PART ONE CHAPTER I THE BEGINNING OF PEORIA "The student of history delights in a good foundation on which to start to write history, without which, it is like beginning in the middle of a story."— Rufus Blanchard. The history of Peoria is one of unusual interest. Emerging as it does gradually from the dim, unknown and unknowable past, it connects the myths, fable, and fancy of the Indian with the wonderful things of our modern life-the Piasa bird with the flying machine. At the time when the first persons who were able to write permanent and intelligible records of what they saw and heard visited this country, the beautiful valley of the Illinois was in the possession of the "Illinois," a confederacy composed of five Indian tribes, the Kaskaskias, Peorias, Cahokias, Tamaroas, and Mitchigamies. The name of the confederacy is now seen and will be forever recognized in the names of our glorious state and our own lovely river connecting the great lakes on the north with the great river, "Father of Waters," on the west. I feel inclined to call the Pe-o'-rias our tribes, because their melodious name is made imperishable in the name of our own fair city and our beautiful lake. The Kaskaskias, who were the strongest tribe of the confederacy, have given their name to one of the largest rivers in Illinois and also to the first capital of the state. The Cahokias are remembered in the name of a town near St. Louis which, in many ways, is closely connected with the history of Peoria. Sixty miles southeast of St. Louis the City of Tamaroa perpetuates the memory of another tribe and the Mitchigamies have given their name to the great lake on our north-eastern borders. Thus, although the melancholy tale of the sufferings and extermination of these Indians is read in the setting sun, their names will remind us forever of those who were here before the coming of the white men. When the first missionary asked the Indians what they were called, they replied that they were "Illini" saying the word meant perfect, manly men. The missionaries added the letters "ois" a French termination meaning a race or tribe; hence the word "Illinois" means a race of perfect manly men. May it long be truly characteristic of those who shall live within our boundaries! Peoria is situated near forty degrees and forty minutes north. Peorians sometimes complain of the climate. It does occasionally change a great many degrees in a short time but it changes more rapidly in some other places in the temperate zone. Of course, in the far north it is always cold and in the torrid zone it is always hot and little change either place and for some ailments of persons of delicate health the Peoria climate is not suitable, but for persons in good health, it is probably as healthy a climate as can be found anywhere and it is believed that for the majority of such persons there is no climate more desirable. If we desire to learn what other places are situated in our latitude and would follow our latitude eastward, we would pass near Logansport, Indiana; Lima and Canton, Ohio; Pittsburg, Pennsylvania and a little south of New York City; crossing the Atlantic, we would land about one-third of the way down on the coast of Portugal; pass near Madrid, Spain; pass through the north end of Sardena; then near Naples and Brindisi in Italy; Salonika in Greece; near Constantinople and Erzerum; near Baku on the western side of the Caspian, the great oil country; then in Central Asia; near Bokahra and Samarkand in the Steppes of Central Asia where it is often fifty degrees below zero in winter and of tropical heat in summer, although it is about the same latitude as Peoria; then near Peking, China; within sixty miles of the north end of the great Japanese island of Nipon; and crossing the Pacific land on the Pacific coast about half way between San Francisco and the southern boundary of Oregon; then near Salt Lake City, the northern line of Colorado; through Lincoln, Nebraska ; and Burlington, Iowa, to Peoria. Peoria is eighty-nine degrees and forty minutes west of Greenwich. If we would follow that degree of longitude south, we would pass near Cairo, Memphis and New Orleans and out in the Pacific Ocean, five hundred miles west of Panama, going past the South pole and coming north on the opposite parallel, we would pass near Calcutta; Lasso, the great religious center of Thibet, the holy capital city of the Buddhists; thence through Siberia to the North pole and from there down on this side of the earth, through the center of the west one-third of Hudson Bay and through the west one-third of Lake Superior. The contour of the earth's surface in this valley of the Illinois was of course, the same when first seen by white men as it is now; but in some portions of it, swamps, the ancient habitant of ducks and wild geese, beavers and muskrats, have been drained and turned into the most valuable of farms, gardens and orchards, happy homes for happy families. This section of Illinois is very productive, well watered and well supplied with coal and it will receive attention in a subsequent chapter. The vegetation has greatly changed. At that time, along the rivers and the ravines leading to them, there were forests of hickory, oak, elm, walnut, locust, ash, cottonwood, hard maple or sugar trees, soft maple, wild cherry, red haws, black haws, persimmons and pawpaws, together with wild plums, crab apples, blackberries, raspberries, grapes, strawberries and gooseberries; and away from the streams were broad prairies covered with a kind of coarse tall prairie grass -the seed stems of which were six or eight feet high-interspersed with rosin weeds and with a blue flower so that at certain seasons of the year the prairies seemed blue and purple, and in other seasons, gray, green or yellow. This vegetation, we are told by early pioneers, grew so high that horsemen on the level prairies two or three hundred yards apart could not see each other; and when in full growth, it was waved by the summer breeze like the rolling billows of the deep ocean, blue and green, very beautiful and enchanting. Some of these prairies. were fifteen or twenty miles wide and some of them extended in all directions as far as the eye could reach. If at the season of the year when this prairie grass was dry, it happened purposely or accidentally to be ignited, the conflagration was at once terrible and magnificent, and could be seen for a score