"'T Is Sixty Years Since" in Chicago
AT a time of life when I can look back over more than two generations of men, I sit down to write my random notes on the growth and expansion of Chicago. To some it is given, in the leisure of age, to rehearse journeys taken into all quarters of the globe. I also have traveled, but my journeys have been vacation jaunts, as it were. I might fairly say that I have spent my days in this place, and have seen the world come to me, in that series of inflowing tides which have brought humanity to the lonely shore of Lake Michigan, and now in the flocking of many nations to see what the men and women of Chicago have to show after their sixty years of city-building.
Until 1833 Chicago had practically no existence except in name. True, for many years it had been a place where furs had been bought from the Indians and trappers, and goods such as their simple wants required had been sold ; but, beyond this, what we call commerce did not exist. A fort had been established in the early part of the century, and had been occupied by a few United States troops ; but it had been abandoned in 1812, and it was still remembered by the first settlers that those troops and their families had been fallen upon and slaughtered by the Indians before they had gone two miles from the fort, and while they were still within the heart of the present city of Chicago. I am now writing on the very spot where that slaughter took place, on the very soil which drank the blood of the women and children who fell by the tomahawks and knives of the “braves,” while their husbands and fathers were being shot down from behind the sand-hills bordering the beach of the lake. This event had made Chicago known and talked about more than a score of years before 1833, but had been practically forgotten by a new generation ; and probably not one in a hundred, even of Americans, remembered the name of the place.
The Congress of 1832-33 made a small appropriation to commence the construction of a harbor at the mouth of the Chicago River. This gave occasion for newspaper discussion in the Eastern States, in the course of which the old stories of Chicago, with descriptions of the surrounding country, were hunted up and republished; and thus was a new interest awakened, which spread among the people of the other States, and a tide of immigration set in, including people of all classes, agriculturists, professional men, and mechanics. The early part of 1833 saw this migratory wave begin to roll westward. It scattered most of its volume in Ohio, Indiana, and Michigan, so that when it reached Illinois it had dwindled to small proportions. This migration has continued its widespread westward flow, with constantly increasing numbers, up to the present time, when the Pacific Ocean is the frontier.
When I started from Utica, New York, to seek a new home in the West, I had not determined where I should establish myself ; nor did I fix upon Chicago as my final objective point till I reached White Pigeon, Michigan. There I made the acquaintance of Dr. John T. Temple and his family, who were then on their way to Chicago. White Pigeon was the terminal point of a line of stages from Detroit; from there a road was laid out through the woods as far as Niles. Thence there was no road ; only an Indian trail, which could be followed with teams to the place where Michigan City now is. From that point travelers could journey on the lake beach, crossing the streams, or rather avoiding them by driving into the lake, and following the bars which form in front of the mouths of all the watercourses which run into Lake Michigan. On these bars the water is very shallow, and may readily be traversed in calm weather. It was scarcely a foot deep, at that time, on the bar over which the waters of the Chicago River passed into the lake, about where the foot of Madison Street now is.
At White Pigeon I learned much from Dr. Temple of the condition and prospects of Chicago and the surrounding country, and, in accordance with his advice, I determined to make that place my destination ; but as there was no public conveyance thence to Chicago, I accepted an invitation to take passage on a raft then lying in Saint Joseph’s River, four miles away. It was composed of lumber for the doctor’s dwelling in Chicago. We were five days floating down the river to its mouth, where there were a few small dwellings, situated on a high bluff on the south side of the stream. Here I was surprised to observe, seated along the bank of the river, what seemed to me a great multitude of men, women, and children, all seeking their passage to Chicago. Where they came from, or how they got there, I could not conceive. A schooner, the Ariadne, lay at the little wharf, and was loading with lumber from a raft which lay alongside ; and in her I soon engaged a passage across the lake to Chicago, the distance by water being about sixty miles.
Late in the afternoon the loading was completed, and we went on board, as many as could find foothold. Lumber was placed on the decks as high as it could be piled and allow the sails to be worked. The little cabin was stowed full of women and children, and the deck-load was fairly black with men holding on as best they could. The wind was very light all night, and we made but little progress. It freshened in the morning, but we did not come to anchor in front of Chicago till afternoon. This boat-load of men and women formed the first distinct wave of the immigration which was soon to flood the town and the surrounding region.
