Adams County, Illinois - Chapter with an unread heading (no. 1 of those read), 1879

Chapter with an unread heading (no. 1 of those read)

Boundaries - Geological - Carboniferous - St, Louis Sandstone - Kin- DERHOOK Group - Economical Geology - Bituminous Coal - Limestone FOR Lime - Clay and Sand for Brick - -Soil and Timber.

This county lies upon the western border of the State and is bounded on the north by Hancock county, on the east by Brown and Pike counties, on the south by Pike, and on the west by the Mississippi river. It embraces an area of about twenty-three townships, or, eight hundred and thirty square miles. It is well watered, having in addition to the great river which forms its western boundary several smaller streams which afford a thorough surface drainage to all parts of the county. Bear creek drains the northern portion of the county, McGee's the eastern and central, and McDonald's creek, Hadley's creek and Mill creek intersect the southern south-western portion. These streams furnish a small amount of water power for mills and machinery, as well as an abundant supply of water for the stock grower. Fine springs of fresh water are abundant in some portions of the county, and more especially in the southern and western part, where the Burlington or Quincy limestone is the prevailing rock. This limestone is somewhat cavernous and admits the free passage of subterranean waters through it until they finally find an outlet at the surface in limpid streams of cold limestone water.

The uplands in this county are nearly equally divided into timber and prairie, the timber portions being mainly resti*icted to the broken lands in the vicinity of the streams. The prairies are generally quite rolling, except in the north-eastern portion of the county where they are comparatively level. The general elevation of the prairie region, above the level of the Mississippi, at low water, is from two hundred to two hundred and

Along the western border of the county there is a belt of alluvial bottom land from one to five miles in width, extending the whole length of the county from north to south, except for about two miles in the vicinity of Quincy, where the bluffs approach near to the river bank. A portion of these alluvial lands is quite dn', being only overflowed by the highest floods in the river, and possesses a very rich and productive soil and is partly prairie, especially the higher portions adjacent to the river blufts. The low bottoms are in part covered with a heav)' growth of timber embracing many varieties not found on the uplands. The bottom lands north of Quincy toward the Hancock county line are intersected with numerous bayous and in the north-west corner of the county one of these widens into a lake four or five miles in length by about two in width, known as Lima lake. The bottom lands in this part of the county are mostly too wet for cultivation, but below Quincy they are rather higher and ailbrd some line farming lands, especially along the foot of the bluffs where a considerable area is above the high water level of the river.

Geological

The geological formations exposed in this county comprise the lower carboniferous limestone series about three hundred feet in thickness, about one hundred feet of the lower part of the coal measures and the Quaternary and Post Tertiary deposits of more recent age which unconformably overlie all the others. The following section will show the thickness and relative positions of the formations exposed in this county:

Quaternary Coal Measures

Beds of sandstone, sandy and argillaceous shale with bands of limestone, bituminous shale and fire clay, with two or three seams of coal 100

Lower Carboniferous Limestones

The Quaternary system properly includes all the deposits, both stratified and unstratified, that are of more recent origin than the Pliocene Tertiar}'. In this county we find a series of beds comprising an aggregate thickness of about one hundred and sixty feet, which properl}' belongs to this sj'stem. They include the surface soil and subsoil on the uplands, and the alluvial deposits of the river valleys, the Loess which is largely developed along the bluifs of the Mississippi, the Drift proper, including all the thick beds of unstratified clay and gravel, enclosing boulders of large size, and, lastly, an ancient Post Tertiarj' soil and subordinate clays, usually distinctly stratified, and without boulders which rest immediately upon the stratified rocks.

The soil at dififerent localities rests upon, and is in part derived from, each of these subdivisions of the Quaternary system, and consequently varies considerably in its general appearance and productive qualities in accordance with the character of the beds on which it rests and from which it has been mainly formed.

The alluvial deposits of the Mississippi valley consist of partially stratified sands, alternating with dark bluish-gray, or chocolate-brown clays, deposited by the annual floods of the river. In the vicinity of the bluffs these deposits are annually increased, by the wash from the adjacent hills and the sediments that are carried down by the small streams during their overflows.

The valley of the Mississippi has been excavated in solid limestone strata to the depth of from one hundred and fifty to three hundred feet, or more, and from five to ten miles in width; and as we frequently find some portions of this valley still occupied by the beds of unaltered drift material, exactly like that which covers the adjacent highlands, we have undoubted evidence that it was not formed by the river, which now, in part, occupies it; but is due to some other and more potent agency, dating back to a period long anterior to the formation of the existing water courses. It is very evident that the surface of the stratified rocks in this portion of the State have been subjected to the action of powerful denuding forces,, anterior to the accumulation of the superficial materials which now occupy the surface, by which these rocks were greatly eroded, and in many places cut into deep valleys, some of which now form our river courses, while others are wholly or partially filled with Drift and Post Tertiary beds; and it is highly probable that if we could see a complete section of the beds which now occupy these ancient valleys, we should find beneath the alluvial beds, already described, even older than any which now cover the adjacent highlands. Along the banks of the water courses we find only from ten to twenty feet of the alluvial beds exposed by natural causes, and the character of the underlying strata can only be determined by artificial excavations.

The next older division of this system is the Loess, a deposit of marly sand and clay, which ranges in thickness from ten to forty feet, and attains its greatest development where it caps the river bluffs, thinning out rapidly towards the adjacent highlands, which form the summit level of the interior portion of the county. It is usually of a light buft'-brown, or ashengray color, frequently showing distinct lines of stratification, and always overlies the drift clays, when both are present in the same section. It is usually quite sandy where it caps the river bluffs, but becomes more agillaceous at other points, where the beds are thinner, and, locally, it becomes quite calcareous. The Loess is well exposed in the bluffs at Quincy, where it is about forty feet in thickness and overlies some beds of plastic clay and sand, which are probably of Post Tertiary age, and older than the true drift. Immediately above the limestone here we find a few feet in thickness of what might be called "local drift," consisting of angular fragments of chert, embedded in a brown clay, which have probably been derived from the subordinate limestones. This is overlaid by a few feet of blue plastic clay and stratified sands, on which the Loess is deposited. At one point, near the base of the bluiFs, in tlie northern part of the city, we observed underlyinj^ the Loess what seemed to be a chocolate-colored soil, about a foot in thickness, which may represent the Post Tertiary soil, penetrated in the shaft at Coatsburg, underlying the Drift deposits. Here the true Drift is wanting, and the Loess directly overlies these older Post Tertiary beds. Notwithstanding the unsolidified character of this deposit, it is sufficiently coherent to present a vertical cliff where it is intersected by artificial cuts, and often remains for years in nearly perpendicular walls wliere.it has been through by running streams or in grading the streets of the cities that have been built upon it. It is everywhere a fine sedimentary accumulation, and usually contains numerous terrestrial and fresh-water shells, which, notwithstanding their fragile structure, are found entirely perfect, showing that they have not been subjected to any violent movements before they were buried in the marly sand of this formation.

The remains of the Mammoth, Mastedon, Megalonyx, Casteroids, and other extinct animals, occur in the Loess, indicating that it is a deposit formed in a fresh-water lake into which the bones of land animals and the shells of terrestrial molluscs were swept by the streams running into it from the adjacent land. The term "Loess" was originally applied to a similar formation which caps the blufts of the River Rhine, in Germany, and has been generally adopted by the American geologists to designate beds that are similar in their character and origin to those on the Rhine, and that appear to have been formed about the same time.

