Wheeling register. [volume] (Wheeling, W. Va.) 1878-1935, 1883-07-24
FIFTY YEARS.
From a Log Hut to a Great Matro-
polls.
History and Growth Of the Wonderful City
of the West-The Old Capital
of Illinois.

Chicago will celebrate On August 10
next the semi-contennial of its incor-
p~ora.ion as q village. This great and
thriving metropolis Of the West is a
wonderful example of rapid growth.
From a small Indian trading post COM
prlslng a hundred or so Of population It
has grown to a nalf million inhabitants
inside Of half q century. Joliet and
Marquette we're the first white visitors
to the spot where the city now stands,
in 1873. The first permanent settle
ment was made in 1904, when Fort
Dearborn was erected. Ii was demOl-
ished in 1856. The town was organized
in 1888 and incorporated as a city in
1887. The first brick house was erected
1898, the first vessel entered her harbOr
in 1884, and the first official census wa
taken July l, 1887, and figured at 4,l7O.
In 1880 the population was 29,963; in
| 60, ll2,lT2; in 1870, 29S,977, and in
1880, 5n3, lS5. What, with the progress
Of building and the fire, it mas resulted
II at very few of Cnicago'S old land
marks remain, albeit the city is yet
amODg the youngest of the large cities
Of the land. The name of Chicago has
been variou>ly interpreted to mean
skunk" or ''pOle cat" and wild onion,
both those animals and that herb hav-
ing once been plentiful in that region.
Again, it is derived from the Indian
word ''checagne," signifying thunder,
or the voice of the Great Manitou.
The Early settlers.
The early settlers came principally
from the Southern States. The embryo
city was infested with wolves, and
many of the old citizens a tell pleas
ant stories OF exciting wolf hunts. The
first resident of Chicago was a negro
named Jean Baptiste Point and sable.
He built a cabin on the north bank of
what was called the main river, Major
Long, 4 government agent, speaks In
lS27 Of Chicago as containing a few
hutS "inhabited by a miserable race OF
men scarcely equal 10 the Indians from
whom they had descended.n Their
houses, he said, were low, filthy anu
disgusting He moreover stated that
it held forth no inducements to a
would. be settler, ''the whole amount of
trade on the lake not exceeding the
CargOCs of five or six sChOOnerS." Ten
years later Chicago became a city and
1t has gore on increasing in a marvel
lOus manner, its wholesale trade now
aggregating over 100000, OOO. The
great fire of 1871 swept over an area of
three and a third square miles, destroy
ing l7,45O buildings and rendering
homeless y, 800 people. The total loss
footed up to $l90,OO0,0 O0. Two years
later another great fire destroyed S4,OOO,-
900 worth of property, covering sixty
acres in the heart OF the city.
The history OF Chicago's wonderful
reeuperatien is too well known to need
repetition. The Chicago of to-day has
a brilliant destiny before it. 1t has an
immense trade in pork and beet and
other commodities amounting in value
Establishments employ owe 10000 hands,
with an estimated capital Of S~1O,OOO,OOO.
Its position, ailording an unsurpassed
water front, the network OF railroads
eonverging there, and its ample facili-
ties for commerce and manufactures,
afford Chicago an opportunity to go
quickly to the front rank of great cities.
The City of Kasksskia-
The venerable city of Kaskaskia,
once the Capital of Illinois, is mostly
under water, owing to the present flood
i'm the Mississippi, and is TO be at least
temporarily abandoned, the inhabitants
having sent to Chester for a steamboat
to take them away. Kaskaskia's glory
has long since departed. The old State
Capital is now q mere relic-a reminis-
eence of former greatness. From a city
OF 1000 inhabitants and the seat OF gov
eminent, as well as the home of the
fashion in the West, to which St. Louis
people came to do their shopping, it
has dwindled to a picturesque ruin, the
home of less than five hundred persons.
The curious looking two.story brick
building in which the first Territorial
Legislature Of Illinois held its session;
the little one-story frame "hoter' where
LAFAYETTE was welcomed and feted; the
new Catholic church, erected on the
ruins of the old pile; the residence of
Senator Kane, on the high bluff across
the Kaskaskia, where Governor Bissell
wooed and won his wife; old Fort Gage,
further south; the old Menard mansion
these and other monuments of q his
toric and fast fading past are pointed
out to the occasional visitor IS objects
once Of public interest, but important
now only through the associations
which cluster around them. kaskasKia
is doomed. The Father of Waters has
encroached upon the town for years and
it Is gradually but surely disappearing.
Kaskaskia is in Randolph county, on
the west bank Of the kaskaskia River,
about one mile east of the Mississippi
River and forty miles south of Belle
vile. 1t was settled by the French
about 1878.