We need to consider the physical features of the country, if we would understand the exceptional growth of the town and city, as well as the character of the inhabitants who have made that growth possible. All of the central and northern part of the State is occupied by what was then, and is still, known as the “ grand prairie ” of Illinois. This prairie covers the whole district from the Wabash to the Mississippi. At its northern extremity it impinges upon Lake Michigan for a distance of four miles, extending from the Chicago River south to a body of timber called the “ oak woods.” This prairie was interspersed by belts of timber which grew on the east and north sides of the running streams, and by isolated groves of greater or less extent. The situation of these belts and isolated groves of timber was determined by the streams and by springs whose waters lodged in ponds, which waters, whether running or stationary, served to keep back the fires which were driven by the prevailing westerly and southerly winds that every autumn swept over the prairie. All the first settlers in the country established themselves on the borders of these forest belts and groves, and inclosed their cultivated fields in the adjoining prairie. When I came to the State, not a single farmer had built a house in the open prairie; but the fertility of the prairie soil had long been demonstrated by actual results.
The immigrants who first settled in Chicago were mostly young men from the Eastern States, imbued with that spirit of ambition and enterprise necessary to stimulate one to seek distant fields of activity on the very borders of civilization, and filled with a cheerful courage which forbade them to repine at privations unknown in the places of their birth. It was these men who laid the business foundations of Chicago, and they were followed by others of the same disposition. Thus was added force to the spirit of enterprise already existing. So it has continued ever since. Fire augments so long as there is fuel to keep up the flame.
The cities have not made the country ; on the contrary, the country has compelled the cities. If the class of immigrants who came to this city were such as would necessarily realize the possibilities spread out before them, the agriculturists who came and settled these great prairies were fully equal to their urban neighbors. Without the former the latter could not exist. Without farmers there could be no cities. To the agriculturists, therefore, at least as much credit is due for the progress of the city. He who has seen both from the beginning can most readily appreciate this.
When the only mode of transportation was by wheel vehicles over the common roads of the country, the agricultural products could be brought from but short distances, and it was quite as difficult to get the farmers’ supplies from the city ; so that the growth of the latter was necessarily limited to the extent of the country upon which it could rely for its support. The farmers would naturally seek the most accessible markets for their products, and there, too, would they obtain their supplies. Sixty years ago, there were so few farmers in the country that but little produce was raised; so little, indeed, within any reasonable distance, that but an insignificant mercantile business could be supported by exchanges. In 1832, salt from the State of New York had begun to come, by way of the Erie Canal and the Great Lakes, to Chicago, and this had become known by the farmers who had settled upon the Wabash River, who, to obtain this salt, came distances of from one hundred to two hundred miles to Chicago ; bringing with them those articles of produce which they thought they could sell, such, for instance, as lumber, bacon, eggs, live chickens, and apples. The beasts of draught in the country were almost exclusively oxen, which could do good work upon prairie grass alone, while horses needed grain to keep them in condition. This transportation was done in what were called " prairie schooners,” which were large tilted wagons drawn by from four to six yokes of oxen. The travelers carried their own provisions, consisting largely of bacon, corn bread, and potatoes, with apples when in season. They journeyed in companies of from two to ten teams, and stopped for the night in the prairie or on the edge of the groves, — wherever darkness overtook them and they could find water. When journeying across the prairie on horseback, I sometimes stayed with these caravans over-night. At such times I was uniformly well received and hospitably entertained. Each party would make a fire on the prairie, around which the oxyokes would be laid, each furnishing a seat for one or two persons, as occasion might require. At this fire supper was cooked. Each man was furnished with a tin plate, from which he ate his supper while he held it on his lap, depending on his fingers and pocket-knife to do duty for other table utensils. All of a party slept under the canvas tilt which covered the wagon, and I observed that they took particular pains to furnish a good bed for “the stranger,” as he was universally called. The oldest man of the party would hitch along on the oxyoke to make room for him, and the patriarch was usually very sociable. I have spent many hours pleasantly and profitably, while sitting on an ox-yoke, beside the leader of the caravan, from whom I learned a good deal about the country on the Wabash in both Indiana and Illinois.