Drift. - This formation is composed of yellowish-brown or bluish clays, with sand, gravel, and large boulders of water-worn rock, the whole mass usually showing little or no trace of stratification, and ranging in thickness from thirty to eighty feet, or more. It is a heterogeneous mass of the waterworn fragments of all the stratified rocks that are known to occur for several hundred miles to the northward embedded in brown or blue clays, and most of the laro:e boulders which it contains are derived from the metaphoric sandstones, granites, sienites, porphyries and other metaphoric and iarneous strata that occurs on the borders of the «;reat lakes. Associated with these there are also rounded boulders, usually of smaller size, derived from the stratified rocks of this and the adjacent States. Fragments of native copper, galena, coal and iron are often intermingled with the general mass, but are not indicative of mines of those minerals in the immediate vicinity where such fragments are found; for they have been transported from other localities by the same powerful agencies to which the drift formation owes its origin. The coal shaft at Coatsburg penetrated the thickest bed of drift that has, perhaps, been found in this county; and I am indebted to Mr. Joseph Edwards for the following section of the beds passed through in sinkiuir this shaft: i

We have in this section eighty-five feet of what may he considered true Drift, consisting of unstratified clays containing gravel and houlders. The upper six feet of the section probably represents the age of the Loess more properly than any other division of tlie Quarternary system; and its formation is explained by Prof. Lesquereux in his chapter on the formation of the prairies.

The ancient Post Tertiary soil, which was reached at a depth of ninetyone feet from the surface, and the stratified clays which underlie it, are of no older date than the Drift proper, and were no doubt formed under very dififerent conditions. So far as we are aware, this was the first point in the State where a bed resembling the surface soil was observed below the Drift, as this shaft was sunk in 1859, but no public notice was made of it at that time, as it was then supposed to be merely a local phenomenon that might not be verified elsewhere. Fragments of wood and also of bones were also reported to have been found in it here, but we were not able to obtain specimens of them, and cannot vouch for the truth of the report. Subsequent discoveries at other points, however, show that wood, in an excellent state of preservation, is often found in this ancient soil, as well as in the underlying stratified clays; and in the shaft at Bloomington, at the depth of one hundred and eighty feet, a considerable quantity of wood, some of which was perfectly sound, was taken from a similar deposit. These stratified clays and the sands frequently associated with them appear to have been entirely of fresh-water origin, the fossil shells which they aftbrded being all of lacustrine or fluviatile species.

At Camp Point, a few miles east of Coatsburg, the Quaternary beds were all penetrated in sinking a tank well at the railroad station. They were here only sixty feet in thickness, but no note was made of the character of the diiferent beds passed through. Probably the lower beds of stratified clays and the ancient soil above them, were not found here, and the beds passed through were only the surface soil and sub-soil and the true Drift deposits. From the soft and yielding character of the beds, a satisfactory natural section of them is rarely met with, and it is only when they have been penetrated in sinking coal shafts, wells, and other artificial excavations, that a correct section of the whole series can be seen. Along the breaks of the streams the drift clays and subordinate beds of superficial material are generally eroded into sloping hillsides, covered with soil and vegetation down to the fundamental rock on which they rest, and only very meager exposures of the beds are to be found on the water courses.

Carboxiferous System

All the Paleozoic rocks that appear above the surface in this country belong to this svstera and comprise the lower portion of the Coal Measures and the whole series of the lower Carboniferous limestones except the Chester series and the lower part of the Kinderhook group.

Coal Mea^ui'c^. - This term is applied to that portion of the Carboniferous svstem that contains the workable seams of cjal and comprises shales, sandstones, bituminous slates and their bands of limestone, with seams of coal and the fire clay that underlie them. The whole thickness of these strata in this country, probably nowhere exceed about one hundred and twentv feet, and they include the three lower coal seams and the strata associated with them. The greatest development of this formation is in the northeast part of the county, on Little Missouri creek, where there is an exposure of some fifty or sixty feet of shales with two thin beds of limestone above ]So. 2 coal, which is worked at different points in the valley of the creek.

The middle coal seam in the above section ( Xo. 2^ is the most regular in its development and furnishes altogether the best coal in the county. It out-crops on the soath fork of Bear creek, and is worked by Mr. Ferguson, on the northeast quarter of section 17. township 1. north, range 6 west. The coal at this p;>int ranges from two to three feet in thickness, and is of good quality, being generally quite free from the bi-sulphuret of iron. The ro<:>f is a bluish clay shale of which about fifteen feet in thickness is exposed at the mine, above which there is a thin seam of bituminous shale and soft coal, indicating the horizon of another coal seam which has been opened on another branch of the cnt about a half a mile southeast of FergTison's mine.

The coal on this upper seam which we refer to, Xo. 3, is only from highteen to twenty inches in thickness and is full of iron pyrites at the only point where it has Ijeen opened in this vicinity. It is overlaid with about two feet of black slate, and by eighteen or twenty feet of sandstone.

A mile and a half southwest of Ferguson's, on section 19, coal has been mined for several years by stripping the seam along the valley of a small creek, a tributary of Bear creek, but the mines are now abandoned.

On Little Missouri creek, six miles northeast of Clayton, coal is dug in the same manner, by stripping the seam in the Creek valley. The seam is here is about twenty-eight inches thick and the coal is of good quality. This is on section 12, township 1 north, range 5 west, on the southeast quarter of section 12, township 2 north, range 5 west; this seam has been worked on Cedar creek. The coal here is about thirty inches thick and is underlaid by white fire clay and overlaid by fifteen or twenty feet of clay shale.

On the southwest quarter of section 34, township 1 north, range 5 west, about a mile southwest of Clayton, a thin seam of coal was opened in the early settlement of this part of the county where the coal outcrops on a small branch of McGee's creek. The coal was found to be only from fourteen to sixteen inches thick and was overlaid by four feet of black shale which contained a few fossil shells, among which were Discina nitida and an Amculojpecten. This is perhaps coal No. 3 of the above section. On the northeast quarter of section 36, township 2 north, range 8 west, coal was dug at an early day on Mr. Higby's land. The coal was found here in the bed of a small creek with no exposure of the bed associated with it, and was mined by stripping the seam of the overlying soil and clay. It was said to be from two to three feet in thickness with six inches of blue shale and about a foot of black shale above it. The coal was rather poor in quality, and was probably an outlier of No. 1. The coal was underlaid by sandstone which was exposed near by and half a mile [southwest of this point, the concretionary limestone of the St. Louis group was found in situ.

