was offered the presidency
of the college at Naperville. Early in his career he was also called to
St. Louis to assist in the organization of its first high school, and at
the conclusion of his work was proffered the principalship. In 1866
Senior Sarmienta, generalissimo of the revolutionary armies, who
finally established the Argentine Republic, visited the United States
to study its government, especially its public school system. Meeting
Mr. Eberhart at a convention of the National Educational Association
he became the intimate and admirer of the young American educator
and offered him the national superintendency of schools of the Argen-
tine Republic. But neither then, nor at a later date, did he see fit to
abandon the splendid work undertaken and accomplished in Cook
county. After a quarter of a century of devotion to this cause he
turned his attention to operations in real estate, became the chief pro-
moter of Norwood Park and Chicago Lawn, and handled thousands
of lots and hundreds of acres of city and suburban property. He
still resides in the latter, is a large land-holder and an honored citizen,
but his strongest title to the gratitude of Cook county and the state
of Illinois rests in his invaluable work as a founder and developer of
their public and normal school systems of education.
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 165
Dr. Eberhart has retained his love for out-door sports, and was,
until a comparatively recent period, an expert with both shotgun and
rifle, having brought down every kind of game from a moose to a
water fowl, and landed every kind. of fish from a 700-pound shark
to a two-ounce trout. He was the founder of the Nippersink Club
and its president during the twenty years of its existence. The organi-
zation, which was limited to twenty-five members, embraced such men
as S. M. Moore, Marshall Field, Eugene S. Pike, Colonel George
R. Clark and Messrs. Reid and Murdoch. Mr. Eberhart was also an
early member of the Young Men's Christian Association, and was one
of the founders of the People's church, over whom Dr. H. W. Thomas
presided until his retirement from the active ministry. Dr. Eberhart
was at one time president of the board of trustees of that organiza-
tion, and his creed, as defined by himself is as follows : "I trust in
an All-Wise Creator and Disposer of Events, and I believe in the
religion of Jesus Christ, as epitomized in His Sermon on the Mount :
'Whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so to
them ; for this is the law and the prophets.' "
On December 25, 1864, Dr. Eberhart was married to Miss Matilda
C. Miller, daughter of the late Joseph C. Miller, who came to this
country from Toronto, Canada, when his daughter was an infant.
Mrs. Eberhart was educated in the schools of Aurora and Chicago, and
is the mother of four children, the eldest of whom, John J. Eberhart,
is his father's partner in the real estate business.
A typical German-American in his relations to the business world.
the field of letters and public affairs, Otto C. Schneider, retired to^
^ ^ bacco manufacturer and now in the second year
of his service as president of the city board of edu-
SCHNEIDER. ' . . /„, . , -J 1 •*• 1^
cation, IS one of Chicago s many-sided citizens who
never tires of laboring for its advancement. He is a native of Kusel,
Rhenish Bavaria, born on the 5th of December, 1856, son of Chris-
tian Ludwig and Dorothea (Emrich) Schneider. His father, who
was editor and publisher of a newspaper in the Fatherland, died
in i860, and the mother in 1865. The family is of old and distin-
guished ancestry, it being traced in an unbroken line to 1585.
Otto C. Schneider partially completed his education before com-
ing to the United States, attending the Latin school in his native
city until he was fourteen years of age. One of his first steps after
1 66 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
locating in Chicago was to â– take a short course at the well-known
Dyrenfurth's College in 1870. He then became an apprentice in '
a drug store,, removing to St. Louis after the fire of 1871 and com-
pleting his training in that city. Completing a course in the St.
Louis College of Pharmacy in 1875 he passed the required examina-
tion for registry before the Missouri State Board of Pharmacy. In
November, 1877, Mr. Schneider returned to Chicago, being then
within a month of his majority. Two years later he opened a drug
store on the corner of Clark and Van Buren streets, which he con-
tinued for about four years. Disposing of that business, he com-
menced the manufacture of tobacco, his entrance into this field being
determined largely by his marriage to a daughter of August Beck,
well known in that line. In 1892 he bought out the firm of Au-
gust Beck & Co., and remained sole proprietor of a large and prof-
itable tobacco plant until 1899, when he sold the concern to the
American Tobacco Company. â– The succeeding three years were
passed at Wiesbaden, the famous hot springs resort in Germany, and
in 1902 he returned to Chicago to devote his' energies and talents to
its betterment in many lines of work and thought.
Mr. Schneider was first appointed a member of the Chicago Board
of Education in 1895, this period of his service being concluded in
1898. Under appointment by Governor Tanner, he served as Lin-
coln Park commissioner the first ten months of 1899, or until his
retirement from business and his departure for Europe. Since 1906
he was a member of the Special Park Commission, and in May, 1907,
he commenced his present term of service on the board of education
under appointment by Mayor Busse. He has been successively elect-
ed its president May 29th and July 16, 1907, and July 15, 1908,
and no incumbent of the office has given more disinterested or effi-
cient service. A man of signal business and executive ability, as well
as of broad education and thorough culture, he has donated his entire
time gratuitously to the school system of Chicago, being regularly
at his desk from 9 o'clock a. m. until 4 o'clock p. m. daily. Among
the many improvements in the educational department which stand-
to his credit are the establishment of free telephone service for the
entire public school system, b}^ which the city has been saved $20,000
annually; the suppression of fraternities and sororities of the high
schools; the expansion of the compulsory feature to cover the paro-
THl fliEW YORK
PUBLIC LIBRARY
A»TO«, LJTNOX AM0
TlLDlf-K KOUWPATIOMl
R 1
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY " 167
chial and private schools of the city; a thorough investigation (ji the
physical and sanitary condition of the public school buildings, with
resulting safeguards and improvements, and a vast improvement in
the financial condition of the board, including an advancement in
salaries from first-year grade teachers to assistant superintendents.
A thorough American, Mr. Schneider is still an ardent admirer
of the poet, Schiller, as are thousands v^ho were not born on Ger-
man soil. He served as president of the five-day commemoration of
the death of the great genius, which was held in Chicago May 5-9,
1905, the elaborate exercises being conducted at the Auditorium.
Two volumes were published commemorative of the occasion, which
were edited by Mr. Schneider, who was also a contributor to the
"Marbach Schiller Book," published at the birthplace of Schiller and
also commemorative of the hundredth anniversary of his death. Mr.
Schneider is also a contributor to the Chicago Glocke, a German
monthly publication devoted to the interests of higher literature and
art. He has been a member of the Germania Maennerchor since
1885 and was its president from 1897 to 1899; has been president of
the German-American Historical Society since 1908; was president
of the Chicago Chess Club in 1906-07; has been a member of the
Union League since 1895, and is also identified with the Chicago
Turn Verein and the Chicago Schwaben Verein.
On the 4th of October. 1883, ]Mr. Schneider was wedded to Miss
Emily Beck, daughter of August Beck, the tobacco manufacturer
who became a business man of Chicago in 1855; served as consul
of the Grand Duchy of Hessen from 1866 to 1871. and has been
honored with the order of the Cross of the Knight (first class) of
Phillipp, the Magnanimous. The children of this union were as fol-
lows : George August, born September 26, 1884, and Clarence Ed-
gar Schneider, born April 8, 1888.
For an entire generation Dr. A. F. Nightingale has been identified
in a conspicuous manner with education and the schools of Cook
county and Chicago. More than this, to quote
' • from an editorial from the Chicago Evening Post
of November, 1906, "Dr. Nightingale has made
education and the organization and direction of educational activities
his life work. He has been remarkably successful. In almost every
field of the work, from the primary to teaching the classics in a uni-
i68 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
versity, from grade teacher to superintendent of high schools, from
instructor in Greek and Latin to college president, he has left the
mark of an earnest student, an apt instructor, an intelligent organizer
and a judicious director." This is very high appreciation, and yet
a review of Dr. Nightingale's career as an educator shows the esti-
mate to be just and well balanced, and that his present position as
county superintendent of schools is merited by both personal fitness
and professional ability.
Of New England ancestry, birth and training, Augustus Fred-
erick Nightingale, a son of Thomas J. and Alice Nightingale, was
born at Quincy, Massachusetts, November ii, 1843. From the public
schools of Quincy he passed first to Newbury Academy, Vermont,
and in 1866 graduated at Wesleyan University, Connecticut, as vale-
dictorian of his class. Since then the following higher scholastic
degrees have been conferred upon him: A. M., 1869; Ph. D., 1891 ;
LL. D., 1901.
From graduation until now, a period of over forty years, Dr.
Nightingale has held an increasingly important position in educa-
tional affairs of the middle west, and latterly of the nation. He
was professor of Latin and Greek the first two years out of college,
at U^pper Iowa University; was president of Northwestern Female
College, Evanston, Illinois, in 1868-71 ; professor of Latin and Greek
in Simpson College, Iowa, 1871-72; was superintendent of the
Omaha public schools in 1872-74, and since that time has been a
leader in the educational work of Chicago and Cook county. For
sixteen years, from 1874 to 1890, he was principal of the Lake
View high school. For two years following he was assistant superin-
tendent of the Chicago public schools, and from 1892 to 1901 was
superintendent of the high schools of the city. In 1902 he was elected
superintendent of Cook county schools, and holds that office by re-
election in 1906.
Dr. Nightingale has made his influence felt in the broader fields
of education by his activity in various associations and educational
movements. He has served as trustee of the University of Illinois
since 1898, being president of the board in 1902-03. He was presi-
dent of the Nebraska State Teachers' Association in 1873, and of
the Illinois State Teachers' Association in 1887, and president of
the secondary department of the National Educational Association
CHICAGO AND COOK COUXT^' 1O9
in 1888. In the systematizing of the work of secondary schools and
co-ordinating their work, Dr. Nightingale has long been one of the
conspicuous educators of the country. From 1895 to 1899 he was
chairman of the committee of the National Educational Association
on college entrance requirements, and in 1898 was president of the
North Central Association of Colleges and Secondary Schools.
He is author of "Requirements for Admission to American Colleges."
As an editor he is best known for his work on the "Twentieth Cen-
tury Text Books," one hundred volumes. He has excellent command
of English and his scholarship is of high rank among American edu-
cators. He has been appointed by Governor Deneen a member of the
Educational Commission to revise and perfect the school laws of
Illinois.
Dr. Nightingale married, August 24, 1866, Fanny Orena,
daughter of Rev. C. H. Chase, of New Hampshire. Their children
are Mrs. W. Ruffin Abbott, Chicago; Harry Thomas Nightingale,
Urbana, Illinois ; Mrs. Harrison M. Angle, Brooklyn, New York ; Mrs.
Vaughn Lee Alward and Mrs. Winter D. Hess, of Evanston, Illinois.
I70 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
Ocnomtnational and Religious 6rowth
The spiritual needs of a new community are ever paramount to
the educational, although American pioneer history indicates that the
founders of cities and states in the western world have usually estab-
lished churches and schools as contemporaneous institutions. Early
separating religious affairs from those of government and drawing
a sharp line between public schools and private churches, the fore-
fathers at the same time recognized the fact that, broadly speaking,
morality and intelligence walk together, and that the forces which
conduce to these desirable traits should be put in operation as soon
as possible.
The history of denominational and unsectarian, but nevertheless
religious, growth in Chicago has generally followed the course of all
such development in the west, although it has included special marked
forces which will be noted. Obviously, the prime cause for the
establishment of new churches is the increase and expansion of pop-
ulation and the desirability of having a house of worship within a
reasonable distance of the place of residence. Various disagreements
over the questions of administration and doctrine also cause disrupt-
ing factions in the original organizations and the establishment of
new societies. In large centers of population,, like Chicago, with the
rapid settlement of outlying districts, the mother churches establish
missions for the propagation of their faith, and these, in turn, become
independent bodies with branches of their own. In common with all
the large western cities (but in a more potential degree), Chicago is
a city of diverse nationalities. It has now within its limits as many
who were born in Germany, or whose parents were natives of the
fatherland, as are inhabitants of the entire city of Cologne, the
seventh in the empire. On the same basis, it has two-thirds as many
Irish as are in Dublin, more Bohemians than the population of Pilsen
(the second city of Bohemia), and nearly as many Swedes as there
are in Gothenburg, Sweden's second city in population. Old-world
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
171
conditions and events have caused large emigrations to Chicago and
the west, such as the German revolution of 1848, the Russian mas-
sacres and revolutions of recent years; but the influx, as a rule, has
been continuous and steady. The result has been the establishment
of an unusually large number of churches, the membership of which
in each case is of the same nationality; such as the Swedish and
German Evangelical churches and the Lutheran organizations, dis-
tributed mainly among the Germans, Swedes, Danes and Norwegians.
Something like one hundred and twenty-five thousand Poles and fifty
thousand Russians are chiefly divided among the Catholic churches
and the Russian Orthodox church, the organizations being based upon
racial lines. There is also quite a large number of Greeks, who
have their orthodox churches in the sections of the south and west
sides of the city, where they mainly reside.
A cause of many church divisions in Chicago and throughout the
country, which is now inoperative, was the question of slavery, which
for many years caused many divisions in the Presbyterian, Methodist
and Congregational churches. The great Chicago fire, while a purely
local cause, had a wide effect on the growth of the city churches.
It wiped out millions of dollars of property, scattered congregations
and drove thousands of them into suburban districts; the former lines
of demarkation between most of the churches on the north side and
those in the central districts of the south side being almost obliterated.
The edifices which replaced those swept away by the conflagration
were, in common with those of a secular character, of a more sub-
stantial and metropolitan character, some of them architecturally
superb. The result of the great fire, with the grand and world-wide
outpourings of sympathy and assistance, was a New Chicago in the
religious field, as in all others. Thereafter not only were the houses
of worship grander and more enduring, but the moral and spiritual
effects of the historic event transformed what was outwardly a vast
calamity into a spiritual l)lessing.
The beginnings of the religious history of the locality now cov-
ered bv Chicago are contained in the missionary labors of Father
Jacques IMarquette, the brave and gentle Jesuit priest who came
among the Miami Indians of this region in the fall of 1673. It is
yet a question under discussion whether IMarquette ever set foot on
1/2 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
any portion of the present site of Chicago. During his last illness,
however, in the spring of 1675, it is said that his successor to the
Illinois mission, Father Claude Allouez, entered the Chicago river
and was welcomed by a band of Indians to his new labors. From
that time on for many years the Indians at and near Chicago were
never without the spiritual ministrations of some zealous Jesuit
father, and in 1796, Rev. Stephen D. Badin, who three years before
had been ordained in Baltimore as the first Catholic priest to be con-
secrated to the church in the United States, honored Chicago with
his presence. He came again in 1822 and baptized Alexander Beau-
bien at Fort Dearborn, his being the first recorded baptism within the
present city limits.
The first Protestant to preach a sermon in Chicago was the
Rev. Isaac McCoy, a Baptist minister from a mission school near
Niles, Michigan. He wrote: "In the fore part of October (1825)
I attended at Chicago the payment of an Indian annuity by Dr.
Wolcott, United States Indian agent, and, through his politeness,
addressed the Indians on the subject of our mission. On the 9th of
October, I preached in English, which, as I was informed, was the
first sermon ever delivered at or near that place." In the following
year Rev. Jesse Walker, superintendent of the Fox River Methodist
mission, came to Chicago and probably preached, as that good and
zealous pioneer of the faith never lost an opportunity to spread the
gospel. His successor, Rev. Isaac Scarritt, cer-
Methodism ^^^"^y d^*i deliver a sermon, and, under such trying
circumstances, that he has had occasion to record
it in detail. One summer day of 1828 he arrived at Fort Dearborn
arid the little settlement of some half dozen houses called Chicago.
At the time, so he noted, there was a great rivalry for popularity
between John Kinzie and John Miller, and after putting up at the
latter gentleman's house, Mr. Scarritt sent word to the lieutenant of
the garrison that (with his permission) he would preach to the
soldiers and others at the fort. Evidently not thinking it good policy
to show any religious partiality, the commandant returned word that
he should neither forbid nor sanction the holding of such services.
"Not to be outdone ty the honorable lieutenant on the point of inde-
pendence," continued Mr. Scarritt, "I declined going to the garrison
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 173
under such circumstances, and made an appointment for preaching
at Miller's at night. Most of the citizens and some of the soldiers
were present and gave respectful attention; but in the matter of con-
gregation we received rather more than we bargained for. During
religious services a gang of boatmen, with their vociferous 'Yo-hes,'
commenced landing and rolling up barrels near the door. This was
a trick of Kinzie's, so Miller said, out of spite to him for having
the honor of entertaining the missionary, and for the agency he took
in promoting the religion of the place."
Within two years Methodism had taken such root in the locality
that the Illinois Conference established the Chicago Mission District
covering the country from Peoria to Chicago, with Rev. Jesse Walker
as superintendent. In June, 1831, the superintendent visited Chicago
with Rev. Stephen R. Beggs, who preached several sermons at the
garrison, and in the fall was appointed by the bishop as the regular
local preacher. Rev. William See, a blacksmith and regularly or-
dained clergyman, also preached in Chicago, as occasion offered.
Services were generally conducted in the fort at this time. In Jan-
uary, 1832, the first quarterly meeting was held and was largely
attended for that time, the provisions which sustained the throng
being drawn by ox-team from Plainfield, forty miles distant. "It
was a season long to be remembered," exclaimed Mr. Beggs. "Every-
one seemed to be baptized and consecrated anew to the great work
to be accomplished in the village that was destined to become a
mighty city." In May, 1832, Mr. Beggs brought his wife to Chicago,
and remained for about a year, the meetings of his growing society
being held during a portion of the time in the log schoolhouse.
Mr. Walker succeeded to the Chicago mission, and "Father Walker's
log cabin," standing on the west side of the river, near the meeting
place of the north and south branches, became church, parsonage,
and the general center of local Methodism. In 1834 Mr. Walker
became superannuated, and died in the following year, his splendid
missionary labors in Illinois marking him as one of the grandest
of Methodist pioneers in the west. He was succeeded by Henry
Whitehead, the local elder, who was the first minister licensed to
preach in Chicago, but it appears that the appointment was only tem-
porary, since Rev. J. T. Mitchell became the regular clergyman in
174 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
the winter of 1834-5. The first church of the society was built
under the direct supervision of Mr. Whitehead, at the corner of
North Water and Clark streets. It was a tiny wooden affair, with
the usual sharp steeple, but although work was commenced on it in
the summer of 1834, it was not completed until 1836. Two years
afterward the church was removed across the river on scows to the
corner of Clark and Washington streets, which was the establishment
of that denomination, on one of the most valuable pieces of property
ever controlled by a church in the west.
In the meantime the Catholics, the Presbyterians and the Baptists
had effected permanent organizations, over which resident clergy-
men presided. Father St. Cyr, a French priest, with only a smatter-
ing of English at his command, was sent from St. Louis by the
bishop of the Missouri diocese, upon petition of the one hundred
Catholics then in Chicago and vicinity. The good Father accom-
plished the journey partly on horseback and partly afoot, and cele-
brated his first mass in Mark Beaubien's log cabin
„ on Sunday, May 5, 1833. Father St. Cyr at once
made preparations for the erection of a house of
worship. He was unable to raise the $200 required for the purchase
of a lot on Lake street, near Market street, and on the advice of
Colonel J. B. Beaubien, selected a canal lot n^ar the southwest corner
of Lake and State streets. The first St. Mary's church was erected
thereon — a plain little wooden structure like a district schoolhouse,
surmounted by the cross of Christianity. The lumber was scowed
across from St. Joseph, Michigan, and after faithful work the church,
at a cost of about $400, was ready for occupancy in October. All
the villagers took a keen interest in the enterprise. Deacon John
Wright, a strong supporter of Rev. Jeremiah Porter, pastor of the
First Presbyterian church, assisted in raising the frame of the build-
ing, and the leading citizens of Chicago took the liberal attitude that
established religion, of whatever denomination, was good for the
community. Before the church was plastered or painted, before the
little open tower by which it was afterward surmounted had been
placed thereon, a company of Indian women cleaned the inside of this
modest house of worship in honor of those who were to attend t-he
dedicatory exercises, and one hundred communicants filled the rough
wooden benches which served as pews.
CHICAGO AND COOK COUXT\- 175
Twelve days after Father St. Cyr arrived to take charge of St.
Mary's parish, the Rev. Jeremiah Porter, a thoroughly educated
Massachusetts gentleman and a graduate of And-
TTTOTAXTc °^'^^" Tlieological Seminary, was rowed from the
schooner which was anchored in the harbor to the
mouth of the river, around Fort Dearborn, and up the sluggish
stream to a small tavern bn the west side, near the junction of the
north and south branches. The Presbyterian mission at Fort Brady
(Sault Ste. Marie) had been disbanded by the transfer of troops
to Fort Dearborn to meet the threatened dangers of the Black Hawk
war. As the former post commandant of Fort Brady had also
been transferred to Fort Dearborn, and invited Mr. Porter to accom-
pany him to Chicago, the latter was now on the ground of his new
missionary work. At the boarding house he met many of the business
men of the place, and among others, John Wright, who, with Philo
Carpenter, was for many years a stanch Presbyterian and a tower of
strength in all Christian work in the city of Chicago. Captain Seth
Johnson, the former commandant at Fort Dearborn, had been a
devout supporter of religion, and with his departure the cause seemed
dark to Mr. Wright and his fellow workers. ,His welcome to Mr.
Porter was therefore in these words: "Well, I do rejoice, for yes-
terday was the darkest day I ever saw. Captain Johnson, who had
aided us in our meetings, was to leave us, and I was almost alone.
I have been talking about and writing for a minister for months, in
vain, and yesterday, as we prayed with the Christians about to leave
us, I was almost ready to despair, as I feared the troops coming in
would be utterly careless about religion. The fact that you and a
little church were, at the hour of our meeting, riding at anchor within
gunshot of the fort, is like the bursting, out of the sun from behind
the darkest clouds." Temporary arrangements were therefore made
for preaching in Fort Dearborn, its carpenter shop being emptied,
cleaned and provided with seats, and on the next Sunday morning
after his landing (May 19, 1833) Mr. Porter delivered his first
sermon in Chicago. In the afternoon, by invitation of Father Walker,
he preached in the log schoolhouse on the west side of the river,
at Wolf Point, and was greeted by an enthusiastic and overflowing
congregation. At six o'clock he presided over a prayer meeting at
the fort, listened to Father Walker "after candle lighting." and would
176 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
have had one of the fairest Sabbaths of his Hfe had it not been
marred by the following sight, as described in his journal : "The
first dreadful spectacle that met my eyes on going to church was
a group of Indians sitting on the ground before a miserable French
dram shop, playing cards, and as many trifling white men standing
around to witness the game." The Methodists, under Jesse Walker,
were very cordial, and Mr. Porter continued to preach at the fort and
Wolf Point for the accommodation of the garrison and villagers.
On Wednesday, June 26, 1833, he organized the First Presbyterian
church, with twenty-six members, seventeen of whom were con-
nected with the garrison and had been members of his church at
Fort Brady. Of the latter was Major DeLafayette Wilcox, who,
with Messrs. John Wright and Philo Carpenter, were chosen elders.
Mr. Carpenter had organized Chicago's first Sunday school the year
before, and this was afterward reorganized by Mr. Porter. With
a separate organization effected, efforts were now set on foot for
the erection of a home, which was finally built on the southwest
corner of Lake and Clark streets. It was about thirty by forty feet,
cost $600, and, notwithstanding that the mercury stood at twenty-
four degrees below zero on the day of the dedication (January 4,
1834), it is on record "that a respectable audience was on hand."
The prayer of consecration was offered by Rev. A. B. Freeman, of
the First Baptist church, which had been organized during the pre-
ceding fall.
Since the arrival of the first Baptist family in Chicago — that of
Dr. John T. Temple — the denomination had been gathering strength.
The doctor, who was an/ enterprising and broadly educated Virginian
gentleman, for some time after his coming (July 4, 1833) had at-
tended the Presbyterian services at Fort Dearborn, but, through
correspondence with the American Baptist Missionary Society, he
had secured the appointment of a Chicago missionary. With one
hundred dollars he then headed a subscription for a building which
should be devoted to religious and educational purposes, and in the
fall a two-story frame, known as the Temple building, was completed
near the corner of Franklin and South Water streets. With the
exception of Rev. Jesse Walker's log house at Wolf Point, this
was the first "house of worship" built in Chicago. The upper story
was used for school purposes and the lower floor by the Methodists,
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTS 177
Presbyterians and Baptists until the completion of the Presbyterian
church in the following January.
When the Rev. Mr. Freeman, with his wife, arrived in Chicago
on the 1 6th of August, 1833, h^ found the Temple building com-
pleted, but on the first Sunday preached to Rev.
First
Jeremiah Porter's congregation at Blackstone's
P Grove, twenty-eight miles south of Chicago. From
this time until Mr. Freeman's death these two min-
isters preached once each month to congregations in some distant
village, on such occasions the Chicago congregations uniting to hear
the brother who remained at home. Mr. Freeman effected a distinct
organization of the First Baptist church October 19, 1833, ^v'^^"* ^
membership of about twenty-five, and during his sixteen months of
ministerial labors in the large territory of which Chicago was the
center, he became known for his faithfulness and tenderness toward
all men, his heroism in the discharge of duty, as well as his kindness
to animals. In December, 1834, while returning from one of his
missionary trips to Long Grove, fifty miles south of Chicago, where
he had preached and administered baptism, his horse was taken sick,
eighteen miles from the village. For two nights and one day Mr.
Freeman watched with the suffering animal until it died. His duty
to man and beast performed, he walked to Chicago. Overcome by
exposure and fatigue, he was prostrated by typhoid fever and died
ten days thereafter, December 15, 1834. The circumstances under
which death came to him, better than words, portray his character
and devotion to duty. Rev. Jeremiah Porter preached his funeral
sermon in the Presbyterian church.
Thus did all denominations, Protestant and Catholic alike, show
a brotherly interest in each other's interests, realizing that they were
struggling for a foothold by which each might accomplish good in
its own way. Death, more than all else, levels all such distinctions,
and in the case of Mr. Porter and Mr. Freeman, the bmtiierly bond
had been warm from the first.
The continuous history of the Catholic church in Chicago dates
from Father St. Cyr's celebration of mass in Mark Beaubien's log
cabin May 5, 1833, his parishioners being composed
rv^ , almost entirely of French Roman Catholics. The
T. ARYS. English-speaking Catholics increased so rapidly,
Vol. 1—12.
178 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
however, that Father O'Meara was appointed priest to them. Bv
1836 the German CathoHcs had gained such accessions that Father St.
Cyr obtained an assistant of that nationaHty. Now, as to Father
O'Meara. He and his parishioners, largely composed of Irish canal
laborers, worshiped in the original St. Mary's church, which he re-
moved from the corner of Lake and State streets to Michigan avenue
and Madison street. In some way he had acquired personal title
to the church property and he even defied his ecclesiastic superiors to
oust him. Moreover, his habits were notoriously intemperate, and,
as Father St. Cyr refers to him many years after, "he proved to be
a notorious scoundrel." When, therefore, the recalcitrant priest re-
moved the church to another location, a large faction of the congre-
tion refused to follow him. At this crisis of affairs the bishop and
vicar general arrived in Chicago with the avowed intention of excom-
municating O'Meara, besides forcing him to surrender to the church
the misappropriated property. Many of the canal laborers then de-
clared that if their favorite was excommunicated they would clear
the church and take possession of it themselves. "The bishop and
vicar general hearing this," says an account written by an eye-wit-
ness, "went among these men, addressed them on the subject, re-
minding them of their allegiance to the church; told them that they
knew no distinction of nation or habit among Catholics, but that
the only distinction which must be maintained was between the worthy
and unworthy, the faithful and unfaithful sons of the church, and
concluded by warning them that if they offered the slightest resist-
ance to any public ceremony enjoined by the church, they would
themselves incur the guilt of sacrilege, and be accordingly subjected
to the very pains and penalties of excommunication which they wished
to avert from another. This had the effect of calming them into sub-
mission and the priest, learning this, consented to assign over to his
superiors the property of the church, which he had unlawfully held
from it and to leave the town on the following day, so that all pro-
ceedings were stayed against him." Father St. Cyr took' his honorable
departure from Chicago in 1837, and Father O'Meara left in disgrace
in 1840. The church was reunited by Rev. Maurice de St. Palais,
under whom, in 1843 (December 25th), was completed the St. Mary's
brick church, corner of Madison street and Wabash avenue. St.
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 179
Palais was succeeded by Rt. Rev. William Quarter, Chicago's first
Catholic bishop, who died April 10, 1848.
Under Bishop Quarter the growth of Catholicism in the diocese
was remarkable. When he arrived in Chicago it contained but one
church arid two priests; two years later, at the first diocesan synod,
thirty-two priests were in attendance and nine were unable to be
present. In 1846 three Catholic churches were also erected — St.
Patrick's, St. Peter's and St. Joseph's — the last two for German com-
municants, St. Peter's being on the. south side and St. Joseph's on the
north side. The University of St. Mary's of the Lake is also to be
credited to Bishop Quarter, a charter for the college being granted
in December, 1844 (the year of his coming to Chicago). The uni-
versity building, with seminary attachment, was opened to the Cath-
olic world July 4, 1845, and was the first institution of higher learn-
ing in the city. He also instituted the first community of Sisters of
Mercy in 1846, and among the organizations of a less denominational
nature which he founded may be mentioned the Chicago Hibernian
Benevolent Emigrant Society, having for its object the protection of
Irish immigrants. According to his desire, the remains of the re-
vered bishop were deposited in St. Mary's cathedral, which he him-
self had consecrated less than three years before.
In 1850 the French Catholics again separated from the mother
church to form St. Louis Society, and worshiped for about two
years in the old St. Mary's church, which then stood at the rear of
the cathedral and was used as a convent by the Sisters of Mercy.
A faction of St. Joseph's church formed a new organization, St. Mi-
chael's, and erected another house of worship on the north side, and
in the following year St. Francis separated from St. Peter's to ac-
commodate the German Catholics of the southwestern section of the
city.
The nucleus of the Cathedral of the Holy Name, ?«■State and
Superior streets, one of the most magnificent religious edifices of the
west, was a small room fitted up in the old College
Holy Name ^^ g^ diary's of the Lake, in 1846, to serve as head-
quarters of the north side parish placed in charge of
the priests of that institution. In 1848 a building was erected on the
southwest corner of the college grounds, corner of Rusli and Supe-
i8o CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
rior streets, and was opened for services in November, 1849. I^ was
known as the Church of the Holy Name and was erected under the
auspices of Rev. Jeremiah A. Kinsella, rector of St. Mary's College,
who, in 1 85 1, also built a small church at the corner of State and
Superior streets. The erection of these houses of worship gave so
decided an impetus to the settlement of Catholics on the north side
that Bishop Van de Velde assented to the building of a large brick
church at the latter location, which should be used as the cathedral
of the diocese. The substantial church, of Milwaukee cream brick,
was opened for the celebration of its first mass on Christmas day of
1854. The fire of 1871 reduced this fine edifice to ashes, but it
was replaced by the present stone cathedral, with its magnificent high
altar of marble, and its architectural magnificence, which stamp it
as one of the noteworthy religious edifices in America. The total
cost of its construction and reconstruction (1891-93) was a quarter
of a million dollars and the completed structure was dedicated No-
vember 17, 1876. While it was in process of construction — that is,
for three years — the headquarters of the bishopric were transferred
to St. Mary's parish on the south side. That church had also been
destroyed by the fire, but Bishop Foley had purchased the Plymouth
Congregational edifice, on the corner of Wabash avenue and Eld-
redge court. Mass was first celebrated therein October 6, 1873, and
from that time until the completion of the cathedral of the Holy
Name it was used as a pro-cathedral. That year and event are also
significant of the permanent transfer of centralized Catholicism from
the south to the north side, but, although St. Mary's is somewhat
shorn of its ecclesiastical dignity, around it cluster all the tender
memories of the early times and it stands as the only outward evi-
dence of the continuous life of the Roman Catholic church as an or-
ganized body in Chicago. Its noteworthy history embraces the es-.
tablishment of the first Catholic church for colored people in the
city and one of the first in the north, the faithful of that race meeting
in the basement of St. Mary's for their initial services in 1881.
After Bishop Foley's death in 1879 the strong standing of Chicago in
the Roman Catholic church was recognized by raising it to the dig-
nity of a metropolitan see and appointing Rev. Patrick A. Feehan
(former bishop of Nashville) as its first archbishop.
The diamond jubilee of St. Mary's church, celebrated June 14-19,
CHICAGO AND COOK COUXTV iSi
1908, occasioned a grand outpouring; of Catholics, one of the oldest,
most noted and most faithful of them, Hon. William J. Onahan, de-
livering the chief address relating directly to the church. As he had
attended his first mass in it as early as 1855, his interesting and
tender narrative came from the lips of an authority. "In the year
1903," said Mr. Onahan, "the charge of the church and parish was
given over by Archbishop Quigley to the Paulist fathers,- who were
cordially welcomed to Chicago by priests and people. The parish
house has since been the headquarters of the missionary band of the
Paulist fathers for the west. It is scarcely necessary to dwell here
on the services oi these fathers in the special line of mission duty
to which they' are given. Their wonderful zeal and power, especially
in the field of conversion, has passed into a proverb. The missions
given to non-Catholics have been rewarded by the happiest results.
"Old St. Mary's means something greater and more significant
than merely a church and parish. St. Mary's was the mother church
— the creator, it may be said — from which sprang the subsequent
marvelous spread of Catholicity in Chicago, and from Chicago through
Illinois and the west in general. How wonderful has been the growth
of religious activity from this fountain source is seen today. The
statistics alone demonstrate how unequaled, how unexampled has
been its progress. Think of it! In Chicago, in 1833, a single priest
and an humble little frame chapel, where now, in 1908, we have an
archbishop, several auxiliary bishops, four hundred priests, nearly
two hundred churches, schools, colleges, innumerable convents and
religious houses, noble hospitals and multiplied institutions of mer-
cy, and charity, and institutions for the care and mitigation of every
form of human infirmity. All this wonderful exhibit is not of con-
cern alone to Catholics. It is, indeed, to their glory and credit; but
it concerns the entire community. What we have done has not been
for Catholics only — it has been for all, since all have shared in the
benefits — the city, society, humanity, have all been gainers."
The expansion of Catholicism in the west division of Chicago
showed marked activity after the fire, which had little immediate ef-
fect upon that section of the city other than to draw the attention of
thousands of homeless people to its ample acres as available for resi-
dence sites. Long before, several notable institutions of the faith had
been created in this section of Chicago, among others that of the
i82 , CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
Church of the Holy Family, under the care of the Jesuit priesthood.
In 1857 Bishop O' Regan invited Father Arnold Damen, of the Mis-
souri diocese, and a member of the Society of Jesus, to take charge of
the Cathedral of the Holy Name, but the latter, after local investiga-
tion, decided that his duties lay on the west side of the river, and even
in what was then a sparsely settled section of it south of Van Buren
street. The result was the purchase of the block between Eleventh
and Twelfth streets, fronting on May, and the erection of a large
wooden chapel, which was occupied as the Church of the Holy Fam-
ily in July of that year. In the face of a financial panic and depress-
ing times, funds were raised for the grand edifice which was dedi-
cated in i860, which passed almost unscathed through the great fire,
and which still stands. In 1862 a clergy house was erected and in
1870 St. Ignatius College was opened — an institution which has sent
out numerous bright young men who have been making history for
Chicago and the country. Father Damen, pioneer of his order in
Chicago, has the love and veneration of thousands, and the parish
of the Holy Family church is now one of the most numerous and
united in the country.
The old St. Louis church, established in 1850, for the separate
worship of French Catholics, passed through much stress and storm
caused by disagreements between their bishop and their- pastor and
the income of a strong element of Irish Catholics. The original
building was consumed in the great fire, but the French Catholics
had again come into their own by the formation of the parish of
Notre Dame de Chicago and the completion of a church for them
in 1865, located on the west side, corner of Halsted and Congress.
The site of the church has been shifted three quarters of a mile to
the southwest, but the French are still in the ascendancy. The
growth of the western division of the city has resulted since in the
founding of such fine and substantial edifices as the massive, two-
spired Church of Our Lady of Sorrows on West Jackson boulevard,
near Kedzie street, and the buildings of St. Mel's parish on Wash-
ington , boulevard, at the corner of Forty-third street.
From first to last the Catholic church in Chicago, as everywhere
else, has been zealous, not only in the establishment of its own pa-
rochial schools and institutions of higher learning, but in the founding
and maintenance of hospitals, which, as far as aid to the sick and
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 183
injured is concerned, have been conducted along unsectarian lines.
But interesting- as is the development of all the local activities of the
church, it is impossible to present more than the general features;
and the same may be said of all denominations.
Although the Catholics, Presbyterians and Baptists all preceded
the Methodists in the formation of regular churches in Chicago, it
is generally admitted that the Methodists were the
first Protestants to secure a firm foothold in the
community, through the faithful labors of Jesse
Walker and Stephen R. Beggs. The nature of those labors, as well
as the building of the first church on the north side of the river and
its removal to the corner of Clark and Washington, in 1838, has
already been described. Two years before, the society (known as
the Clark Street M. E. church) had been stricken from the list of
missions and recognized as an independent organization. It had been
incorporated in 1835 as the Methodist Episcopal Church of Chicago,
and it was not until 1857 that the name was formally changed, by
legislative act of reincorporation, to the First Methodist Episcopal
church. This organization has been the mother of Methodism in
Chicago, and holds that relation to the local faith even more dis-
tinctively than St. Mary's does to Catholicism. In 1845 the growth
of the society made necessary the erection of a brick church and in
1858 this was displaced by what, for those days, was an elegant mar-
ble structure, four stories high. The lower, or main floor, was given
up to stores, the second to offices, and the two upper stories to re-
ligious purposes. Prior to 1850 the Canal Street Methodist and the
State Street Methodist churches had been founded by colonies from
the mother body and through her financial assistance, and the Welsh
and German residents of the city, also received substantial support in
the formation of pioneer churches on the west and north sides. The
First Swedish Methodist Episcopal church was organized as the
Scandinavian Mission early in 1853 and in the following year a
building was erected on Illinois street near Market, north side. As
illustrative of this faith in the good missionary offices of the First
church, is the fact that, in 1865. an appeal was made by the West
Indiana Street church lor pecuniary aid, and a resolution was prompt-
ly passed that this application should be first on the list— after the
lot on Indiana avenue, which was being purchased for what is now
i84 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
Trinity Methodist church, had been paid for. In fact, nearly every
Methodist church in the city, which has found itself in any special
straits, has received assistance from the First Methodist church,
which, before the great fire, had given away $70,000. The fine mar-
ble block which it had erected was ruined by the conflagration, but by
the fall of 1872 the present building was standing on its site, and
the generosity of the First Methodist church has since in no wise
abated.
The Methodist Church block, now in the business heart of the
city, is still the heart of Chicago Methodism, and in a large measure
that of the west. It has been the scene of many notable denomina-
tional gatherings and none which caused a more profound sensation
in the home church than that which assembled to try Dr. Hiram W.
Thomas on the question of his orthodoxy. The trial of Dr. Thomas
opened in the lecture room of the First church on
Dr. H. W. Thursday, September 21, iSSr, the judge of the
Thomas. , . \ , . u r u- u J
ecclesiastical court before which his case was
brought being the presiding elder of the Chicago district. Rock River
Conference, of the Methodist Episcopal church. The result, both of
his trial and the appeal to the conference jury, which was decided
two years afterward, was to expel Dr. Thomas from the ministry
and membership of the church. The groundwork of the accusations
was laid while he was pastor of the Centenary Methodist church, on
the west side, from 1877 to 1880, although his pulpit utterances had
given rise to much criticism by the orthodox members of the church
during the three years (1872-75) that he occupied the pulpit of the
First church. His early theological studies had been under Charles
Elliott, president of the Iowa Wesleyan University, and when little
more than eighteen he commenced to preach. In 1856 he joined the
Iowa Methodist conference, filled numerous appointments throughout
the state and also served as chaplain of the state penitentiary, and
in 1869 came to Chicago to fill the pulpit of the Park Avenue Meth-
odist church. While preaching in Iowa his liberality had occasioned
comment, but not until he commenced his pastorate of the First Meth-
odist church of Chicago did it cause general criticism. The climax
was reached at the delivery of his sermon in 1874 on the trial of Dr.
Swing for heresy, in which he took exception to the doctrines of
foreordination and perdition. In the fall of 1875 the orthodox op-
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 185
position resulted in his transfer to Aurora, and at the Alethodist con-
ference of 1878 his utterances were discussed and he was asked to
give assurances that his objectionable teachings would be discontin-
ued, or that he retire from the Methodist pulpit. Although he de-
clined to do either, but stated that he would continue to do the best
he could as a Christian minister, he continued his pastorate at the
Centenary church, with the result that he was expelled from the de-
nomination.
In the meantime his stanchest friends, who had foreseen the result
of the trial, had organized the People's church, the pulpit of which
Dr. Thomas occupied from the time of his trial and
Pfople^s
withdrawal from the Centenary church, until 1901,
or for two decades. Services were first held in
Hooley's theater, then in the Chicago Opera House, and finally
at McVicker's theater, the People's church growing continu-
ally in numbers and influence until Dr. Thomas' advancing years and
declining strength made it necessary for him to drop his heaviest phy-
sical burdens. Those who have ever come under his kindly and mag-
netic spell and his broad fraternalism are still under their influence,
and wnll recall with gratitude the words of the Northzvestern Chris-
tian Advocate, published soon after his expulsion from the church,
in 1881 : "Now that the struggle is past, we say cordially that Dr.
Thomas is in a position (we wish it had been voluntary on his part)
where every Methodist can, without embarrassment, give him all
kindness and brotherly love. He can think, say, write and urge all
that is nearest his heart, without a word of Methodist criticism as to
himself personally. Fie is now in the ranks of, or near to, those from
whom Methodists can receive criticism and antagonism tKvithout
flinching. We congratulate the non-Methodist public in having a
preacher who is far more evangelical than the average independent
teachers. He has brains and reading and attractiveness. W'e sin-
cerely hope and pray he may have thousands of disciples and con-
verts, and that he may live many years and do a hundred times more
good than even he had hoped to do. The world needs earnest teach-
ing, and we shall be glad to know that the People's church is gather-
ing heavy sheaves."
One of the most vigorous offshoots from the First M. E. church
in the city was what has developed into the Grace church, LaSalle
i86 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
avenue and Locust street, north side. In 1847, when the mother
church had been located on the south side of the river for some 5^ears,
various citizens of the north side desired to have a place of worship
nearer their homes and organized the Indiana Street chapel, with
headquarters in a little frame building on the south side of that thor-
oughfare between Clark and Dearborn. The society grew rapidly,
and, in 1863, with the spread of population north, erected a substan-
tial building on the site of the "Moody church," Chicago and La-
Salle avenues. This was burned in the fire of 1871 and the parish
threw up a temporary chapel on its site which became noted as "the
first church after the fire." The lot was purchased by D wight L.
Moody's supporters, however, and the magnificent Grace church of
the present was completed in 1873, at LaSalle avenue and Locust
street. It represents one of the strongest Methodist organizations in
the country and has itself been the founder of numerous missions,
several of which have developed into independent congregations, no-
tably Wesley, Elsmere and Christ churches.
Although the Moody church on Chicago avenue and the numerous
Christian movements inspired and forwarded by the great evangelist
were non-sectarian, his work was largely supported
'by the Methodists, and his earlier labors in the
Moody.
establishment of the Young Men's Christian As-
sociation were centralized in the rooms of the Methodist Church
block, corner of Clark and Washington streets. He was a Massa-
chusetts man, and commenced his active life in Boston, as a successful
salesman, his energy, tact and attractiveness making business success
assured, had he elected to follow it. Joining the Congregational
church in his twentieth year, his early attempts in Boston and Chicago
to address prayer meetings were such failures as to prompt his
friends to advise him to serve the cause in some other way. Fol-
lowing that advice, for the time, he took a Sunday school class at
the First Methodist church and was soon an active promoter of
a small mission. He also became interested in the work of the
Bethel Home, and while distributing religious literature among the
sailors, met a Presbyterian elder from Rochester, likewise engaged,
and the two worked together for a number of months. Near the
north side market he further collected a motley crowd of juveniles
in a deserted saloon, and instructed them in morality with such
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY iHy
hearty good will that the school was removed, as a large establish-
ment, to North Market Hall and was there maintained for six years,
afterward being installed in a saloon which he rented for the purpose.
He soon determined to devote his entire time to the work. With re-
gard to his first labors in Chicago Mr. Moody once said : "When I
began my Christian course I tried to work in the churches of Chicago
and I was told I had better not speak. I went into the dark lanes
and got meetings there. I kept my mouth shut. I did not let the
church close it. Take a bold stand for Christ. You will never
be good for much for God's service until the world calls you crazy.
If the world has nothing to say against you, you are not much of a
Christian." Mr. Moody's great power as an evangelist was finally
proven in his work for the Young Men's Christian Association,
which had been organized in 1858, largely through Cyrus Bentley
and John V. Farwell, but which so languished during its early infancy
as to be on the verge of complete prostration. When the young man
Moody, who had already been recognized b}^ the First church as a
good mission Sunday school worker, entered the ranks of the asso-
ciation, he at once connected himself with its practical measures
of relief, and as chairman of the committee to visit the poor and
sick he found broad scope for his broad and tender ministrations.
His absolute sincerity and infectious earnestness within the succeed-
ing few years also brought him into the class of effective speakers,
and his power and eloquence as an orator increased continually with
the vastness of his practical Christian works, until the truth became
recognized that he was one of the greatest Christian agents of his
time. At the breaking out of the war he was chairman of the
devotional committee of the association, and active throughout the
period of hostilities in connection with the Christian and Sanitary
Commission, being president of the executive branch of the latter for
Chicago. Locally his labors were chiefly centered in Camp Douglas,
where he erected the first camp chapel of all time, and afterward
organized prayer meetings and revivals attended by thousands of
soldiers, by wearers of both the blue and gray. In 1865 an employ-
ment bureau was established, largely through Mr. Moody, and two
years afterward Farwell Hall was completed and occupied by the
association. It was burned in the following year, rebuilt in 1S6S-9,
and again destroyed in the great fire. In the meantime his purely
i88 ' CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
evangelical labors had found a home in the famous Moody Taber-
nacle, corner of Illinois street and La Salle avenue, but the 1871
fire made a clean sweep of this, as well as of his house and furniture.
He saved nothing but his bible from his household effects. Within
thirty days a low wooden building had been erected at Ontario and
Wells streets and became known as the North Side Tabernacle, where
his congregation was accommodated until the basement of the new
structure on Chicago avenue was completed. After the fire Mr.
Moody carried his work abroad as an evangelist, and, with the assist-
ance of his co-worker, the lamented Sankey, preached Christianity
and himself into the hearts of British and Americans alike.
From that time until his death in 1894 the Chicago avenue church
was supplied with resident pastors of marked ability and Christian
virtues.
Presbyterianism in Chicago was perhaps more strongly affected
by the slavery question than any other denomination, although in its
early period its experience was uniform with that of the other sects,
the division and subdivision of its members into organizations being
mainly determined by the growth and shiftings of population. In
some instances the dividing line was also determined by Old and New
School predilections, in which case, as in that
T^ â– ' where slavery caused the rupture, the newly formed
church usually joined the standard of Congrega-
tionalism. In 1842 the First Presbyterian church became so over-
crowded that a number of its members formed another organization
and under a young Cincinnati minister. Rev. Robert. W. Patterson,
inaugurated the Second church. Services were first held in the Saloon
building, one of the finest public halls in those days, the Unitarians
throwing their church open to the new society on Sunday afternoons.
Under Dr. Patterson's pastorate the church waxed strong and dedi-
cated a house of its own in 185 1. The material of the edifice was a
soft, bituminous limestone, and, with the sun and general exposure,
the petroleum was gradually drawn to the surface, giving the building
the name of the "spotted church," which, as the years passed, became
the "old spotted church." It stood at Washington street and Wabash
avenue, and was considered a handsome building, notwithstanding its
odd appearance, at the time of its destruction by the great fire. Dr.
Patterson occupied the pulpit of the Second Presbyterian church the
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 189
first twenty-three years of its life, and not only was the prime pro-
moter of the society into one of the most flourishing in the north-
west, but became a leading figure of his denomination at large. He
was especially opposed to the proposed secession from the general
conference of the church, because it refused to consider slavery as a
proper subject upon which to take formal action. Just before the
fire the location of the church was changed from Washington street
and Wabash avenue to the Olivet Presbyterian church, Wabash
avenue and Fourteenth street, and Dr. Patterson severed his connec-
tion with the society in 1872, a year after the union of the Second
and Olivet churches. At this time it stood as one of the most active
beneficiaries of the denomination in the city. For the immediate
benefit of the church had been spent some $200,000, and for other
purposes $150,000. The first mission Sunday school was organized
and carried on for twenty-five years by members of this church,
Olivet, Westminster and Lake Forest Presbyterian churches had
sprung from it, and it had given paternal strength to North, Calvary
and Hyde Park churches. Up to the time of the fire the Second
Presbyterian church had expended about $175,000 on charities and
benevolences, and it has fully maintained its reputation for generosity
established early in its history.
The great fire which swept away the church, Sunday school and
mission buildings of the First Presbyterian church on Wabash avenue,
between Congress and Van Buren streets, caused a removal further
south, and a great income of energy and Christian helpfulness. I'our
years after the erection of the edifice on Indiana avenue and Thirty-
first street, the Forty-first Street Presbyterian church was organized
and for some years was sustained by the First church.
It was in the parlors of this church that Dr. David Swing was
tried by the Chicago Presbytery for heresy, with Dr. Arthur Mitchell,
pastor of the church, as moderator, and Professor
Francis L. Patton, who held the chair of theology
at the Seminary of the Northwest (now AlcCor-
mick Seminary), as prosecutor. Westminster and North Presby-
terian churches had been organized by certain members of the First
and Second, to accommodate the New School Presbyterians of the
north side, and just before the fire they had consolidated as the
Fourth church. The five vcars during which Dr. Swing had preached
I90 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
to the congregation of the Westminster church had been characterized
by a remarkable growth and by a sustained interest in his eloquent
and scholarly discourses. His popularity led to the consolidation of
the two societies and although the building in which the united church
worshiped was destroyed the fire, the enthusiastic supporters of Dr.
Swing provided accommodations for the continuance of services at
McVicker's theater. There he continued to preach for fourteen
months, or until the completion of the new edifice at the corner of
Rush and Superior streets, which was opened January 4, 1874.
But the extreme liberality of his teachings made it necessary for
the Presbytery to take cognizance of them for the purpose of weigh-
ing their orthodoxy. He was therefore arraigned before that body
on April 13th of that year, a long list of specifications charging him
with having abandoned the fundamental evangelical doctrines and
given his support substantially to â– Unitarianism. The specifications
were sustained by witnesses and by Professor Swing's published
books and sermons. The defendant admitted the extracts from his
sermons and essays, but asked the Presbytery to consider the entire
essays or discourses. An attempt made by the friends of Dr. Swing
to arrest the proceedings was voted down, although the final verdict
of the trial, which lasted over a month, was an acquittal by a decided
majority. Professor Patton announced that he would appeal from
the decision of the Presbytery to the judgment of the Illinois synod,
but the case never came to a re-trial, since Dr. Swing withdrew from
the denomination and severed his relations with the Fourth Presby-
terian church in December, 1874. The Central church was then
organized, preaching was commenced in McVicker's theater in April,
1876, and in the fall of 1880 Dr Swing began his pastorate at Central
Music Hall, which concluded only with his death in October, 1894.
Like the trial of Dr. Thomas by the ecclesiastical authorities of the
Methodist church, six years later, the proceedings against Dr. Swing
were conducted without acrimony, simply in the spirit of duty to the
denomination. Its spirit was well expressed in the language of Rev.
William Beecher, who said he had never attended meetings of that
character in which there was less unkind and ungenerous feeling.
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 191
In his broad scholarship and polished and impressive oratory
the late Dr. John H. Barrows resembled Dr. Swing, the sharp dis-
T- ^^ tinction in their careers being that the former ac-
JOHN H. ,• , 1 , , ^
Barrows comphshed a great and beneficial work withm the
denomination, while the height of Professor
Swing's fame and usefulness was reached as an independent preacher.
Dr. Barrows served for more than fourteen years as pastor of the
First Presbyterian church. In November, 188 1, after having en-
joyed a thorough theological training at Yale, Union and Andover
and spent twelve years in missionary, educational and pastoral work
in Kansas and Illinois, Dr. Barrows spent a year in European travel,
and then as pastor of the Lawrence (Mass.) church his remarkable
eloquence and learning attracted to him the strong minds of his
church in the New England states. His subsequent success in raising
from the Maverick church of East Boston its crushing indebtedness
called attention to his practical talents in the line of organization and
administration, and had great weight in making him one of the re-
ligious powers of Chicago, the west and the world. His incalculable
service for the First Presbyterian church was concluded in February,
1896, his profound scholarship and nobility of character having so
impressed the country that three years before retiring from that
special ministry he had been chosen chairman of the general com-
mittee of religious congresses of the World's Columbian Exposition.
This gathering of religionists from the four quarters of the globe to
compare their beliefs in a spirit of brotherly forbearance, if not of
love, was largely Dr. Barrows' conception, and, aside from the pos-
session of admirable traits of scholarship, charity and balance of
character, it was eminently fitting that he should have the honor of
organizing and conducting that great Parliamenc of Religions, which
Max Miiller pronounced "one of the most remarkable events in the
history of the world." Dr. Barrows severed his connection with the
First Presbyterian church to develop the two lectureships which had
been established through the liberality of Mrs. Caroline E. Haskell —
one providing for a course of lectures on comparative religion unilcr
the auspices of the University of Chicago and the other of a course
on Christianity to be delivered in the chief cities of India. He had
been delivering the university courses for two years, when he re-
signed his pastorate to give his entire time to that vast work of
192 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
scholarship, rehgion and humanity. On his way to the Orient he
stopped six months at Gottingen, Germany, to take advantage of the
rich theological library of that city; delivered a lecture in French,
while stopping in Paris, on "Religion as a Unifier of Mankind,"
which created a profound sensation in the gay capital, and his stay
in India established his standing as one of the foremost exponents
of Christianity in the world. Upon his return to this country in 1897
he delivered the Morse lectures before the Union Theological Sem-
inary of New York, his "Christian Conquest of Asia", being con-
sidered by theological scholars one of the great utterances of the age.
Dr. Barrows held the Haskell lectureships until February, 1898, when
he accepted the presidency of Oberlin College. In the work of lifting
that institution to material prosperity and broadening its scope as
an educator, he taxed his strength beyond endurance, and his superb
career was closed by death June 3, 1902.
The Presbyterians of the west side obtained their first church in
1847 and it was established largely through the encouragement and
support of the First. Thomas Cook, a member of that society,
donated a lot on Des Plaines street, which was in the middle of a
corn field, and the little frame building, dedicated July 4th of that
year, stood there until the congregation erected a stone church on the
corner of Washington boulevard and Carpenter street in 1858. The
panic of 1857 threatened to crush the enterprise completely, but one
of the church members saved it by mortgaging his house for $2,000
to supply the required funds. The building was afterward remodeled
and improved, so that when it was sold to St. Paul's Reformed
Episcopal church, in the autumn of 1877, it would compare favorably
with any in the city. In May, 1878, a magnificent edifice was dedi-
cated on Ashland avenue, and the Third church has continued to
be perhaps the strongest Presbyterian organization on the west side.
'The long pastorate of Dr. Abbott E. Kittredge, who was installed
about a year before the great fire, was one of the most prosperous
in the history of the church. Three churches have been organized
from the membership of the Third — the Reunion, Westminster and
Campbell Park — and among its mission Sunday schools may be
mentioned the Home, Foster and Noble Street.
The greatest claim, however, which the Third Presbyterian church
has to local historic distinction is the position which a strong element
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 193
early assumed on the question of slavery, and. with its secession,
formed the First Congregational church of Chicago. The majority
was marshaled in 1850, and for nearly two years thereafter, by the
pastor, Rev. Lewis H. Loss, and Philo Carpenter, who for years
had been a pillar of all religious movements in Chicago. He was
sent as a delegate from the Third church to the Christian Anti-
Slavery convention, which met in Cincinnati in 1850, and both his
pastor and himself were leaders in the later movement to unite
the New School Presbyterians and the Congregationalists of Illinois
into an organization by which they might sever their connection with
slave holders and still retain their relations with the general assembly.
But all attempts at a compromise failed, and the Chicago Presbyter}'
dropped the names of those members who had refused to abide
by what they characterized as a vacillating policy of the general
assembly on the slavery question.
The members who were thus severed from the Third Presbyte-
rian church by the action of the presbytery and their own volition,
organized the First Congregational church May
^ 22, i8si, their most distinguished layman being- the
Congregation- ^ , t^i -1 r- . v .• r ^t t
r. Sturdy Philo Carpenter. A native of Massachu-
AL Church. \^ r^ ,,1
setts, Mr. Carpenter had then been a resident of
Chicago for twenty-three years and had amassed a fortune in busi-
ness and by wise investments in real estate, the latter of which brought
him a large income for years after this period. One of his purchases
for which he was long ridiculed was that of a quarter section of land
from the government, at $1.25 per acre, which was afterward plat-
ted as Carpenter's addition and was bounded on three sides by Madi-
son, Halsted and Kinzie. In his later years his property interests
were largely on the west side, which partially accounted for his
special interest in a Presbyterian church for that section of the city.
But in his general support of religion and morality he knew no sec-
tional bounds. As early as 1832 he wrote and circulated the first
total abstinence pledge in Chicago ; so far as known delivered in the
log hut of Jesse Walker, the first temperance address in the city,
and on the 19th of August, of the same year, was the organizer of
the first Sunday school. He was founder of the First and lliird
Presbyterian churches, before he became the leader of the secession-
ists from the latter, which formed the First Congregational church;
Vol. 1—13.
194 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
three years afterward became one of the founders and first treas-
urer of the Chicago Theological Seminary and, both in religious and
educational matters, accomplished so much of practical and enduring
value that a city cannot accord him too much honor which has al-
ways been noted for "doing things" almost in a breath with their
discussion.
In 1852 (the year following the organization of the First Con-
gregational church from the membership of the First Presbyterian)
Plymouth Congregational church was organized.
Plymouth Although both societies were offshoots of the First
^ Presbyterian body, Plymouth was formed not pri-
AL Church. ./ , ... ^ ,
manly because of any disagreement over slavery,
but on denominational points. The well-understood differences in
church administration between the two sects caused the withdrawal
of a number of Congregationalists who had been worshiping at the
First Presbyterian church and the organization, December i, 1852,
of the Plymouth Congregational Church of Chicago. The reasons
given to the ecclesiastical council which created it include slavery as
a consideration, but one only of secondary importance. The desire
of Plymouth was "to be united under a church polity which would
secure to the majority the right to carry their own acts of discipline
and benevolence and that would be free from all ecclesiastical con-
nection with the sin of slavery." On the last Sunday of the month
following the organization of the society a wooden church, thirty by
fifty feet, was occupied on the corner of Madison and Dearborn
streets, and in the fall of 1855 was removed to the corner of Third
avenue and Van Buren street, where the congregation worshiped
regularly until the erection of a new edifice, corner of Wabash ave-
nue and Eldredge court, in April, 1866. This remained the headquar-
ters of the Plymouth Congregational church until its consolidation
with the South Congregational church July i, 1872. The latter was
within a year of the age reached by Plymouth, its nucleus having
been formed by various New England families living in the vicinity
of the American Car Works, on the lake shore, at the foot of what
is now Twenty-sixth street. Its members were, as a whole, connect-
ed with that manufactory, its president and several officials being
among the number. The proprietors of the company donated a lot
on the northeast corner of Calumet avenue, and otherwise contributed
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY ,,^5
*
so liberally toward the founding of the South church than its first
building- was dedicated in the fall of 1853. It contained sixty pews
and was modeled generally on the architectural lines of Plymouth
church. At that time the North church was nearly completed and
the First Congregational was preparing to build a better house of
worship on the west side; so that Congregationalism was flourishing.
The history of the South and Plymouth churches run along some-
what parallel lines, and in 1872 the former was occupying a large
edifice at the corner of Indiana avenue and Twenty-sixth street. A
majority of the members of Plymouth had moved to that vicinity and
it was thought best that the two societies should unite. Both pastors,
therefore, resigned their positions and a consolidation was effected July
I, 1872, at which time the services pi the new Plymouth church were
inaugurated in the South church, under Rev. William A. Bartlett.
A few months afterward the edifice formerly occupied by the Ply-
mouth congregation at Wabash avenue and Eldredge court was sold
to St. Mary's Catholic church. The consolidated society flourished
vigorously and was in prosperous condition when Dr. Frank W.
Gunsaulus, in March, 1887, was called from Brown ]\Iemorial Pres-
byterian church, Baltimore. He was installed on the 27th of June.
The twenty-one years which Dr. Gunsaulus has spent in Chicago
have placed him in the front rank of pulpit orators, organizers, schol-
_ ^^^ ars and litterateurs. The warm friendship which
r . W. . .
^ ' * the late Philip D. Armour conceived for him early
Gunsaulus. . , . ^ ,, , , , -^
m his career suggests a parallel between the prac-
tical union of their forces in the establishment of moral and educa-
tional institutions and the work carried on by Dwight L. Aloody and
John V. Farwell. Dr. Gunsaulus was ordained a Methodist minis-
ter and preached within that denomination for four years, joining
Congregationalism in 1879 and preaching in Ohio and Massachu-
setts, before going to Baltimore. While pastor of Plymouth church
he accomplished wonders in the development of the Armour missions
and throughout his pastorate showed a strong and practical interest
in the young men of the community. In one of his sermons he drew
in general outlines an ideal picture of an institution which should
scientifically prepare them for the practical duties of life ;uul make
special provision for those in humble cia'cumstances but of moral,
ambitious and able characters. After the discourse Mi. Armour, in
196 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
his impulsive way, met his pastor and offered to found such an m-
stitute as he had pictured, provided he would assume its organization
and management. This was the origin of the great Armour Insti-
tute, of which Dr. Gunsaulus is still president. Notwithstanding
that for years he carried the noted technical school upon his shoul-
ders, at the same time he developed a church organization which be-
came so strong and broad in its influences that Central church was
formed in 1899 and he commenced his notable services at the Audi-
torium. This great hall is also filled to overflowing and Dr. Gun-
saulus, the preacher and the man, has long been called the Wendell
Phillips of this day.
The establishment of the First Baptist church in Chicago in 1833
and the erection of its house of worship as the city pioneer have al-
^ ready been described. In 1844 a new building was
Baptist
„ completed on the corner of Washington and La-
V^HURCHES. r-> 11 1 • r 1 /--I 1 r- z-'
Salle, the present site of the Chamber of Commerce,
and in r868 was donated to the Second church and re-erected on the
corner of Monroe and Morgan, west side. In August, 1843, thirty-
four members of the First church formed the Second, being, at their
own request, dismissed from the parent organization that they might
take a decided stand as a religious body against the institution of
slavery. About a week afterward the name was changed to the Ta-
bernacle church, but in 1864, after another accession of membership
from the First church, it resumed its former name. The old First
church has followed the example of the pioneer body of the other
denominations and become the mother of many children. The Union
Park church originated in large measure with members of the first
society who had removed to the west side. In November, 1857, the
North Baptist church appeared as an offshoot, and in the following-
year members of the First who had removed to Evanston estab-
lished a society in that village. In 1864 the Indiana Avenue Baptist
church sprung from a union of membership of the First and Wabash
avenue churches, and in 1868 a large delegation was sent out by let-
ter from the mother church to organize the University Place society.
In 1868 the Chamber of Commerce offered $65,000 for the site of
the First Baptist church, corner of Washington and LaSalle streets.
