Northwestern Indiana from 1800 to 1900A regional history written by Timothy H. Ball . . . .
Source Citation:
Ball, Timothy H. 1900.
Northwestern
Indiana from 1800 to 1900 or A View of Our Region Through the Nineteenth Century.
Chicago, Illinois: Donohue and Henneberry. 570 p.
NORTHWESTERN INDIANA FROM 1800 TO 1900
564
CONCLUSION.
When this year
which we call 1900 closes, then will end the Nineteenth century of the Christian
Era. That it has been over all the world the civilized and the savage world, a
remarkable century for changes, for inventions, for discoveries, for rapid
movement among the world's forces, all are well aware.
When it commenced Northwestern Indiana, having
passed in name and form from the French to the
British, and from the British to the Americans,
had no proper owners but Indians, no inhabitants but Indians and the wild
denizens of forest and prairie, with possibly an Indian trader, and so for some
thirty years continued; and now, as the century is hastening rapidly to its
close, about seventy years having passed since the smoke first began to mount
upwards from the stick chimneys of a few log
cabins, we have farms and orchards and immense numbers of domestic animals ;
workshops and factories; villages and towns and cities; gravel and macadam
roads; railroads and telephones and electric lights and electric railways;
schools and churches and some majestic stone court houses; intelligent,
prosperous farmers, and many cultivated and wealthy citizens. We have increased
from the first log cabins scattered here and there
in the woodlands to about one hundred villages and towns and cities, with nearly
eight hundred and forty school
565
houses and about two hundred and twenty-five churches.
It is true that there is another side, and some dark, very dark spots in the
full picture. There are jails and a penitentiary, and many haunts of evil, and
some homes of poverty and want. But while we have some beer-factories and
hundreds, possibly thousands of saloons, and, it may be, some dens of infamy,
yet it is sadly, fearfully true that these are the blots as yet remaining over
all Christendom, thickest and blackest in the largest cities, attesting well the
claim that humanity is "tainted with leprosy within," and showing full well that
earth's millennium age has not yet come. But the fiercer the conflict grows,
"irrepressible" indeed, between good and evil, the further, it is evident, we
have advanced in achieving a Christian civilization. Thousands of prosperous,
peaceful, Christian homes, in towns and on fertile farms, show that the seventy
years of effort here have not been in vain. If there are some things much worse
than anything known in the wild life of Indian savages, there is an immense
amount of good which goes far to prove our right to occupy their ancient home.
And this immense amount of good, in its varied forms, is to be left as a rich
heritage to many promising boys and many fair and lovely girls, who are now
preparing in country and city homes for the conflict of the coming century.
The work of the Pioneers is done. Most of those who here, in their young manhood
and in the hopefulness and brightness of their earlier womanhood, laid the
foundations for the successes and enjoyments of the present, have already gone
beyond the reach of human words of praise or blame or cheer. Here and there is a
grayhaired woman, and now and then there
566
can be found an aged man, who knew the life and shared the toils of seventy,
sixty, and up to fifty years ago. But they stand as do the few old oaks that can
be found in our once open woodlands, few and lone, amid the thick "second
growth" that covers so many broad acres now, reminding us of what once was in
the home of the Indians and haunts of the deer. So these few aged ones, over
whose heads the changes of fourscore years have passed, remind the thoughtful
and true ones among us of a sturdy generation of noble men and women who have
passed on. As the voices are heard here no more of the Indians who once held
over this region an undisputed sway, so are the voices silent now of the scores
and the hundreds of the Saxon race who succeeded those red children of the wilds
and whose footsteps often followed the red man's well beaten trail. Those joyous
children in the pioneer households, who on prairies and in woodland enjoyed a
freedom equal almost to that of the beautiful wild animals around them, have
been succeeded in their turn by a generation that know nothing of their rich
free life. Men and women and children too, of a quite different class, have
entered upon the heritage won by the true-hearted pioneers, some of them worthy
to enjoy the results of others' toil; some of them sadly wanting in the traits
that characterize a noble manhood, ready and eager to grasp results and striving
only to bend these to their own selfish ends.