South of Clayton the country becomes quite rolling and hilly, but the ravines seldom expose the bed rock, and no coal is found outcropping though it probably underlies most of the surface north of McGee's creek. After crossing the creek at Hughes' Ford, coal is found in the bluft'on the south side, section 28, township 2 south, range 5 west; while below it are outcrops of the St. Louis and Keokuk limestones, the latter forming the bed rock in the creek valle}^ The coal seam has been opened by Mr. Luke Snow at two points; one in the face of the bluff, where a tunnel has been commenced, and the other on a small stream still further south, where the seam has been worked in an open trench on the outcrop. The coal is here from eighteen to twenty inches thick, and is overlaid by about two feet of bituminous shale, above which about six feet of clay shale was seen. The beds immediately below the coal were not exposed, but we are inclined to regard this as an outcrop of the lower seam, No. 1. On the northeast quarter of section 31, township 2 south, range 5 west, there is an outcrop of coal that was known as Bassett's coal bank, and was worked at the time of our first visit to this part of the county, in 1853. Tiie coal is here from sixteen to eighteen inches thick, and is overlaid by about two feet of black shale, containing numerous fossils, among which were a large Dlscina^ perhaps only a variety of Diseina nitlda Aviculojyecten Coxana, A. pelluoidus, Produetus mnrlcatus, Orthislna crassa, Orthoceras Rushensis and Pleurophomis soleniformis. On the southwest quarter of section 7, township 3 south, range 6 west, there is a similar outcrop of coal and ])ituuiinous shale, the latter containing the same fossils as Bassett's. South ot Liberty and west of Kingston, coal outcrops at various localities on the head waters of McDonald's creek; and before the construction of the C, B. & Q. Railroad the beds were worked quite extensively, and the coal hauled on wagons to supply the Quincy market. Since the construction of the railroad, however, coal can be more cheaply obtained from the mines in McDonough county, and those formerly worked in this part of the county have been generally abandoned. There is, however, a little coal still dug in this vicinity to supply the demands of the immediate neighborhood. An analysis of Bassett's coal, reported in Dr. Norwood's "Analysis of Illinois Coals," made by Henry Pratten, gave the following results:

The coal measures in the south part of this count}', as in Pike, are quite irregular in their development, and seem to assume the character ot outliers from the main coal Beld. North of Columbus the three lower seams are found in their regular order, although not all equally constant in their development. Coal No. 2, or the Colchester seam, is by far the most constant, and will probably be found underlying nearly all the townships 1 and 2 north, in ranges 5 and 6 west, in this county; and may be reached by shafts, at a depth varying from seventy-five to one hundred and fifty feet, according to the thickness of the Quaternary beds at the difierent points.

At Camp Point, No. 2 was found at the depth of ninetj'' feet, and at Coatsburg at one hundred and twenty-nine feet. Its general thickness is from two to two and a half feet, being tJie same here as in McDonough county. The quality of the coal is good, but the seam seldom has a good roof, and consequently requires considerable expenditure for cribbing where the mines are to be worked permaTiently. South of Columbus there is no development of coal in the county that would justify the expectation of its ever becoming a valuable mining region, though considerable coal may be found in the vicinity of Liberty and Kingston, extending south to the

Pike county line, perhaps sufficient for the local supply of that part of the county for some years to come. Mill creek, on the western borders of this region, and McGJ-ee's on the east, show continuous exposures throughout their whole course, of the lower carboniferous limestones that lie entirely below the coal measures, and clearly defined horizon, below which no workable coal seam has ever been found. These limestones may be reached anywhere over tlie coal field in this county at a depth of one to two hundred feet, and when reached a further search for coal, by going deeper, will only result in failure. In the northern part of the county the coal measures rest upon the St. Louis limestone, and hence the outcrop of this rock is a valuable guide in determining the boundary of the coal area; but in the southeastern part of the county this limestone is not found, and the coal measures rest upon a lower division of the lower carboniferous series, as they also do in Pike county; this has resulted from the erosion of the limestone strata before the coal epoch, by which the upper beds have been wholly or partially removed, allowing the coal measures to rest unconformably upon the lower divisions of the series. But whenever any division of this limestone series is reached in searching for coal it is entirely useless to extend the search below that horizon.

St. Louis Limestone. - This division of the lower carboniferous series, as has ah-eady been remarked, usually forms the sub-stratum on wliich the coal measures rest, and will be found outcropping immediately below the sandstone which forms the base of the coal measures, in the northwestern as well as the southwestern portion of the county. The upper division of this formation of this division is usually a light-gray concretionary or brecciated limestone, from five to twenty feet in thickness, below which there is usually bedded brown or browmish-gray raagnesian limestone from ten to twenty feet thick, which locally becomes shaly and passes into a calcareous or argillaceous shale. The concretionary limestone sometimes contains irregular seams of green shale, or marly clay, disseminated through it, and at some points, as at Butt's mill on McGee's creek, is entirely replaced by green shales. At this point there is about thirty feet in thickness of this group exposed, consisting of regularly bedded limestones at the base, passing upward into green and bluish colored shales which are overlaid by ferruginous sandstone, the latter representing the base of the coal measures on Waters' Branch. A half mile south of this mill there is a fine exposure of the regularly bedded limestone of this group, about ten feet thick, forming a perpendicular wall along the banks of the creek. There is a bed of earthy gray limestone about four feet thick intercolated in it at this point that appears like a hydraulic rock. The concretionary member of this group outcrops on the upper corner of McGee's creek, three miles southeast of Columbus, and with the regularly bedded limestones below continues along the blufis of this creek through its whole course in this county. In the vicinity of Hughes' Ford, on sec- tion 27, township 2 south, range 5 west, the brown niagnesian limestone of this series is well exposed, the bed ranging from ten to fifteen feet in thickness. It is about thirty feet above the bed of the creek and overlies the geodiferous shales of the Keokuk group, which extend below the creek level. In the Coatsburg coal shaft this limestone was reached at a depth of about one hundred and forty-seven feet, and the shaft was carried on through it and into the geodiferous shales of the Keokuk group, where it terminated at a depth of about two hundred feet. On the Walnut Fork of Mill creek, about four miles, a little south of west from Columbus, this limestone is exposed on the southeast quarter of section 21, township 1 south, range 7 west, and as it is only about seven miles to its outcrop on McGee's creek, east of that town, it is probable that it constitutes the bedrock entirely across the divide between these points, and separates the coal south of Columbus from that in the north part of the county. In the vicinity of Mendon this limestone was met with at several points, and is overlaid with the coarse quartzose sandstone of the coal measures; here the upper part of it is a light-gray, more or less concretionary rock, from ten to twelve feet in thickness, below which we find the brown magnesian limestone and the shaly beds which form the lower division of the group. This limestone is also found well exposed on the tributaries of Bear creek, in township 2 north, range 8 west, and on the main creek, on its upper course for some distance further east, where it passes beneath the coal measures, and the latter becomes the bedrock over all the northeastern portion of the county.