These men were mostly emigrants from Kentucky and Tennessee, and I was especially interested in some peculiarities of their dialect, several of the words of which were new to me. Some words, too, that I was familiar with they used in senses peculiar to themselves; for instance, the word “ which ” was always used in place of “ what,” when they wanted an inquiry repeated, or when they wished some occurrence explained. About the time of which I am now speaking, I saw, in an Eastern paper, a communication from some Yankee who had come West, and was writing back information of what he had seen and heard here. In order to emphasize the mode in which this word was used by these prairie-schooner men, — these Hoosiers, as they were called, — he used the following language: —
Were I as Crœsus rich,
I ’d give it all to see him jump,
And loudly answer ‘ Which ? ’ ”
Not only were oxen employed on the roads; the farmers were equally dependent upon them for work on the farm. The first task for the new settler was to build himself a log cabin; the next, to break up a piece of prairie on which to cultivate a crop. The work of settling this country was very different from that undertaken by our forefathers in the heavy-timbered regions of the East. There, before they could plant a crop, they were obliged to clear away a portion of the forests,—a necessity which involved great labor and considerable time ; and if the settler depended on his own hands (which was frequently the case), he could add but very few acres each year to his clearing, and then the stumps remained obstructions to cultivation until they were removed by natural decay. This delay and expense did not occur on the great prairies. All that was necessary was to “break” them, as it was called. This could be done in the spring of the year, and a crop raised upon the ground the same season. A breaking-team consisted of several yokes of oxen, usually five or six, and a very heavy, strong plough which cut a furrow from eighteen to twenty-four inches wide. The roots of the grasses and weeds that covered the prairies were very tenacious, and the share of the plough was of steel, kept sharp by the frequent use of a large file. Though there was little sand or gravel in the soil, it was found necessary to sharpen the plough after running it four or five hundred yards. Experience showed that it was better to plough very lightly; not more than two inches deep, in fact. It was not desirable to turn the furrow over flat, but it was laid in ruffles, so as to permit the air to reach it on both sides, in which condition decay took place more rapidly. The wild vegetation which covered the prairies was very easily subdued. The roots of the vegetation, once cut off by the ploughshare, even if they fell back into their original places immediately, were absolutely killed.
The first crop usually depended upon was corn. With an axe the planter cut a gash in the broken sod, into which he dropped a few grains of seed, and then stepped upon it as he passed along. No subsequent cultivation, that season, could be made, and about half a crop could be expected the first year; but as a single team could plough from forty to fifty acres in time to plant corn, this half-crop would commonly furnish bread for a goodly family for the year. After the corn crop was put in, the breaking-team could be kept running as long as it was thought advisable, although the prairie sod broken after the first of July would not decay as readily as that broken earlier. A breaking-plough was usually rigged with wheels, having a lever to raise it out of the ground, a device which did away with the necessity of a man to hold the plough.
After 1834, settlers began to encroach upon the prairies, miles away from the timber. There they built their little huts or shanties ; and it was astonishing how men, even those starting very poor, got along, and finally prospered. When, in 1838 and 1839, operations on the Illinois and Michigan Canal were suspended, the laborers on that work each bought a sack of corn meal, which they placed in their wheelbarrows, and, followed by their wives and little ones, started out into the broad prairies, selected places which suited them, and with their spades cut up sods, with which they built little shanties, dug holes in neighboring sloughs for water, spaded up a place for a garden, where they planted a variety of vegetables which grew in the same season, so as to supplement their corn-meal diet. In this way was a considerable portion of La Salle County first settled by hundreds of men, whose acquaintance I formed when hunting grouse in the prairie, and with whom, and their descendants, that acquaintance has ever since been kept up. Some of the most wealthy and respected citizens of that county had been the little boys who, led by their mothers on foot, followed their fathers out into the unbroken prairie.
Twenty years later, he who traveled through that country where those sod huts were first built would find neat farmhouses, painted white, surrounded by flower gardens, fine barns, herds of cattle and horses in the pastures, and great crops of grain in the fields, or being harvested with reapers drawn by horses; roads laid out and worked, bridges across the streams, and white schoolhouses at convenient distances. If the first settlers were somewhat clannish, so that separate localities were known as the Norwegian settlement, the Irish settlement, the French settlement, or the Yankee settlement, the new generation became so intermingled that these names signified only a geographical location. All now have become simply Americans, speak only the English language, and are thoroughly imbued with the principles of our institutions.
In the absence of modern means of transportation, it was impossible for the immediate neighborhood to furnish enough business to build up a great city. Railroads and canals came along and extended the area which could reach Chicago and contribute to its trade. As these artificial avenues spread far and wide, to the same extent the commerce of the city increased, and in the same ratio has the city grown. I repeat that the tributary country has made the city, and not the city the country.
