Tell me about that house . . . . Part Three

By Jared L. Olar

Local History Specialist

This lithograph from the 1873 Atlas Map of Tazewell County depicts the home of D. C. Smith, youngest of the Smith brothers and first manager of the Teis Smith Bank.

Continuing the history of 405 Willow St., we will consult some old maps, drawings, and photographs that can help us determine the approximate time when the house at that address was built, and by whom.

One source that we can consult is the 1891 Tazewell County Atlas, which indicates that by that year there was a structure at this site. We already know from the title history and the old city directories that it was then the home of Dietrich C. Smith, who was also the property owner.

The D. C. Smith mansion is indicated on this detail from the plat map of Pekin from the 1891 “Atlas of Tazewell County.”

But the most helpful source that we should consult is the 1873 “Atlas Map of Tazewell County”, which not only includes a plat map of Pekin that was drawn in 1872, but in fact has a drawing of this very house (shown above), which the atlas says was the residence of D. C. Smith, i.e. Dietrich C. Smith.

The location of the D. C. Smith mansion is indicated on this detail of an 1872 plat map of Pekin, from the 1873 “Atlas Map of Tazewell County.” At the time this map was drawn up, the mansion would have been newly built.

Similarly, the same house shown in the 1873 atlas can also be seen in an 1877 hand-drawn aerial map of Pekin.

In this detail from an 1877 aerial-view map of Pekin, a drawing of the D. C. Smith mansion can be seen about the bottom middle of the image. The mansion was about five years old at the time.

However, at first glance the house shown in the atlas drawing and the aerial map would seem to be a completely different structure from the house that stands on that site today. Was the home of D. C. Smith demolished at some point and replaced with a new house?

The answer, perhaps surprisingly, is no. The same house shown in the atlas and aerial map is the one still standing today. What accounts for the great change in the house’s appearance – especially the house’s height? The explanation may be found in Rob Clifton’s “Pekin History: Then and Now,” in which we find a vintage photograph of this house from circa 1895 compared with a photograph that Clifton took in 2004.

The vintage photograph from about 1895 shows the D. C. Smith mansion as it then existed. A fire in the early 20th century destroyed the second storey, attic, and tower. A new roof was then built atop the ground floor.

Rob Clifton’s photograph from 2004 shows the house at 405 Willow Street as it then appeared. The home was then the residence of Eugene V. Marshall and his family.

As Clifton explains, the house suffered a fire early in the 20th century that destroyed the upper storey, attic, and tower. When the house was repaired, it was not restored to its pre-fire condition, but instead a new roof was built over the remaining ground-level floor. A close examination of the first-floor windows seen in these photos will show that it is in fact the same house.

There is one big difference in the appearance of the ground level, though – a pillared semi-circle front porch was added at some point, perhaps when the house was repaired after the fire, or perhaps some time after that. We know the porch was there by Sept. 1925, thanks to the Sanborn Fire Insurance Map of Pekin that was published then.

On this detail of the Sanborn Fire Insurance map of Pekin from Sept. 1925, we see an outline of the house at 405 Willow St. shown in pink and yellow. Note, however, that the street address is given as 403 Willow St.

Another change in appearance to the house is that it is now painted white, but in earlier years had a darker color even after it had been repaired following the fire.

From all of this information we’ve gathered, we can determine that this house must have been built by D. C. Smith in the first half of the 1870s, apparently in 1871 – for the title history shows that Smith bought the property from Menne F. Aden and his wife on 8 May 1871, and the drawing from the 1873 atlas indicates that the house already existed by 1872 when the atlas was compiled and prepared for publication.

Now that we’ve learned something of the history and changes to this house’s structure and appearance, we can turn our attention to the history of the families who have called this house “home.” Next week we will explore the life of D. C. Smith and his family.

This scanned photocopy supplied by the current home owner of 405 Willow St. depicts the house as it appear on 15 May 1921. The house’s dark color is a great contrast to the pure white appearance it has today.