This limestone may be readily distinguished from any of the lower divisions of the lower carboniferous series, either by its lithological character, or the fossils which it contains. The light gray concretionary limestone is characterized by two species of fossil corals, one or both of which may be found at nearly every locality where the rock is exposed, and are often met with in fine specimens weathered out of the limestone, and lying in detached masses in the debris along the streams. They are generally silicious, and where they have not been rolled and water-worn after being detached from the rock, they retain perfectly their original form, and are frequently of a reddish-pink color from the silicious matter which has replaced the carbonate of lime in the original coral. These corals belong to the genus Litliostrotion^ and are known as the L. canadense and L. and the former species, which usually occur in massive forms, is popularly known as "petrified honey comb," from the polygonal form of the numerous calyces of which it is composed. In the magnesian and shaly bed of this group, fossils are usually quite abundant, and among the most striking forms we may mention the screw shaped fossil known as the Archimedes, the axis of a peculiar form of Bryozoa. The largest form of this interesting genus, the A. Wortheni of Hall, is found abundantly through the shaly beds of this group, and some of the largest specimens attain to a foot or more in length. Various other forms of Bryozoa also abound in this rock, and at some localities the raagnesian beds of this group appear to be in good part composed of the delicate reticulated remains of this class of organic ibrms. Marine shells are also abundant in the same beds, among which are: Sjnfifer lateralis, 8. suh-aequalis, Mhynchonella mutata, R. suhcuneata, Retzia Verneuiliana, Orthis duhia, Terebratula hastata, Platyceras atictirostris and Proihictus Altonensis. A knowledge of these species will enable the observer to identify this formation wherever it may appear, as some of them have a wide geographical range, especially the Lithostrotion canadense, which is known to range from Illinois to Alabama, and on a recent visit to Utah, we found it imbedded in the highly metaphoric limestones of the Wahsatch mountains, within twenty miles of Salt Lake City. Hence, we may understand the great value of fossils to the geological observer, as they enable him to establish the identity of strata at widely separated points, where the lithological character of the beds are completely changed, and where it would be impossible to trace the continuity of the strata.

The upper one consists of bluish-gray or grayish-brown calcareo-argillaceous shales, and shaly limestones, enclosing silicious geodes of various sizes, some of them a foot or more in diameter, a part of which are solid spheres of crystalline quartz, covered externally with a thin coating of chalcedony, while others are hollow and have their inner surfaces covered with beautiful crystals, of quartz, calcite, or dolomite, or with the mammillory form of chalcedony. Crystals of arragonite, iron pyrites and zinc blende are also occasionally found in these silicious geodes, and the finest cabinet specimens of the crystalized minerals above mentioned, to be found in this State, are obtained from thi^ bed. The shales and shaly limestones in which the geodes, where originally imbedded, yield readily to the influence of frost and moisture, and the silicious geodes, are readily weathered out, and may be found in great numbers in the beds of the small streams by which this formation is intersected. The Coatsburg coal shaft terminated in this bed, at a depth of about two hundred feet below the surface, and we obtained several finely-crystalized geodes here in 1860, from the material that had been thrown out of this shaft. This division of the group is about forty feet in thickness, and is well exposed on McGee's creek and some of its tributaries, and also on Bear creek, and some of the smaller streams in the western part of the county. Locally, this portion of the gronp becomes quite calcareous, and the beds are then filled with the same species of fossil-shells and corals that characterize the lower division. Another species of Archimedes, much smaller than that found in the St. Louis group, called the A. Owenana occurs both in the upper and lower

The lower division of the Keokuk group consists mainly of bluishgraj limestones, in quite regular beds, varying from six inches to two feet in thickness, separated by intercalations of buff or blue shale, or marly clay. Toward the base, it is very thin-bedded and clierty, the flinty material predominating over the calcareous. These beds are well exposed in the upper part of the quarries at Quiucy, especially in the northern part of the city, where extensive quarries have been opened in these cherty beds, and also on the small creek at Whipple's Mill, where they gradually pass upward into the more regularly bedded limestone above. At Col. Jamison's place, two miles northeast of Qnincy, the regularly bedded limestone of this group, the equivalents of the beds quarried at Nauvoo and Keokuk are exposed, and higher up on the creek above mentioned and a mile and a half further east, the quarries were opened in this limestone to furnish the foundation limestone for Gov. Wood's mansion. These quarries furnish an evenly bedded bluish-gray semi-cr3'stalline limestone, in beds from six to twenty inches thick, and furnished large slabs of dimension stone from the facility from which the rocks could be split in the desired form. The quarry rock at this point is directly overlaid by the brown shales of the geode bed.

From Quincy to the north line of the county this limestone outcrops at various points along the bluffs, and is well exposed on Bear creek, near the Lima and Quincy road, where it forms a mural cliff from forty to fifty feet in height. It is also found on all the small, streams in the western part of the county, as far south as Mill creek, and on both forks of that stream, though not on the main creek. The regularly bedded limestones of this group are mainly composed of organic matter, and are formed from the calcareous portions of the molluscs, crinoids, and corals, which existed in such countless numbers in the carboniferous ocean during this period of the earth's history, as to furnish the greater part of the material required to form entire groups of limestone strata. All these animals secrete the carbonate of lime to form the habitations in which they live and the solid integuments of their various parts, and these calcareous fragments, cemented together by the chemical precipitation of the mineral matters held in solution by the waters of the ocean, now constitute many of the limestones and marbles out of which our cities aj'e built, and which enter so largely, in various forms, into the economic use of human life. The alternations of limestone with seams of clay or shale indicate the changing conditions that prevailed in the ocean at this time, as these clay seams were formed by the muddy sediments that at various times were introduced by the currents, or other causes, into the ocean, which, settling to the bottom, formed the shaly, sedimentary strata b}' which the limestones were separated. The characteristic fossils of this group occur almost everywhere that the rock is exposed. In the debris of the old quarries, northeast of Quiiicy, we found Archimedes^ Owenana^ Agaricocrbius Arnericanus, ActinoGrlnus jpernodosus^ A. hiturbinatus, Splrifer Keokuk, Prodtictus punctatus, and Zaphrentis dalii. In the quarries at Quincy are obtained Aviculopecten atnpUis, Spirifer striatus and Productus semireticulatus from the cherty beds at the base of the group.

Burlington Limestone. - This formation diflers but little in its lithological characters from the lower portion of the Keokuk limestone, but is usually of a lighter gray color; and contains intercalated beds of buff or brown limestone, while the bands of the argillaceous shale, which separate the beds in the Keokuk group, are not seen in this. There is, however, one band of green clay, or clay shale, from one to six inches in thickness, intercalated in the beds at Quincy, about midway from the bottom to the top, at the exposure at the lower end of the city, where the beds are well exposed. At the quarries, in the upper layer of the limestone, opposite the steamboat landing, the cherty beds belonging to the Keokuk group are quarried, but in the lower part of the city the underlying limestones are well exposed, and are extensively quarried to supply the demand for building stone and for burning into lime. The rock is tolerably even bedded, and aifords some layers two feet or more in thickness, which, when free from chert, may be cut with facility, and forms an excellent building stone. The following is a section of the rocks exposed in the bluffs, in the lower part of the city of Quincy:

The lower forty-eight feet of this section belongs to the Burlington limestone, and furnishes most of the building stone and limestone for the manufacture of quick-lime, to supply the city and adjacent country. The light gray limestones are nearly pure carbonate of lime in their composition, and often contain pockets lined witli beautiful crystals of calcite. The buff and brown layers contain carbonate of magnesia and iron in small quantities, and some of the lower beds of this formation are highly magnesian, and approach a true dolomite in their composition. On Mill creek, at the old mill, six miles southeast of Quincy, there is about forty feet of this limestone exposed, the lower part of which consists of alternating beds of light gray and brown limestone, all of which are probably more or less magnesian in their composition, and afford an excellent building stone, comparatively free from chert and sufficiently massive to furnish dimension stone of any desired size. From this point to the south line of the county, this limestone forms continuous outcrops along the river bluffs, the exposures ranging from twenty-live to fifty feet, or more, in thickness. This limestone outcrops only over a limited area in the southwest part of the county, and a line drawn from the citj of Quincv to the soutlieast corner of township 3 south, range 7 west, would represent, very nearly, its eastern boundary, while its western would be determined by the river bluft's.