As the radius of the accessible circle extended, the contributory area was augmented approximately in the proportion of the circumference to the radii; and when the Gulf of Mexico and the Pacific Ocean, with their long lines of productive coast, were reached, millions of square miles contributed their quota to swell the volume of interchange between the East and the West, the North and the South, much of which commerce found itself centring here. Of all this Chicago can boast nothing, except that she has afforded facilities for this interchange, and she has taken good care to be well paid for doing so.
The topography of the country where this city and its environs stand must be understood in order to comprehend the difficulties experienced and the expense incurred in its construction. When I came here, sixty years ago, the surface of the ground along the river was so low as to be but little above the level of the water. When the latter was frozen over, in the winter season, we were in the constant habit of driving in a sleigh from the ground on to the ice, experiencing no more trouble in the descent than is very frequently encountered in the common roads; and the ice on the river was universally used for pleasure-riding on runners. In times of high water, the land was overflowed.
There have always been observed what are called tidal waves, rising to the height of several feet, when the water rushes in from the lake and flows up the river, so as to raise it out of its bed, after which it recedes as suddenly as it rose. I recollect that, in 1838, as I was passing down Lake Street, near Franklin, a tidal wave swept up the river, and overflowed its banks to the extent of two feet, at least; passing over the grade in the middle of the street, and filling the ditch on the south side of Water Street. It receded immediately; and when I pursued my way down the street, I observed a large fish which had been left by the recession of the water, which fish I captured and took home, and used on my own table. This tidal wave acted much like the artificial wave produced by the rapid passage of a side-wheel steamer in narrow waters. No periodicity has been observed in these tidal waves, and no explanation of them has ever been given which is satisfactory to me, though they have occurred several times each year. One, in 1870, was estimated to have a height of five feet. It overflowed the wharves on the river banks, and penetrated to a considerable distance beyond the river forks up the north and south branches. These waves have been the subject of frequent discussion in scientific circles.
Beside this sudden upheaval and recession of the waters near the head of Lake Michigan, a more staid and stately change in the level of the lake has always been noted. We have periods of high water and periods of low water, not limited to certain seasons of the year, but extending over several years. In 1881, the water in the lake, in front of the window where I am now writing, was more than six feet lower than it was in 1886, five years afterward, and periods of high and low water have repeatedly occurred since my first arrival here ; and the oldest Indian chiefs with whom I became acquainted assured me that it had always been so.
The soil upon which the city is built, near the shores of the lake, consists largely of sand, which has evidently been thrown up by the winds and waves. This is higher than the surface back of it, which is composed largely of a tenacious clay intermixed to a limited extent with sand, and frequently with crystallized gypsum in small quantities.
In the spring of the year, when the frost is coming out of the ground, this subsoil becomes very soft, and approximates the consistency of a semi-fluid ; and when the streets had been trampled sufficiently to break up the turf which originally covered them, they became, by continued use, like a bed of mortar, and in them I have often seen teams of horses and oxen mired. A few days’ warm sun would dry off the surface, and form a crust over the softer material below ; soon sufficiently strong to sustain men in walking over it, and later strong enough to sustain teams. It was not uncommon for people who ventured upon this treacherous ground to break through the crust soon after its formation, and find themselves sinking into the soft mud below, from which they would have some difficulty in extricating themselves without assistance. At such times, one standing upon this crust could, by a little effort, shake the surrounding ground for a rod or more. Then, of course, streets were not used as ways for passage ; the adjoining prairie, where the sod was not broken, was resorted to. In these circumstances underground cellars were out of the question ; nor was the soil suitable, without piling, for foundations for very heavy structures, although many large buildings were constructed. Higher grades were established from time to time, beginning with 1855, when almost the whole business section of a city of eighty thousand inhabitants was raised, in some cases a height of nine feet at one time. Another important change of grade took place after the great fire of 1871 ; and now the streets are generally from five to fourteen feet above the original soil. The elevation of structures in 1856 was a remarkable sight. Whole brick blocks were raised by means of thousands of jackscrews, by imperceptible gradations, without the cracking of a wall or the breaking of a pane of glass, and without interruption to the business within. Temporary steps gave the public access to hotels and stores as they were being elevated. These large structures were not only raised, but actually moved considerable distances. When this elevating process was commenced, the area covered by the business part of the town was limited; but as the town expanded, and even in anticipation of its growth, the streets had to be filled up to the established grade, and now there are places where paved streets are on a level with the second story of the houses adjoining.