#405-willow-st, #d-c-smith, #dietrich-c-smith, #menne-f-aden, #pekin-history, #pekin-history-then-and-now, #rob-clifton, #sanborn-maps

The Tazewell County Jail of 1892

By Jared L. Olar

Local History Specialist

Shown here is the old Tazewell County Jail and Sheriff’s Residence that was built in 1891-1892 at the present site of the McKenzie Building next to the Tazewell County Courthouse. This jail was built while Johann Christian “Chris” Friederich was Tazewell County Sheriff, and it is possibly Sheriff Friederich standing in this photo.

Over a year after Tazewell County was erected by the Illinois General Assembly in 1827, the county’s first jail was constructed at Mackinaw, the county seat, at a cost of $325.75. That first jail was a two-story building made of hewn timber, 16 feet square, and at the time was thought to be the strongest – and the costliest – jail built by the pioneers of Central Illinois.

That didn’t stop the jail’s first prisoner, a horse thief named William Cowhart, from escaping from it, though.

Later on in the county’s history, after the struggle between Pekin and Tremont over which town would get to be the county seat was finally settled in Pekin’s favor in 1849, a new county jail was constructed at Pekin in 1852 at a cost of $7,000. It was from a tree in front of the 1852 jail that the outlaw William Berry, leader of the Berry Gang, was lynched on July 31, 1869. The lynch mob had been enraged by Ike Berry’s killing of Tazewell County deputy sheriff Henry Pratt earlier the same month.

The old Tazewell County Courthouse Block is shown in this detail from an “Aerial View of Pekin,” a unique map that was printed in 1877. The old Courthouse, which stood from 1850 to 1914, is near the middle of this image. To its left are two buildings — at the corner of Fourth and Elizabeth was a building that held county offices for elected officials such as county clerk, recorder of deeds, etc. Just below that, at the corner of Fourth and Court, is the old Tazewell County Jail and Sheriff’s Residence (which was replaced in 1892 — today it’s the location of the McKenzie Building, which was built as a new jail in the 1960s). Since this map was drawn in 1877, it’s only eight years after Bill Berry’s lynching in 1869, which took place outside the jail at the corner of Court and Fourth. Note that there are four trees represented in front of the jail — there’s no telling which of them was Berry’s gallows tree.

This detail of the 1892 Sanborn fire insurance map of downtown Pekin shows the foundations of the 1892 jail next to the old 1852 jail.

This detail from the 1898 Sanborn fire insurance map of downtown Pekin shows the county jail six years after it was constructed. There is no more trace of the old 1852 jail.

That jail building was replaced in 1892 with a new jail and sheriff’s residence, a limestone and red-brick edifice constructed at a cost of $20,000 on a site adjacent to the 1852 jail. This new jail structure was built while Johann Christian “Chris” Friederich was Tazewell County Sheriff. Friederich was sheriff from 1890 to 1894.

The 1892 Tazewell County Jail and Sheriff’s Residence, shown in a colorized photograph from an early 20th century postcard.

The 1892 Tazewell County Jail and Sheriff’s Residence as shown in a postcard that was mailed in 1914. (This is the same kind of postcard as the colorized one shown above — the image is identical.)

Because the job of county sheriff included the duty of overseeing the county jail and the prisoners held there, the old practice was for the sheriff and his family to live in the jail. As a rule, county sheriffs were married men for the practical reason that his wife would be hired by the county board to be the jail’s “matron.” Her main responsibility was cooking the meals for the jail inmates.

Sometimes there would be a county sheriff did not live in the jail – for example, Sheriff James J. Crosby (1930-1934) – in which case it would be the chief deputy and his family who will live in the jail and directly oversee jail operations. The last county sheriff to live in the jail seems to have been George Saal, who served two non-consecutive terms, 1950-1954 and 1958-1962.