The quarries at Qnincy liave afforded a good many iine examples of the fossils peculiar to this group, among which the following are the most common sj^ecies:

Spirlferplenns.S. Grh/iesi, Athyrls lamellosa^A.iiicrassatus^ Chonetes Illinoisensis, Productus seniireticulatus, P. punctatus^ Metoptoma umhella, Platyeera.s Quincyensis, P. hiserkdis, Actlnocrhias Verneuiliarnus. A. oblatus, A. Bageri, A. Christyl, A. pyriformls, Granatocrlnus Norwoodi and G. nielo.

From the lower beds of this limestone, exposed in the river bluffs, between Mill creek and the south line of the county, we obtained Antinocrinus carlccu, a very rare species not yet found in any other locality of the State, A. luiiGormis. A. clariis^ A. dlscoideus, A. verrucosus, Strotocrlnus tunhrosus, Codoiiaster stelliformis, and Pentremites elongatus, with three s])ecies of Platycrlnus not yet determined. At Quincy we obtained a number of specimens of the remains of cartilaginous fishes, consisting of teeth and spines, and noticed one layer of limestone in the upper part of the quarries, that was well tilled with these fragmentary remains. The "first bed" of this division ot Lower Carboniferous series was first noticed at Quincy, and a fine series of teeth and s))ines were obtained from it as early as 1854. The fossil shells and crinoids above named were nearly all of them peculiar to this rock, and an acquaintance with them will enable the observer to distinguish this limestone from the Keokuk group, to wliich it is closely allied in its lithological characters, being largely composed, like that of the calcareous, of the marine animals that swarmed in countless numbers in the old carboniferous ocean, in which these limestones were formed.

Nearly all of the purely calcareous strata of this formation are made up of the remaiTis of marine animals, in which the Crinoidea or EncH- }iites, largely predominate, and hence it has been called the Crinoidal or Encrlnital limestone by some of the early observers. It contains a good deal of chert or flint, disseminated through it in seams and nodules, sometimes forming irregular layers between the limestone strata, but more frequently in detached nodular or ovoid masses, in the limestones. These chert bands and nodules furnished the flints so much used by the Indians in the manufacture of spears, arrow-heads and other rude instruments, and it was probably the most useful and valuable mineral known to them, anterior to their acquaintance with the white man.

Kinderhook Group. - Immediatel}' beneath the Burlington Limestone, we find a series of sedimentary strata, consisting of sandy and argillaceous shales, and thin beds of impure limestone, only a portion of which appear above the surface in this county, to which the name Kinderhook Group has been applied, from their line exposure near the village of Kinderhook, in Pike county. The first considerable exposure met with in this county was at Fall creek, twelve miles below Quincy, where there is about thirty feet of this group to be seen in the creek bluffs, beneath the Burlington limestone. The section here is as follows:

This foi niation is altogether about a hundred feet in thickness, and frequently has a bed of black or ciiocolate-colored shale intercalated in the lower portion, which has lead many to believe that coal might be found in it.

This black shale was reached in the boring, made just below the city 01 Quincy, in search of coal, at a depth of about one hundred and fifty feet, but does not come to the surface anywhere in this county. As it lies nearly four hundred feet below any coal seam known in this county, all the time and money spent in the search of coal in this formation, can only result in pecuniary loss and disappointment.

This group is exceedingly variable in its lithological characters, and at some localities it becomes quite calcareous, and consists mainly of calcareous shales and magnesian limestones.

The bed silicious, near the base of the above section, may represent the light blue or dove-colored limestone, called, in the Missouri Report, "Lithographic Limestone," but at this locality it appears more like a stratified flint than anything else. Fossils are quite abundant in the silicious grit stones at Kinderhook and several points in Pike county, but none were found at the exposures on Fall creek. The outcrop of this formation, in Adams county, is restricted to the vicinity of the river bluffs, from this creek to the south line of the county.

Economical Geology

Bituminous Coal. - About one-half of the entire area of Adams county is underlaid with coal measures, embracing the central and eastern portions of the county, and the strata developed here include the three lower coal seams, and tlie beds usually associated with them, but the coal seams, except the middle one, are very irregular in their development, and therefore become of little value for the production of coal. The middle seam, or No. 2, the equivalent of the Colchester coal in McDonough county, is generally quite regular in its development, and will be found underlying most of the region north and east of Columbus. Its average thickness is a little over two feet, though it frequently attains to thirty inches, and sometimes to three feet. The coal it affords is of fair quality, and in some respects above the average of our western coals. The analysis of Basset's coal will serve to indicate the quality of the coal obtained from the southern part ot the county, and may be compared with the following analysis of Higby's, two miles north of Mendon, which I believe to be an outlier of Coal No. 1. This analysis was made bv the late Henry Pratten, and is given in "Norwood's Analysis of Illinois Coals:"

The coals from Nos. 1 and 3 are usually inferior in quality than that obtained from No. 2, and the two former are not likely to be found suthcently persistent in their development in this count}' to be of any great economical value for the production of fossil fuel. Over all the northeastern portion of the county No. 2 Jias been found wherever the measures have been penetrated to the proper depth, or where the right horizon has been exposed by natural causes.

The principal drawback to the successful mining of this seam is the shaly character of the roof, which is usually a blue clay shale, though it has been seen at a few localities where it was overlaid by a bituminous shale, which forms a good roof. This coal seam will aiford, according to the usual mining estimates, about two million tons of coal to each square mile of surface which it underlies, and although at the present time there is but little demand for coal except along the railroad lines, yet the time is not very remote when a good coal two feet or more in thickness will be considered of sufficient value and importance to be opened wherever it can be reached at a depth not exceeding one hundred to one hundred and lifty feet below the surface.

Building Stone. - All the principal limestone groups of this county furnish more or less building stone of good quality, and there are but few points in the western part of the county where some of them are not easily accessible in the bluffs or valleys of the streams. The Burlington limestone, which is extensively quarried at Quincy, is one of the most important and valuable deposits of building stone, in the county, and as its aggregate thickness is about one hundred teet, nearly all of which may be used as building stone, the supply from this formation stone might be fairly considered as inexhaustable. It is for the most part a light gray or nearly white semi-crystalline limestone, which cuts easily when free from chert, and is an excellent stone for dry walls as well as for caps and sills, and all the ordinary purposes for which cut stone is required. The buff and brown layers contain a small per cent, of iron and magnesia, and the surface becomes more or less stained by long exposure, but the light gray beds are nearly pure carbonate of lime in tlieir composition, and generally retain their original color. The brown magne§ian limestone of the St. Louis group is an evenly stratified rock admirably adapted to common use in foundation walls and especially for bridge abutments and culverts, where a rock is required to withstand the combined actions ot frost and moisture.