of miles. All these varieties of trees may still be found in reduced numbers here and there, along the streams, but the prairie grass, the golden rosin weeds, and the purple flowers are almost entirely things of the past though a specimen may be found here and there, perhaps, in some country church yard that has never been cultivated or pastured. The Illinois valley was from its earliest history known to be a remarkable. producer of Indian corn. It seems to have been "The Corn Belt" from the very start. The Indians also cultivated beans, melons and squashes. The productiveness of this part of the country was recognized from the beginning by the Indians in the name they gave their village, PEORIA, which signifies "The Land of Fat Beasts." Marquette says of it that his party had seen nothing like the Illinois valley for fertility. The animals consisted chiefly of the bison which roamed in immense herds, numbering thousands. These when stampeded could neither be stopped nor turned aside, and one's only safety was to escape out of their way. The bison were generally mis-called buffalo by the inhabitants. They were not much like the buffalo. They were called "cattle" by some of the early missionaries and explorers but they were not cattle in the sense in which we now use the word. They were a separate and distinct species peculiar to this part of the world. What we now call cattle in this country were first brought over to America by Columbus on his second voyage and from that time on were frequently imported by the Spaniards. The bison were not valuable as dairy animals; they furnished very little milk, although what they did give was rich and good. Moreover, notwithstanding what Hennepin says, they probably were not, and could not have been made useful as draft animals or for any domestic purposes. Some of the early missionaries and pioneers tried to take them when young and train them for draft purposes but on reaching their growth, they would often run away to join any herd of their wild roving kindred coming into the neighborhood; six months afterward they might be found with the herd with their halters or harness still on them. From the earliest time of which we have any knowledge they were extremely numerous but about the time the Indian left, they all migrated to the west in a body apparently and our Illinois country knew them no more. Their departure was sudden and complete. The Indians had no horses. These too were brought over from Europe by the Spaniards, and probably by others of the white race. They eventually became numerous; and at the present time large herds of wild horses, the descendants of the early importations, are found on some of our western plains. These wild horses or ponies are smaller than those in our domestic use, but hardy and enduring, and cattle ranchers use them because they can live on the short grass of our semi-arid plains summer and winter without other food or shelter. It was only after the Indians obtained and learned to use them, that they were able to inhabit or migrate across the prairies. Bears were to be found and the Indians greatly prized their meat for food. There were also turkeys, ducks, geese, rabbits and foxes. The bears and foxes are gone. The wolves that then abounded are now very scarce and rapidly passing away. There were wild pigeons by the million but these are now no more. There were prairie chickens but now one can seldom be found. There doubtless were quail and we still have them as well as the rabbits among us; and thanks to our game laws, the quail may be preserved, for although they are not a domestic bird they do not seem to flee from civilization. It is not known that the Indians had any domestic animal except probably the dog. The rivers, especially the Illinois, were at that time as now, filled with an abundance of the finest kind of fish and they were largely used for food by the Indians. CHAPTER II THE ABORIGINES "There's a sweetness in thy name, That betrays from whence it came, Soft and mellow are its sounds, Land of prairies and of mounds, There is indeed music in the word Illinois (Ill-i-noi). Historians agree that the Indians who were in the valley of the Illinois when it was first visited by the missionaries were neither the original inhabitants nor their descendants, but that this whole country in the valley of the Mississippi river comprising the states of Missouri, Iowa, Illinois, Ohio, and Indiana, together with some other northern states and also Arizona and New Mexico were formerly inhabited by a race which has either perished from the earth or, going farther south became the forefathers of the Aztecs, Toltecs and other ancient peoples of Mexico and Central America. This early race has received the name of Mound Builders because mound building was one of their chief characteristics and the one by which we now know of their existence. Their mounds are found without number in Ohio and other central western states. Many scores of them are found opposite St. Louis on the Illinois side of the Mississippi river and some within the boundaries of St. Louis itself. Some such mounds have been seen by the writer in Arizona. There are some smaller mounds on the east side of the Illinois river near Peoria and some within Peoria County near Chillicothe. These ancient people seem to have been tillers of the soil, and from the records which they have left, such as they are, ethnologists have concluded that they did not live chiefly by hunting or fishing. It is thought that the buffalo were not here in their day. Whence the mound builders came or whither they have gone is as yet a matter of conjecture. It is an interesting study which the limits of our history do not permit us to pursue. Mankind in ancient times and in many ancient countries as well as in Mexico have built mounds of somewhat similar character, sometimes building of stone, sometimes of sunburnt brick. In North America, they are often built in terraces, the lowest part reaching a height of twenty or thirty feet, upon which one or more smaller mounds are superimposed, as is the case with the great Cahokia Mound. They are supposed to have been built as places of religious worship and those who have built them are generally supposed to have been worshippers of the sun. There are many of these mounds in the United States, some of them being regular and perfect pyramids or cones of earth, not faced with stone. The |