The Democratic press. [volume] (Ravenna, O. [Ohio]) 1868-1901, 1884-11-06
Phenomenal Chicago.

A recent local census gives Chicago,
in round numbers GAS, 600 population:
for 1884. In 1880 the United States
census gave sos, 600 as the then popuIa-
ton. The increase in the four years is
l40,OO OF Very nearly % per cent, or
z per cent. per year. Nothing out of
the ordinary way has intervened to
cause this astounding increase. In fact
for the last year and half business
has been less active than usual at Chi
cagO, and yet the increase averages
higher than for the extraordinary lively
decade from 1870 to $780, when the in
crease was less than per cent. q year.
If the ratio of increase continues the
same as since 1880 up to June, 1880, the
population of Chicago will then be 913,
600 a growth of 10000 in twenty
years.
In the history of cities, ancient and
modern, there is nothing equal to this
And the expansion in trade and wealth
has been even greater than in popula-
ton. But this is only one of its phe-
nOmenal characteristics. 1t appears
that Chicago is the most cosmopolitan
city in the world in its Inhabitants.
Not one-fourth of them are Of Amefi-
~
Planted, as it is, right in the heart of
the continent, 1000 miles from the sea
on one side and $500 on the other.
nearly four out of every five of its peo-
pie are of foreign birth, representing
every race, color, and nation in the
world. Paris, as the center of fashion,
taste, wealth, and pleasure in Europe.
has foreign population not exceeding
20 per cent. of the whole; Berlin still 3
lower per centage who are not German.
In Chicago the foreign percentage ris-
es to about 7S of the whole. The Ger
mans predominate; the Irish come next,
and after the Irish the Scandinavians.
Chicago has become the ultimate dis
tributing point of more than two-thirds
OF the yearly immigration from Europe.
They land at New York, but proceed
direct to the great Western center,
where they await the opportunity of q
final choice of hOme-in Illinois, Indi-
ana, Michigan, Kansas, Wisconsin, Ne
braska, Iowa, Eastern Missouri, Dako-
ia, Colorado. New Mexico, Minnesota,
Montana, Wyoming, Utah, and even in
the Pacific States and Territories, and
in Manitoba; far more emigrants reach
the ''Great Lone Land by way of Chi
eago than by all other routes.
Another curiosity of Chicago is her
daily papers. She has two that publish
more columns in the course of a year
than any three papers in New York,
and their local market reports from day
to day are more elaborate than those of
any in the great Atlantic seaboard met
ropolis. In an article written by
Stephen A. Douglas and published in
the Democratic ReUiea0 Just thirty years
ago it was predicted that New Orleans
would not long be able to hold her po-
sition as the first commercial city of
the Mississippi Valley; that no city ON
the great river would permanently hold
that place; that St. Louis must by and
by yield to some city planted on one
of the great lakes; that the chances ia
vored Chicago as such city, and finally
that there would come time when the
region between the Alleghanies and tha
Rockies would build up city that
would become the financial and COM
mercial center of that vast domain, and
outrun New York and Philadelphia in
population. Douglas died before this
prophecy had fairly taken shape for re-
aization. But now what was treated
as dream is taking on the appearance
of fact that may be possibly worked
out even in the present century, or at
any rate, before the National debt is
due and redeemed.-!Sdn Francisco
Chronicle.