The offer was accepted and of that sum $25,000 was donated to the
following churches, which had been formed in whole or in part from
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 197
the membership of the First: Second church (then in process of
formation in the west division of the city), building and fixtures of
the former house of worship, $10,000; North Baptist, $6,500; Union
Park, $4,000; Berean, $1,000; OHvet (colored), $500. About
one-half the cash remaining in the church treasury was devoted to
the purchase of the new site on Wabash avenue south of Hubbard
court, and in March, 1866, its great building was dedicated. It cost
$175,000, seated 1,500 people and was then the largest Protestant
church in the west. In this massive and elegant house of worship,
in May, 1867, were held various anniversary meetings of the local
Baptist churches, making it especially a striking evidence of the sub-
stantial standing of the denomination. Although it escaped the great
fire, it was laid low by the conflagration of 1874, after which the
society transferred its hon;e further south to its present site. South
Park avenue and Thirty-first street. The new edifice was dedicated
in April, 1876.
In 1879 Dr. Lorimer was called to the First Baptist from the
Tremont Temple Baptist church (of Boston), and under his eloquent
and practical ministrations the society grew with almost unprecedent-
ed rapidity. After the burning of the Michigan Avenue Baptist
church in 1881, some two hundred and fifty of the most influential
members of the First church joined the former society, and, with Dr.
Lorimer as their pastor, formed a new organization, and Dr. P. S.
Henson, who faithfully served the. original society for so many years,
assumed the pastorate. They both, however, eventually returned to
the east, where Dr. Lorimer died.
In the support of city missions the First Baptist church has shown
marked liberality. Among these are the Shields, on Twenty-fifth,
street, near Wentworth avenue; the Bremer avenue, corner of Div-
ision and Sedgwick streets; the Ward's Rolling Mills, which became
an independent church; the Raymond, on Poplar avenue, near Thir-
ty-first street, and the Wabash Avenue Mission, corner of Thirty-
eighth street. • In addition to the support of these outside enterprises
connected with the denomination, with others mentioned and unmen-
tioned, the First church has subscribed $100,000 toward the endow-
ment of the University of Chicago.
The founding of the old Chicago University was due to Senator
Stephen A. Douglas, who, as early as 1854, offered a site for that
198 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
purpose in the southern part of the city to the First Baptist church.
At first decHned, his offer was accepted some two years afterward
and the corner-stone of the building between Thirty-third and Thir-
ty-fourth streets, was laid July 4, 1857, but the financial depression
stopped the work for a time. In 1858 Dr. J. C. Burroughs resigned
the pastorate of the church to accept the presidency of the prepara-
tory department of the university, resigning in 1873 to become chan-
cellor. The main building was completed in 1865, and Dr. Bur-
roughs, Senator Douglas and William B. Ogden (the two last named
us presidents of the board of trustees) made valiant efforts to float
the enterprise, but its encumbrance of $320,000 was not to be lifted
ai.'d the property was sold to hquidate the indebtedness in 1885. In
May, 1888, the American Education Society was formed in Washing-
ton and under its auspices the new university came into being largely
through the munificence of John D. Rockefeller and the wonderful
powers of organization, persuasion and scholarship of the late Dr.
William R. Harper. But the development of the later institution
belongs to the educational history of Chicago. The Baptist Theo-
logical Seminary, chartered in 1865, was also connected with the old
Chicago University, but in the late seventies it was removed to Mor-
gan Park, a southern suburb of the city.
The Episcopalians organized in 1834, and by invitation of Rev.
Jeremiah Porter, first held services in the Presbyterian church, and
later the Baptists threw their house of worship
Episcopal t^ •
^ open to them. The Kinzies were strong Episco-
palians, and John H. Kinzie fitted up a building
(afterward Tippecanoe Hall) where religious services were held for
some time. In 1836 he donated two lots at the corner of Cass and
Illinois streets, upon which the St. James church was erected and
dedicated in the following year (1837). It was a little Gothic struc-
ture, sometimes called the "Kinzie church," and its chief interior
attraction was a massive mahogany pulpit, whose proportions were
suitable for a cathedral. In 1857 St. James erected a large and
handsome building of stone, corner of Cass and Huron streets, which
was not consecrated by Bishop Whitehouse until May 19, 1864, when
all its indebtedness was cleared off. The church property was im-
proved before the fire by the expenditure of over $100,000, but
church and rectory were swept away, and it was not until fou^
CHICAGO AND COOK COUiNTY 199
years afterward that the congregation were able to celebrate their
occupancy of even a larger and handsomer building. As early as
1841 it was decided by St. James church that the Episcopalians of
the south side ought to be provided with religious services, and for
that purpose Trinity church was formed, the first regular house of
worship being on Madison street between Clark and La Salle. The
church was first occupied in 1844. In 1850 the Church of the Atone-
ment was organized by the west siders, at Randolph and Canal streets,
and in the following year Grace church was formed from the mem-
bership of St. James. Rev. Dr. Clinton Locke became its rector in
1859 and served until several years before his death in 1904, which
constituted one of the longest pastorates in the religious history of
Chicago. Steps were early taken looking to the founding of an
Episcopal cathedral, and in 1855 ^^^^ were deeded to Bishop White-
house for that purpose, but it was finally decided to utilize the Church
of the Atonement, corner of Washington boulevard and Peoria street,
which had been greatly burdened with debt. This was purchased,
enlarged and improved, and after Easter of 1861 was known as the
Cathedral of SS. Peter and Paul.
Rev. Edward Charles Cheney, who had been rector of Christ
church, corner of Michigan avenue and Twenty-fourth street, since
i860, was placed on trial at the cathedral for a violation of the
prescribed Episcopalian ritual in omitting certain words' which pro-
claimed the doctrine of baptismal regeneration. His case, which
was carried through various ecclesiastical and civil courts, covering
the period from July 21, 1869, to February i, 1871, resulted in his
formal pleading to the formulated charges, and his suspension from
the church by Bishop Whitehouse on the i8th of that month. At
the urgent request of Christ church he nevertheless continued as its
rector, and was several months later convicted by the ecclesiastical
court of contumacy. Subsequently Dr. Cheney's parishioners re-
fused to recognize Bishop Whitehouse's authority, upon the occasion
of his visitation to Christ church, and, as a congregation, followed
their beloved pastor into the Reformed Episcopal denomination, of
which he was one of the founders. In December, 1873, he was con-
secrated missionary bishop of the northwest, and in 1878 was made
bishop of the synod of Illinois. Dr. Samuel Fallows, who had
200 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
been called to the pulpit of St. Paul's Reformed Episcopal church
upon its organization in 1875, became missionary bishop of the north-
west to succeed Bishop Cheney, and the two have since maintained
their places as the leaders of their church in the west. Bishop Fal-
lows' career as an ecclesiastic has teemed with variety. Before en-
tering the Reformed church he had made a splendid reputation as
a Methodist divine, as a Civil war officer and a Wisconsin educator,
and since occupying the pulpit of St. Paul's church he has become
identified with community work, civic reforms, city and state chari-
ties, and everything which stirs the blood of the citizen in times of
peace, who is alive to the necessity of countless social and industrial
reforms. Charitable and kindly in spirit, action and word, Bishop
Fallows has always exhibited a brave aggressiveness against evil
and evil-doers.
Of the Protestant Episcopal churches in Chicago, there is none
more beautiful and few more elegant in the west, than the Church
of the Epiphany, corner of Ashland avenue and Adams street. The
society was organized in 1868, and its splendid Norman-Gothic edifice
of-stone was completed in 1885. It has enjoyed a continuous history
of prosperity, and there are few church goers of the west side who
have not charming and elevating recollections of its flowers and
music.
St. Ansgarius church has a special historic claim to distinction.
Organized in 1849 by the north side Swedes and Norwegians, in
1 85 1, while still endeavoring to complete its little building on Franklin
and Indiana streets, the society was rejoiced at a gift of $1,000 from
Jenny Lind, who also presented it with a silver communion set.
As the church grew and its members agitated a split on the line of
nationalities, the question arose as to the future ownership of the
silver cup and paten, which brought a letter from the great singer
declaring that in the event of a dissolution the communion set should
be the property of her countrymen. The natural division occurred
in after years, and the Swedish church, which was moved far north
of its first location, retained the name of the original society. As
late as 1885 it was the only Swedish Episcopal church in the United
States.
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 201
The members of the Lutheran church in Chicago are virtually
confined to the German and Scandinavian elements, although there
are two churches on the west side patronized by
Lutheran. the Slavs. The organization, or denomination, is
divided into various synods, grouped according to
nationality and by states. There is also a strictly local, or Chicago,
synod. St. Paul's German Evangelical Lutheran church, organized
in 1846, by the Rev. Augustus Selle, was the first Lutheran -society
in Chicago,, but two years later it joined the United Evangelical de-
nomination — that is, a majority of the members seceded, the minority
remaining with their old pastor. The first church of the original
society was at the corner of Ohio and La Salle streets, but after
the division, St. Paul's church moved further and further north until
now it occupies a magnificent structure at the corner of Franklin and
Superior, its pastor. Rev. Henry Wunder, being one of the oldest
clergymen in continuous service in Chicago. From St. Paul's have
sprung Liimanuel Evangelical Lutheran in 1854, whose house of
worship originally stood on Twelfth street, upon the site now cov-
ered by the Church of the Holy Family; St. John's Evangelical
Lutheran, organized in 1867, with a church on West Superior street,
and St. James Evangelical Lutheran (1870), which occupied premises
on the corner of Fremont and Sophia streets. From Immanuel
society have been formed four churches, and from St. John's, two;
so that nine church organizations can trace their direct ancestry
to St. Paul's Evangelical Lutheran church. Li February, 1848, the
Norwegians of the city organized an Evangelical Lutheran church
under Rev. Paul Anderson, their first building being on Superior
street between Franklin and Kingsbury. The Swedish Lutherans
organized their first church in 1848, under Rev. Paul Anderson, and
in 1856 erected a brick house of worship, corner of Franklin and Erie
streets. The church known as Our Saviour's Norwegian Evangelical
Lutheran, organized in 1858, has now one of the finest buildings of
the denomination in the United States, at the corner of North May
and West Erie, in the northwestern part of the city. Reference has
been made to the split in the old St. Paul's church in 1848, by which
most of its members followed Rev. Augustus Selle into the Evangeli-
cal United deno^nination. A society had been formed in 1843. com-
posed of prominent Germans of the north side, and in after years
202 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
it erected a church and orphan asylum (Uhhck German Orphan
.Asykim) on La Salle street. Besides the Evangelical United church,
the Evangelical Association of North America has considerable
strength among Chicago Lutherans.
The Hebrew element in the city is also strong, and several of its
congregations (notably the Sinai, with Dr. Emil G. Hirsch as pastor)
are quite liberal in their tendencies. Li 1843 mem-
^ "^ bers of the Jewish race and faith commenced
Congregations. , „, . . -111
to reach Chicago m considerable numbers un-
der the auspices of the Jewish Colonization Society, whose head-
quarters were in New York City. Soon the}^ organized a cemetery
association, with grounds in the present Lincoln Park, and a church
society, which was chartered in 1848 as Kehilath Anshe Mayriv, or
"congregation of the men of the west." The years brought several
changes of location and finally, in 1890, a veritable temple was erect-
ed on the southeast corner of Indiana avenue and Thirty-third street.
The building is the largest Jewish place of worship in the city and is
one of the handsomest structures for religious purposes in Chicago.
Sinai congregation worship in a stately temple on Indiana avenue and
Twenty-first street, and the strongest Jewish society on the west side
is the Zion congregation, located on Washington boulevard and Ogden
avenue. These congregations are affiliated with the Reformed, of
liberal branch of the faith, and are representative of the best thought
of the fifty or more Jewish organizations in Chicago. Perhaps the
most noteworthy feature in the general policy of these reformed con-
gregations is that of holding services both Saturday and Sunday. Dr.
Hirsch is the ablest exponent of Jewish liberal thought in Chicago,
and, while a stanch defender of his people against any form of op-
pression or discrimination, at the same time he is a co-worker with
denominational leaders and independent thinkers in all works of pub-
lic charity and sociological and religious advancement.
The origin of the Sinai congregation is suggestive of its present
advanced position. In i860 about twenty young men, who had con-
stituted a reform association within the Kehilath Anshe Mayriv, se-
ceded from the parent body for the purpose of expunging from the
liturgy that portion of it which expressed the hope that the Jews
would eventually return to Jerusalem, and making other changes in
the services and doctrines of the congregation which they considered
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 203
in accord with the spirit of the times and the progress of history.
They desired, especially, that the Jews should abandon their claim to
be representatives of a nation and take their stand as religious people.
Although these young men were a small minority, they were much in
earnest, and their formation of the Sinai congregation, under Rev.
Bernhard Felsenthal, was the commencement of a great liberal move-
ment among the Hebrews of Chicago and the west. Dr. Hirsch has
been pastor of Sinai congregation since 1880.
Of the liberal denominations in Chicago, the Unitarians were
the pioneers, their first meeting being held in June, 1836, at the Lake
House, then being erected at the corner of Rush
and Michis^an streets, north side. Rev. Dr. Follen
T A TVTC
was the preacher and Harriet Martineau, the fa-
mous English woman of letters, who was then traveling through the
west, thus describes the meeting: "We were unexpectedly detained
over Sunday in Chicago and Dr. F. was requested to preach. Though
only two hours' notice were given, a respectable congregation was
assembled in the large room of the Lake Flouse. Our seats were a
few chairs and benches and planks laid on trestles. The preacher
stood behind a rough pine table, on which a large Bible was placed.
I was never present at a more interesting service, and I know that
there were others who felt with me." During this same month of
June, the First Unitarian Society of Chicago was incorporated un-
der state laws, and in October, 1839, Rev. Joseph Harrington en-
tered upon his duties as its regular pastor. Li 1840 a church was
erected on Washington street, between Clark and Dearborn, and
its chief claim to distinction was its possession of the largest bell
in the city. This was used for giving fire alarms until 1855, when
the First Baptist church installed a larger bell and took away the
honor.
Rev. George F. Noyes, who assumed the pastorate of the First
Unitarian church in 1857, was chiefiy instrumental in organizing
what is known as the "Ministry at Large," of which
Robert ^^^ Robert Collyer (who had recently been de-
COLLYER. p^^^^ ^^,^^^^ ^^^^ ]\Iethodist ministry) became super-
intendent. Li this year, also, Unity church was organized from the
First Unitarian, to accommodate the members living on the north
side, and in ^Lny, 1859, Mr. Collyer became its pastor. For three
204 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
years he carried along the duties of the two positions, but finahy re-
signed the ministry-at-large. Mr. Collyer became a national char-
acter, and as he left the Methodist church because of his dissatis-
faction over its conservatism on the slavery question, so, during the
Civil war, the Blacksmith Preacher stood forth as one of the great
patriots of the north. The young men of his church entered the army,
at his earnest solicitation, and early in the conflict he threw the Amer-
ican flag over the pulpit and, announcing to his congregation that the
church was closed, he first joined the Union army on the Potomac,
and afterward at Fort-Donelson and Pittsburg Landing, to minister
to the wounded, sick and dying. Many of the women of his church
became members of the Sanitary Commission and performed noble
service both at home and at the front. ^ Unity church was only one
of many in these works, but, in proportion to its numbers and means,
none can show a brighter record. Mr. Collyer remained pastor of
Unity church until 1879, and since then has been pastor of the
Church of the Messiah, New York City. Now in his eighty-fifth
year, as pastor emeritus of that organization, he is one of the vener-
able and picturesque fathers of the faith. Unitarianism has never
had a large following in Chicago, as its membership has always been
largely decimated by other liberal movements.
There were enough Universalists in Chicago to organize a small
congregation as early as 1836, but no regular minister was engaged
until 1843, ^^d their first church, on Washington street, near the
Clark Street Methodist church, was built in the following year. Dr.
William E. Manley was the first pastor. By 1857 the society had
developed into the leading church of the denomination in the north-
west, and in 1857 a large stone church was erected on Wabash ave-
nue and Van Buren street. It was dedicated by Dr. E. H. Chapin,
of New York City, one of the founders of the faith in the United
States, and the old building was sold to the Olivet Presbyterian
church. After several changes in the pastorate, the late Dr. Wil-
liam H. Ryder commenced his long and beneficent ministry January
I, i860. He came from the famous Hosea Ballon church of Rox-
bury, Massachusetts, and his pastorate at St. Paul's
-p â– * did not terminate until April 16, 1882, a period of
twenty-two years and three months. The first years
of his ministry, which covered the Civil war, were trying, but proved
CHICAGO AND COOK COUXTV 205
the metal of both pastor and congregation. Dr. Ivyder himself was
sent to Richmond in aid of the Chicago Sanitary Fair and while
there discovered the famous letter used by the government in the
assassination trial. St. Paul's church was destroyed by the fire, but
a more substantial building was erected and the society is still a sub-
stantial organization. At Dr. Ryder's resignation, in 1882, his con-
gregation invited him to accept the relation of pastor emeritus to
them, but he declined the honor with the belief that it might em-
barrass his successor. This rugged and beloved man died in 1888;
Tlie Second Universalist church, or Church of the Redeemer, was
organized on the west side in 1854.
The half a dozen Swedenborgian societies in Chicago have sprung
from the religious loyalty of J. Young Scammon, who, soon after
his coming to Chicago in 1835, commenced to hold services alone in
his dingy little law office. In 1836 he was joined by a second con-
vert, but the Chicago Society of the New Jerusalem was not founded
until 1843. The Christian Scientists, although of comparatively re-
cent founding, have now eight well attended churches in Chicago.
Outside of all religious organizations and justly classed as inde-
pendent, there are a number of churches in Chicago which are doing
a vast work in charity, reform and general thought-elevation. The
Central Church and the Chicago Avenue Church have already been
noted. The Independent Religious Society of Chicago, with M. M.
Mangasarian as lecturer, has for years maintained a substantial or-
ganization, and the People's Liberal church, on Stewart avenue (for-
merly Englewood), of which the Rev. Rufus A. White has long been
pastor, is one of the liberalizing and elevating forces of the city. All
Souls' church, corner of Oakwood boulevard and
JENKIN L. i^angley avenue, was organized by Rev. Jenkin
JONES. Lloyd Jones as a Unitarian society, more than
twenty-six years ago. The society occupies a massive structure at
that location and its work embraces countless religimis. moral, in-
tellectual and social settlement features. Dr. Jones is a Welshman.
with all the straightforwardness, fervor and eloquence of his race.
He was secretary of the Western Unitarian conference for nine years;
was secretary of the World's Parliament of Religions in 1892-93:
has served as first president of the Illinois State Conference of Chari-
2o6 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
ties, and is a lecturer in English for the extension department of the
University of Chicago, He is also a director of the Abraham Lin-
coln Center, which is the nucleus of the charitable and sociological
work of the church, and for years has been a leader of high thought
and good works in countless ways.
In this, and all else which has been said, it has been possible to
touch only the salient points concerning the growth of the churches
and religious movements in Chicago. Much attention has been given
to the parents of religious bodies ; but, as a rule, it has been the plan
to deal more with personalities than organizations. In making these
latter selections it has been the earnest desire to be strictly impartial
and deal with those who are fairly illustrative of the best thought and
life of the prominent sects and independent developments.
The modern minister of the gospel is no longer a closet man in
th€ essentials of his life. It is true, he must devote some time to
meditation, but his reflections are chiefly applied
^^ â– to the work of laying out his course of action in the
HiRSCH. , / ° . r .1 11 /-^r
great and pressmg movements oi the world. Ur
the Chicago clergymen who are active in the promotion of charitable
and reformatory movements, none are more revered than Rabbi Emil
Gustav Hirsch, for twenty-seven years the guiding spirit of Sinai
Congregation, one of the most liberal Jewish societies of the coun-
try. The doctor is not only foremost in educational and reformatory
work, and a leader in the higher movements of religion, but is a pro-
found scholar, both biblical and philological. Although in the strict
letter of the word he may not be a minister of the gospel, considered
from the standpoint of "good tidings," he is emphatically in that
class, as all his sermons and addresses breathe a spirit of optimism,
charity and good fellowship.
Dr. Hirsch was born at Luxembourg, Grand Duchy, Germany,
on the 22nd of May, 1852, the son of Samuel and Louisa (Mickolls)
Hirsch. His father was German and his mother English. The boy
received an education in the gymnasium of his native town before
the family settled in Philadelphia (1866), and after completing his
classical course at the University of Pennsylvania, returned to the
Fatherland to study philosophy in the universities of Berlin and
Leipsic. He received the degree of A. M. from the University of
Pennsylvania in 1875, after he had been studying abroad for three
CPIICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 207
years. In Berlin he was also a student at the Hii^h School for Jew-
ish Science. In 1876 he returned to the United States, and was or-
dained a rabbi in the following year, his first charge being as minis-
ter of the Har Sinai congregation, Baltimore. In 1878 he removed
to Louisville, Kentucky, to assume the pastorate of Arnath-Israel
congregation, and in 1880 received the call to the Sinai congrega-
tion of Chicago, which brought him to his broad and productive field
of labors in this city.
Besides the original degree of A. M. conferred upon him in 1875
by the University of Pennsylvania, Dr. Hirsch has been honored
with the following: LL. D., Austin College, Illinois. 1896; L. II. D.,
Western University of Pennsylvania, 1900; D. D., Hebrew Union
College, Cincinnati, Ohio, 1901. Since 1892 he has served in the
University of Chicago as professor of rabbinical literature and piiilos-
ophy. He has also achieved a national name as an original contribu-
tor to religious literature, having been editor of the "Zeitgeist."
Milwaukee (Wis.), in 1880-7; and of the New York Reformer,
in 1886; is now editor of the Reform Advocate, Chicago; was the
editor of the biblical department of the Jewish Encyclopedia, and is
the author of various papers on biblical and religious subjects. One
of his works, "The Crucifixion from a Jewish Point of View," attracted
widespread attention from scholars and original investigators, what-
ever their creeds or beliefs.
From 1888 to 1897 Dr. Hirsch was a member of the Chicago
public library board, and was at one time president of the board of
examiners of the civil service commission. In 1901 he was appointed
by Governor Yates a member of the state board of charities, but re-
signed the office rather than have it hampered by politics and poli-
ticians. In 1896 he was elected an elector-at-large on the McKinley
ticket, running 1,700 votes ahead of his nearest associate. Although
generally a supporter of the Republican party. Dr. Ilirsch's views,
especially upon local affairs, are never guided l)y partisan considera-
tions, but are determined by considerations of the public welfare. It
is a matter of certainty that wherever there is a wrong to be correct-
ed — social, political or religious — he will be found, out in the open,
battling bravely for what he believes to be the right.
2o8 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
The Most Reverend James Edward Quigley, D. D., was appointed
Archbishop of Chicago on the 8th of January, 1903, being formally
installed in his high position on the tenth of the fol-
' ^ lowing March. He succeeded the universally be-
OuiGLEY-
^ ' ' loved and admired Archbishop Feehan, the hero and
the ministering spirit of two awful cholera epidemics, and for twenty-
eight years a faithful and effective worker for his church before he
came to Chicago as the archbishop of the recently created see. On
September 10, 1880, his appointment was given to the world, and his
departure from Nashville was considered a public calamity. At the
time of his arrival the archdiocese comprised eighteen counties in
northern Illinois and about one hundred and sixty churches, and at
the time of his death, more than twenty years later, it contained over
six hundred priests, a Catholic population of over a million people,
and churches, colleges and religious institutions in proportion. This
was the magnificent and honorable responsibility assumed by Arch-
bishop Quigley in 1903, and which he has borne so nobly and so
cheerfully. For more than twenty years the archdiocese has been
second in ecclesiastic importance to that of New York, and Arch-
bishop Quigley is more than ever a national figure in the councils of
the Roman Catholic church. Since his graduation from the College
of the Propaganda, Rome, nearly thirty years ago he has steadily
progressed in the good graces of his church, his courtesy, dignity and
ability making him especially acceptable to the large and important
territory, the main guidance of whose spiritual affairs has been en-
trusted to him.
James Edward Quigley is a Canadian by birth, his native town
being Oshawa, and his birthday, October 15, 1854. When he was
two years of age he was brought by his parents to Lima, New York,
and received his preliminary ecclesiastical education in the Empire
state. He first graduated from St. Joseph's College, a well known
institution conducted by the Christian Brothers at Buffalo, New York,
and afterward studied in the Seminary of Our Lady of the Angels,
now known as the Niagara University. Desiring, however, to imbibe
the calmer and more historic atmosphere of the old world, he went
abroad and became a student at the University of Innsbruck, planted
among the picturesque and inspiring country of the Austrian Tyrol.
After graduating therefrom he passed on to the famous College of
CHICAGO AND COOK COUXTY 209
the Propaganda, Rome, where he completed his training for the
priesthood in 1879.
Dr. Quigley's first charge, after being ordained to the priestliood
in 1879, was as pastor of St. Vincent's church, Attica. New York,
and for five years he remained thus happily and profitably employed.
In 1884 he received the appointment of pastor of St. Joseph's cathe-
dral, Buffalo, New York, and after thirteen years of faithful, able and
broadening service in that capacity was advanced to the bishopric of
Buffalo. From the signal performance of these duties he was called
to assume the archbishopric of Chicago in 1903.
Rt. Rev. Peter J. Muldoon was auxiliary bishop of the Roman
Catholic diocese of Chicago from the 25th of July, 1901, until his
appointment to the Rockford diocese in September,
Bishop
1 008. A revered figure in the councils of the church,
Muldoon. ^ . , -^^ , , , , . r r^, •
Bishop Muldoon s departure from Chicago was at-
tended with general regret. He had gained the esteem of the general
citizenship of Chicago, and, irrespective of religious opinion, he was
regarded as a strong influence for the highest ideals of civic and per-
sonal righteousness. He is still comparatively a young man in years,
having been born in Columbia, California, in the year 1863. He is
of Irish parentage and received his early education in the public
schools of Stockton, California. Subsequently he became a student
at St. Mary's College, Kentucky, and St. Mary's, of Baltimore, Mary-
land, and was ordained to the priesthood in 1886.
Bishop Muldoon commenced his pastorate in the service of his
church as assistant pastor of St. Pius' church, Chicago, and in 1888
was appointed chancellor of the diocese of Chicago and secretary to
the archbishop. He held this dual position for seven years, and in
1895 was placed in charge of St. Charles Borromeo church, of this
city, discharging the duties of that pastorate with credit to himself
and advantage to the church. As stated, in July, 1901, he began
service as auxiliary bishop of the Chicago diocese, being also vicar
general of the diocese and titular Bishop of Tamassus.
Rt. Rev. Alexander J. McGavick. auxiliary bishop of the diocese
of Chicago, was consecrated to his high position on the ist of May,
1899. After a short time he assumed the charge
Bishop^ of Holy Angels church .m the south side, and
McGavick. ^^^^^^ i^jg assistants in the extended work ui his
Vol. 1—14.
2IO CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
large congregation, Rev. T. C. Gaffney, D. D. ; Rev. Bernard Heeney,
Rev. J. E. McGavick and Rev. Timothy O'Shea.
Alexander J. -McGavick is a native of Illinois, born at Fox Lake,
on the 2 1 St of August, 1863, being a son of James and Catherine
(Watt) McGavick. Until he had reached the age of fifteen vears
he attended the public schools of his home neighborhood, and soon
after graduating from the common school system commenced a long
course of preparation for the priesthood. In 1879 he entered St. Via-
teur's College, at Kankakee, Illinois, and in 1887 graduated from
that institution with the degree A. M. He was ordained to the priest-
hood in the same year, and after well performing the duties attached
to minor, charges in Chicago churches was appointed pastor of St.
John's church. This was in 1897. The result of his faithful and
efficient work in this capacity was his advancement to an auxiliary
bishopric in the Chicago diocese, to which he was consecrated May i,
1899. He is especially designated titular Bishop of Marcopolis.
Since 1900 he has served as pastor of Holy Angels church.
Among the Roman Catholic clergy of Chicago there are none
who stand closer to the hearts of the faithful, or higher in the minds
of those who admire loyalty to the church and broad
„ *^" ability in its support and propagation, than Rev.
FiTZSIMMONS. ^^. , , ^ ^. . ^ , A 1 1 1 r
Michael J. ritzsmimons, pastor of the Cathedral of
the Holy Name, who for a quarter of a century has spent an open,
helpful and Christian life in the city of his birth. He was born in
Chicago of Irish parents, on the 23d of October, 1850, and has been
the highest credit to his race, his parentage, his birthplace and his
country. His father, Michael Fitzsimmons, came to the United
States as a boy, and remained an hon6red citizen of Chicago and
later of Morris, Illinois, until his death in 1855.
Rev. Michael J. Fitzsimmons obtained his preparatory education
in the parochial schools of Morris, going thence for a classical course
to St. Joseph's College, Teutopolis, Illinois, whence he graduated in
1878. His studies for the church included courses of a year at St.
Viateur's Seminary, near Kankakee, Illinois, and three years at St.
Mary's Seminary, Baltimore, Maryland. His ordination to the priest-
hood occurred in August, 1882, and it is a somewhat remarkable co-
incidence that the ceremonies took place in the cathedral of which he
is now pastor. Father Fitzsimmons' first appointment was to St.
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 211
Mary's Church, Wabash avenue and I^^ldredge court, but before the
close of the year he was transferred to the Cathedral of the Holy
Name, and has since remained a \ ilal factor in its spirtual and chari-
table activities and for a time in the administrative work of the dio-
cese. From assistant pastor he was promoted to the chancellorship
of the archdiocese in 1887, and on the death of the Very Reverend
P. J. Conway, in 1888, was made rect6r of the cathedral. He had
the direct supervision of the rebuilding and renovation of the edifice,
on North State and Superior streets, in the years from 1890 to 1893,
which transformed the Cathedral of the Holy Name into one of the
most beautiful church edifices in the United States and fitting memor-
ial to perhaps the most important archdiocese of the Roman Catholic
church in the country.
Rev. Peter J. O'Callaghan, C. S. P., rector of St. Mary's Church,
on Wabash avenue, corner of Eldredge court, and superior of the
_ _ Paulist Fathers, presides over the mother church
Peter I *
Q,p of the Roman Catholic faith in Chicago. Among
the earliest pioneers of Fort Dearborn and Chicago
were numbered not a few good Catholics, and in April, 1833, the
bishop of St. Louis appointed Father J. M. I. St. Cyr priest of St.
Mary's parish. Less than two years before he had come from France,
but when he reached Chicago to take charge of his little flock he had
sufficiently mastered the English language to be able to converse and
preach in that tongue. The parishioners first met in Mark Beau-
bien's little log cabin, on Lake street near Market, but in the fall
the tiny wooden church of St. Mary's was completed on the south-
west corner of Lake and State streets. Rev. Father St. Cyr remained
in Chicago until 1837, when he returned to St. Louis. The brick
St. Mary's Church, afterward built on the corner of Wabash avenue
and Madison street, was destroyed by the great fire of 1871. and two
years afterward the edifice at Wabash avenue and Eldredge court
was dedicated. On account of the destruction of the Cathedral of
the Holy Name, St. Mary's was used as the pro-cathedral from the
time of the purchase of the property in the spring of 1873 ""^'^ ^^^^
removal of the bishop to the north side in 1876. It is this historic
institution, so linked with the progress of Catholicism in Chicago,
over which Father O'Callaghan has presided with such faithfulness,
dignity and characteristic zeal for the past four years.
212 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
Peter J. O'Callaghan is a native of Milford, Massachusetts, born
on the 6th of August, 1866, his parents both coming to America from
their Irish home when quite young. They were reared in Massa-
chusetts and were there united in marriage. The youth graduated
from the high school at Salem, and finished a course at Harvard Uni-
versity in 1888, but the call of the church drew him to the Catholic
University of America in Washington, and in 1893, soon after his
graduation therefrom, he was ordained to the priesthood. His first
service was as assistant in the St. Paul the Apostle parish of New
York City, and he was then sent on missionary work to various sec-
tions of the country. In 1901 he was made Novice Master, and after-
ward returned to the missionary field. In the performance of these
duties he visited Chicago in 1903, and in the following year was called
to his present position as pastor of St. Mary's Church. His charge
is now one of the most important in Chicago, and he has ten brother
priests to assist him in the conduct of the great work.
Dr. F. A. Purcell, rector of the College of the Sacred Heart, Chi-
cago, one of the most noted preparatory seminaries for the education
of the Catholic priesthood in the country, is still a
' â– comparatively young man. He is a native of Chi-
cago, born March 17, 1872, son of James and Jo-
hanna (Brazil) Purcell. His parents, who are of Irish descent, set-
tled in Chicago in the fifties. The son was reared in this city and
received his earlier education in its public schools. He afterwards
pursued a course in literature at St. Benedict's College, Atchison,
Kansas, from which he graduated in 1893, afterwards completing his
theological studies at St. Mary's Seminary, Baltimore, Maryland.
Father Purcell' s first work for the church was performed as
assistant pastor of St. Anne's Church, Chicago; but in 1903 went to
Rome, and in the famous University of the Minerva he pursued a
post-graduate course in philosophy, theology and denominational
pedagogy, which peculiarly fitted him for the position which he was
called upon to fill in Chicago. He returned to that city in 1905 and
at once assumed his position as rector of the new diocesan and pre-
paratory seminary for the education of young men for the priesthood.
By virtue both of his important office and the strong qualities
which he brings to bear upon it, he is one of the influential agencies in
the diocese working for the advancement of his church.
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 213
Rev. Thomas James McCormick, C. S. V., pastor of St. Viator's
church, corner of Behnont and Fortieth avenues, was born in Man-
Chester, New Hampshire, on the 31st of July, i860.
, , P â– ^' His parents, Thomas and Mary (Donoher) McCor-
mick, were both natives of Ireland and were married
in his native city. There were eight children in the family. When
Thomas was seven years of age his parents removed to LaSallc,
Illinois, in whose public schools the boy obtained his preliminary
education.
Father McCormick completed his higher literary studies and his
preparation for holy orders at St. Viator's College, Kankakee, Illi-
nois. He spent the period from 1885 to 1894 in thoroughly train-
ing for his life work, and soon after his graduation in the latter year
he was formally received into the priesthood. The following four
years were spent in earnest and effective work on the teaching staff of
his alma mater, and in 1893 he was transferred to St. Viator's church
of Chicago as an assistant priest. In 1901 he assumed charge of
St. Edward's parish, Mayfair, and in 1903 was appointed principal
of the boys' parochial school at the Cathedral parish. Father Mc-
Cormick's capacity for broad and useful work was further strength-
ened in the following year by his appointment to the pastorate of
St. Viator's church, with its larger and more important field of priestly
labors. About five hundred families are included in his parish, and
the parochial school, of which he also has charge, has an average
attendance of some two hundred. The parish has been established
eighteen years, and has never been more flourishing than under his
pastorate.
Rev. Bernard P. Murray, the earnest, able and beloved pastor
of St. Bernard's church, whose parish is in the southern section of
the city, formerly known as Englewood, has accom-
Bernard p. ijgj^g^ ^ notable work for the cause of Catholicism
Murray. . , . . r 1 . . 1 . u 1
m this section of the state and country. He has
within the past twenty years organized a stronghold of the faith.
where before it was virtually unknown.
Father Murray is a native of county Antrim. Ireland, born in
Glenariffe, near Cushendall. In 1856, when a young cliild. he was
brought to America by his parents, and received his earlier education
which was to prepare him for the service of the church in the state
214 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
of New York. He graduated from St. John's College, Fordham,
and received from that institution the degrees of Bachelor and Master
of Arts. . Later, his theological studies, were pursued at St. Mary's
Seminary, Baltimore, Maryland, and on the 17th of December, 1881,
he was ordained by Archbishop (now Cardinal) Gibbons.
Father Murray served as assistant priest at Galena, Illinois, until
he was transferred to St. Bridget's church, Chicago, being then ap-
pointed secretary to Archbishop Feehan and chancellor of the arch-
diocese. In these capacities he drew to himself the affection and
respect which are inseparable from the nature of his character, and it
was with the deepest regret that he departed for the scene of his diffi-
cult labors in the parish of St. Bernard, which Archbishop Feehan
had established in July, 1887. Prior to that time the so called "En-
glewood district" had been almost non-Catholic, but Father Murray's
zeal, persuasiveness and executive ability were the means of building
up one of the strongest Catholic congregations in the city — and all
this within the succeeding decade. In 1897 the imposing evidence of
this fact arose at the corner of Stewart avenue and Sixty-sixth street
in the form of a massive and graceful marble edifice, said to be the
first in the city to be erected of that material. This work has made
him one of the strongest forces in the expansion of the Roman
Catholic church in the west, and of late years it has been necessary to
call to his assistance the services of two brothers in the priesthood.
Father Murray is also recognized as a profound scholar, deeply and
broadly cultured in Irish and church history, and in this connection
it is worthy of comment that the widely known Catholic historian, the
late Dr. John O'Kane Murray, was his brother.
Rev. J. D. Laplante, principal of St. Viator's Normal Institute,
corner of North Fortieth and West Belmont avenues, is a native of
Osceola, Michigan, born on the 22d of December,
T â– 1874. After attending the public schools for about
Laplante. ' , , r- a » a 1
four years, he pursued courses at St. Ann s Acad-
emy, Lake Linden, Michigan, and at St. Viator's College, Kankakee,
Illinois, spending seven years in the latter. He entered the Congre-
gation of the Clerics of St. Viator August 30, 1894. The young man
then went abroad to complete his education and training for the priest-
hood, spending most of the time in Paris and Cambrai (Department
of Nord), France. Four years were thus profitably spent, almost
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 215
equally divided between these places, and on June 29, 1902. Father
Laplante was ordained to the Catholic priesthood.
Father Laplante came to Chicago soon after his ordination, ar-
riving in the city on the 6th of August, 1902. At first he took charge
of the novitiate department of the institute, but it very soon became
evident that he was fully qualified to assume more important respon-
sibilities, and on the 23rd of August, 1907, he became principal. His
six years' work in St. Viator's Normal Institute indicates that Father
Laplante has been placed in a position of great and good influence on
the rising generations of his church, and those who teach them in its
ways and tenets.
Rev. Thomas Pope Hodnett, founder of the well-known west side
Catholic parish of St. Malachy and for a number of years pastor of
the Immaculate Conception church on North ave-
nue, near Schiller, is one of the fathers of the faith
Hodnett. , . , . , „
who, for more than a quarter of a century, has well
proven his strength as a missionary and promoter of Catholicism. He
is a native of Glin, County Limerick, Ireland, born February 2, 1845,
and the son of Thomas Pope and Elizabeth Griffin (HalHnan) Hod-
nett. When thirteen years of age he entered a private academy and
the following year St. Munchin's Jesuit College, at Limerick, where
during the four years of his course he completed with honor the whole
"course of humanity." He then entered the affiliated college of the
Catholic University of Ireland at Ennis, known as St. Flannan's,
where he passed the examination with the highest honors and received
his papers from Rt. Rev. Dr. Woodlock, afterward bishop of Ardagh,
Ireland. After this he attended the concurcus of the diocese of Killa-
loe, held in Nenagh, north riding of Tipperary, and. as meritorious
competitor, was assigned to a place in the Irish College, Paris, France.
Here he remained as a distinguished student from 1863 to 1866,
resigning in the latter year to come to Chicago.
Upon arriving in this city. Father Hodnett became a student at
St. Mary's of the Lake University, and at the expiration of a year
entered St. Francis Seminary, near Milwaukee, where he completed
his theological course under the Very Rev. Michael Heiss, the pro-
found theologian who subsequently became archbishop of Milwaukee.
At that institution he was ordained by the widely known and es-
teemed pioneer prelate. Archbishop Henni, and was appointed by him
2i6 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
assistant pastor to Rev. John W. Norris, D. D., of Watertown, Wis-
consin. Tliere he remained one year, during which he assisted largely
in procuring the property on which now stands the College of the
Sacred Heart. In 1868 he became pastor of St. Thomas church,
Potosi, Wisconsin; after three years was transferred to St. Clement's
church, Lancaster, and subsequently to St. Jerome's church, Ocono-
mowoc, both charges being in Wisconsin.
In January, 1874, Father Hodnett returned to the diocese of Chi-
cago, and Bishop Foley appointed him pastor of St. Patrick's church,
Lincoln, Illinois, with the affiliated missions of Elkhart and Atlanta.
He remained with this charge for nearly a year, or until the forma-
tion of the Peoria diocese, when he was transferred to St. Patrick's
church, Dixon, Illinois, having also under his spiritual jurisdiction the
missions of Harmon and Ashton, Lee county. On June 10, 1882, he
was summoned by the Rev. Archbishop Feehan to organize the new
parish of St. Malachy, Chicago, out of portions of the two parishes
of St. Jarlath and St. Columkill.
St. Malachy's parish originally embraced the territory lying be-
tween Chicago avenue and Adams street and between Rockwell and
Robey streets to Kinzie, where the eastern boundary extended to
Hoyne and thence to Chicago avenue. Having obtained permission
from the building committee of the city council to erect a frame
chapel on the lots purchased at Western avenue and Walnut, Father
Hodnett was pushing its erection with characteristic energy when
officers of the fire department forbade the work to proceed. But hav-
ing municipal authority behind him and not being legally enjoined,
he collected a large force of men and boys and in seven hours (on
July 3, 1882) he had erected and enclosed a frame building, chris-
tened it the "Wooden Ark," and floated over it an American flag.
This he used as a temporary church until the completion of the per-
manent structure in December, 1884. He also reared a stone school
house south of the church. Originally there were about 300 families
connected with the parish, but under Father Hodnett's zealous and
wise pastorate, which terminated in February, ,1901, that number was
increased threefold. Since becoming pastor of the Immaculate Con-
ception church, on the north side, this parish has also witnessed a great
development. His assistants in the present field are Fathers J. J.
Hurley, J. J. O'Meara and Edward Gahagan. During his continuous
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 217
service for the church in Chicago since 1882, Father Hodnett has not
only been of broad use in secular work, but has been foremost in
movements of charity and morality, having been an especially strong
factor in the progress of temperance. This distinguishing feature of
the church v^fork was early marked in his career, to which the states
of Wisconsin and Illinois can enthusiastically testify. When the
Peace Jubilee, celebrating the close of the Spanish-American war,
was held in Chicago in October, 1898, Father Hodnett delivered an
address at the Auditorium in the presence of the president, members
of the cabinet, and many distinguished men in official and civil life.
Father Hodnett's advent to the Immaculate Conception church
was signalized by the organization of the different societies of St.
Vincent de Paul Conference. Father Mathew's Total Abstinence So-
ciety, Woman's Temperance Association and Brotherhood of Our
Mother of Good Counsel, two courts of Catholic Foresters. Ladies'
Benevolent Association, Tabernacle and Rosary Sodality, Young La-
dies of the Immaculate Conception, Children of Mary of St. Agnes
and St. Aloysius (boys' sodality). The Dominican Sisters conduct-
ing the school have also trained a surpliced choir, which lends a pe-
culiar charm to the solemn mass on Sunday. In addition to his con-
tinuous organization and development of church societies and the gen-
eral promotion of secular work, Father Hodnett has made many
marked improvements of church property. He has laid a new floor-
ing in the church, installed elegant pews, set up chaste and classic
stations of the cross and erected richly tinted and variegated stained
glass windows. The latter were imported from ^lunich, Bavaria, and
in their artistic beauty and harmony are not surpassed in Chicago,
their symbolic significance being the missionary spirit of Ireland,
through the apostles whom she sent forth in the sixth, seventh and
eighth centuries and who succeeded in evangelizing most of what is
now modern Europe. The cost of these improvements was some
$12,000; besides which Father Hodnett has built a new vestry, en-
larged the pastoral residence into one of the most commodious priests'
houses in the archdiocese, and a little over a year ago completed an-
other school edifice. The auditorium of the latter, which has a seat-
ing capacity of seven hundred, is used for commencement exercises,
entertainments, meetings of societies and other parochial gatherings.
These improvements involved an additional outlay of $35,000 and
2i8 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
furnish added evidence of Father Hodnett's determination and suc-
cess in keeping the parish in the front ranks of progress.
Rev. James A. Hynes, pastor of the Church of Our Lady of the
Angels, situated on North Hamhn avenue, corner of Iowa, has
within the past decade accompHshed fine mission-
t* * ary work in this section of the city. Since 1896
he has been in charge of the parish, the nucleus of
which when he then came into the field was little more than a small
brick yard ; in the face of this discouraging outlook he went to work
energetically, bravely and intelligently, and has the present satisfac-
tion of knowing that he has raised up for the good of his church a
flourishing parochial school and an earnest congregation of four hun-
dred and fifty families.
Father Hynes is a native of New York City. In his young boy-
hood the family located in Chicago, where James received his educa-
tion — first, at the old Franklin public school, and then at the school
of the Immaculate Conception, one of the first Catholic parochial
schools on the north side. He afterward pursued advanced courses
at the St. Ignatius College, on West Twelfth street, Chicago, and at
the Niagara University, Niagara Falls, New York. In 1886 he was
ordained to the priesthood at the latter institution, and then came to
Chicago to assist in the spiritual work of St. Sylvester's parish, whose
church edifice is on North Humboldt boulevard. Father Hynes re-
mained in the faithful and efficient performance of these duties for
ten years, and in 1896, as stated, was called to his present charge.
Since that time he has established a congregation of some four hun-
dred and fifty families, and a parochial school of some three hundred
and fifty pupils, whose mental and spiritual welfare is under the im-
mediate supervision of nine Sisters of Charity of the B. V. M. He
has also built churches at Cragin and an academy connected with St.
Genevieve parish, on Fifty-first street near Hamlin avenue. Ably
assisting him in such manifold duties as are here indicated is Rev.
Thomas F. Troy. From the above bare record of facts it is evident
that Father Hynes is possessed of untiring zeal and is an important
factor in the spreading influence of his church in the section of the
city where he has so long labored.
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 219
Rev. George A. Thomas, C. S. S. R., pastor of St. Alphonsus'
church, Southport avenue, corner of WelHngton street, is well known
. as one of the most zealous missionaries of the Ro-
I T^ /*\ T5 /"^ "C f\
' man Catholic church, and is now at the head of a
large and important parish. He is a native of New
Orleans, Louisiana, born on the 3rd of December, 1867. He received
his preparatory education in Kansas City, Missouri, and was ordained
by Bishop Hogan to the priesthood in 1892.
Father Thomas was initiated into the practical work of the church
as assistant pastor of St. Alphonsus', and after continuing thus for a
number of years entered the missionary field. For more than a dec-
ade he was thus engaged in different parts of the country, and in
1907 he was called to Chicago to assume the pastorate of his present
charge, succeeding Rev. Nicholas L. Franzen. In the conduct of his
pastoral work he has six assistants, and a capable force of Sisters to
do the active teaching in the parochial school. In addition to the
heavy responsibilities which devolve upon him, Father Thomas vol-
untarily bears the burden of personally conducting much of the work
of relief and spiritual instruction in the "slum" districts of Chicago
and in the Houses of the Good Shepherd Sisters, where his work
among those children is deeply appreciated.
Rev. Patrick J. McDonnell, the pastor in charge of St. Mel's
church, one of the largest and most rapidly growing Catholic parishes
on the west side, has been zealous and influential in
,/^xJ^^^^ the local extension of his faith for the past twenty-
McDONNELL. . , ^111 ^ r ^ i .i
eight years. The church property fronts on both
Washington boulevard and Forty-third avenue, and includes a mag-
nificent building costing $100,000, erected in 1907, on the boulevard
named, and devoted to the education of the girls and boys of St.
Mel's parish. Also a convent erected in 1908, costing $40,000. The
main entrance of the unfinished church is on Forty-third avenue.
Father McDonnell is a native of Ireland, and he obtained his edu-
cation in the motherland, graduating from All Hallows' College in
18S0, and being received into the priesthood of the church in the same
year. In that year also he came to Chicago, and assumed his first
active duties as an assistant to the pastor of St. Gabriel's church on
West Forty-fifth street. In 1883 he was transferred to tb> parish
of which he is now rector, then known as St. Philip's. When he took
220 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
charge of the original St. PhiHp's parish there were about one hun-
dred families within his jurisdiction; now there are 700, and from a
small parochial school has been developed an educational institution
attended by nearly one thousand pupils of both sexes. Father Mc-
Donnell has two earnest and capable priests to assist him in his pas-
toral labors.
Rev. M. O'Sullivan, P. R., who is the worthy and able pastor of
St. Bridget's church, on Archer avenue corner of Church street, was
born in Sneem, County Kerry, Ireland. He obtained
,^ his higher education in St. John's College, VVater-
O Sullivan. . , , . _^^ , ., .„ . , . , ,
ford, and m 1886, while still a resident of the mother
country, was ordained to the priesthood of the Roman Catholic church.
In August of the same year Father O'Sullivan came direct to
Chicago, first serving as assistant in the organization which finally
developed into the flourishing church of St. Mel's, Washington boule-
vard and Forty-third avenue. During the following three years and
a half he held the same position in St. Pius' church and was then
transferred to the Church of the Nativity, located at Thirty-seventh
street and Union avenue. A faithful and useful service of nearly
four years in that capacity was followed by a change of priestly
duties to St. Patrick's church, Lemont, Cook county, Illinois. He
found this a spiritual field almost uncultivated by his church, but the
six years of his pastorate in that locality produced radical changes.
Through his efforts and substantial labors he organized the scat-
tered members of his faith, raised the necessary funds and erected a
handsome Gothic church. His work there was so noticeable that in
1900 he was transferred after a competitive examination to the more
metropolitan field of St. Bridget's parish, Chicago. There he has
also erected both a church and school, his pastorate now embracing
about a thousand families. The school, which is attended by some
twelve hundred pupils, is under the direct supervision of the twenty-
four Sisters of Charity, while Father O'Sullivan is also assisted in
his pastoral work by two priests. Rev. Joseph Fitzgerald and Rev.
James Grace.
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 221
Rev. Innocent A. Kestl (or Khestl), pastor of the Church of Our
Lady of Good Counsel, located on North Western avenue near Cor-
nelia street, presides over a flourishinc: Catholic par-
Innocent A, . , . t, 1 • TT- 1 .• T • • ,
^ ish of Bohemians. His education and training have
well fitted him for his responsibilities.
Father Kestl was born on the 24th of June, 1878, at Frycovice,
Moravia, this district of Austria-Hungary being a crownland of the
dual empire lying to the east of Bohemia. His parents are Innocent
and Maria (Huvar) Kestl, his father being an honest, industrious
cabinet maker. The son, who had a strong and early desire to enter
the priesthood of the Catholic church, obtained a thorough education
preparatory to the pursuit of a theological course. This preliminary
training included courses in the grammar school of Ticha, the high
school of Frankstadt and the gymnasium of Valasske Mezirici. After
his graduation from the last named institution in 1899, he entered
the Priests' Seminary at Olomouc, and in 1903 completed his theo-
logical and churchly training there and was initiated into the orders
of Catholicism.
Father Kestl spent the first three years of his service for the church
in Moravia, as follows : Assistant priest in Veseli ; administrator in a
rectory at Jestrabice, and assistant again at Veseli. In 1906 he was
sent to the United States as assistant priest to a church in Cleveland,
Ohio, and in 1907 was appointed pastor of his present charge. As
he has spent virtually all his life in a countiy which has a large Bo-
hemian population, he has a thorough understanding of the people
in his adopted city amidst whom his pastoral work is conducted, and
he is therefore accomplishing broad and practical results.
Rev. Daniel Croke, pastor of St. Cecelia's church, corner of West
Forty-fifth street and Fifth avenue, is a stanch member of the Cath-
olic clergy who has latelv returned to the local field
iJANiEL ^vi-iich he first entered more than twenty-one years
^°*^^' ao-o. In Ireland he was born, educated and ordained
to the priesthood, and in 1887, soon after attaining holy orders, he
left the mother country for Chicago.
Father Croke's first four years in this city were spent as assistant
pastor in St. James' church, on Wabash avenue and Twenty-ninth
street, and he fulfilled the duties of that position until 1891. when
he was transferred to St. Elizabeth's church, on the corner of Wabash
222 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
avenue and Forty-first street. In 1899 he was appointed pastor
of St. Mary's church at Freeport, Ilhnois, doing most useful work
for the parish and the church for a period of eight years. He was re-
called to Chicago in October, 1907, and assumed charge of the im-
portant parish of St. Cecelia's. Within his pastorate reside 800 Cath-
olic families, the parochial school numbers 800 pupils, and he is as-
sisted in his work by two priests and fifteen Sisters of Charity.
CHICAGO AND COOK COUX'l Y 223
Cbc park Systems
The municipality, or local government, corresponds to the heart
of the human organism, and any areas which are reserved against the
encroachment of congested districts may be likened to its lungs
through which the populace may imbibe life-giving oxygen and revive
its depressed or flagging spirits. The establishment of a grand sys-
tem of pleasure grounds goes far toward allaying the discontent of
the mass of city toilers whose home surroundings are often unlovely
and sometimes unsanitary. The work is therefore in the line of good
municipal policy, as well as of high humanity. To provide free, health-
ful, attractive recreation is to keep thousands out of the jails, work
houses and hospitals. A vast, growing city must have great lungs,
or everything in time will go wrong, and in this matter Chicago has
looked far and wisely into the future. Her lungs are not only great,
as befits an American metropolis, but space is about to be provided
for a vaster set of vital organs in preparation for the founding of a
world's city. The inner belt of parks and boulevards is already being
perfected for the great city, and the outer belt is the future develop-
ment to accommodate the Greater Chicago when it shall absorb its
outlying suburbs and cities for a dozen miles north, west and south.
The park areas of Chicago actually improved and thrown open to
the public amount to "about 3,200 acres, whereas the dream of the
future is to provide 37,000 acres'of freedom for every man, woman
and child who chooses to take advantage of the city's generosity and
wisdom. The nucleus of the projected system is Grant Park, more
popularly known as the Lake Front. In a future not far distant it
is anticipated that not only the Art Institute, but the Field Columbian
Museum and the Crerar Library will have their sites therein, and
with the great Public Library across Michigan boulevard, will form
a cluster of architectural gems well worthy this crown of the city
parks. In the words of Henry G. Foreman, former president bf the
South Park Commissioners and the Outer Belt Park Commission:
"Grant Park is the axis of the inner and outer belt of parks and boule-
vards. From it as a hub the system expands in the form of a half
224 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
wheel. The diagonal city streets are the spokes; the inner belt of the
parks and boulevards is the support of the spokes; the outer belt of
preserves and parkways is the tire; and the inner and outer systems
are merged into the broad shore boulevard. All parts of the great
recreation area are accessible quickly by transportation lines at low
fares. When this system is a reality, Chicago will take its place at
the head of American cities in park area and applied facilities. It
will then be the Paris of America for artistic attractiveness."
It is an interesting fact of local history that Chicago's park sys-
tem should have had its origin in the locality which is now prophesied
as the coming nucleus of its cosmopolitan development in this line;
for the year after Chicago became a city, seventy years ago, it set
aside a little square which is now the site of the Public Library and
which it christened Dearborn Park. For two decades after 1839 the
municipality made no attempt to create a system of parks, but set off
small areas for the several divisions of the city, such as Washington
square on the north side, Vernon, Wicker, Jefferson and Union parks
on the west side, and Douglas Monument, Woodland and Groveland
parks on the south side. These small, unconnected breathing spots
ranged from Douglas (now Douglas Monument Square) at the foot
of Thirty-fifth street, on the south side, to Washington Square (now
opposite the Newberry library), on the north side, Wicker park on the
northwest side (north Robey street), and Jefferson (west Monroe
and Loomis) and Union (Ashland boulevard and Warren avenue),
on the west side. These gathering places for tired people and pick-
nickers were then in the outlying districts of the city; in a word, "out
in the country." Dearborn Park was the down-town pleasure ground
and a favorite gathering place for out-of-door meetings, such as
were organized for political and war purposes.
It was not until 1869 that the citizens of the three territorial di-
visions of the municipality joined issues on the park question and
worked together to establish a system, with boulevards as pulmonary
tubes connecting larger and more elaborately improved parks. Under
a legislative act of that year park districts and commissioners were
created for the north, south and west sides. The first board of com-
missioners for the north division of the city consisted of E. B. Mc-
Cagg, John B. Turner, Andrew Nelson, Joseph Stockton and Jacob
Rehm. They were to serve for five years, their successors to be ap-
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 225
puinted by the circuit judge of Cook county. For about four years
(he city had been expending ten or fifteen thousand dollars annually
on the improvements of Lincoln Park. Chicago had owned the south
120 acres of the 562 acres now embraced in the system, since 1840.
and after using it as a cemetery for more than a quarter of a century,
the residence district had so encroached upon the grounds that burials
therein were prohibited as a sanitary measure. In 1865 the north
half of the Chicago cemetery had been reserved for public uses, the
tract being named Lincoln Park in July of that year; in the following
year all burials in the south half of the city property were prohibited;
in 1868 Lincoln Park was thrown open to the public, and when the
legislative act of February 8, 1869, creating the boards of park com-
missioners, was passed, about $70,000 had been expended on Lincoln
Park. It is therefore the pioneer of the established system of Chicago
parks and boulevards. Extending from North avenue to Diversey
boulevard, a distance of a mile and a half, with North Clark street
as its western boundary and Lake Michigan as its eastern, it is a grand
tract devoted to the comfort, recreation, refreshment and education
of one of the most thickly settled sections of the city. A fine zoological
garden, a large museum of natural history, a magnificent conserva-
tory of flowers and ferns, beautiful statuary scattered over acres of
grass plots and wooded land, lily ponds, lagoons for boating, a noble
stretch of water near the lake front for expert rowers, bathing beaches,
a yacht harbor, baseball grounds, tennis courts, and a score of other
attractions and facilities for rest, exercise and improvement, have
given Lincoln Park a popularity and a public usefulness not to be
measured by dollars and cents. The extensions of its area lakeward
and the improvements of its magnificent water front, with the additions
to its northern sections have been mainly accomplished since 1902.
The truth that the parks are for the people, to be used by them
in the most practical sense of the word, is nowhere better illustrated
than by the management of the Lincoln Park system, as expressed by
Francis T. Simmons, president of the board of commissioners: "Its
available area being only a little over three hundred acres is taxed to
its utmost capacity, especially on holidays and the pleasant Sundays
of the summer; 100,000 to 120,000 visitors on such days are not at
all infrequent, and it became very evident that something had to be
done to afford greater facilities for the ever-increasing population.
Vol. I— l.j.
226 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
The board in 1902 began looking about to accomplish this end and,
as the submerged shallows of Lake Michigan were theirs and lay
temptingly within reach, it was not far to the decision that an addi-
tion could be accomplished by filling them in, and it was decided to
thus increase the park area by over two hundred acres. A survey
was made of the shore lying immediately north of the present park
and a plat made of the proposed extension, which at that time was
entirely submerged by the lake. To effect this a system of dikes and
breakwaters running along the outer boundaries was projected, which,
when completed, would hold and retain the material which would be
taken from the lake for filling up to grade this large area. Steps
rapidly followed each other in gaining the necessary legislative action
— the issuing of bonds and the projection of the work. If Lincoln
Park was required simply to take care of its local population, or the
population lying contiguous and naturally tributary to it, the prob-
lems which today are forcing themselves upon the board would be
very much simplified and lessened, but this park (fortunate in one
sense and unfortunate in another) contains drawing features. It
contains the only zoological garden in the city, which in its scope and
wide and comprehensive selection of specimens, attracts the visitor
from all parts of the city, as well as from the country at large. Being
immediately upon the lake, makes it a Mecca for Chicago people in
the hot and oppressive days of the summer. Its extensive shade and
free lawns make it an almost universal picnic ground. Probably
nothing would strike the European visitor more forcibly than the free
and unrestricted use of the lawns. The 'Keep Off the Grass' signs
which are so constantly in evidence in European parks and which are
so objectionable and forbidding, are not found here. Nothing could
be more gratifying to the settlement worker, the philanthropist and
the social economist than the sight of groups of families — almost
innumerable — with their luncheons and other comforts, that dot the
lawn stretches of Lincoln Park.
"The writer accompanied the late Admiral Taylor to the park on
an evening of a hot Sunday. Upon entering the park the writer was
horrified beyond expression to see that it was littered with news-
papers, lunch baskets and other evidences of vanished feasts. He
said to the Admiral, 'By 9 o'clock tomorrow morning I could show
you the park with a clean face. I regret its appearance exceedingly.'
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 227
"The Admiral replied, 'I think I have never seen anything more
gratifying than what I see here. It shows me beyond question that
this park is serving well its purpose for the people — they use it.' This
remark proved the Admiral a member of the 'great democracy,*
which must count in its ranks all park boards who fulfil well their
duty to the public."
The feature of Lincoln Park which gives it an especial nobility is
its lake front, the improvements of wdiich have been progressing for
more than twenty years. Commencing as a simple breakwater at
Bellevue place in 1886, it now embraces a vast sweep of massive sea
walls, granite paved beach, broad drives, bathing beaches, lagoons,
promenades, sloping swards, wide lawn stretches, flower gardens, no-
ble boulevards and carriages and automobiles, speeding tracks for
equestrians, bordered on the one side by the cool blue waters of the
lake and on the other by a continuous array of green foliage. This
is the panorama for a mile and a half.
Lincoln Park is also rich in statuary. Near the Dearborn avenue
entrance is the massive memorial to Abraham Lincoln. This im-
pressive monument was created from the munificence of the late Eli
Bates, who, in 1887, bequeathed $40,000 for the purpose. The year
before the heroic figure of Schiller was unveiled, under the auspices
of "the German- American Society of Chicago, and in 1891 the Swedes
of the city and all those who delight in the beauties and mysteries of
plant life saw with gratification the addition of Linnaeus to the statu-
ary of the park. As the result of a popular subscription, in which
100,000 people participated, Grant, the great and magnanimous war-
rior, sternly overlooks the waters of Lake Michigan from the back of
his speaking steed. More than 200,000 people gave their presence to
the unveiling of this great work in October, 1891. The statue of
Shakespeare took its place among these out-door works of art in
1894, and in the same year Lambert Tree made the second of his gifts
of statuary to Lincoln Park, in the shape of the Indian warrior hold-
ing aloft his feathered staff as "A Signal of Peace." His first dona-
tion had been the heroic bronze statue of La Salle. "A Signal of
Peace" is a striking contrast to the "Alarm," an Indian group of four
figures, representing a gift from Martin Ryerson. The electric foun-
tain, one of the magnificent attractions of Lincoln Park, was pre-
sented to the city by the late Charles T. Yerkes in 1890. The mas-
228 ' CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
sive Academy of Sciences, which stands at the main entrance to the
park fronting Clark street, was completed in 1893, and contains fully
250,000 specimens of natural history. Its collections of mollusks
and of local specimens are especially complete. It may be added that
the lily pond in Lincoln Park, an acre and a half in extent, is one of
the largest in the world, and that the zoological garden contains some
1,200 animals.
The district controlled by the Lincoln Park commissioners com-
prises the towns of North Chicago and Lake View,- or nearly sixteen
square miles, and embraces a population of nearly half a million peo-
ple. The board has more than $393,000 available for the purchase of
small parks, and several have already been established and improved,
at a cost of over $106,000 as virtual accessories to social settlement
work. One of these, the Chicago Avenue Park, comprises over nine
acres between the pumping works and the lake and contains a shelter
house, refectory, gymnasium and playground for children. The Elm
street playground, some distance to the west, is much smaller, but
provided with the same conveniences for the mothers and children
of the poor. The original fund, created for these purposes, was
$500,000. In this connection mention is also due of the Lincoln Park
Sanitarium for children (supported by the Chicago Daily News),
which is situated on the lake shore in the park proper and for years
has been doing a useful work for the little ones of the poor. The
principal funds available for the various improvements at Lincoln
Park were as follows: Park extension, $1,000,000; old shore pro-
tection, $203,000; small parks, $500,000. The expenditures on ac-
count of these funds have been: Small parks, $106,000 (as stated) ;
old shore protection, $203,000; park extension, $642,000. The total
available funds amount to $1,103,531.
Under the legislative act of February, 1869, the governor appoint-
ed John M. Wilson, Chauncey Bowen, George W. Gage, L. B. Sidway
and Paul Cornell as the first commissioners of the South Park system.
