This edition is being issued as a present-day mirror of Carroll County. Not as a history of the past achievements of those gone before, but a presentation of the people and present, 1930 day, and the leaders in business, professions, and as citizens.
Carroll County, although not the smallest county in the State of Illinois, is one of the smallest so far as population and area is concerned; but one of the richest, most healthful, prosperous and progressive in the state, made so first, by its natural beauty and advantages and, second, by its advanced and progressive citizenry.
Carroll County is bounded on the west by the broad Misissippi River and the land is very rolling for ten or more miles eastward, then spreads into a broad, rolling prairie, just uneven enough for good drainage. There are seven cities, towns and villages in the county. Savanna on the west is the largest, being the terminal of two railroads, the C., M., St. P. & P., and the C., B. & Q. Thomson is in the southwest corner and is in the watermelon district. Chadwick is in the south central portion, a farming country; Milledgeville in the sootheast corner; Shannon in the northeast; Lanark in the north central portion; with Mt. Carroll directly west of Lanark and east of Savanna. Mt. Carroll is the county seat.
The natural beauties of the county are many and cannot be surpassed. Carroll Creek, or the "Waukarusa" the Indian name given it, starts from Badger Springs, near Shannon, flows just north of Lanark, winds its crooked way westward, passes through Mt. Carroll, through City Park, thence through Smith's Park, to Plum River and on to the Mississippi at Savanna. Plum River, which has its source in Jo Daviess County, passes through Freedom and Woodland townships in Carroll County. Elkhorn Creek, quite a pretentious stream, flows through Milledgeville southward making the county a well-watered one at all seasons of the year, for there are many "runs", rivulets, and small creeks running into and feeding the larger streams, while Johnson Creek starting southeast of Mt. Carroll, meanders through Salem, Mt. Carroll and York townships, growing in size before it reaches the Mississippi.
Carroll County and especially Mt. Carroll are favoredwith many parks and beauty spots. Savanna has a StatePark just north of the city along the majestic bluffs bordering the Mississippi River, "Palisade Park" it is called. Besides this they have "The Old Mill Park", just east of the city limits on Route 27. Mt. Carroll has a very fine natural City Park in the west part of the city, while further down the Waukarusa is Smith's Cave Park, than which there is no natural scenery in the state that can compare with it. Then we have the Caroline Mark Home Park, the Court House Park, and beautiful groves and forests and parks all around the city.
As an educational county there is none that surpasses our own Carroll County, and Mt. Carroll is favored by having the Frances Shimer School for Girls, an endowed institution, affiliated with the University of Chicago, situated here, with its substantial buildings and spacious beautiful campus, one of the most healthful and enchanting spots in all Illinois. This School was started in pioneer days as the Mt. Carroll Senainary and has gone steadily forward all these years. At one time in its earlier days both sexes were admitted and at least two former governors, Governor Samuel McCall of of Massaehusetts, and Goverernor Willis J. Bailey of Kansas, were products of this School. as well as many of the foremost, noted, and talented women of the country. At present it is in a most prosperous condition, and each year has as pupils as many girls, coming from every state in the Union, as it can accommodate.
Our public schools are the pride of the people of the entire county. Savanna has four modern public sehoolbuildings, as well as a parochial school. Thomson has two buildings and a gymnasium. Chadwick, a building suitable to the needs of its children. Milledgeville has a Community High School building to which the citizens "point with pride. Shannon has a good school building and has just completed a a new gymnasium. Lanark is well equipped with buildings and leads the county in its agricultural courses. Mt. Carroll has two school buildings and a separate gymnasium, but still lacks room for its large attendance. Besides these there are a number of rural standard schools. Every school in Carroll County has at its head educators of ability and corps of teachers who cannot be excelled in talen and ability, as instructors of the rising penerataon.
Carroll County, every town in it, has excellent churches of every denomination and able and talented ministers who look after the spiritual welfare and spiritual needs of the people. As a whole Carroll County is peopled with the American born citizens who are as moral as those of any county in the state and in fact ranks among the top counties of the state in morals and less crime than in others. The people are intelligent, a reading, God- fearing people, progressive, educated, religious, and up to date, and ministers find that it has been made so by the teachings of the schools, the teachings of the churches and the natural desire of the people to live moral lives in moral surroundings.
