Kendall County, Illinois - Chapter with an unread heading (no. 42 of those read), 1877

The Plano Harvesters

HE year 1859 opened prosperously, and was an especially favorable season for railroads. The '* Cliicao;o and Plainfield Railroad" was to run from Chicago to Ottawa, through Plainfield, Lisbon and Newark. A company was formed and a charter obtained. The part of the company in this county were John Moore, John Litsey, A. K. Wheeler, William Thurber and Benjamin Ricketson. If the road had been built, the circumstances of those old prairie towms would have been different. The long contemplated " Joliet and Terre Haute Railroad," having lain still five years, turned over and took a new name. The first division was called the " Joliet, Newark and Mendota Railroad," and was pushed vigorously forward. The farmers along the line took hold of it, and considerable grading was done. But the only visible results to-day are huge embankments and deep cuttings, which the farmers can neither pasture nor plow, and which, if their origin should pass into oblivion, would be classed by our descendants with the mysterious works of the Indian mound-builders. And good old Newark, instead of being the bustling junction of the Chicago and Plainfield Railroad and the Joliet, Newark and Mendota Railroad, is only Newark still. The latter road was to be the Eastern Division of the Illinois Grand Trunk Railway - and thus we were at once to be in the middle of the world. At a town meeting, held in October, Big Grove, by a vote of one hundred and eighty to ninety, voted to issue bonds for twenty thousand dollars in aid of the road - the interest to be payable when the line was graded through to Mendota. A thousand dollar bond, however, was issued, and one year's interest paid on it. In 1869 the town was sued for further payment, but with no result.

Another improvement made during the year was a bridge over the river, on the town line, at Post's mill. It stood nine years, and was carried away by a freshet in 1868. A part of the stone abutment on one end is all that is left.

July 17th, Shabbona, the hero of 1832, died on his twenty acre farm, near Seneca, aged eighty- four years. His wife, Wionex Oquawka Shabbona, followed him November 30th, 1864, aged eighty-six years, and was buried by his side in the Morris cemetery. A daughter and grand-daughter are also buried there - but as yet no monument marks the spot. Morris is an appropriate place for an Indian to be buried, as many of his race have been laid there. The cedar pole at the grave of the chief Nacquett still stands, or did a short time ago, and in 1845 no less than nineteen funeral mounds were visible.

Miss Haigh, Mr. Seeley and Mr. Smith were early teachers. In 1867, the old wooden building on the Bristol side of the line was superceded by the present brick structure. William Grimwood, and Emma and Amelia Spencer were the first teachers in it.

Plano Harvester Avorks

The originator of the idea of binding grain on the machine as it is cut, is Augustus Adams, of Sandwich, then of Elgin, who took the hint from Thomas Judd, of Sugar Grove, in 1850. The latter was testing a new McCormick reaper in the presence of Mr. Adams, when he exclaimed : " The day will come when men will not be so foolish as to throw their grain on the ground and then tear their hands in the stubble while getting it up again." It was a seed thought. Mr. Adams bore it away with him, and within two months produced the first harvester with a binder's platform. When the patent was applied for, it was rejected, and for much the same reason as Capt. Ericson's little Monitor, was despised - for its strangeness. But in 1852 it was patented by Sylla & Adams, and manufactured at Elgin. The elevator for bringing the grain to the binder was introduced by Watson and Rennick. The Adams patent, in 1859, was sold to Aultman & Co., Ohio. There was a great prejudice against the machines for years, for they were ahead of the times. But they have outlived all that, and of the many kinds that are now made, two, the Marsh and McEwen, come from this county, although only the former is manufactured here. Messrs. C. W. and W. W. Marsh commenced their harvester in 1857, and built various experimental machines up to 1860.

The Initial Harvester

During the following winter, John Hollister and W. W. Marsh built one at Piano, which varied in several points from the previous model, and on trial was found to work well. It was the initial harvester.

In the fall of 1863 their manufacture was begun at Piano, bj C. W. Marsh and George Steward, under the firm name of Steward & Marsh. Lewis Steward furnished the capital. They were made in the stone shop. The first building on the ground was Steward & Henning's warehouse, with an engine for elevating grain. In 1858 Lewis Steward built the stone shop, though it was not yet determined to what purpose it should be put. For its first use, with the help of a warehouse engine, it was turned into a sorghum mill, and a sash factory by Latham & Doty followed. For the harvest of 1864, fifty machines were begun and twenty-six finished. The remainder were finished for 1865. In the meantime, under a contract with another manufacturer at Beloit, sixty machines were made, with some additional improvements - all of which were experimental. The finish of the coming harvester had not yet been reached. In 1866, one hundred machines were made at Piano. W. W. Marsh came in and the firm name was changed to Marsh Brothers & Steward, and from that time the business went on steadily increasing. The pioneer difficulties incident to such great undertakings were nearly overcome, and the Marsh Harvester was an assured success. In 1867-8, six hundred were manufactured. At the latter date Lewis Steward was received into the firm as an open partner, and the name became Marsh, Steward & Co. In 1869, seven hundred and fifty were manufac- tured ; in 1870, one thousand ; in 1871, fourteen hundred, and the same the year following : in 1873, twentyseven hundred and fifty; and in 1874, five thousand ; while during 1875-6, there were put out from the Piano shops, ten thousand harvesters. Gammon k Deering, of Chicago, are the present proprietors (since Oct. 1875), and they are making also the Sprague mower, the J. II. Gordon binder, and other implements, and do a business of one million dollars annually.