This rock may be found in the bluifs of McGee's creek, through nearly its whole course in this county, and also on Bear creek and its tributaries in the northwest part of the county. The bed is variable in thickness, ranging from five to twenty feet, and it often affords massive strata from two to three feet thick. In the vicinity of Ferguson's coal bank, four miles northwest of Camp Point, there is an outcrop of brown sandstone overlying Coal No. 3, which seems to stand exposure well, as it forms a mural cliff nearly twenty feet high along the creek for some distance, and would probably make a durable building stone. There are but few counties in this State where good building stone is so abundant and easily accessible to all parts of the country as here.

Limestone for Lime. - Most of the limestone used in the manufacture of quick-lime is obtained from the Burlington limestone in the vicinity of Quincy, and a large amount of this is produced annually for the supply of the city and the adjacent country. The light gray beds of the Burlington, and bluish-gray strata of the Keokuk group, are each of them sufficiently free from silicious or other foreign material, when carefully selected, to produce a quick-lime of excellent quality. The upper, or concretionary bed, of the St. Louis group is also, in many localities, a very pure carbonate of lime, and may be found useful for this purpose; in the eastern portion of the county where the underlying formations are not accessible, its outcrop is mainly around the borders of the coal formation, immediately below the sandstone conglomerate which usually forms the base of the coal series.

Fire and Potter's Clays. - The under clays of coal seams JSTos. 1 and 2 are usually of good quality, and where the strata are of suflicient thickness they become valuable deposits of fire clay, and may be successfully worked in connection with the coal seams. At some points there is a bed of fine light blue clay shale intervening between these two coal seams, which, on exposure, weathers to fine plastic clay, and forms an excellent potter's clay. This is the bed from which the clay used in the potteries at Ripley, in Brown county, have been obtained. This bed of clay shale is exposed at various points in this county, and will furnish an abundant supply of potter's clay, while the under clay of No. 2 may be used for the manufacture of fire brick.

Clay and Sand for BrlcJc. - T\\e subsoil clays intermingled with the fine sand of the Loess form an excellent material for the manufacture of common brick, and may be obtained almost anywhere in the western part of the county, and there are but few points in tlie State that have produced as good an article of common brick as have been manufactured for many years in the vicinity of Quincy. In the eastern part of tlie county where the Loess is wanting the sand ^or this purpose may be readily obtained in the alluvial valleys of the small streams. These materials are so uni versally abundant that almost every farmer in the county may find them at hand upon his own premises for the manufacture of all brick required for building purposes.

Soil and Timber. - As an agricultural region this county is not surpassed by any portion of the State, of the same geographical area. The western portion of the county, including a belt of country from five to ten miles in width adjacent to the river bluffs, and extending through its entire length from north to south, is underlaid by marly sands and clays of Loess, and possesses a soil of remarkable fertility, with an undulating surface which furnishes a free drainage, so that with a rather porous subsoil it is less subject to the deleterious influences of remarkably dry or wet seasons than the other upland soils of the county. The growth of timber on this variety of soil consists principally of red, white, and black oak, pignut and shell-bark hickory, elm, black and white walnut, sugar maple, linden, wild cherry and honey locust. These lands are admirably adapted to the growth of fruit, and this portion of Adams county has been long and favorably known as one of the finest fruit regions in this portion of the State.

On the breaks of McGee's creek and its tributaries the surface is considerably broken, and the soil, which is mainly derived from the drift clays, is a stiff clay loam, better adapted to the growth of wheat and grass than almost any other crop usually grown in this latitude. The growtli of timber on this kind of soil consists mainly of two or tliree varieties of oak and hickory, which is the characteristic growth of the '' oak ridges," that are so frequently met with in the small streams in this and other portions of the State. In the northeastern portion of the county there is a considerable area of comparatively level prairie, covered with a deep black soil, highly charged with vegetable matter derived from the annual growth and decay of the shrubs and grasses which clothe its surface. This black prairie soil is predicated upon a fine silicious brown clay subsoil, which does not permit the surface water to pass freely through it, and hence these lands suffer greatly from a surplus of water during a wet season. They are very productive, however, when the season is favorable, and produce abundant crops of all the cereals usually grown in this latitude. A judicious system of drainage would add greatly to the productive capacities of this soil. The alluvial bottom lands bordering the Mississippi are generally similar in their character to those in Pike county, and are heavily timbered with the same varieties. Where these bottom lands are elevated above the annual overflow of the river they are exceedingly productive, and rank among the most valuable farming lands in the county.

French Missionaries - Discovery of the Mississippi - History Prior to State Organization - First White Settlement of County - Organization OF THE County - Origin of j^ames of County and County Seat - First Electon - Court Seals - Entry of County Seat Land - QuiNCY Platted - First Sale of Town Lots - First Marriage.

In the year 1632, seven years after Quebec was founded by the French, the missionaries had penetrated as far as West Lake Huron. The Wyandots and Iroquois Indians were at that time engaged in a war of extermination, and the priests, following their converts through good and evil fortunes, and tenaciously adhering to the altars which they had reared by perilous exertion in the wilderness, shared all the privations and dangers which usually attend these savage feuds.

In their intercourse with the Indians on the shores of the northern lakes, the French became informed of the existence of a river flowing to the south, and desired to ascertain its character. Father Marquette, a priest, and Joliet, an inhabitant of Quebec, were employed to prosecute this work of discovery; and having ascended the Fox river crossed the portage, and descending the Ouisconsin (now Wisconsin), entered the Mississippi on the 17th of June, 1673. They pursued the course of that mighty stream to its confluence with the Arkansas, and on their return ascended the Illinois and re-entered Lake Michigan at Chicago. Meeting with some of the natives, LaSalle remarks: "We asked them what nation they were of; they answered they were Islinois, of a canton called Cascaiquia." This account settles the question as to the origin of the name of this countr}', which some have supposed to be of French origin, and to be derived from the words Isle aux nois, but which undoubtedly is aboriginal, although the orthography may be Gallic. The tribe alluded to were the Illini.

History Prior To State Organization

In 1712 Louis XIV., by letters patent, granted to Anthony Crozat, counsellor of state, etc., and his heirs in perpetuity, all the mines within the tract of country then called Louisiana, and described in these words: "Bounded by New Mexico on the west, and by the lands of the English of Carolina on the east, including all the ports, havens, rivers, and principally the port and haven of the isles of Dauphin, heretofore called Massacre; the river of St. Louis, heretofore called Mississippi, from the edge of the sea as far as the Illinois, together with the river St. Philip, heretofore called Ouabache [now Ohio], with all the countries, territories, lakes within land, and rivers which fall directly or indirectly into that part of the river of St. Louis."

In 1717, M. Crozat relinquished his grant, and in the same year letters patent were granted to an association of individuals at Paris under the style of the " Company of the West," by which they were invested with the same rights and privileges which had been given to Crozat, together with others far more extensive. The territory was granted to them in allodium, in lordship and in justice, the crown reserving no other rights than those of fealty and homage.

In 1718, the Company of the West formed an establishment in Illinois, at Fort Chartres, and this part of the country being reported as remarkably fertile, received a great accession of population.

In 1719, by an edict of the king, the Company of the West was united to the East India and Chinese Company, under the title of "La Corapagnie Royale des Indes." Finally, in 1731, the whole territory was reconveyed to the crown of France, the object of the company having totally failed.