But doubtless many of the thousands that are now and that are yet to be, as they
enjoy comforts and ease and luxuries and life and love, made sure to them by
self-denials and hardships and toil, will in their hearts honor the hardy and
enterprising generation of builders that went before them, and will read with
interest
567
and gratitude the names of some of Indiana's pioneers. These
from their labors rest. If
they did not plan all that those of this generation here possess, if they did
not foresee the wonderful inventions and improvements of this stirring age,
their lives here made possible for others all these conveniences that we now
enjoy.
Note. July 30, 1900. I have enjoyed the work of collecting the material which
the readers have here found, of putting it into what I have hoped might be an
acceptable form, and also the late constant effort to see that the proofreading
was fairly well done -- attaining perfection I do not expect -- and now, as this
care and effort are coming so near to an end, I take the opportunity to express
the hope and the prayer, that we who are now enjoying the rich inheritance of
pioneer toils, privations, and bright hopes, may finally meet with our pioneer
forefathers and those who with them gathered into the pioneer households, who
encouraged every effort and so patiently and lovingly helped in all that was
good -- even as we hope to meet the noble men and women of sacred history, with
Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and the Sarahs and Naomis and Ruths, and the Marys
and Marthas and Salomes -- in the glad future of the Endless Kingdom.
To the compositors and proofreaders, who have managed with so much skill and
patience the manuscript copy put into their hands, a patience and a skill which
I have highly appreciated, I here return hearty thanks. And to all who have had
part in the printing of this book, for courtesy and kindness, I express
appreciation and thanks.
Map
of State of Indiana
[Click Image to Enlarge]
NAVIGATION OF
NORTHWESTERN INDIANA FROM 1800 TO 1900
FRONT MATTER AND DEDICATION
CONTENTS
INTRODUCTION
CHAPTER 1
- GENERAL OUTLINES
CHAPTER 2
- THE INDIANS
CHAPTER 3
- THE EARLY SETTLERS
CHAPTER 4
- WHAT THE EARLY SETTLERS FOUND
CHAPTER 5
- PIONEER LIFE
CHAPTER 6
- COUNTY ORGANIZATIONS
CHAPTER 7
- OUR LAKES AND STREAMS
CHAPTER 8
- LAKE MICHIGAN WATER SHED
CHAPTER 9
- TOWNSHIP AND STATISTICS
CHAPTER
10 - RAILROAD LIFE
CHAPTER
11 - POLITICAL HISTORY
CHAPTER
12 - THE WAR RECORD
CHAPTER
13 - RELIGIOUS HISTORY
CHAPTER
14 - RELIGIOUS HISTORY
CHAPTER
15 - RELIGIOUS HISTORY
CHAPTER
16 - SUNDAY SCHOOLS
CHAPTER
17 - TOWNS AND VILLAGES OF NEWTON AND JASPER
CHAPTER
18 - TOWNS AND VILLAGES OF WHITE, PULASKI AND STARKE
CHAPTER
19 - VILLAGES, TOWNS AND CITIES OF LAKE
CHAPTER
20 - VILLAGES AND TOWNS OF PORTER
CHAPTER
21 - VILLAGES, TOWNS AND CITIES OF LA PORTE
CHAPTER
22 - EARLY TRAVELS
CHAPTER
23 - PUBLIC SCHOOLS
CHAPTER
24 - PRIVATE AND PAROCHIAL SCHOOLS
CHAPTER
25 - LIBRARIES
CHAPTER
26 - OTHER INDUSTRIES
CHAPTER
27 - SOCIAL ORGANIZATIONS
CHAPTER
28 - THE KANKAKEE REGION
CHAPTER
29 - DRAINING MARSHES
CHAPTER
30 - ANIMALS AND PLANTS
CHAPTER
31 - MISCELLANEOUS RECORDS
CHAPTER
32 - COURT HOUSES
CHAPTER
33 - ARCHAEOLOGICAL SPECIMENS
CHAPTER
34 - BIRTH PLACES OF PIONEERS
CHAPTER
35 - McCARTY
CHAPTER
36 - ATTEMPTS TO CHANGE
CHAPTER
37 - ALTITUDES
CHAPTER
38 - MISCELLANEOUS RECORDS
CHAPTER
39 - SOME STATISTICS
CHAPTER
40 - WEATHER RECORD
CONCLUSION
Transcribed by Steven R. Shook, April 2012