Strictly Agricultural
Carroll county is a strictly agricultural county. It has the best of country homes, rich alluvial soil, and an intelligent rural population. It has more paved state roads and state gravelled roads leading in all directions through the county and the rich farming lands than any other like area in the state, thanks to former Governor Len Small, who gave them to us. Mt. Carroll has a $65,000 bridge spanning the Waukarusa on Clay street, which is an improvement given us by the governor,and which we would never have been abot to get otherwise. On summer evenings hundreds of our people drive over these paved highways through the country and the lowing of the kine, the neighing of the horses, the satisfied grunting of the well-fed pigs, the baaing of the sheep, the playing of the colts and calves and lambs, the clucking of the hens, the quacking of the ducks, the honking of the geese or the gobble of the turkeys in barnyards and in pastures is music to the soul of the tired city business man as he views the beautiful homes and notes the quiet contentment of rural life, in the lowering light of the setting sun in springtime.
Besides the cities, towns and villages above mentioned, there are a number of thriving hamlets, among whick we note, Argo-Fa, Wacker, Ideal and Fair Haven, all of which have mills, filling stations, shops and other enterprises.
Mount Carroll
Mt. Carroll is a city of about 2,000 people, 128 miles west of Chicago, as the Milwaukee railroads runs, with two arterial motor highways leading to that city, the Lincoln Highway and the Grant Highway, to which Mt. Carroll is connected by paved Highways 78 and 40. Mt. Carroll has the Caroline Mark Home for aged ladies, a most imposing building in the north part of the city, where ladies of six counties, Jo Daviess, Stephenson, Winnebago, Ogle, Lee, Whiteside, adn Carroll, are admitted, and which is always filled with a contented, happy number of aged ladies who find it all its names implies, a Home for them.
A Beautiful, Prosperous City
Mt. Carroll is the home of the Frances Shimer School for Girls, as above noted. Our library is something we point to with pride and pleasure. Our public schools, our churches, our parks, our bridge, our paved streets, and our beautiful cemetery on the hill, the silent city of the dead, where lie so many of our relatives and friends are all things our citizens take pride in. We have many beautiful, commodious, comfortable, modern homes. Mt. Carroll is the county seat, and although the county buildings are not new, they are substantial and we are surely well manned by officials competent, honest and true. Our stores are above the average of any town of our size, our street lighting, with boulevard lights adequate. Our merchants are progressive. Our Doctors and Lawyers are talented and amont the most successful and the following pages will show who are most public spirited alive and leading among the people of the county.
Never Had A Bank Failure.
Carroll County has never had a bank failure. It has banks and banks, all as solid and enduring as the Rock of Gibraltor. Neither have we ever had many commercial failures or bankrupts. The people of Carroll County are successful generally in whatever they undertake.
The County Officials
District Officials
Circuit Judges
Reporters -
County Judge - Orion M. Grove
State's Attorney - Ralph M. Eaton
County Clerk - Walter R. Watson
Deputy County Clerk - WIlliam M. Nipe
Circuit Clerk & Recorder - Valentine Boerner
County Treasurer - Harl Smith
Sheriff - Henry S. Wise
Head Deputies - Ed. S. Barnes, Harry L. Wise
Supt. of Schools - Martha J. Ashby
Supt. of Highways - S.C. Campbell
Congressman - William R. Johnson, Freeport
State Senator - Joseph L. Meyers, Sciota Mills
Representatives - John Acker, Savanna; John S. Bingham, Galena; Charles C. Franz, Freeport
Harry L. Edwards, Dixon
William J. Emerson, Oregon
Harry L. Heer, Galena
Gus Gossman, Dixon; Miss Lily Walberg, Oregon; Oscar Heard, Freeport
Mt. Carroll has not made many remarkabk changes in the past thirty years and those who left here that long ago would recognize the city if they came back now. Except for the streets and the buildings at the Frances Shimer School, the City looks as it did thirty years ago. For the past decade there his been very little done in the way of commercial building, but at that the city has fine substantial buildings and very fine residences
Mt. Carroll has many wealthy citizens, more than any other town in the county, and some of them are very liberal in helping along civic enterprises, while like all other places, a team of mules is required to pull a dollar out of the pockets of some when help is wanted and needed to forward and some enterprise. They will not let loose of a dollar unless they can see two returning at once, giving no heed to the fact that the better the the town, the more money is spent in it, and that when money circulates almost everybody has a chance of getting some himself.