These are the Tazewell County Sheriff’s who served during the years when the 1892 county jail was in use:

Johann Christian “Chris” Friederich (1838- )          1890-1894

John Edmond Stout (1856- )                                        1894-1898

John D. Mount (1860-1925)                                        1898-1902

Robert Ingersoll Clay (1869-1920)                             1902-1906     1918-1920

James Alfonzo Norris (1855-1939)                             1906-1910

Christian A. Fluegel (1863- )                                       1910-1914

John Lee Wilson (1864- )                                             1914-1918

Athol Sebree “Pat” Whitmore (1889-1960)            1920-1922

Emil Neuhaus (1861-1941)                                          1922-1926

Ernest Leroy Fleming (1873-1955)                              1926-1930

James Jackson Crosby (1855-1939)                            1930-1934

Ralph Croy Goar (1896-1976)                                     1934-1938

Guy Emmet Donahue (1892-1958)                             1938-1942

William Grant (1881-1947)                                         1942-1946

Herbert Hirstein  (1947-1988)                                     1946-1950

George Leroy Saal (1918-1996)                                  1950-1954     1958-1962

Ray Owen Crafton (1904-1981)                                  1954-1958

George H. Sweeter (1907-1964)                                 1962-1964

Arch E. Bartlemay (1919-1987)                                  1964-1970

Notable moments in the history of the 1892 Tazewell County jail and sheriff’s residence include:

• The Little Mine Riot (6 June 1894) near Wesley City. The mob leaders of the riot were arrested by Sheriff Friederich and held at the jail before they were convicted and sent to the state penitentiary in Joliet.
• Albert Wallace’s murder of his sister Belle (Wallace) Bowlby, for which he was sentenced to death and was hanged by Sheriff Stout on a gallows built outside the jail on 14 March 1896. This was the last legal hanging in Tazewell County.
• Inmates attempted to break out of the jail in Oct. 1899 by sawing through the bars.
• Samuel Moser murdered his wife and three children with extreme brutality and fled to Utah, where he was captured. Sheriff Mount was granted extradition and personally went to Utah to retrieve Moser, who was sentenced to 23 years at Joliet (where Moser later hanged himself).
• The Oct. 1902 attempted escape of James Hastings, a Galesburg shoe store thief. While Sheriff Mount walked Hastings to the jail, Hastings broke free and ran through the Block & Kuhl store, making it several blocks and hiding in a barrel, where the Sheriff found him and hauled him to a jail cell.
• The jail escape of William Eddie, alias William Young, who was caught in Springfield in May 1903 and brought back to the Tazewell County jail.
• The death of Sheriff Robert I. Clay on 4 Sept. 1920. Clay suffered a gunshot wound to the knee during a gun fight with bootleggers in Wesley City, and the wound became infected causing the sheriff’s death. Clay is the only Tazewell County sheriff to be killed in the line of duty.
• An attempted jail break of four prisoners, Mack Houchins, Frank Milton, Dan Cassey, and Thomas Erb, in March 1910. In an elaborate plan, the four fashioned their own jail cell keys, sawed bars, and picked at plaster around a jail window, with the intention of murdering Sheriff Norris and escaping. Norris became aware of their plans and allowed them to break into a jail corridor, where he and his deputies awaited them with revolvers drawn.
• The May 1913 arrest of Ruby Miller for “white slavery” human sex trafficking.
• Sheriff Wilson’s appointment of his daughter Frances as a deputy in 1916 – the first woman to serve as a Tazewell County sheriff’s deputy.
• The arrest of Nick Kepper for the murder of “bootlegger king” Tom Miller of East Peoria on 19 Sept. 1927. Kepper was sentenced to life in prison in the state penitentiary.
• The 1 Sept. 1932 death in his jail cell of Martin Virant, who was suspected as a material witness or accomplice in the murder of Lew Nelan at an East Peoria speakeasy. Virant had been severely beaten during interrogation by Sheriff Crosby’s deputies and had succumbed to his internal injuries. Two or more deputies then faked a hanging of Virant’s corpse. The incident sparked months of outrage and an attempted to impeach the sheriff and his entire force, but in the end no one was held accountable for Virant’s murder or the cover-up.
• The murder of Betty C. Crabb of Delavan in March 1938, a scandal that is the subject of Norman V. Kelly’s book “Shadow of a Nightmare.”
• The Aug. 1951 escape of two boys who had been arrested for breaking windows at a Delavan school. The boys ripped out some bars and got out the back door. Sheriff Saal apprehended the boys only four blocks away.
• The March 1956 escape of three teenage boys, who were being held at the jail for stealing a car in Anderson, Indiana. The boys used a broken broomstick and a wire coat hanger to jimmy the locks of the detention room and then stole a deputy’s car. The escapees were apprehended less than two hours later in Springfield.
• The Jan. 1957 murder of Mackinaw Night Marshall Charles H. Norris by three young men, who got hold of Norris’ own gun and used it to shoot him.

