CHAPTER IX.
CHICAGO.
Topographical Situation of Chicago.—Meaning of the Name.—Early History.—Massacre at Fort Dearborn.—Last of the Red Men.—The Great Land Bubble.—Rapid Increase in Population and Business.—The Canal.—First Railroad.—Status of the City in 1871.—The Great Fire.—Its Origin, Progress and Extent.—Heartrending Scenes.—Estimated Total Loss.—Help from all Quarters.—Work of Reconstruction.—Second Fire.—Its Public Buildings, Educational and Charitable Institutions, Streets and Parks.—Its Waterworks.—Its Stock Yards.—Its Suburbs.—Future of the City.
"See two things in the United States, if nothing else—see Niagara and Chicago," said Richard Cobden, the English statesman, to Goldwin Smith, on the eve of the departure of the latter to America. And truly, if one would obtain a proper sense of America's wonders and achievements, then Niagara and Chicago may be accepted as respectively the highest types of each. Niagara remains the same yesterday, to-day and forever. But if it were a desirable thing to see Chicago at the time of the visit referred to, how much more so is it to-day, when, Phœnix-like, she has arisen from her own ashes, turning that which seemed an overwhelming disaster into positive blessing; drawing her fire-singed robes proudly about her, crowning herself with the diadem of her own matchless achievements, and sitting beside her inland sea, the queenliest city of them all.
Situated upon a flat and relatively low tract of country, Chicago is yet upon one of the highest plane elevations of our continent. Lake Michigan represents the headwaters of the great chain of American lakes, through which, in connection with the St. Lawrence, much of the rainfall of that city finds its way to the Atlantic; while through the canal to the Illinois River, its sewage is borne to the Gulf of Mexico. Perhaps no more hopeless site could have been selected for a city than that seemed half a century ago. A bayou or arm of the lake penetrated the land for half a mile or more, but a sand-bar across its mouth prevented the ingress of all but the smallest craft. This bayou, called by courtesy the Chicago River, separated into two branches, the course of one of which was in a northerly direction, and of the other in a southerly one. The land was barely on a level with the lake, and at portions of the year was a vast morass, some parts of it being entirely under water. Teams struggled helplessly through the black ooze of its prairies, and a carriage would sink three or four feet in mud and mire within two miles of where the court house now stands. Sometimes in this slough a board would be set up, with a rude inscription: "No bottom here." But American enterprise has found a bottom and reared a city, the history of whose seemingly magical building almost rivals the tales of the Arabian Nights.
Chicago is an Indian word, signifying the widely-varying titles of a king or deity, and a skunk or wild onion. In its early history, while drainage it had none, and its water supply was mere surface water, foul with all the accumulated impurities of the soil, and while from the lagoon, which lay stagnant for twelve or fifteen miles, a horrible, sickening stench constantly arose, the latter appellations seemed singularly appropriate, and no doubt originated in these conditions. But since the city has been purified by fire, and its sanitary conditions made such as they should be, it has earned its right to the nobler titles.
The first white visitors to the site of Chicago were Joliet and Marquette, who arrived in August, 1673. The year following his first visit Pere Marquette returned and erected a rude church. Later the French seem to have built a fort on the spot, but no traces of it now remain. Very early in the nineteenth century John Kinzie, an Indian trader, and agent of the American Fur Company, having traded with the Indians at this point for some time, probably influenced the government to build a fort here. Accordingly, in 1804, Fort Dearborn was built and garrisoned with about fifty men and three pieces of artillery. Mr. Kinzie removed his family to the place the same year.
In 1812, Fort Dearborn was the scene of a bloody Indian massacre. Captain Hull, then in command of the fort, having placed too great confidence in the professions of fidelity of the Pottawatomie tribe, and trusting to an escort of that tribe to convey the soldiers and inhabitants of the fort to Fort Wayne, saw his entire party either killed or taken prisoners, and found himself a prisoner. The fort stood at the head of Michigan avenue, below its intersection with Lake street. Abandoned and destroyed at this period, it was rebuilt in 1816, and finally demolished in 1856.