To those of our readers, former citizens who have been away for the past twenty years or more, we desire to say that they would not know the streets, for there has been a wonderful change. Market street is paved with brick, laid on cement, from the intersection of Carroll street east to the intersection of Clay street. Main street is paved with the same material from Market to Broadway, east on Broadway to Jackson to the Station, so that the rough, muddy streets they knew will be known no more. The terracing along the paving has made a wonderful change. Route 27 comes in from Lanark straight down from the Dan Hurley corner to Clay street, to what was known as the Browning corner, opening up a new street, then down Clay across the new $65,000 bridge, and winding down the hill in North Carroll comes out at the old Wm. Warfield place in West Carroll, and thence to Stockton, paved with cement. This is known as Route 78, which is from Morrison to the Wisconsin stateline passing through the city on Clay street from the depot. The grading is all done from Morrison to Mt. Carroll and the cement will be laid during the coming summer. Clay street is paved south from Broadway to the residence of Coleman Miles. This is the road from which the state and railroad will build a viaduct and underground crossing just west of the depot. Route 40 from Sterling passes through Milledgeville and Chadwick, and with Route 27 to Savanna we have paved roads leading in every direction from Mt. Carroll.
In our souvenir edition of 1898 we had a picture of "The Falls at High Water". But the old mill dam and the falls have gone forever. The Waukarusa winds down where the dam used to be through the city, as ever, but through a channel cut deep through the soil of the farms of the county, washed down in times of freshets filling the bed of the old dam, and when a great hole was cut into the dam, destroying the falls, a channel was washed as dep as the wall of the dam, from far up the creek, leaving the falls apart and as dry as the proverbial powder horn.
Mt. Carroll in 1930 is not the Mt. Carroll of 1900 or earlier. The parks have been improved, although nature still holds sway there. The Devil's Backbone, , the Grotto, and other familiar spots down the creek are there, changed somewhat by the passing years, but still in their primitive beauty. The bed of the old mill pond has been nude into productive gardens in places, where potatoes and all kinds of vegetables are raised in summer, with trees growing just above the Falls, a wilderness not unpleasing to the sight as the setting sun in summer gives it color, from the new bridge.
Business Just As Good
As to businesss there are some who say that there is not as much business done now as in the old days. But we differ with them . It is not done in the same way, but it is a great business town. Saturday is no longer a day when eierybody comes to town for their mail, for it is carried to their doors daily by rural carriers who penetrate to the remotest bounds of the district. Merchants no longer keep ther stores open late every week night. They close half of the week at six o'clock. WIth the automobile on nearly every form, country people no longer wait for Saturday, but come to town whenever the spirit mo\ves them'' to do so and buy what they want, so that we no longer see the big wagon loads of goods that formerly were taken out n Saturdays.
So far as public entertainments are concerned it is not so easy to get up celebrations as in the old days. There are so many who say; "What is there in it for me?" This has been proven by soliciting for the Souvenir Edition. "there is nothing in it for me",, was the statement of a number. They did not look forward to public spirit, but to the immediate dollar. Others excused themselves by saving they were getting old and were "out of the picture". We hope not. That is something we are not, and never will he out as long as God permits us to live. We have been `in the picture" for many years and we want to remain in it, as active as possible, until it comes time for us to pass "out of the picture" eternally. Others said they did not believe in this kind of advertising. As this is not an advertising stunt, but an advertisement of the city and who is in it and making it today, and is public spirited When they do not believe in progressiveness and boosting, then they acknowledge that they do not care for public spirit. Others did not go in because of the costs. It costs for cuts, for paper, for typesetting, for press work, for binding and for postage to send the Souvenir out and we figured as low as we could and come out even, etting nothing for the many hours we are putting in.
