Historical Images of Porter County

The White Star Steamboat at Indian Island Sawmill
Kankakee River, Porter County, Indiana

Date: 1868
Source Type: Sketch
Publisher, Printer, Photographer: J. Lorenzo Werich, Wilson Reed Berry (illustration)
Postmark: Not Applicable
Collection: Steven R. Shook
Remark:  A sawmill operation was organized in 1866 on Indian Island located approximately three-tenths of a mile north of the Kankakee River and about two miles west of present day Baum’s Bridge. The sawmill was owned by numerous shareholders, including Boone Township pioneer James Dye and his daughter Mary (Dye) Werich, wife of John Lorenzo Werich. Other shareholders in the company included John Bissell, Ira Cornell, Aaron Brody, Senior, and his son John Brody.

The sawmill equipment was manufactured by the Kellogg Foundry in Valparaiso and hauled by wagon to the mill site. The Werich family moved to Indian Island to operate the mill on October 9, 1871, and remained there until they located at Hebron in 1881. Brody reportedly sold the land on which the mill was located to Samuel Irvin early in the year of 1873. Irvin would sell the property in the fall of 1879 to the Sherwood brothers, Jerry and Holland; the Sherwoods then sold the property two years later (circa 1881) and move to Tennessee.

In 1868, Bissell and Cornell would hire carpenter Addison E. Buck of Hebron to construct a steamship called The White Star to facilitate transport of the mill’s lumber and cord wood on the Kankakee River to markets in Momence, Kankakee County, Illinois, and points between. Given that the sawmill was three-tenths of a mile from the river, a canal eighteen feet wide and four feet deep was dug to allow the steamship to access the mill. The White Star would haul barges loaded with product from the mill. The sawmill property appears on Hardesty’s 1876 plat map of Boone Township. The house constructed in association with the saw mill was still standing in good condition as late as 1927.

Image Source:
Werich, J. Lorenzo. 1920. Pioneer Hunters of the Kankakee. Logansport, Indiana: Chronicle Printing Company. 197 p. [see p. 137]

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Image and related text prepared by Steven R. Shook