It is evident that these citizens saw further into the future needs of
Chicago in the way of generous lungs to provide for her phenomenal
expansion than the commissioners for either the north or the west
sides ; for bonds to the amount of $2,000,000 were at once floated
and with their proceeds 1,500 acres of land were purchased — the fu-
ture sites of Washington and Jackson parks, with their connecting
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 229
Midway Plaisance. The entire South Park system is now less than
1,900 acres. The projection of so stupendous a plan naturally aroused
a feeling of considerable skepticism, and in the laying of its simple
groundwork the early boards of commissioners encountered discour-
aging obstacles, but which by no means deterred them in their defin-
ite advance. Six miles from the city hall. Washington Park, the
nearest of the public reserves, was first taken in hand. It was largely
an unlovely swamp, and the work of reclaiming it and laying out
the grounds in general lines had only fairly begun when the great
fire of 1871 created a suspension of all work for about a year. In
1872 improvements were resumed, but the development of both Wash-
ington and Jackson parks was delayed for several years on account
of the unreasonable prices demanded by owners whose property had
been condemned and by the difficulty of enforcing the taxes and
special assessments required for the prosecution of the work. But
by the close of the seventies more than one thousand acres had been
improved in both parks and by 1884 all the floating indebtedness over
the South Park system had been paid. At that time the total amount
expended for the purchase of land had been $3,277,846.91, and for
interest on bonds and land contracts $1,723,553.08. By the early
eighties Washington Park (long known as West Park) had as-
sumed the features which give it special prominence now. A nimiber
oi greenhouses had been erected and the botanical gardens of Wash-
ington, as well as those of the old world, had made generous contribu-
tions toward the establishment of a similar attraction for Washington
Park. For years this Chicago pleasure ground has been noted for
its superb and uiii(jue floral displays outside its magnificent conser\a-
tory. Its entire area had been tilled, seeded or planted to forest trees,
about one hundred acres known as "the south open green," having
been reserved as a superb lawn, then, as now, one of the largest and
most beautiful in the country. Although the rough lines of this fea-
ture were fixed thus early, in 1890 this noble meadow was subjected
to a vigorous course of plowing, draining, re-seeding antl rolling, and
has been in course of renewal or improvement ever since. The Ram-
ble, with its winding walks over artificial hills and ravines, through
thickets and across bright open spots, is in direct contrast to the great
common. Then there is the massi^•e carriage house, built for the ac-
commodation of the park horses and vehicles, which is a model of its
230 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
kind, and near the large conservatory is a beautiful lily pond. Cro-
quet courts, an archery range, horse speedway, fly casting accommo-
dations, wading pool and sand court (for children) and a house to
shelter lovers of the winter game of curling, are a few of the other
attractions which place Washington in the list of the other demo-
cratic parks of the city. It is 371 acres in extent, and is bounded on
the north by Fifty-first street, east by Cottage Grove avenue, south
by Sixtieth street, and west by South Park avenue.
The Midway Plaisance, connecting Washington and Jackson Park
to the east, is bounded on the north by Fifty-ninth street, on the
south by Sixtieth street, on the west by Cottage Grove avenue and
on the east by Stony Island avenue. When the Midway was first
projected it was planned that waterways should run between the
drives, with a cascade, or lock at the Washington Park terminus.
Owing to the large expense in constructing and beautifying the chan-
nels, building bridges, etc., the project was abandoned; but with the
establishment and splendid development of the University of Chicago
along the borders of the Midway steps are now being taken to carry
out the original plan and create a magnificent waterway for college
regattas and pleasure boating.
The first decided improvement along the lake front of Jackson
Park was completed in 1884, when the beach was paved from Fifty-
sixth to Fifty-mnth streets and the breakwater was extended to a
point about two hundred feet south of Sixty-third street, or within
four blocks of the present southern limits. The northern boundary
of this noble expanse of picturesque- waters and green sward is Fifty-
sixth street. Its western limits are marked by Stony Island avenue,
and no park in the Chicago system better merits the term magnificent
than Jackson. Its present distinctive features were fixed by the re-
moulding of its entire surface to meet the practical and artistic de-
mands of the World's Columbian Exposition. In 1892 the South
Side Park commissioners turned over to the management of the
World's Fair more than 666 acres, including the Midway Plaisance,
and the transformations made during the coming year in Jackson
Park are among the wonders of history. But while the Fine Arts
(now the Field Columbian Museum) and the German buildings, with
the quaint Japanese temples on the wooded island, and the stern little
convent of La Rabida on the lake front, are all that remain of the
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 231
architectural triumphs of the exposition, the outHnes of the noble
water approach which culminated in the superb Court of Honor may
still be traced, the magnificent stretch of the Manufacturers' building
may still be recalled in a great grassy depression in the northern por-
tion of the grounds, and, as stated, the general topographical features
of the park were largely fixed by the great engineering and landscape
workers of the World's Columbian Exposition. The Columbian cara-
vels also still float in its waters and the nautical representative of the
real American pioneer, the Viking ship, also reposes in the shade of
the Field Columbian Museum. It was some time after the close of
the Exposition that the great golf links were established that have
made Jackson Park one of the most favorite western resorts for
lovers of the game, and the improvement of its yacht harbor and the
extension of the completed work to the southeast were works of a
comparatively recent day. Briefly stated, Jackson Park is provided
with every facility for oarsmen, yachtmen or owners of launches. It
has two fine golf courses, with shelter, lockers and showers for both
men and women ; also baseball and football fields, tennis courts, re-
fectory, beach bathing, music court, winter skating and tobogganing,
and the Field Columbian Museum of Natural History, which is to be
removed to Grant Park, near the x'Vrt Institute.
A striking feature in the future expansion of the South Park sys-
tem is a shore boulevard, or park, six miles in length, connecting Jack-
son and Grant parks. The plan includes drives, water ways, picnic
grounds along the route, and the most complete facilities for boating
and swimming. The legislature has already authorized the commis-
sioners to negotiate with the riparian owners, and the project is fairly
under way. Grant, or Lake Front Park, extends from Randolph
street to Park Row, and embraces 205 acres. The portion south of
the Art Institute is a stretch of meadow, only embellished by the
Logan equestrian statue, while the section north is devoted to baseball
fields.
The South Park commissioners have the honor to be first in the
general municipal movement which has made the park system of
Chicago a power in the relief of the depression and actual suffering
attending the congestion of resident districts. Under the statute of
1903 they promptly expended $1,000,000 in the purchase of fourteen
parks located in crowded and often cheerless sections of the city, and
232 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
proceeded to provide both sexes and all ages with facilities for amuse-
ment, mental improvement, exercise and sanitary care. The largest
of these are Marquette Park, 371 acres extending from Sixty-seventh
to Seventy-first streets and between California avenue and the Grand
Trunk Western Railroad, eighty acres of which have already been
transformed into ball fields and tennis courts, skating ponds and to-
boggans ; McKinley Park, over seventy- four acres between Thirty-
seventh and Thirty-ninth streets on Archer avenue, which is provided
with swimming pool, outdoor gymnasiums for men and women, ten-
nis courts, ball fields, children's play ground, wading pool and facili-
ties for winter sports ; Sherman Park, which has all these features,
as well as a free assembly hall for various entertainments, club rooms
for the use of neighborhood residents, reading rooms and a band
stand, under which concerts are given Sunday evenings during the
summer months ; Ogden Park, over sixty acres in extent between
Sixty-fourth and Sixty-seventh streets. Center avenue and Loomis
street, at which the means for recreation and improvement are similar
to those provided at Sherman Park; and Caluniet Park, with an area
of more than seventy-three acres extending from Ninety-fifth to
102nd streets along the lake, which is provided with bathing accom-
modations, and has also grounds for both summer and winter sports.
Improvements are progressing in all of the larger parks and the
smaller areas, such as Palmer, on iiith street; Hamilton, on Seventy-
fourth street ; Bessemer, on Eighty-ninth street, and Gage Park, on
Fifty-fifth street, are covering as many features as their location and
size make possible.
This vast extension of the usefulness of the system in the role
of public benefactor is well termed the New-Park Idea, by Henry G.
Foreman, president of the South Park commissioners, in these sug-
gestive words: "Justified by the success which has marked the
service in the new South Division parks and squares, the South Park
commissioners, now working toward the completion of the expansion
epoch begun in 1903, are planning still another increase in recreation
area and facilities. The dominant idea of the service in our new parks
is to place recreation facilities and educational and moral influences
at the very doors of the people. While all the old-park ideas of trees
and flowers and water and verdant stretches are retained in the New-
Park Idea (and to that extent we believe our new parks compare fav-
orably with others anywhere) the novel, year-round service, which
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 233
has drawn special attention to our new parks, is provided by neigli-
borhood center features. It is the extensive use of the clubhouse for
the people that has created an emphatic demand in other portions of
the south division for similar appliances. The extent of the popu-
larity of the new park facilities can be realized when one considers
that nearly 5,500,000 persons actually used the gymnasia, baths, read-
ing rooms, club rooms, assembly halls, refectories, game fields, etc.,
in these new parks during the last year alone. This figure excludes
spectators. It is the record of actual service. The great value of
such service is realized when one recalls that all but one of these parks
are located in congested districts, where working people reside in
homes that provide little more than the necessities to sustain life.
Ten parks, for the most part small, neighborhood parks, are equipped
with club houses now. . . . The acreage of these parks also
will be increased to better meet existing needs. Requests from
people, many of them flat dwellers, residing- near Washington
and Jackson Parks, and also from residents about McKinley
Park, have been received by the commissioners to provide them
with neighborhood center buildings and facilities.
Last winter the people residing in the manufacturing districts
in the southern portion of Hyde Park, through their represent-
atives in the general assembly, secured the passage of an act
authorizing the commissioners to issue bonds for locating more of
these parks. The citizens of the South Park district, by a vote of
about two to one, authorized the commissioners to issue $3,000,000
additional bonds for this purpose. The commissioners now have un-
der consideration three or four sites in the southern portion of Hyde
Park for additional parks and an additional site for a new park in
the South Town."
The South Park system is now more than one thousand eight hun-
dred and eighty- four acres in extent, or nearly sixty per cent of the
entire park system. The territorial district covers more than ninety-
two square miles and embraces a population of 600.000. While there
is a direct connection, by means of the city l)oulevards between the
South, West and Lincoln Park systems, there is no continuous link
between the northern and southern systems. This defective break
has been under discussion for years. Many plans for the creation of
a grand boulevard between Michigan avenue and the Lake Shore
234 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
Drive have been proposed, but so far none has forcibly appealed both
to the practical sense and the esthetic sensibilities. The only material
progress which has been made is in the passage of legislative acts
which will enable the South Park and Lincoln Park commissioners to
unite their efforts with those of the municipality in the realization of
this much desired improvement.
The West Chicago parks, like those in the other divisions of the
city, were systematized and the largest of them founded, under the
legislative act of 1869, which provided for a board of coinmissioners
and under whose authority the governor appointed Charles C. P.
Holden, Henry Greenebaum, George W. Stanford, Eben F. Runyan,
Isaac R. Hitt, Clarke Lipe and David Cole. The new board was
authorized to expend $400,000 for the purchase of the present sites
of Garfield, Douglas and Humboldt parks, with their connecting bou-
levards. The management of the West parks has overcome many
embarrassments. The fire of 1871 and the panic of 1873 were draw-
backs to progress which were common to all local enterprises, but the
misfortunes of maladministration culminating in 1877 and the treas-
ury defalcation in 1896 were troubles which especially affected the
growth of the park system in this section of the city. The latter blow
following so closely the depressions of 1893-4 almost paralyzed im-
provements for some time, but within the past decade, and especially
within the past five years, the chief pleasure grounds of the West
division have shown marked and rapid improvement.
Garfield Park, which was known as Central Park until 1881,^ is
the most western of the system, and comprises over one hundred and
eighty-seven acres, bounded east and west by Homan and Hamlin
avenues and divided by Madison and Lake streets. *To the north of
Garfield is Humboldt Park and to the south, Douglas, the three being
connected by the boulevards planned in 1869. Douglas boulevard
connects Garfield and Douglas parks, and Franklin boulevard joins
Garfield and Humboldt parks. The largest of the parks is Humboldt,
about twenty-eight acres larger than Garfield, and the latter is only
about six acres larger than Douglas; so that the western, northwest-
ern and southwestern sections of the city have an almost equal rep-
resentation in park area.
Within quite recent years the improvements in Garfield Park have
made it one of the most attractive in the city. The portion north of
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 235
Lake street is sparsely wooded, with winding roadways and shallow
brooks, and contains not only the fly-casting pond but the new con-
servatory and propagating houses, one of the finest botanical estab-
lishments in the country. The middle section of Garfield Park, be-
tween Lake and Madison streets, embraces the boating lakes, and a
beautiful boat landing pavilion, refectory and club hall, all under one
roof. Further south and across a wide driveway is a magnificent
water court (a miniature of the World's Fair Court of Honor), which
is divided by Madison street and extends, on the southern side of that
thoroughfare, between bright and fragrant beds of flowers and to-
ward a fine music pavilion. Beyond the rolling hills and the band-
stand, as it is popularly called, is a large expanse stretching toward
the southern limits of the park on Colorado avenue. This was a cir-
cular park devoted for years to horse racing and bicycle riding, base-
ball and footfall, but it is now being transformed into tennis courts,
golf links and finished baseball diamonds, or being restored to park
purposes of an ornamental nature. A fine toboggan slide is also in-
stalled in this portion of the park.
Nearly two miles to the southeast is Douglas Park, stretching
from Twelfth street on the north to Nineteenth street on the south,
and from California avenue on the east to Albany avenue on the west.
The natural gateway at the western, or Douglas boulevard entrance,
consists of flowering shrubbery and trees, with a fountain basin placed
at the intersection of the park and the boulevard, and the general
efifect is extremely artistic and pleasing. The special inner attractions
of the park are a fine boat landing and pavilion, a natatorium, a con-
servatory and a great winter garden. The latter is installed in a
great building of iron and glass, 178 feet long by 62 feet wide, the
central pavilion of which displays palms, ferns and medicinal plants.
Li addition the park provides the usual facilities for baseball, boating
and tennis, and such winter sports as skating and tobogganing.
Marshall boulevard extends from Douglas Park to the Illinois
and Michigan canal, over two miles, and connects the \\'est antl the
South Park systems at Western avenue. Completed at a compara-
tively recent date, it is the last link in the chain of boulevards thirty
miles in length which binds the South, West and North svstems,
leaving as the only section of the circuit incomplete one mile of the
down-town district from Jackson boulevard to Ohio street.
236 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
Humboldt Park, which is the largest in the west division, contains
nearly two hundred and six acres, and, proportionately an unusually
large water surface. The park is bounded by North avenue on the
north, California and Sacramento avenues on the east. Division and
Augusta streets on. the south, and Kedzie avenue on the west. More
than two hundred and forty thousand dollars was expended in the
purchase of land within these limits, and of the liberal sums expended
on improvements a large portion has been expended in excavating the
lake basins and in the beautifying of the grounds immediately adja-
cent. The naming of the park was in deference to the distinctive
Germanic element which prevails in the northwestern section of the
city. Both Germans and Scandinavians largely predominate, and
the characteristic pastimes of the latter element are given a larger
measure at Humboldt Park than any other in the city. Not only are
the principal skating tournaments held upon its lakes, but the best fa-
cilities for skeeing are provided. Grounds are furnished for the
other prevailing outdoor sports of both summer and winter, and there
is a wading pool and shelter building especially for children. One
of its most striking summer features is a magnificent rose garden,
with an elevated promenade around it and a garden hall connecting-
it with beautiful grounds beyond. At the eastern entrance of the park
is an ornamental gateway, with garden lanterns, fountains and seats.
Humboldt boulevard, nearly three miles in length, connects the park
(and therefore the West Side system) with Lincoln park on the
north.
The West Chicago parks also include Union, Jefferson, Vernon
and Wicker — small tracts, which were originally in the outskirts of
the city — as well as Logan square and Palmer place (on Humboldt
boulevard), and numbers of smaller pleasure grounds of a still later
creation. Three small parks have been founded and are being adapt-
ed to their purposes or furnishing recreation and relief to the crowded
neighborhoods of the west side. On the eight-acre tract bounded by
Chicago avenue, Cornell, Noble and Chase streets, and located in
one of the most densely populated districts of the northwest side,
men, women and children have been provided with such luxuries as
gymnasiums, shower baths, swimming pools, and eating, library and
reading rooms. Smaller parks and playgrounds are being improved
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 2^7
in the Ghetto district of the west side, and in a congested section of the
southwest side between Twentieth and Twenty-first streets.
A general idea of the vastness of the work and tine problem en-
trusted to the West Chicago Park commissioners may be gained from
the statement that the area of their district is 35.5 square miles; popu-
lation, about 770,000; total area of parks, 626.38 acres, and of parks
and boulevards (twenty-five miles) combined, 1,036 acres. In addi-
tion to the parks and squares under the management of the constituted
boards there are about forty small areas which are cared for either by
the city or by private parties. In this list is Douglas Monument, at
the foot of Thirty-fifth street near the lake shore, the noble shaft
and statue erected to the memory of the Little Giant of Illinois hav-
ing an especially close significance to the earlier residents of Chi-
cago. These scattered and independent tracts comprise more than one
hundred and seventeen acres, bring the grand total of the park area
of Chicago up to 3,191 acres. There are also several boards of park
commissioners, whose jurisdiction is outside that of the three division
boards. The North Shore Park commissioners are allotted a district
bounded on the north by the city limits. They have no parks in their
territory, but supervise about four miles of boulevards, including
Sheridan road, Ashland avenue and Pratt boulevard. The Special
Park Commission comprises members of the common council, promi-
nent citizens and prominent architects and landscape engineers, and is
charged with the development of the outer-belt system of parks and
boulevards for the Chicago of the future. It is only possible to speak
in general terms of the great enterprise, which is to so increase the
lung capacity of the metropolis, the preliminary plans of a work of
such magnitude being liable to even radical change. Briefly, the com-
mission propose (as already stated) to make Grant Park, on the lake
front, which is to be the grand aesthetic and educational center of the
municipality, the topographic axis of half a gigantic wheel of parks
and boulevards. It is proposed to make a grand boulevard of parks,
picnic grounds and waterways from Jackson to Grant parks and
transform the Hyde Park reefs into beautiful island reefs. With
Grant Park and the Lake Shore Drive connected by that long-deferred
boulevard, Lincoln Park would be a grand link in the belt which
would be laid along Lake Michigan to the Evanston drainage canal.
The wide strip along this waterway running toward the west would
238 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
be beautified with resident parks and lagoons. The improvements in
the northern system would, however, be chiefly made in a strip of
country, three-eights of a mile wide, running along the north line of
Cook county, from Lake Michigan for a distance of sixteen miles
into what is known as the Skokie, a flat tract of country which is
now usually covered with water in the spring or during especially
rainy seasons. This section of the belt is designed to terminate at
Bowmanville and cover an area of 8,320 acres. A beautiful country
drive is planned from the Skokie to the Desplaines river; thence
south through Wheeling, Desplaines, Franklin -Park, River Forest
and Riverside to the Drainage canal, the twenty-five miles of parked
boulevards embracing an area of 8,800 acres and some of the most
restful and picturesque valley scenery in the middle west. A strip is
projected along Salt creek, running west from Riverside to Western
Springs and Willow Springs, on the Drainage canal, and the high-
lands and forest in the vicinity of the latter, the north half mile of the
Palos hills and the intervening Sag valley are suggested as the nat-
ural basis of a great forest reserve and camping ground. It is, in fact,
one of the principal aims of the special commission to prevent the
destruction of the considerable tracts of native timber which still
stand in the valley of the Desplaines. The central feature of the
southern section of the belt will be Lake Calumet, whose shores are
proposed to be a continuous chain of parks and boulevards, with a
great tract of 1,500 acres south of the lake. The connection between
the western and southern systems is to be the proposed South Chicago
drainage canal, running from the main channel to Blue Island, and
the Calumet river, the stream tributary to the lake. The acquisition
and improvement of property bordering Lake Michigan from the
Calumet district to Jackson park are to complete this great under-
taking, in the full realization of which many years will probably pass.
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 239
Chicago Drainage and Ship Canal
It is a high tribute to the practical wisdom and the paternal fore-
thought of the projectors of the canal which is tlie nucleus of the
Sanitary District of Chicago, that they should first have perfected it
as an agency for maintaining the purity of the water supply of two
million and a half of people, before bringing prominently to the fore-
ground its logical claim as the most important link" in the internal
system of water-ways destined to be a vast and necessary outlet for
the congested riches of the Mississippi valley and the west. For years
the city has been pouring its money into a magnificent system of water
works, with its supply drawn from the seemingly incorruptible bosom
of Lake Michigan, but an unprecedented increase of population
brought with it also a threatened, and ofttimes an actual, contamina-
tion. It was necessary to turn the sewage of the city away from the
lake into some other catch basin, especially that which had been dis-
charged from the northern and southern districts of the city and was
the main source of the evil. The central districts had largely used the
river for this purpose, with the result that no large city in the world
had created such a standing nuisance and menace to public health.
The comparatively level surface of the country gave the river, which
was also clogged with the filth of a large portion of the city, a cur-
rent which was often imperceptible. But this natural feature, which
appeared the greatest obstacle to be overcome, proved eventually the
saviour of the situation; for by the cutting of the slight divide be-
tween the headwaters of the Chicago river and those of the Desplaines
at Lockport, nearly thirty miles away, as well as the blasting of a
magnificent waterway through the intervening limestone, the waters
of Lake Michigan were made to flush out the foul stream; those
waters were drawn into the Illinois and thence into the Mississippi,
and, through the alchemy of nature, so purified as to be healthful and
sparkling when used by the large cities down the valley of the Mis-
sissippi.
The legislative bill creating the Sanitary District of Chicago was
signed by the governor of Illinois May 29, ICS89. antl the first board
240 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
of trustees was elected on December 12th of that year. As the pro-
posed work was of tremendous proportions and quite new to most of
the members, there were natural disagreements which resulted in
many changes in the personnel of the board before earth was actually
broken at Robey street, Chicago, on September 3, 1892. The term
of the first trustees was six years, but after 1895 i^ was reduced to
five. Under the act of 1889 the original sanitary district contained
185 square miles, but by the act of July 14, 1903, it was enlarged
by the annexation of the North Shore district (78.6 square miles')
and the Calumet district (94.48 square miles), which makes the total
area 257.08 square miles. The North Shore district includes the
towns of Evanston, Niles, New Trier and portions of the townships
of Northfield and Main, as well as Norwood Park. The Calumet dis-
trict includes the township of Calumet and portions of Worth, Bremen
and Thornton, and is drained into the main canal by a reversal of the
flow of the Calumet river. The North Shore district is to be drained
into the Chicago river direct from Lake Michigan through a series of
artificial channels, the pumping plants being erected near the lake.
Important as they are to the suburban districts north and south of
Chicago, these features are of course subordinate to the main canal,
or backbone of the district, which extends from Robey street, Chicago,
to Lockport, a distance of 28.05 miles; and a justification for adopting
the title "Chicago Drainage and Ship Canal" is found in the fact that
the population of the city proper is fully ninety-five per cent of that in-
cluded in the entire sanitary district.
The main channel of the canal was completed and the waters of
Lake Michigan turned into it on the 2nd of January, 1900. Thirteen
days thereafter the magnificent channel was filled to the controlling
works at Lockport; on January 17th the great dam at that point was
lowered and the waters of Lake Michigan started on their long jour-
ney toward the Gulf of Mexico. This consummation marked the
formal opening of the Sanitary District canal. From Robey street to
Summit, nearly eight miles, the channel is no feet wide at the bot-
tom and 198 feet at the water line, with a minimum depth of 22 feet
of water; from Summit to Willow Springs, 5.3 miles, 202 feet at the
bottom and 290 at the top, with the same depth; and from Willow
Springs to Lockport, nearly fifteen miles (known as the rock section),
the bottom of the channel is 160 feet and the top 162 feet. In the
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 241
construction of this great channel were removed 20,693,000 cubic
yards of glacial drift and 12,265,000 cubic yards of solid rock, the
material being piled along the entire course in a massive ridge of
hills. The retaining walls and brick masonry contained 457.777 cubic
yards of stone, laid in cement mortar. Thirteen bridges were built
over the canal proper. Outside of the main channel from Robey street
to Lockport vast works were pushed to completion as parts of the
general system. The controlling works at Lockport, with their i)ow-
erful machinery, comprise seven sluice gates and one trap dam. the
latter having an opening of 160 feet. The dam has been well de-
scribed as "two great metal leaves hinged together and working be-
tween masonry bulkheads." Be3'ond the controlling works to Joliet
the Desplaines river was also dredged, widened and otherwise im-
proved to meet the new conditions, the entire work so vast in extent
and complicated in details being directed primarily to the object of
giving the waters a free sweep through natural and artificial channels.
A magnificent pumping station was also erected at Thirty-ninth street,
Chicago, to increase the current inland. An idea of the main cost
incurred in the completion of the main channel from Lake Michigan
to Lockport, thirty-four miles, may be gained from the last report
of the board of trustees of the Sanitary District, the items of which
partially tell this romance in engineering being as follows : Main
channel construction (Robey street to Lockport), $18,600,195; bridge
construction, main channel, $1,978,536.38; controlling works. Lock-
port, $331,253.65; Chicago river, dredging, docking, etc., $2,190,-
903.70; bridge construction, Chicago river, $2,970,707.76; Thirty-
ninth street pumping station, $229,702.00; river diversion construc-
tion, $1,000,186.38. These items amount to $27,071,782.87 of the
total ($29,135,436.54) expended upon the actual construction and
improvement of the main drainage canal from the commencement
of work on Shovel Day (September 3, 1892) up to January i. i(jo8.
Including water power development ($4,058,056), interest on bonds,
land taxes, maintenance of bridges, and administration and operating
expenses ($5,369,021), the expenditures up to that tlate were $58,-
747»233-23-
Some of the best brain and brawn of Chicago were expended in
the conception, organization and prosecution of this great work, and
it is therefore extremely difficult to select participants for special
Vol. 1—16.
242 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
mention. But it is generally conceded that none were more prom-
inent from the conception to the virtual completion of the system
than Lvman E. Cooley, the eminent engineer, and Frank Wenter,
the energetic and broad-minded president of the board, during the
first three years of constructive work, and a trustee from the organ-
ization of the board until five years after the completion of the main
canal. Mr. Cooley's record is even more of a pioneer nature; for, in
his capacity as an engineer, as early as 1885, he commenced to agi-
tate the necessity of a sanitary canal, and as a member of the Citi-
zens' Association drew up the report which resulted in the crystaliza-
tion of a drainage and water supply commission and finally the sani-
tary district itself. He was consulting engineer to the city and the
sanitary district commission, and in 1889 represented both municipal
and civic interests when the bill was passed by the legislature which
created the Sanitary District. He determined the physical boundaries
of the district; was its first engineer; afterward served five years
(1891-5) as a member of the board; was consulting engineer in 1897;
for a year previously was one of the experts who devised the system
of intercepting sewers upon which depends the thorough flushing of
the sewage into the drainage canal, and in 1901 was one of the em-
inent engineers engaged upon the scientific completion of the works
of the Sanitary District. All in all, it would be impossible to find a
man who has been earlier or more prominently identified with all
phases of this remarkable project and accomplishment than Mr.
Cooley.
The sanitary problem having been virtually solved at the expen-
diture of over fifty million dollars, the management of the canal sys-
tem brought to the foreground the enormous earning power of the
waters which had been drawn from Lake Michigan. Its current should
be converted into electricity to assist Chicago in lighting her streets
and structures and operating her manufactories. It is impossible, and
would be useless, to give the details by which the Sanitary District of
'Chicago, in the face of opposition from the Economy Light and Pow-
er Company and even the municipality, acquired the right to sell the
surplus power of the canal at rates which will soon net the board
about $500,000. .The most complete and yet condensed statement of
the situation, and also of the general progress of this feature of the
canal enterprise, was made by the Citizens' Association in June, 1908.
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 243
After a thorough investigation of the whole matter, the committee
made a report which uplield the sanitary board in all its main con-
tentions. It narrated how in 1903 the Sanitary District was author-
ized by the legislature to develop the water power created by the flow
of the drainage canal and as the first step erected the Lockport power
plant at a cost of $4,000,000. Then came the negotiations and con-
tentions with the city for permission to build transmission wires
through its streets and alleys; the bringing of test cases in the courts
and the final decision (after the report of the Citizen's' Association
was made) upholding a former decision that the legislature had con-
ferred upon the Sanitary District full authority to construct trans-
mission wires anywhere within the city limits.
The present and prospective operations of the electrical plant of
the Sanitary District are thus described :
"Since January (1908) the Sanitary District has installed three
generators capable of producing continuously 16,500 horse power and
for peak service 20,600 horse power. It is installing two additional
generators capable of producing continuously 11,000 additional horse
power and with an estimated peak capacity of 13,000 horse power.
In six months the plant should be capable of producing continuously
27,500 horse power, and for peak service 34.350 horse power. This
will be increased to 30,000 and 37,500 horse power within two years
when the flow is increased by widening the river. Within two years
the district can safely contract for the sale of power aggregating
50,000 horse power.
"The district is supplying to the city and other customers at night
9,300 horse power and during the day 1,000 horse power. Its elec-
trical energy now is being furnished to the city at the rate of $15 a
horse power, which is less than one-half what it formerly cost the
city to generate its lighting power by steam.
"There is no apparent reason why the Sanitary District cannot
within a few years duplicate its power plant at Hickory creek. The
only obstacle in the way of this plan is the plant <>[ the Economy Light
and Power Company at Joliet, which company's lease from the state
expires in 1916, after which time the Sanitary District, with the co-
operation of the state, will be in a position to install a plant at Hickory
creek and double its output of power.
"If the Sanitary District is not hampered in the future in its ef-
244 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
forts to sell its surplus power its net income from the sale of power,
by the time it has made arrangements for the sale of its whole
product, should amount to at least $500,000 a year. This estimate is
based upon the productive capacity which should be attained within
the next six months. With the widening of the Chicago river this
income can be largely increased, and ultimately, by the development
of the power available at Hickory creek, the total capacity should be
increased to 80,000 horse power, which should insure the Sanitary
District a net revenue from its water power of at least $1,500,000 per
year.
"We are informed by the trustees of the Sanitary District that it
is and will continue to be their policy to furnish to the city and other
municipalities within the borders of the Sanitary District all the
power that can be used by them ; and to sell to private consumers only
the surplus that remains after providing for municipal needs."
But the stretch of territory bordering the canal-way from Robey
street to Joliet, thirty-two miles, has already been christened the "Val-
ley of Manufactures," as it undoubtedly will be within the next dec-
ade. The district owns a right of way on either side of the canal
varying from 270 to 1,000 feet, or nearly 6,000 acres of land, and the
leases already made to manufactories bring an income of some $75,-
000 per year. As illustrative of the extent of some of the leaseholds —
the Corn Products Company, which has plants in Chicago, Waukegan
and Peoria, is perfecting a $5,000,000 establishment near Summit and
building the town of Argo to provide homes for its 2,000 employes.
At Lockport the Western United Gas and Electric Company has se-
cured a site from which it will supply gas to forty towns and cities
in the immediate territory. The International Harvester Company
has over 20 acres under lease at an annual rental of $9,000 for fifty
years, many of the leases covering this period. Farming lands have
been leased for one to four years, and several railroads are paying
for water privileges, by which tanks are supplied for filling locomo-
tive boilers. Besides there are sixty miles of dockage to be leased.
The railroads vie with the canal, also in furnishing transportation.
Three main lines parallel the canal, and an electric line is in operation
connecting the towns along the route — Summit, with a population of
700; Argo, which will probably be consolidated with it; Willow
Springs, population about 400; Lemont, with 2,500 people; Lockport,
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 245
2,700, and Joliet, 40,000. At Summit the canal is adjacent to the
clearing yards of three of the great railroads centering in Chicago,
touching also the Chicago Junction, Chicago Terminal Transfer and
the Indiana Harbor belt roads. The sanitary board is developing a
plan for a huge warehouse at Summit, through which freight may be
transferred from water to rail ; docks will also be built at intervals
connecting railroads by car ferries, and a city warehouse is in con-
templation at Washington street by which manufacturers in the canal
zone may distribute their goods. Considering the further fact that
millions of cubic yards of limestone are piled along the canal banks
ready for the stone crusher and the builder, it is difficult to escape the
conclusion that within the present generation the Chicago Drainage
and Ship Canal will be the main artery of one of the grandest manu-
facturing districts in the world.
This transformation of the hydraulics of the canal into light and
industrial power will eventually vastly add to the value of the real
estate controlled or owned by the district. Even though this feature
is of comparatively recent origin, since its development the valuation
of the property, as equalized by the state board, has increased fully
$100,000,000. In 1890, the year after the organization of the dis-
trict, the valuation was given as $217,458,360.00; in 1900, the year
of the formal opening of the canal, it was $269,287,109.00; in 1902,
the year before the district was authorized to develop its water power,
it had increased to $393,080,042.00, and in 1907, with the enterprise
stiH in an unsettled state, it had taken a bound to $499,727,415.00.
The completion of the Illinois and IMichigan canal, in 1848, was
the practical commencement of the grand system of internal water-
ways by which it is proposed eventually to bring the great lakes into
connection with the Gulf of Mexico and make Chicago the greatest
interior cosmopolis of history. The drainage canal of the twentieth
century is the elder brother of the old water trough of sixty years
ago, and is the great head or inlet of the projected inland waterway
system which is to strive with the growing network of railways to
relieve the congestion of riches so patent in the Mississippi valley.
The canal is considered the first gigantic step in the construction of
the fourteen-foot waterway from the lakes to the gulf. In 1907
practical steps were taken, both by Illinois and other interested states,
looking to the active prosecution of the work, and in March of that
246 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
year President Roosevelt appointed an Inland Waterways Commis-
sion and gave it his usual hearty and practical support. The esti-
mated- cost of the Lakes-to-Gulf system is $100,000,000 (exclusive
of what will be spent in the further development of the Chicago
canal), of which $31,000,000 will be for the section from the ter-
minus of the Chicago drainage district to St. Louis. Joliet will be
a most important center of improvement in the grand scheme, and
the horse power which will be developed at that point is estimated at
43,000, with an annual income of from two and a half to three mil-
lion dollars. As the state of Illinois owns the major part of the in-
terests in the Joliet level and the remainder is divided between the
Chicago Sanitary District and the Economy Light and Power Com-
pany, it is believed that eventually the entire cost of the improvements
contemplated by the grand waterway from the main channel of the
district above Joliet to the head of the Illinois river at Utica (over
sixty miles), can be paid from the sale of power and light. Thus it
is planned that, with comparatively little burden to the taxpayers of
Chicago or Illinois, the drainage canal shall be transformed into a
ship, canal and become the commencement of a great national water-
way.
Lyman Edgar Cooley, the Chicago civil engineer, has achieved
a reputation which is even more than national, his advice and wise
professional counsel having been sought and util-
^ ' ized in the furtherance of great projects which are
CoOLEY. . . , . , . ^^ ^^ ^ , . ^
mternational m their scope. He was born m Can-
andaigua, Ontario county. New York, on the 5th day of December,
1850, being the son of Albert B. and Aksah (Griswold) Cooley.
The Cooleys (originally Cowleys or Cooleighs) are of English an-
cestry, a collateral branch being the Wellesleys, of which the first
Duke of Wellington was the most distinguished member. The Ameri-
can ancestor came to New England prior to 1636, and the great-
grandfather, John Cooley, removed to western New York from Con-
necticut late in the eighteenth century. The late Judge Thomas M.
Cooley, of Michigan, was also of this family.
After a course of study at the Canandaigua Academy, Mr. Cooley
taught in that institution in 1870-2, and then pursued his professional
studies at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute at Troy, New York, from
which he graduated in 1874 with the degree of C. E. In 1874-7 he
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 247
served as professor of engineering at Northwestern University, and
in 1876-8 was associate editor of the Engineering Ncivs. In 1878
he performed his first active work of construction as assistant to
Wilham Sooy Smith, on the construction of the railway bridge across
the Missouri river at Glasgow, Missouri. From 1878 to 1884 he
served as assistant United States engineer under Major Suter on the
Missouri and Mississippi river improvements, with headquarters at
St. Louis. During this period he had charge of local improvements
and surveys in Nebraska, Iowa, Missouri, Arkansas and Tennessee,
and was chief assistant in general charge of the work on the Mis-
souri river below Yankton.
Returning to Chicago in 1884, Mr. Cooley became editor of the
American Engineer, but in 1885 severed his connection with that
journal and gave his attention largely to the great sanitary matters
which agitated Chicago, and which required the best available en-
gineering talent to solve them satisfactorily. As a member of a sub-
committee of the Citizens' Association, in September, 1885, he drew
the report which originated the public agitation in favor of a sanitary
canal, and aided in securing the organization of a drainage and water
supply commission, of which he was chief assistant, in 1886-7. ^^i
1888 he was appointed consulting engineer to the city and to the
Sanitary District Commission, representing the city and its civic
organizations at Springfield in 1889, when the bill was passed through
the legislature. He acted as engineer to the commission which deter-
mined the boundaries of .the sanitary district in 1889, ^"*^ ^^ the fol-
lowing year served as its first chief engineer. In 189 1 he became a
member of the board of trustees, serving until the expiration of his
term in December, 1895, and acting as consulting engineer of the
sanitary district in 1897. Previously (1888-91) he had also served
as consulting engineer of the State Board of Health. In 1896-7 Mr.
Cooley was a member of the expert committee appointed by Mayor
Swift, which devised the system of intercepting sewers along the lake
front now nearing completion, and in 1901 was also among the em-
inent experts engaged upon the comprehensive plan for the comjile-
tion of the works of the saiiitary district of Chicago.
There are few engineers in the countiy who have a more prom-
inent connection with the internal waterways of the United States
and the vast projects under way to make them international highways.
248 CHICAGO, AND COOK COUNTY
than Lyman E. Cooley. In 1895 he was appointed by President
Cleveland a member of the International Deep Waterways Commis-
sion, his American associates being Dr. James B. Angell, of Michi-
gan, and John E. Russell, of Massachusetts. Mr. Cooley had charge
of the investigation, and surveys have since been made for ocean
navigation from the Atlantic seaboard to Chicago and Duluth, via
the Great Lakes. Of the association to promote this project, he is
the American vice president. In 1897-8 he made an examination, in
company with a group of contractors, of the Nicaragua canal project,
and in the latter year acted as advisory engineer to Governor Black's
commission, in the investigation of the $9,000,000 expenditure on the
Erie canal. _
During the construction of the Cheesman dam, which controls the
flow of the South Platte near the outlet of South Park, Mr. Cooley
was consulting engineer of the Union Water Works Company of
Denver, Colorado. This dam, which is of granite masonry and 225
feet high, required four years in its construction. He also projected
the water power dam across the Mississippi river at the foot of the
Des Moines rapids, Keokuk, Iowa, which is to be thirty-five feet high
and over a mile long. He has reported upon water power projects
in several states, and upon river improvements and flood protection,
and has had much to do in economic investigations of transportation
matterg and the appraisement of public utilities. He prepared the re-
port of the Internal Improvement Commission of Illinois upon the
Lakes and Gulf Waterway, and promoted the legislation passed by
the general assembly in 1907 by which the state undertakes to co-
operate in this enterprise.
Mr. Cooley has been a prolific and valued writer upon what has
been called waterway literature, his work, entitled "The Lakes and
Gulf Waterway," being the most complete and authoritative literary
production on the subject. He is also in demand as a lecturer on
technical subjects, having repeatedly appeared in this capacity at the
Universities of Illinois, Wisconsin and Michigan. He is a member
of the American Society of Civil Engineers, Western Society of En-
gineers, National Geographical Society, Chicago Academy of Sciences
and the Chicago Press Club.
On December 31, 1874, Mr. Cooley was united in marriage to
Miss Lucena McMillan, and the children born to them have been as
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 249
follows: William Lyman, deceased; Charles Albert and Rebecca.
The family residence is at Evanston, Illinois.
Isham Randolph has done as mnch active and practical work in
the construction and development of the sanitary and ship canal as
any member of the engineering profession who has
T^ been connected with it — one of the most momentous
Randolph. , ,. , .
public achievements of modern times. He was born
on a farm called New Market, Clarke county, Virginia, on the 25th
of March, 1848, son of Robert C. and Lucy Nelson (Wei ford) Ran-
dolph. His father was a physician and his mother a woman of ex-
cellent education, both parents being people of unusual culture and
strength of character. The boy was chiefly educated by his mother,
outside of her gentle and effective instruction obtaining about two
years of mental training in two private schools of his native state.
Mr. Randolph's tastes were early indicated, and by persistent study
and actual work he eventuall}^ became remarkably proficient in his
profession. From the position of axman in the employ of the Balti-
more & Ohio Railroad Company he was advanced to an employe of
the engineering corps, and after serving in various responsible posi-
tions, he was invited to become the chief engineer of the Chicago &
Western Indiana Railroad; upon these duties he entered in May.
1880. In 1886 he assumed the same position with the Chicago. Madi-
son & Northern Railway, and on June 7, 1893, was chosen chief
engineer of the Sanitary District of Chicago. In this post of eminent
responsibility he earned a national reputation, but this faithful and
able service was accomplished at the expense of his private interests,
and, to the deep regret of his associates and the public, he resigned
his ofBce in August, 1907, to devote himself to private practice. His
services with the great project which he has so materially furthered
are still retained as consulting engineer.
On June 15, 1882, Mr. Randolph was united in marriage with
Miss Mary H. Taylor, and the children born to them have been
Robert Isham, Oscar DeWolf, Spotswood Wellford and George Tay-
lor. The family have long had a pleasant home in the beautiful suburb
of Riverside. Mr. Randolph stands very high with his professional
co-workers, being a member and ex-president' of the Western Society
of Engineers, and a member of the American Society of Civil Engi-
neers and the Chicago Engineers' Club. He is also well kiKnvn as a
250
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
ZiNA R.
Carter.
valued contributor to the engineering journals of the country. He
has been a member of the Episcopal church since 1875 and is senior
warden of St. Paul's Episcopal Church at Riverside.
Zina R. Carter was president of the Sanitary District of Chicago
in 1903 and had been a member of the board of trustees from the
district since 1895 and for eight years was chairman
of the finance committee of the sanitary board. He
is thus one of the prominent figures in connection
with the sanitary district both during the work of construction of that
great enterprise and since it has become a sanitary and commercial
feature of Chicago's life.
Zina R. Carter was born in a log- cabin in Jefferson county, New
York, October 23, 1846, son of Benajah and Isabel (Cole) Carter.
He was brought up on a farm and attended school for a brief period
and after he came west worked on a farm in DuPage county, Illinois,
for several years. His introduction to Chicago was signalized by
the opening of a store on the west side, the firm of Zina R. Carter and
Brother, being still in existence. His connection with public life is ex-
tended. In addition to his services with the canal board he was alder-
man from the old tenth ward, was candidate for mayor in 1899 and
is now a member of the Civil Service Commission, having been ap-
pointed by Mayor Busse in 1907. He has been a member of the
Chicago Board of Trade since 1872 and was president in 1898, hav-
ing also filled all the other official positions of the board.
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 2m
Social, Benevolent and Reformatory Hgencies
Carlyle often bewailed the machine-like tendencies of the age
and the sinking- of the individual in the organization. His attitude
was partially borne out by the facts, but was, at the same time, largely
determined by his peculiar personality, which was distinctively ex-
clusive, not to say repellant. He failed to place sufficient stress on
the strength of the social instincts, which are far stronger and more
general than the intellectual or reformatory. As this is a labor-saving
age — that is, an age in which man aims to accomplish more with a
given expenditure of labor than ever before — it is clearly perceived
by thoughtful and active men and women that a greater influence
in a far shorter period of time may be exercised upon a compact
body of individuals than if it were separated into scattered units.
In the formation of societies, either for sociability or co-operation,
the fundamental truth is illustrated that "man is a gregarious ani-
mal," and thoroughly believes that in "union there is strength."
In the establishment of every new community, one of the first
acts of its members is to "get together" and organize a church, a
society, or other association, for the exchange of views and co-opera-
tion in work. It is of record that soon after the organization of the
Methodists of Chicago into a religious class and before the formation
of the old St. Mary's church by the Catholics, the few civilians out-
side Fort Dearborn joined with some of the choice representatives
of the garrison in the formation of a debating society. Colonel J.
B. Beaubien was its president. Diversion, as well as intellectual ini-
provement, appears to have been within the scope
irIONEER r .1 • • ' r ^1 • • • 1 • /-
c. or this pioneer of Chicago societies, and its first
Societies. . ^ , , ** . ^
meetings were held in the winter of 1831-2. Ihe
first temperance organization was known as the Chicago Temperance
Society, which was founded in 1832, and was the predecessor of
many associations engaged in that field of reform, such as the Wash-
ington Temperance Society, instituted in 1840; the Bethel, or Mar-
iners' Temperance Society of 1842, and the Junior Washington
252 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
Temperance Society, founded in 1843. The Wasliingtonian Home,
one of the best known institutions for the reformation of inebriates
in the country, was founded in 1864.
In 1834 the Chicago Lyceum was founded, and for a decade the
cream of -Chicago's sociabiHty and intellectuahty gathered around it,
and from it radiated many elevating influences. As stated by the
late Thomas Hoyne, who was one of its early members, "Not a man
of note, not a man in the city of any trade or profession, who had
any taste for intellectual and social enjoyment, but who belonged
to the Lyceum." Its meetings were generally held in the old court
house, corner of Randolph and Clark streets, in the hall of the old
Saloon building or in the Presbyterian church. The Lyceum was
virtually merged, with its library, into the Young Men's Asso-
ciation, the latter becoming the father of the Chicago Public Library.
In the organization of the Chicago Harmonic Society, founded in
1835, the musical element in the city was first marked for signal en-
couragement and gratification, its concerts in the Presbyterian church
and Saloon building being events among the cultured people of the
city.
In 1837 the Chicago Mechanics' Institute was organized, the
forerunner of those numerous organizations in Chicago designed to
conserve the interests of the mechanical classes, both through edu-
cation and co-operation. As set forth in its constitution, the objects
of the society were "to diffuse knowledge and information through-
out the mechanical classes; to found lectures on natural, mechanical
and chemical philosophy and other scientific subjects; to create a
.library and museum for the benefit of mechanics and others; and
to establish schools for the benefit of their youth and to establish
annual fairs." A good library was established, fairs were held under
its auspices, evening schools were established for apprentices and
sons of the members, but the panic of 1857 dissipated the resources
of the institute, its library was absorbed by the Young Men's
Association, and its influence waned; so that, although it still
exists in name and as an organization, it is now chiefly interesting
as a relic of a strong and useful institution of the early times.
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 253
The many societies of a secret and benevolent nature in Chicago
had their origin in the early forties, when Masonry and Odd Fellow-
ship were first locally represented. LaFavette was
the first Masonic lodge to be organized in the city,
its charter being granted by the grand lodge of the
state October 2, 1843. It was represented by Lewis C. Kercheval,
an eccentric public character who served the city both as inspector
of customs and justice of the peace, besides being the first Chicago
Mason to be admitted as representative of the grand lodge. From
LaFayette Lodge came Apollo No. 32, in 1844, and Oriental Lodge
No. 33, in 1845, and on October i, 1849, Masonry had gained so
strong a foothold in Chicago that the grand lodge held its session
here. On May 18, 1854, the corner-stone of the old Masonic Temple,
83-5 Dearborn street, was laid with characteristic ceremonies. It was
dedicated on St. John's day, June 24, 1856. The grand master at
this time was William B. Herrick, who delivered the principal ad-
dress, the after-banquet continuing at Dearborn park, from 5 to 8
o'clock p. m. The Chicago Council was formed in 1854 and in
1857 the Occidental Consistory was created. In 1870 the so-called
West Side Masonic Temple was completed, on the southwest corner
of Halsted and Randolph streets. Oriental Hall, on LaSalle street,
having been erected several years before. With the expansion of
the order various halls were provided for the accommodation of the
lodges and the higher bodies, but it was not until the late eighties
that a strong movement was under way for the erection of such a
real temple as should fitly represent the power of Masonry in Chi-
cago and the west. In 1890, at the northeast corner of State and
Randolph streets, was laid the stone upon which is inscribed the
"Masonic Fraternity Temple," and the massive and lofty structure
which was erected above and beyond it. within the following three
years, is such a tribute to the power of the order as has carried its
name around the world.
LaFayette, Washington and Corinthian chapters, of Chicago Ma-
sonry, were organized respectively in 1844. 1858 and 1864, and
Apollo Commandery, established in 1845. was the fir.st organization
of Knights Templar to be established in the northwest. Its first com-
mander was Rev. IT. \\'alker. who. during his Masonic service in that
office, was rector of St. James Episcopal cIuutIi. In 1866 Chicago
254 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
Commandery No. 19 was chartered to accommodate residents of the
west side, and in 1870 the north division was hkewise favored in
the chartering of St. Bernard No. 35. Masonry has expanded so
rapidly in Chicago that there are now in the city twenty-three chap-
ters subordinate to the 'Grand Chapter of Ilhnois, seven councils sub-
ordinate to the Grand Council of the state, and eleven commanderies
subordinate to the Grand Encampment. The affiliated Order of the
Eastern Star, which admits both men and women to its membership,
has more than fifty subordinate chapters. The Order of the Eastern
Star originated in France about 1765, and the first lodge in Chicago,
known as Miriam Family No. iii, was organized in 1866. It should
be added that the establishment of a large colored element in Chicago
has resulted in the formation of numerous bodies (whose members
are of that race), including the Eastern Star and those representing
the progressive degrees of Masonry to the Ancient Arabic Order of
the Nobles of the Mystic Shrine.
For a number of years the question of establishing an asylum or
home for the widows and orphans of Illinois Masons was often un-
der discussion, but did not result in definite action until March, 1885,
when a preliminary organization was effected in Chicago, which, on
the nth of that month, obtained a charter from the state for the es-
tablishm.ent of the Illinois Masonic Orphans' Home. By the follow-
ing sum.mer sufficient money had been collected to purchase the old
Hayes mansion at the corner of Carroll avenue and Sheldon street.
This building was remodeled and adapted to its new purpose and was
dedicated by the Grand Lodge of Illinois October 7, 1886. As ex-
pressed in the articles of the original organization, the aims of the
home have since been well realized : "To provide and maintain, at
or near the city of Chicago, a home for the nurture, and intellectual,
moral and physical culture of indigent children of deceased Free Ma-
sons of the state of Illinois, and a temporary shelter and asylum for
sick and indigent widows of such deceased Free Masons."
The first Odd Fellows' lodge in Chicago (Union No. 9) was in-
stituted February 28, 1844, the year following the establishment of
. Masonry in the city. Duane Lodge No. 1 1 followed a year later,
and Excelsior Lodge No. 22 in 1847. The first encampment in the
city was instituted in 1845 ^^ Illinois No. 3, but this was soon re-
placed by the present Chicago Encampment No. 10, which was found-
CHICAGO AND COOK COUXTY 255
ed in 1848. Germania Encampment No. 40. the first German organi-
zation of that grade, was formed in 1857. The first cantons, or units,
of the Patriarchs MiHtant, the semi-mihtary order of Odd Fellow-
ship, were mustered in November 11, 1885, ''^s Occidental No. i and
Excelsior No. 7. There are now ten cantons in Chicago, forming a
regiment with a commanding officer, as in other military organiza-
tions. The next higher rank in this military grade is the brigade,
whose headquarters are also in Chicago. Subordinate to the gr^ind
body are nineteen subordinate encampments; within the order here
are also Rebekah lodges of female members and various bodies of the
fraternity composed of colored citizens.
The Knights of Pythias, who constitute one of the strongest or-
ders in Chicago, established Welcome Lodge No. i as their pioneer
local body, its founding being effected in 1869. It has now more than
forty lodges in the city, the membership of the uniform rank being
very strong. This corresponds to the Knights Militant of Odd Fel-
lowship and is also divided into brigades and regiments. The Uni-
form Knights in Chicago are organized into twelve companies and
two regiments. There are also Pythian Sisters and Colored Knights
of Pythias.
The Independent Order of Foresters has also been firmly planted
in the local field for many years, and in 1878 it had so increased in
membership that the High Court of Illinois was organized. The
present membership in Chicago now embraces about seventy-five
subordinate and forty companion courts. Other fraternities, secret
and benevolent, well represented in Chicago, are the_ Ancient Ortler
of United Workmen, with about sixty lodges; Royal League, with
ninety-five; Modern Woodmen of America, with ninety subordinate
lodges; Knights and Ladies of Honor, with about seventy; Royal
Arcanum, with some sixty-five councils and the Tribe of Ben Hur,
with fifty courts.
The Independent Order of B'nai B'rith is a strong Hebrew organ-
ization, which was organized in New York during 1843. '^'^^l "*^^
long after a lodge was formed in Chicago. District No. 6, with its
headquarters in Chicago, embraces the states of Illinois. Michigan,
Wisconsin, Iowa, Minnesota and Kansas. The grand lodge of this
district was instituted in 1868, there being eight subordinate lodges
in the city of Chicago. The object of the order is to unite Israelites
256 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTS
in educational, moral and philanthropic work; "alleviating the wants
of the poor and needy; visiting and attending the sick; coming to
the rescue of victims of persecution; providing for, protecting and
assisting the widow and orphan on the broadest principles of human-
ity." Not only through the order of B'nai B'rith, but through nu-
merous other associations and institutions, the representatives of this
race and religion have instituted noble charities in Chicago. It is,
in fact, their pride, which is jealously maintained by acts, that the
Hebrew so cares for his poor brother that he is seldom thrown upon
the community as a pauper. One of the strongest organizations of
this character formed was the United Hebrew Relief Association,
which came into existence as early as 1859. ^^s relief of the sick
largely superseded the other work of the association, and prior to
the great fire it maintained a small hospital. It was destroyed in
1 87 1, but no attempt was made to replace it until 1880, when the late
Michael Reese bequeathed $97,000 to the association by which the
fine hospital, which bears his name, was founded. Although Michael
Reese Hospital is controlled by what is known as the United Hebrew
Charities, that institution receives patients without regard to race or
religion. Another of the Hebrew fraternities which merits special
mention is the Independent Order of Free Sons of Israel, which has
a grand lodge, with headquarters in Chicago, and nine subordinate
lodges. The Associated Jewish Charities should also be mentioned
as a general organization founded for the special relief of the He-
brews of Chicago.
The Germans of Chicago were among the first to organize on the
basis of nationality. In 1854 the revolutions of their Fatherland sent
them to America in large numbers, and Chicago became -so favorite
a center of settlement that some of the leading citizens of the na-
_, tionality formed the Society for the Protection and
Patriotic
<-, Aid of German Immig-rants. There has never been
Societies. .,,..,
a year smce when the services of such an organiza-
tion could be dispensed with. The German Maennerchor, which is
among the strongest of all organizations in the city, was formed in
1865, ^s the result of a gathering of fellow countrymen at the funeral
of Abraham Lincoln, upon which occasion they rendered a chorus.
St. George's Benevolent Association was organized in i860 to assist
English immigrants, and St. Patrick's Society, with rather a wider
CHICAGO AND COOK COUXTV 257
range of objects, was founded by the Irish-Americans of Chicago in
1865. Among other work accomphshed by the latter society, besides
that of promoting Irish colonization, was the founding of the Hiber-
nian Bank. These were the forerunners of innumerable societies
which arose with the increase of various nationalities. One of the
oldest of the Italian organizations, and still the strongest, is the So-
cieta C. Columbo, founded in 1879.
Closely allied to this group are the many societies founded on
state lines, like the Sons of Illinois, Sons of New York, etc. Geneal-
ogy is also responsible for a large class, represented by the societies
of Colonial Wars, War of 1812, Mayflower Descendants, etc., while
subsequent wars are responsible for such as the Grand Army of the
Republic, Sons and Daughters of Veterans, Ladies of the G. A. R.,
Blue and Gray Legion, and Spanish-American War Veterans.
The county and city make generous provision for the care of the
sick, poor and dependent, and private associations supplement their
^ efforts with large outlay of time and means; yet the
Organized r 1 1 • 1 ^1
^ means of relief is always far behind the necessities
of applicants. The Chicago Relief and Aid Society
is one of the oldest private agencies to enter the field, although the
Chicago Orphan Asylum is an institution of 1849. Until 1850 the
city had not grown beyond the relief powers of the county and city
authorities, but a marked expansion of the population was followed
by the panic and depression of 1857, and the demands for relief
were too many for the constituted authorities. At this crisis the Chi-
cago Relief and Aid Society was incorporated, and by its charter its
directors have always been required to make an annual report to the
city council. At the time of the Chicago fire it had really been es-
tablished as a municipal agency for the distribution of charity, ir-
respective of sect, political faith or nationality, and when the gigantic
fund for the relief of the victims of the fire had collected in the mu-
nicipal treasury, it was naturally turned over to the Chicago Relief
and Aid Society for distribution. During the following eighteen
months nearly four million and a half dollars was distributed among
about 160,000 people, besides quantities of clothing and food; and
some $500,000 remained for future disbursements. In 1884 the en-
tire fire fund was exhausted, and since then the society has relied
upon voluntary contributions to carry on its charities. Its ordinary
Vol. 1—17.
258 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
expenses are met by the income from several bequests. Rev. Charles
G. Truesdell was appointed superintendent of the society in 1875 and
thus served for nearly thirty years. Among the strongest features of
the society which he did so much to develop, are its departments of
information and visitation, designed to prevent fraud on the part of
the recipients of charity and to place and keep the society in close
touch with the objects of its assistance. The Bureau of Associated
Charities, organized in 1894, occupies a similar but even a broader
field. It is in the nature of an advisory and harmonizing board,
which aims to so promote co-operation among the numerous city
charities that there shall be no confusion or duplication of work.
The thousands of cases which are annually brought to its notice are
usually distributed to the proper relief agencies, the bureau itself
. giving material assistance only in emergency cases. Like the Chicago
Relief and Aid Society it maintains active departments of investiga-
tion and visitation.
The Illinois Humane Society of today had its origin in the Illi-
nois Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, chartered by
the state in 1869 and the scope of its work extended in 1882 so as tO'
include cruelty to children. Its work and its spirit have been so broad
and so beneficent as to be familiar to all intelligent people, and the
name of John G. Shortall, one of its founders, its president for nearly
thirty years and the organizer of the American Humane Association,
is something treasured in the hearts of Chicago humanitarians.
Such institutions as the Foundlings' Home, founded by Dr.
George E. Shipman in 1871; the Newsboys' and Bootblacks' Home,
which was established somewhat later, and the Children's Aid So-
ciety, organized in 1890, are. also representative agencies which are
protecting and caring for unfortunate juveniles. The old people's
homes are also numerous and of long establishment, being founded
by both general and religious societies.
The cemeteries of the city are all controlled by associations and
the munificent sums lavished upon their improvement are but inade-
^ quate tributes to the dead. There are few more
Ceaik—
beautiful homes for the departed than Rosehill,
TERIES. .
Graceland, Calvary, Waldheim and Forest Home,
and nothing is more representative of a high state of society than
such tender care of mortality. The first of Chicago's burial grounds
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 259
were set aside as a tract of about sixteen acres on the lake shure, at
Twenty-sixth street, and a plat of about half that area east of Clark
street, near Chicago avenue. This was in 1835. Five years after-
ward the south side cemetery was abandoned, as well as the ground
at Chicago avenue, and a general city cemetery was established on
the south sixty acres of what is now Lincoln Park. In 1854 the Jews
of Chicago established the Chebra Kadisha Ubikar Cholim cemetery
on North Clark street, near the present Graceland avenue, and its
five acres represents the oldest burial ground in Chicago. Just south
of Graceland "cemetery, five miles north on Clark street, is Wunder
Churchyard, consecrated by the German Lutherans in 1856, and the
pioneer of their burial grounds. The Hebrews of the city have sepa-
rate plats assigned them at Rosehill and Oak Woods, and eight small
burial places between Forest Home and Riverside, in the southwest-
ern districts, which were laid out in 1876.
Rosehill, the largest and most elaborately improved of the Chi-
cago cemeteries, was dedicated in 1859, and Calvary, the leading
Catholic cemetery, was consecrated in the same year, although its
site had been purchased three years before. Rosehill is seven miles
north of the city hall and Calvary ten, while Graceland, founded in
1865, is five miles in the same general direction. When the city coun-
cil forbid further interments at the old Lincoln Park cemetery and
abolished the city burying ground there, these three cemeteries re-
ceived most of the bodies which were removed.
Oak Woods, on Sixty-seventh street and Cottage Grove a\enue,
is also one of the great and beautiful cemeteries, and was one of the
first to be laid out on the south side. The cemetery association was
incorporated in 1864. One of the noteworthy features of this ceme-
tery is its Confederate burial ground, wherein (in a plat of ground
purchased by the United States government) are interred nearly six
thousand prisoners who died at old Camp Douglas during the Civil
war. A beautiful Catholic cemetery is Mount Olivet, near Morgan
Park, sixteen miles south of Chicago, which was consecrated in
1886. Waldheim, a German cemetery, ten miles from the city hall,
on West Harrison street, was laid out in 1873. Its beauties are
largely natural and it has a historic interest as being the burial place
of the Haymarket anarchists. Forest Flome, still further to the
south and west, is also a large and well improved cemetery. Alto-
26o CHICAGO AND' COOK COUNTY
gether, there are about fifty cemeteries in Chicago and vicinity and
among others well known may be mentioned Concordia, Montrose,
Moses Montefiore, Mount Auburn, Mount Carmel and Oakland-
Chicago numbers among its societies an unusually large number
of social, political, literary and athletic organizations. The Chicago
Club is one of the oldest organizations of prominent
Clubs. citizens, being formed in 1869 as the outgrowth of
the old Dearborn Club. Its home is now the old
Art Institute building, corner of Michigan avenue and Van Buren
street. The Standard, the most influential Jewish club, was also or-
ganized in that year, and owns a house at the corner of Michigan
avenue and Twenty- fourth street. In 1879 the widely known Union
League Club was incorporated as "The Chicago Club of the Union
â– League of America," its present name being legally adopted on the
17th of January, 1882. Although the Union League Club has always
been Republican, its tendencies have been broadly patriotic and its
civic spirit of the strongest afid highest. Its handsome brick building
is at Jackson boulevard and Custom House place. The Iroquois
Club, formed in 1881, is equally typical of firm Democracy, with
headquarters at 200 Clark street. The first really strong organiza-
tion of women was formed- in 1876, as the Chicago Woman's Club,
and it is still one of the leading organizations in the west devoted to
philanthropic and literary work. The Fortnightly Club, organized
in 1873, is more purely intellectual and social in its aims, and has
the distinction of being the pioneer among the women's societies.
The Chicago Literary Club, whose membership is open to both sexes,
is the oldest organization of the kind in the city, being established
in 1874. It holds its meetings in the Art Institute and maintains its
high rank among the literary societies of Chicago. The Press Club
has been alive since 1880. The Illinois Club, the leading social or-
ganization of the west side, was founded in 1878, and has a fine club
house at the corner of Ashland avenue and Monroe street, while the
Ashland Club, established eight years later, has its home on Washing-
ton boulevard. Among the old social Republican clubs should be
mentioned the Lincoln and Marquette, and among the organizations
of a later day, the Hamilton Club, which of late years has acquired
a strong influence.
The Chicago Athletic Association was organized in January,
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 261
1889, and is the leading organization of the kind in the city, if not
in the United States. Its ten-story cUibhouse on Michigan avenue
is certainly as completely equipped as any establishment of a like na-
ture in the world. Sociability and exercise are skillfully cf^mbined
in the workings of this association, with its library and reading rooms,
its bath and living rooms, its private apartments for special gatherings
and its great banquet hall. The Turkish and Russian baths and nata-
torium are on the ground floor. The gymnasium proper occupies the
fourth and fifth floors, the running track being arranged on a bal-
cony occupying the outer rim of the great hall. The ninth and tenth
stories are also thrown into one grand hall, which is divided into
ball, racquet and tennis courts. The association's membership of
some 2,000 includes many of the leading citizens of Chicago. The
New Illinois Athletic Club, occupying a fine clubhouse on Michigan
avenue, is also a strong organization, both from the social and ath-
letic standpoint, and the old-time German "turn vereins" still main-
tain their high standing.
