EARLY TRANSPORTATION
It was 1833 when the first stage coach line in northern Illinois
began to operate between Niles, Michigan and Chicago. In that year
the government had improved the old Indian trail between Detroit and
Chicago, and a tri-weekly line of stages was inaugurated over the
route. The popular Concord coach was used, and there were relays of
fresh horses every few miles.
The Chicago Road formed the western extension of the government
road along the shore of Lake Erie. During the 1830's and into the
1840's this would be one of the great thoroughfares of emigrant
travel. Stage coach travel increased so rapidly that in 1835, daily
departures were made from Detroit to Chicago and travelers were
compelled to make reservations in advance.
Chicago would soon become the center of an extensive coach line
service. As early as 1834 Dr. John L. Temple began operating an
"elegant, through- brace coach carriage" between Chicago and Ottawa
by way of Plainfield. This was the first stage coach to run west of
Chicago. Soon after a line of weekly stages ran between Chicago and
Galena by way of Dixon's Ferry. A few years later a Chicago to Galena
stage line by way of Rockford was put into operation and by 1846 tri-
weekly stages were running between Chicago and Galena both by way of
Dixon and by way of Rockford and Freeport. There was also a stage
line in service between Chicago and Peoria.
Arrivals and departures of stages at Chicago numbered eight daily
in 1846, with an average of fifteen passengers to the coach. Between
Chicago and Galena and between Chicago and Peoria, the scheduled
travel time was forty-eight hours, but stages frequently arrived at
their destinations many hours late. It was not uncommon that complete
suspension of service for days or weeks at a time were put into
effect during periods of deep snow or heavy rains which rendered the
roads virtually impassable.
Westward, during this period along the Chicago Road, the
Danville- Bloomington Road, the National Road and other overland
trails, and even across the open prairies moved picturesque caravans
of covered wagons. The start of the mighty migration had started and
that was to sweep the continent in the wake of railway development in
the years to come. Usually several prairie schooners traveled
together, forming what was commonly known as an "emigrant train", so
that if one of the cumbersome wagons became stuck in the mud or in
fording a stream, as frequently occurred, there was ample ox, horse,
and man power on hand to extricate the heavily laden wagon.
The difficulties of crossing unbridged rivers and streams were
sometimes formidable, but still greater problems were presented by
the frequent sloughs in which wagons sometimes became almost
hopelessly bogged. When an especially bad slough was encountered all
available teams were sometimes hitched together to pull the prairie
schooners through, one by one. On occasion the combined strength of
all oxen and horse power was not equal to the task, and it would be
necessary to wait for the next emigrant train to provide
reinforcements.
It would be difficult to exaggerate the wretchedness of Illinois
roads in those early years but with such transportation conditions to
contend with, is there any wonder that the interior of the state had
been so slow in settlers taking advantage of millions of acres of
fertile government lands, especially in central Illinois. Land had
been on the market for years without purchasers at $1.25 per acre.
Citizens would soon take a lively interest in accounts which
reached them of the Russian plank roads in Canada, the first of which
had been introduced in 1834. The plank road was constructed of heavy
boards or planking laid crosswise upon parallel rows of heavy wooden
sills. The craze for plank roads reached Illinois in 1844, and during
the legislative session that winter three companies applied for
charters to build plank roads leading from Chicago. It was not until
1850, however, that the first section of Chicago's pioneer plank road
was opened for traffic. This road, sixteen miles in length was known
as the Southwestern Plank Road, because it ran in a southwesterly
direction from Chicago. It was a private enterprise which, like other
plank road projects, obtained its revenue from tolls. (even then
Illinois had its "toll roads")
During the next two years the road was extended first to
Naperville and then to Oswego in Kendall County, with branches to
Sycamore and Little Rock. Encouraged by the success of the
Southwestern, which enjoyed a thriving business from the start,
several other companies were soon formed to undertake similar
projects. Within two or three years Chicago was served by four plank
roads, one extending northward along the lake shore, another in a
northwesterly direction to the Des Plaines River, another westward
through Elgin to Genoa, and another south for ten miles to Kyle's
Tavern. Three plank roads were built out of Freeport, and other plank
roads were projected or built in the southern region of the state.
Few plank roads reached back into the interior. The greater part
of Illinois was unaffected by their rise and rapid decline. Many soon
fell into disuse and decay due to the cost to build and maintain
them, and one by one the plank road companies passed out of
existence. Travel and transportation in the prairie country would
continue to depend upon a few crude trails and dirt roads.
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