The autumn of 1818 found Gurdon S. Hubbard as a clerk on a bateau as an agent of Astor’s American Fur Company. Hubbard, only 18, tells of the party passing Pere Marquette State Park singing Canadian boat songs and spending the night of November 5 at the mouth of the Illinois, bound for St. Louis. This party returned in the first week of December as Illinois was accepted into the Union. Hubbard became a legendary figure in Illinois, living a full and adventurous life in the Illinois fur trade.
SETTLERS ARMY VETERANS
Five veterans of the regular army were the first settlers in this region this same year. One of these, David Gilbert, settled on the bank of the lake now bearing his family name. George Finney, another veteran, platted the village of Camden in February, 1821, in the valley now bearing that name at the mouth of the Illinois river.
Corner of interesting nature museum
James Mason entered land in 1830 just to the east of Camden to establish a ferry to facilitate trade with St. Louis. Late in April, 1831, a flatboat drifted past here, manned by four men from the Sangamon country, bound for the New Orleans market. One of the crew, 22-year-old Abraham Lincoln, was to be indelibly impressed by the slave market at New Orleans.
Mason built a home on his land, founding Grafton in 1836. An earth wharf was built, becoming known as Mason’s Landing. In 1837 the town of Hartford was platted where the Pere Marquette lodge now stands. The church and school bearing this name are the sole reminders of this development today. The flood of 1844 wrecked Grafton and business shifted east to Alton.
When the Illinois and Michigan canal was opened in 1848 Mason’s Landing became a wood and coal center for the river traffic. Corded wood came from the surrounding forests and coal was kept in 2½ bushel boxes to maintain the steamboats. Large rafts of pine logs and lumber from Wisconsin appeared on the Mississippi River each spring, were caught at Grafton, and held backed up on the Illinois River, until needed farther down stream.
Quarrying began in 1857, and the old Lindell Hotel in St. Louis, and the piers of the Meredosia and Hannibal railroad bridges were built of Grafton stone. The Underground Railroad was a well kept secret of the period in Grafton, Calhoun Point being the rendezvous for escaped slaves.