The Chicago societies given over to art and music are many and
prosperous, one of the oldest in the latter class being the Apollo Club,
organized in 1872 by Silas G. Pratt and George B. Upton and di-
rected for nearly a quarter of a century by that enthusiastic genius.
Professor William L. Tomlins. As a trainer of voices in chorus, es-
pecially of children's voices, he has never had a superior. He finally
resigned the directorship of the Apollo Club fin 1898) to devote his
entire time to the training of school teachers in voice culture, through
them reaching millions of public school children.
From the very nature of the city and its population, from the
fact that it is both a center of business and industry and a hotbed of
economic reforms, Chicago has an imposing array of organizations
representing combinations of both employes and employers, civic and
professional clubs, trades unions and commercial associations. Among
the youngest and strongest of the last named is the Association of
Commerce. Although organized in 1905, it already has a member-
ship of over a thousand, embracing some of the strongest representa-
tives of the mercantile, financial, real estate antl commercial interests
of the city. The association has secured an option on the corner of
Jackson boulevard and Plymouth court and is planning to build
thereon a fourteen-story structure at a cost of $700,000.
262 - CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
It is evident from the foregoing, which is httle more than an
enumeration of some of the leading local societies and associations,
that whatever the serious business, the taste or even the fad of the
Chicagoan, he need not go far to find some combination of kindred
workers and spirits. The list is so long and diverse, in fact, that it
defies complete classification in a reasonable space, and all that has
been historically attempted is to note the beginnings of some of the
most vital organizations, which have endured to the present and from
which have sprung strong and useful progenies.
John G. Shortall, who was a resident of Chicago for more than
half a century, was a lawyer by profession and one of the oldest and
- ablest real estate men of the city. He is -best known
^, ' however, and most deeply honored, for his labors
Shortall. . , ' , , • • • •, i
of nearly four decades m connection with the pro-
tection of mute animals and helpless children from the brutality of
hard masters and parents. As the founder of both the Illinois Humane
and the national organization, with the incessant and able work which
he bestowed upon this noble cause of humanity, Mr, Shortall's name
was written high among the world's philanthropists at the time of his
death, July 23, 1908. He had been president of the state society
from 1877 to 1906, and since the latter year his only son, John L.
Shortall, has well filled the office and continued his father's great work.
John G. Shortall was born in Dublin, September 20, 1838, and
when six years of age was brought to New York by his parents.
His father died when the boy was very young and he passed several
years in the employ of the New York Tribune before coming wxst, in
[854. His first western employment was on the survey of the Illinois.
Central Railway near Galena; afterward he spent some time in -the
Chicago Tribune office, and then associated himself with J. Mason
Parker in the compilation of real estate abstracts. Upon the comple-
tion of this work, in 1856, he leased the books and records of his
former employer, and entered the abstract business as an independent
operator. He afterward became connected with the firm of Greene-
baum and Guthmann, and in~i86i purchased their books and records.
In 1864 he became a member of the firm of Shortall and Hoard, and
so remained until the merging of the property with Chase Brothers
and Jones and Sellers, as a result of the fire of 1871. Subsequently
the interests of these concerns were absorbed by the Title Guarantee
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 263
and Trust Company, of which Mr. Shortall was a direclur lur many
years. Besides being thus one of the main factors in the cstabhshm'ent
of the abstract business on a firm basis, after the fire, he was .strongly
instrumental in bringing about the adoption of the principles that the
values of real property be based on its income-producing power. With
Mark Kimball and Enos Ayres, he was the first to apply this i)rinciple
in Chicago, as a representative of the city in the school property
appraisals. In every way he was considered one of the highest judges
of real estate values in the city.
Mr. Shortall w^as one of the founders of the Illinois Humane
Society, in 1869, but its work was not conducted with system and
effectiveness until he became president of the organization, in 1877.
In 1879, at his earnest solicitation, the scope of the so-called /'Society
for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals" was extended so as to
include the protection of children, and its present name was adopted.
In 1877, also at his suggestion, the American Humane Association
was founded at Cleveland, Ohio. Mr. Shortall's broad and liberal
spirit was manifest in numerous forms. He was always a moving
spirit in the Municipal Refonn Club and the Citizens' Association;
served in several official connections with such musical societies as
the Chicago Philharmonic and Beethoven ; was a director for ten years,
and three terms president of the Chicago Public Library, and was
one of the founders and main supporters of the Central church, of
which Professor David Swing was pastor until his death. Mr. Shortall
retired from active connection with the abstract and real estate busi-
ness in 1872, and for thirty-six years thereafter gave his life to the
higher movements of the community. The deceased was married Sep-
tember 5, 1861, to Mary D. Staples, daughter of John N. Staples,
of Chicago, by whom he had one child — John L. Shortall, who suc-
ceeded his father as president of the Illinois Humane Society.
264 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
JMcdical Ristory
BY JOHN HAMILCAR HOLLISTER, A.M., M.D.
The medical history of Chicago dates from the building of Fort
Dearborn, which was completed in 1804. In the detachment
detailed for that purpose one surgeon's mate is included, but there
is neither record of his name, antecedents or subsequent history.
He is only important to our purpose as the first representative of the
medical profession in Chicago, from whom date the beginnings of its
medical history. At that time only the families of John Kinzie and
John Baptiste Beaubien were permanent residents at this place. For
the present therefore, our history relates only to the surgeons who
were stationed at the fort. For the next six years there is no record
of medical and surgical service in the garrison, but when in 18 10 a
transfer of troops was made and Captain Nathan Helm succeeded in
command, the attending surgeon was Dr. John Cooper. After a brief
period he resigned his position in the army and in 181 1 was succeeded
by Dr. Isaac VanVoorhies. The latter was a native of Fishkill, New
York, born in 1 790 of Dutch antecedents prominently related and fine-
ly educated. At the age of twenty-two he fell a victim when Ft. Dear-
born was so blotted out that for four years the bones of the slain were
unburied and left to bleach upon the sands of Lake Michigan at a
point now in the center of a city of 2,000,000 inhabitants, and this
only ninety-five years ago. At the conclusion of the war with Eng-
land in 181 6 a detachment of troops commanded by Capt. Hezekiah
Bradley was detailed to rebuild the fort. His attending surgeons
were Dr. John Gale and Dr. McMahon. Dr. Gale was a native of
New Hampshire. After serving at Ft. Dearborn he was transferred
to Ft. Armstrong at Rock Island, 'where he died in 1830. Of Dr.
McMahon's later service we fail to find any record.
At this point special mention should be made of Dr. Alexander
Wolcott. He was a man of such prominence and so intimately asso-
ciated with our medical history that our records would be incomplete
without a somewhat extended reference to his life and eminent ser-
vices.
CHICAGO AND COOK C( »r\ lA' 2^.;
Dr. Wolcott. a native of Windsor. Connccticnt. was born in 1700.
H^ graduated from Yale CoUej^e in iSoi^. In 1812 he was commis-
^ . sioned as surgeon's mate in the United States Armv.
i)R. Alexander , ., , • , t ,•
„, In i(S20 he was appomted In(han atrent to succeed
Wolcott. °
Mr. Jowett at Ft. Dearborn, lie accompanied the
expedition under Governor Cass, of Michigan, which that year, start-
ing from Detroit, wended its way through the upper lakes to the
sources of the Mississippi. The facility with which Dr. Wolcott ac-
quired serviceable knowledge of the Indian dialects was remarkable.
and the rapidit}- with which he gained commanding inlluence over
the Indians has hardly a parallel. In 182 1, when Ciovernor Cass con-
cluded an important treaty with the Indians at Chicago. Dr. Wolcott's
services w^ere so valuable as to secure recognition of them by the gov-
ernment. Mr. Schoolcraft, the historian who accompanied Governor
Cass, makes special mention of him. "as a gentleman commanding
respect by his manners, judgment and intelligence." At the conclusion
of the treaty he served as one of the witnesses to the signatures there-
to. Though he was under appointment of the government as Indian
agent, he was never officially identified with the ftirt. Soon after
his arrival he completed the agency building which had been com-
menced by his predecessor, Mr. Jowett, on the north side of the ri\er.
and. occupying it as he did, a bachelor, it was facetiously called '*Col>
web Castle." But matters did not thus Ion"- remain. In Mav. 182;.
the garrison was withdrawn and, as the property at this point was
left in his charge, he occupied the officers' quarters and continued
to do so until it was again occupied by troops in 1828. Two months
after he was thus installed he was married to Miss Marion Kinzie, and
a justice of the peace from Fulton county was summoned to perform
the ceremon3^ ]\Iiss Marion was then sixteen years old, and is believed
to have been the first white child born in Chicago. He occupied the
quarters in the fort for five years, wdien in 182S they were again occu-
pied by soldiers. Though not detailed for service at the fort, still
through life he held the rank of army surgeon, and tloubtless as a con-
sultant held intimate relation with those at the fort. TlKuigh not a
matter of record, he must during the period of his residence here
have contributed valuable service to such as had need. In 1827 he
received the appointment of justice of the peace for IV^ria county, and
at the election of the justice Un- the prc^inrt of rhicio-r, \vns ,mc of
266 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
the judges. During the period of his agency large amounts of
property were entrusted to his care, and such was the fidehty with
which he executed that trust that he received emphatic approval by
the government. He died at the agency in 1830.
Further reference to the surgeons at the fort must necessarily be
brief. In 1828, when it was again occupied, Dr. J. B. Finley was
made surgeon in charge. We have no knowledge of his history ex-
cept that incidentally he was absent from his post in 1830, and the
vacancy thus occasioned was filled by Dr. Elijah D. Harmon, who
had just reached Chicago with a view to permanent settlement as a
practicing physician.
From June 17, 1832, to May 31, 1833, Dr. S. G. F. Decamp was
the surgeon at the fort. He received the appointment of assistant
surgeon in 1823 and was promoted to the rank of surgeon in 1833.
He continued in the United States service in that capacity twenty-
nine years. He was retired in 1862 and died at Saratoga Springs,
New York, in 187 1. -
Dr. Philip Maxwell, of whom special mention is ^elsewhere made,
was the successor of Dr. Decamp. He entered upon his duties at Ft.
Dearborn May i, 18-^3, and held the position of fort
Dr Philip .
, , â– suro;-eon until the final withdrawal of the troops in
Maxwell. ^ ^^ ^
1836.
The medical military history which commenced with the completion
of Ft. Dearborn in 1804 and terminated with its close in 1836, forms
an appropriate introductory chapter, prefacing those that relate to
medical practice in civic life and to the medical institutions which have
since been developed. As a fact illustrative of the rapid growth of a
hamlet numbering two hundred inhabitants in 1830 to a city of over
two millions of people in 1907, the writer ventures to state that he was
permitted the honor of personal acquaintance with the first physician
who settled in Chicago as a medical practitioner, and also with nearly
all of his immediate associates, a number of whose biographical
sketches are here included.
Biographical Sketches.
In writing a medical history of Chicago it seems essential that
special reference should be made to as many of the makers of that
history as our limits will permit. Our regret is that the names of
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 267
many others of like prominence must necessary be omitted. From
these we are led to select a few of those who were not only conspicu-
ous in private practice, but who were also largely instrumental in the
formation of our medical institutions. We have not ventured to in-
corporate sketches of men now living, presuming that that work can
be done better to their liking by other hands. From among those
worthy of record we venture to select the following :
Dr. Elijah Dewey Harmon has justly been styled "The Father of
Medicine in Chicago"; for he was the first to settle here as a medical
-^ _ ^ I)ractitioner. He was one of the Green Mountain
Dr. Elijah D. , ^ , , .
-rr boys ot whom so many became famous. He was
born in Bennington, Vermont, in 1782. His school
days were spent at that place. He studied medicine in Manchester in
his native state, and for a few years was engaged in practice in Bur-
lington. He entered the army as a surgeon at the outbreak of war
with England in 18 12. At the memorable battle of Plattsburg he
was surgeon on board the Saratoga, commanded by Capt. McDon-
ough, during the terrific encounter in which the Saratoga bore so
conspicuous a part. At the close of the war he resumed medical
practice in Burlington. In 1829 he determiued to seek his fortune in
the west. He came first to Jacksonville, then one of the most attrac-
tive locations in northern Illinois, but with a prescience peculiarly his
own, soon made Chicago his objective point and located here in 1830.
In 1 83 1 Dr. J. B. Finley, to whom reference has been made, being
absent from the fort. Dr. Harmon was appointed to fill the vacancy,
and he and his family became residents in the fort. In 1S32 the Black
Hawk war occurred, and the pioneer settlers from the adjacent cmm-
try thronged to the fort for protection. Here Dr. Harmon proved
himself a master spirit, not only in caring for the sick, but also in
ministering to the comfort of the homeless.
Gen. Winfield Scott, with a command of one thousand strong,
had been ordered to reach this fort in the shortest possible time. He
came by way of the lakes and arrived on the 8th of July, 1832. While
on the way an epidemic of cholera raged fearfully among his troops.
Hundreds were victims of the scourge and were buried at different
ports along the lake, or over the rail at sea. When the command
reached Chicago the mortality was at its height. A panic at once
prevailed, and nearly every house was deserted. People tied in every
268 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
direction leaving their doors unbolted and their effects unguarded.
The soldiers previously stationed at the garrison were hurried to
barracks hastily improvised, two miles distant from the fort. Dr.
Harmon was detailed as their medical attendant. Not only was he
assiduous in his care of the soldiers but gave his services unstinted
to such of the citizens as remained. Against this gruff General Scott
demurred and ordered him to confine his services to the barracks.
This Dr. Harmon declined to do and, rather than obey, surrendered
his position. While of the soldiers under General Scott's command
every third man was suffering from the disease, so perfect had been
their isolation that only three men under Dr. Harmon's care at the
barracks died, and these from other causes than cholera. Having
thus terminated his relations with the government he settled down in
the old Kinzie house to engage in the practice of medicine among the
returning settlers, to whom he had become greatly endeared. He is
said to have been the first to perform a capital surgical operation in
Chicago, having successfully amputated the feet of a man whose feet
had been frozen. Dr. Harmon was a man of business affairs, and
had such unbounded faith in tne future of Chicago that he predicted
the time would come when the city would contain a million of inhab-
itants, and for this he was esteemed a little "off his base." True to
his belief he located one hundred and thirty acres of government land
on the lake shore, the north boundary of which was at i6th street,
the present value of which, located as it is in the center of the city, in
comparison with its value in 1833, seems fabulous. Like many an-
other, he sold his land too soon. Harmon court was named for him.
At the northwest corner of Harmon court and Michigan avenue stood
the old Harmon mlansion in which in 1856 Mrs. Harmon died of
cholera. The writer was consultant at the time of her death.
In 1834 Dr. Harmon had become largely interested in land grants
in Texas, which, as a vast empire, was to become twelve years later
one of the United States. For the proper supervision of these grants
he became a resident of Texas while still holding relation with Chi-
cago, and for many years made annual journeys betwe-en the two
points. He died in Texas in 1869. He bore an honored name as the
first physician of Chicago, and as the first physician of Chicago his
name will be memorable.
At the close of 1832 the Black Hawk war had terminated and the
CHICAGO AND COOK COUXT^• 269
fear of cholera had hiri^el} abated. A year hiler Chicago inmibcred
two hundred inhabitants, and in the meantime eip^ht pliysicians. ow
to every twenty-hve inhabitants, had come to make this their home.
Their names and the order of their coming are as follows:
Dr. Elijah D. Harmon, arrived j\Iay 10, 1830.
Dr. V^alentine A. Boyer, arrived May 12, 1832.
Dr. Edward S. Kimberlee, also in 1832.
Dr. John T. Temple. July. 1833.
Dr. William B. Kagan. in the fall of 1833.
Dr. Henry B. Clark, in 1833.
Dr. George F. Turner, who was assistant surgeon at the fort.
Between the years 1834 and 1836 a land-craze swept over the
entire country the like of which was before unknown, has not been
known since and will hardly be known in the future. Chicago soon
became the great western storm-center. Banks issued money as
fast as their bills could be printed, and millions of dollars thus issued
changed hands with incredible speed. In like manner the population
of Chicago had increased in numbe:* from 200 in -833 to 4,179 in
1836. and the physicians from eight to forty.
From this date the medical history of Chicago developed so rapid-
ly and in so many ways, that it is impossible to compass them or rightly
represent the labors of the many who contributed to its making. In
this respect our history, arrange the matter as best we may. must be
seriously imperfect.
Dr. Philip Maxwell was one of whom special mention should be
made. He was bor,i in Guilford, Vermont, in 1797. He studied
meciicine in New York, but graduated in his native
Dr. Philip , , tt ^- •" 1 *^ ■* 1 •
state. He was a man ot varied attamments and uni-
MaXWELL. ,, , T, , , , 11 11- I- ,
versally popular. He had hardly settled ni medical
practice in Sackctt's Harbor, New York, when he was electetl a mem-
ber of the state legislature. Following this, having received the ap-
pointment of assistant surgeon in the United States army, he was as-
signed lor duty at Chicago in 1833. L^^ter he was promoted to the
rank of surgeon and was transferred to tlie division of the army under
the command of Gen. Zachary Taylor, with whom he servetl during
the Florida war. In 1844 he resigned his j)osition in the army and
came to reside in Chicago as a private practitioner, entering into a
partnership with Dr. Brockhurst McVicker. Although devoted to his
profession, he was none the less interesteil in the welfare of the com-
270 ' CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
munity at large. The people of Chicago were quick to appreciate
him and he soon became a member of the Illinois state legislature.
He made a record in the assembly creditable alike to himself and his
constituency. He maintained close relations with his patients at home,
who welcomed his return. While thus engaged in medical practice
it was the writer's privilege to enjoy his personal acquaintance, and
is able to speak of him from personal knowledge. Physically, Dr.
Maxwell was a man of commanding presence, symmetrical and comely
of form, he stood six feet and two inches in height, and weighed 275
pounds. While not on duty he was the soul of good fellowship, and
as to wit and repartee scarcely had his equal. When he entered the
sick room, however, there was a power of healing in his face; no
footstep lighter than his ; none more gentle than his touch. Dr. Max-
well was an ardent lover of nature. He longed for a rural retreat
where he might enjoy its pleasures to the full. Leaving many ardent
friends to regret his going, he relinquished medical practice in 1855
and betook himself to the beautiful banks of Lake Geneva, in Wiscon-
sin, now a famous resort. Here for four years he realized his fondest
hopes and here in 1859, ^^ ^^^ ^§^ ^^ sixty years, he came to the close
of an eventful life.
Dr. William Bradshaw Eagan was another of the early eight, con-
spicuous in the development of our medical history. He was a native
of Ireland and born September 28, 1808. He com-
„ ' menced his medical studies at the early age of fifteen
Eagan. _ . ^ . ^ , . ^ , ,
years, nrst pursunig them m Lancashire, England.
He received his diploma from Dublin LTniversity. Soon after his
graduation he sailed for America and, landing at Quebec, was soon
engaged in school teaching. ' Later he was employed in like manner
in Montreal, in New York City, and finally in the University of Vir-
ginia. While employed as a teacher in the literary institutions. Dr.
Eagan steadily pursued his medical studies. In 1830 the New Jer-
sey State Medical Society granted him a license to practice medicine
in that state, and he began his work in Newark. Two years later he
was married to Miss Emeline Babbett, and the year following, in
1833, they came to reside in Chicago. They were soon numbered
among the foremost citizens in the little hamlet. A man of such talent
and of such unusual culture could not long remain unnoticed. Only
a year after his arrival he was appointed to represent the South Di-
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 271
vision of the city as a member of the health committee. He was often
called to preside as master of assembles on puljlic occasions. As a
presiding officer he rarely had an equal, and as a platform speaker was
noted for his eloquence. When ground was to be broken for the
building of the Illinois and Michigan Canal, the event was celebrated
in a manner before unknown in Chicago, and on that occasion Dr.
Eagan was the orator of the day.
He not only served as a medical practitioner, but in other capaci-
ties as well. In 1844 he was elected to the office of city recorder, and
for a series of years was a prominent operator in real estate. In
1853 and 1854 he rendered important services as a member of the
state legislature. In 1856 he was one of the prime movers in the or-
ganization of the Republican party, and when Anson Burlingame,
the author of the celebrated Chinese Treaty, made his two memorable
speeches, one at Chicago and the other at Morris, Dr. Eagan was the
presiding officer. Dr. and Mrs. Eagan were noted for their hospitality.
His home and his. grounds were conspicuous for their beauty, and
for a long time presented one of the chief attractions in the West Di-
vision of the city. Here, surrounded by a devoted family, he passed
peacefully to rest in i860, at the early age of fifty-two years.
Dr. Valentine A. Boyer was also one of the early eight. The rec-
ords with reference to him are brief. He came to reside in Chicago
May 12, 1832. He was here in the midst of the chol-
Dr. Valentine • , • , r ^1 r 1*1
. _ era epidemic and was one of the few who stood man-
A. Boyer. ^ „ , . , ^ . ^
fully at their post, and for a series of years was en-
gaged in medical practice. In 1840 he was appointed assistant sur-
geon of the City Guards, then connected with the Sixteenth Regiment
of the Illinois Volunteers. Of his later history we are not advised.
Dr. Edmund Stoughton Kimberlee was still another of the early
eight. He came to reside here in the fall of 1832. When the prelim-
_ ^ inary meeting was held August 5, 1838, to dcter-
Dr. Edmund S. . 1 .1 /-^ • 1 1 1 1 • 4. 1
„ mine whether Chicago should be incorporated as a
Kimberlee. .,, ,..-., r ^ , 1 1
village, Dr. Kimberlee was one of the twelve who
voted in favor, while there was one in opposition. At the election
which occurred on August loth Dr. Kimberlee was elected one
of the town trustees and acted as clerk of the board. In the spring
of 1833, associated with Peter Pruyne, he opened the ' second
drug store in Chicago, Philo Carpenter having established the first
272 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
the year previous. Though continuing to practice medicine he was
considered the leading druggist in the city, and was best known
in connection with the drug" business. For many years he was closely
identified with educational matters and served in many official capaci-
ties in that connection. While continuing in the drug business he
was still' a practicing physician in the city for thirty years. His health
becoming impaired he retired from active life in 1854, and went to
reside at his country seat in Lake county. He lived a quiet, happy
life for twenty years, and died October 25, 1874, aged seventy-two
years.
Dr. Temple was another of the early eight. He was a native of
Virginia born in 1804. He graduated from Middlebury College in
Castleton, X'ermont, in 1830, and settled in Chicago
â„¢ -^ ' in 18^^. He came with a contract from the United
Temple. ^, ^^ , ., , ^, .
States government to carry the mail between Chi-
cago and Fort Howard at Green Bay. In the following year he was
instrumental in erecting the first building to be used for schools and
other public purposes. It was two stories in height and located near
the corner of Franklin and South Water streets. The upper room
was mainly used for religious assemblies; the lower one was for a
long time occupied as the principal school in the village. It was
known as the "Temple Building." Later he contracted with the
government to carry the mail from this point to Ottawa, Illinois,
and he drove the first mail coach between those points with his own
hands. His first and only passenger was Judge Caton, and according
to the Judge's statement carried not a single piece of mail. In his
church connection he was an ardent Baptist and was the prime mover
in the organization of the First Baptist church. He was an active
member of the school board, also a trustee of Rush Medical College
at the time of its organization. He adopted the Homeopathic med-
ical treatment and becoming an ardent disciple of Hahnemann, he
devoted himself to that method of practice. He first settled in
Galena ; later he removed to St. Louis, where he built up a large and
lucrative practice and became one of the founders of the St. Louis
Homeopathic College, in which he served as a member of the faculty
until his death, which occurred in 1877, in the seventy-seventh year
of his age.
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 273
Dr. John W. Eldreclge was one of the very early physicians. He
was born in Washington county, New York, in 1808, graduated at
^ ^ .,, Fairfield JMedical College, New York, in 18^4. He
Dr Iohn W
Eldredge " '^^ settled in Pittsfield, Pennsylvania, and from
tlience came to reside in Chicago in 1834. He was
a man of decided ability and especially pronounced in his opinions.
He came from a family prominent for intellectual ability. R. P.
Eldredge, Esq., a brother of his, was for many years one of the
leading lawyers in Michigan and noted for his elocpence. When
Chicago was incorporated as a city in 1837, provision was made for
the organization of a board of health, consisting of three commission-
ers. Of the three thus appointed Dr. Eldredge was chairman, and
Dr. Brainard was the first city physician under the new organization.
In 1S40, Dr. Eldredge was married to Miss Sophia Holton. Their
only daughter became the wife of Mr. George C. Clark, a prominent
business man of Chicago. Dr. Eldredge was one of the noted prac-
titioners in the city for thirty-four years. He retired from practice
in 1868 and died at his home January i, 1884. Eldredge court, the
place of that home, remains to perpetuate his name.
Dr. Joseph C. Goodhue was born in Pittsfield, Massachusetts.
His father, a physician, was the first president of the Berkshire
Medical Society and one of the founders of Berk-
^' -^ ' shire Medical College. After graduation. Dr.
Goodhue. ^ „ ,,,*'. • ^ ,
Goodhue settled for a tune m Canada and from
thence removed to Chicago in 1835. He first formed a partnership
with Dr. J. H. Barnard and a year later with Dr. S. Z. Haven. In
1837, he united with Dr. Brainard in the drafting of the bill for
incorporation of Rush Medical College which was passed by the
legislature that year, although by reason of the financial panic which
swept over the country, it was not organized until 1843. When
Chicago was incorporated as a city in 1837. Dr. Goodhue was elected
one of the board of aldermen from the First ward. He was also
one of the commissioners for the obtaining of subscriptions for the
building of the Galena Railroad, the first link in the vast network
which was soon to span the continent. He subsecjuently changed his
location to Rockford, Illinois, and was one* of the founders of the
Winnebago County Medical Society, wliich was for a time the leading
Vol. I— IS.
274 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
medical organization in the state.. Here he acquired an extensive
practice and by reason of an accident met with premature death.
Dr. Charles Volney Dyer was born in Clarendon, Vermont, in
1808. He graduated in medicine at Middlebury, in 1830, and com-
menced the practice of medicine in Newark, New
.p^ ' Jersey. In 1835, he came to Chicago. The follow-
ing" 3^ear he received the nomination for member-
ship in the state legislature, but was ineligible, not having resided
for the requisite time in the state. In 1837, he was elected judge
of probate. In 1840, he was appointed surgeon of the city guards.
He was married in 1837 to Miss Louise M. Gifiord, of Elgin. Their
daughter, Mrs. Stella Louise Loring, has for years been celebrated
for her development of one of the most popular young ladies' semi-
naries in this country. Dr. Dyer was always deeply interested in
educational work. When Bell's Commercial College was organized
in 1853, he was one of its trustees. He was also a trustee in a
popular private school known as the Garden City Institute. While
yet an active practitioner of medicine he was also interested in many
outside matters. He was one of the corporate members of the Chicago
Eye and Ear Infirmary in 1858. In 1859, he was a corporate member
of the North Chicago City Railway. The same year he was a charter
member of the Rosehill Cemetery. He was a leading Abolitionist and
knew all the ins. and outs of the "underground railroad," and harbored
many a fugitive slave in Chicago. His home was one of the most
prominent residences north of Lincoln Park. Dr. Dyer died in 1878
at the age of seventy years.
The 3^ear 1837 was one of the most eventful in the early history
of Chicago, in which, as before stated, the whole country was ab-
sorbed in w^ld speculation, and Chicago was one of the principal
centers. It was incorporated as a village in 1833, and contained at
that time three hundred inhabitants. Four years later it was incor-
porated as a city and the number had increased to 4,179. In connec-
tion with this rapid influx of population there was a proportionate,
or rather excessive increase of doctors of every name and creed.
Some came but for a day and were known no more. Others became
the stalwart representatives of the profession, achieving not only local
but national reputations: They were to be the founders of our
colleges and hospitals which would make this city such a center for
CHICAGO AND COOK COUXTV 275
medical education that its students would outnumber those of any
other in this country.
Dr. Levi Daniel Boone was one of the many physicians who came
to reside in Chicago in 1836, and who attained to special prominence
^ ^ ^ not only as a practitioner, but by reason of business
Dr. Levi D. ,.-.,' n tt 1 • 1
T, and CIVIC relations as well. He was born m the
Boone.
state of Kentucky in 1808, and was named for his
uncle, Daniel Boone, the famous Kentucky pioneer. He was a grad-
uate of Pennsylvania University and saw service as a captain in the
Black Hawk war in 1832. Tn 1839, he was a partner of Dr. Volney
C. Dyer, of whom mention has been made. He served as city phy-
sician for three vears and for the next three vears was one of the
city aldermen. In 1855, he was elected mayor of Chicago, the only
physician who in the seventy years since its incorporation has attained
to that position. \Vhile thus allied with civic interests during his
earlier years, he was in close touch with his profession. When the
Cook County Medical Society w-as organized October 3, 1836, the
same year of his arrival, he was elected secretary, and when, in 1850,
it was re-organized and took the name of Chicago Medical Society,
he was its first president. During this period Dr. Boone was also
interested in educational matters and was associated with his former
partner as a trustee of Garden City Listitute. He was also at that
time, 1853, one of the publishers of the Christian Times, theii one of
the leading Baptist publications in this country. In his earlier years
he was a decided pro-slavery man, in strong contrast with his partner,
Dr. Dyer, who was one of the most pronounced Abolitionists. He
delivered a series of lectures to proxe the scriptural warrant for
human slavery. Such was the intensity of feeling on that subject
and the difference of views that it led to a withdrawal of a portion
oi the members of the First, and the organization of the Second
Baptist church. Notwithstanding his \-iews concerning slavery, he
was a kindly mannered man, gentle and courteous to all. of perfect
integrity, hospitable as became his Southern origin, and much beloved
by all who knew him. . \\nicn Chicago L^niversity was first organized
under the auspices of the Baptist denomination, Dr. Boone was one
of its incorporators. He was eminently a man of business affairs.
As early as 1837, he was the secretary of the banking institution
known as the Chicago Fire and Alarine Insurance Company, and in
2/6 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
1852 was the president of the Merchants and Mechanics Bank of
Chicago. At the age of sixty years, Dr. Boone relinquished medical
practice and became extensively engaged in real estate and insurance
business, in which he was largely successful. His benefactions were
many and unostentatious. He is said to have contributed $100,000
to one religious organization. He passed peacefully to rest, sur-
rounded by a devoted family, in 1884, aged seventy-four years.
Dr. Brainard, whose ancestral record dates back to the immigrant
from England of the same name, who settled in Haddam, Connecti-
cut, in 1662, was born in Oneida county, New
^ â– York, in 18 12. He came to manhood with the
Brainard. , , . ,, , . , ,.
development of a fine physique and a commandmg
presence, at once inspiring respect. He was a farmer's son and
trained after the old New England fashion by the parents of whom
he might be justly proud. During his school days, and while pur-
suing his academic studies, he was noted for the exhaustive manner
in which he pursued his investigations. In fact this was character-
istic of him through life. As a result he was remarkably varied in
his attainments. While pursuing the study of medicine he found
time to deliver a course of scientific lectures at Fairfield, New York.
Also within his chosen field of study, two years after graduation, he
delivered a course of lectures on anatomy and physiology in Oneida
Institute. He studied at Rome, Whitesborough and in New York
City and graduated at Jefferson Medical College in 1834. During
the following year he was engaged in practice in Whitesborough,
New York, but as the tide of immigration towards the west was
strongly set, he determined to breast the vicissitudes of pioneer life
and came to Chicago in the autumn of 1835. From that day to the
date of his death,, although achieving an international reputation, he
continued to make Chicago his home. Though he had located at
what was then the extreme border of civilization, his firm determina-
tion was to maintain close relations with all that was best in his
profession. He foresaw that one of the needs of the mighty tide
of emigrants so rapidly peopling the great northwest would be a
medical college, in close proximity to their home, where the sons of
these hardy pioneers might be thoroughly trained for medical prac-
tice. As early as the winter of 1836-37, he outlined his project to
Dr. Goodhue, then one of the leading practitioners in the village,
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 277
later located in Rockford, who heartily joined him in the consumma-
tion of this purpose. He justly aspired to be a leader in his profes-
sion and to found a college which both at home and abroad, should
command respect. He determined, though at pecuniary loss, for the
time being, to avail himself of opportunities for further medical and
surgical research the best which tlie world afforded. In 1S39, lie
went to Paris, where he spent two full years in close relation with
those who as physicians and surgeons had received world-wide repu-
tations. On his return he delivered a course of lectures in St. Louis,
still having in mind the foimding of a medical college in Chicago.
In 1843, that purpose was fulfilled, and such was the profound
respect that Dr. Brainard entertained for his old preceptor, Dr.
Benjamin Rush of Philadelphia, that he gave to the new organization
the name of Rush Medical College. A brief history of the college
will be given later. In 1852, Dr. Brainard again visited Paris, and
having gained permission to pursue original investigation â– in Le
Jardin des Plantes, he made an extensive series of experiments,
noting the effects of woora and other poisons upon wounds inflicted
upon reptiles placed at his command. While there he was made an
honorary member of leading French societies, and also the Medical
Society of Geneva, Switzerland. In 1854, he obtained the prize
offered by the American Medical Association for his treatise on
"Ununited Fractures," a paper which was translated into most of
the leading foreign journals. In the further prosecution of his inves-
tigations, and for the completion of his works designed for publica-
tion, now well advanced. Dr. Brainard was contemplating a third
visit to Europe in the near future. But while in the full maturity
of his years, and in the midst of splendid achievements, his life was
suddenly cut short. At the early age of fifty-six years he died of
cholera in Chicago on the tenth day of October, 18C6. Thousands
of graduates from Rush Medical College, scattered world wide, unite
to venerate the name of Daniel Brainard.
Dr. Blaney was born in Newcastle, Maryland, in 1S20. He
graduated at Princeton, New Jersey, when eighteen years old, and
^^ ^ -.r ^t the earlv age of twenty-one received his medical
Dr. James V. ,. , / j re at r 1 r- n t.
^•^ diploma from letferson Medical College. It was
JdLANEY. , . • ■, " 1 -1 r -n r TT
his rare privilege to be a pupil of Professor Henry,
so long and so favorably known in connection with the Smithsonian
278 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
Institute. Though an inviting field was at his command he early
determined to try his fortune in what was then termed "The Western
Frontier." In 1842, he visited St. Louis, and for a brief time was in
the government employ at Jefferson barracks. Later in the year he
went to St. Paul. In 1843, when the faculty of Rush Medical College
was organized, he was invited to occupy the chair of chemistry and
materia medica, and from that time forwar-d, Chicago was his home.
From the first he was regarded as one of the most popular lecturers
and was an especial favorite with medical students. He also engaged
in the practice of medicine and soon held a position second to none
in the city. His testimony in the celebrated Green trial, and the dem-
onstrations there made before the jury, were such as to gain for him
a national reputation as a chemical expert. As a literary man he
stood in the front rank of his profession, and had the honor of con-
ducting as editing chief the Illinois and Indiana Medical Journal,
the first medical periodical published in this section of the west. He
was one of the founders of the Cook County Medical Society, and
one of its delegates to the Springfield convention in 1850, which
resulted in the formation of the Illinois State Medical Society. For
several years he served as its treasurer, and later was its president.
At the outbreak of the Civil war, Dr. Blaney tendered his services to
the Department of the Union Army, and was soon assigned to the
important position of medical director and medical inspector at Fort-
ress Monroe. Such was his power of discrimination and such his
excellent judgment in matters of appointment that he was soon
regarded as one of the most important officers connected with the
medical department in the army. In 1864 he was made medical
purveyor and stationed at Chicago, in which position army stores,
the value of which was counted by millions, passed under his super-
vision, and the fidelity with which he executed the trust won for him
special commendation by the government and he was given the rank
of lieutenant colonel. At the conclusion of the war he resumed his
former position in the faculty of Rush Medical College and when,
by reason of the sudden death of President Brainard, the presidency
of the college was vacated, he was unanimously chosen for that posi-
tion. The highest honor within the gift of the Masonic fraternity
came to him wtihout solicitation. Personally Dr. Blaney rarely had
his equal as an accomplished gentleman. As a conversationalist he
CHICAGO AND COOK CULM A' 279
was at once brilliant and always instructive. On the platform he
was a most attractive speaker, and his addresses on public occasions
won for him the admiration of his fellows. When the corner stone
of the old Chicago University was to be laid with Alasonic cere-
monies, by common consent Dr. Blaney was the orator. Such was
the strenuous life he led in connection with his public duties that his
health gradually failed. He was obliged to resign the presidency of
the college, and deeply to the regret of his patients, compelled to
relinquish his medical practice. During his active years his services
had been valuable in many ways, and in the formative period of the
city just such men were especially needed. He was not only active
in organizing and building up medical societies but also was one of
the founders of the Chicago Academy of Sciences, the Microscopical
Society of Chicago and a specially active member of the Chicago
Historical Society, to all of which he made important contributions.
In 1876, he passed peacefully to his rest at his Chicago home, one of
Chicago's most cherished citizens.
Dr. William B. Herrick, a native of Maine, was born at Durham,
in 18 1 3. He received his literary education at Gorham Academy,
and spent several years in teaching. He received
„ ■the medical degree from Dartmouth College in
1836. He had early determined to make his home
in the west, and in 1837 settled in Louisville, Kentucky. During his
residence there he was connected with the Louisville Medical College.
In 1839 he removed to Hillsborough, Illinois. The following year
he was married to Miss Martha J. Seward, daughter of John B.
Seward, one of tlie prominent pioneers and a near relative of the
Hon. Wm. H. Seward. Dr. Herrick remained in medical practice
in Hillsborough four years, when he accepted the chair of anatomy
in Rush Medical College, and came to Chicago in 1844. Two years
later he was enrolled as assistant surgeon in the first company of
Illinois volunteers and saw much acti\e service in the Mexican war.
He served as surgeon-in-chief at Buena Vista and later had charge
of the hospital at Saltillo. He was compelled to resign this position
by reason of health and returned to medical practice in Chicago and
to his chair in the college. Though nc\cr restored to his former
health Dr. Herrick was al)lc to meet the requirements of a very
extensi\e practice and of a large social acquaintance. He was active
28o CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
in the support of the local medical societies and editor of the North-
western Medical Journal. When a convention was called to meet at
Springfield in June, 1850, Dr. Herrick and Dr. Blaney were appointed
to represent the Cook County Medical Society, and as there was at
that time no railroad communication with Springfield the journey
was performed on horseback. At that convention the State Society
was organized and Dr. Herrick had the honor of being its first presi-
dent. During those years Dr. Herrick was one of the most promi-
nent and popular members of the Masonic fraternity, being past
master of Oriental Lodge, a member of Apollo Commandery, and
grand past master of the Grand Lodge of Masons of Illinois. Suf-
fering gradually but increasingly from spinal paresis, Dr. Herrick
was obliged to relinquish practice and retire from active life in 1857.
He had the undoubted sympathy of a host of ardent friends and his
retirement was a serious loss to the medical profession. He returned
to his native state with the hope that in his old home beside the sea
he might yet improve, but the hope was vain. The insidious disease
through eight long; years never relinquished its hold. Bravely he
bore his sufferings, tenderly he was cared for, and on the last day of
the year 1865 he entered into rest, aged fifty-two years.
Dr. Evans, the founder of Evanston and of the Northwestern
University, was born in Waynesville, Indiana, March 9, 1814. He
graduated at the Cincinnati Medical College in
â– -' 1B38. He came to Chicago in 1848, was appointed
Professor of Obstetrics in 1849, ^^^ held that
position until 1855. Through the ministration of Bishop Simpson,
he was led to unite with the Methodist Episcopal church, and became
a most influential man in that denomination. It was he who in con-
nection with Bishop Simpson first selected a location for the North-
western University, and for him, when the site was selected, the place
was named Evanston, and when the institution was organized, he
was its first president, and to it he made liberal contributions. We
are indebted to him also for the inauguration of the Chicago high
school. For several years he served as editor of the Northwestern
Medical and Surgical Journal. He was also active in political affairs
and was one of the delegates to the Republican convention which nom-
inated Lincoln for the presidency in i860. He was also actively
engaged in railroad enterprises and was largely instrumental in secur-
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 281
ing the right of way for the entrance of the Pennsylvania Central
Railroad into Chicago, and also in the huilding of the Chicago &
Ft. Wayne Railroad. He retired from medical practice in 1855 and
devoted himself to extended real estate and business enterprises.
President Lincoln appointed him governor of Colorado in 1862 and
at the first session of the Colorado legislature he was elected United
States senator. He was largely instrumental in the building up of
the new city of Denver, wliich had become his permanent home,
and where he died July 3, 1897, aged eighty-three years.
Perhaps no other man of the medical profession has been more
widely known or more highly honored than was Dr. Davis. Probal^ly
no one exerted a like influence in bringing into inti-
T^ â– mate relation and fraternal fellowship the leadinsr
Davis. , . , ,. , , . . , . *=*
members of the medical profession in this country.
The powerful organization known as the American Medical Associa-
tion has done more to secure this result than all other influences com-
bined, and to him as to no other it is indebted for its organization and
successful development. It would require a volume to give adequate
expression to the work which he accomplished. Our limits only permit
a brief outline of his life and labors.
He was born in Chenango county, New York, in 181 7. Until he
was sixteen years old he labored on his father's farm and had the
educational advantages of the common district school. Although the
youngest of seven children, such was his love of books that he was
permitted to attend the Cazenovia Academy, then in the zenith of its
prosperity, and from which so many eminent men entered public life.
He commenced the study of medicine at the early age of seventeen
years under the supervision of Dr. Daniel Clark, one of the most
prominent physicians in his native county. He attended his first
course of lectures at the College of Physicians and Surgeons in New
York City during the winter of 1834-35. In the spring of '35 he
registered with Dr. Thomas Jackson, one of the leading physicians
in Binghamton, New York, and graduated at Fairfield in 1S37. when
he was not yet twenty-one years old. The same year he opened an
office in Binghamton and in 1838 was happily married to Miss Anna
Maria, daughter of Hon. John Parker of Vienna, New York. He
was soon elected a member of Brown County Medical Society, and
was an officer continuously in that organization until he removed from
282 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
the county. In 1842 he was appointed to represent the county in the
New York State Medical Society and took his seat in that body in
Albany in February, 1844. At this first meeting with the state society
he offered a series of resolutions having for their object the securing
of a higher standard of medical education, and so ably did he advo-
cate that at the next annual meeting, in 1845, ^^^ following resolution
presented by him was adopted, to wit : "Resolved, That the New York
Medical Society earnestly recommend a national convention of dele-
gates from medical societies and colleges in the whole Union to con-
vene in the city of New York on the first Tuesday in May, 1846, for
the purpose of adopting some concerted action on the subject set forth
in the preamble." The resolution was adopted, and a committee
appointed to carry out the purpose of the resolution, of which Dr.
Davis was made chairman. As the result of extended correspon-
dence, a large and influential meeting was held in New York City in
1846 representing nearly every state in the Union. At this meeting
committees were appointed to perfect a permanent organization. The
meeting adjourned to meet in Philadelphia the following year. At
that meeting the committees reported, plans were duly perfected,
and the American Medical Association was organized. By reason of
the arduous labors in organization and later development, by common
consent Dr. Davis has been recognized as the "father" of the associa-
tion. In 1847 he removed from Binghamton to New York City and
became connected with the College of Physicians and Surgeons. While
thus connected and also engaged in private practice, he still found
time to edit the medical journal called The Analyist. In 1849 he
accepted a call to the chair of physiology and general pathology in
Rush Medical College, and came to reside in Chicago in the fall of
that year.
Of his relations with Mercy Hospital from its founding in 1850,
until his retirement in 1890, a period of forty years, further mention
will be made when speaking of that institution. At the close of his
first course of lectures in Rush Medical College he was transferred to
the chair of principles and practice of medicine and of clinical medi-
cine. Pie occupied this position for ten years. When the medical de-
partment of Lind University was organized in 1859 he resigned to
accept the like position in that institution. The reasons for this change
are fully set forth in the liistor}^ of the Lind University and need not
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 283
be recited here. Though not present at the organization of the IlUnois
State Medical Society at Springfield in 1850, he was elected a mem-
ber at that time, and rarely through all the successive years until the
time of his death was he absent from its annual meetings. He was
elected its president in 1855, and for twelve consecutive years served
as its secretary. \Vhether in local, state or national society, his labors
were alike conspicuous and helpful. He wielded the i)en of a ready
writer, and his productions were able, terse and convincing. In i<S:^5
he had become the leading editor of the Chicago Medical Journal, and
held that position until 1859. In i860 he began the publication of a
new journal named the Medical Examiiicr, and continued the same
until 1873, when it became the property of the Medical Publicati(jn
Society and was merged with the Chicago Medical Journal with the
two names , united.
When in 1853 it w\as determined by the American Medical Asso-
ciation to journalize its transactions and issue them weekly, Dr. Davis
was by common consent chosen editor of the journal. He gave to it a
vast amount of personal attention until it was successfully and per-
manently established. At the eighth International jMedical Congress
held in Copenhagen in 1884, it was voted to hold its next session in
Washington, District of Columbia, in 1887. ^'^ ^^''^ preparation for
the meeting the arduous work of the general secretary rested up<3n
Dr. Davis. While in the midst of the labors incident to this respon-
sible position, Prof. Austin Flint, Sr., the president-elect of the com-
ing congress, suddenly died, and Dr. Davis was at once called to that
position. In the furtherance of its interests he visited England and
held extended correspondence with most of the principal men in Eu-
rope who were specially interested in the congress. The congress at
Washington was an eminent success. Dr. Davis presided over its
deliberations with conspicuous ability.
It is hardly needful to say that he was closely identified with the
educational, moral and philanthropic institutions of the city wherever
in civic relations his influence could be felt. He was one of the
founders of the Northwestern University and one of its most influen-
tial trustees until his death. In the Union Law School of Chicago he
held the chair of medical jurisprudence. He gave years of time to
the management of the \Vashingtonian Home for the reclamation of
inebriates. He was also one of the founders of the Chicago Historical
284 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
Society, the Academy of Sciences and of the Chicago Microscopical
Society. During his years of collegiate instruction he found time
to publish his extended work on the "Principles and Practice of Medi-
cine," in which his teachings are concisely embodied. Early in life
he set himself to the accomplishm.ent of three important purposes.
The first was the organization of an American Medical Association
which should unify the medical profession of the entire Union. The
second was the foundation of a medical college in which a graded
course of instruction should be inaugurated. The third was the pub-
lication of a text book upon the "Principles and Practice of Medi-
cine." Each of these in due time he lived to see realized.
Personally Dr. Davis, though slight in form, was a man of almost
unparalleled endurance, which, with intense adherence to his con-
victions, coupled with untiring industry, made him eminently success-
fuPin the accomplishment of his purposes. He was a man of strong
religious convictions and an active member of the Methodist Episcopal
church, and one of its most constant attendants. His home relations
were ideal. Until almost the last he continued his daily visits to his
office. When at last he fell asleep his loving family was at his side.
He died June i6, 1904, aged eighty-seven years.
Dr. Hosmer Allen Johnson was a native of Wales, near Buffalo,
New York. He was born in 1822, and spent his childhood among the
rocks and dells which surrounded his home. There
he imbibed a lifelong love of nature. When ten years
Johnson. , , , . , ^ , ,,r- , •
old, his parents removed to Almont, Michigan,
where, aside from the advantages of a good district school, he derived
a still more valuable instruction from a gifted mother. He had the
sad misfortune while yet a youth to suffer from a severe attack of acute
bronchitis, from which in a chronic form he never fully recovered.
Though tuberculosis was never developed, the affection was the oc-
casion of repeated attacks of pneumonia, and these often so severe
,as to imperil his life. Gradually his health began to improve, and at
the age of eighteen he entered the Romeo Academy, and from thence
the sophomore class of Michigan University. During the second
year of his course his health so failed that he was obliged to leave col-
lege, as his friends thought, not again to re-enter. Though seem-
ingly thwarted in his purpose, his tireless ambition never permitted
him to falter. He soon- found himself at the head of a select school
CHICAGO AND COOK COUXTY 285
in Vandalia, Illinois, and while thus engaged pursued the college cur-
riculum of studies. He returned to the university in time to pass his
examination and graduated with his class in 1849. I' or years it
had been his purpose to enter the medical profession. In the further-
ance of this design he came to Chicago and registered as a medical
student with Dr. W^m. B. Herrick, then one of the leading prac-
titioners, and a professor in Rush Medical College. At that time
Mercy Hospital, the first to be established in Chicago, was being or-
ganized, and Dr. Johnson, though not yet a graduate, was Chicago's
first medical interne. He graduated from Rush Medical College in
1852, and only a year later became a member of its faculty. These
relations continued until 1858, when he resigned from Rush, having
in mind, with others, the organization of a new college in which to
inaugurate a graded system of instruction. In 1859 that purpose was
accomplished by the development of a medical department in Lind
University, afterwards the Chicago Medical College, and later the
Medical School of the Northwestern University. In addition to pro-
fessional and college labors, he was also editor-in-chief of the North-
western Medical Journal.
When by reason of the Chicago fire the Relief and Aid Society
was formed he was one of those most active in its organization,
through which important agency millions of dollars were distributed,
and that without the shadow of a criticism. Such incessant labors so
told upon his strength that he never fully recovered his former health.
In civic life he bore a conspicuous part, not ostentatiously, but with
signal effect. Many honors came to him and he bore them with that
modesty becoming the man. Through life Dr. Johnson was a promi-
nent member of the Masonic fraternity. Its highest honors came to
him unsouo-ht. In his religious connection, in earlv life he was a
member of the Methodist Episcopal church. In later years he was
prominently identified with the Central Church of Chicago under the
ministration of Prof. David Swing. Dr. Johnson was exceptionally
happy in his home relations. Soon after his graduation he was mar-
ried to Miss Margaret Seward, a relative of Senator Seward, a lady
of elegant culture and refinement. To them were born a darling
dau"-hter, who died while vet in the bloom of vouth. and an only son,
Frank Seward Johnson, who became dean of the college his father
helped to found and president of its board of trustees. He ranks as
286 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
«
one of Chicago's most prominent physicians. Dr. Johnson's health
had been gradually failing, and an unfortunate exposure while visit-
ing an old patient accelerated the result, and he sank to his rest Feb-
ruary 26, 1 89 1, at the age of sixty-nine years.
Dr. Andrews was born in 1824 and died at his residence in Chi-
cago January 24, 1904. He was in its fullest sense a manly repre-
sentative of the old New England stock. His
/ father was a Presbyterian clergyman and his
Andrews. , , , -l , , , 1 t 1 r
mother a descendant of the celebrated Lathrop fam-
ily. His academic days were spent in the Rochester Collegiate Insti-
tute, New York, and in the Romeo Academy, Michigan. He
matriculated in the Michigan University in 1846, and graduated in
1849. He then entered the medical department of that institution
and received his diploma in 1852, and at the same date the degree
of A. M. The following three years he was engaged in medical
practice in Ann Arbor, the seat of the university. During that time
he occupied the position of demonstrator of anatomy, and of com-
parative anatomy. During these years he edited and published the
Peninsular Medical Journal, of which he was both editor and pro-
prietor. His ability as a writer was at once conspicuous. A larger
field was awaiting him and in 1856 he became a resident of Chicago,
and during that year was appointed demonstrator of anatomy, and
professor of comparative anatomy in Rush Medical College. Three
years later he was one of the prime movers in the organization of
the medical department of Lind University, in which he occupied
the chair of principles and practice of surgery and of clinical and
military surgery. He held this position during his active service
through life and later as an emeritus. He was surgeon in chief in
Mercy Hospital, and in continuous service there since 1859, except
while on duty in the field during the Civil war, or when absent on his
summer vacation. He maintained active membership in the local
societies, the State Medical Society, the American Medical Associ-
ation, the Society of Physicians and Surgeons of Michigan, and was
an honorary member of several foreign bodies. He was also the
surgeon of the First Regiment, Illinois Light Artillery, and saw
active service in the field at Corinth, Shiloh, Pittsburg Landing, and
elsewhere. He was eminently a lover of science. In its interests
he thought and wrote so much that one was not long in his presence
CHICAGO AND COOK COUXTY 287
before being led into the discussion of some scientific subject, or to
a visit with him to some far off unfrequented glen, or mountain side
well nigh unknown where in his vacation hours he had heart to heart
revels with wilds of nature not yet desecrated by the hands of man.
Such were his in\estigations with reference to the geological con-
formation of the Northern States and British America that on these
subjects he was considered one of the most competent and reliable
authorities. He was active in the organization of the Chicago Acad-
emy of Sciences, to which in its early years it mainly owed its success.
He w^as also a member of the Academy of Sciences of Wisconsin.
Dr. Andrews did not reveal to others his strength and fullness so
fully as when, seemingly almost oblivious to things around, he gave
himself to abstract reasoning, for things he knew not he profoundly
sought to learn. His methods of investigation were so manifest in
his teaching as to leave lasting impressions upon the minds of his
many pupils.
He was a man of strong and settled religious conviction, a critical
student of the Bible, of which for many years he was a gifted
instructor. His home relations were of all others most dear to him,
and there he passed peacefully to rest, aged eighty years. Memorial
services were held in the Second Presbyterian church, at which time
Michigan University was represented by some of her ablest men,
and successive speakers seemed to vie with others in paying loving
tribute to his memory. There was nothing of fulsome adulation, but
such portrayal of his character and work as well became the man.
On his father's side Dr. Freer w^as of Dutch descent, and his
mother was from the Paine families, wdio were among the most
^ ^ prominent of the earlv New England settlers. He
Dr. Joseph , . ,, v " v.r 1 • . . x-
,„ i^ was born m It. Ann, W ashmgton countv. New
W. rREER.
York, in 18 16. At the early age of eighteen he
commenced the study of medicine in Clyde, New York, under the
tutelage of Dr. Lemuel C. Paine. Relinquishing his medical studies
only for a time, he came to Chicago in 1836, when the great land
craze was at its height, and in connection with his father's family
located government land near the present city of Wilmington. Illi-
nois, where, while farming, he resumed the study of medicine. In
1844, he was married to Miss Iimily Holden. daughter of Phincas
Holden of Will countv. Mrs. Freer died within two vears of their
288 • CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
marriage. Though Dr. Freer had been successful as a business man,
this sad event led to an entire change in his plans, and his fondness
for the medical profession was such that he closed out his farming
interests, came to Chicago, entered the office of Dr. Daniel Brainard,
and graduated from Rush Medical College in 1849. He soon came
to hold very intimate relation, both personal and professional, with
Dr. Brainard and was his trusted assistant in a great number of
capital operations, laying broad and strong the foundation of an
extended surgical practice to which he soon' attained. While yet a
medical student he served as demonstrator of anatomy, and when
Professor Herrick was transferred from the professorship of anat-
omy in Rush College, Dr. Freer was elected to fill the vacancy. Soon
.after his graduation he married Miss Katharine Gatter of Wurtem-
berg, Germany. Three sons and a daughter were the fruitage of the
union, each attaining to prominence in early life. One an eminent
artist, another following in the footsteps of his father, a prominent
physician in his native city. Dr. Freer was deservedly popular with
the medical students who at his decease had come to be numbered
by hundreds. In the organization of the faculty in 1859, at his
request he was transferred to the chair of physiology and micro-
scopical anatomy. In his pursuance of his physiological investiga-
tions he gave much time to vivisection, not only before his classes
but also by request in the presence of the State Medical Society. In
connection with the hospital his labors were varied and arduous. In
the United States Marine Hospital he was in active service with
Dr. Brainard during the entire period that the latter was surgeon-in-
chief of that institution. He was also a member of surgical staff
at Mercy Hospital. At the reorganization of the County Hospital
at the close of the Civil war he was appointed a member of the med-
ical board and held that position until his death. At the outbreak of
the Civil war he entered the military service and was immediately
promoted to the rank of brigade surgeon. His health being unequal
to the labors incident to that position he was obliged to resign. Later
he received the appointment of enrolling surgeon for the Chicago
district and rendered most important service in deciding upon the
fitness of those who were applicants for appointment in the army.
For several years after the war Dr. Freer spent much time in Europe,
repeating his visits until he was familiar with all the main medical
CHICAGO AND COUK COUNT V â– 289
centers of the old world. For years he had been making rare collec-
tions illustrative of his teachings, all to be swept away by the fire of
1871. After the death of Dr. Brainard in 1866, Dr. J. \'. Z. Baleny
succeeded to the presidency of the college, but his health soon failing
he was obliged to resign the position and Dr. Freer succeeded to the
presidency in 1872 ; thus the student who graduated in 1849 ^^^^ been
steadily advanced in position and in influence until after twenty-three
years of active service he became the president of his alma mater.
For five years after the Chicago fire he struggled manfully to retrieve
his wasted fortune and in this he was rapidly succeeding. His plans
for the future were wisely made and only needed time for their
maturing, but this was not to be. Gradually he sank under failing
health and died in April, 1877, at the age of sixty-one years.
Dr. William Heath By ford was born in Easton, Ohio, May 21,
18 1 7. While yet a child his parents removed to New Albany, Indi-
ana. His father died when he was nine years old
tt' t> and he soon had need to be a helpful member of
H. Byford. . .
the family. Seeking a trade he became apprenticed
to a tailor in Palestine, and later completed his apprenticeship in
Vincennes, Indiana. The beginnings of the man to be were in him
from the first. His desire to obtain a liberal education was such
that while faithfully plying his needle he not only mastered the
primary branches of an English education but also a sufficient
knowledge of tlie Greek and Latin classics to fit him to enter the
sophomore class in a literary college. For a long time it had been
his desire to fit himself for the practice of medicine. With this pur-
pose in view he registered as a medical student with Dr. Joseph
Matteson, then one of the leading physicians in Vincennes, and such
was his progress, that in eighteen months he passed the requisite
examination, was granted a certificate by the examining board, and
entitled to practice medicine and surgery. For two years he was
thus engaged when he removed to Mount Vernon, Indiana, and
became the partner of Dr. Hezekiah Hammond, the daughter of
w^hom, later, became his wife. Dr. Byford received his medical
degree from the Ohio Medical College in 1844. In 1850, he was
invited to the chair of anatomy in the Evansville College, and a year
later was transferred to that of the theory and practice of medicine.
He became one of the vice-presidents of the American ^ledical Asso-
Vol. 1—19.
290 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
ciation in 1857. The same year he accepted the chair of obstetrics
and diseases of women and children in Rush Medical College. When
the medical department of the Lind University was organized in
1859 he transferred his relation to a like position in the new insti-
tution. Dr. Byford, though a wise and conservative teacher, was at
the same time a bold and successful operaiior. He was the founder
of gynecology as a specialty in Chicago, and by common consent has
been termed its father. He was eminently successful as an organizer.
The institutions which he was largely instrumental in founding he
lived to see permanently established. He first projected a Women's
Hospital in 1865, and a year later gave liberally of his time and
money to the founding of a Women's College, which later came into
the possession of a college building in immediate proximity to the
City Hospital, where accommodations for two hundred students were
provided at a cost of $40,000. In 1876, he was active in the organ-
ization of the American Gynecological Association, was one of its
first vice-presidents, and then became its president. He was also
prominent as a medical writer. In 1875 he became editor-in-chief of
the Chicago Medical Journal and Examiner, which he conducted until
its management was assumed by the Chicago Medical Publishing
Society. He published an extended treatise on "Chronic Inflamma-
tion and Displacements of the Womb." This was soon followed by his
elaborate text-book entitled, "The Practice of Medicine and Surgery
as Applied to Women," which passed through a series of editions.
His writings were founded largely upon the results of his personal
observations, and in many instances show that he was blazing the
way in which other footsteps were to follow. Just at the time when
he seemed to have reached the zenith of a successful life and the
fulfillment of a most commendable ambition, in an hour least antici-
pated, his career was suddenly closed, and a family dearly beloved,
and a retinue of friends were left to bemoan this sudden bereave-
ment. Though brief, his life was full orbed, and he died at the age
of fifty years.
Dr. Isham was born in Herkimer county. New York, in 183 1.
He received a thorough academic education and graduated at Bellevue
Medical College in 1852. As surgeon of a ship, he
J ' crossed the ocean and visited many of the promi-
nent foreign medical institutions. Returning he
CHICAGO AND COOK COUXTN' 291
came to reside in Chicago in 1856. He soon gained the favorable
notice of Dr. Brainard, president of Rush College, then the leading
surgeon of the north.west, and l)y this means, and his own native
merit, his relations with llic medical profession and with the commu-
nity at large were soon successfully established. At lirst he was a
partner of Dr. Norcom, but later was associated with Dr. David
Rutter, formerly a noted obstetrician, from Philadelphia, but now
retired from practice. ]t was in this office that in conjunction with
Dr. Rutter and himself. Dr. Hosmer A. Johnson and Dr. Edmund
Andrews met for a conference which resulted in the development of
a medical department of Lind University. When the faculty of that
institution was organized he assumed the chair of surgical anatomy
and of operative surgery. Later when the college was reorganized
and incorporated as the Chicago IMedical College, he held the chair
of principles and practice of surgery and of clinical surgery. He held
many important professional positions. Not only did he give largely
of his time and means to the building of the college with which he
was connected, serving as its secretary for years, but he was actively
employed elsewhere. For years he was surgeon-in-chief of the
Marine Hospital ; he w^as also surgeon of the Chicago Hospital, be-
sides holding the posit-ion of surgcon-in-chief of the great Northwest-
ern ]\ailway System. As a skillful and successful operator to the
end of life he held a prominent position in the profession. By mar-
riage he was related to the family of George \V. Snow, one of the
leading pioneers of the city, and his home became one of the noted
ones in the north division. Ample means gave him the opportunity to
gratify his tastes along literary lines; his library was ample and of
rare excellence ; his summer home at Lake Geneva was a favorite
resort ; his early church relation was with the Second Presbyterian
church ; he was afterwards one of the leading men associated with
Professor Swing. His son, George S. Isham, succeeds his father in
the profession and college relations. Dr. Isham died at his home in
Chicago, iVIay 27, 1904.
On his father's side Dr. Allen was of Dutch antecedents. His
mother's ancestral representative came in the Mayllower. a Puritan
of the Puritans. He was born at Middleburv. \'er-
Dr. Jonathan ^ . ., 1 r 1 ■/-i • \ ' _
» •' . mont. m i8j;, and died in Chicago. Aul-usi 1 ;.
A. Allen. „ , ■^ tt . 1 1 • i-. T
1890, aged sixty-nve vears. He took his literarv de-
292 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
gree at Middlebury College and received his medical diploma at
Castleton Medical College, 1846, when only twenty-one years of
age. In 1847 ^"^^ located in Kalamazoo, Michigan, and the same
year was married to Miss Mary Marsh of that village. While there
engaged in practice, when the medical department of Michigan Uni-
versity was organized in 1850, he was called to the chair of physi-
ology and pathology. Here he entered upon his brilliant career as a
medical teacher. He was a prominent member of the Michigan
State Medical Society, of which he was president in 1858. In 1859
he was invited to the chair of principles and practice of medicine in
Rush Medical College, which position he held for thirty-one years,
and which only failing health compelled him to relinquish. He was
a brilliant lecturer and an able instructor. Thousands of students
who listened to his lectures have a fond memory of "Uncle Allen."
He was a man of exquisite literary taste, and his fondness for an-
cient classics was remarkable. His library was composed of excep-
tionally rare books. He also gave his vacations to foreign travel.
In Morocco, in Egypt, in Palestine, in England and upon the Conti-
nent he was alike at home. He was a prominent member of the
Masonic fraternity, its highest honors came to him unsolicited, and
on many a public occasion he was the chosen orator. As a citizen
and patriot, as a professional man and personal friend, few are per-
mitted to achieve such distinction as that which was worthily won
by Dr. Allen. After a brief illness he died at his residence in Chicago
in 1890. Rush College accorded to him its highest honor and was
richly requited by his thirty years of personal service.