The natural surface of the ground rose gradually as it receded from the river, sufficiently to allow the water to run off slowly ; but from the town westward to the divide near the Des Plaines River the elevation was so slight that the rank grass which covered the prairie held back the water, so as to constitute a real swamp or marsh except in the driest parts of the year. I have often crossed it on horseback when the water stood several inches deep upon the whole surface; when the earth beneath was honeycombed with the holes made by crawfish, from which streams of water were ejected by the pressure of the horses’ feet as they traveled over the prairie. I have frequently had jets of water thrown into my face in this way. When the tall grass had been removed and the prairie settled, roads and streets made, the water allowed to run off, and the surface subjected to the action of the sun, the country became dry and habitable. All the swampy character disappeared thirty or forty years ago, and for many miles around what was early Chicago is now a densely built city.
I have deemed it necessary to say thus much in order to indicate the difficulties which had to be overcome to build a city where Chicago now stands, and to enable the reader to draw a contrast between former days and these. The magnitude of the work can be understood only when one remembers that the area which has thus been improved extends for a distance of from ten to fifteen miles from where the little hamlet stood sixty years ago, which still maintains its central position, and constitutes the most active business part of the city. It was a long time before the farmers could produce enough food to supply the town and the country immigration. For a number of years, flour, butter, eggs, and the like were brought to us by way of the lakes from the shores of Lake Erie, and more than once I have known scarcity of food in Chicago. At the time of the land sales here, in 1835, when there was a considerable influx of visitors from the East, the flour in the place gave out, or ran so low that at the public tables a small piece of bread was placed on each plate, as the portion allowed to each guest. For several years milk was a scarce article ; none was brought in from the country for sale, and the householders had to depend for their supply upon cows which they themselves kept. Those who owned cows furnished their destitute neighbors with what they could spare, giving preference to those who had young children, while the public houses did not pretend to supply their tables regularly with milk. Then it was that we learned how good a substitute is butter for milk in coffee. We were rarely short of meat, for good beeves were driven up from the South and slaughtered here, and with them cows were brought along; but it was many years later before milk came in from the country to be sold in the streets.
The business of packing pork and beef did not begin here till about 1840, and then in a very small way, when the farmers began to raise a surplus above what was required to supply the domestic demands. As early as 1837, a few pigs could be bought in the streets of Chicago from farmers’ wagons, which were taken for family consumption ; but for some time afterward our main supply of pork came from Ohio and Indiana. Pork-packing for export was established on the Illinois River long before it became a business in Chicago. Jabez Fisher, from Boston, did a large business at Lacon, in Marshall County, packing pork for Boston consumption, which he sent out by way of New Orleans ; and he alone did more in that line than was done in all Chicago. It would be interesting to trace the growth of the packing business in this city from that time till now, when it has assumed such enormous proportions.
Not inferior to the packing of meat in this city has been the market for cereals. The growth of the business done here in these two articles alone would afford figures incredible in former times. It is not very many years since Chicago was behind several other cities in the Mississippi Valley in the business of packing meats, and also in the sale of cereals. Now it probably exceeds any other city in the Union, if not in the world, in the volume of business done in these lines. The lumber business of the city is also very great. When I came here, no pine was sold in this market; the only lumber then was whitewood, mostly brought across the lake from Saint Joseph’s River in Michigan. The first pine lumber was imported in 1835, and but very little in that year ; but in 1836 several mills were started along the shores of the lake, and pine lumber in this market became abundant, and the trade in it grew rapidly.
The first steam engine used in Chicago came in 1834, when a steam sawmill was built by a Mr. Huntoon, on the north branch of the river, which furnished oak lumber ; and this, with the whitewood lumber from Michigan, constituted the only wooden building material used in Chicago for some time thereafter. The quantity of lumber required in the country for settling the great prairies was simply enormous, and while but a limited proportion was brought through Chicago, that trade made this one of the greatest lumber markets in the world.
To specify the growth of the different branches of business which have forced this city to its present dimensions would be both tedious and unprofitable. The task which I had proposed to myself was to speak of my earliest recollections of Chicago and its environment so far as to afford such explanation of its subsequent growth as these might tend to give.