The Marsh brothers have a manufactory of their own at Sycamore, where also their harvesters are extensively made, but the credit must ever remain with Kendall county of giving to the world the best harvester ever invented - one with which three men can do the same work it formerly required eight men to do. The old fashioned harvest time has lost its magnitude, and takes its place in the year with other ordinary employments.

In 1860, also. Nelson Messenger, of Newark, brought out his " Gopher," or corn cultivator, which has had such a run since, and is now manufactured by Edward Budd at the Millbrook factory. Parley Freeland had invented a previous gopher, in 1858, and the peculiar name appears to have been given to it then.

Two murders during the year disgrace our county annals ; one the result of a saloon brawl and the other of business hate. Stephen Jennings and a Norwegian, having had a previous quarrel, renewed it in a saloon in Newark, kept by Isaac Harris, and Jennings was killed. The murderer was acquitted on the plea of having acted in self-defense. W. Boyd was a money broker in Bristol, and was shot dead in his office one stormy night, prob- ablv by some one who thus took revenge for some business difficulty. No clue to the murderer was ever found, and he will probably have his first trial at the bar of God.

The Bristol Station school house was built, and Gilbert Lester w^as the first teacher ; then Mr. Alford, Mr. Boomhaur, C. Smith and A. D. Curran.

Yorkville Church

was built, Michael Lewis being the preacher in charge. A class had been organized two years before, and held its meetings in the school house. The succeeding pastors have been : Melvin Smith, Mr, Taplin, A. D. Field, Mr. Lee, J. B. McGuffin, John Ellis, Mr. Freeman, Mr. Cone, T. H. Hazeltine and Mr. Brookins.

In 1860, Fairview M. E. Church was built near Holderman's grove, on the High Prairie Circuit - named Fairview by Father Lewis. B. D. Linebarger and C. W. Batchelder preached there at a very early day. After that, Revs. Plumb, Fiddler, Irving, Flowers and 0. H. Hutchins preached in the school house ; then, in the meeting house, Mr. Wallace and Mr. Adams, and, finally, T. L. Helliwell. After the latter left, the society was too poor to maintain preaching, and the house was sold to Russell Wing for a barn.

The Greenfield school. Fox, was opened in 1861. The first teachers were : Mary Walker, James Ward, Josephine Hay and George Walreth. Its predecessor was the Rogers school, started in 1859, and had the following teachers: J. J. Baird and James Near. The first in the district was the Darnell school, built in 1849 in the timber near the Millbrook ford. Among the teachers were : Emily Webster, Cynthia Wood, Delia Southworth, Edward Malker, Amelia Smith and Julia Short. The two former schools were consolidated in 1870.

at Bristol Station, was laid out on L. S. Knox's land in 1862. J. Loucks was the first one buried there. It is a pleasant site, and contains some fine monuments, especially those of John C. Scofield, Orrin Kennedy, Augustus Boutwell, Joab Austin, William Thurber and Mrs. Susan Short. In 1863 or " Re-organized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints," made their headquarters at Piano. After the troubles at Nauvoo, in 1844, they were scattered abroad until, in 1853, in Wisconsin, a re-organization was effected under Joseph Smith jr. The first general conference of the re-organized body was held at Amboy,

The Latter Day Saints

Illinois, in 1860, at which time Mr. Smith was recognized as President of all branches of the church throughout the world. He has for ten years past resided at Piano. They have there a well ordered publishing house, from which they issue denominational books, and two semi-monthly papers, the ^'' Latter Day Saints' Herald'' - transferred from Cincinnati - and " Zions ITope," a children's paper. They differ from evangelical believers mainly in receiving the Book of Mormon as of equal authority with the Bible. They have in Piano a church of about one hundred and twenty members, F. G. Pitt, formerly, and Elder Smith, the present pastor. They have also a church in Sandwich.

- The school house of District No. 5, Oswego, was built in the fall of 1863. Early teachers : Lyman Pike, Lizzie R. Winn, Mary Tremain, Mary Smith, Anna Mason, Anna Reed and R. V. Beach.

During these years ordinary items of interest appear scarce, because dwarfed into insignificance by the absorbing interest and larger magnitude of our civil war. This, like the rising of the sun, puts so completely out of sight all lesser orbs, that they drift by without drawing our attention.