Dr. Gunn was of Scotch antecedents, .a lineal descendant of the
Gunn Clan in the north of Scotland. He was born in East Bloomfield,
New York, April 20, 1822. He graduated at Ge-
â– neva Medical College in 1846. When the medical
Gunn. , , , °,^. , . ^^ .
department of the Michigan University was or-
ganized he was elected to the chair of surgery, which position he
held for seventeen years. In 1848 Dr. Gunn was married to Miss
Jane Augusta Terry, and made his residence in Detroit, though still
continuing his connection with the university. The degree of A. M.
was conferred upon him by Geneva College in 1856, and in 1877 he
received the degree of LL. D. from the Chicago University. At the
call of his country in 1861 he entered the army, and while thus serv-
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 293
ing he was perfecting himself in military surgery. At the close of
the war he was called to the chair of surgery in Rush Medical College,
made vacant by the death of Dr. Brainard. which position he held for
twenty years preceding his dcatli. As a surgeon he was held in high
repute, and as a lecturer was always attractive and instructive. 1 le
was a man of remarkably fine physique, and in whatsoever sphere was
one always to be noted. After a protracted illness he died at his
home in Chicago, November 4, 1887, in the sixty-sixth year of age.
Dr. De Laskie Miller was a farmer lad until the age of seven-
teen. He was born in Niagara county, May 29, 18 18. Leaving the
^ _ .^ farm, he acquired a good academic education and
Dr. De Laskie , , 1 • 1 1 1 • t^
^ tor tour years was engaged m school teachmg. Dur-
ing this period he was pursuing his studies, having
in view the medical profession. He graduated from Geneva Medical
College in 1842. He first engaged in practice in Lockport, N. Y..
and then removed to Flint, Michigan, where he built up a fine lucra-
tive practice. In 1852 he removed to Chicago, and entered into part-
nership with Dr. A. D. Palmer, who later was called to the chair of
theory and practice of medicine in Michigan University. In 1859
Dr. Miller was appointed professor of obstetrics and diseases of women
in Rush Medical College, and he held that position with great accep-
tance for thirty years. He traveled extensively in Europe, acquaint-
ing himself with the prominent teachers in the old world, observing
critically their methods and their facilities with a view to a betterment
of medical teaching in this country. He went also as a delegate to
the Seventh International Congress which was held in London in
1 88 1. He was honored with the chairmanship of the obstetrical sec-
tion of the International Congress when it met in Washington in 1887.
His popularity at home was attested by the fact that he was appointed
consultant in his department in St. Luke's, Cook County, Presbyte-
rian and Michael Reese hospitals. He was a member of the local so-
ciety at Chicago, of the State Medical Society, and of the American
Medical Association. Pie was also honored by a life membership in
the British Gynecological Society of London.' As a member of vari-
ous Masonic orders he was especially conspicuous and won for him-
self the highest honors at their command. Plis religious affiliation
was with the Episcopal church, of which he was an honored and ex-
emplary member. He was an ardent patriot, an honored citizen, a
294 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
boon companion. His manly bearing, his lucid teaching and his
kindness of heart never failed to impress for good the thousands of
students who listened to his teachings. Thus he lived and thus he
died, July 9, 1903, aged eighty-five years.
Dr. Abraham Reeves Jackson, the son of Washington and De-
borah Lee Jackson, was born in the city of Philadelphia June 17,
1827; concluded his classical course in his native
-r, â– -r city, entered upon the study of medicine and gradu-
R. Jackson. -^ \ , , ,. , , , -^^ , .
ated from the medical department of Jrennsylvania
College in 1848. For twenty-two years he practiced medicine in-
Stroudsburgh, Pennsylvania. During the Civil war he was assistant
medical director of the United States Army of Virginia. In 1871
he accompanied an expedition from New York to Palestine as ship
surgeon. In his "Innocents Abroad," Mark Twain makes pleasant
mention of the doctor, who was his boon companion. He came to
reside in Chicago in 1850, and immediately set about the founding
of a women's hospital, of which he became surgeon in chief in 1872.
At that date he became lecturer upon gynecology in Rush Medical
College and continued that relation until professional labors com-
pelled him to resign. He will be longest remembered in connection
with the founding of the Chicago College of Physicians and Sur-
geons, of which he was president, having as his associate founders,
Drs. D. A. K. Steel, S. A. McWilliams, Leonard St. John and Charles
Warrington Earle. Dr. Jackson achieved to such prominence in
gynecological practice as to make large drafts upon diis time and
strength and yet found time for much literary work. He was for
several years the editor of the Chicago Medical Register. He was
also associate editor of the Independent Practitioner of New York
City, and also editor of the Western Medical Reporter, published in
Chicag-o. Aside from his gynecological studies and practice, he gave
much time to medical jurisprudence, and was coming to be regarded as
an authority in that department. During the performance of a gyne-
cological operation he had the sad misfortune of becoming infected,
and gradually developed arterial atheroma, ending in apoplexy. He
died suddenly at his home November 15, 1892, aged sixty-five years.
He had achieved prominence in his profession and his death was
recognized as a serious loss.
CHICAGO AND CO(M< COUXIA' 295
Dr. David Shepard Smith was a native of Xcw Jc-r.scy, born in
Camden in 18 16. He was of Welsh extraction and was possessed
„ T^ o of ^'1^' intensity of conviction, the nnfaihiiLT purnijse
Dr. David S. , . , . 1 • , , r , f> ' 1
^ to wm and ot hiy;h moral tone of character so char-
acteristic of that people. Having the advantage of
a thorough preliminary education, he entered upon his medical stud-
ies at the early age of seventeen. He applied himself earnestly to
the attainment of his profession, attended three full courses of lec-
tures at Jefferson Medical College, from which he was graduated in
1836, when he became a resident of Chicago. For several years he
had been studying the tenets of Hahnemann, and in 1843 announced
himself as a practitioner of homeopathy. His partner, Dr. Adams,
became his associate in the same practice, and Dr. Aaron Pittman,
who had moved hither from Jordan. New York, completed the nu-
cleus from which homeopathic practice and homeopathic institutions
were to be developed in Chicago. Dr. Smith has been styled the
"father of homeopathy" in Chicago and in the northwest. It was
through his instrumentality that a charter was obtained and the
Hahnemann College of Chicago was founded. For many years he
was its treasurer and most active promoter. The honorary degree
of doctor of medicine was conferred upon him in 1856 by the Homeo-.
pathic College of Cleveland. He was made secretary of the Ameri-
can Institute of Homeopathy, and in 1858 became its president and
still later served as its treasurer. Dr. Smith was a man of fine phy-
sique and manly bearing, affable alike to rich and poor, serving each
and all regardless of station with the" faithfulness due to his profes-
sion. By reason of impaired health he was obliged to relinquish ac-
tive practice for a while and repaired to the village of W'aukegan,
Illinois, that he might secure the needed respite. He returned to the
city with health somewhat improved, but again his failing health
demanded another vacation and in 1866 he, with his family, visited
England and the continent. While closely allied to his pn^fession
through life and was president of Hahnemann College until his death,
he was at the same time an able financier. He died April j8, 1891.
aged seventy-five years. Of four children born to Dr. and Mrs. Smith,
but two survive; the one, the wife of Major Whiteside of the I'nited
States Army, the other the wife of J. L. Ely. a resident of New
York City.
296 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
Dr. Reuben Ludlam was the son of Dr. J. W. Ludlam, a promi-
nent practitioner of medicine in Camden, New Jersey, who removed
to Evanston, Ihinois, where he died in 1868. Dr.
Reuben Ludlam was born in Camden, October 7,
1 83 1. Under his father's tutelage he early became
proficient in medical studies while yet pursuing his literary career.
At the. age of twenty-one he received his medical diploma from the
University of Pennsylvania. He soon located in Chicago and became
one of the leading practitioners in the city of the homeopathic school
When the Hahnemann Medical School of Chicago was organized he
was a member of its first faculty, and accepted the chair of physiology
and pathology. He taught in that department for four years. He
was then transferred to the chair of obstetrics and diseases of women
and children. This was the department which he had most preferred
and in which he achieved a national reputation, as a bold, yet conser-
vative and successful operator in uterine surgery. Like his associate,
Dr. Small, Dr. Ludlam was eminent in the homeopathic profession
as a medical writer. His first essay in the journalistic line was the
issue in connection with Dr. D. S. Smith, of a monthly periodical in
1853, entitled the Chicago Homeopath, which they jointly conducted
for three 5^ears, when its publication was suspended. For a number
of years Dr. Ludlam was connected as an editorial writer with the
American Joitrnal of Homeopathy, published in New York. His
chief journalistic labors were in connection with the publication of the
United States Medkal and Surgical Journal, with which he was con-
nected editorially for nine years. He was also the author of several
works which were well received ; the one entitled "Clinical and Didac-
tic Lectures on the Diseases of Women" earned for him an inter-
national reputation. It became a text-book with teachers and students
in the homeopathic school of this country and a translation served
a like purpose in France. Dr. Ludlam was popular as a lecturer and
an instructor. An attempt was made to induce him to accept the
corresponding chair in the New York Homeopathic College. While
he appreciated the compliment, and thought well of New York, he
thought better of Chicago and declined the invitation. He was ap-
pointed president, successively, of nearly all the prominent homeo-
pathic organizations of this country, both local and national. He
was the homeopathic representative on the Illinois State Board of
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 297
Health ; a member of the ReHef and Aid Society, and served in
connection with the Chicago Fire ReHef. Dr. Ludlam was first
married to Miss Anna Porter of Greenwood, New Jersey, who died
three years later. His second wife was Miss Anna G. Perrin. One
son bearing the father's name was their only surviving child. Dr.
Ludlam completed the years of a well rounded life and died at his
home in Chicago, April 29, 1899, aged sixty-seven years and six
months.
Dr. Small was born March 4. 181 1, in Wales, Lincoln county,
Maine. After pursuing a thorough academic course he became
T^ . ^ principal of one of the public schools in Bath.
Dr. Alvin E. l, . ^ , r 1 1 .• 1
^ Havmg entered upon a medical education he pur-
sued his studies under the tutelage of the distin-
guished Dr. Greene of Saco, Maine. He then went to Philadelphia
and completed his course at the University of Pennsylvania. After
engaging in medical practice in the country for two years he settled
in Philadelphia and became a practitioner of homeopathy, in which
he became eminently successful. When the Homeopathic College of
Philadelphia was organized he was one of its most active promoters
and was assigned to the chair of physiology and pathology. Four
years later he was appointed professor of institutes and practice of
medicine. In 1856, he changed his residence to Chicago. The pop-
ularity of his writings had so preceded him that he entered immedi-
ately upon an extensive and lucrative practice. As he had been one
of the founders of the Homeopathic College in Philadelphia, so here
in 1859 he was active in the organization of the Hahnemann Medical
College of Chicago, and was made dean of the faculty and accepted
the chair of theory and practice of medicine. The courses of lectures
were continued till the end of his life and were received with the
utmost satisfaction bv the successive classes that turned to him for
• instruction. He was a voluminous writer. His manual of homeo
pathic practice passed through many editions and was translated into
several foreign languages, and as widely used as a text-book by
teachers and pupils both at home and abroad. Dr. Small gave much
time to the investigation of scientific subjects, and his writings upon
these were varied and numerous. He was a member of the Chicago
Academy of Sciences, the Chicago Historical Society, etc. He was hon-
ored with the presidency of the Illinois Homeopathic Association and
298 . CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
was one of the presidents of the American Institute of Homeopathy.
As a successful teacher and practitioner, to the end of his Hfe he was
one of the most eminent members of the Homeopathic profession.
He died sitting in his chair, of cerebral hemorrhage, December 31,
1886, aged seventy-five years and nine months.
Dr. George E. Shipman was born in New York City in 1820. His
earlier studies were pursued in Middlebury College, Vermont. Later
he entered the University of New York, from
â– â– which he graduated in 1837. He decided to make
Shipman. , . , . , / r > ..1 1 • -r-, â–
his home m the west, and hrst settled m reoria,
Illinois. In 1845, he was married to Miss Fannie E. Boardman of
Connecticut, and in 1846 they came to reside in Chicago. He soon
became one of the leading Homeopathic practitioners, and during his'
life one of its most able representatives. -He took an active part in
the organization of the Western Homeopathic Association. He was
especially conspicuous in the organizatiofi of Hahnemann College
in 1855 and in its faculty occupied the chair of materia medica and
therapeutics. In connection with college and professional labors the
one thing for which he will long and gratefully be best rememabered
was his development of the Foundlings' Home, to the maintenance of
which he not only devoted his time unstinted, but very largely the
means for its support. It is safe to say that but for him the Found-
lings' Home would not have been, nor that beneficent work accom-
plished lasting through many years. Although thus occupied with
the Foundlings' Home, college duties and a large medical practice,
Dr. Shipman was a prolific writer. For four 3^ears, commencing
in 1848, he published the Northzvestern Homeopathic Journal,
the pioneer, of the homeopathic journals in the northwest. In 1865,
he was appointed editor-in-chief of the United States Medical and
Surgical Journal, under the auspices of the Western Institute' of
Homeopathy, and was for years a valuable translator of foreign
literature.
Dr. Ross was a native of Ohio, born in Clark county, January 7,
1828. He received a thorough academic education, attended two
T^ T- .^ full courses of lectures in Starling Medical College,
Dr. Ioseph P & t. '
' p ' and a third course in Ohio Medical College,
from which he graduated in 1853. During that
year he came to Chicago and formed a partnership with Dr.
CHICAGO AND COOK COUXTY 299
Lucius P. Cheency. He soon became atending physician at
the Protestant Orphan Asylum, and also one of the attending phy-
sicians at the State Reform School, then located in Chicago. He
was married in 1856 to the daughter of the late Tuthill King, one
of the prominent' and wealthy pioneers of Chicago. His home was
one in which elegance and comfort were combined, and where hos-
])itality and good cheer, so manifest in himself and his wife, found
full expression. As a business man and an organizer. Dr. Ross was
especially conspicuous. He was largely responsible for the incep-
tion and development of the hospital on Eighteenth and Arnold
streets, which later developed into the City Hospital. As a member
of tlie county board of supervisors he was influential in securing
for it its present location, and in shaping its development. The lo-
cation and rebuilding of Rush College in immediate proximity with
the City Hospital was likewise mainly secured through his influence.
He was also one of the prime movers in the forming of the Presby-
terian Hospital ; also in close relation with the college, thus affording
abundant facilities for clinical instruction. He was prominent in his
profession. He held the chair of clinical medicine and chest diseases
in Rush Medical College for twenty-one years, and onl}- by reason
of ill health relinquished that position in 1889. He held an official
position in the Presbyterian church of which he was an influential
member. He was esteemed alike for his benevolence and personal
worth. He attained a high standard of citizenship and was an al^le
and worthy representative of his profession. After two years of
lingering sickness, he was released from suffering January 15, 1890.
The parents of Dr. Dyman were of New England antecedents,
and went as missionaries to the Sandwich Islands, where he was born
^ ^^ at Hilo, Hawaii, November 26, 18^5. He was a
Dr. Henry M. , , , ■,.-„. r- u • o o 1 1
^ graduate of \Vuhams College m 185b, and was val-
edictorian of his class. He attended a course of
lectures in Harvard University and a year later, entered the Col-
lege of Physicians and Surgeons in New York, from which he grad-
uated in 186 1, being here honored as the class valedictorian. He
entered l)cllc\nc Hospital as house surgeon for a year, and in 1862
was appointed surgeon in the United States Army, and was detailed
for service in the United States Plospital at Naslnille. His health
became impaired and he was obliged to resign from military service.
300 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
During the year 1863 he was married to Miss Sarah Clark, of Rox-
bury, Massachusetts, and in the autumn of that year they came to
reside in Chicago. For ten years he was a member of the medical
staff of Cook County Hospital. In 1871, he was appointed to the
chair of chemistry in Rush College, and held that position for five
years, when he became professor of mental and nervous diseases,
which chair he held until the death of Professor Allen in 1890, when
as his successor. Dr. Lyman was called to fill the chair of principles
and practice of medicine thus made vacant. He became dean of the
faculty in 1899, and held that position until failing health obliged
him to relinquish all college work. In connection with his labors
in Rush College, he also held the like chair in the Women's Medical
College for eight years. From the time of its organization until the
failure of his health, he was the senior member of the medical staff
of the Presbyterian Hospital. He was a ready and lucid writer.
The wide extent of his reading and acquaintance with historical and
scientific subjects was phenomenal. His memory was most remark-
able, enabling him, as it did, to recall and speak accurately at all times
concerning historical and scientific questions. He was a genial gen-
tleman, a delightful companion, a broad-minded, generous-hearted
man, an honor to his profession and the city which was his home.
He issued a small volume upon "Anesthesia and Anesthetics," and
another on "Diseases of Sleep," but his final work on "Theory and
Practice of Medicine" was his crowning contribution to medical lit-
erature. He was an invalid for several years, spending much of his
time in California in search of health. He died in Chicago.
Dr. Ingalls was a native of Connecticut, born May 26, 1823, He
was of English lineage, his ancestors having settled in New England
only eight years after the landing of the May-
j flower. The original settlement was at Lynn,
Massachusetts. At the age of fourteen, young
Ingalls came to Illinois. Here, in addition to his previous studies,
he pursued his literary course at Princeton and at Illinois College.
In 1845, at the age of twenty-one, he entered Rush Medical College
as a medical student and graduated in 1847. He settled in Lee
county, Illinois, and for ten years knew all the varied experiences
of a country doctor. In 1858, he came to reside in Chicago, and was
soon established in a lucrative practice. At that time Dr. Brainard
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 301
was editing the Chicago Medical Journal, and Dr. Ingalls became as-
sociate editor. A year later he was made professor of materia medica
and medical jurisprudence in Rusli Medical College. lie held this
position for twenty-one years, and it is said of him that not in
all that time did he, save in a single instance, fail to meet his classes
promptly on time, in that instance, to have left his patient would
have been criminal. He gave liberally for the building of the present
college, the former one having been swept away by the fire of 1871.
Another instance of his generosity was the contribution of $10,000
to the Chicago Medical College in token of his appreciation of its
first establishing graded courses of instruction in medical schools.
He was the apostle of medical ethics. In the State Medical Society
he was not only honored with its presidency, but more than almost
any other he was successful in harmonizing the various sectional in-
terests in the state. Few members exerted more beneficial influence
in the meetings of the State Medical Society. He was a member
of the American Medical Society. His popularity at home is at-
tested by the fact that at three different times he was elected presi-
dent of the Chicago Medical Society. He was possessed of fine lit-
erary taste and enjoyed the perusal of" the classic literature of all
time. Though not actively engaged in teaching in his later life,
he maintained close relations with the college and was an emeritus
of Rush College at his 'death.
Dr. Smith was a native of New Hampshire. He was born Jan-
uary 24, 1828. As a youth he received training in Philips' Academy.
He entered Harvard University as a medical student
■„ 'in 1848, but owing to the Webster-Parkman trag-
edy, which occurred that winter, he transferred his
relations to the University of Pennsylvania from which he graduated
in 185 1. For the next two years he was connected with almshouse
in South Boston. Fie came to settle in Chicago in 1853, where he
built up a very desirable and lucrative practice. In the cholera sea-
son of 1854 he stood manfully at his post of a terror-stricken people.
He told the writer that in a single night there were eleven deaths in
a public house where he was in attendance. Again in 1866 he had a
similar experience, yet by no means so severe. He was one of the
six physicians first detailed to care for the ConfecTerate soldiers at
Camp Douglas. In 1868, he spent a year abroad visiting nearly all
302 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
the principal medical schools and hospitals in England, France and
Germany. Later he was an associate with Dr. Byford in the de-
velopment of the Hospital for Women and Children, in which he
served as consultant physician. He held the same position in the
Presbyterian Hospital. He was also a member of the board of
trustees of the Hospital for Incurables. Dr. Smith was a man of un-
usual ability and fine literary culture. He drew around him a class
of men of unusual culture, by whom his attainments were best ap-
preciated. He was president of the Harvard Club of Chicago, presi-
dent of the Chicago Literary Club, and president of the Club of
Medical Graduates of the University of Pennsylvania. In 1873, he
was married to the youngest daughter of the Hon. Erastus Gaylord,
of Cleveland, Ohio, a woman of rare culture and of social prominence.
Dr. Smith's literary tastes led him to the creation of a library of rare
excellence, one of his peculiar specialties being the accumulation of
three volumes of quaint epitaphs. He died in 1894 at the age of
sixty-six 3^ears, his widow alone surviving him.
Dr. Thompson was a woman of such rare and notable achieve-
ments as to require more than a passing look. Coming upon the stage
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she modestly, graceiully and yet heroicall}^ met and
overcame every obstacle in her way to success has commanded the
admiration of all who knew her. Her birth occurred at Ft. Ann,
New York, in 1829. She was educated at Ft. Edwards' Collegiate
Institute, and then engaged in teaching, and the bent of her mind
toward her future vocation is clearly indicated by the fact that she
established courses of study in physiology and anatomy in her cur-
riculum of study, a new departure in ladies' schools in those days.
She commenced her medical studies in the New England Female
Medical College, Boston, and later graduated from the New York
Female Medical College, and during the course of her studies was a
diligent attendant of the clinics given at the Bellevue hospital. She
graduated from the Chicago Medical College in 1870, and the writer
had the honor of signing her diploma. Dr. Thompson was specially in-
strumental in establishing the Chicago Hospital for Women and Chil-
dren, bringing to her aid such eminent physicians as Dr. William H.
Byford, Dr. Godfrey Dyas, and others, out of which sprang the
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CHICAGO AXD COOK COUNTY 303
Women's ^Medical College, each of which became conspicuous in our
medical history. She, with her associates, also early developed a
training school for nurses, thus leading to the creation of a new in-
dustry and service, bringing joy and comfort to many a home. Dr.
Thompson was also a skill fuh surgeon and performed many major
operations with commendable success. In the Women's College she
w-as an able teacher, and her commanding dignity, allied with her
unassuming modesty, did much to command respect for the school.
She died suddenly from cerebral hemorrhage, May 21, 1895, aged
seventy-six years. Since her decease, as a tribute to her memory,
the hospital will hereafter be known as the Mary Thompson Hospital
for Women and Children.
Dr. Charles Warrington Earle was a native of Vermont, born
at Westford, April 2, 1845. With his parents he came to reside in
Lake county in 1854. He was a farmer boy and
,,^ -p had a farmer boy's advantages, displaying a typical
physical form, trained to vigorous service. At the
age of sixteen years, when Fort Sumter was fired upon, he joined
Company I, Fifteenth Regiment, Illinois Volunteer Infantry. On ac-
count of an injury he was mustered gut. Upon his recovering he en-
tered the service the second time. This time he joined the Ninety-
sixth Regiment, Illinois Volunteers. Before he was eighteen years
old he was made second lieutenant. In the terrible encounter at Chick-
amauga he stood almost alone as commander of his company, bearing
the colors of his regiment, his comrades having fallen on every side
of him in the battle. The story of his capture, his lot in Libby prison,
his escape through the tunnel, his six days' w^andering before he
reached the Union line, and his promotion for gallant services, form
a wonderful chapter in his life history which cannot be repeated here.
At the close of the war he w^as a student in Beloit College for three
years, when he entered the Chicago Medical College, from which he
was graduated in 1870. He was active in the organization of the
Women's Medical College, and upon the death of Dr. Byford, be-
came its president. He was one of the founders of the Chicago Col-
lege of Physicians and Surgeons, and at the time of his death held the
offices of both dean and treasurer of that institution. In its faculty
he held the chair of obstetrics. He also occupied the chair of opera-
*-n'p obstetrics in the Post-o-raduate Medical School. He was a mem-
304 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
ber of the American Medical Association, ex-president of Illinois
State Medical Society and at the time of his death was president of
the Chicago Medical Society. He was a charter member of the Chi-
cago Gynecological Society, the Pathological Society, the Practi-
tioners' Club and the Medico-Legal Society. He was also a member
of the British Medical Association. For eighteen years he was physi-
cian-in-chief of the Washingtonian Home, where he made special,
studies of inebriety. He was an honored member of the Union Park-
Congregational church. Fraternally, he belonged to the Royal
League. He was married to Miss Fanny L. Bundy, of Beloit, Wis-
consin, in 1 87 1. To them two children were born, Carrie and Wil-
liam Byford. His was an ideal home. At intervals he had visited all
the prominent medical centers of the old world. As a medical writer
he was also prominent. While yet in the prime of life, which had
promise of many years of usefulness, he died suddenly in 1893, aged
forty-eight years.
Dr. Edward Lorenzo Holmes was a native of Massachusetts, born
in Dedham, January 28, 1828, and was graduated from Harvard Col-
lege in 1849. He received his medical degree from
Dr. Edward ^, • ^-^ .• • o.. a j:^
_ __ the same mstitution m 18^2. After a year m gen-
L. Holmes. , , • ■, • ^ 1 • • 1 -r^ • , ^r-
eral hospital, m 1854-55, he visited Pans and Vi-
enna. He had chosen diseases of the eye and ear as his specialty. He
located in Chicago in 1856 and was the first to devote himself ex-
clusively to that specialty. He became a prominent member of the
Illinois State Medical Society and his annual contributions were al-
ways valuable and well received. He was mainly instrumental in
the founding of the Illinois Charitable Eye and Ear Infirmary in
1858, and was at the head of its medical and surgical staff for thirty-
nine years. In 1871 the infirmary, which had hitherto been sus-
tained by the contributions of benevolent citizens, was assumed by
the state and became one of the most prominent institutions of its
kind in this country, to which reference is elsewhere made. In 1867
he was appointed to a full professorship in Rush Medical College,
and in 1890 became dean of the faculty. He was active in the devel-
opment of the Presbyterian Hospital and from its opening until his
death was an active member of the staff — a consultant and finally an
emeritus. He commanded the profound respect of the entire pro-
fession. His life was a generous contribution to the afflicted, and in
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 305
his ethical relation he was above criticism. He died in his home sur-
rounded by loving friends, February 12. 1900, aged seventy-two
years.
Medical Colleges.
The medical colleges of Chicago have attained to such a degree
of excellence as to be held in high repute by the profession at large.
This is evident from the constantly increasing number of students that
congregate here for medical instruction. Their importance and their
intimate connection with the medical history of the city warrants a
somewhat extended reference to their origin and development.
Rush Medical College was the pioneer college in the northwest,
the schools in Cincinnati and Louisville being in nearest proximity.
Although a charter for its organization had been secured in 1837,
such was the unparallelled depression following the panic of that year
that the school was not formally opened until 1843. ^^ occupied two
rooms near the corner of Clark and Randolph streets. At the close of
the session William Butterfield was the only graduate, the other mem-
bers being first-year students. During the next season a lot was do-
nated on the corner of Dearborn and Indiana streets and the second
year's course of lectures was given in its own building on its own
ground. The classes steadily increased until in 1854 the matriculates
numbered 150, with T,y graduates. During the ten years the college
had entirely outgrown its accommodations and a new building was
erected on the same corner in 1855 at the cost of $15,000. In 1867 a
still larger one was built, the former being utilized as an annex. This
building, at a cost of $70,000, was entirely destroyed in the Chicago
fire in 1871. Nothing daunted, the faculty secured ground in proxim-
ity to the Cook County Hospital, then located at the corner of Eigh-
teenth and Arnold streets, where temporary barracks were erected.
Recurring to its early history, the first course of lectures com-
menced December 4, 1843, ^"<J continued sixteen weeks. Dr. A. \V.
Davisson, who was then prosector for Dr. Brainard. once told the
writer that when Dr. Brainard concluded his first lecture antl re-
turned to the ante-room he made a clean jump over a Windsor chair
in token of his success. The faculty at that time was constituted as
follows :
Daniel Brainard, M. D., professor of anatomy and surgery;
Vol. 1—20.
3o6 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
James V. Z. Blaney, M. D., professor of chemistry and materia med-
ica; John McLean, M. D., professor of theory and practice of medi-
cine; J. M. Knapp, M. D., professor of obstetrics. ^
The introductory exercises were held in the new edifice Decem-
ber II, 1844,'and fully reported in the daily papers. Dr. Robert W.
Paxton officiated as chaplain, Dr. Brainard delivered the inaugural
address. The faculty had now been materially reinforced and was con-
shtuted as follows :
Daniel Brainard,. M. D., professor of surgery; Austin Flint, M.
D., professor of institutes and practice of medicine; G. N. Fitch, M.
D., professor of obstetrics and diseases of women and children;
James V. Z. Blaney, M. D., professor of chemistry and pharmacy;
John McLean, M. D., professor of materia medica and therapeutics;
Wm. B. Herrick, M. D., professor of anatomy; A. W. Davisson, M.
D., prosector to the chair of anatomy.
During the succeeding years various changes occurred in the per-
sonnel of the faculty. Dr. Flint resigned at the end of the second
course, in 1848, and Dr. Thomas Spencer succeeded him. In 1849
Dr. Fitch resigned the chair of obstetrics and was succeeded by Dr.
John Evans, who held that position until 1855, when he was followed
by Dr. William H. By ford. In 1850 Dr. Thomas Spencer resigned
from the chair of principles and practice of miedicine and was suc-
ceeded by Dr. Nathan Smith Davis, who, during the term of 1849
and 1850, had held the chair of physiology and pathology. In the
meantime Dr. Hosmer Allen Johnson had been elected to the chair
of physiology and microscopy. In 1855 Dr. Edmund Andrews was
called to the professorship of comparative anatomy and demonstra-
tor of anatomy. In 1859, Drs. Davis, Johnson, By ford and Andrews
having resigned with the purpose of organizing a new college, the
faculty was reorganized and was constituted as follows :
Daniel Brainard, M. D., professor of surgery; Jonathan Adams
Allen, M. D., professor of principles and practice of medicine and
of clinical medicine; James V. Z. Blaney, M. D., professor of chem-
istry and pharmacy, followed by Dr. Walter S. Haines; DeLaskie
Miller, M. D., professor of obstetrics and diseases of women; Eph-
raim Ingalls, M. D., professor of materia medica and therapeutics;
Joseph Freer, M. D., professor of physiology and pathology; Robert
L. Rea, M. D., professor of anatomy.
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 307
Since 1859 ^lie college faculty has continually enlarged to meet
the necessities incident to its rapid growth. Upon the death of Dr.
Brainard in 1866, Dr. Moses Gunn was called to the chair of surg-
ery. Drs. Henry M. Lyman, Norman Bridge, Frank Billings, Dan-
iel Brower, John M. Dodson, James B. Herrick, Alfred C. Cotton,
Henry B. Favill and Bertram Shippey now represent the single chair
of medicine. The chair of surgery in the announcement of 1907
was represented by Professors Nicholas Senn (since deceased), Ar-
thur Dean Bevan, John B. Murphy, Dr. D. W. Graham and thirty-
nine associate professors, assistant professors, lecturers and clinical
lecturers. Each of the professorships have been greatly expanded and
have a correspondingly enlarged teaching force. Quoting from the
announcement for 1907, the faculty numbers thirty-one professors
and one hunded and forty-three associates, lecturers and assistants.
The announcement for May, 1907, gives also the following summary:
. Freshmen and sophomores, including special students. 270; ju-
niors, 78; seniors, 96, post-graduates and special students, 123; total,
567-
The affiliations of Rush Medical College have been as follows r
In 1887 it became the medical department of Lake Forest Uni-
versity. By mutual consent this relation was terminated in 1898, and
a little later the college became the medical department of the Chi-
cago University, under whose auspices its announcements are now
made.
LiND University, Chicago Medical College and North-
western University Medical School. These are the three names
by which this institution has been known. Although the classes of stu-
dents in Rush Medical College had been steadily increasing in num-
bers and ample provision had been made for their accommodation and
the relations in the faculty having been entirely cordial, yet, on the
part oi several of the members there had been growing a pronounced
dissatisfaction with the methods of medical teaching then prevalent
throughout the entire country. Up to this time it had been the cus-
tom in all the schools to give courses of instruction extending usu-
ally through a period of about four months. Students who had at-
tended a first course were required to attend a second as a condition
of graduation. This, second course was simply a repetition of the
lectures of the previous year, and the second-year students were on
3o8 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
the same plane with those just matriculated. It seemed to a portion
of the faculty that a graded course of instruction was as essential in
the teaching of' medicine and surgery as in other literary institutions,
and that second-course students should not be compelled to fall back
and retrace the ground with those of the first course.
They argued that a first course should embrace the primary
branches and be taught by one corps of professors and that a second
course taught by another corps of teachers should embrace the prac-
tical applications of the teachings of the first year, embracing the
practice of medicine and surgery and the chairs associated therewith.
An opportunity was now offered for the org-anization of a second
school in connection with Lind University in which a graded system
of instruction should be inaugurated.
On the evening of March 12, 1859, Dr. Hosm^r A. Johnson and
Dr. Edmund Andrews met Dr. Ralph N. Isham and Dr. David Rut-
ter at the office of the two latter gentlemen. At this preliminary meet-
ing the matter was fully discussed and resulted in the adoption of a
resolution to organize a school in which, for the first time in this
country, a graded system of instruction should be incorporated as one
of its features.
In the formation of the new faculty, Dr. Nathan S. Davis was
tendered the chair of theory and practice of medicine and Dr. Wil-
liam H. Byford the chair of obstetrics and diseases of women and chil-
dren. The faculty of Rush College, being unwihing to inaugurate the
graded course, these gentlemen accepted those positions in the new
school that they might carry out the views that they had long cher-
ished, and strongly advocated. The faculty of the new school con-
sisted of the following professors :
David Rutter, M. D., Emeritus, professor of obstetrics and dis-
eases of women and children; Hosmer Allen Johnson, M. D., profes-
sor of pathology and pathological anatomy and dean of the faculty;
Edmund Andrews, M. D., professor of principles and practice of
surgery; Nathan Smith Davis, M. D., professor of principles and
practice of medicine; William H. Byford, M. D., professor of mid-
wifery and diseases of women and children ; John Hamilcar Hollister,
professor of physiology and histology; F. Mahla, Ph. D., professor
of chemistry; M. K. Taylor, M. D., professor of general pathology
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 309
and public hygiene; Titus DeVille, M. D., professor of anatomy; iJ.
G. Spofford, Esq., professor of medical jurisprudence.
Rooms were fitted up in the upper stories of the Line! block, situ-
ated on the corner of Market and Randolph streets. The opening
exercises were. conducted by Dr. H. A. Johnson, dean of the faculty,
in the building thus arranged. On the evening of October 9, 1859,
a popular lecture was delivered before a crowded audience by Dr.
N. S. Davis. The first didactic lecture was delivered on the follow-
ing morning by Dr. J. H. Hollister.
Like Rush College, it was to be developed from small beginnings.
During the first course the class contained but thirty-three students,
and at the close of the term there were nine graduates. After five
years it seemed desirable to terminate the connection of the medical
department with Lind University and to continue its work under an
independent organization. By mutual consent the severance was
made.
An act of incorporation was obtained from the state legislature
giving full power for such organization for the purpose of medical
teaching. By the act of incorporation the name became "The Chi-
cago Medical College." The following were the corporate members
of the board of trustees, with power to elect their successors : Hos-
mer A. Johnson, Nathan Smith Davis, Edmund Andrews, \\'illiam
H. Byford, Ralph N. Isham, Henry W^ing, John H. Hollister and
James Stewart Jewell.
When duly organized Dr. Johnson was made president of the
board of trustees and Dr. Davis was dean of the faculty. It was
during this year that it entered new quarters in a building constructed
for its use near the corner of State and Twenty-second streets. In
its new location during the next six years its classes steadily grew
and the efficiency of a graded course of instruction was indicated by
the unusual number of students who, in competitive examination,
secured positions in the various hospitals. It had now so far out-
grown its home that another change became necessary, and in 1870,
it became affiliated with the Northwestern University, and entered its
new building constructed under its own supervision on the corner of
Twenty-sixth street and Prairie avenue, at a cost of $25,000.
In 1868 this college had made a further advance in the way of
more thorough education and instituted a three-years course of in-
310 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
struction with separate groups of studies for_ each of the three years.
It may be proper to remark that at the present time nearly every re-
putable college in the United States has adopted the plan of graded
instruction first proposed on the evening of March 12, 1859, by Drs.
Johnson, Andrews, Isham and Rutter. Later the medical faculty
conveyed its property interest to the Northwestern University and
assumed the name of the Northwestern University Medical School,
and, with liberal appropriation from that institution, it is now per-
manently established with ample and commodious buildings on Dear-
born street, near the corner of Twenty-fourth street, in close prox-
imity to the Wesley and Charity Hospitals and the Post-graduate
Medical School Hospital. Its faculty in 1907 numbered thirty-two
professors, twelve associate professors, ten assistants and twenty-nine
instructors. ^
Women's Hospital Medical College. Northwestern Uni-
versity Women's Medical School. Under the first name this insti-
tution was organized in 1870. Its special promoters were Dr. William
H. Byford, Dr. Godfrey Dyas, and Dr. Mary H. Thompson, in connec-
tion with President E. O. Haven of the Northwestern University. The
faculty of the college as first constituted was as follows :
William H. Byford, M. D., president, professor of clinical
surgery of women; W. Godfrey Dyas, M. D., professor of
theory and practice of medicine; R. G. Bogue, M. D., pro-
fessor of surgery; T. D. Fitch, M. D., secretary, professor
of diseases of women; E. Margueret, M. D., professor of
obstetrics; Charles Gilman Smith, M. D., professor of diseases of
children; Mary Harris Thompson, M. D., professor of obstetrics and
h3^giene; S. C. Blake, M. D., professor of mental and nervous dis-
eases; G. C. Paoli, M. D., professor of materia medica and thera-
peutics; S. A. McWilhams, M. D., professor of anatomy; C. W. Earle,
M. D., professor of physiology; Norman Bridge, M. D., professor of
pathology; Addison H. Foster, M. D., professor of surgical anatomy
and operations in surgery; M. De Lafontaine, M. D., professor of
chemistry; F. C. Holtz, M. D., professor of opthalmology and otol-
ogy; P. S. McDonald, M. D., demonstrator of anatomy.
Its requirements for graduation were a satisfactory preliminary
education, attendance upon three full courses of lectures of six
months each in the graded system, and requisite attendance upon
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 311
clinical lectures in the hospital. Previous to the Chicago fire the
school was located in temporary rooms on the north side. Imme-
diately after this disaster a location was secured on Adams street
in the west division. Lectures were immediately resumed, the class
of that session numbering eighteen. Here the college remained for
six years. In 1878, a desirable lot was secured opposite Cook County
Hospital. Here a commodious building was erected, capable of ac-
commodating two hunderd students and was occupied in 1879. Dur-
ing the succeeding twelve years the college steadily increased in the
number of its students and in the efficiency of its work. Material
changes occurred in the personnel of its faculty, but the efficiency
of its teaching was fully maintained. The need for such an institu-
tion is apparent from the fact that as early as 189 1 the ladies in
attendance numbered one hundred and twenty-five, and of these
twenty-four were graduated at the close of that session. At that
date, with its achievement of success as an independent organization
fully assured, it yet seemed desirable that it should become an integral
part of the Northwestern University, henceforth to be known as the
Northwestern University Women's Medical School.
Chicago College of Physicians and Surgeons. Chicago was
fast approaching the two million mark in the number of its inhabi-
tants. It had reached the point where it was soon to be the leading med-
ical center in this country. It was evident to not a few that the time
had corne when another college with a high order of requirements
was warranted, and the result has fully justified that view. Dr. A.
Reeves Jackson and Dr. Charles Warrington Earle are credited
with its inception. At the first meeting called to consider the ques-
tion, Dr. Jackson acted as chairman, and Dr. D. A. K. Steele was sec-
retary. It was decided to procure an act of incorporation. The
sum to be named in the certificate was $30,000, which was subscribed
by those then present. A lot was purchased at the corner of Harrison
and Honore streets, at a cost of $5,000, and a splendid spacious and
well adapted building was erected directly opposite the main entrance
of Cook County Hospital at a cost of $57,000. The first session of
the college opened September 26, 1882. Its faculty was constituted
as follows :
Dr. A. Reeves Jackson, president, professor of surgical diseases
of women and clinical gynecology; Dr. Samuel A. Mc\yilliams, pro-
312 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
fessor of clinical medicine and diseases of the chest; Dr. D. A. K.
Steele, professor of orthopedic surgery; Dr. Leonard St. John, dem-
onstrator of surgery, surgical appliances, and minor surgery; Dr.
Charles Warrington Earle, professor of obstetrics ; Dr. Henry
Palmer, professor of operative surgery, clinical surgery, and surgical
pathology; Dr. R. L. Rea, professor of principles and practice of
surgery, and clinical surgery; Dr. Frank E. Waxam, professor of
diseases of children.
1 o the original faculty large additions were made, and enumer-
ated in the successive announcements. The requirements on the part
of the students were as follows: First, a good moral character;
second, twenty-one years of age; third, three years of study with a
physician in regular standing; fourth, attendance upon two or more
winter courses of lectures, one of these at this college; fifth, dissec-
tion of each part of a cadaver; sixth, attendance upon two courses
of clinical and hospital instruction; seventh, satisfactory examination.
The enrollment of students for the first year numbered one
hundred and sixty-five. At the close of the session fifty -two
of these were graduated. The faculty has been steadily enlarged
to meet the increased requirements, and each year there has been a
steady increase in the number of its students. In the announcement
for 1907 the enrollment numbered five hundred and two. In
1897 the college became affiliated with the Illinois State University,
the president of the university being president ex officio of this de-
partment, Dr. D. A. K. Steele president of the board of trustees, and
W. E. Quine dean of the faculty. The faculty for 1907 was repre-
sented as follows : Forty-seven professors, thirty-eight associate pro-
fessors, and fifty-nine instructors. The present class numbers five
hundred and two students.
Hahnemann Medical College. Through the special efforts of
Dr. D. S. Smith, ably seconded by those of Hon. Thomas Hoyne, a
charter for the college was procured in 1855. Its board of incor-
porators was constituted as follows, the same acting as a board of
trustees : Dr. D. S. Smith, Thomas Hoyne, Orrington Lunt, George
A. Gibbs, Joseph A. Daggett, George E. Shipman, John M. Willson,
William H. Brown, Norman B. Judd and J. H. Dunham. In the
organization of the board J. H. Dunham became president, Dr. D.
S. Smith vice president, and Dr. George E. Shipman secretary and
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 313
treasurer. The organization of the faculty was not completed until
1859, and was constituted as follows:
Dr. David S. Smith, president of the faculty and ex-ofhcio presi-
dent of the board of trustees; Dr. E. A. Small, professor of theory
and practice of medicine; Dr. George E. Shipman, professor of ma-
teria medica and therapeutics; Dr. H. K. W. Boardman, professor
of surgery; Dr. J. L. Kellogg, professor of obstetrics; Dr. Reuben
Ludlam, professor of physiology and pathology; Dr. N. E. Cook,
professor of chemistry and toxicology; Dr. G. D. Beebe, professor
of anatomy; George Payson, Esq., lecturer in medical jurisprudence.
Dr. A. E. Small was elected dean and Dr. R. Ludlam secretary
of the faculty. The college at first was located at 168 North Clark
street. The length of the college term was twenty weeks. The first
course of lectures opened October 15, i860. Here, for eight years
annual courses of lectures were given to steadily growing classes.
For a brief period the location of the college was changed to 1237
State street. In 1870 the Hon. J. Y. Scammon presented to the col-
lege a desirable lot on Cottage Grove avenue, between Twenty-eighth
and Twenty-ninth streets, well suited for both college and hospital
purposes, and here in a building amply constructed and well appoint-
ed, the college and hospital are permanently located. Although all
the original members of the faculty have been removed by death, it
still maintains the ability and efficiency imparted by its founders.
At the date of the withdrawal of a portion of the faculty in 1S76
for the organization of a new college, there remained of its permanent
members, Drs. D. S. Smith, A. E. Small, A. G. Hall, T. S. Iloyne
and Reuben Ludlam. The following became members of the fac-
ulty at that time: Drs. C. H. Vilas, E. S. Bailey, S. Leavitt. H. P.
Cole, 11. B. Fellows and N. J. Hawkes. At the death of Dr. D. S.
Smith, who had been president of the faculty since its organization,
Dr Reuben Ludlam succeeded, and upon his death, Dr. G. F. Shears
was his successor, and is now its president. Dr. H. R. Chislett is
dean of the faculty. Among those who are members of the present
staff and who prominently represent the institution the names of
Drs. E. Stillman Bailey, N. B. Delamater, Clifford Mitchell, H. V.
Halbert, W. M. Stearns, A. L. Blackwood and B. A. McBirney are
worthy of special mention. By the union of the Hahnemann and
Homeopathic colleges in 1904, an able faculty has been secured and
314 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
renders the college one of the most prominent of the homeopathic
colleges in this country. Its course, of study is in full accord with
the requirements of the Illinois state board of health. Its faculty is
represented by thirty-nine professors and twenty-six adjuncts and
teachers.
Chicago Homeopathic College. This college was incorporated
under the general law of the state of Illinois in 1876, and its first
session opened in September of that year. The location of the col-
lege was on Van Buren street and Michigan avenue. With a view
to permanency, for the enlargement of its quarters and for the ad-
vantages of clinical teachings, a lot was secured on Wood street, in
immediate proximity with the Cook County Hospital, and a fine
building erected at a cost of $45,000 was opened for students in 1881.
It was ample in its appointments and its amphitheater had a capacity
for five hundred students. It was represented by a full corps of clin-
ical teachers in Cook County Hospital. The following was the con-
stitution of the first facultv :
Dr. George E. Shipman, Emeritus, professor of materia medica;
Dr. A. C. Gatchell, professor of physiology and public hygiene; Dr.
Rodney Welch, professor of chemistry and toxicology; Dr. Leonard
Pratt, professor of special pathology and diagnosis; Dr. J. S. Mitch-
ell, professor of clinical medicine and throat and chest diseases; Dr.
S. P. Hedges, professor of institutes and practice of medicine; Dr. A.
G. Beebe and Dr. Clias. Adams, professors of practice of surgery
and clinical surgery; Dr. Willis Danforth, professor of gynecology
and surgery; Dr. John W. Streetor, professor of diseases of women
and children; Dr. R. N. Foster, professor of obstetrics; Dr. W. H.
Woodyat, professor of opthalmology and otology; Dr. A. M. Hale
and Dr. A. W. Woodward, professors of materia medica and thera-
peutics; Dr. E. H. Pratt, professor of anatomy; Dr. J." R. Kippax,
professor of dermatology and medical jurisprudence; Dr. R. F.
Tooker, professor of physiology; Dr. Romeyn Hitchcock, professor
of chemistry and toxicology; Dr. N. B. Delamater, professor of
electro-therapeutics and proovings.
The officers : J. S. Mitchell, president ; Chas. Adams, secretary
and treasurer; Albert G. Beebe, business manager. The college had
its private hospital advantages and its corps of clinical professors in
connection with Cook County Hospital. With the necessary changes
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 315
in the faculty incident to the deaths and removals, it continued its
annual sessions with gratifying- success for thirty-three years, when,
in 1904, by mutual agreement, it was merged with Hahnemrmn Col-
lege, in which a portion of its faculty is represented.
Bennett College of Medicine and Surgery. Bennett CollcL^e
of Eclectic Medicine was founded by a special act of the state legisla-
ture in 1868. It was thus named in honor of J. Hugh Bennett, of
Edinburgh, Scotland. His views as to use of the lancet and especially
his objection to the use of mercurial preparations in the treatment of
diseases were so fully in accord with the Eclectic physicians in this
country that when an Eclectic college was to be established in Chicago,
it seemed to its projectors most fittingly appropriate to give it the
name of this distinguished teacher. Its first location was on the cor-
ner of Kinzie and North LaSalle streets. The corporate members
were Drs. L. S. Major, W. D. Achinson, H. C. French, H. D. Garri-
son, William M. Dale, H. J. Whitford, A. L. Clark, John Foreman,
W. M. Teegarden, R. A. Gunn, A. L. Brower and J. F. Cook. Dr.
L. S. Major was elected president and held that office for four years,
when, in 1872, he was succeeded by Dr. A. L. Clark, who has been
president of the institution for thirty-five years. The first course of
lectures commenced November i, 1868. There were thirty students
registered, and at the close of the term there were ten graduates. A
more eligible location was secured and the second course was given
in rooms specially fitted up at 180 Washington street, where they
were destroyed by fire in 1871. A building was purchased at 461
South Clark street. After three years this property was disposed of
and a college building and hospital, well suited to its needs, was
erected at 51 1-5 13 State street. Business began so to encroach upon
this location that in 1889 it was deemed expedient to dispose of this
property also and seek a location in proximity to some of the large
hospitals, where better clinical instruction could be secured. .\ lot
was purchased and the present spacious building was erected on the
corner of Ada and Fulton streets. It has all the appointments need-
ful to meet the requirements of a modern college and its classes of
students well sustained the institution. It ranks as the leading Eclec-
tic school in this country. Its courses of study have been enlarged
and the length of the college extended. In 1879 the length of the
course was extended to six calendar months, and in 1898 it was again
3i6 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
extended to eight months. Ladies are admitted on equal footing with
gentlemen, many of whom have made especially good records. The
college faculty, which, at the first, numbered only seven members,
now numbers over thirty. It has on its ground a fine hospital in
which, in addition to the general hospital, special advantages are se-
cured for clinical instruction. Its college faculty includes thirty-seven
professors and twelve associates and instructors.
Post-Graduate Medical Schools and Hospitals.
The time had come when large numbers of medical men were
desirous of leaving their fields of practice for a little time and, while
enjoying temporary respite, availing themselves of a thorough re-
view of the branches of medicine and surgery in which they were
specially interested. For several years the colleges had attempted
to meet their wants by instituting short special courses at the close of
the regular sessions. While these were, in a measure, satisfactory,
it was evident to both instructors and physicians that they did not
meet the requirements. More and more it was apparent that col-
leges and hospitals adapted to the needs of graduated physicians
must be developed and conducted. The result has been the organiza-
tion of two such schools in Chicago, each of which has achieved emi-
nent success.
The Chicago Polyclinic School and Hospital was at first lo-
cated in a rented building on the corner of Chicago and LaSalle ave-
nues. It began its first course of lectures in July, 1886. To name its
professors is to indicate the ability of its faculty. Dr. Truman Miller,
its president, was professor of general urinary surgery. Its active
surgeons were Drs. Nicholas Senn, Christian Fenger and Malcolm
T. Harris. Active physicians. Dr. John H. Chew, treasurer, and
Dr. Joseph T. Patton; gynecologists. Dr. Fernand Henrotin, • secre-
tary; orthopedic surgery. Dr. A. E. Hoadley; obstetrics. Dr. Henry
Hooper; diseases of skin and venereal diseases, Dr. R. D. McArthur;
dermatology. Dr. Henry G. Anthony; neurology, Dr. Archibald
Church. To this faculty numerous additions were soon made. Three
years had hardly elapsed until, in 1889, the school and hospital had
so outgrown their quarters as to compel removal. The strength to
which the institution had attained is evident from the fact that it
was able to enter a building of its own, situated at 174-176 Chicago
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 317
avenue, at a cost of $70,000. Still later it has been greatly enlarged
and its facilities perfected at a total cost of $100,000. The numbers
in attendance and the satisfaction expressed by physicians emphasize
the fact that post-graduate schools and hospitals have been developed
to meet an imperative need. The Chicago Polyclinic is complete in
its appointments. Its schools, its hospital, its chemical, biological,
physiological and pathological laboratories, with its anatomical de-
partment and its clinical advantages offer exceptional facilities for
general review and for original research.
The Post-Graduate Medical School and Hospital of Chi-
cago. In 1889 a portion of the faculty of the Polyclinic School, hav-
ing resigned from that institution, united with others in forming a
second school known as the Post-Graduate Medical School and Hos-
pital of Chicago. It first occupied rooms fitted for the purpose on
Washington street, where the annex of Marshall . Field and Com-
pany's store now stands. Here a number of beds were installed where
clinical lectures were given. In 1890, leaving this business center, a
fine building was erected in Plymouth place. Business encroaching
here also, a location was secured adjoining tlie City Hospital, and
the College of Physicians and Surgeons. The latter, desiring the
building for clinical purposes, purchassd it and the Post-Graduate
School proceeded immediately to erect a fine five-story hospital build-
ing at 2400 Dearborn street, where clinical instruction could be af-
forded not only in its own ward but in the Charity Hospital and
Wesley Hospital, each in close proximity. Its appointments embraced
the latest improvements and its private rooms suited to the needs
of patients most fastidious are at command when vacancies occur.
Full courses in all the specialties iu, medicine and surgery are given,
and physicians from all parts of the Union are found in its classes.
Its active staff on duty is composed as follows : Present board of
trustees, W. Franklin Coleman, president; Arthur R. Elliott, vice
president; Franklin FI. Martin, secretary; W. L. P>aum, treasurer,
and Frederick A. Beasley. The faculty is constituted as follows :
Medicine — Arthur R. Elliott, M. M. Porter, George F. Butler,
A. A. Goldsmith and H. H. Goodwin.
Surgery— F. A. Beasley, J. T. Sullivan. A. E. Halsted, W. R.
Cubbins, A. B. Kanavel and FI. M. Richter.
Pathology and Bacteriology — E. Robert Zeit.
3i8 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
Orthopedic Surgery — Robert Hardon.
Gynecology — Franklin H. Martin, M. L. Ries, Albert Goldspohn
and A. McDermid.
Diseases of the Rectum — Stuart Johnstone.
Stomach and Intestines — Fenton B. Turck, Milton H. Mack and
G. F. Pierce.
Eye — W. Franklin Coleman, George F. Suker, C. W. Hawley, R,
S. Patillo.
Ear, Nose and Throat — Otto J. Stein, James T. Campbell, G. P
Head, George P. Marquis.
Nervous Diseases — Julius Grinker.
Obstetrics — C. E. Paddock.
Diseases of Children — J. T. Cook, T. G. Allen and Joseph Brei)
neman.
Skin and Venereal Diseases — William L. Baum.
Anatomy — William R. Cubbin.
Electro-Physics — Charks A. Neiswanger.
An able corps of lecturers is associated with each department.
Hospitals.
We are not to infer from the fact that Chicago has eighty-hvv
accredited hospitals that it is not the healthiest city of its size in the
world. It is rather to its credit that it makes such abundant provi
sion for the care of its sick. A large number are private hospitals,
well furnished and in which the best of treatment is at command,
and where every possible comfort is assured. Our limits permit only
brief reference to a few of the older public hospitals which, in part
at least, are dependent upon the benevolent contributions of a gen-
erous public.
Mercy Hospital. Mercy Hospital deservedly stands first in
the list of those which our limits permit us to mention. It merits
priority as to the date of its organization and also by reason of the
successful manner in which it has been developed from feeble begin-
nings to its present magnificent proportion. The first movement for
the organization of a pubHc hospital in Chicago originated with Dr.
Evans, then a professor in Rush Medical College. In connection with
some of his associates he procured a charter granting the power tc
organize a board, of trustees and create a public hospital to be named
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 319
the Illinois General Hospital of the Lakes. The trustees named in
the act of incorporation were John Evans, Mark Skinner and Hugh
Dickey. The matter remained dormant two years, when a movement
was successfully made in 1850 for its development. Dr. Nathan S.
Davis, now transferred to the chair of principles and practice of medi-
cine in Rush Medical College, gave a series of lectures, the pro-
ceeds of which were to be devoted to this purpose. A number of
small donations from private individuals was added to this sum. and
furnished the means for beginning a hospital in a small way. The
glory of the old "Lake House" had long since departed, and a por-
tion of it was leased for hospital purposes, and in the fall of 1850,
equipped with twelve beds and a medical staff consisting of Drs.
Brainard as surgeon and N. S. Davis as physician, the first public
hospital in Chicago was opened for the reception of patients. The
citizens of Chicago having failed to meet the expenses necessary for
its permanent support during the following year, its control was
transferred to the Sisters of Mercy, and in 1852 its name was changed
to Mercy Hospital. Its accommodations were immediately enlarged,
and by agreement at the time of transfer, facilities for clinical in-
struction were secured to the college, in return for which free medi-
cal and surgical attendance by members of the faculty were secured
to the hospital. After three years of successful experiment, the Sis-
ters of Mercy transferred the hospital to premises under their con-
trol situated on Wabash avenue, near Van Buren street. Here it
remained for about ten years, when a further enlargement of its
quarters became necessary. It had now acquired a valuable property,
securinp- the south half of the block bounded by Prairie, Calumet,
Twenty-fifth "and Twenty-sixth streets. For a number of years a
portion of this ground was leased to the Chicago Aledical College.
Upon the expiration of that lease it covered nearly the whole of its
ground with its present extensive buildings, in which it provides
three hundred beds.
Cook County Hospital. When the sanitary condition of the city
passed under the control of the county commissioners it became neces-
sary to provide hospital care for those who were a public charge, and
especially those suffering from contagious diseases. Until the year
1849, this work had been but imperfectly accomplished. During
that y^ar a severe epidemic of cholera prevailed and another followed
320 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
in 1854. It was evident that provision for a permanent public hos-
pital could no longer be delayed, and to further its construction,
the sum of $80,000 was appropriated by the city, and the first
county hospital was erected at the corner of Arnold and Eighteenth
streets. For some time after the disappearance of the cholera scourge
it ceased to be occupied by patients and was finally utilized by the
United States government as an eye and ear infirmary for the treat-
ment of the United States soldiers. In 1866, Dr. George K. Ammer-
man, then a member of the board of supervisors, seconded by the aid
of his successor. Dr. J. P. Ross, induced the board to assume the
control of the building as a county institution, in which the sick who
were the legitimate charge of the county should be cared for, and
it became the Cook County Hospital. It was duly organized as the
County Hospital in 1866, and the following is the list of the first
medical and surgical staff:
Attending surgeons, Dr. George K. Ammerman, Dr. R. G.
Bogue, and Dr. Charles Oilman Smith; consulting surgeons, Dr.
Joseph W. Freer and Dr. William Wagner; attending physi-
cians, Dr. Thomas Bevan, Dr. Joseph Ross and Dr. H. W.
Jones; consulting physicians, Dr. Hosmer A. Johnson and
Dr. R. T. Hamill; eye and ear surgeon, Dr. Joseph S. Hildreth;
pathologist. Dr. Henry M. Lyman.
When the building of the Rush Medical College was destroyed
by fire, the lectures for four successive years were given in the ampi-
theater of the hospital and in temporary structures on the same
grounds. In 1874, the county commissioners determined upon a
permanent location for a hospital commensurate with the need of
the rapidly growing city. It purchased the entire block bounded by
Harrison, Polk, Lincoln and Wood streets, at a cost of $145,000,
and upon this location they have built the present magnificent struc-
tures; the first two pavilions were constructed in 1875. In 1875
these were connected by a corridor and surgical ampitheater. In
1882 the institution was greatly enlarged by the addition of two more
pavilions and an administration building. The cost of construction
at this date (1907) exceeds one million dollars.
AuGUSTANA Hospital. The Augustana Hospital was incorporated
by the Swedish Lutheran church in 1882. It has always been located
on Cleveland and Lincoln avenues. Until 1893 it occupied a wooden
CHICAGO AND COOK COUXT^' 321
house containing eiglitecn beds. At tliis time the south half of the
present structure was completed, providing accommodations for
one hundred and twenty-five patients. This capacity was again
increased in 1904, to two hundred and twenty beds, which
are constantly full. The hospital consists of a thoroughly modern,
absolutely fireproof structure, built entirely of stone, brick,
steel and tile. The building is six stories in height, so placed that
every room and ward is exposed to the sunlight during some portion
of the day. The first floor contains the office, waiting room, exam-
ining room, a large laboratory and a library, as well as the rooms
for the matron and the resident staff. The second and third stories
contain wards for one hundred and sixty beds, and the fourth and
fifth stories contain fifty private rooms. The top story is divided into
three departments; first, operating and dressing rooms; second, obstet-
rical department ; third, kitchen and dining room. The medical staff is
organized on the German University Hospital plan, with one chief
at the head of each department. The following physicians and
surgeons comprise the staff:
John Bartlett, M. D., consulting physician; Richard Dewey, A.
M., M. D., consulting neurologist; Albert J. Ochsner, B. S., F. R.
M. S., M. D., chief of staff, surgeon in chief; Henry B. Favill, A.
B., M. D., department of internal medicine; James Nevin Hyde, A.
AL, M. D., dermatologist; Oscar Dodd, M. D., opthalmologist and
Otologist ; Rudolph W. Holmes, M. D., obstetrician ; Thor. Roth-
stein, A. B., M. D., neurologist; Alfred Hakanson, M. D., rhinolo-
gist and laryngologist ; Edward H. Ochsner, B. S., M. D., attending
surgeon; Anders Prick, M. D., attending physician; Charles E. Blom-
gren, M. D., junior attending physician; Emanuel O. Benson, A. B.,
M. D., children's diseases; Cornelius Larson Lenard, B. S., M. D.,
junior attending surgeon; Carl W. Johnson, M. D., advisory sur-
geon; Joseph E. Rehnstrom, M. D., department of dentistry.
Wesley Hospital. The project of a Chicago Methodist hospital
had previously been discussed, but to Drs. I. N. Dan forth and M.
P. Hatfield belong the credit of its existence. In the fall of 1888, in
connection with a few of his personal friends. Dr. Dan forth issued
a call for a meeting of representative IMethodists to consider the
project. The meeting was held in the Sherman House on the
Vol. 1—21.
322 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
evening of September 8th, and a committee appointed to procure a
charter and select trustees.
- On September 29, 1888, the legal organization of Welsey Hos-
pital was completed, its first board of trustees elected and sufficient
money pledged to begin hospital work in four rooms generously
tendered by the Methodist Deaconesses Training School then located
on Ohio and Dearborn streets. The first patient received in Wesley
Hospital was on Thanksgiving Day, 1888. Its first staff was com-
posed of Drs. I. N. Danforth, Charles W. Earle and M. P. Hatfield;
its earliest superintendent Rev. J. S. Meyer, and its nursing was at
first exclusively in the hands of the Methodist deaconesses.
As its work soon outgrew the possibilities of the deaconesses'
rooms, a three-story building (335 E. Ohio street) was leased and
shortly after an adjoining house was found necessary to accommo-
date the rapidly increasing number of patients.
In less than two years the two buildings became inadequate, and
in April, 1890, Mr. William Deering presented the hospital with its
present location. Twenty-fifth and Dearborn streets. A temporary
brick, at a cost of $8,000, was erected thereon, and nurses and pa-
tients moved to the south side early in 189 1.
Under the efficient management of Supt. J. S. Harvey, Wesley
Hospital outgrew its quarters, and R.* D. Sheppard, William Deering,
N. W. Harris, G. T. Swift. and J. B. Hobbs undertook the task of
providing a hospital building commensurate with the needs of
Methodism and the Northwestern University Medical School.
The result is the present rhagnificent fireproof structure of brick
and steel, erected at a cost of $300,000, caring comfortably for two
hundred patients. The hospital is at present under the control of
the Northwestern University and appointments to the staff are lim-
ited to members of the faculty of the Northwestern University Medical
School.
Illinois Charitable Eye and Ear Infirmary. This prominent
state institution was developed from small beginnings. With the first
six years it was conducted as a public dispensary, and was located on
North Clark street, with Dr. E. L. Holmes as attending surgeon.
