Kendall County, Illinois - Chapter 8: Our Earlier Pioneers, 1877

Chapter 8: Our Earlier Pioneers

to the Mississippi, and then up to St. Louis, where buying ponies, they followed the banks of the Illinois river to Ottawa, and up the Fox to Yorkville. Reining up their horses on the present Court House Hill, they gazed on the lovely stream below them, the wide, beautiful prairies beyond them, and the timber behind them. The green was dotted with flowers, the birds sang in the branches, and a group of deer stood gazing at the strangers from the edge of a hazel thicket some distance away. "Here," thought Mr. Adams, " is my home," and dismounting he drove his stake in the soil and took possession. Following up the river about two miles farther, they came to a creek, where Mr. Morgan halted and made his own claim. This done, they passed up to Chicago, sold their ponies, and returned home by way of the lakes.

George And Clark Hollenback Hollenback And Others Locate

Ham Harris and Ezra Ackley, were on the ground. They were from West Virginia, and had approached the frontier by short stages; first to Ohio, then to the Wabash, and lastly to Magnolia. The men came first on a prospecting tour, in the latter part of March. Traveling on foot, they crossed the Fox river at Ottawa, passed over the high prairies of the town of Mission to Vermet's, and from there struck out for the Big Woods, above where Aurora now stands. At Specie grove they were informed that the Big Woods country was very wet, so they did not go as far as they intended, but encamped at a place near Oswego.

In the morning, while the others prepared breakfast, Mr. Hollenback strolled off on a tour of observation, and in a few minutes found and drove a stake on his claim. But it had been decided that they should settle together, and when the others objected that there was not enough timber there for all of them, he relinquished his claim. Where now ? Mr. Hollenback remarked that he had noticed a large grove on their left as they came up, which, from its lying low, seemed to promise desirable shelter as well as timber ; so it was agreed that they should return to that. It was Hollenback 's grove, near Millbrook. They entered it on the east side, and it was at once settled that the ridge between the two creeks should be the dividing line, Ackley and Harris taking the north, and Hollenback the south. And that rido-e is a dividins; line still.

Then they brought up their families : Clark Hollenback, wife, daughter and three sons - young men ; George Hollenback, wife, daughter and three sons, who were boys ; William Harris, wife, three daughters and four sons ; Ezra Ackley, wife and two daughters ; Patrick Cunningham and wife ; and William Brooks, - a little colony of twenty-nine souls. Clark IloUenback settled in the Newark timber, living in Hobson's old cabin until he could build his own, on the hill below Mr.Needham's. Cunningham put his stake on the opposite side of the timber, where John Boyne now lives.

In a few days Hobson happened along, and was not particularly pleased at finding his old house inhabited ; but Mr. Hollenback satisfied him, and they j^arted good friends. But it was the common law of squatter days that when a man forsook his claim, it was the rightful property of whoever should, next claim it.

The others settled on their respective claims and at once erected three shanties, viz : enclosures of logs, covered with bark and split timber, to shelter their families while the houses were building. Mr. Hollenback's was on Hollenback's creek, near the present residence of W. A. Hollenback. Mr. Harris' was near the present site of a tenant house owned by Thos. Atherton, north of Ackley's creek, and Mr. Ackley's was near the ridge, midway between.

Arrived on the ground April 18, they immediately began to make clearings to plant corn, for they had rather plant among the stumps than risk the prairie sod. But Clark Hollenback broke, during the summer, fifty-five acres and fenced it in. It is now Albert Needham's farm.

George B. Holllenback First Frontier Store

shop, which he afterward sold to his father and Mr. Holderman. When the summer's work was done, he built a log store in the edge of the grove, and going to Peoria on horseback, he took the boat to St. Louis and purchased a stock of Indian goods to the amount of two hundred dollars. They were brought up the Illinois river, and thence overland. This was the beginning of a frontier store which became widely known, not only among the surrounding settlers, but even in the States. It was the beginning of the business of Newark, or Georgetown, as, for many years, it was called - after the founder. His wife was Mrs. Reynolds, whose daughter is Mrs. A. D. Newton, of Yorkville. It is perhaps needless to say that he sold but little of his goods for cash, but traded them to the Indians for muskrat skins.

Daniel Kellogg

was on the move. Leaving Ottawa, where he had been chosen the first Justice of the Peace in LaSalle county, he came to Holderman's, and crossing the narrow slough, bought oat Countryman, at what has ever since been known as Kellogg's grove. And the Indian family, packing their little property on ponies, bade farewell to their old wigwam, and filed out among the trees and over the prairie in search of another resting place. A few weeks after, on foot, with an ax and gun, crossed that slough, and weary with his journey, lodged with his friend and old neighbor, Mr. Kellogg. In the morning he set off pros- pecting, and after exploring all day through the towns of Big Grove and Fox, found himself at dusk at the infant settlement in Hollenback's grove. Mr. Hollenback's family had arrived that day, and had just established themselves in their new shanty. It aftbrded but little room, but what frontiersman was ever known to turn away the stranger ? Mr. Booth was entertained, and in the morning, when no pay would be taken, he volunteered to cut down a tree, and did so - thus giving the little settlement their first lift. Then retracing his steps of the previous day, he choose for the site of his cabin the splendid knoll on the north-east corner of Apakesha grove, now occupied by the fine residence of Lott Scofield. Looking out from among the tall white oaks that formed the border of the grove, his eye could take in the wide sweep of level prairie to Plattville, and around almost to Minooka. It would have been glorious to a poetic temperament, but Mr. Booth was a practical man, and proceeded at once to cut ^'a set of house logs." This done, he brought his family,* which consisted of his wife and the boy who, four years before, went through the snow from Beresford's to Hawley's, in search of a needle. He was a slim lad, not yet thirteen years of age, and had been bound to Mr. Booth about two years. The country hiid changed somewhat since his previous trip. Instead of two lonely families, out of sight of each other - the only inhabitants in eighty miles - there were five houses, and other little settlements near ; traders and travelers passing every few days, and Indians every day. Ansel Reed now owns a fine farm near Plattville, and has a sister - Mrs. Emeline March - at Bristol Station. She was five years old at the time of the journey through Kendall. Mr. Booth remained at Kellogg's a few weeks, and rented of him five acres of land, to plant corn and pumpkins. But dissatisfied with his claim, for some reason - perhaps remembering the northeast wind - he made another in the adjoining Big grove, where a mile of heavy timber would be between him and the north wind in any shape. There, about twenty rods in the grove, on the south side, he built his house. It was sixteen feet square, and Mr. Kellogg, his son Ezra, and his hired man - William Teal - helped raise it, Ansel Reed looking on. It still stands, as a part of the residence of J. W. Mason, Esq., and was not only the first house in Big Grove, but is, without doubt, the oldest existing building in Kendall county, and as such we may hope it will be long preserved and cherished as a memento of the days that are past, and that will come again no more.