But we have many enterprising and progressive people, public spirited ones who really have the interest of the city at heart and are not selfish; they love the old town and want to see it prosper, and we are willing to do their share, and you will find their names in the pages of this Souvenir.
Mt. Carroll is blessed with having had Nature do much for her; man added to it and there is no prettier city in any State than our own little Mt. Carroll, one of the cheeriest and most delightful place places to live in the world. A moral community, an educated people and none more congenial anywhere. Maybe we do need pepping up a little, for the city can be made better from every business viewpoint. We have the finest water, the streets well lighted, adequate fire protection, lodges and societies of all kinds, church and civic; fine churches, fine schools, an the best School for Girls in the universe. We have a fine public library, a good city hall, a great band, large and beautiful filling stations and garages, the Caroline Mark Home, good hotels and restaurants and the finest stores in the Northwest. We are contented to live the balance of our life here, and when the end comes be laid beside our loved ones in the "City of the Dead" overlooking the business section of the city where we have so long lived.
What the future of Mt. Carroll will be lies with the present business generation and those who will come after. In this day and age God still helps him who helps himself; but is not forcing prosperity or public spirit on anyone.
Mt. Carroll citizens take much interest and pride in their City Park. Some former Mt. Carroll people, who have been away for years would not recognize old "Point Rock'. The City Park starts at the south line of the Cemetery and takes in all the land east of Point Rock, to the highway, and on the south to the Charles Moore line, thence west to the Sandiford line. There is a park house where people find shelter in case of a rain, and where they can eat if necessary. There is a cook house, where coffee can be made, or beefsteak fried, or for a weiner roast. There are swings for the children, a horse shoe pitching grounds an dall in all it is one of the finest little parks in the country, the original giant oaks furnishing shade; city water is piped to the park house. E.A. Mowery is caretaker and never was there a better man for the place. He takes as much interest and pleasure in his flower beds and lawn and in keeping them clean as if they were his own. Cement drives and walks lead from the entrance, through two gates to the park proper, and a swinging bridge furnishes passage way for foot passeners, while in the past the bed of the creek had been cemented forming a driveway for cars, but this will be done away with this year when a new bridge, partly built last year, will be finished and no matter how high the water is, cars can cross over, which they cannot do now when the water is high. The park is looked after by three-commissioners; J.W. Squires, J.M. Rinewalt, and Simon Bowman.
Mt. Carroll also has a Commercial Club governed and conducted by a board of five directors. The present directors are Harold R. Eaton, President; Robert Hansen, Sec.; E.N. Gsell, Clarence Colehour, William Frank. Their term of office expires in March, at which time an election will be held for a new board.
While Mt. Carroll has a volunteer fire department, the equipment is of the best and the department as efficient as many paid departments. Carlos Robbe is chief, and takes much interest in the work as do all the members....
Mt. Carroll City Council
The Supervisors
Mayor - W.W. Hartman
Aldermen - Robert Hansen, George E. Myers, Ward 1;
Aldermen - Henry G. Richter, John L. Buckwalter, Ward 2;
Aldermen - Robert M. Browning, Charles R. Isenhart, Ward 3.
Treasurer - Owen P. Miles
Marshal - Carlos Johnston
Washington - Arthur Haas
Woodland - Robert Carson
Freedom - Ward R. Fritz
Cherry Grove - William Straw
Shannon - William A. Fisher
Lima - John Warner
Rock Creek - Mrs. Fannie Flickinger
Salem - Harry Spealman
Mt. Carroll - John H. Keltner
Savanna - Hans Johnson & L.A. Oyster
York - James J. Sheridan, Chairman
Fair Haven - William C. Bast
Wysox - O.M.Meyers
Elkhorn Grove - Walter R. Knox
The Biographical and Business Descriptions of the original series was not in any kind of order..By hitting the "Next" button you can continue on through the booklet as it was written - OR - you can skip to the people and places of interest by using the Index. "Home" will take you back to the Homepage.