He was the first physician in the city as a specialist to devote himself
solely to the treatment of the eye and ear. The first board of
trustees of the dispensary was composed of the following prominent
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 323
citizens : Dr. Charles Volney Dyar, Luther Haven, Samuel Stone,
Wm. H. Brown, Rev. Wm. Barry, Philo Carpenter, J. H. Kedzie,
E. B. McCagg, Flavel Moseley, Rev. N. L. Rice and Mark Skinner.
Dr. Holmes was appointed active surgeon and Drs. Daniel Brainard
and Joseph W. Freer were consultants. When, during the Civil war,
provision needed to be made for the treatment of disabled soldiers,
the sanitary commission came to the relief of the dispensary and in
a building the use. of which was donated by Mr. Walter Newberry,
increased facilities w re secured for the treatment of both citizens
and soldiers. Othe states made provision for their soldiers which
were lodged here for special treatment. For defraying the expenses
of our own troops here under treatment, the state voted an annual
appropriation of $5,000. In the fire of 1871 the building was en-
tirely destroyed. As a result the state took the institution in hand,
purchased a lot on the corner of Peoria and West Adams and erected
a fine commodious building at a cost of $80,000. To the incessant
labors of Dr. Holmes the city and the state are indebted for this
valuable institution. As associates upon the staff from time to time,
the names of a number of prominent oculists and aurists appear, such
as those of Dr. F. C. Holtz,. E. J. Gardiner, Lyman Ware, W. T.
Montgomery, Borne Bettman, C. H. Barnes, S. S. Bishop and Ira
E. Marshall.
St. Luke's Hospital. This hospital has a history of small
beginnings, heroic struggles and ultimate success. It owes its incep-
tion to an appeal by Rev. Dr. Clinton Locke of Grace Episcopal
church in 1864, which met with hearty resp9nse from a noble
band of lady parishioners, who had just terminated their labors
in caring for the Confederate soldiers by reason of the closing of
Camp Douglas. At a meeting convened in the home of Mrs. B. F.
Haddock, the formal organization was eft"ected, and the following
officers were elected: Rev. Clinton Locke, president; Mrs. W. Frank-
lin and Mrs. Henry W. Hinsdale, vice presidents; Mrs. B. F. Had-
dock, treasurer, and Mrs. Aaron Hayden, secretary. At first a small
wooden house on State street was rented and seven beds were in-
stalled. By special effort the sum of $1,500 for its furnishings and
supplies was secured. A year had not yet elapsed when a better build-
ing was obtained and eighteen beds were furnished. The charter first
obtained in 1864 "Ot being sufficiently ample, a new one was secured in
324 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
1894, and to it was given the name of St. Luke's Free Hospital, at
which time it contained one hundred and ten patients, of whom sixty-
three occupied free beds. In its later history the hospital has been
exceedingly fortunate in securing subscriptions from a large number
of wealthy men and women, and has been the recipient of a number
of liberal bequests. Fifty-one beds have been permanently endowed
by as many contributors, at an average cost of $5,500 per bed,
In addition to its first location, corner of Indiana and Fourteenth
street, it has secured a most desirable frontage on Michigan avenue.
The bequest of Mrs. Stickney gave a splendid building for the
nurses, of whom eighty-one are on duty and in process of training
"The George Smith Memorial," in memory of Mr. George Smith,
Chicago's first great banker, is a princely contribution of half a
million dollars, ai^d was contributed by his near relative, Mr. James
Henry Smith. With this fund in hand, the trustees are now erecting
a befitting memorial building fronting on Michigan avenue, which
is designed for paying patients, exclusively, the revenue from which
is to be applied exclusively for the current expenses of the general
hospital, thus serving as far as it may for a perpetual endowment.
The present active staff is as follows :
Attending surgeons, Drs. John E. Owens, Lewis L. McArthur,
W. H. Allport, E. A. Halsted; attending physicians, Drs. Frank
Billings, Henry B. Favill, Francis X. Walls, Robert B. Preble; at-
tending gynecologists, Drs. E. C. Dudley, T. J. Watkins, L. E.
Frankenthal, William Cuthbertson; attending obstetricians, Drs.
Frank Carey and J. C. Hoag; opthalmologists and otologists, Drs.
Frank Allport, Casey Wood, Thor. A. Woodruff and Paul Guilford;
orthopedic surgeons, Frederic Medler, John L. Porter; neurologists,
Drs. Archibald Church, Sanger Brown; laryngologists, Drs. W. E.
Casselberry, T. Melville Hardy, Norvil Pierce ; attending pathologist,
T. L. Dagg.
Chicago Baptist Hospital. It was first organized in 1891, and
occupied a frame building on North Halsted street, with only twenty-
five beds, but soon gained more ample accommodations at the corner
of Racine and Center avenues, and at that time was under Homeop-
athic administration. In 1896 the management was fortunate in
securing the extensive buildings on the corner of Rhodes avenue and
Thirty- fourth street, originally built for the Baptist Theological
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 325
Seminary. It was completely remodeled, its dormitories being trans-
formed into private rooms and the whole building made complete
in all its appointments, and contains one hundred beds. It is man-
aged by a board of twenty-one directors, selected from all the Baptist
churches in Cliicago. The medical staff is appointed by this board.
One of the special features of this hospital is its fine training school
for nurses. Practitioners of every school of medicine recognized
by law can treat their patients here. With reference to the admis-
sion of patients no sectarian lines are drawn. The hospital is in a
prosperous condition, and free beds are accorded to the full limits
which its finances will permit.
The Presbyterian Hospital. A nmnber of prominent men
connected with various Presbyterian churches united in an organiza-
tion for the building and support of a hospital ''for the purposes of
affording medical and surgical aid and nursing to disabled persons,
and to provide them while inmates of the hospital with the ministra-
tion of the Gospel agreeable to the doctrine and form of the Pres-
byterian church." Several large subscriptions were made, and those,
together with a great number of minor ones, enabled the trustees to
erect a building which for size, durability of structure and perfec-
tion of its arrangement and details must insure to its projectors
grateful recognition on the part of those to whom its benefits are
accorded. The hospital is located on the corner of Wood and
Congress streets, on a lot contributed by Rush Medical College, with
which it is closely aftlliatcd for clinical purposes, and the hospital
staff is largely represented from the staff of Rush Medical College.
It contains two hundred beds and its appointments are highly credit-
able. In its medical and surgical service it is one of the representa-
tive hospitals of the city. Its Training School for Nurses ranks with
the best in the country.
Michael Reese Hospital. Under the supervision of the United
Hebrew Charities a building for the care of patients was secured on
the corner of LaSalle and Schiller streets in 1868. The building was
destroyed by the Chicago fire. Fur ten }ears patients cared for by
this society were lodged in the various hospitals in the city, but in
1880 the present hospital was organized and the building was lo-
cated on the corner of Twenty-ninth street and Groveland avenue. It
was named in honor of Mr. ^Michael Reese, who had bequeathed to
326 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
it the sum of $50,000. To this the further sum of $75,000 was ob-
tained by private subscriptions and- a substantial plant completed at
a cost of $125,000, with a capacity of one hundred and fifty beds.
After twenty-five years it was decided to rebuild on the same ground,
and the old hospital was entirely removed. The present magnificent
structure occupying that place, having an ideal position on the lake
shore, has just been completed at a cost of $750,000, with an equip-
ment costing $250,000 more, so that the institution represents an ex-
penditure of $1,000,000. It is provided with three hundred and
sixty-two beds. It has provision for the education of one hundred
and twenty-five nurses, eighty-five of whom are on duty and require
three years' course of instruction. A large corps of distinguished
physicians and surgeons constitute its stafT.
Women's Hospital. This hospital recalls the name of its found-
ers, Drs. William H. Byford, A. Reeves Jackson and Mary H.
Thompson. It is pleasantly located on the corner of Thirty-second
street and Rhodes avenue. It was established in 1880, and has a
capacity of forty-three beds. It is limited to the reception of ladies
requiring surgical operation and after treatment. It is under the su-
pervision of a large board of lady managers, who are prominent in
society and who are liberal contributors toward its support. The
following surgeons constitute the active staff : Drs. Henry T. By-
ford, Franklin H. Martin, Bertha Van Hoosen, C. E. Paddock, Fred-
erick A. Besley, William R. Cubbins, D. A. K. Steele, Joseph Brenne-
man, George T. Ruggles and Mary J. Kearsley.
First Homeopathic Hospital. This hospital wa^ opened by
Dr. George F. Shipman at 20 East Kinzie street, in 1854. It was
sustained by private subscriptions. The encouragement for its open-
ing was derived from the fact that Mrs. Wright promised to con-
tribute $1,000 a year towards its support. In 1855 ^ permanent or-
ganization was effected by the creation of an executive board, of
which Mr. J. H. Dunham was president, Dr. D. S. Smith, vice presi-
dent, Dr. George F. Shipman, secretary. The attending physicians
were Dr. George F. Shipman, Dr. D. S. Smith and R. Ludlam. The
attending surgeons were Dr. H. W. K. Boardman and Dr. L. A.
Douglas, with a number of prominent men as board of directors. The
death of Mrs. Wright occurred the following year, and the amount
promised by her could not be legally appropriated. The liberal con-
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 327
tributioiis which were made by the physicians and their friends were
not sufticient for its needs and would not warrant its continuance. On
May I, 1857, it was voted to close the hospital.
Hahnemann Hospital. This hospital is located in connection
with Hahnemann College on grounds for college and hospital pur-
poses, situated on Cottage Grove avenue, between Twenty-eighth and
Twenty-ninth streets. In honor of J. Y. Scammon it was first named
the "Scammon Hospital," but later, at his suggestion, it was named
Hahnemann Hospital. In its earlier history its expenses were met
by private donations to which the college faculty and a number of
influential men were liberal contributors. The net proceeds of a fair
held in its interests amounted to $11,000. A bequest from Mrs.
Phebe Smith added $10,000 more. Then came the munificent do-
nation of $50,000 from Mrs. Caroline E. Haskell and a contribution
of $5,000 by Mr. Hugh Riddle. The hospital has been the recipient
of constant smaller amounts, which, in the aggregate, have enabled
it to do a large and much-needed charitable work. The financial
burden which, in all public hospitals not yet endowed, and which al-
ways rests heavily upon a few individuals, has, in this instance, been
happily largely lifted from those who bore the brunt by the munifi-
cent bequest of $250,000 made by D. B. Shipman, who acquired a
princely fortune in Chicago and gave to its citizens this perpetual
token of his gracious remembrance. Monumental shafts in ceme-
teries are fitting mementoes of those who only think of themselves,
but a hospital is a perpetual expression of one's regard for his fellow-
men. An addition to the hospital, giving it a capacity of two hundred
beds, is rapidly approaching completion, in which all the comforts
and conveniences of a modern, up-to-date hospital are assured, and
in this connection the Training School for Nurses will find ample
provision.
Alexian Brothers Hospital. This hospital was organized by
the Alexian Brothers and located on the corner of Dearborn and
Schiller streets in i860. The accommodations were soon outgrown
and the hospital was removed to a more commodious building on
North Market street. Here it remained for three years, when the
entire effects were swept away 1)y the Chicago fire. Notiiing re-
mained but the brave souls of the Brothers who had inspired it. In
1872 the Chicago Relief and Aid Society came to their help witii a
328 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
donation of $18,000 and this, in connection with generous donations
from private individuals, enabled them to build the present structure,
capable of accommodating about two hundred and fifty patients.
The internal management and nursing are entirely under the con-
trol of the Brothers, and none but male patients are admitted to the
hospital. During the successive years the following have been among
the leading members of the staff:
Consulting Surgeons — Truman W. Miller, Ernst Smith.
Attending Physicians — Rudolph SeifTert, Otto L. Schmidt, J.
H. Hoelscher, F. W. Rohr, Jr., Wihiam S. Orth.
Attending Surgeons — Fernand Henrotin, J. B. Murphy, W. J.
Wiswald.
Opthalmologic Surgeon — Casey A. Wood.
Neurologist — N. V. Clevenger.
The hospital is situated on the corner of Belden and Racine ave-
nues. On an average .2,800 patients are received and treated annually.
St. Joseph's Hospital. This hospital is situated at 360 Gar-
field avenue. It was organized by the Sisters of Charity in i860.
Its first building was destroyed by the fire in 1871, but the present
one, with its ample facilities, was erected on the same spot and has
accommodations for two hundred and fifty patients, while provision
is made for the care of the helpless who are needy, and a number of
free beds have been contributed by generous donors. There are
also fine accommodations for pay patients. It has always had the
good fortune to secure the services of an unusually able staff of at-
tending physicians and surgeons, among whom the following can be
named : Dr. G. W. Reynolds and Dr. J. H. Chew, physicians ; Dr.
D. R. Brower, professor of mental and nervous diseases; Dr. John
Bartlett, chief of the obstetrical department; Dr. Ephraim F. Ingalls,
nose and throat diseases ; Dr. F. C. Holtz, diseases of the eye and ear.
Medical Societies.
Although it is reported that a medical society was formed in the
village of Chicago as early as 1836, no authentic records have been
preserved, and it was not until 1850 that the first permanent society
was organized. During the spring of that year the call was made to
consider the question of forming a medical society. The profession
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 329
was very fully represented at the meeting and Rush College was
specially active in the movement, being represented by Drs. Brainard,
Blaney, Herrick and Da\is. y\mong others, we note the presence
of Drs. Boone, McVickar, Bird, Max-Meyers, McArthur and a num-
ber of the older physicians. At this preliminary meeting a commit-
tee was appointed to draft a constitution and by-laws, which were
adopted a week later. It took the name of the Chicago Medical So-
ciety, on which Dr. Daniel Boone was made president. There was
not entire harmony in the society. A number of members withdrew,
and a quorum for the transaction of business could seldom be se-
cured. The minority, faithfully maintaining regular meetings, finally
took the matter in hand, and leaving the organization to such result
as might follow, organized the Cook County Medical Society with
a view of enlisting the co-operation of prominent physicians in the
county not residents of the city. From this time on new members
who were yet to become prominent, were occasionally being added
to the society, and as the former city society had lapsed into desuetude
by reason of the great preponderance of city physicians in the meet-
ing of the Cook County Society, it seemed desirable to resume the
old name, and so, by unanimous vote, it again took the name of the
Chicago Medical Society in 1858. From the first it had been the
leading medical society in the northwest, and at present it is believed
to be, from the number of its members, the largest medical society
in the world; so large, indeed, as to reciuire'sub-divisions into a num-
ber of sections, representative of the various specialties. Later the
expansion of the city has been such as to require branch organiza-
tions with local officers and independent meetings, all of the branches
being subordinate to the central society. According to the reports
these branches are well attended and doing efficient work, bringing
to their help, by invitation, speakers of repute from other associate
branches. At stated periods the branches are all massed in general
assembl}^, and men of special renown, both in this country and abroad,
are invited to address this assembly.
Health Dcpartuicnt.
When Chicago was incorporated as a city in 1837, one section of
the act required "the appointment annually of three commissioners
to constitute a Board of Health." In May of that year those appointed
330 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
to constitute such board were Dr. John W. Eldredge, A. N. Fuller-
ton and D. Cox. Dr. Daniel Brainard was appointed as the first city
physician. Dr. E. S. Kimberly was his successor in 1838-41. Dr.
John W. Eldredge, from 1841-43. The following are the names and
dates of those who succeeded as city physician : Dr. William B. Ea-
gan, 1843-45; Dr. Philip Maxwell, 1845-47; Dr. Henry S. Huber,
1847-49; Dr. L. D. Boone, 1849-52; Dr. A. D. Palmer, 1852; Dr.
B. McVickar, 1853-55; Dr. L P. Lynn, 1855-57; Dr. Gerhard Paoli,
1857-59; Dr. Wilham Wagner, 1859-60. At this date the office of
health officer was vacated by the common council, and for two years
the city was without the services of a duly appointed physician. In
December, 1861, Dr. Lucien Cheeny was appointed to that position
and served until 1864, when Charles S. Perry, a policeman, was de-
tailed as health officer. In 1867 a board of health was organized,
composed as follows : Dr. William Wagner, Dr. H. A. Johnson, Dr.
J. H. Ranch, William Giles, A. B. Reynolds, Samuel Hoard and
John B. Rice, mayor, ex-officio. They appointed Dr. J. H. Rauch
sanitar}^ ^superintendent, and Dr. H. S. Hahn, city physician. Dr. H.
A. Johnson was made president of the board, and he, with Dr. J. H.
Rauch, continued to serve through the period of the Chicago fire and
until 1874. Dr. Benjamin C. Miller succeeded Dr. Rauch and served
from 1874 until 1876. In 1876 the common council abolished the
board of health and reorganized the health department. They cre-
ated the office of commissioner of health, the appointee to act as chief
officer, with provision for a corps of assistants. Dr. Oscar C. DeWolf
was the first to be appointed to that office in January, 1877. Dr. J. S.
Kno>' was his assistant and Dr. H. B. Wright was registrar of vital
statistics. Dr. DeWolf held the office of commissioner of health for -
ten years, and to him largely we are indebted for the admirable man-
ner in which his department was organized. Dr. Swayne Wicker-
sham held the office for three years and was succeeded in 1890 by Dr.
John D. Ware. It should by no means be forgotten that while special
honor attaches to him who holds position of chief, the onus of the
work falls upon those who stand behind the guns. Citizens little
realize the debt they owe to those who stamp out contagious dis-
eases and prevent the consumption of millions of pounds of impure
food. It is a matter of regret that city politics have so much to do
•with the administration of the health department and the office of
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CHICAGO AND COOK COUX I \ 331
commissioner of health with each incoming administration being
filled by some political favorite. To illustrate, Dr. J. I). Ware held
this office for two years; Dr. Reynolds succeeded for two years;
then again a change and William Kerr, not a physician, was apprnnted
to succeed him. Such was the turn in the political tide that Dr. R.
A. Reynolds was again appointed and held the position for eight
years. Another change in the administration brought Dr. W'halen
to that position for tw'o years, when, with the present mayor and
council in power, the present incumbent is Dr. W. A. Evans. The
sub-division of the health department is as follows :
First — Control of contagious diseases. Second — Laboratory de-
partment, examination of meats ; inspection of meats, fruits, vege-
tables, water supplies; bacteriological work. Third — Vital statis-
tics; registration of births and deaths. Fourth — Sanitary depart-
ment; plumbing, sewerage and sanitary condition of premises.
Such has been the efficiency of the labors of the health depart-
ment for several years, that the death rate has been less per thousand
than that of any other city of over 500,000 inhabitants, of which there
are official records, either in this country or abroad, being only thir-
teen and a fraction per thousand inhabitants.
Biographical Sketches.
John Hamilcar Hollister, author of the Medical History of Chi-
cago, published in this volume, is the oldest practicing physician of
Chicago, having been actively identified with the
_; â– profession for fifty-one years, and in his time has
Hollister. J „ , -^ ^ -^ . , .....
known all the great ngiu'es m the profession m this
city, both in the earlier years and since. Dr. 1 lollister was born at
Riga, Monroe county, New^ York, August 5, 1824. was graduated
from the Rochester Collegiate Institute in 1842, studied medicine at
the Berkshire Medical College, from which he received the degree of
M. D. in 1847, ^"^^ began practice in Chicago in 1855. He was con-
nected with the faculty of the present school of medicine of the Xorth-
western University when it was known as Lind University and the
Chicago Medical College. He was a trustee and professor in the
school from 1859 to 1895, and since then has been professor emeritus.
He was physician to Mercy Hospital 1866 to 1896 (now emeritus),
has been a member of the American Medical Association since 1858,
332 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
is a member, ex-president and for twenty years was treasurer of the
Illrnois State Medical Society, was editor of the Journal of the Ameri-
can Medical Association for two years, and for eight years one of its
trustees. Dr. HolHster was married, January 2, 1849, to Miss Jennette
Windiate, of Drayton Plains, Michigan. Their only child is the wife
of Dr. FrankHn H. Martin of Chicago.
In the death of Nicholas Senn, on the 2nd of January, 1908,
the' modern world not only lost one of its great surgeons, but a
strong and tender character of ceaseless activity,
Nicholas Senn, ^^^^^^^^ j.j^^^ ^^^^ ^^.^^ ^^^ -^ ^^^^ ^^ doctor, citizen
and man, we will not soon look upon again. His
passing away was the cause of profound grief to men and women
of all classes and conditions, and drew forth expressions of affection
, for him as a man and recognition of him as a scientist and surgeon
such as Europe, Asia and America have seldom, if ever, before
proffered to a citizen of the new world.
As a surgical operator. Dr. Senn was undoubtedly one of the
greatest of all times; but his fame far outstripped these limitations.
He made the clinics in his profession the basis of a far-reaching
original investigation, and brought the study of bacteriology into the
field of surgery in such a manner as to wonderfully decrease the
fatalities incident either to operations, or injuries received on the
field of battle. The deductions drawn by an unusually vigorous
and scientific mind from a professional experience as varied as it
was broad, added rich stores to the literature of pathology and
operative surgery. Personally, he not only made invaluable contribu-
tions to the standard literature of his profession, but was the means
of giving to the west one of the rarest and most valuable of libraries,
covering the entire range of medical science. Although a man of
compact and powerful physique, the labors which he performed
were so prodigious and unceasing as to wear out the human machine
before its time, and it was laid away to rest after having performed
a remarkable part in the work of the world during his life of sixty-
three years and two months.
Dr. Senn was a native of the picturesque canton of St. Gallen,
or St. Gall, in northeastern Switzerland, where he was born of
humble parents on the 31st of October, 1844. When he was eight
years of age the family came to the United States and settled in
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Washington county, Wisconsin, where he detained a preHniinary
education, finishing his academic studies in the scliools of Fond du
Lac. He afterward tauglit for several years, but in 1864. before
he had attained his majority, commenced his me(hcal stu(Hcs in the
office of Dr. E. Munk, of that city. In 1866 he entered the Chicago
Medical College, and, graduating therefrom in the spring of 1868,
commenced his interneship of eighteen months in Cook County Hos-
pital.
In 1869, after his marriage to Miss Aurelia Meuhlhauser, Dr.
Senn removed to Ashford, Fond du Lac county, Wisconsin, and com-
menced private practice not many miles from the locality where he
had acquired his first medical training. In 1874 he abandoned coun-
try practice and settled in Milwaukee, that state, soon afterward
being appointed attending physician to the Milwaukee Hospital, and
later, as his reputation extended, attending or consulting surgeon to
nearly all the important charities of the city and county. He also
served as surgeon general of the state of Wisconsin.
Wishing to still further broaden his theoretical and clinical knowl-
edge, in 1878 Dr. Senn went abroad and pursued special courses
in the University of Munich, Germany, graduating therefrom in
the following year. Upon his return to this country he was elected
by the faculty of Rush Medical College, Chicago, to the chair of
the principles of surgery and surgical pathology, and the acceptance
of this honor induced him to remove to this city. In 1884-7 '1^'
served as professor of surgery in the College of Physicians and
Surgeons (now the Medical School of the University of Illinois),
and for the succeeding three years held the chair of the principles
of surger}'. In i8(;o he was elected professor of practical and clin-
ical surgery at Ivush Medical College, and occupied the chair at
the time of his death. He was also professor of surgery at the
Chicago Polyclinic; professorial lecturer t)n military surgery at the
University of Chicago; attending surgeon at the Presbyterian Hos-
pital, and surgeon-in-chief of St. Joseph's Hospital, with which insti-
ution he was identified for eighteen years and where he performed a
large part of his private work. As institutions, Rush Medical College
and St. Joseph's Hospital especially, felt the loss of Dr. Senn's faith-
ful and strong support, personally, and also of his invalliable profes-
sional services. The deceased was a member of all the leading
334
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
medical and surgical societies of the state and nation; had been presi-
dent of the American Medical Association and the American Surgi-
cal Association; was a life member of the German Congress of Sur-
geons ; a corresponding member of the Harveian Society of London,
and an honorary member of the Edinburgh Medical Society. In
1890 he was chosen as an American delegate to the International
Medical Congress which met at Berlin, and in 1897 to the Moscow
congress, while in 1901 he again went abroad as one of the most
distinguished delegates from the United States to the International
Red Cross conference, which met at St. Petersburg.
In 1894, through the generosity and public enterprise of Dr.
Senn, there ,was installed in the Newberry library of Chicago, the
great historical and scientific collection of books relating to medi- .
cine, which had been brought together as the result of half a cen-
tury's labors on the part of Dr. William Baum, late professor of
surgery in the University of Gottingen and one of the founders of
the German Congress of Surgeons. This splendid library of more
than seven thousand volumes was donated in addition to the large
collections which he had already given. By the terms of the princely
gift, they were to be known as the Senn Collection, were to be
kept together on the shelves, retained as a library in their entirety,
and separately catalogued. Dr. Senn's wife has the credit of making
the original suggestion that the collection be transferred to the mas-
sive walls of the Newberry library for safe keeping.
In the domain of military surgery Dr. Senn reached world-wide
eminence. His career in this specialty was inaugurated early in his
professional life by his service as surgeon general of the state of
Wisconsin. He was appointed surgeon general of the National
Guard of Illinois, which he held at the time of his death, and in
1891 was one of the prime movers in the organization of the Asso-
ciatic»i of Military Surgeons of the National Guard of the United
States. Of this national body he was elected president. It was
founded by about fifty surgeons of the National Guard, representing
fifteen states, who in the year named met in Chicago and perfected
an organization. Before its first year it had reached a membership
of over two hundred, and from the date of its inception Dr. Senn
was foremost in calling attention to the true province of the military
surgeon in modern warfare. The keynote of his position is given
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 335
in these words, taken from an eloquent address which he deHvered
before the association in April, 1892 : "More ingenuity has been
displayed of late years In perfecting firearms and in the invention
of machines for wholesale destruction of life than in devising ways
and means for saving the lives of those seriously wounded. It is
our duty as military surgeons to counteract as far as we can the
horrors of war, by devising life-saving operations and by protecting
the injured against the dangers incident to traumatic infection. Anti-
septic and aseptic surgery must be made more simple than it is now,
in order that we may reap from them equal blessings in military as in
civil practice." Dr. Senn's published investigations, especially his
work on "Surgical Bacteriology," have gone far toward bringing
about this humanitarian purpose, whose desirability has been doubly
emphasized by the fatalities of the Spanish-American and Russo-
Japanese wars. In both these conflicts he bore a leading part as a
surgeon and an original investigator of international authority. In
May, 1898, he was appointed chief surgeon of the Sixth Army
Corps, with the rank of lieutenant colonel of the United States Vol-
unteers, and chief of the operating staff with the American army
in the field.
Dr. Senn so enriched the medical and surgical literature of his
day that a mere mention of the hundreds of papers which he con-
tributed to it is impossible. His more pretentious and best known
works include, "Four Months Among the Surgeons of Europe,"
"Experimental Surgery," "Intestinal Surgery," "Surgical Bacteri-
ology," "Principles of Surgery," "Pathology and Surgical Treatment
of Tumors," "Tuberculosis of Bones and Joints," "Tuberculosis of
the Genito-Urinary Organs," Syllabus" of the Practice of Surgery,"
"Surgical Notes of the Spanish-American War," "Medico-Surgical
Aspects of the Spanish-American War," "Practical Surgery,"
"Nurse's Guide for the Operating Room," "Around the World via
Siberia," "Around the World via India (A Medical Tour)," and
"Our National Recreation Parks."
Besides the great and honored name, which survives him, Dr.
Senn left a widow, who throughout his remarkable career was his
wise and sturdy comfort and assistant, and two sons, who are rising
members of the profession in Chicago. Dr. E. J. Senn, who gradu-
ated from Rush Medical College in 1893, is now associate professor
336 CHICAGO AND COOK _ COUNTY
of surgery at his alma mater, and an attending physician at St.
Joseph's and Presbyterian hospitals. Dr. W. N. Senn, a younger son,
is a Rush graduate of 1900, and an associate professor of surgery at
the college named.
With the death of Christian Fenger, March 7, 1902, the surgical
profession of the west and the United States lost one of its most skilful
diagnosticians and operators ; more, he was an ideal
„ of faithfulness to the highest code of professional
Fenger. , . , , , _ ^ . ^ , ,
ethics, and beneath a brusque exterior concealed one
of the warmest and tenderest of hearts. When the name of Christian
Fenger was spoken either by fellow surgeons or students it carried an
admiration and an affection seldom accorded one of his profession.
Dr. Fenger was born in Copenhagen, Denmark, in the year 1840,
and graduated in medicine from the university of his native city in
1867. He then served as an assistant in Meyer's Ear Clinic, and after
leaving that institution was an interne for two years in the Royal
Fredericks Hospital. At the conclusion of that service, he established
himself in private practice in Copenhagen, and thus continued until the
breaking out of the Franco-German war, through which he served as
surgeon in the International Ambulance Association.
At the conclusion of the war Dr. Fenger returned to Copenhagen
and for three years filled the position of prosector of the City Hospital,
a large and leading institution of one thousand beds. In 1874 he pre-
sented his thesis for lectureship in the university upon "Cancer of the
Stomach," and was thereupon appointed lecturer on pathological anat-
omy. His early investigations in this field were continued throughout
his life, and as a, medical and surgical specialist on cancer he attained a
rank with the foremost in the United States. In 1875 Dr. Fenger left
Copenhagen and went to Egypt, being recognized within the succeed-
ing two years as among the leading authorities on public hygiene in
the country. First made a member of ihe Sanitary Council of Alex-
andria, in 1876 he removed to Cairo, where he sensed, by appointment
of the khedive, as medical officer of the famous Khalifa quarter. By
reason of ill health, he was obliged to leave Egypt, and in 1877 located
in Chicago.
Dr. Fengef's career in this city was a steady progress in the highest
regards both of his professional co-workers and his rapidly increasing
patrons. At various times he held the professorship of principles of
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 337
surgery and clinical surgery in the Northwestern University Medical
School and the chair of surgery in the Chicago Polyclinic ; was also sur-
geon-in-chief of the German Hospital for many years, attending sur-
geon at the Passavant Memorial Hospital, and consulting surgeon to
the Cook County, Provident, Tabitha and Baptist hospitals, lie was
an active member, and served for one term as vice president, of the
American Surgical Association, and was identified with the American
Medical Association. Illinois State Medical Society, Chicago Medical
Society, Physicians' Club, Chicago Gynecological Society and the Scan-
dinavian Medical Society.
Dr. John B. Murphy, A. M., M. D., LL. D., is one of the notable
surgeons in the country, and among his fellow practitioners he is
freely recognized as a man not only of decision and
John B. 1 • 1 • .1 • • ^ , 1
^, a presence which justly mspires conndence, but as
a member of the profession of remarka])le skill and
originality. His work has brought him into national prominence
as an operator, and his identification with the medical institutions of
the city has materially added to Chicago's advancing reputation as a
great center of professional education and clinical instruction.
Dr. Murphy was born in Appleton, Wisconsin, on the 21st of
December, 1857, and, after obtaining a public and a high school edu-
cation in his native city, commenced his medical studies under the
preceptorship of Dr. J. R. Reilly, one of the leading surgeons of
that place. With this preliminary training he came to Chicago and
was matriculated at the Rush Medical College, from w'hich he gradu-
ated in 1879. He served as an interne in Cook County Hospital from
February, of that year, until October, 1880, and after engaging in
private practice in Chicago for two years, went abroad for study,
observation and practice in the medical centers of the old world.
During the period from September, 1882, until April. 1884. he
worked in the universities and hospitals of Vienna, Munich, Berlin
and Heidelberg, broadening both his theoretic and practical knowl-
edge of medicine and surgery.
In the spring of 1884 Dr. Murphy returned tn Chicago, being
soon elected lecturer on surgery in Rush Medical College, and in
1892 professor of clinical surgery in the College of Physicians and
Surgeons; in 1890 professor of surgery in the Post-Graduate Medi-
cal School, and during the same year attending surgeon to the Alex-
voi. 1—22.
338 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
ian Brothers Hospital, having served, in a similar ca_pacity in the
Cook County Hospital prior to his departure for Europe. He became
president of the medical staff of the Cook County Hospital in 1891,
and was chosen to the presidency of the National Association of
Railway Surgeons in 1895. Dr. Murphy is also a member of the
American Medical Association, the Surgical Society of Germany, the
Surgical Society of Paris, and of numerous other medical and surgi-
cal organizations of less note. Among the late honors bestowed
upon him for eminent scholarship and practice in surgery is the Lae-
tare medal, received from Notre Dame University, Indiana, March
9, 1902.
Dr. Murphy has been a frequent contributor to the standard lit-
erature of surgery, his papers being of unusual value, based, as they
are, upon the results of actual practice. He has a world-wide reputa-
tion in surgery of the abdominal tracts, and his invention and won-
derfully successful application of the anastomosis button has greatly
reduced the fatalities incident to injuries to the intestines, extend-
ing his nam^e and fame throughout the medical world. He was also
the first in America to recognize the disease in man, which, under
the popular name of "lumpy jaw/' has made such ravages among
cattle. Both as an original investigator and an eminent operator.
Dr. Murphy is now second to none in the country, his services as a
surgeon being in demand from coast to coast.
Frank M. Billings, M. S., M. D., dean and professor of medicine
of Rush Medical College, Chicago, and a physician and pathologist of
^ , , the highest standing, is a native of Hi8:hland, Iowa
Frank M ^ >
p â– county, Iowa, born in 1854 to Henry M. and Ann
(Bray) Billings. In 1881 Dr. Billings graduated
from the Northwestern University Medical School with his medical
degree, and in 1890 the university conferred upon' him that of M. S.
For many years he served as consulting physician at the Cook County,
Children's Memorial and Michael Reese hospitals, and attending physi-
cian at the Presbyterian and St. Luke's hospitals. He is a member and
ex-president of the Chicago Medical Society; served as president of the
American Medical Association in 1902-3, and is an active member of
that organization, as well as of the Chicago Pathological Society,
Chicago Neurological Society, Illinois State Medical Society and Asso-
ciation of American Physicians. Other organizations with which he is
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CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 339
identified are the Chicago Athletic Association, and Chicago, Univer-
sity, Chicago Literary and Quadrangle chibs. Dr. Billings was mar-
ried in Washington, District of Columbia, May 26, 1887, to Miss
Jane Ford Brawley, and has become the father of one child, Margaret,
born in Chicago, August 8, 1888.
In February, 1905, the invention of the "Ballenger Swivel Knife"
for the sub-mucous removal of deformed cartilage of the nasal sep-
tum producing nasal obstruction, caused world-
â– wide interest among the medical profession, and
has since been recorded as among the most valuable
modern inventions and discoveries by which surgery has been ele-
vated to rank among the greatest and most exact sciences. The
swivel knife, which the inventor at once gave to the profession with-
out securing a patent, and which has since come into general use, re-
duces the time of operation from half an hour to a few minutes,
and at the same time simplifies the entire operation. Through the
use of this instrument the name of Dr. Ballenger is spoken wherever
surgery has become a distinct art, and this invention alone, so gen-
erously given for the benefit of the world, is a broad basis for the
most enduring fame that comes to members of the medical and
surgical profession.
In his practice Dr. Ballenger is a specialist in the diseases of the
ear, nose and throat, and in this special province, none of the younger
generation has gained greater distinction. Like many others who
have become leading specialists he commenced as a general practi-
tioner, and is thus enabled to connect special symptoms with general
causes, and to make a broad and thorough diagnosis of the cases
which come to him for treatment. In addition to his practice, he oc-
cupies the chair of rhinology, laryngology and otology at the College
of Physicians and Surgeons, the Medical Department of the Univer-
sity of Illinois.
Dr. Ballenger is a native of Economy, Indiana, and was born
April 26th, 1 86 1, a son of William and Lydia Ann (Starbuck) Bal-
lenger. The schools of his native place, both common and high, af-
forded him his preliminary education, and he was also a student of
Earlham College, Richmond, Indiana.
He received his professional education at Bellevue Hospital Med-
ical College, New York, which gave him the degree of M. D. in 1886,
340 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
the three years prior to his entering that school being spent as a
teacher in the pubHc schools of Indiana.
Dr. Ballenger commenced the practice of his profession at Rich-
mond, Indiana, immediately after his graduation, and continued it at
that point from 1886 to 1893, and at Evanston, Illinois, for the suc-
ceeding two years. In 1895 he centered his studies and his work on
the subjects of rhinology, laryngology and otology, to which he has
since confined himself as a practitioner, an educator and an author.
Dr. Ballenger began his career as an educator when he was appointed
instructor in his specialties at the College of Physicians and Surgeons
in 1905, and has since been advanced to the full professorship of
rhinology, laryngology and otology, which chair he had occupied
since 1903. In 1896 he was appointed instructor in otology at the
Chicago Polyclinic and in the following year professor of the same
chair at the Chicago Eye and Ear College and Hospital.
The doctor's connection with organizations identified with his
specialties has also been prominent. He served as secretary of the
American Academy of Ophthalmology and Oto-laryngology in 1899-
1902, was its president in 1902-03, and has since been a counselor of
the body. He is a leading member of the Chicago Medical Society,
of which he was vice president in 1904, and is also a Fellow of the
International Otological Congress; Chicago Laryngological and Oto-
logical ; American Laryngological Association ; American Laryngo-
logical, Rhinological and Otological Association (vice president
1905) ; Illinois State Medical Society, and the Chicago Academy of
Medicine. He is a well-known contributor to the foreign and Amer-
ican scientific and medical journals along the lines which he has so
thoroughly investigated, and is the author of a standard text book on
"The Surgical and Other Diseases of the Nose, Throat and Ear."
Through the constant use of the name "Ballenger Swivel Knife," and
his writings, his name is becoming as familiar to the profession as
that of Dr. Murphy, the inventor of the famous "Murphy Button."
Dr. Ballenger was married at Richmond, Indiana, July 15, 1886,
to Miss Ada Poarch. They have one child, Joanna, born October 22,
1905. The family home, "Wildermere," is at Hubbard Woods, Illi-
nois, and his office is in Chicago. Aside from his connections with
professional organizations, he has membership in the VVinnetka Club,
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 341
c'md the Chicago Athletic Association, and stands high socially, as he
does in the ranks of the medical fraternity.
The late Dr. Fernand Henrotin was one of the most skilled sur-
geons, learned physicians and genial and useful citizens of Chicago
^ and tlic west, and cnimenced to come into ijromi-
Fernand , . , , . . , , * .
TT nence at the tnne that his father was about t(j retu-e.
Henrotin. „ , , . .
rather and son, m fact, were representatives of the
most cultured and successful element of the profession for a period
of fully sixty years, and in 1907 the name was grandly perpetuated
in this city by the opening of the grand Henrotin Hospital on LaSalle
avenue, which had been erected as a continuation of the Chicago
Polyclinic, in the founding of which twenty-one years before, the
younger Henrotin had borne so great a part. Until the day of his
death this institution had been the Doctor's professional pride, and
he had contributed generously of his time, strength and professional
and executive abilities. Dr. Henrotin did not live to see this cher-
ished project realized, as the magnificent $1,000,00 hospital was not
completed until six months after his decease. It was opened in No-
vember, 1907, without formal celebration, as those who were so
closely associated with him in the prosecution of the work did not
care to celebrate without their leader and friend.
Dr. Henrotin was born in Brussels, Belgium, on the 28th of
September, 1847, son of Dr. J. F. and Adele (Kinson) Henrotin,
and soon after his birth the family came to Chicago, where the
father commenced the practice of his profession and continued it
almost uninterrupted!}' until his death in 1875. Fernand received
his early education in Chicago, and after graduating from the high
school commenced his preparation for the profession which had been
honored both by his father and his grandfather. He was matriculated
at Rush Medical College, and in 1868, after a three years' course, was
graduated with his professional degree. For two years thereafter he
was prosector at Rush Medical College, after which he served for a
like period as county physician of Cook county. Then he became
surgeon of the police and fire departments, being connected with the
former for fifteen years and with the latter for twenty-one, for a
number of years also serving as surgeon of the First Brigade, Illinois
National Guard. He was surgeon and gynecologist of Cook County
Hospital for several 3'ears, and at the time of his death was surgeon
342 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
at the Alexian Brothers' Hospital, gynecologist at the Chicago Poli-
clinic, consulting gynecologist at St. Joseph's Hospital and acting
gynecologist at the German Hospital. Nothwithstanding that he held
and filled all these official positions, and was so closely identified with
the Chicago Policlinic in its educational work, he managed a large
private practice (the bulk of which was surgical) with untiring faith-
fulness and consummate skill.
The deceased was a member of all the local and of the most promi-
nent societies connected with his profession ; was for many years
secretary general for America of the International Gynecological and
Obstetrical Congress; served in -1896 as president of the Chicago
Medical Society, and, although unanimously re-elected the following
year, declined to serve. Dr. Henrotin's monographs on professional
subjects, chiefly on gynecological matters, have also earned him wide
prominence. Among numerous articles which have appeared in the
medical press may be instanced "Pelvic Septic Diseases in Women,"
which has been quoted the world over; "Estopic Gestation," in "Prac-
tice of Obstetrics by American Authors," and "Gynecology," in the
"International Text Book of Surgery." One of his latest contribu-
tions, and which attracted unusual attention from the fact, perhaps,
that the subject was treated in a somewhat popular style, was the
small work entitled "Democracy of Education in Medicine."
In 1873 Dr. Henrotin wedded Miss Emile B. Trussing, and, al-
though no children were born to their union, their married life was
an unusually happy one, gladdened, as it was, by the high regard and
warm affection of numerous and congenial friends and with the most
harmonious personal relations. They resided for many years at 353
LaSalle avenue, which is still the home of the cultured and beloved
widow.
The patient, thorough, strongly-fibred German temperament is
especially adapted to scientific investigation and progress, as well as
to the practical and conservative application of dis-
WlLLIAM . , . . . . . . . ^. . . ,.r
â– r -n covenes and developmg pnnciples. Ihis scientific
L. Baum. , . , \ ^ , .
nature, this thoroughness of investigation and con-
scientiousness in practice, make the typical German an ideal diagnos-
tician and an ideal physician in the treatment of diseases, He is not
satisfied with superficial methods or temporary results, but endeavors
to reach the foundation of every disorder of the human body which
ly i^£jcc^yxx^ ^i ^'-A-<^i>^-»^ , A^ ,2?
;HI new YORK
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TiLDr.M yoUi-JDATIOM*
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 343
comes before him for adjustment. This trait is reaping its profes-
sional rewards in the many honors which are continually being be-
stowed upon physicians who are natives of the fatherland, and come
to this country as to a field of broader opportunities, or to those of c]n'ie
German ancestry.
Dr. William L. Baum, who in May, 1907, was elected president of
the Illinois State Medical Association, is the son of Henry and Eliza-
beth (Zorrmann) Baum, and, as the names of both his parents impl\-.
is of good Teutonic stock. He was born in Morris, Illinois, May 1 1 .
1867, and before he assumed his professional studies received a thor-
ough general education in the public and normal schools of his native
place. Dr. Baum would doubtless have made a good teacher, but
found that his call to the medical profession was too strong to resist.
Having determined upon his specialty, he foresaw the advantages of a
thorough knowledge of drugs, and he completed a course at the Phila-
delphia College of Pharmacy in 1887 with the degree of Ph. G. In
the meantime he had become so far advanced in his general studies
that, in 1888. he graduated from the Jefferson Medical College as a
regular M. D.
After practicing about a year at Morris. Illinois, during which he
served as coroner and county physician of Grundy county. Dr. Baum
went abroad to take post-graduate work, spending the period from
1889 to 1 89 1 at the medical schools of the Berlin and Vienna Univer-
sities and in visiting the hospitals and clinics of those famous centers
of medicine and surgery. A portion of the latter year he also spent
in Paris, in study, observation and investigation. Coming to Chicago
during the latter part of that year, in August (1891) he was appoint-
ed professor of skin and genito-urinary diseases at the Chicago Post-
Graduate School, and in 1894 attending physician to the Cook County
Hospital. Since 1897 he has been treasurer of the Post-Graduate
School, and is now dermatologist to the Baptist Hospital. In 1905-6
Dr. Baum served as chairman of the medical staff of Cook County,
one of the most important positions in connection with hospital ad-
ministration in the west.
Aside from the presidency of the Illinois State Medical Society,
with which he has recently been honored, Dr. Baum has been an active
and prominent factor in the progress of the professional organizations
of the city and country. As to his official prominence, he was a mem-
344 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
ber of the board of trustees of the Chicago Medical Society in 1901-5 ;
president of the board, Chicago Academy of Medicine, 1900-1905;
secretary of the Chicago Medico-Legal Society, 1900-06; treasurer of
the Chicago Medical Society 1905-6; president of the Chicago Uro-
logical Society, 1905-6; first vice president of the American Uro-
logical Society, 1906, and chairman of the section of Cutaneous Medi-
cine and Surgery, American Medical Association, 1899. Besides
membership in the above he is connected with the Mississippi Valley
Medical Society, Chicago Dermatological Society, Physicians' Club,
Chicago Pathological Society, Chicago Urological Society and the
German Medical Society, being a fellow of the Chicago Academy of
Medicine. Since 1905 Dr. Baum has been commodore of the Chi-
cago Yacht Club.
Dr. William Franklin Coleman, M. D., M. R. C. S., Eng., one of
the leading oculists and aurists in the country and founder of the Chi-
cago Post-Graduate School (the first in the city), is
W. FRANKLIN ^ native of Canada, where he was educated and
where the Coleman family had been established since
the Revolutionary war. The Doctor's great-grandfather loved the
mother country too much to fight against it, and when the colonies
declared their independence migrated to the Dominion and settled
with his family at what soon became Coleman's Corners, near the
St. Lawrence river, Upper Canada. He transformed the locality into
an important manufacturing center, was honored politically and per-
sonally, and brothers, sons and grandsons established various indus-
tries in the same section, continuing them far beyond the limits of
his days.
One of the most prominent of these manufacturers was Billa Cole-
man, a grandson, who married Ann Eliza Willson, a native of New
York and of English descent. A few miles distant from Coleman's
Corners (afterward known as Lyn) was Brockville, the county seat,
and here was born to this substantial couple a son named W. Franklin
Coleman. As his honored and beautiful mother died two weeks after-
ward, as an infant he was removed to the ancestral town, where he
obtained his early education. The schools of Brockville and of Pots-
dam, across the St. Lawrence river, in New York, furnished him with
a grammar and academic education, and McGill College, Montreal,
and the office of Dr. Reynolds, of Brockville, were the scenes of his
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 345
early medical studies. Ill health forced him to abandon his profes-
sional education for about two years, but in iSf)^ he fmallv completed
his course at Queen's College, Kingston, from which he obtained his
degree with honors.
Dr. Coleman commenced the general practice of medicine at Lvn.
and thus continued for seven years. During this period as a country
physician he had a good opportunity to decide upon a specialty, and
selected diseases of the eye and ear. His first preparatory step was to
spend a year at the London Hospital, England, and at Moorefield's
Eye Hospital, making such progress that in.1871 he passed the ex-
amination by which he became a member of the Royal College of Sur-
geons, England. Returning to Canada, he spent seven years in To-
ronto, a portion of that time being in partnership with Dr. A. M.
Rosebrugh, a leading oculist and aurist, and serving during the entire
period as surgeon to the Toronto Eye and Ear Infirmary. For a year
he then attended the famous clinics of Vienna and Heidelberg, after
which he located in St. John, New Brunswick, and, both in private
practice and as (jculist and aurist to the Provincial Hospital, estab-
lished a wide and high reputation during the seven years of his resi-
dence there.
Through his writings and his professional work, Dr. Coleman's
name had preceded his coming to Chicago, and his advent was soon
signalized by the establishment, chiefly by his initiative, of the Post-
Graduate Medical School, which has been a powerful means of giving
to the city a decided standing among the centers of higher medical
education in the country. Coming to Chicago in 1885. Dr. Coleman
organized the school two years later, and since 1891 has been its
president and professor of ophthalmology. He is also a member of
the American Medical Association, the Chicago Medical Society, the
Chicago Ophthalmological Society and the Physicians' Club of Chi-
cago.
John Edwin Owens, M. D., has always been, most emphatically .1
working member of the profession, so that he has stood in the fn^nt
ranks of operating surgeons in the west for many
•^ ■years, albeit his name has only occasionallv headed
Owens . '.
anv contribution to medical literature. Xo repre-
sentative of his profession in Chicago is more highly honored for
what he has done and what he is than Dr. Owens, and two of the
346 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
great educational institutions of the city and the northwest have fek
the benefit of his unobtrusive scholarship and clear demonstration.
While honored as an operator and an educator, his connection of
forty-five years with St. Luke's Hospital has established him as a
public benefactor, for it has been his wise and strong personality,
added to his professional skill, which has been perhaps the chief sup-
porting and developing force of that great charity.
Dr. John E. Owens is a native of Maryland, born at Charleston,
Cecil county, on the i6th of October, 1836. Prior to his matriculation
as a medical student he was educated at various private schools, at
West Nottingham and Elkton academies, and under private tutors.
In 1862 he graduated from the Jefferson Medical College of Philadel-
phia, and afterward enjoyed a special course in surgical anatomy and
operative surgery under Dr. D. Hayes Agnew, the famous surgeon.
After serving a short time as resident physician at Blockley Hospital,
he removed from Philadelphia to Chicago in 1863.
Soon afterward, St. Luke's Hospital completed its organization,
and a year later Dr. Owens was placed at its head, performing the
first surgical operations within its walls. He was also elected a mem-
ber of its board of directors, and has since been continuously identified
with the institution. He has been a strong administrative factor in
the development of the hospital, and is still president of its medical
board. In 1867 he was appointed lecturer at Rush Medical College
on surgical diseases of the urinary organs, and four years afterward
commenced to lecture on the principles and practice of surgery in the
same college. In 1877-83 he held that chair in the Woman's Medical
College, having in 1882 transferred his educational activities from
Rush College to the Medical Department of Northwestern University,
by accepting from the faculty of the latter the chair of surgical anat-
omy and operative surgery. In 1891 he was chosen to his present
professorship, that of surgery and clinical surgery. He served as
medical director of the World's Columbian Exposition in 1893. For
many years he has been chief surgeon of the -Illinois Central Railway
and of the Chicago & Northwestern Railway, and was long a leading
member of the American Association of Railway Surgeons, of which
he has been president. He is also a fellow and was one of the vice
presidents 'of the American Surgical Association, and is a member of
the American Medical Association, Chicago Medical Society, Doctors'
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CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 347
Club, Chicago Medico-Legal Society and the Chicago Surgical So-
ciety, of which he was the first president.
On December 30, 1869, Dr. Owens married Miss Alelhea S. Jamar,
daughter of Reuben D. Jamar, of Elkton, jMaryland. and to them
have been born one child, Alarie Girvin Owens. The Doctor is iden-
tified with the Calumet Club, was for many years a member of the
Tolleston Shooting Club, and resides at the Lexington Hotel.
The specialists of the day are those who are placing in final
oblivion the old saying that "medicine is a blind science." By their
studies, experiments and thoroughly scientific inves-
-n ' ligations they are letting bright light into heretofore
obscure pathological causes, inventing new processes
and mechanisms to keep pace with their discoveries, and raising
medicine to the dignity of an exact science. Li the field of invention
as applied to the medical and surgical treatment of the nose, throat
and ear, there are few members of the profession in the country who
stand higher than Seth Scott Bishop, M, D., LL. D. An untiring and
original investigator, a deep scholar and one of the ablest and busiest
practitioners in the west, these inventions have grown from the neces-
sities of his own work; among them are a massage otoscope, an
improved tonsillotome, a middle-ear curette, an ossicle vibrator, a
compressed-air meter, a light concentrator, a cold wire snare, a nasal
speculum, a nasal knife, a camphor-menthol inhaler, powder-blowers,
an automatic tuning fork, double retractors, an ear aspirator, a com-
bined periosteum elevator and curette, etc. He is also the discoverer
of camphor-menthol itself.
Dr. Bishop has made a great number of valuable contributions to
the literature of his specialties, most of which have been originally
read at the conventions of the various medical associations. He has
made an especially exhaustive study of that illusive ailment, hay
fever, two of his papers taking the first prizes given by the United
States Hay Fever Association. His "Statistical Report of Twenty-
one Thousand Cases of Diseases of the Ear, Nose and Throat,"
carries with it most valuable instruction, and illustrates the author's
thoroughness of research and wide acquaintance with his subject.
Other published papers cover almost all known subjects relative to
these diseases. He is also the author of two standard works, his
"Diseases of the Nose, Throat and I'^ar" having been adopted as a
348 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
text-book in a large proportion of the medical colleges of the United
States and Canada. "The Ear and Its Diseases" appeared in the fall
of 1906, and was received with marked favor by the profession and
especially medical educators. He is also the editor of The Illinois
Medical Bulletin and one of the editors of the Laryngoscope.
Continuous and energetic efforts, directed wide experience and
scientific and inventive endowments of a high order, have enabled
Dr. Bishop to reach his position of eminence when he is in the full
maturity of his physical and intellectual strength. He is a Wisconsin
man, born at Fond du Lac, February 7, 1852, the son of Lyman and
Maria (Probart) Bishop. His parents came from New York, the
paternal branch of the family being English and the maternal, Scotch-
English. The boy received his early education in the public schools
of his native city, subsequently taking classical courses at Pooler
Institute, Fond du Lac, and at Beloit College. In his youth, besides
attending school and studying music, he mastered the printer's trade
in the office of the Fond du Lac Daily Commomvealfh and printed the
first successful daily paper on the first power press which ever ap-
peared in that city. Later he edited, "set up" and published an
academ.ic paper called The Pen, and commenced to read medicine.
After he had prosecuted his professional studies as far as possible at
home, he attended two courses of lectures at the University of the
City of New York (1871-2), studied systematically under Dr. S. S.
Bowers, of Fond du Lac, and finally received his degree on gradu-
ating from the Northwestern University Medical School of Chicago
in 1876.
Dr. Bishop commenced practice in his native city, then removed
to Rochester, Minnesota, but in the fall of 1879 ventured into the
larger field awaiting him in Chicago. In 188 1 he was elected a mem-
ber of the medical staff of the South Side Free Dispensary, where
he served first in the children's, and afterward in the eye and ear,
department for many years. Later he conducted clinics in the West
Side Free Dispensary, and has been consulting surgeon to the Illinois
Masonic Orphans' Home from its foundation, having also been in
active service as attending surgeon to the Illinois Charitable Eye and
Ear Infirmary for more than fifteen years. He is honorary president
of the faculty and professor of diseases of the nose, throat and ear,
Illinois Medical College; professor of otology in the Chicago Post-
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 349
Graduate Medical School and Hospital, surgeon to the Post-Graduate
and Illinois Hospitals, and consulting surgeon to the Mary Thompson
Hospital, to the Chicago Hospital School for Nervous and Delicate
Children (in atifiliation with the University of Chicago), and to the
Silver Cross Hospital of Joliet. His wide identification with the
fraternal and educational organizations of his profession embraces
membership in the Chicago Pathological Society, the State Medical
Societies of Wisconsin, Minnesota and Illinois, the Mississippi Valley
Medical Association, the American Medical Association, the Pan-
American Medical Congress, the International Medical Congress,
American Medical Editorial Association.
13r. Bishop was married March 23, 1885, to Miss Jessie Abagail
Button, his wife being the daughter of the late Peter Button, the well
known contractor and builder. Their children are Jessie Elizabeth
and Mabel Bishop. The Doctor is a member of the Beta Theta Pi
fraternity, Beloit College Chapter, is a thirty-second degree Alason,
a Knight Templar, a Shriner, and is also identified with the Odd
Eellows, Knights of Honor and A. O. U. W.
Among the best known surgeons of the state. Dr. Davison is
identified with the history of Illinois both as a skillful surgeon and
a leading educator. He is a native of Lake county,
^ this state, born on the 13th of Januarv, 1858, being
the son of Peter and Martha Maria (VVhedon)
Davison. He is of English extraction, the founders of the American
branch of the family coming to the United States in early colonial
times.
Dr. Davison obtained a preliminary education in the public schools,
was further advanced by courses at the Barrington High School and
the Wauconda Academy, and for two years thereafter studied under
a tutor. He commenced Jthe study of medicine, beginning his regular
course at the Chicago ]\Iedical College (Northwestern University
Medical School) in 1880, graduating in 1883. He was a conscien-
tious and able student and at the conclusion of his studies passed the
competitive examination for a hospital interneship, and had advantage
of being assigned to the Cook County Hospital, wherein the oppor-
tunities for valuable observation and experience are more numerous
than in any other institution of that character in the west. After
remaining there for the full period of eighteen months, in 1883-4,
350 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
Dr. Davison entered into private practice in Chicago, having from the
first devoted himself chiefly to surgical work.
Dr. Davison's standing, both in the practice and theory of his
specialty, is evident by the positions of responsibility to which he has
been appointed on the working hospital staffs and the faculties of
various educational institutions devoted to the progress of medicine.
He has served as professor of surgery and clinical surgery. Univer-
sity of Illinois (College of Physicians and Surgeons), professor of
surgery Chicago Clinical School (post-graduate), and attending sur-
geon Cook County and West Side Hospitals. He is also a trustee
of the University of Illinois, a fellow of the Chicago Surgical Society,
and a member of the American Medical Association, the Illinois
State Medical Society and the Chicago Medical Society. Socially
and fraternally, he is identified with the Illinois Club and the Masons,
being a Knight Templar and a member of the Mystic Shrine.
On October 20, 1887, Dr. Davison was married to Mary Lavina
Kidd, by whom he has had one child, Charles Marshall Davison,
born April 16, 1896. His home is at 955 Jackson boulevard . and his
down-town office No. 103 State street.
Through his original work and contributions to medical science
as well as through the invention of new instruments and advanced
^ operative technique, Dr. Channing Whitney Bar-
Channing ^^, . ^, • ^ • ^t, I,- ^
â– r^. p rett s name is among those promment m the history
W. JjARRETT. ._, . ... . __ ,.
of Chicago medicine and surgery. Upon locating
in Chicago he at once became identified with Dr. H. P.
Newman in his private and institutional work and has ever
been an enthusiastic teacher in post-graduate and undergraduate
work. Dr. Barrett is adjunct professor of gynecology and
clinical gynecology in the medical department of the University of
Illinois (College of Physicians and Surgeons) ; surgeon and gynecol-
ogist to Marion Sims Hospital; gynecologist to Chicago Polyclinic
School and Hospital ; obstetrician to Cook County Hospital, and for-
merly professor of gynecology in Chicago Clinical School. He is a
member of the American Medical Association, the Chicago Medical
Society, the Illinois Medical Society, the Mississippi Valley Medical
Society, a fellow of the Chicago Gynecological Society, and member
of Public Health Defense League.
Dr. Barrett was born of sturdy stock, has a robust constitution,
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CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 351
a mechanical turn of mind, and is naturally ambidextrous. He began
life on a farm, spent many of his younger years in acquiring an
education, and has won advancement in his profession on his own
merits. He was born at Blissfield, Michigan, December 14, 1866,
and was reared at Hudson, Michigan. His father was David Fowler
Barrett, a son of Israel Barrett, whose ancestors lived in Berkshire
county of western Massachusetts during the colonial era. The ma-
ternal ancestors of the Doctor's father were Blanchards, who settled
at Munson, Massachusetts, at a very early date. Dr. Barrett's mother
was Martha C. Dewey, a daughter of Jesse Dewey, whose birthplace
and ancestral seat was in A'ermont; her mother was a Wilcox, of
New England Puritan stock.
After attending common school and Fayette Normal University,
and Hillsdale College, Dr. Barrett taught in common and graded
schools for six years. He began studying medicine at Hillsdale,
Michigan, in the office of Dr. Bion Whelan, and afterward, from
1892 to 1895, in the Detroit College of Medicine, where he graduated
in the latter year with the degree of M. D. He was an interne at
St. Luke's Hospital, Detroit, 1893-95, was house physician and sur-
geon-in-chief at Harper Hospital, 1895-96; was house physician,
1896-98, and assistant surgeon, 1898-1904, at Marion Sims Hospital;
assistant surgeon Chicago Clinical School, 1896-99; instructor and
assistant in gynecology. College of Physicians and Surgeons, 1896-
1900 Dr. Barrett married, July 22, 1896, Miss Lulu May Alvord.
Their children are: Russell Alvord, born February 26, 1899; Flor-
ence Louise, born June 6, 1900, died September 18, 1902 ; Helen
Elizabeth, born October 21, 1902. Their residence is at 28 St. James
place, and his office at 100 State street.
]3r. John Edwin Rhodes, A. M., M. D., is a native of Bath, Sum-
mit county, Ohio, born on the 12th of February, 185 1, and is a son
of John and Rebecca Clark (Smith) Rhodes. His
V, â– fatlier was a well-to-do merchant, who, while Dr.
Rhodes. t^, , .,,,.,, , ., ^, .
Rhodes was still a child, removed to Akron, Oliio,
and subsecjuently to South Bend, Indiana. The family still later
removed to Webster City, Iowa, and there resided for eleven years,
during which period young Rhodes made good progress in his edu-
cation. At the age of sixteen he returned with the family to South
Bend, Indiana, and at a later date to Belvidere, Illinois.
352 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
After a preliminary course of instructioii Dr. Rhodes entered the
University of Chicago, from which he graduated with the degree of
A. B. in 1876. During this period he proved himself a thorough
university man, being actively identified with the college societies and
Delta Kappa Epsilon Fraternity, editor of the college paper, presi-
dent of the literary society and especially prominent in oratorical
contests. Three years after leaving the university his alma mater
conferred upon him the degree of A. M. The summer succeeding
his graduation Dr. Rhodes spent in the east, visiting the Centennial
Exposition, and subsequently locating in Sacramento, California,
where he entered the employ of Huntington, Hopkins & Company,
wholesale hardware merchants
After a successful career of seven years in connection with the
house named, Dr. Rhodes commenced the realization of a slowly ma-
turing determination to assume for his life work the medical profes-
sion. Locating in Chicago again, he was matriculated at Rush
Medical College in 1883, and three years thereafter graduated as
valedictorian of his class. Several months of European travel and
study followed, after which he returned to Chicago and became
associated with Dr. E. Fletcher Ingals and engaged in general prac-
tice.- After a few years, however, he confined himself to the special-
ties in which his professional associate and friend had already ac-
quired such eminence. Early in this special practice Dr. Rhodes was
elected by the faculty of Rush Medical College as lecturer on laryn-
gology and diseases of the chest, and he was later advanced to the
associate professorship of the same chair, which he still occupies.
At one time he was also professor of physical diagnosis and clinical
medicine of the Woman's Medical School. For ten years he was
secretary and treasurer of the Rush Medical College Alumni Asso-
ciation, was historian of the college, president of its Instructors'
Association, a leading member of the Nu Sigma Nu, and in every
detail as earnestly interested in the welfare of his medical alma mater
as of his literary sponsor, the University of Chicago.
At the present time Dr. Rhodes is laryngologist to St. Mary's of
Nazareth Tlospital and the Home for Destitute Crippled Children,
consulting physician to Chicago Relief and Aid Society, and attending
physician to Marion Sims Sanitarium and Charleston (111.) Sani-
tarium. He is a member of the American Laryngological Associa-
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 353
tion, Chicago Laiyngological and Otological Society, American Med-
ical Association, Illinois State Medical Society, Chicago Medical
Society, and Physicians' Club. He is also identified with the Chicago
Athletic Association and the Forty Club.
Dr. Rhodes was married in Sacramento, California, July 12, 1877,
to Miss Anna Louise White, and their children are John Edwin, Jr.,
and Margaret. In politics, the Doctor is a Republican, and in religion
a Baptist.
A. Augustus O'Neill, M. D., is a well known practicing physician
and surgeon of Chicago, a resident for fourteen years. He was born
in Hereford, Herefordshire, England, November,
'p., -XT 1865, and is a son of Christopher and Elizabeth
(Jones) O'Neill. His father was born in Swan-
sea, Wales, and his mother in Hereford. The Doctor received his early
education in English parochial and American public schools, and after-
ward made a thorough study of the classics under private instructors.
His professional education was also remarkably complete, graduating
as he did from the Medical Department, University of Kansas, Kansas
City, in 1890. He became full partner of S. S. Todd, emeritus profes-
sor gynecology and president Kansas City Medical College for eighteen
years. Dr. O'Neill took post-graduate studies at Jefferson Medical
College, Philadelphia, the New York Post-Graduate Medical School
and the New York Pol3''clinic, and received a post-graduate degree
from Jefferson Medical College, and Midland University conferred that
of Ph. D. upon him.