In 1762, France, by a secret treaty, ceded Louisiana to Spain, to prevent its falling into the hands of the English. The next year the treaty of Paris, signed at Fontainbleau, gave the country in question to England. In 1779 it was captured from the English by Col. Geo. llogers Clark, and finally, four years later, by the treaty of peace between the United States and England, that part of the countrj^ which embraced Illinois was acknowledged to be a portion of the United States, and in 1784 Virginia ceded the northwest territory to the general government, to be cut into states. In the year 1809 - Feb. 3d - Illinois was erected as a territory, with the capital at Kaskaskia, near the mouth of Kahokia creek. Thus it will be seen that about two hundred and six years ago, Marquette, the first white explorer of the upper Mississippi, floated down the father of waters, passing along the borders of Adams county, and, it may have been, that he made a brief halt at, or near, where the beautiful city of Quincy now stands. To strengthen that belief, he has mentioned in his journal of that voyage the blufi^'s upon the eastern bank of the river, and also made a rude sketch of the same.

poses Adams county was completely hidden from the civilized world, neither legend or record throwing any light npon the subject. It is said that one Bauvet, a French trader, located on the bluffs of Quincy, bat was soon afterwards killed by the Indians. A legend comes down from the same shadowy source that there was an Indian village located on the bluffs of Quincy, but from the most authentic sources of information to be obtained such was not the case ; but, however, there was an Indian village near Bear creek, in the northwest part of the county, as evidences still remain of a permanent occupation by the noble red man of the Sauk tribe.

In 1813, Gen. Howard, with two regiments of mounted rangers from Illinois and Missouri, on an expedition to the north part of the territory, passed this point, and found the remnants of some rough stone chimneys and a few wigwam poles along the shore near the bluffs.

The legendary stories of the existence of this savage village of the Sauk tribe, which flourished here in the olden time, relate that its uncivilized inhabitants on hearing of the approach of Gen. Howard and his two regiments of mounted rangers, fled from their homes, and left the village to the tender care and mercies of the pale faces. Gen. Howard's rangers, upon their arrival at the place, burned the village and passed on.

For a period of about six years the future county of Adams appears to have retired from the public gaze, as neither legend, romance or record reveals to us anything which may have taken place.

Williard Keyes, one of the pioneers of Adams county, says, in his lecture before the New England Society: " We floated past the model city (Quincy) on the 10th of May, 1819, unconscious of our future destiny in its eventful history."

In the summer of 1820 Asa Tyrer, searching for his land, (which he afterwards settled upon, just southeast of the city, being at the river side when the " "Western Engineer," the first steamboat that ever stopped at Quincy, came in sight, took passage for some point down the river. In February, 1821, John Wood came, at the solicitation of a man named Flynn, to find his laud, and was successful, it having been located on the very spot where Gov. Wood's orchard is now growing. Flynn was dissatisfied with the location, while, on the contrary. Wood was enraptured with the locality, and upon his return to his home in the East, so impressed Keyes, who was his partner, with the beauties of the section that Keyes came to Quincy, and encamped near the foot of Yermont street, spending some time tracing lines and exploring the country.

There were several other persons who had moved into this section since 1820. Of these, Justus I. Perigo was here in 1820, and it may safely be said that he was the first actual settler in Adams county. He resided on what is how the eastern portion of Fall Creek township. Daniel Lisle

In December, 1822, John Wood, in company with a man by the name ot Longley, erected the first cabin in Qnincy. It stood on the east side of Front street, south of Delaware. It was a queer mansion, compared with the palatial one which he afterwards erected at the corner of State and 12th streets, in Quincy. The dimensions were 18x20, and it was decidedly an economical affair. Not a nail was used in its construction, it ])eing fastened together by wooden pegs.

In the spring of 1823 Jeremiah Rose moved from Pike county with his wife and cliild, and took up his abode with Wood, he being a joint owner in the mansion heretofore described, Mrs. Rose being the first white woman who settled in Adams county, and her daughter, afterwards Mrs. Geo. W. Brown, the first white child resident.

The immigration to the county in the next few years following was not very rapid, most of those who came settling in the Bear creek and Rock creek sections, and some few in and near Quincy. The Beebes, Holcombs and Thomases on Fall creek, Campbells, Grosony and Worleys about Rock creek, during the year 1823. Asa Tyrer came to Quincy with his family in 1824, and erected the blacksmith shop. More than one-half tlie land comprising the military tract was land granted to the soldiers of 1812, and was not subject to entry, and as none could be purchased except what was known as the bounty lands, the settlement was much retarded on that account.

In the year of 1824 Williard Keyes returned to Quincy and erected his cabin near what is now Vermont and Front streets. Jno. Droullard came about the same time and erected his cabin near the corner of 7th and Hampshire streets, in Quincy.

As part of the Northwest Territorj-, in 1T90 all of Illinois south ot what is now Peoria was made the county of St. Clair, with Cahokia as the county seat. In 1812 the northern portion of St. Clair county, above St. Louis, was created Madison count}-, with Edwardsville as the county seat, tlie county extending to the Wisconsin line. Illinois was admitted into the Union as a State, April 18, 1818. On the 31st of January, 1821, all of Madison county between the Illinois and Mississippi rivers was detached and made Pike county, with Coles Grove, now Giliad, in Calhoun county* as the county seat.

County Organization

A petition will be presented to the General Assembly of the State of Illinois, at its next session, prajing for the establishment ol a new county, to be formed from the county of Pike and the parts attached, the southern boundary of which shall be between towns three and four, south of the base line. [Signed]

The notice having been published twelve times, as required bj the lawthen in force relating to the formation of new counties, the General Assembly was not slow in considering the matter presented in the petition of Mr, Wood, and at the following session passed a bill which was approved on the 18th day of January, 1825, of which the following is a copy.

The county of Adams was formed out of the counties of Pike and Fulton and the attached parts, by an act of the Legislature, approved January 13th, 1825. Act:

Be it enacted, \\\&l all that tract of country within the following boundaries, to-wit : beginnihg at the place where the township line between townships three south and four south touches the Mississippi river, thence east on said line to the range line between ranges four and five west, thence north on said range line to the northeast corner of township two north, range five west, thence west on said township line to the Mississippi river, and thence down said river to the place of beginning, shall constitute a countj'^, to be called the county of Adams.

The same act appoints Seymore Kellogg of Morgan county, Joel Wright of Montgomery county, and David Button of Pike county, to select a permanent seat of justice for the new count}', and directs them to meet at the house of Ebenezer Harkness, in said county, on the first Monday of the next April, or within seven days thereafter, and after taking the oath before a justice of the peace, to locate the seat of justice for the future accommodation and convenience of the people, shall proceed to fix the seat of justice, and when fixed it shall be the permanent seat of justice of said county; and the commissioners shall forthwith make out a copy of their proceedings and file them in the office of the recorder of Pike county; and the said commissioners shall receive the sum of two dollars per day for each day spent by them in the discharge of their duties, and for each day spent in going to or returning from the same, to be paid out of the first money paid into the treasury of said county of Adams after its organization.