I must not neglect to refer to my own profession, to which I have been ardently devoted through a long and laborious life. As I have said, sixty years ago Chicago was but a little hamlet, with a very limited local business; not without law, by any means, but without lawyers, and without anything for lawyers to do. The machinery of the law was here, but, in the absence of commerce and crime, that machinery could not be set in motion. There were in the county a sheriff, a constable, and three justices of the peace, at least nominally; and one of the three justices. Squire Isaac Harmon, kept an office. He practically did all the judicial business which the quiet little community required to be done, and did it so well that no one seemed to appreciate that his judgments were not conclusive. The county had been organized in 1829, and provision had been made for holding a circuit court in this county every year thereafter; but as no case had arisen, either civil or criminal, to be brought in judgment before that court, none had been placed upon its records ; so the presence of the judge had not been required, and up to the time of my arrival here in June, 1833, he had never appeared to open the court. In ordinary times, the amount of litigation is a safe criterion by which to judge the amount of business done in a community. This quiet in the legal machinery was a very sure indication that commercial transactions of any considerable amount were not occurring, and that crimes of the graver sort had not been known here. Certain it is that nothing had thus far arisen which could not be dealt with by the justice of the peace and the constable. If some person should choose to ascribe the absence of litigation to a want of lawyers to foster it,
I might correct him by the assurance that such want did not exist. Russell E. Heacock, who was really a very good lawyer, — he knew more law than my associate, Giles Spring, and myself put together, when we reached Chicago, — had resided here for several years ; but, in the absence of all professional business, he had opened a carpenter shop in a log building, and practiced the trade he had learned before he studied law, and by that means earned a living. He was one of the three justices of the peace in and about Chicago, but he did not court official business, and rarely exercised his official functions. As soon as we settled here, both Spring and I gave ourselves out as lawyers ; but we had been here more than two weeks, and still nothing of a litigious character, even before a justice of the peace, had occurred to encourage us. One morning, as I was walking along Water Street, almost in despair, since my two weeks’ board bill must be paid, a gentleman stepped up to me and inquired if I was a lawyer. At this inquiry I am sure my countenance must have brightened very much. I quietly answered that that was my profession, and asked what I could do for him. He informed me that, the night before, somebody had stolen all the money he had, amounting to thirty-six dollars in Bellows Falls bank bills, and desired my assistance to catch the thief and recover the money. I took him to Squire Heacock’s carpenter shop, drew up a complaint and procured a warrant for a young man whose name I did not know, but who had slept in the same bed with my client the night before, and had disappeared before the latter had wakened in the morning. I assisted the constable in hunting for the young man all day, and just at dusk the officer arrested him and brought him in. The money as described in the complaint was found secreted on his person. Spring was retained to defend him. Then it was that both.Spring and I had an opportunity of first appearing before a Chicago audience, and we made the most of it. We spoke more to the people than to the magistrate. Of course the prisoner was bound over to the circuit court. That was the first case ever entered upon the records of a court of record in Cook County. About two weeks later, I was retained to commence an action by attachment, and that was the second case which was placed upon those records. And so am I enabled, from memory, to go back to the very beginning of the judicial history of Chicago.
Several other cases were begun in the circuit court during the year 1833, but how many I do not remember. Spring and I were engaged in them all. In that year, the population of Chicago was largely increased relatively ; but I do not recollect that any other lawyer arrived here in 1833 except Edward W. Casey.
The first circuit court opened in Chicago was held by Judge Young, in May, 1834. Nominally, it was in session four days, but the actual time consumed in the dispatch of business was only three days. By the fall term of that year, the business of the court had so increased that it was barely possible to conclude it within the four or live days allowed by law. During the year 1834, the Chicago bar was augmented by the arrival of a considerable number of lawyers, but how many I cannot state from recollection, nor can I remember the names of all; nor have I the means of determining the increase of the number of the members of the bar from that time on till the great fire of 1871, when all the court and municipal records were destroyed. Suffice it to say that in numbers they have kept pace with the increase of population in the city, and now exceed twenty-five hundred.
At the May term, 1834, but three days were needed to dispatch the business of the court, while now it requires the labor of more than a score of judges, constantly engaged in exercising the same jurisdiction wielded by Judge Young in three days in May and four or five days in October. And still the courts are, on the average, more than a year behind.
To me it has been a pleasing task to trace the chain of events which connects the present with the far distant past, and to select such incidents and facts as may enable others to appreciate the beginning and the advancement of a country and a city whose history contains some useful lessons to him who would study the progress of civilization. I have been compelled to pass over much that might be interesting, such as the state of society, the progress of its growth, amusements among the young people (nearly all were young), the condition and growth of educational facilities, religion and morals, and many other kindred subjects. To treat of these properly would require greater space than is at my disposal.
John Dean Caton.