Dr. O'Neill has been a resident practitioner since 1894, his standing
as a physician and surgeon being recognized by the profession in his
appointment to such positions as the following, which he now holds :
President and surgeon-in-chief of the Columbia Hospital, and pro-
fessor of medical jurisprudence of the Chicago College of Law. He
also filled the chair of diagnosis at the Harvey Medical College for five
years. lie is a member of the Chicago Medical Society, American
Medical Association, Illinois State Medical Society, the American
Electro-Therapeutic Association, and Tri-State Medical Association,
and president Illinois State Electro-Therapeutical Association. Dr.
O'Neill is the father of one child, Christopher S. O'Neill. The family
residence is at 4327 Drexel Boulevard, and offices at 103 State street.
Vol. 1—23.
354 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
Dr. Ferdinand Hotz, who has held the chair of ophthalmology at
the Chicago Policlinic since 1888 and at the Rush Medical College
since 1898, is a native of Germany, born in Wert-
Ferdinand ^^.^^ . , ^^^ ^g^ jjjg parents were Gottfried
and Rosina (Muschaweck) Hotz, who thoroughly
beHeved in giving their son a substantial and broad education. After
attending the common school of his native place, he entered the ly-
ceum or preparatory school to the university, and after graduating
from it at the age of eighteen years took up his medical studies with
energy and determination. At the University of Jena he first began a
four years' course in his profession, and completed his medical studies
at Heidelberg, from which he graduated in 1865 with his degree of
M. D. During the last year of his course there and for twelve months
after graduation, he served as interne at the University hospital, and
in 1866 had the advantage of experience as an army surgeon in the
Austro-Prussian war. Soon afterwards he pursued advanced studies
on the eye and ear at Berlin and Vienna, under such eminent special-
ists as Graefe, Arlt, Jaeger and Politzer. He was appointed house
surgeon at the University hospital of Heidelberg, and in 1869 at-
tended clinics at Paris, London, Edinburgh and Glasgow.
With this varied experience and thorough professional education,
in August, 1869, Dr. Hotz came to the United States, and at once lo-
cated in Chicago for practice. In the following year he was appointed
oculist and aurist at Cook County hospital, and after holding the
position for five years became attending surgeon at the Illinois Chari-
table Eye and Ear Infirmary. He retained the latter position until
1892, or for a period of seventeen years. The Doctor entered the
educational field in 1871 as professor of ophthalmology and otology
at the Woman's Medical College, occupying that chair for four years.
In 1888 he was elected professor of ophthalmology in the Chicago
Policlinic, in 1897 became oculist and aurist at the Presbyterian hos-
pital and in 1898 professor of ophthalmology and otology at Rush
Medical College, and these three positions he still holds. In 1888
he was made chairman of the section of ophthalmology and otology
of the American Medical Association, an honor never accorded a
member of the profession without a national reputation for surgical
skill and deep scholarship. The Doctor also founded the Chicago
Society of Ophthalmology and Otology, of which he was the presi-
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dent the first three years. He is still a leading member of this organi-
zation, as well as of the Chicago Medical Society (president in 1892),
American Medical Association, Illinois State Medical Society and the
American Academy of Ophthalmology and Otology.
Dr. Hotz has contributed largely to ophthalmic and otological
journals, especially on new and improved operations for entropium,
ectropium and symblcpharon. He is the author of the valuable chap-
ter on ''Lid Operations," for the "American Textbook of Diseases
of the Eye, Ear, Nose and Throat," and among the most noticeable of
his brochures may be mentioned the following : 'Tntra-Ocular Lesions
Through Sun-Strokes," "New Operation for Entropium," "Mastoid
Operations," "Plastic Lid Surgery" and "Skin Grafts in Eye Sur-
gery." The Doctor also has always taken a deep interest in educa-
tional affairs outside of his profession, and in 1875 was chosen as a
member of the Public Library Board of Chicago, serving thus with
fidelity and efficiency for three j^ears.
On January 6, 1873, Dr. Hotz was united in marriage with Miss
Emma Rosenmerkel, daughter of Adolph ^Rosenmerkel, the first Ger-
man druggist to settle in Chicago. The six children born to this union
are Olga, Elsa, Lucille, Katherine, Marguerite and Clara. The Doc-
tor has a beautiful summer residence at Morton Grove, Illinois, known
as "The Pines." He is a man of decided domestic tastes, and his
club life is confined to the Chicago Athletic Association. His down-
town office is at No. 34 Washington street, the Venetian building.
In January, 1907, The American Medical Couipend, a monthly
journal of medicine and surgery published at Toledo, Ohio, issued
what is called the "Byron Robinson Number," it be-
„ ingf a special edition devoted to the original and in-
ROBINSON. , , , . . . ... . ^ . , .
valuable mvestigations and discoveries of this emi-
nent Chicago physician and surgeon in the field of medical science.
Editorially, the occasion was announced to be "Byron Robinson's
silver jubilee in medicine," and the tributes collected from leading
members of the profession in the United States, Canada, England,
Germany and Australia, were notable for their invariable admission
that Dr. Byron Robinson has been found a real scientific investigator
and discoverer, who ranks with the learned and original anatomists
and pathologists of the day.
It would be manifestly impossible to draw copiously from this
356 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
mass of interesting and appreciative material, but the words of Dr.
Nicholas Senn are fairly illustrative of its general tenor. "The name
of Byron Robinson," he says, "as an original investigator is a familiar
one in medical literature. For over two decades his contributions
to the medical press have shed luster on American medicine, and have
done much toward widening the scope of scientific medicine. Byron
Robinson is a remarkable man in many ways. Success, in his case,
attended merit. He is a splendid example of that army of physicians
who, true to their vocations, are not content to practice medicine to
earn a livelihood but who besides expend much of their time and money
in the furtherance and development of the science of medicine. From
the time of his graduation in medicine Byron Robinson has been a
builder and a pathfinder. He cares little for the accumulation of wealth
and outward appearances; his main ambition has been to contribute
his liberal share to the enormous task of making medicine what it is
destined to be — an exact science. His enthusiasm in the field of
original research is boundless, and instead of waning after more than
twenty years of hard unselfish work, if anything, is on the increase.
^ ^ ^
"All his writings breathe the same spirit of critical inquiry and
thought. He is a leader in the hard working band in our profession
who take an active part in unraveling the many mysteries which must
be cleared before rational medicine triumphs over disease which now
baffles our skill. From the very beginning of his professional career
he has by word and example taught the great truth that the modern
physician must be a scientist if it is his ambition to remain in the
front rank of the most progressive of all professions. His life and
work furnish a striking example of what the progressive physician
should be, and which is well calculated to impress upon the younger
members of the profession that, combined with science, medicine is
the noblest of all professions; without science, the meanest of all
trades.
"The amount of scientific work accomplished by Byron Robinson
outside of a large and onerous gynecological and surgical practice is
something phenomenal. No man in this or any other country has
contributed more to medical literature in the same space of time. His
writings are found in nearly every medical journal in the United
States, and extracts of them, in foreign journals of many tongues
CHICAGO AND COOK COUXTY 357
which reach the remotest parts of the world. When I was in Adelaide.
Australia, I became intimately acquainted with Professor Archibald
Watson. One evening we discussed medical subjects, and among other
things he said : 'There is one mjin in the United States whose writ-
ings I always read, and his name is Byron Robinson.' Recently a
prominent American physician visited a distinguished surgeon in Paris,
and in conversation the latter made an allusion to a man in Chicago
who in his estimation- had made the most important contribution to
the science of anatomy on this side of the Atlantic, and whose name
for the moment he could not recall. The visitor mentioned several
names, among them my own. 'No, no,' said the surgeon, whose mem-
ory then lightened up and he said 'his name is Byron Robinson.' The
abdomen and pelvis are the fields which Byron Robinson selected for
his original investigations. He made no mistake in his choice of sub-
jects for his life work.
"Dr. Robinson's additions to our knowledge of the structures of
the biliary and pancreatic ducts, the utero-ovarian (Robinson's circle),
the ureters (Robinson's three ureteral isthmuses), the great sympa-
thetic nerve (abdominal brain), and the peritoneum, are of far-reach-
ing scientific and practical value, and will have to be incorporated in
forthcoming works on anatomy. That this has already been done is
best shown in glancing over the pages of the best work on anatomy
extant, which recently left the press; I refer to Da Costa's Gray's
Anatomy, where Dr. Robinson's name appears no less than forty
times. Such well merited recognition by such an eminent and scruti-
nizing author as Professor Da Costa must certainlv be a source of
gratification to the subject of this sketch, and gratifying to his many
friends. The amount of work Byron Robinson has performed can
be best measured by his literary productions. He is the author of
two volumes on practical intestinal surgery, four books on diverse
gynecological subjects, a large volume on the peritoneum, and a 660-
page book on "The Abdominal and Pelvic Brain." He has con-
tributed to various medical journals 600 articles. He worked four
years in obtaining material for his life-sized chart illustrating the
sympathetic nerve. He spent a small fortune of hard-earned money
for the illustrations which are incorporated in his writings for the
better elucidation of the subjects of which they treat. How is it pos-
358 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
sible for any one man to do the vast amount of work indicated by the
above mentioned pubHcation?
"To give an inteUigent answer to this question one must know
Bvron Robinson, as well as his early history. He inherited a vigorous
constitution and a fertile, active brain. He is a man of exemplary
habits and has an innate love for work; social life, theaters and other
amusements have no charm for him. From early youth he was in-
flamed with the desire for learning. His path to the study of medi-
cine was smoothed by a university education. After graduating in
medicine from Rush Medical College, he began the practice of his
profession in Grand Rapids, Wisconsin, in 1882. As a country doctor
he commenced his experimental work, and it was then and there he
laid the foundation of his future scientific career. Unaided by anyone,
impelled by his indomitable energy and insatiable thirst for knowledge,
he penetrated deeper and deeper into the mysteries of medicine and its
allied sciences, until he felt the need of additional advantages to bet-
ter prepare him for the coveted field of original research. Following
this inclination he spent at three periods, three years in Europe,
spending most of his time in Vienna, Berlin, Heidelberg, London and
Birmingham, iii the last named city as a private pupil of the late Law-
son Tait. Of the many distinguished teachers whose clinics he at-
tended and in whose laboratories he worked, he was most impressed
by such men as Virchow, Karl Schroeder, Erb. Mendel, Bilroth, Kun-
drat, Carl Braun, Schenck, Nothnagel, Jordan LloyH and Lawson Tait.
Soon after his second return from Europe he accepted the chair of
anatomy in the Toledo Medical College, where he taught this funda-
mental branch of medicine with signal success for two years. After
living with Lawson Tait as a private pupil for six months he came to
Chicago in 1891. He has taught anatomy for ten years in different
medical institutions of Chicago. For thirteen years he has held the
chair of gynecology and abdominal surgery in the Illinois Medical Col-
lege. Anatomy and pathology have always had a fascination for
Byron Robinson. To him anatomy is an open book. Since he came
to Chicago he has performed 700 abdominal post mortem examina-
tions, and made accurate records of their findings. He has studied
comparative visceral anatomy in the slaughter house, where he ex-
amined and studied the abdominal organs of 250 carcasses. If one of
the wild animals in the zoolosrical Qrardens of Lincoln Park die, Robin-
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY '359
son is one of the first to know it, and has made the post mortem and
preserved interesting- specimens for future study, usually before his
colleagues knew that another day had been born. All this Byron Rob-
inson has done, besides attending to a large private and hospital prac-
tice. He is still in the prime of life, and his ardor for original investi-
gation has not been dampened by the years of toil. His motto has
been, and always will be : 'Nothing is so difficult but may be overcome
by industry.' "
Little can be added to the above just and authoritative review of
Dr. Robinson's professional and personal character by Dr. Senn, the
character of whose life work inspires him with a strong fellow feel-
ing, but a few facts may be presented to make the sketch complete.
His parents, William and Mary Robinson, were born in England,
and, coming to the United States in 1845, located on a farm near
Mineral Point, central Wisconsin. Here Byron Robinson was born
. and reared, and, after living together for fifty years, his father and
mother died on the old homestead. His early education was obtained
in a log school house near home, and, after completing a course in
the Mineral Point Seminary, he entered the University of Wisconsin,
from which he graduated in 1878 with the degree of B. S. In 1879-80,
while teaching in the high schools of Ashland and Black Earth, Wis-
consin, he commenced the study of medicine, and graduated from Rush
Medical College with his professional degree in 1882. He commenced
practice, in the year named, at Grand Rapids, Wisconsin; continued
for two years, and then went abroad for the first time, as narrated by
Dr. Senn. In 1888 Dr. Robinson removed to Toledo, where he re-
mained for two years, where, as professor of anatomy and clinical
surgery, he first gained prominence as a practical anatomist and a
clinical teacher. In 1891 he removed to Chicago, and was elected to
the department of gynecology in the Post-Graduate School. At the
present time, besides holding the chair of gynecology and abdominal
surgery in Illinois Medical College, Byron Robinson is gynecologist
to the Woman's Hospital and consulting gynecologist to the ]\Iary
Thompson Hospital for Women and Children.
In 1894 Byron Robinson was married to Dr. Lucy W'aite, herself
a skilful operator, a classic writer on medical and surgical subjects,
and, for tlie past decade, head surgeon of the Mary Thompson Hos-
pital. To her good judgment and practical professional assistance, in
36o CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
fact, the Doctor attributes much of his success and the final recogni-
tion of his standing, so weh set forth by Dr. Senn.
Lucy Waite, A. B., M. D., has been known for many years as a
skilful and successful surgeon and a deep and indefatigable investi-
gator. In the latter capacity she has made some
,,r notable additions to the literature of the profession.
Waite. . :
Dr. Waite comes of a hardy and intellectual
family, on both her mother's and father's side. Her maternal an-
cestors were the Van Valkenburghs, a substantial Dutch family of
the Netherlands. Of those who settled in Canada and New York
not a few were descended from former residents of the historic
Ghent. They were staunch supporters of the Revolution, several
of them holding high positions in New York commands. Her grand-
father, Dr. Daniel D. Waite, was one of the pioneer physicians of
the city, being among the early presidents of the Chicago Medical
Society.
The Doctor is a native of Chicago, a daughter of ex-Judge Bur-
lingame and Catherine (Van Valkenburgh) Waite, her mother having
been a native of Canada, a graduate of Oberlin College, and, while
a resident of Chicago, founder of the widely known Hyde Park
Seminary. She is a lawyer and former publisher of the Chicago Law
Times. At the International Council of Women, held at Washing-
ton in 1888, Mrs. Catherine Waite was elected president of the
Woman's International Bar Association, and -both as a writer and a
pioneer lawyer among women she achieved national fame.
The father, Burlingame Waite, was a New Yorker, and had prac-
ticed in Chicago for years before President Lincoln (in 1862) ap-
pointed him judge of the Supreme Court of Utah. In 1865 he
resigned this ofiEice after making a national record in the various
complications between the supreme judiciary and the Mormon church.
In the year mentioned Judge Waite became district attorney for the
territory of Idaho, but returned to Chicago in the following year and
now resides here and at the age of 84 retains his mental and physical
vigor and is actively engaged in his literary work. Judge Waite has
an international reputation among scholars as the author of "The
Christian Religion to the Year 200."
Dr. Waite is head surgeon and medical superintendent of the
Mary Thompson Hospital for Women and Children, a position she
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CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 361
has held for ten years. She fitted herself for such a position through
years of training both in this country and in Europe. When she
decided to devote herself to surgical work she went to Europe and
took up the special branches of gynecology and abdominal surgery.
After two years spent in the clinics of \'ienna and Paris she returned
to America and continued her studies in the post-graduate medical
schools in this country. Dr. Waite is a graduate of the Chicago Uni-
versity. In 1880 she took the degree of B. A. in the old University
and later her degree was re-enacted by the new University. In 1883
she took a medical degree from the Hahnemann Medical College and
later from the Harvey Medical School of Chicago. During the two
years spent in Europe she was under the personal tuition of Carl
Braun, Spaeth and Pavlik in Vienna, and Pean, Pozzi and Doleris
in Paris. She is a good German and French scholar, having l^een
obliged to master these languages while prosecuting her studies
abroad.
In 1894 Dr. Waite was married to Dr. Byron Robinson. She is
at present clinical professor of gynecology (extra mural) in the
College of Physicians and Surgeons. Dr. Waite conducts one of the
largest gynecological clinics in the city, which she uses to the best
advantage in teaching this branch to the women students of the
college. She is a member of the American Medical Association and
of the Chicago Medical Society.
Philip Schuyler Doane, M. D., has the honor of having been
associated for a number of years with one of the most eminent
â– r^ r. gynecological surgeons in the country, the late Dr.
Philip S .
â– p. " Fernand Henrotin, thus placing the seal of his high
authority upon the skill and scholarship of the
younger practitioner. Dr. Doane is a native of Illinois, born at Oak
Park on the i6th of August, 1868, being the son of Thomas H. and
Mary Warren (Kellogg) Doane. His advanced education in literary
and scientific branches was obtained in the Oak Park High School
and at Phillips Exeter Academy, his graduation from the latter occur-
ring in 1892.
Dr. Doane's medical education was acquired at Rush ISIedical Col-
lege, Chicago, from which he graduated in 1895 ^^ith the degree of
M. D. Afterward he served for eighteen months, in 1895-7, as
interne at the Presbyterian Hospital, and the three months following
362 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
were spent in the service of the State Board of Health in the main-
tenance of the quarantine against yellow fever at Cairo, Illinois. In
the fall of 1897 he began practice on the north side, Chicago, and
shortly afterward became associated with Dr. Henrotin, as stated.
The five years thus passed were spent in the performance of surgical
and g}mecological work in the various hospitals of the city. He was
also for four years on the surgical staff of Cook County Hospital,
and has been attending surgeon at the Central Free Dispensary and
instructor in surgery at Rush Medical College. He has contributed
interesting and valuable monographs on surgical subjects to standard
periodical literature, and is a well known member of the American
Medical Association, State and Chicago Medical societies, and the
Physicians' Club of Chicago.
Dr. Doane was married January i, 1903, to Miss Helen Pullman
Stewart, daughter of Graeme Stewart, and their two children are
Helen Stewart and Graeme Stewart Doane. The family residence is
at No. 541 North State street, and the down-town office in the
Venetian building, 34 Washington street. Dr. Doane is identified
with the Chicago, University, Saddle and Cycle and South Shore
Country Clubs. He is a Republican in politics and a Presbyterian
in religion.
Alexander Hugh Ferguson, M. D., is one of that brilliant and
substantial body of Canadians who, within the past twenty years,
, have constituted such an invaluable addition to the
-rr T-^ surgery and medical education of the United States.
H. Ferguson, ^t t, • r^ . • ^ ^ j ^u
He was born m Ontario county, Canada, on the
27th of February, 1853; his parents were Alexander and Ann
(McFadyen) Ferguson; his paternal ancestors being the famous Fer-
gusons of Argydeshire, the first family name in Scotland, whose his-
tory goes back to the dim periods of time. In this genealogical fact
the Doctor takes a just pride, and as he himself can read and speak
the Gaelic tongue he is able to follow the family records back to the
period of legends and myths to about 300 B. C.
Dr. Ferguson moved to Manitoba in 1874, when he was twenty-
one years of age, having already obtained a good education in the
common schools and at Rockwood Academy. After coming to the
western province he pursued a course and also taught in the Mani-
toba College, and later went to Toronto, where he attended the Uni-
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versity in that city and the Trinity Medical School. In 1881 he
graduated as Fellow by examination from the latter institution, also
as medalist, and received the degrees of M. B. from Toronto Uni-
versity and M. D. and C. M. from Trinity University. He also
enjoyed post-graduate training in New York, Glasgow, London and
Berlin, receiving instructions in surgery, bacteriology and pathology.
He first located for practice at Buffalo, New York, and in 1882
left a promising field in that city to locate in Winnipeg, at the request
of an aged mother. In the same year he was appointed registrar of
the College of Physicians and Surgeons of Manitoba, and in 1883 he
took the initiative in founding the Manitoba Medical College, which
he was instrumental in establishing as a high standard among the
educational institutions of the Dominion. The Doctor held the chair
of physiology and histology for three years, and in 1886 he assumed
the professorship of surgery. In this educational position and as
an operator, he soon gained a wide reputation. He was also a
member of the staff of the Winnipeg General Hospital, surgeon-in-
chief of the St. Boniface Hospital, and performed the major opera-
tions at the Brandon and Morden hospitals. During this period he
was chosen first president of the Manitoba branch (pioneer) of the
British Medical Association. In 1894, having been elected to the
chair of surgery of the Chicago Post-Graduate Medical School, he
prepared to leave the field in which he had attained such professional
leadership. His departure was referred to by the press and the
people as a "public calamity," and a farewell address from the faculty
of the Manitoba Medical College speaks of him in these terms: "As
professor of surgery you have not only commanded the admiration
and regard of your associate professors, but also the veneration and
loyal esteem of your students. Your operative work in hospital and
private practice has challenged the keenest attention of the medical
profession of this country and has reflected the highest honor on
yourself and credit upon the medical profession of Canada."
In June, 1894, Dr. Ferguson assumed the chair of surgery at the
Chicago Post-Graduate School, and he lias held the professorship
continuously with professional ability and manly honor. In 1900 he
was elected professor of clinical surgery in the College of Physicians
and Surgeons (University of Illinois), and still holds the position.
He is also president and chief surgeon of the Chicago Hospital (in
364 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
which he has over three-fourths interest), and is otherwise identified
with the surgical service of hospitals.
He is ex-president of the Western Surgical and Gynecological
Association, the Tri-State Medical Association and of the Chicago
Medical Society, and also enjoys membership in the American Med-
ical Association, British Medical Association, corresponding member
of the Urological Society of France; member of the Chicago Gyn-
ecological Society, Chicago Neurological Society, Chicago Urological
Society, Chicago Surgical Society, International Surgical Society,
Military Tract Medical Association, American Surgical Association
and American Association of Obstetricians and Gynecologists ; Wayne
County Medical Society (Detroit) and Michigan State Medical Soci-
ety enrolled him as an honorary member. Dr. Ferguson's reputation
has attracted the attention of the profession and people from ocean
to ocean and from the Gulf of Mexico to within his native land on
the north, and to many places within these confines he has been many
times called in consultation and to operate.
Since coming to Chicago, Dr. Ferguson has both broadened and
strengthened his Canadian reputation; in fact, such an authority as
The American Journal of Surgery refers to him as "the most clean
and clever operator on the western continent.'* There is hardly a
major operation on the body which he has not repeatedly performed,
while his work on hydatids of the liver has been the most extensive
and notable of any man in America. He has also invented many valu-
able surgical instruments and originated several surgical procedures
which are decided advances beyond the methods formerly in vogue. He
is the author of many valuable papers on operative surgery, and in the
course of his varied work has developed not only eminent skill and
acquired deep learning, but has gathered the fine virtues of humanity.
His last work is a book entitled "Modern Operation in Hernia,"
which is so well received that a second edition was called for in six
months by the publishers. One of the latest honors to be bestowed
upon him for his eminence in the science and art of surgery was the
decoration of Commander of the Order of Christ, presented by the
lately assassinated King Carlos of Portugal in the fall of 1906, soon
after the meeting of the International Medical Congress at Lisbon.
While there are a few chevaliers of this order in America, so far Dr.
Ferguson is the only one to have received the higher title of Com-
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 365
mander. In 1907 the Royal Geographical Society made him, accom-
panied by its decoration, a corresponding member.
In his fraternal and social relations he is a member of the St.
Andrew's Society, the South Shore Country Club, the Press Club, the
University Club and Scottish Rite Freemasonry, thirty-second degree.
The above sketch of Dr. Ferguson does not at all mention all the
tokens of distinction tendered to him. It is worthy of notice that
when the late Count Creighton of Omaha, Nebraska, donated a new
college building for medical education. Dr. Ferguson was chosen to
deliver the opening address of the Creighton Medical College. In
1903 he delivered the address on Surgery before the Canadian Med-
ical Association, at London, Ontario. A similar honor was shown
to him by the Minnesota State Medical Association in Minneapolis,
where in 1904 he gave the oration on Surgery before that distin-
guished body.
The Doctor's wife, to whom he was married April 5, 1882, was
formerly Sarah J. Thomas, and their children are Ivan H. and
Alexander D. Ferguson.
Daniel Nathan Eisendrath, A. B., M. D., a leading surgeon of
the modern school, thoroughly educated, has come to be a skilful
operator through his large private practice aiid his
-r^ ' continuous connection with several of the citv hos-
ElSENDRATH. . , tt i • /^i • .1 r at .1
pitals. He was born m Chicago, the son of JNathan
and Helena (Fellhcimer) Eisendrath, and mastered the elementary
branches by attending its public schools. In 1889 he completed his
higher training in literatirre and the sciences by graduating from the
famous Johns Hopkins University, of Baltimore, with the degree of
A. B. He returned to Chicago and entered the Northwestern Uni-
versity Medical School, which, upon the completion of his course in
1 89 1, conferred upon him the degree of ]\I. D.
Upon competitive examination Dr. Eisendrath was appointed to
an interneship in the Cook County Hospital, and for eighteen months
between 1891 and 1893 received the benefit of the broad experience
in medicine and surgery which attaches to the duties of this position,
if conscientiously performed. Before entering the actual field of
practice he studied in the famous European centers of learning and
clinics for a period of two and a half years. He then returned to
366 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
Chicago, and since 1895 has been exclusively engaged in the practice
of surgery.
Dr. Eisendrath is attending surgeon to the Cook County and the
Michael Reese hospitals, and adjunct professor of surgery in the
medical department of the University of Illinois (formerly the Col-
lege of Physicians and Surgeons). His other professional connec-
tions are further indicated by his membership in the American Med-
ical Association, the Illinois State Medical Society and the Chicago
Medical Society. He was married February 15, 1898, to Miss Maude
Rosenbaum, and is the father of one child, Richard Rosenbaum
Eisendrath. The Doctor's social side, apart from his pronounced
domesticity, is illustrated by his identification with the Standard and
the Illinois Athletic Clubs.
Dr. Eisendrath is the author of a large number of monographs
upon surgical subjects. He is also the auiihor of two very popular
medical text-books upon "Clinical Anatomy" and "Surgical Diag-
nosis."
John Clarence Webster, M. D., well known in Scotland, Canada
and the western states as a specialist in obstetrics and gynecology, has
now been a practicing physician in Chicago for
JOHN . nearly ten years, and has also been prominently
connected with Rush Medical College and various
hospitals of the city. He is a native of Shediac, New Brunswick, born
on the 2 1 St of October, 1863, son of James and RosHn (Chapman)
Webster. His paternal ancestors are Scottish and his maternal, En-
glish, although his mother's family has been established in Canada
for more than a century.
Dr. Webster's early education was obtained at the Westmoreland
County Gram.mar School of New Brunswick, his first collegiate course
being pursued at Mount Allison University, also in that province of
the Dominion, from which in 1882 he received the B. A. degree. He
afterward went abroad and for a number of years took advanced and
special courses at the University of Edinburgh, Scotland, which hon-
ored him with M. B. and C. M. in 1888 and M. D. (gold medallist) in
1 89 1. In 1893 he became a Fellow of the Royal College of Physicians,
Edinburgh, and from 1890 to 1896 practiced in that city, holding also
the position of first assistant in the department of obstetrics and dis-
eases of women in the University of Edinburgh. In 1897 Dr. Webster-
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 367
located in Montreal, Canada, and during the two years of his practice
in that city was also lecturer on gynecology at McGill University and
assistant gynecologist in Royal Victoria Hospital.
Since 1899 Dr. Webster has been identified with professional work
and education in Chicago, holding the following positions : Professor
of obstetrics and gynecology at Rush Medical College, now affiliated
with the University of Chicago ; obstetrician and gynecologist to
Presbyterian Hospital and Central Free Dispensary, and consulting
gynecologist to Passavant and St. Anthony's hospitals. He is a mem-
ber of the British Medical Association, Edinburgh Obstetrical Society.
Royal Academy of Medical Science of Palermo (Italy), Italian Ob-
stetrical and Gynecological Society, American Medical Association,
American Gynecological Society (fellow), Chicago Medical Society
and the Chicago Gynecological Society, and, as to non-professional
organizations, he is identified with the University and Chicago Liter-
ary clubs. The Doctor is also well known as the author of various
medical and scientific books, monographs and papers. He was mar-
ried in 1899 to Miss Alice Kessler Lusk, daughter of the late Dr.
William Lusk, of New York, and the children born to them are Janet
Sophia, John Clarence, Jr., and William Lusk Webster. Dr. Webster
resides at 27 Bellevue place, and his office in the business district of
the city is at 100 State street.
John Ellis Gilman, M. D., emeritus professor of materia medica,
Hahnemann Medical College, Chicago, and one of the oldest graduates
of that institution now engaged in practice, is also
>, * one of the most prominent homeopathists in the
GiLMAN. ^^ . r ■, ■, ^ • , , •
west. He is of old Puritan stock, his progenitor com-
ing over from old England and settling in New England in 1638. Dur-
ing the Revolution Nicholas Gilman was a member of the Continental
Congress and was subsequently chosen a United States senator from
New Hampshire, while John Taylor Gilman was governor of the
Granite state for fourteen years during the last portion of the eight-
eenth and the first of the nineteenth century. Fisher Ames, a cousin
of Dr. Gilman's grandmother, was also a member of the first Con-
gress of the United States, his immediate ancestors settling at Exeter
and Gilmanton, New Hampshire, in very early colonial days.
Bartholomew Gilman, the Doctor's grandfather, was among the
368 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
first of the family to leave New Hampshire for the new Northwest
Territory, locating at Belore, a few miles -southwest of Marietta. He
afterward removed to Kentucky, but not before the birth of John C.
> Oilman, the father of John E.
John E. Oilman was born at Harrner, a suburb of Marietta, Ohio,
on the 24th of July, 1841, and his father was not only a physician, but
married a Miss Fay, of an old historic Massachusetts family, three
daughters of whom married physicians. His uncle. Dr. Oeorge Oil-
man, was also for many years a leading member of the profession in
Lexington, Kentucky, and his elder brother, previous to entering the
ministry, practiced medicine for some time in Marietta. The tendency
of John E. Oilman to adopt a medical career seemed to be inbred from
all sides of the family.
When the boy was five years of age, the family removed to West-
boro, Massachusetts, where he was educated and prepared for college,
having in the meantime served an apprenticeship at piano making in
Boston and obtained quite a knowledge of medicine and surgery. He
had also become quite a musician, and, as his father died at about this
time he turned his talents in this direction to practical account by
teaching music for about three years. In 1861 he returned to Mari-
etta and conducted a piano store, but continued his medical studies
with his brother, and when he removed to Toledo to follow the same
mercantile pursuit found a medical instructor in the person of Dr.
Oeorge Hartwell. After thus employing three years of his time he
embarked in several oil speculations in Marietta and then settled down
in earnest to make a professional name for himself.
Contrary to the wishes and instruction of his father and his sev-
eral instructors, the young man joined the school of homeopathy
when its principles were in general disfavor, and often ridiculed by
the "regulars." In 1867 he became a student at Hahnemann Medical
College, which had been founded in Chicago seven years previously,
and received his degree therefrom in the spring of 1871. He at once
established himself in practice at the old Crosby Opera House, his
abilities being quickly and substantially recognized. He was one of
the originators of the art gallery which attracted so many to that .
popular and fashionable resort, and Dr. Oilman shared materially in
the benefits derived by the managers of the Opera House in this influx
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 369
of wealth and culture. The great fire, however, swept away all his
private possessions, and he was obliged, with thousands of his fellow-
citizens, to re-establish himself in business and in life.
Dr. Oilman was the first physician in Chicago to offer his services
to the Citizens' Relief Committee, and was appointed chairman of
the medical department. In this capacity he organized the burnt ter-
ritory into districts, appointed the physicians in charge, instituted the
opening of hospitals and dispensaries, and attended personally to the
relief of sufferers temporarily sheltered in three of the city churches
until the management of the work could be assumed by the Chicago
Relief and Aid Society, During, the following winter and spring,
as secretary of that organization and physician of the Herrick Free
Dispensary, he added to his laurels both as a physician and a man.
In 1882 Dr. Oilman was elected to the chair of physiology and
sanitary science of Hahnemann Medical College, holding that profes-
sorship until 1888, when he was transferred to the chair of materia
medica. Resigning the latter in 1902, he has since been emeritus pro-
fessor. Both as private practitioner and public educator, therefore, for
more than thirty-six years his reputation has been continually growing
until it now places him in the front rank of homeopathic physicians
in the west.
Dr. Oilman's contributions to medical literature have been many
and valuable. He is also well known in general and art literature,
being a clear and strong writer on current topics, and having been for
some time, in company with Joseph Wright, editor of the Chicago Art
Journal. It follows, as a matter of course, that his association with
the medical societies of the school of which he is so distinguished a
representative is both wide and intimate.
On July 26, i860. Dr. Oilman was married at Adrian, Michigan,
to Miss Mary D. Johnson, of Westboro, Massachusetts. They have
two children, William Tenney and Cora Edith May Oilman, the son
also being a Chicago physician. The Doctor and his wife reside at the
Kenwood Hotel, on the South Side. He is a member of the Chicago
Press, the Palette and Chisel, Chicago Athletic and South Shore
Country clubs, and a sociable, polished and companionable gentleman,
as well as an eminent representative of his profession.
Vol. 1—24.
370 CHICAGO. AND COOK COUNTY
The career of Robert Hall Babcock as a physician and surgeon
has some special points of interest, especially owing to the fact that
since thirteen years of age he has been blind, and
P â– pursued his subseciuent studies and has gained dis-
tinction in his profession against the obstacles inter-
posed by that physical disability. Dr. Babcock is a graduate, with
bachelor's and master's degrees, of Western Reserve University, grad-
uated in medicine in 1878 from what was then the Chicago Medical
College (now the medical department of Northwestern University)
and the following year from the College of Physicians and Surgeons
of New York City. Three years were spent in professional study in
Europe, and since 1883 he has practiced medicine in Chicago. As a
specialist Dr. Babcock has devoted much of his practice to diseases
of the heart and lungs. His professional connections have been ex-
tensive. Until September, 1891, he was attending physician in the
chest department of the South Side Free Dispensary; from 1891 to
1905 was professor of clinical medicine and diseases of the chest in
the College of Physicians and Surgeons (Medical Department of the
Illinois State University) ; has also been attending physician in Cook
County Hospital, consulting physician to several local hospitals, and
for a number of years professor of physical diagnosis in the Chicago
Post-Graduate Medical School. He is a member of the National
Society for the Study and Prevention of Tuberculosis and the Chi-
cago Tuberculosis Institute; member of the Chicago University Club,
the Chicago Medical Society, the Chicago Pathological Society, As-
sociation of American Physicians, American Climatological Society
(at one time its president), American Medical Association, Illinois
State Medical Society, corresponding member of the Medico-Chirur-
gical Society of Edinburgh, and the International Tuberculosis Insti-
tute, the National Congress of Physicians and Surgeons, and honorary
member of the Colorado State Medical Society. He is author of nu-
merous articles contributed to medical journals, and of "Diseases of
the Heart and Arterial System," (D. Appleton & Co., 1903), and
"Diseases of the Lungs," (D. Appleton & Co., 1907).
Dr. Babcock was born at Watertown, New York, July 26, 1851.
His family is of New England Puritan stock. His" father, Robert
Stanton Babcock, a native of Stonington, Connecticut, died in Kala-
mazoo, Michigan, where he had been a merchant and banker. The
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY ' 371
mother, Emily Hall Babcock, who is still livinir, is a native of New
York City. Among the direct ancestors who lived and gained reputa-
tion in Revolutionary days were Dr. Joshua liabcock and Col. Harry
Babcock, both residents of Westerly, Rhode Island. On the mother's
side also were men who fought in the RcNolution, as the records of
the Sons of the American Revolution and the Society of Military
Orders of Foreign Wars show. Dr. Babcock being a member of both
of these societies. Robert Hall Babcock was taken by his parents to
Kalamazoo, Michigan, when one year old, and in (liat town, which
then had about five thousand people, he grew up, an accident depriv-
ing him of sight when he was thirteen. From September, 1864, to
June, 1867, he was a pupil of the blind in Philadelphia, and the two
years following in a preparatory school at Olivet, Michigan. In Sep-
tember, 1869, he entered Western Reserve College (then located at
Hudson, Ohio, but since removed to Cleveland). Never a robust boy,
his student life was several times interrupted by periods of ill health.
The suggestions of two medical friends led him to the choice of a pro-
fession, in which his honors and attainments ha\'e been notable. Dr.
Babcock is a Republican in politics, and a member of the Fourth Pres-
byterian church of Chicago. June 12, 1879, he married, at Montclair,
New Jersey, Lizzie Clinton West. Her genealogy is noteworthy be-
cause it includes the name of George Soule of the Mayflower, and
various other prominent personages connected with the early history
of the American colonies. Dr. and Mrs. Babcock have two children :
Eleanor Clinton Babcock, born in Chicago, December 31, 1888; and
Robert Weston Babcock, born in Chicago, May 9, 1893.
The actualities and possibilities of the X-ray as applied to sur-
gery and medical diagnosis have attracted the profound attention and
investigation of the fraternity for several years
-r^ â– past. Dr. Noble Murray Eberhart is one of the
JiBERHART
few who have become so absorbed in it scientifically
and as an instrument of immeasurable value in the progress of medi-
cine as an exact science, that he is now concentrating all his abilities
to the exposition and development of the phenomenon. The result
is that he is attaining national repute in his specialty.
r)r. Eberhart is of ancient and noble German ancestry, being de-
scended on the paternal side from a line of Wurtemberg kings who
were in power from the twelfth to early in ihe nineteenth century.
372 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
The maternal forefathers were Scotch and EngHsh. The son of Isa
Amend and MeHssa (Jacobs) Eberhart, he is a native of Benton
Harbor, Michigan, where he was born on the 21st of April, 1870.
Later the family removed further west and Noble was educated in
the common branches b}^ attendance at the public schools of Iowa,
Wisconsin and Ilhnois. He was also a student at the University of
Illinois, Lombard University and Racine (Wis.) College, graduating
from the last named institution at the age of eighteen, with the degree
of B. S. In 1 89 1 Hedding College conferred M. S. upon him, and
upon his graduation from Bennett College, Chicago, in 1894, he
became an M. D. Later (1901), he graduated from the medical
department of the University of Illinois.
After serving as an interne in Cook County Hospital Dr. Eber-
hart commenced general practice in Chicago, but gradually limited
his work to special surgery. In 1901 he became greatly interested
in the X-ray and finally relinquished all other work to specialize in
this line. Prior to entering this field he had served for five years on
the attending staff of the Cook County Hospital and for two years
was attending surgeon at the Baptist Hospital. Eor three years he
was in charge of the X-ray department of the Chicago Post-Graduate
Medical School and Hospital, and is now professor and head of the
department of electro-therapy and secretary of the faculty, Chicago
College of Medicine and Surgery, as well as attending surgeon and
director of the X-ray laboratory of the Frances Wihard Hospital.
Dr. Eberhart is a contributor to the standard medical periodicals,
among his noteworthy papers being a series in the Medical Standard
entitled "Practical X-Ray Therapy." He is also the author of a
condensed guide to "X-Ray and High Frequency Technique," "Brief
Guide to Vibratory Technique," a text-book issued in 1907, and of a
series of three text-books on entomology and one on zoology. It
should also be stated that he has been breveted captain for services
in connection with Reed's Regiment, in the Spanish-American war.
The Doctor is a member of the Chicago and Illinois State Med-
ical Societies, the American Medical Association and the American
Association of Life Insurance Examining Surgeons, and a Fellow of
the American Academy of Medicine, also an honorary Life Fellow
of Society of Science, Letters and Arts of London, England. He is
a Mason of high degree, being a member of Garden City Lodge No.
iHK NEW YO
ASTOH. LKNOX XHB
Tli-Dr.N J-OUWDATlOKt
'i^7{A^ ^^te^.
^^b.
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 373
141, Oriental Consistory and Medinah Temple of Mystic Shrine. Dr.
Eberhart's marriage to Miss Margaret Freeman occurred December
15, 1906, and their pleasant home is at No. 1139 Sheridan Road.
Albert Goldspohn, M. S., M. D., who has been an active prac-
titioner of medicine and surgery in Chicago for the past twenty years,
has a high record for thoroughness and efficiency,
„ which is so characteristic of his ancestry. Care-
GOLDSPOHN. . ,, , , , , , , , , , ,
fully educated, both at home and abroad, and hav-
ing the advantage of the best clinics of Europe and America, it is
safe to say that there are few physicians and surgeons in the city
who have been more faitli fully prepared for their professional work
than Dr. Goldspohn. He was born in the township of Roxbury,
Dane county, Wisconsin, on September 33, 185 1, and is the son of
William and Fredericke (Kohlmann) Goldspohn, both of whom were
natives of Germany, where they were educated, l)ut came to America
before their marriage. His paternal grandfather was chief of police
at Neu Strelitz, Mecklenburg, and was one of the few survivors of
Napoleon's army in its memorable retreat from Moscow in 18 12.
Very wisely his parents did not adopt the English language in their
domestic circle, nor retain any of the German provincial dialects,
but taught their children the proper German ("Hochdeutsch") as
their mother tongue. This was of great value to Dr. Goldspohn
while pursuing his literary and professional studies, especially while
taking his post-graduate course of two and a half years in Germany.
As the eldest child of a pioneer farmer, Albert's boyhood days
were thoroughly schooled to industry. He cared little for games,
but had a natural inclination for books and thorough intellectual
investigation. This trait of conscientious thoroughness he carried
with him through the district school, the village high school and
his experience of two years as a drug clerk. It was while engaged
in the latter capacity that he determined upon a collegiate course and
the ultimate study of medicine. After completing his preliminary
education he entered the Northwestern College at Naperville, Illi-
nois, graduating in 1S75 from the Latin Scientific course, which
carried with it the degree of Bachelor of Science. Since then his
alma mater has conferred upon him the M. S. degree. The Doctor
looks back to. his early college days with affectionate gratitude, which
does not rest with mere sentiment, as is evident bv his donation of
374 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
twenty-five thousand dollars, in 1906, for the erection of a science
hall as an attractive and useful feature of the Northwestern College.
Dr. Goldspohn at once entered Rush Medical College, Chicago,
and after three years of faithful study, taking also the full winter
and optional courses, he graduated with his medical degree in 1878.
The succeeding eighteen months which he spent in the Cook County
Hospital as an interne were of vast im.portance to his future, opening
as they did a field of wide and vital experience. This was followed
by six years of general country practice at Des Plaines, Illinois, after
which he again evinced his ujifailing determination to develop his
professional abilities to the utmost by going abroad for a post-grad-
uate course at the famous German universities. For two and a half
years he pursued his studies with characteristic method and energy
at Heidelberg, Strassburg, Wurzburg, Halle and Berlin, chiefly de-
voting himself to pathology, bacteriology and general surgery, par-
ticularly to gynecology, in which specialty he has since acquired well
merited distinction.
Thus strengthened by broad experience and a training under
masters of world-wide fame, in October, 1887, Dr. Goldspohn began
practice in Chicago, about six months later was appointed attending
surgeon to the German Hospital, and in June, 1892, professor of
gynecology in the Post-Graduate Medical School and Hospital, of
the city, the latter an especially flattering recognition of his profes-
sional skill and originality. He is a member of the Chicago Medical,
Medico-Legal and Gynecological Societies, Illinois State Medical So-
ciety, Mississippi A^'alley Medical Association, American Medical
Association, American Association of Obstetricians and Gynecologists
and the International Periodical Congress of Obstetricians and Gyn-
ecologists. The Doctor keeps in line with the best medical and scien-
tific thought not only through his leading identification with such
organizations but through a liberal subscription to current publica-
tions, especially those, both in German and English, which are de-
voted to the diseases of women and general surgery. He has himself
been a valued contributor along these lines, having written about
forty monographs upon these subjects and medical sociology. Out-
side of his professional field he is a member of the Evangelical
Association, in religion, and a Republican in politics. But he is no
politician, either political or medical, and has the utmost repugnance
CHICAGO AND COOK COUX'IA' 375
toward office seeking or office holding. Dr. Goldspohn's present wife,
to whom he was married February ±s, 1903, was formerly Miss
Rosene H. Crasser, and his home has long been at No. 517 Cleveland
avenue.
More delicate research and profound thought have been given to
the medical and surgical diseases of the eye than to the disorders of
any other of the special organs, for the very con-
clusive reason that blindness is the universal horror
of mankind ; and any physician or surgeon who
can cure, or even alleviate, a serious defect of sight is considered by
the patient in the light of a benefactor who can never be sufficiently
rewarded. The scientific and clinical literature of ophthalmology is
therefore of widespread interest and value to the professional and
layman alike. This fact, combined with his remarkable abilities as a
praciiticner, his originality as an investigator and his distinctn^n as
a writer has made Casey Albert Wood, M. D., C. M.. D. C. L., of
Chicago, one of the most marked figures in the medical and surgical
circles of America.
Dr. Wood is a native of Canada, born at Wellington, Ontario, on
the 21st of November, 1856, son of Orrin Cottier and Louisa (Leggo)
Wood. His father was a well known physician, a native of New York
state, and a descendant of Epenetus Wood; the latter born in 1689, in
Berkshire. England, emigrated to America and settled near Newburgh,
New York, in 171 7. Samuel Wood, the great-grandfather, was an
officer in the Continental army.
Dr. Wood received his education at tlie grammar school and col-
legiate institute located in Ottawa, Canada, graduating from the
latter as prize-man in 1872. After a year's residence in a French
school at Grenville, Ouel)ec, he began the study of medicine with his
father, later entering the medical department of the University of
Bishop's College. Montreal, and recei\ing clinical instiaiction in tlie
Montreal General Hospital. After completing the course there he
was admitted to the College of Physicians and Surgeons of Ontario,
and became a licentiate of the College of Physicians and Surgeons
of Quebec. For several years he practiced successfully in Montreal,
most of the time holding the chairs of chemistry and patholog}^ in
the University of Bishop's College. Pie then retired from general
practice to make a specialty of ophthalmology and otology, spending
376 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
several months at the New York Eye and Ear Infirmary and two
years in Berhn, Vienna, Paris and London. In 1886 Doctor Wood
was married to Emma, daughter of James Shearer, a prominent
citizen of Montreal. -
Coming to Chicago, in 1889, Dr. Wood soon acquired a large
practice, which has continually increased with the growth of his
reputation. His prominent identification with hospital work is shown
in that he has been ophthalmologist for two terms to the Cook County
Hospital ; ophthalmic surgeon for four years to the Alexian Brothers'
Hospital, and is now attending ophthalmologist to St. Luke's, Wesley,
Passavant Memorial and the Post-Graduate Medical School Hos-
pitals, as well as consulting ophthalmic surgeon to Cook County and
St. Anthony's Hospitals. Since 1890 he has been professor of
ophthalmology in the Chicago Post-Graduate Medical School, and in
1898 was appointed professor of clinical ophthalmology in the Uni-
versity of lUinois. In 1906 he resigned this position on receiving the
appointment of head professor of ophthalmology in the medical
faculty of Northwestern University. He was elected chairman of
the ophthalmological section of the American Medical Association,
in 1899, and in 1902 became president of the Chicago Ophthalmo-
logical Society. In 1903 he was chosen vice-president of the Medico-
Legal Society.
Dr. Wood is a member of the International Medical Congress, the,
American Association for the Advancement of Science, the Pan-
American Medical Congress, "Die Ophthalmologische Gesellschaft,"
the Illinois and Chicago Medical Societies, the American Medical
Association, the Chicago Neurological, Medico-Legal and Ophthal-
mological Societies, and is also a fellow of the American and Chicago
x\cademies of Medicine. In addition to the offices in the various
medical societies already mentioned, he has held the presidency of the
American Academy of Medicine, and in 1905-6 was president of the
American Academy of Ophthalmology and Oto-Laryngology. He
is also a member of the Illinois Society of the Sons of the Revolu-
tion, and of the Union League, University, Calumet and Caxton
Clubs, of Chicago.
As a contributor to the science and literature of his specialty Dr.
Wood has earned a reputation which is more than national. For
many years he acted as editor-in-chief of the Annals of Ophthalmol-
.CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 377
ogy, and now has charge of the department of Itahan hterature in Oph-
thahnology. He is also bne of the principal editors of the Ophthalmic
Record. Among other journals with which he has been connected
are the Chicago Medical Standard and the Anall de Oftaliuologia,
City of Mexico. He wrote "Wayside Optics" for the Popular Science
Monthly; a series of illustrated papers on the Eyes and Light-Sight
of Printers for the Inland Printer, and since 1900 has contributed
many other articles to scientific journals. Dr. Wood has edited the
ophthalmic section of the Practical Medical Series, an annual review
of medicine and surgery by prominent writers; has published "Les-
sons in the Diagnosis and Treatment of Eye Diseases" and "The
Toxic Amblyopias: Their Pathology and Treatment"; has translated
numerous ophthalmological works from German, French and Italian
writers, and has written chapters for the "Posey-Wright Text-Book
of Diseases of the Eye, Ear, Nose and Throat," the "Hansell-Sweet
Manual of Diseases of the Eye," the "Posey-Spillcr Treatise on the
Neurology of the Eye," the "Randall and DeSchweinitz American
Text-Book of Diseases of the Eye and Ear," "Hare's Therapeutics,"
and other publications of a similar nature. In conjunction with Dr.
T. A. Woodruff he has written a book on "The Commoner Diseases
of the Eye," which has passed through three editions. With the late
Dr. Frank Buller, of Montreal, he was engaged for several years in
collating statistics bearing on the ravages of wood alcohol on the
American population. Several hundred cases of death and blindness
were made the basis of a number of articles contributed, in 1904, to
the Journal of the American Medical Association. The agitation at-
tending these investigations contributed not a little to the passage
of the Industrial Alcohol and the Pure Food bills by Congress, Dr.
Wood, upon invitation, giving his testimony before a committee of
the Plouse having the matter in charge. His original and most recent
addition to our knowledge of comparative ophthalmology is con-
tained in a monograph on the "Eyes and Eyesight of Birds," a
zoological study mostly carried on in the gardens of the London
Zoological Society, of which Dr. Wood is an active Fellow.
In 1903 the University of Bishop's College, his alma mater, con-
ferred on him the honorary degree of D. C. L., for distinguished liter-
ary services. Tn 1905 he was granted by ^IcGill University the "ad
378 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY-.
eundem" degrees of M. D., C. M., chiefly on account of his noteworthy
contributions to medical hterature.
More recently (1908) he has completed a large work, entitled "A
System of Ophthalmic Therapeutics," the only complete treatise of its
kind in the English language.
On the resignation of Dr. Frank S. Whitman from the superin-
tendency of the Illinois Northern Hospital for the Insane, a successor
was chosen whose previous experience and acknowl-
VACLAV . g(^[o-ecl ability in the fields of medicine and adminis-
P0DSTA.TA
tration at once insured his fitness for the new duties
and the confidence of his subordinates and the public. Since the date
of his appointment on July i, 1906, Dr. Podstata has made a record
fully in keeping with the high expectations entertained at the time.
For a number of years Dr. Podstata has been known in the pro-
fessional and public service in Chicago and the state. Of Austrian
birth, born at Hohenbruck, April 24, 1870, son of Vaclav and Anna
Koblizek Podstata, educated in the high school at Braunau and in the
college at Chrudim, he arrived in America from his native land in
1889, and until 1892 was associate editor of the missionary paper
Pravda, published in Chicago by Rev. E. A. Adams. He continued
more or less his connection with this paper during the following years
when he was engaged in his medical studies. He was graduated from
the Chicago Homeopathic College in 1895, and in the same year took
the interne examinations for Illinois State Hospital positions and was
appointed to the Illinois Eastern Hospital for the Insane at Kankakee.
Receiving his appointment on June ist, in the following September he
was promoted to the regular staff as assistant physician. He continued
at Kankakee until October, 1899, when he received a leave of absence
and entered upon post-graduate work in the University of Illinois.
In May, 1900, he returned to Kankakee, and in February, 1902, was
promoted to chief of the medical staff. A few months later he re-
signed and became physician in charge at Oakwood Sanitarium, a
private institution in Geneva, Wisconsin. In June, 1903, on the
recommendation of a number of persons engaged in the regeneration
of the Cook County Institutions at Dunning, President Foreman of
the county board appointed Dr. Podstata to the position of general
superintendent of Cook County Institutions. A thorough reorganiza-
tion at Dunning was a task requiring the highest degree of profes-
CHICAGO Ax\D COOK COUNTY 379
sional skill and administrative ability. The impnnenients of service
and methods and the erection of numerous ])uildings and additions
have been so many that Dunning no longer has its former reputation
as a plague spot on the civic body. The success that attended his work
in Dunning brought his name at once to the attention of the trustees
of the Illinois Northern Hospital for the Insane when Dr. Whitman
resigned, and his appointment came as an honor thoroughly merited.
Dr. Podstata is a member of the Chicago Medical Society, the Ameri-
can Medical Association, and the Illinois State Medical Society. He is
Republican in politics. January 12, 1903, he married Miss Mary Gra-
ham Porter.
William Patterson MacCracken, M. D., one of the leading physi-
cians and surgeons in Chicago and prominent in fraternal circles, is a
native of Allegheny, Pennsylvania, born May 20,
,, ^ â– 1863, son of Isaac and Isabel Elizabeth (Caldwell)
MacCracken. ,. ^^ , . , . „ '
MacCracken, respectively of Scotch and English-
American descent. During his business life the father was a merchant
in that city, his death occurring in Spokane, Washington, in the }ear
1898, and the mother is still living in Allegheny.
Dr. MacCracken obtained his preliminary education in the public
and high schools of his native city, and subsequently, for three years,
was a student at the Western University of PennsyKania. He then
dropped his studies for some four years, being then engaged in the
wholesale dry goods business at Pittsburg, Pennsylvania. Although
his systematic education had been thus interrupted, the Doctor had
continued his readings along various lines, which gradually had cen-
tered in things medical and surgical. In 1884 he commenced the for-
mal study of medicine under the preceptorship of Dr. L. II. Willard,
of Pittsburg, and in the following year came to Chicago to enter the
Hahnemann Medical College. Graduating from that institution in
1887, he has since been continuously engaged in the ])ractice of his
profession in Chicago, and not only has acquired a high standing as
a physician but as an educator, through his connection with the faculty
of Hahnemann Medical College. He was professor of physiolog}- in
1892-95, of medical jurisprudence in 1895-97,. theory and practice,
1897-99, ^'^'^^ attending physician to the 4iospital in 1892-99. Outside
the radius of Hahnemann College he has been attending physician to
the Lakeside and Baptist Hospitals and lecturer on materia medica hi
the Baptist Training School for Nurses. The Doctor has had a long,
38o CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
close and influential connection with the Royal Arcanum, which brisk
and growing fraternity has drawn upon his professional skill for many
years. In 1890 he was appointed a subordinate medical examiner for
Chicago, which position he filled for fifteen years, and in 1905 became
supervising medical examiner for Illinois, as a just promotion for his
long, faithful and efficient service and his deep devotion to the inter-
ests of the order. Dr. MacCracken is president of the Royal Arcanum
Medical Examiners' Association, and is a leader in the transactions
and cooperative work of The American Institute of Homeopathy,
Illinois Institute of Homeopathy, Clinical Society of Hahnemann Col-
lege (of which he has been president), and the Chicago Homeopathic
and Chicago Medical Societies.
Dr. MacCracken has been interested and periodically identified with
military matters since his youth, his record in this line beginning in
1878, when he was captain of the cadet corps at the University of
Pennsylvania. In his student years at that institution he received a.
thorough military training, which has since been utilized at various
times. He is prominent in Masonic work, being past high priest of
Fairview Chapter, R. A. M., and captain of the drill corps of Montjoie
Commandery, K. T. At the outbreak of the Spanish-American war
he tendered his services to the government, and in 1899 was appointed
superintendent of the work incident to the care of returned soldiers
who entered the Chicago hospitals. His connection with organizations
not already mentioned extends to the Royal League and the Iroquois
and Kenwood clubs. It should also be mentioned that his Masonic
record dates from his membership in Landmark Lodge No. 422. In
politics the Doctor is a Republican, but has never meddled with poli-
tics except as a voter and an intelligent citizen.
Married September 17, 1887, at Aurora, New York, to Miss
Elizabeth Avery, Dr. MacCracken has become by her the father of
two children — William P. MacCracken, Jr., and Cornelia Isabelle
MacCracken, who died in 1898. The Doctor's professional work has
increased to such an extent that he not only has an ofhce at his resi-
dence, 4327 Greenwood avenue, but headquarters in the heart of the
down-town district, at 100 State street. In 1887, when he first com-
menced practice in Chicago, he opened an ofhce at the corner of Forty-
third street and Lake avenue, and since that year has always been lo-
cated in the immediate vicinity.
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 381
Oscar Oldberg-, dean of the Northwestern University School of
Pharmacy, and a founder of the institution as well, is one of the fore-
most authorities of his dav in all pharmaceutical
IjQ i^ AT? "
„ matters. He comes of a people famous for its bot-
Oldberg. . , . , , . , . ,
anists, chemists and pharmacists, being born in
Alfta, Sweden, on the 22nd of January, 1846. ITis parents were
Anders and Fredrika Oldberg, who provided him with a thorough edu-
cation directed toward the realization of a scientific career. After re-
ceiving a preliminary training in various public schools of Sweden
and under the tuition of private teachers, he also pursued a course
at the gymnasium, located at Gefle.
When he was nearly twenty-one years of age Mr. Oldberg emi-
grated to the United States, and engaged in the practice of pharmacy
at New York and Washington. In 1872 he served as vice consul of
Sweden and Norway at Memphis, Tennessee. Subsequently he re-
turned to Washington, District of Columbia, where for seven years
he was identified with the United States Marine Hospital service as
chief clerk and medical purveyor. Wliile thus engaged he became a
member of the faculty of the National College of Pharmacy, which
conferred upon him the honoraiy degree of Pharm. 1).
In 1884 Dr. Oldberg came to Chicago, and in 1886 became one of
the prime movers in the founding of the Northwestern University
School of Pharmacy and was elected dean of its faculty. This office
he still fills with his old-time zeal and efficiency, his chair on the faculty
being professor of pharmacy and director of the pharmaceutical lab-
oratories. Since 1880 he has served as a member of the Committee of
Revision of Pharmacopoeia of the United States, and in 1893 ^'^''^^
honored with the secretaryship of the Seventh International Pharma-
ceutical Congress. He is a member of the American Association for
the Advancement of Science, American Pharmaceutical Association,
the German Chemical Society, the American Chemical Society, and
several state organizations devoted to that field.
As an author, both alone and in collaboration with others. Dr.
Oldberg has an international reputation. In this line, he is the author
of "Companion to the United States Pharmacopoeia," published by
Oldberg and Wall in 1884; "Weights and Measures." 1885; "Labora-
tory Manual of Chemistry" (with Professor John H. Long), 1894;
382 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
"Home Study in Pharmacy," 1890; "Fifteen Hundred Examples of
Prescriptions and Formulas," 1892; "Inorganic Chemistry, General,
Medical and Pharmaceutical," 1900. Besides being the author of
such standard works, he is a constant contributor of valuable papers
to the current medical press, on pharmacy, chemistry, pharmacopcDeias
and metrology.
On May 17, 1873, Dr. Oldberg was united in marriage with Miss
Emma Parritt, of Youngstown, Ohio, and the children born to them
have been as follows : Arne, Olga (now Mrs. Thornton W. Small-
wood) and Virgil. The family residence is at No. 7808 Union avenue.
Thomas Adams Woodruff, M. D., C. M., L. R. C. P. (London),
is one of that increasing class of physicians who, commencing as
general practitioners, become especially attracted to
some form of pathological condition, or affections
WOODRTTFF
which relate to special organs, and are impelled to
devote their professional study and practice to a sharply defined field.
Their previous training gives them such a broad foundation for their
special investigations and practice that they are able to instinctively
judge as to the relation of general conditions and remote pathological
causes to the abnormal developments in special regions or organs,
thus having an advantage as diagnosticians over fellow practitioners
who may reach the same conclusions only after long and laborious
study and research.
Dr. Woodruff", so widely known as a specialist in ophthalmology
and otology, is a Canadian, born in St. Catharines, Province of On-
tario, on the 4th of June, 1865, his parents being Samuel DeVeaux
and Jane Caroline (Sanderson) Woodruff. He is a descendant of
Matthew Woodruff, who settled in Connecticut in 1640 and was one
of the original proprietors of Farmington, Connecticut. His great-
grandfather, Ezekiel Woodruff, was born in Litchfield, that state,
graduated at Yale University in the class of 1779, and was a lawyer
by profession. In 1795 he moved to Canada, settling in the Niagara
district. The paternal grandfather, William Woodruff, was a native
of Litchfield, but when very j^oung was brought to Canada by his
parents, and afterward became a leading merchant and man of affairs
in the Dominion, at one time serving as a member of the assembly, of
Upper Canada. His father, Samuel DeVeaux Woodruff, was a well
known and prominent resident of St. Catharines and the Niagara
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CHICAGO AND COOK COUXTN" 383
district, a civil engineer and for many years superintendent of the
Welland Canal.
Dr. WoodrnlT received his early education in the schools of St.
Catharines and Niagara and pursued his higher literary studies at the
Upper Canada College, located at Toronto. After matriculating at
the University of Toronto he entered McGill University, at Mon-
treal, from which he graduated in 1S88, with the degrees of M. D.
and C. M. The succeeding two years he spent in Europe, attending
tlie hospitals in London, Berlin and Goettingen and ohtaining an
experience of incalculable benefit to him in his future practice. While
abroad, he was also house physician in the Nottingham General Hos-
pital, England, and in 1890 took the degree of L. R. C. P. in London.
It was during the latter year that the Doctor became a resident
physician of Chicago, and for four years engaged in a most successful
general practice. In 1894 his attraction to ophthalmology and otology
had grown so intense that he formally retired from general practice
to take up these specialties. The years 1894-5 were spent in attend-
ance upon the eye and ear hospitals of Vienna, Berlin and London,
and in the fall of the latter year he returned to Chicago and has since
confined himself to his special field,' establishing both a lucrative prac-
tice and a broad reputation among his fellow specialists for signal
skill either in diagnosis or medical and surgical treatment.
For many years Dr. Woodruff has been prominent in connection
with professional organizations and in the- literature devoted to his
specialty. He formerly held the chair of ophthalmology at the Chi-
cago Post-Graduate Medical School, and is ophthalmic surgeon to
St. Luke's Hospital, St. Anthony de Padua Hospital and the Post-
Graduate Hospital. In 1906 he served as vice-president of the Chi-
cago Ophthalmological Society, of which he is a leading member, as
well as of the following: American Medical Association, American
Academy of Ophthalmology (Fellow), American Academy of Med-
icine (Fellow), Illinois State and Chicago Medical Societies, Chicago
Ophthalmological Society, Physicians' Club and Die Ophthalmo-
logischen Gesellschaft. Dr. Woodruff is editorial secretary of the
OpJitJialinic Record and collaborator of "Ophthalmology." In con-
junction with Dr. Casey A. Wood he has written a book on the
"Commoner Diseases of the Eye," which has passed through three
editions. Individually he is author of a number of papers on ophlhal-
584 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
mology, which have attracted the close attention of the fraternity,
and materially extended his already broad reputation as a skillful
and learned specialist in the field which he has elected to occupy —
and in which aim he has met with such marked results. Dr. Wood-
ruff is also president of the McGill Alumni Association, which num-
bers in Chicago quite a number of prominent practitioners, and has
served as president of the Chicago Ophthalmological Society in 1908
and third vice-president of the American Medical Association in
1908. Outside of the organizations identified with his profession he
has membership in the Calumet Club, of which he was first vice-
president in 1906-7-8 and president in 1908-9. He is also a member
of the South Shore Country and University clubs. He is also identi-
fied with the Zeta Psi fraternity and is a member of the Society of
Colonial Wars, and is, in every sense of the word, a man of intense
and broad activity, believing, with other physicians of the modern
school, that the way to attain greatest usefulness in the world is to
get into the most intimate touch with the greatest possible number of
its people.