On the 30th of April, 1825, Messrs. Kellogg and Button, two of the commissioners, came to the town site, as Quincy was then called, prepared to locate the county seat. They were determined to place it at the geographical center of the county, and procured Williard Keyes as a guide, who was known as a skillful land hunter. He however, from some cause not fully explained but which may be attributed to a little self-interest, led them into the bogs and quagmires of Mill creek, where they floundered around for a whole day, and were at night-fall compelled to return to the town site for shelter. The next morning the commissioners had changed their minds, and forming a procession composed of three-fourths of the male population of the place, they proceeded to the spot now known as Washington Square, and halting near the east park gate, drove their stake into the ground and officially announced that the northwest quarter of section 2, town 2, south range 9, west of 4tli principal meridian, was the county seat of Adams county, and placing their hands upon the stake named the place Quincy.

The name of the count}'' and county seat was suggested by the following incident: In November, 1824, on the day appointed to choose electors of President and Yice-President, the settlers living in and around that portion of the kingdom of Pike, now called Adams county, being of an enterprising turn determined to hold an election, and organizing an election precinct, appointing their judges and clerks, using an antiquated tea-pot for a ballotbox, they proceeded to open the polls. It was found upon counting the ballots that about twenty-live votes had been cast for the Jno. Quincy Adams' elector. There were some Missourians present, and they were by general consent permitted to vote. Thus it will be seen that ballot-box stuffing was of early origin even on the frontiers. The votes were received without protestor "electoral commission," and William Harrison, the Adams' elector, was chosen. It was thereupon suggested to the legislature that the name of the county be Adams. At the time the commissioners established the county seat, the late election was one of the principal topics of conversation, and Kellogg, one of the commissioners from Morgan county, was a strong Adams' man; he informed the persons present that the Morgan county people had called their county seat Jacksonville in honor of the defeated candidate. Some one in the crowd suggested " let us take another slice from the President's name and call our county seat Quincy, and in the struggle for position among the counties of the state, we will see who takes the lead Adams or Jackson."

At the time of the establishment of the county seat, there were present of the people composing Quincy, Williard Keyes, Jeremiah Rose, and John Drouilard; John Wood, the other one-fourth of the population, being absent on a business trip to St. Louis.

First Election

On the 2d of July, 1825, in pursuance of an order of the Judge of the Circuit Court, the first election for county oflicers was held at the cabin of Williard Keyes; about forty votes were cast, and Levi Wells, Peter Journey, and Williard Keyes were elected county commissioners.

Peter Journey, a Jerseyman by birth, resided at the lower end of the bluff some ten miles south of Quincy, in what is now Fall Creek township, Williard Keyes of Quincy living at what is now the foot of Yermont St., and Levi Wells residing near what is now the village of Payson.

The count}^ had at this time an estimated population of about seventy; the population now - 1879 - being estimated at 70,000. What a striking illustration of the progress made by our country, and results not even dreamed of by those sturdy pioneers who waited at its birth.

Court Seals

On Monday, July 4, 1825, the first county court of Adams county was duly organized in the cabin of Williard Keyes at Quincy. Messrs. Journey, Keyes and Wells, Commissioners, all being present. Earl Pierce was appointed a special constable for the court, and Henry H. Snow was appointed clerk, entering into a bond for the faithful performance of the duties thereof, having Earl Pierce and Levi Hudley as sureties upon his bond. Ira Pierce was deputed to take the census of the county. At the same time Joshua Streeter, John L. Soule, Lewis C. K. Hamilton and Amos Bancroft were recommended to the Governor and received their appointment as Justices of the Peace. The clerk was authorized to procure seals for the county and circuit courts, the seals to contain these words, viz: " Seal County Commissioners Court, Adams Co., 111., 1825." " Seal Circuit Court, Adams Co., 111., 1825." He was also authorized to procure the necessary stationery for use of the Court, using his own discretion as to quality and quantity. It is self-evident that those early people had faith in their public servants more than is now shown to the unfortunate wight who thirsts for political honor in the way of a county office. However, H. H. Snow is described as a remarkable man in his way, and was one of nature's noblemen. He had arrived in the county but a short time previous to the convening of the court, and having good clerical ability, was the man for the hour. He afterward held some four or five of the county offices at one and the same time.

The quarter section designated by the commissioners appointed by the Legislature as the county seat, not being subject to entry, the clerk was instructed at this term of the court to apply to the land office at Edwardsville for its pre-emption according to an act of Congress, granting to counties the right of pre-emption to one quarter section of public lands for a county seat. In that day as in this, it was no trouble to make the order, but it was decidedly more difficult to raise the money. It appears, as the following will show, that the county officials had personal credit. At least, the money was borrowed from one Russell Farnham, a river trader who agreed to loan the commissioners $200, taking the personal note of the commissioners for the payment of the same. The following is a true copy of the note:

For value received of Russell Farnham, vv^e, the undersigned, county commissioners oi said county, promise in the name of the aforesaid county, to pay him or his order the sum of two hundred dollars on or before the fifteenth day of May next, with interest at the rate of ten percent, per annum, from the seventeenth day of August last till paid. Dated at Quincy, this sixth of September, 1825. '

Paid Mr. Farnham, seventy-four dollars and fifty-nine cents, being balance of interest due on this note, which amount is in full for principal and interest due him on the within note (without date). Robert Tillson.

It appears from the above note that the money was obtained August 17, 1825, and the note given for it September 6th following; it has been said that Gov. Wood made the ari-angeraent for the money in the first place, thereby securing the land, and a conveyance was made by the United States to the county of Adams and its successors on the 13th of February, 1832.

Quincy Platted

In November, 1825, the County Commissioners' Court ordered that the land purchased from the government be laid off and platted as the town of Quincy. Henry H. Snow was appointed to perform the work and to receive as compensation one dollar per day while so engaged, and he was authorized to employ assistants at the rate of seventy-five cents per day. The commissioners set apart block 12 for a public square, and the west half of block 11 was appropriated for the public buildings.

On Monday, September 5, 1825, the Commissioners' Court ordered that the persons then living in township three, south range eight, west of the fourth principal meridian, be organized into a school district, to be called District No. 1. Thus, at that early date, do we see the people moving in the commendable work of education, and to-day, from that feeble little band of struggling, heroic pioneers, has grown into existence some of the finest schools of which this or any other county can boast.

On the 13th of December, 1825, fifty-one lots, which had been advertised for sale in the Ed wards ville and St. Louis papers, were sold at public auction by the county commissioners, the most of them being purchased by the commissioners, sheriff and other citizens of the county, very few being sold to outside speculators. Feeling that it would be of interest to the readers of this work to see a list of the lots sold, with the prices the lots brought, we insert it. Many now who are familiar with the lots and the present value to which they have grown, will in looking over the list recall opportunities, without number, when a trifling investment, with the advantages of the past progress of the county, would have placed them in a position to which we all struggle to attain and few succeed - easy and affluent circumstances. It is related that one of the old citizens of the county recently, in commenting upon the opportunities presented in Quincy to acquire wealth by real estate investments, made the remark, " I remember when I could have purchased the whole of the lot on which the Quincy House now stands for a pair of boots." "Why," said the person whom he addressed, "did you not make the purchase? " " For a very good reason," he answered ; " it was a cash offer, and I hadn't the boots."

First Sale Op Town Lots In Quincy First Marriage

The first marriage ceremony that ever took place in the town of Quincy occurred during this year, being the marriage in June of Amos Bancroft to Miss Ames.