Henr)^ Stevens Tucker, M. D., dean of the Chicago College of
Medicine and Surgery, president of the staff' of the Frances Willard
Hospital and a prominent and honorable practi-
rp ' tioner, especially well known as a gynecological
surgeon, is a native of Illinois. He was born at
Campton, Kane county, on the ist of May, 1853, and is a son of
John Richard and Margaret (Thompson) Tucker, his English and
Scotch ancestry bringing to him the industry, persistency and thor-
oughness which mark him as a man and have signalized his profes-
sional career. The foundatipn of his literary education was laid in
the common schools of Campton and St. Charles, Illinois. Later he
spent two years at Wheaton (111.) College, but received his literary
degree from Oskaloosa College, of Iowa.
Dr. Tucker pursued his professional course at Bennett Medical
College, Chicago, which conferred M. D. upon him in 1879. In 1904
he took a post-graduate course at the American College of Medicine
and Surgery, having previously had a long and prominent experience
in connection with the educational work of his alma mater. From
1879 to 1883 he was demonstrator of anatomy on the faculty of
Bennett Medical College; professor of general and descriptive anat-
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CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 385
oniy in 1883-9, ^'^^^ professor of surgery and attending and consulting
physician in the college hospital from 1889 to 1900. At the present
time, besides being dean of the Chicago College of Medicine and
Surgery and president of the Willard Hospital staff, he is professor
of gynecology in the former institution and a member of the con-
sulting staff of the Cook County Hospital. His fraternal connection
with professional organizations are with the American Medical Asso-
ciation and with the Illinois ]\Iedical and the Chicago Medical Soci-
eties.
Dr. Tucker's wife, whom he married October 15, 1884, was for-
merly Emma Kronenberg, daughter of Joseph Kronenberg, a hard-
ware merchant of Hamburgh, New York, and they have a daughter,
Inez.
The Doctor has long taken a deep interest in Masonry and has
advanced high in the order, being a member of Ashlar Blue Lodge,
Lafayette Chapter, Montjoie Commandery and Oriental Consistory.
In religion he is a Presbyterian, in politics, a Republican, in profes-
sional character, able and conscientious, and, as to his private traits,
approachable, yet high minded and absolutely reliable.
Alexander Leslie Blackwood, M. D., senior professor of materia
medica and professor of clinical medicine in Hahnemann Medical
College, a practitioner of high standing, was born
T^ â– in Huntington county, Ouebec, July 28, 1862, son
Blackwood. ^ ^ , , * /r-~,ix -n, 1
of John and Ann (Steell) Blackwood. He re-
ceived his literary education in his home academy and at McGill
University, Montreal, Canada, and was subsequently matriculated at
Hahnemann Medical College for the full course, graduating from
that institution in 1888 with the degree of M. D. Not being satisfied
with his professional attainments thus acquired. Dr. Blackwood pur-
sued a course in the New York Post-Graduate Medical School in
1889, and at the Medical School of Johns Hopkins University, Balti-
more, Maryland, in 1902.
Notwithstanding these thorough courses in advanced work. Dr.
Blackwood has been engaged in an active and prominent practice in
Chicago since his graduation from Hahnemann College in 1888, and
has also attained high standing in connection with the educational
work of his alma mater. He is a member of the Chicago Medical
Society. American Institute of Homeopathy, Illinois Homeopathic
Vol. 1—25.
386 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
Medical Association, Homeopathic Medical Society and the Clinical
Society of Hahnemann Hospital. The Doctor is also widely known
as a contributor to the literature of his profession, being the author
of "Diseases of the. Heart and Lungs," "Materia Medica Preparations
and Pharmacology," "Diseases of the Liver," and "Diseases of the
Intestinal Tract."
On August 1 6, 1 89 1, Dr. Blackwood was married to Miss Helen
A. Winslow, who died February 11, 1903, leaving two children,
Leslie Winslow and Howard C. Dr. Blackwood is a staunch member
of the Congregational church. He is a Republican in politics; has
been a leader in educational affairs for years, and is now serving on
the Chicago Board of Education, his term expiring in 1908. He is
also a member of the Chicago Press Club and a member of the
American Association for the Advancement of Science.
E. Fletcher Ingals, M. D., an 'eminent authority in diseases of the
throat, chest and lungs, is a native of Lee Center, Lee county Illinois,
^ ^ where he was born on September 29, 1848. He
* -r comes of a family which was settled in the north of
Ingals. ^ , , , . -^ , , . . . ,^
England durmg early historic times, the first Ameri-
can ancestor coming to the United States in 1627. Various members
located in Vermont at a pioneer period of American history, the grand-
parents of E. Fletcher Ingals removing thence to Pomfret, Connecti-
cut, where his father was born. Later, the family migrated to Lee
county, Illinois, where Charles F. Ingals was a leading farmer and
stockman for many years, but finally removed to Chicago, where he
died at 85 years of age, and his wife is still living, aged eighty-eig-ht.
Dr. Ingals was educated in the public schools of Lee Center, Illi-
nois, in the State Normal School at Normal, and Rock River Seminary
at Mount Morris, and as his medical studies were pursued in Chicago,
his entire mental and professional training has been pursued in the state
of Illinois.
When Dr. Ingals first came to Chicago, in 1867, he kept books for
a year and afterward began the study of medicine with his uncle, Prof.
Ephraim Ingals, who had already attained prominence as a practitioner
and for his educational work in connection with the Rush Medical
College. In 1871 he himself graduated from that institution with his
professional degree, and was at once made a member of the spring
faculty.
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CHICAGO AXD COOK COUXT^^ 387
Upon competitive examination Dr. Ingals secured an interneship
at Cook County hospital, and, after completing his practical course
there of eighteen months, went abroad to obtain even a broader expe-
rience in the hospitals of London and Paris. In 1873 ^^^ returned to
Chicago, and for ten years engaged in general practice.
Since 1883 Dr. Ingals has devoted himself to diseases of the throat,
nose and chest, and has become a national authority in these special-
ties. His text book on "Diseases of the Throat, Chest and Lungs" is
a standard, and has passed through many editions, while his superior
position as an educator and practitioner is indicated by his prominent
connection with professional schools and societies. He now holds the
office of comptroller of Rush Medical College and professor of dis-
eases of the chest, throat and nose, professorial lecturer in medicine,
University of Chicago, as well as the chair of laryngology and rhinol-
ogy in the Chicago Policlinic, having been an incumbent of the latter
since 1889. Dr. Ingals was formerly professor of diseases of the
throat and chest of Northwestern University Woman's Medical School,
and has been a member of nearly every international medical congress
since 1880. Pie was also chairman of the section of laryngology of
the Pan-American Congress in 1893 and of the same section of the
American Medical Association, later. He has been president of the
American Laryngological Association, the American Climatological
Association, Illinois State Medical Society, American Medical College
Association and the Chicago Laryngological and Climatological So-
ciety.
On September 5, 1876, Dr. Ingals was united in marriage with
Miss Lucy S. Ingals, daughter of Dr. Ephraim Ingals and Melvina R.
Ingals. Their children are as follows: Francis E., Melissa Rachel,
Mary Goodell, and E. Fletcher Ingals. Jr. The family residence is at
5540 W'oodlawn avenue.
Although especially identified witli the homeopathy of the west,
there are few practitioners of either school who are more able or widely
known than Charles Adams, ]\r. D.. who of late
L^iiARLEb years has devoted himself exclusively to surgery. He
Adams. . ^ .. . . , t-i xt .1 ' .
is an Englishman, born at Floore, Aorthampton-
sh're, on the 29th of May, 1847, being the son of John and Elizabeth
(Clarke) Adams. He is of old yeoman stock, which may account for
his sturdy, yet courteous aggressiveness, and the straightforwardness
2>S6 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
of his character. Until he was ten years of age he received his educa-
tion in the grammar school at Wellingborough, England, when he
came with his parents to Milwaukee, Wisconsin, where he continued
his studies. In 1861 the family removed to Chicago and the youth
became a bookkeeper for his father, who was engaged in the live-stock
business. Eight years of experience in this line convinced him that a
profession, especially that of medicine, which had in it the elements of
science as well as humanity, was more to his liking than the mere
accumulation of money.
Dr. Adams became a student at Hahnemann Medical College, Chi-
cago, in 1869, and graduated three years later with his professional
degree. After his graduation he spent a year in the Hahnemann Hos-
pital as house surgeon, studied for a time in London, England, and in
1873 returned to Chicago to commence a continuous practice, which,
during the intervening quarter of a century, has brought him generous
and legitimate financial reward, and a broad, high and substantial pro-
fessional reputation. From 1873 to 1896 he was a busy, progressive
general practitioner, and since the latter year has given his attention
solely to surgery, his leadership in that field having been widely and
signally acknowledged.
From 1873 to 1875 Dr. Adams was professor of surgical pathology
at Hahnemann Medical College, and from 1875 to 1884 professor of
principles and practice of surgery, Chicago Homeopathic College. In
recognition of his eminent abilities. Rush Medical College, although
the stanch representative of another school of medicine, in 1898 con-
ferred upon him a second degree of M. D. From 1882 to 1898 he
was major and surgeon of the First Infantry, Illinois National Guard,
was lieutenant-colonel and brigade surgeon in the state service in
1898-03, and in 1898 also filled the office of major and brigade sur-
geon of United States Volunteers. There are few members of his
profession who are more widely known in the ranks of the Illinois
soldiery than Dr. Adams. As consulting surgeon he is attached to
the staff of St. Joseph's and Evanston Hospitals and the Chicago
Nursery and Half Orphan Asylum. He is a Fellow of the Royal
Microscopical Society of London, a member of the Association of
Military Surgeons of the United States and of the State of Illinois;
also a member of the American Medical Association, the Illinois and
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 389
the Chicago Medical Societies, of the Chicago Surgical Society and
the Academy of Sciences.
Married in 1875 ^^ Mary Curtis, daughter of Thomas S. Curtis,
of Wellingborough, England, Dr. Adams' first wife died in 1887, the
mother of one child, Cuthbert Clarke Adams, who survives. His pres-
ent wife, whom he married in 1888, was Mrs. Elizabeth (Mitchell)
Gaylord, widow of Henry Gaylord and daughter of W. H. Mitchell,
vice president of the Illinois Trust and Savings Bank, of Chicago.
John Milton Dodson, A. M., M. D., professor of medicine at Rush
Medical College and dean of students of the same institution, is one
of the o'encral practitioners and educators in Chi-
JOHN M. ^ ^
IS cago.
DODSON. ^^ ^ ,. „,. . , , f T- ,
Born at Berhn, Wisconsm, on the 17th of reb-
ruary, 1859, Dr. Dodson is the elder of two sons born to Nathan Mon-
roe and Elizabeth (Abbott) Dodson. Graduating from the high
school of his native city in 1876, he entered the University of Wis-
consin for a literary course and graduated therefrom in 1880, with
the degree of A. B., being honored with the degree of A. M. from the
same institution eight years later. After his graduation from the
Wisconsin State University he removed to Chicago, and was matricu-
lated at Rush Medical College, from which he received his profes-
sional degree in 1882, obtaining a second degree of M. D. from Jeffer-
son Medical College, Philadelphia, in 1883.
After graduating from Rush Medical College, for three years he
practiced his profession in Berlin, Wisconsin, removing thence to
Madison, that state. In January, 1889, Dr. Dodson located in Chi-
cago, having been appointed demonstrator of anatomy and lecturer
on osteology in Rush Medical College, occupying that position until
1891, when he became professor of physiology and demonstrator of
anatomy, thus continuing until 1898, soon after being appointed to
the chair of medicine, department of diseases of children, his present
professorship. In 1899 he was also appointed junior dean of the col-
lege, and held the office for two years, having been dean of students
since 1901, as well as dean of medical courses of the University of
Chicago.
In addition to this continuous and honorable connection with his
Chicago alma mater, Dr. Dodson has been professor of pediatrics of
the Northwestern University Woman's ^Medical School (1894-7);
390 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
member and distributor of the Illinois Demonstrators' Association
since 1889; trustee of the Chicago Medical Society (1898-1902);
member of the board of directors of Physicians' Club from 1896 to
1903 (president in 1902-3), and has long been identified with the
following organizations : Association of American Anatomists,
American Medical Association, Association of American Naturalists
(central states), Illinois State Medical Society, Wisconsin State Medi-
cal Society, Chicago Medical Society, Chicago Pathological Society,
Chicago Pediatric Society and American Association for the Advance-
ment of Science. It should be added that, in the midst of an active
practice and the duties connected with his college offices and profes-'
sional organizations, the Doctor has found time to contribute not a
little to the medical literature of the day.
July I, 1884, Dr. Dodson was united in marriage to Miss Marie
Van Slyke, of Madison, Wisconsin, who died June 17, 1887. On
November 12, 1890, Dr. Dodson was united in marriage with Miss
Jessie Palmer Kasson, of Milwaukee, and with their two children, a
son, Kasson M., age sixteen, and a daughter, Elizabeth P., age ten,
they reside at No. 5806 Washington avenue. His down-town office
is in the Venetian building. He is a member of the Quadrangle Club
and of the Westward Ho Golf Club.
Joseph Pettee Cobb, M. D., one of the leading homeopathic physi-
cians in the country and an especially high authority on pediatrics, is
a native of Abington, Plymouth county, Massachu-
P ' setts. His parents, Edward White Cobb, of his na-
tive town, and Elmina Howard Cobb, of Bridge-
water, Massachusetts, were representatives of families directly descend-
ed from the English colonists who had been established in the Old Bay
state for many generations.
Dr. Cobb received his education, primarily, in the Abington public
schools, and afterward' spent three years in fitting for college at Wal-
tham New Church Scliool. In 1875 he entered Harvard University,
receiving his A. B. degree in 1879 and for one year thereafter teach-
ing in the public schools of Bridgewater. Soon afterward he came
west and located at Milwaukee, Wisconsin, where he entered a physi-
cian's office and also engaged in the educational work of fitting boys
for eastern universities. Removing then to Chicago to prosecute his
professional studies, in 1881 he entered Hahnemann Medical College
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and Hospital, and in 1883 graduated therefroin with the degree of
M. D., taking- first honors in a class of one hundred and thirty-five.
Since that year he has practiced medicine continuously in Chicago, and
for nearly twenty years has been prominently identified with the ad-
vancement of his alma mater as well as with the general progress of
homeopathy.
In 1888 Dr. Cobb was appoint.;d lecturer in physiology in Hahne-
mann Medical College, and in 1891 elected senior [)rofessor of the de-
partment of physiology, histology and bacteriology. In 1894 he was
chosen senior professor of the department of pediatrics, in the Hahne-
mann Medical College, and clinical professor in diseases of children in
Hahnemann Hospital — which latter positions he continues to hold.
It is in these fields, which include the care of children both in health
and disease, which embrace the preventive and the curative process-
es alike, that Dr. Cobb has acquired the greatest prominence, and
enjoys the full confidence of the profession as well as a large clientele.
He has been a frequent contributor to the medical journals of his school
on topics which concern the welfare of children, has three times been
chairman of the bureau of pedology in the American Institute of Ho-
meopathy and always takes an active part in the same department of
the State Society. In 1893 Dr. Cobb was elected business manager
of the Hahnemann Medical College, which position he resigned at the
end of the year to take the more important ofiice of registrar of the
college and business manager of its official organ The Cliniquc. The
position of registrar he held from 1894 to 1900, and during that time
was instrumental in developing in the college a consistent graded
course, in broadening the scope of the "laboratory work of the school,
m establishing a business like method of attaining and filing scholastic
records, and in putting the college in the front rank of medical schools.
The Doctor's breadth and prominence of reputation is emphasized
by his election, 'in 1903, to the presidency of the American Institute of
Homeopathy, the oldest national medical society in the country, and
the only representative society of that school whose scope embraces
the United States. The annual meeting for the year named was held
in Boston, Massachusetts. Since the inception of the institute in 1844
four of its meetings have been held in Chicago — in 1857. 1870, 1893
(in connection with the Educational Congress of the W orld's Colum-
bian Exposition) and in 1905. The office of president has also been
392 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
filled four times by a member of the Chicago profession — in 1858, by
Dr. D. S. Smith, the pioneer homeopath of Chicago; in 1869, by Dr.
Reuben Ludlam, who was later president of the Hahnemann Medical
College; in 1873, by Dr. Alvin E. Small, who was at the time presi-
dent of that college, and in 1903 by Dr. Cobb. In addition to his
prominent identification with the American Institute of Homeopathy,
he is an active member of the Southern Homeopathic Medical Society,
the Illinois Homeopathic Medical Association, the Chicago Homeo-
pathic Medical Society and the Clinical Society of Hahnemann Hos-
pital.
In September, 1882, Dr. Cobb was married to Edith Helen Per-
sons, at her home in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. They have one son, Ed-
mond P., born August 2, 1883, a graduate of Harvard University, and
at present in the employ of the J. K. Armsby Company, Chicago. The
Doctor is deeply and actively concerned in the work of the Sweden-
borgian church, now serving as president of, the Chicago Society of the
New Jerusalem church. Exercise, especially out of doors, is one of
his life tenets, and he is therefore identified with the Chicago Athletic
Association, the South Shore Country Club, the Calumet Country
Club and the Kenwood Club, all of Chicago.
Oscar Dodd, M. D., a resident of Evanston, with a Chicago office
at 103 State street, is an eye and ear specialist of high standing and
large practice. He was born at Rosendale, Wis-
-p. consin, August 20, 1864. Of his parents, Bushnell
and Margaret (Murray) Dodd, his father was of
English descent, and his mother, who was of Scotch parentage, came
from Prince Edward Island.
Dr. Dodd's early education was obtained in the schools of Rosen-
dale, and in pursuance of the higher branches he attended Ripon Col-
lege, Wisconsin, after which he came to Chicago to take up his
medical studies. Matriculating at the College of Physicians and
Surgeons, he pursued his professional course with credit and gradu-
ated in the class of '90. His undergraduate work was such that he
received appointment as interne at the Illinois Charitable Eye and
Ear Infirmary after his graduation, then for about a year was en-
gaged in general practice at Negaunee, Michigan. He then went
abroad and in the noted schools and hospitals of London, Vienna and
Heidelberg attended climes and engaged in the special studies of
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ophthalmology, otology and laryngology for a year and a half. Thor-
oughly equipped and benefited by a broad and varied experience, he
returned to America.
When Dr. Dodd located in Chicago in 1893 he was, therefore,
a thoroughly educated and experienced physician and surgeon in his
chosen specialties, and has succeeded in establishing both a fine prac-
tice and a high reputation. For a long time he has been identified
with the staff of the Illinois Charitable Eye and Ear Infirmary, for
the past eight years having served as surgeon in the eye department.
He is also oculist and aurist at the Augustana and the Norwegian
Lutheran Deaconess Hospitals. His professional connections include
membership in the American Medical Association, the Chicago Med-
ical Society, the Chicago Ophthalmological Society and the American
Academy of Opthalmology and Oto-Laryngology.
Married to Agnes T. Sheldon, May 18, 1898, Dr. Dodd is the
father of three children, Dorothy, Charles Ward and Margaret. The
family home is at 141 9 Chicago avenue, Evanston, both he and his
wife being identified with the cultured society of that city. The
Doctor himself is a member of the Evanston Club.
Of the thoroughly educated and scientific members of the medical
profession who have transferred the scene of their labors from the
old to the new world, and, more particularly, to thc-
T^ newest world's metropolis, Filipp Kreissl, M. D.,
of Chicago, has achieved unusual prominence
within the past twelve years. Coming from Vienna, one of the great
capitals and educational centers of Europe, and finely equipped with
both learning and clinical experience, he was admirably fitted to meet
the professional conditions of the newer and more aggressive western
metropolis, with the result that his abilities were at once recognized
and his advancement has been rapid.
Born in Vienna, in the year 1859, Dr. Kreissl's parents were
Jacques and Elisabeth Kreissl, who first gave him a good education
in the public and high schools of his native city. His professional
education was obtained in one of the most eminent institutions of
Europe, the Imperial Medical College of Vienna, from which he
graduated in May, 1885, with the double degree of Doctor of Medi-
cine and Surgery. He had shown such marked ability in scholarship
and operative skill during this period that he was appointed assistant
394 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
to the clinics of surgery, obstetrics and genito-urinary diseases, and
held that position for four years after his graduation. Then, after
three years of creditable private practice, He came to the United
States, joining the ranks of the local fraternity in the following year.
Before putting a period to the Doctor's European career, it should
be stated that his first practical experience in the medical world was
as a member of the hospital corps of the Austrian army in 1881-2.
Since becoming a resident practitioner of Chicago in 1892 Dr.
Kreissl has established a good private practice in his specialty, and
has been signally recognized as a physician and surgeon of high
character and attainments. In 1897-8 he served as president of the
medical board of the Chicago Civil Service Commission; was attend-
ing surgeon of the Cook County Hospital in 1902-3, and has held the
chair of genito-urinary surgery in the Chicago Clinical School from
1 897- 1 904. He is a member of the Chicago Medical Society, Phy-
sicians' Club, Illinois State Medical Society, American Medical Asso-
ciation and American Urological Society, and is also identified with
the Chicago Athletic Club and the Chicago Yacht Club. Dr. Kreissl
was married in Vienna to Miss Bertha Faber and he has a son, Hans
George Kreissl.
Dr. Burwash has practiced medicine in Chicago since 1884. He
was for several years surgeon to Cook County Hospital, and his pro-
fessional connections are of the very highest, mark-
-r, ing him an able and successful phvsician. He has
Burwash. ^. ^ ^ .
written numerous monographs on medical subjects,
and has membership in the following professional organizations :
McGill Alumni Asociation, of which he is an ex-president; the Ameri-
can Medical Association, the Chicago Medical Society, and the Chi-
cago Pathological Society.
Dr. Burwash was born at St. Andrews, province of Quebec, No-
vember 17, 1854, son of Albert and Jane (Jefiferson) Burwash; of
English ancestry, but his paternal grandfather was born in Vermont.
He attended the public schools at St. Andrews and the La Chute
Academy, and obtained his medical education in McGill University,
in Montreal, Canada, graduating in 1879, M. D., C. M. ; also licentiate
of Royal College of Physicians, London, England, in 1879; and
during the same year did post-graduate work at St. Thomas' Hos-
pital, London. In 1880-81 he practiced in Manitoba and in the
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Northwest Territory, then spent three years in Minneapolis, after
which he came to Chicago, in 1884. Dr. Burwash was the first phy-
sician in Rapid City — then the Northwest Territory. He is upon the
surgical staff of the Norwegian Lutheran Deaconess Home Hospital.
Dr. Burwash married, at Minneapolis, May 3, 1883, Margarita
A. Meyer, a native of Hanover, Germany. Their children are
Elvira and Florence, the latter deceased. He is a Knight Templar,
Mason, member of Chicago Commandery No. 19. He was created
a Mason at Minneapolis, Minnesota, in Cataract Lodge No. 2, in 1883.
He is also a member of the new Illinois Athletic Club. His resi-
dence is at 721 North Hoyne avenue.
Of the younger members of the medical profession in Chicago,
Norman Kerr, M. D., is a steadily rising representative, being already
well known as a surgeon both in the operative and
T^ . the demonstrating fields. He is of Scotch descent and
Kkrr
comes from our Canadian neighbor, who has con-
tributed to the local fraternity not a few valuable additions to its
working, progressive and successful members. Dr. Kerr is a native
of Harrington, province of Ontario, where he was born on the 12th
of August, 1867, and is the son of Norman McLeod and Catherine
(MacKenzie) Kerr. Educated, in his earlier years, in the public
school at Holyrood, and the high school at Kincardine, both Ontario
towns, he graduated from the latter institution in 1884, and then
commenced the preparation for his medical career.
After pursuing a thorough course at McGill Medical College,
Montreal, he graduated therefrom with the degrees of M. D. and
C. M., on the 31st of March, 1889, and about a month afterward
came to Chicago to engage in practice. Since that time the attrac-
tion has been so mutual that he has resided here and practiced and
taught continuously. In 1891 he was appointed assistant in sur-
gery at the Chicago Policlinic, instructor in 1895 and assistant pro-
fessor in 1902. Since 1898 he has been attending surgeon at the
Maurice Porter Memorial Hospital for Children. He is a member
of the American Medical Association, the Illinois State Medical
Society, the Chicago Medical Society, and the Surgical, Orthopedic
and Pathological societies. As will be inferred. Dr. Kerr's specialty
in surgery is the prevention and treatment of deformities in the
396 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
young, caused by malnutrition, constitutional causes or accidents,
and his success along these lines has been marked.
On the 3d of November, 1897, the Doctor was united in marriage
to Lottie M. Austin, daughter of Dr. John Austin, and they have
become the parents of two children, John Austin Kerr and Norman
Archibald Kerr (deceased). Fraternally, Dr. Kerr is identified with
the St. Andrew's Society and the United Order of Foresters. He
votes the Republican ticket and in his religious belief is a Presby-
terian. His residence and office are at No. 275 La Salle avenue,
while his downtown office is at room 612, 100 State street, and he is
known as one of the most skillful practitioners in his specialty in
that section of the city.
Dr. John Martin Little John, since 1900 president and professor of
theory and practice of osteopathic therapeutics, American College
of Osteopathic Medicine and Surgery, is a native of
T ' Scotland. He was born in Glasgow, February 11;,
LiTTLEJOHN. ^ b ' J J>
1867, and is a son of Rev. James and Elizabeth
Walker (Scott) Little John.
Dr. Little John is a graduate of the University of Glasgow. He
studied for the ministry and was ordained in 1886, following which
he taught theology for one year, and then resumed his higher studies,
receiving the degrees of A. M., B. D. and LL. B. After coming to
the United States, he continued his studies as a Fellow at Columbia
College, in 1892-3. He received the degree of Ph. D. in 1894, and
has since been the recipient of the honorary degrees of D. D. and
LL. D. The degree of M. D. has been conferred upon him by
both Dunham Medical and Hering Medical colleges, by the former
institution in 1902. His career as an educator commenced as a tutor
at Glasgow University, and in 1890 he was elected president of the
Rosemount College of Glasgow, four years later being chosen presi-
dent of Amity College, College Springs, Iowa. From 1898 to 1900
he was professor of physiology and psychology and dean of the
faculty at the American School of Osteopathy, Kirksville, Missouri;
has also been professor of physiology at the Hahnemann Medical
College, Chicago, and now holds that chair at Hering Medical Col-
lege, of that city.
Dr. Little John is a member of* the Chicago Osteopathic Associa-
tion, Illinois Osteopathic Society, the American Osteopathic Associa-
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 397
tion and the Regular Homeopathic Society, and is a Hfe member of
the council of the University of Glasgow. Besides being a Fellow
and a gold medalist of the Society of Science, London (1898), he
was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature of Great
Britain in 1899. He was editor of the Journal of the Science of
Osteopathy for 1900-1903, of the Osteopathic IVoiid from 1903
to 1905, is now editor of the Bulletin and Journal of Health, Chi-
cago, and is a member of the United Editors' Association of the
United States. In addition to other articles and lectures, Dr. Little-
john is the author of "Christian Sabbatism," "The Political Theory
of the Schoolmen and Grotius," "The Evolution of the State,"
"Lecture Notes on Physiology," "Text-Book on Physiology," "Lec-
ti>res on Psycho-Physiology," "Lectures on Psycho-Pathology,"
"Journal of the Science of Osteopathy," "Science of Osteopathy and
a Treatise on Osteopathy." On August 11, 1900, at Ipswich, Eng-
land, Dr. Littlejohn was married to Miss Mabel Alice Thompson.
They are the parents of Mary Elizabeth Helen, Mabel Emma, James
and Edgar Martin Littlejohn. The family residence is at No. 928
West Adams street.
Dr. Frank H. Montgomery, who was drowned August 14. 1908,
while yachting near his summer home at White Lake, Michigan, was
a man whose high worth was by no means limited
,, * to his attainments in his profession. Although still
Montgomery. . , ..,.,.
HI tlie most progressive period of early middle life
he already ranked with the leading physicians and surgeons of the
west; but while his death was widely recognized as a distinct loss to
the profession, from a scientific and practical standpoint, the feeling
among his associates and friends was profound and keen because of
his magnetic, manly and lovable qualities. In the domestic circle,
where these traits were seen untrammeled and at their best Dr. Alont-
gomery's death was like the partial extinguishment of a great and a
warm light.
Dr. Montgomery was a native of Minnesota, born on the r)th of
January, 1862, son of Albertus and Mary Louisa Montgomery. He
obtained his literary education at the St. Cloud High School and the
University of Michigan, after which he commenced his medical studies
at Rush Medical College, Chicago, from wiiich he graduated in 1888.
Later lie was appointed associate professor of skin aiul genito-urinary
398 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
diseases at that institution and held that chair at the time of his
death. For years he was indirectly associated with Dr. James Nevins
Hyde, in conjunction with whom he wrote several volumes on his
specialties. His investigations and studies were not confined to the
locality, but extended to the famous educational centers and clinics of
London, Vienna and Paris, and in this city not only Rush Medical
College, but the University of Chicago considered him one of its
most valued lecturers and authorities. At his decease he was also
dermatologist to St. Elizabeth and Presbyterian hospitals and a mem-
ber of the following professional organizations : American Derma-
tological Association, Congress of American Physicians and Surgeons,
American Medical Association, the Illinois State Medical, Chicago
Medical and the Chicago Patholog^ical and Medico-Legal societies,
and the Physicians' Club. He was also identified with the University,
Chicago Literary, Quadrangle and Homewood clubs, and was always a
most welcome figure to whatever circle he chose to join.
On January ii, 1897, Dr. Montgomery was united in marriage
with Miss Carrie L. Williamson, and three children were born to
them — Hamilton, Charlotte and Mary Louise Montgomery. At the
time of the accident, which resulted in his death, the family were all
together at their summer home, having as their guest a stenographer
who was assisting the doctor in the preparation of a series of his lec-
tures and essays. While the wife and her little daughters remained
at home, the other members of the household went for a sail on the
lake. A gust of wind capsized the light yacht and when discovered
in mid-lake the boy only was found alive. It is significant of Dr.
Montgomery's active temperament that even in a season of recreation
he found it impossible to entirely forsake his professional work. Both
he and his wife were interested in social settlenient work and in the
various activities about the University of Chicago, and their connec-
tion with this phase of the city's development has always been highly
appreciated. These words of Professor Shailer Mathews, of the
university, are, therefore, of weight: "Dr. Montgomery was of the
type of men who make Chicago's best citizens. Through his own
books, written in conjunction with Dr. Hyde, he became recognized
as an authority in his profession. But it was not only because of his
attainments professionally that he was admired. He was a man who
was loved by everybody who knew him."
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Dr. Truman William Bruphy. M. D., D. D. S., LL. D., is widely
known as the founder of the Chicago College of Dental Surgery and
one of the most eminent dental surgeons in the
' world. Of Irish-English descent, his parents, Wil-
liam and Amelia (Cleveland) Brophy, being natives
of Hemmingford, Quebec, a small town not far from Lake Champ-
lain and the international boundary. Wlicii the two were children
their families moved together to the rich agricultural and fruit coun-
try near Newcastle, on the northern shore of Lake Ontario, near To-
ronto. From this locality they migrated tu Aurora, Illinois, and
thence to Will county, southwest of Chicago. William Brophy, the
youth, visited Chicago and in those days was chiefly impressed with
its dirt and rawness. As a young man he returned to Canada, where
he was married in June, 1843, '^^'^^^ ^^"^ September, 1844, settled in
Will county, Illinois, with his young bride. The city was now grow-
ing, however, and the senior Brophy secured profitable contracts as
a builder and contractor. Preferring, however, a country life, he
bought a farm at Gooding's Grove, near Lockport, and here, on the
1 2th of April, 1848, was born his son, Truman W.
It was some years before the family located permanently in Chi-
cago. After a residence of two years at Gooding's Grove, a removal
was made to Elgin, where the father was engaged in the construc-
tion of a section of what is now the Chicago & Northwestern Rail-
road. The increasing family was next moved to St. Charles, Illinois,
and after providing a comfortable home, Mr. Brophy, in 1852, start-
ed across the plains for California. Two years afterward he was
fortunate enough to return ill such sound financial condition that he
purchased a good farm a few miles west of St. Charles, which was
the family homestead until the final removal to Chicago in the fall
of 1866. '
At this time Truman was in his nineteenth year. He had re-
ceived a good common school and academic education in the insti-
tutions of St. Charles and Elgin, and after his coming to Chicago
pursued courses both at Dyrenfurth's Business College and the Athen-
eum. In early boyhood he had decided to study dentistry, and in the
spring of 1867, through the influence of his uncle, Reuben Cleve-
land, he entered the office of Dr. J. O. Farnsworth. In accord with
the custom of those times, after obtaining practical knowledge of the
400 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY '
profession in office work, he entered into practice himself, and upon
the death of his preceptor, a few years after he had commenced his
apprenticeship, succeeded to the business. The fire of 1871 found
Dr. Brophy in quite prosperous circumstances for one of his years,
and left him nearly bankrupt. Before resuming practice, however,
he wisely decided to obtain a systematic education and training along
the lines of his professional work, and in the fall, not long after the
fire, started for Philadelphia, where, until the spring of 1872, he
pursued a regular course in the Pennsylvania College of Dental Surg-
ery and obtained his degree of D. D. S. Upon his return to Chi-
cago he renewed his practice with redoubled confidence, but meeting
cases which required a more extended knowledge than he had ac-
quired, in 1878 he pursued a regular medical and surgical course
at Rush College, from which he was graduated with the degree of
M. D. in 1880. Dr. Brophy had been elected president of his class,
and his career had been marked by such distinguishing features that
almost immediately upon graduating he was chosen by the faculty
to the professorship of dental pathology and surgery, which position
he still holds.
In the summer of 1882 Dr. Brophy took the initiative steps to-
ward the founding of the Chicago College of Dental Surgery. He
was solely instrumental in raising the money for the erection of the
building and persistently urged the selection of the present site. Its
first regular course began in March, 1883, and, with Dr. Brophy at
its head, has since developed into the largest institution of the kind
in the world. Besides being president, he is also professor of oral
surgery at the Chicago College of Dental Surger}^ He has also been
connected with the Central Free Dispensary of Rush Medical College
for many years and is still associate professor of surgery; also den-
tal and oral surgeon to the Presbyterian Hospital; consulting oral
surgeon to Provident Hospital. Dr. Brophy is ex-president of Odon-
tological and Dental Societies of Chicago and is a member of the
American Medical, Chicago Medical, Pathological, Medico-Legal,
National Dental, Odontographic and many other medical and dental
societies, state and national, in their scope. Furthermore, he is ex-
president of the section of dental a,nd oral surgery, now the section
of stomatology, American Medical Association, which was suggested
by him and organized chiefly through his efforts. He is also con-
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nected with a number of organizations not allied to either dentistry
or medicine, such as the Union League, the Illinois Club, and the Chi-
cago Athletic Association.
Dr. Brophy is quite a constant contributor to professional litera-
ture, but the active duties of his calling consume so much of his time
and strength that he has assayed nothing in book form. Mention
should here be made of the honor conferred upon him by Lake For-
est University, in 1855, by which he received the degree of LL.D.
He served as president of the United States Fourteenth International
Medical Congress, held at Madrid, Spain, 1903, and was president of
the International Commission of Education and chairman of section
on education, nomenclature, literature and history at the Fourth In-
ternational Dental Congress, a member of the Association of Military
Surgeons, and assistant surgeon of the First Regiment, Illinois Na-
tional Guard.
On May 8, 1873, Dr. Brophy was united in marriage to Emma
J. Mason, daughter of Carlile Mason, of the Excelsior Iron Works.
They have had a family of three daughters and one son, namely :
Jean Mason Brophy Barnes, Florence Amelia Brophy Logan, Truman
William Brophy, Jr., and Alberta Louise Brophy.
Julius Henry Hoelscher, M. D., who is a well-known specialist
on internal medicine, and has been engaged in original research along
this line for a number of years, is a native of Elm-
-/! ' hurst, Illinois, born March 13, 1864. He is a son
of Moritz and Sophia (Duensing) Hoelscher, and
comes of good German stock, his mother being born in the Father-
land. His initial education was obtained in public and private schools
of New York state and Chicago, and his professional training, prior
to actual practice, at the Chicago Medical College, which afterward
became the medical department of the Northwestern University.
In 1885 Dr. Hoelscher graduated from the Northwestern Uni-
versity Medical School, and for two years thereafter he served as
house physician to the Alexian Brothers Hospital, and, until re-
cently, as attending physician, thereby obtaining a wider experience
than would naturally fall to the young physician in years of private
practice. Since 1887, however, he has been building up a fine indi-
vidual practice and establishing a high reputation as an original in-
vestigator. He is the author of "Original Research." regarding per-
402 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
spiration, cholelithiasis, cryptogenetic infection, and the surgery and
medicine of three gastro-intestinal cases, while he is now engaged in
research work regarding the intestinal juices.
In addition to the official positions already named, Dr. Hoelscher
is attending physician to the Columbus Hospital and consulting phy-
sician to the German and North Chicago Hospitals, and was assistant
to the resident physician at Mercy Hospital as early as 1883. He is
assistant professor of clinical medicine in the extra-mural depart-
ment of Rush Medical CoUege and professor of internal medicine at
the Chicago Clinical School, as well as examining physician to the
Providence Savings Life Assurance Society of New York. As to
his professional membersliip, he is identified with the American Med-
ical Association, the Illinois State Medical Society, Chicago Med-
ical Societ}^, German-American Medical Society and the Physicians'
Club. He also belongs to the Public Health Defense League and
the Chicago Athletic Association, and is a Mason of high 'rank, being
a member of Lincoln Park Lodge, A. F. and A. M., Chapter and
Commandery,«and connected with the Phi Rho Sigma fraternity.
Married in Chicago, September 20, 1887, to Miss Anna Wolff,
the doctor has become the father of one child, Francis Fred. He
resides at 1669 Sheridan Road, and has an office in the business dis-
trict at 34 Washington street.
Albrecht Heym, physician and surgeon, has enjoyed merited
prominence and honors in his profession, and since coming to Chi-
cago in 1898, has been the recipient of numerous
At â– RlR'pPTT'T
proofs of professional distinction. He is at the pres-
Heym. . ^ ,,,,,, ^
ent time professor and head of the dep^rrment of
neurology and psychiatry in the Chicago College of Medicine and
Surgery; holds the same chair in the Illinois Medical College; is
professor of nervous and mental diseases in the Illinois Post-Gradu-
ate Medical School; is neurologist to St. Mary of Nazareth Hospital,
to the Alexian Brothers Hospital, to the Home for Orthodox Aged
Jews; medical superintendent of the sanatorium of the Alexian
Brothers Hospital; physician to the Imperial German Consulate, and
until two years ago held his commission as staff surgeon in the
German army. These official positions demand of their incumbent
highest skill and ability, and in regular practice and in the service
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performed officially, Dr. Heym has won a reputation for these quali-
ties in Chicago.
Dr. ITcyni, whose full name is Bernhard Theodore Albrecht, was
born in Leipsic, Germany, February 4th, 1862, son of Professor Dr.
Carl F. and Elvira (Flerzberg) Fleym. Dr. Carl F. Heym was one
of the most eminent mathematicians of his time; in recognition of
the value of his mathematical researches a monument to his memory
was erected in Leipsic by the life insurance companies of Germany
and Austria.
Some of the most famous schools of the old world supplied Dr.
Heym with his education. He attended the Thomas Gymnasium at
Leipsic, the Royal University of Leipsic and the University of Hei-
delberg. He received his diploma as Doctor of Medicine April 25,
1887. During the next two years he traveled extensively in all parts
of the world.
From 1 89 1 to 1898 he was connected as resident physician with
the state insane asylums at Sonnenstein, Hubertsburg and Kaisers-
wert ; at the latter place he was medical superintendent of the Insane
Hospital of Kaiserswert. He was next connected for two years with
the Neurological Clinic of Professor Dr. Erb, and with the Psychi-
atric Clinic of Professor Dr. Kraepelin, both connected with the
University of Heidelberg.
In 1898 he came to America, settling in Chicago. His office is
in the Venetian building. Fie is a member of the Evangelical Luth-
eran church, also of the Germania Maennerchor, and of various med-
ical societies.
August 15th, 1891, he married Johanna Flartman. His son, Ger-
hard, was born August 21, 1892, and his daughter, Erna, was born
October 29, 1899. The family residence is on Cleveland avenue.
W. E. Potter, M. D., active and prominent in both private prac-
tice and the sanitary affairs of Oak Park, Illinois, is a native of Peo-
ria county, this state, where he was born on the
■• 1 6th of December, 1875. His parents arc D. E.
and Rosetta (Simpson) Potter, the boy being
reared and receiving a common school education in the place of his
birth.
The doctor's professional education commenced in the School of
404 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
Pharmacy of the Northwestern University, Chicago, from which
he was graduated in 1897. Three years afterward he obtained his
degree of M. D., from the medical school of the University of Illi-
nois, and this training of unusual breadth in the schools was supple-
mented by an invaluable experience of two years on the resident
staff of the West Side Hospital, connected with the College of Phy-
sicians and Surgeons of the University of Illinois.
In 1902 Dr. Potter located at Oak Park, Illinois, for the practice
of his profession, and at once became instrumental in organizing its
board of health, of which he was the first president. He held the
office for two years and was instrumental in bringing it to a high
state of efficiency. He has also been prominent in the good work of
the Oak Park Hospital, on whose surgical staff he has served since
its founding.
In 1902 Dr. Potter married Miss Ida B. Bradley, daughter of
Mrs. Harriet Bradley, well known and highly honored in Oak Park.
They are both active in the charitable and religious work of the
Grace Episcopal church. In politics, the doctor is a Republican, and,
as to his fraternal relations, is identified with Masonry, the Modern
Woodmen of America and the Royal Arcanum, He is a member of
the Oak Park Club, Colonial Club of Oak Park, and the Oak Park
Military Club.
C. Wallace Poorman, M. D., a progressive member of the pro-
fession numbered among the younger generation of practitioners, has
achieved prominence solely through his own efforts
p and his marked abilities, both natural and trained.
Not only has he acquired a high and substantial
standing in his profession, without the aid of fortuitous circumstances,
but obtained his education through hard and unremitting labors.
Such difficulties, bravely overcome, not only test character, but de-
velop it in breadth and ruggedness.
Dr. Poorman is a native of Coles county, Illinois, born on the-
7th of January, 1873, son of Noah and Lucinda (Mull) Poorman.
His father, who was born in Cincinnati, Ohio, is of German descent,
while his mother, a native of Illinois, comes of English and Scotch
ancestry. The doctor is the third of six children born to this honor-
able couple, and when an infant of one year was taken by his par-
CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY 405
ents to Junction City, Illinois, where he obtained his first schooHng.
At the age of about nine years he left home, and at that tender aue
became virtual master of his destiny. Never daunted, he worked
hard both for a livelihood and an education, and finally became a
student in the Kansas State University, located at Lawrence. For
three years he pursued the higher courses of literature and science
at this institution, eagerly taking advantage of any employment
which offered in the very commendable but decidedly disagreeable
process which so many sturdy, ambitious youths of America recog-
nize by the phrase of "working through college." In 1895 he lo-
cated at Gallup, New Mexico, and entered into business relations
with the Navajo Indians, whose language he learned to speak like
a native. After spending about three years and a half in that local-
ity, he removed to Morenci, Arizona, where, for some months he
continued to engage in various mercantile lines. In 1899 he became
identified with the Detroit Copper Mining Company, and soon aft-
erward came to Chicago.
Dr. Poorman obtained his professional education in the College
of Physicians and Surgeons, from which he was graduated in 1903,
having spent four years therein, faithfully prosecuting his studies.
He was then appointed to the staff of the West Side Hospital as
house physician and surgeon, and he is now serving as assistant sur-
geon to Dr. Thomas A. Davis, the head surgeon of that institution,
so important an adjunct to the College of Physicians and Surgeons.
In 1905 Dr. Poorman located for practice at Oak Park, Illinois, and
is a valued member of the Oak Park Hospital and the Oak Park
board of health, as well as of the staff of Illinois Post-Graduate Med-
ical School, located at 819 West Harrison street.
In 1906 Dr. Poorman was united in marriage with Mrs. J. K.
Dunlap, of Oak Park, a most estimable lady, who has added to the
high social standing which he already enjoyed. The doctor's prac-
tice is now recognized as among the most substantial and select en-
joyed by his professional brethren in the western suburbs. He is
a leading member of the Chicago Medical Society, and among the
fraternities is identified with the Oak Park lodge of Masons, and the
Oak Park Club.
4o6 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
Albert French Storke, M. D., president of the Oak Park board
of health, and an active physician and citizen of that place, is a na-
tive of Wisconsin, born in Dodge county, on the
„ ■1 2th of November, 1866. His parents are Dr. Eu-
gene F. and Mary (French) Storke, the family, on
the paternal side being of Dutch origin, various members of which
emigrated from The Hague to the Mohawk valley. New York, which
remained the ancestral home for four generations. On the mother's
side the ancestry was English. The father came to Wisconsin when
he was a boy of ten years, and was reared and married in the Badger
state. By force of circumstances he was his own master at an early
age, educated himself, became a successful physician and a useful
citizen.
Albert F. is the only child of the family, and was about four years
of age when his parents located in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. He re-
ceived his schooling chiefly in what was first known as Markham's
Academy, now the Milwaukee Academy, from which he was gradu-
ated in 1884. He then took a literary course of two years at the
University of Michigan, and in 1887 came to Chicago to perfect his
medical education. He first matriculated at Rush Medical Collepe,
but after completing two years of its curriculum, decided to adopt
homeopathy, receiving his degree from Hahnemann College in 1890.
Dr. Storke chose Golden, Colorado, as his first professional lo-
catiorf, and practiced there until October, 1892, when he became a
resident of Oak Park, where he has since remained. He was one
of the founders of the local board of health, of which he is now
president, and has been active in matters of public moment not iden-
tified with his professional work. He is one of the directors of the
Parents' .and Teachers' Association, and both as a citizen and a
Republican can be relied upon to do his share of active and neces-
sary work. The doctor is a member of the Chicago, Wisconsin and
Illinois Medical societies; is a Mason in good standing, and belongs
to the Chi Psi fraternity. His wife, to whom he was married in
1 89 1, was Laura Butler Rogers, daughter of Major Henry G. Rog-
ers, of Milwaukee, and the two children born to their union are But-
ler and Eugenia.
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C. Pruyn Stringfield, M. D., with offices in the Western Union
Telegraph building, is one of the leading physicians and surgeons
in Chicago, having of recent years specialized to a
„ ■large extent in diseases of the kidney. He is also
iT'RTiN'P FIELD
widely known as a military and examining surgeon.
He has served as president of the Chicago Medical Examiners' As-
sociation and is a leading member of the American Association of
Life Examining Surgeons, being medical examiner of the Phoenix
Mutual Life, of Hartford, Connecticut, and well known profes-
sionally in the insurance field. Dr. Stringfield has been identified with
the National Guard of Illinois since 1882; has served on the staff
of Governor Yates, with the rank of colonel, and is now on the
retired list. He is also a familiar figure as resident physician of
the Grand Pacific hotel, having held that position since the reopen-
ing of the popular hostelry in 1898.
Dr. Stringfield is a native of Washington, District of Columbia,
but spent the years of his early manhood in the west. In 1881 he
removed to Chicago, from Topeka, Kansas, and soon afterward
commenced the study of medicine. Finally entering the Chicago
Medical College (medical department of the Northwestern Uni-
versity) for a regular course, he graduated therefrom in 1889 with
the degree of M. D., and at once became assistant to the chair of
principles and practice of surgery in his alma mater. He was at-
tending surgeon on the staffs of the Cook County and Baptist hos-
pitals for years, and at one time was a surgeon of the United States
Marine Corps. At the present time he is a physician to the Actors'
Fund of America, and besides his identification with professional
organizations already mentioned, enjoys membership in the Ameri-
can Medical Association, Association of Military Surgeons of the
United States, the Illinois State Medical Society and the Chicago
Medical Society. In his fraternal relations he is a Mason and a
life member of the Elks and Knights of Pythias, having been prom-
inent in each order. In Masonry he is a member of Blaney Blue
Lodge No. 271, Lincoln Park Chapter No. 177, R. A. M., Apollo
Commandery No. i, and Medinah Temple of the Mystic Shrine;
and is past chancellor of Globe-Athol Lodge, Knights of Pythias.
On August 14, 1889, Dr. Stringfield married Miss Josephine
Milgie, of Chicago. The Doctor is popular socially, as well as pro-
4o8 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
fessionally, and is a welcome member in the Hamilton, Forty, Chi-
cago Athletic, Chicago Yacht, South Shore Country and Chicago
Automobile clubs.
William Mcllwain Thompson, M. D., a promising younger mem-
ber of the medical fraternity, is of good Scotch-Irish descent, and
was himself born in Ireland, at McGuire's Bridge,
William M. ^^^ ^^^^ ^g^^^ ^^ November, 1868. He is a son of
Rev. L. H. Thompson, D. D., and his wife, form-
erly Martha Mcllwain, his father for many years having been a
leading minister in the Presbyterian church.
Dr. Thompson's education was obtained at the public schools of
Baltimore, Maryland, at McAllister College and Princeton Uni-
versity — that is, through these mediums he laid a broad foundation
of general and literary knowledge and scientific attainments, which
is the best possible preparation for the physician and surgeon of the
day. His professional studies were pursued first at the Hahnemann
Medical College, Chicago, from which he was graduated in 1892,
and a supplementary course, at the College of Physicians and Sur-
geons, of the same city, earned him a second degree of M. D. In
his specialty of gynecology, Dr. Thompson is now acknowledged to
be a leading authority and practitioner. He is consulting gynecolo-
gist to St. Joseph's and Union hospitals, and has a large private
clientele. In common with other up-to-date members of his pro-
fession, he keeps in touch with the advanced literature and clinics of
medicine and surgery by identifying himself with such organizations
as the American Medical Association, the Illinois Medical Society
and the Chicago Medical Society.
Dr. Thompson's wife, to whom he was married April 25, 1901,
was formerly xA.nna Carruth Hill, and the two children born to them
were Anna Hill Thompson, deceased, and William Mcllwain, Jr.,
born August 19, 1907. The family residence is at No. 1840 Wright-
wood avenue, but an increasing practice requires an office in the cen-
tral business district of the city, which is located at 100 State street,
Cassius Clay Rogers, A. M., M. D., for' a number of years prom-
inently identified with the progress of medical practice and education
_ in Chicago, is an Illinois man, born in the year
P * 1869, at Minonk, Woodford county, son of Alma
and Johanna (Kerrick) Rogers. He comes of an
^'
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old eastern family, his ancestors settling in America prior to the
Revolutionary war. After passing through the district and high
schools of his native locality, he entered the Valparaiso (Ind. ) Uni-
versity, receiving from that institution the degree of B. S. in 1890,
and of A. B. in 1891. Soon afterward he was appointed assistant
principal of the high school at Liberty, Missouri, and in 1892-3 held
the principalship of the Greeley public school, at Streator, Illinois.
The details and routine of pedagogy, however, were ill adapted
to Dr. Rogers' active and scientific temperament. He therefore re-
signed his position at Streator, and was matriculated at Rush Medical
College, Chicago, from which, after an assiduous course of study,
he was graduated in 1896 with his M. D. Since June of that year
he has continuously practiced in this city, and, either from a pecuniary
or a purely professional standpoint, has no reason to regret his choice
of a location. From 1898 to 1905 he served as assistant surgeon of
the Chicago Clinical School; in 1903-4 coached the Cook county quiz
class in surgery, for the College of Physicians and Surgeons; was pro-
fessor of clinical surgery of the Chicago College *f Medicine and
Surgery in 1905-6; secretary of the west side branch of the Chicago
Medical Society in 1905-6; since 1901 has been professor and head
of the department of physical diagnosis, Chicago College of Dental
Surgery, and since 1906 professor and head of the department of
surgery of the Chicago College of Medicine and Surgery (Medical
department of the Valparaiso University). He is also surgeon to
the Frances E. Willard hospital.
The Doctor is a member of the American Medical Association,
the Illinois State Medical and the Chicago Medical societies, and the
Tri-State Medical Society (Illinois, Iowa, Missouri). He is an honor-
ary member of the A. K. K. fraternity, connected with the Chicago
College of Physicians and Surgeons. His contributions to medical
literature are numerous and highly valued, and in 1907 his profes-
sional attainments were further strengthened and broadened by Eu-
ropean travel and education. In the summer of that year he visited
the leading hospitals and clinics of Europe, and returned to his prac-
tice with the increased knowledge and confidence which come with
such valuable experience. His practice is now limited to surgery and
consultations.
Outside of his profession Dr. Rogers is a leader in several of
4IO CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
the historic fraternities. He is identified with Landmark Lodge,
Knights of Pythias, and in Masonry is a member of Wright's Grove
Lodge, A. F. and A. M. ; Oriental Consistory, Valley of Chicago
(thirty-second degree), and Medinah Temple, Mystic Shrine. The
Doctor's wife, to whom he was married in 1901, was formerly Miss
Rena Belle Richards, and the family residence is at the corner of
Warren and Homan avenues. The downtown office is at No. 72
Madison street.
Among the members of the medical profession who have located
in Chicago within recent years and made the treatment of the eye and
ear their specialty in practice and educational dem-
onstration, none better merit notice in a work of
this character, both by reason of their thorough
preparation and proficiency, than David Fiske, M. D. He is of
English descent, and his family has furnished to this country numer-
ous representatives who have become prominent in literary and pro-
fessional fields. A native of Shelburne, Massachusetts, born in
April, 1872, his parents are David Orlando and Isabelle (Hawks)
Fiske, and the education of his boyhood and youth was obtained in
the common schools of his native town and the high school at Green-
field, Massachusetts.
Dr. Fiske obtained his fundamental professional education at
Rush Medical College, from which he was graduated in 1900, but, in •
line with other advanced members of his profession, has pursued
several post-graduate courses abroad — notably in Berlin and \'lenna.
After his graduation from Rush Medical College he at once began
practice in Chicago, and is now well and favorably known as an
oculist and aurist in private, clinical and educational circles. He is
assistant professor of otology at the Chicago Policlinic, attending
oculist and aurist at the German Hospital and attending oculist and
aurist at the Maurice Porter Memorial Hospital, as well as assistant
in ophthalmology and otology at Rush Medical College. He keeps
in co-operative relations with his fellow practitioners and also in
touch with the latest progress in scientific medicine and surgery
through his membership in the American Medical Association, and
the Illinois State Medical, the Chicago Medical, the Chicago Ophthal-
mological and the Chicago Otological societies. Socially he is identi-
fied with the Illinois Athletic, the Marquette Club and the Glen View
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Golf Club, and is not onl}^ recognized as an able specialist in a field
which requires the most delicate skill and accuracy of knowledge,
but a gentleman of broad and attractive personality.
There is perhaps no profession in which the sciences and higher
mechanics are so closely related as in that of medicine and surgery.
_. ^^ The chemist, the investigator in the realm of the
Robert H. , , . , , • 1 , ,
^ natural sciences, and the mventor and developer of
some of the most delicate of instruments, are all
brought into the service of the modern physician and surgeon. The
member of the profession who makes the medical and surgical treat-
ment of the intricate organs of the senses his specialty has especial
need of scientific and mechanical attainments of the highest order.
He must also have a broad medical education, in order that he may
be able to trace special effects from general constitutional conditions,
or remote causes in the human anatomy. The specialist of today is
therefore everything but narrow ; in fact his knowledge is usually
wonderfully exact and thorough in his own field, and broader outside
of it than the average so-called general practitioner. Of the specialists
of the day none require greater accuracy or breadth that those en-
gaged in the treatment of the eye, ear, nose and throat — parts of
the body which are so intimately related that it is often a severe
test to the diagnostician to locate the primal cause of the trouble.
Robert Hosea Good, M. D., whose prominence in the field men-
tioned is a certainty that he possesses the modern requisites for ad-
vancement, is a Canadian by birth, but received his higher and pro-
fessional education in the United States. He was born in Waterloo,
province of Ontario, on the 31st of December, 1873, the son of
Joel and Agnes (Hosea) Good. On the paternal side he is of Ger-
man blood, his ancestors coming from the fatherland to the United
States in 1737, while his maternal forbears were of good Scotch stock,
his mother coming to Canada in 1839. Until he was sixteen years
of age the youth attended the Canadian schools, for two years after-
ward attending an American high school, and in 1896 graduating
from the academic course of the Northwestern College, at Naper-
ville, Illinois. Soon thereafter he entered the Albion (Mich.) Col-
lege, completing his course and receiving his degree of B. S. in 1899.
In 1902 Dr. Good completed his professional studies at Rush Medi-
cal College, entitling him to an M. D., and the same year received
412 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
also an M. S. from Northwestern College. In 1906 he pursued a
post-graduate course at the University of Vienna, Austria, for which
he received a regular certificate. It will thus be seen that along
literary, scientific and professional lines Dr. Good has had a most
thorough mental training, and since he commenced his practice and
educational work in Chicago, in 1902, his advancement has been
so rapid as to be a signal proof of the wisdom of such a radical prep-
aration.
From 1903 to 1905 Dr. Good served as clinical assistant in the
eye and ear department of Rush Medical College; is assistant in-
structor in physical diagnosis at the Chicago College of Dental Sur-
gery, in 1904; assistant in eye at the Chicago Policlinic, in 1905; sur-
geon in eye, ear, nose and throat to the Evangelical Deaconess Hos-
pital; staff member in ear, nose and throat at Frances Willard Hos-
pital, and is now head professor in ear, nose and throat at the Chi-
cago College of Medicine and Surgery. The Doctor keeps in line with
modern progress and in close touch with the members of his pro-
fession by his identification with the transactions and publications of
the American Medical Association, the Illinois State Medical Society,
the Chicago Medical Society and the Chicago Laryngological and
Otological Society.
Dr. Good was married June 26, 1900, to Ella Bell Wagstaf¥e,
and of this union has been born two children — Palmer Wagstaffe
and Grace Madeline. The Doctor's residence is at River Forest,
where, as in Chicago, he is known as a leader in his specialty, and a
cultured, affable and popular gentleman.
William Sheriff Orth, M. D., a well-known practitioner, long con-
nected with the staff of Alexian Brothers Hospital, is a native of
Illinois, born at Keithsburg, September 21, 1864.
William S. -.t- ^ 1 • o- T • 1 ^^r t^
^ His parents are Calvm Siechnst and Mary Frances
(Sheriff) Orth, and, as the name indicates, he
comes of substantial German ancestry. From the public schools he
graduated finally into Monmouth College, and in 1887 received from
the latter the degree of B. S. Soon afterward he came to Chicago
and was matriculated at Rush Medical College, from which he ob-
tained his professional degree in 1890. Still desirous of greater ex-
perience before entering practice, he secured an interneship at Alex-
ian Brothers Hospital, under competitive examination, and remained
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there during- eighteen months of 1890 and 1891. At the conckision
of that term of service he was appointed attending physician at the
hospital, and has filled the position since. This long official connec-
tion, with his growing private practice, has made the doctor a most
familiar figure on the northwest side of the city. His residence is
at 1764 Wrightwood avenue, and his downtown office is in the
Schiller building.
On June 23, 1898, Dr. Orth was married to Miss Anna Catherine
Tempel, and their three children are Dorothy Frances, Calvin Wil-
liam and Richard Edgar Orth. The doctor is professionally identi-
fied with the Chicago Medical Society and the American Medical
Association, and his fraternal relations are with the A. F. and A. M.
In the specializing of medicine no department has received more
earnest attention, or made greater advances within the past twenty
years than that devoted to the treatment of chil-
. * dren's diseases. The reason lies neither deep nor
obscure, for it was early recognized by general prac-
titioners that many troubles and weaknesses of the human body, if
taken in hand at an incipient stage, could either be eradicated, or
at least be prevented from becoming chronic and life-long burdens
to the flesh. The wisdom of prevention has, in fact, had as much
to do with raising pediatrics to its present plane of importance as
the natural parental anxiety for a cure when a disease is actually
fixed or at an acute stage. The successful practitioner among chil-
dren must be of an especially sensitive, observant and sympathetic
nature, and yet of great self-control so as not to communicate his
perplexities or fears to those who are, perhaps, unduly concerned in
the welfare of their young. Not having the assistance of a mature
patient in diagnosis, he is thrown with particular emphasis upon his
own resources. Such noteworthy success as has come to Isaac Ar-
thur Abt, M. D., is, therefore, a special evidence of professional
penetration and skill.
Although an Illinoisan. born at \\'ilmington, December 18, 1868.
the doctor's parents, Levi and Henrietta (Hart) Abt, are natives of
Germany. He obtained his elementary education from the public
schools of Chicago, and was prepared for college at the old Univer-
sity of Chicago. In 1889 he completed a preliminary medical course
at the Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, and in 1891 graduated
414 CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY
from the full course of the Northwestern University Medical School,
then known as the Chicago Medical College. During the following
two years he had the advantage of serving as an interne at the Mi-
chael Reese Hospital, Chicago, and from 1893-94 took post-graduate
work in Berlin and Vienna.
He was professor of diseases of children at the Northwestern Uni-
versity Woman's Medical School until it went out of existence, and at
one time was instructor in physiology, histology and diseases of chil-
dren at Northwestern University Medical College. He is now attending
physician (diseases of children) to Michael Reese and Cook County
Hospitals ; consulting physician to Provident Hospital and Home for
Crippled Children, and associate professor of diseases of children at
Rush Medical College. He has written numerous monographs on
the diseases of infancy and childhood; is the editor of The Year
Book on diseases of children, and is a member of the various medical
associations.
On x\ugust 20, 1897, Dr. Abt was united in marriage with Lena
Rosenburg, the children of their marriage being Arthur Frederick
and Lawrence Edward. The family residence is at 4326 Vincennes
avenue, and his ofhce at 100 State street.
Benjamin Brindley Eads, M. D., dean and professor of surgery
and clinical surgery, Rlinois Medical College, graduated from Jef-
ferson Medical College, at Philadelphia, in 1891,
Benjamin B. , . ,, , , .. . . , ,
Zj, and m the same and followmg year was resident-
in-chief at Jefferson Hospital, and also associate
surgeon with Dr. Boardman Reed' at Atlantic City, New Jersey. In
1892 he passed his examination before the New York State Board of
Health, at Albany, and the New Jersey State Board of Health at
Trenton, and he is entitled, by registration, to practice in Pennsyl-
vania, Ohio, Kentucky and Illinois.
Dr. Eads first became known as an educator in Chicago in 1893,
when he was appointed instructor in anatomy and assistant demon-
strator of anatomy in Rush Medical College, holding the position
until 1894. From 1895 to 1897 he served as professor of anatomy
in Ilhnois Medical College; was professor of applied anatomy and
operative and orthopedic surgery in the same institution in 1898-
1900, and since 1900 has been professor of surgery and clinical surg-
ery, as well as dean of the facult}^ Since 1894 he has also been
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CHICAGO AND COOK COUxXTY 415
surgeon to the Illinois Hospital; was professor of surgery and clin-
ical surgery at Jcnncr Medical College in 1897-98, and was surgeon
to Cook County Hospital in 1905-07. He was president of the ex-
Resident Physicians and Surgeons of Jefferson Hospital for 1907-08,
and is a member of the following professional organizations: Amer-
ican Medical Association. Chicago Medical Society. Chicago Patho-
logical Society and the Mississippi Valley ]\Iedical Association.
Dr. Eads, whose professional career has been distinguished by
rapid progress to such responsibilities and honors, was born at Paris,
Bourbon county, Kentucky, on the 23rd of January, 1870, son of
Darwin D. and Anna Frank (Adair) Eads. His father was also a
physician, a graduate of Jefferson Medical College, class of '69. The
son was educated in the common schools of Bourbon county, also in
private institutions and under private instructors, and completed his
literary training in the college at Carthage, Missouri. On Septem-
ber 6, 1898, he married Miss Elizabeth Douglas Stedman. Their
children are Elizabeth, Benjamin Brindley, Jr., and Charles Stedman. 