The above list of sheriffs and summary of notable events is drawn almost entirely from Susan Rynerson’s series on Tazewell County’s sheriffs that ran this year in the Tazewell County Genealogical & Historical Society’s Monthly newsletter.

The old Tazewell County Jail and Sheriff’s Residence, as shown in a 1949 photograph.

By 1960, the county was in need of a new and larger jail facility. Therefore, during George Saal’s second term as sheriff, the county began the construction of the McKenzie Building. The new facility was built at a cost of $1 million over a three-year period, from 1960 to 1963, to serve as the site of the new jail as well as certain county governmental offices. For many years after that the south half of the McKenzie Building housed the jail and the Tazewell County Sheriff’s Department – but gone were the days of the sheriff and his family living in the same building as the jail. In 2003 the jail and sheriff’s department moved to the current $16.5 million Tazewell County Justice Center located at the corner of Capitol and Elizabeth streets.

#albert-wallace, #arch-e-bartlemay, #athol-sebree-whitmore, #berry-gang, #betty-c-crabb, #bootlegger-king, #charles-h-norris, #christian-a-fluegel, #dan-cassey, #emil-neuhaus, #ernest-fleming, #ernest-leroy-fleming, #frances-c-wilson, #frances-c-wilson-jurgens, #frances-wilson, #frank-milton, #george-h-sweeter, #george-leroy-saal, #george-saal, #guy-emmet-donahue, #henry-pratt, #herbert-hirstein, #ike-berry, #james-alfonzo-norris, #james-hastings, #james-jackson-crosby, #johann-christian-friederich, #john-d-mount, #john-edmond-stout, #john-lee-wilson, #lew-nelan, #little-mine-riot, #mack-houchins, #martin-virant, #mckenzie-building, #murder-of-belle-wallace-bowlby, #nick-kepper, #norman-v-kelly, #pat-whitmore, #pekin-history, #ralph-croy-goar, #ralph-goar, #ray-owen-crafton, #robert-clay, #robert-ingersoll-clay, #ruby-miller, #samuel-moser, #sanborn-maps, #shadow-of-a-nightmare, #sheriff-arch-bartelmay-jr, #sheriff-chris-friederich, #sheriff-james-j-crosby, #susan-rynerson, #tazewell-county-genealogical-historical-society, #tazewell-county-history, #tazewell-county-jails, #tazewell-county-justice-center, #the-third-degree, #thomas-erb, #tom-miller, #william-berry, #william-cowhart, #william-eddie, #william-grant, #williamyoung

“The Elm” – a ‘history mystery’ from Pekin’s downtown

By Jared L. Olar

Local History Specialist

Recently a historical research query was submitted to the Pekin Public Library from someone who was seeking information about an old trade token that he had found. The trade token was from a business called “The Elm” that was located at 110 Court St. in downtown Pekin.

His query left me quite stumped, and neither he nor I were able to find any record of a business of that name located at that address. A systematic and thorough search through the old Pekin city directories from the 1890s to the 1960s was unable to turn up a single reference to “The Elm.”

An examination of the old Sanford Fire Insurance maps of Pekin indicates that there was no building at 110 Court St. that could have housed any business until the 1890s, so it only stands to reason that there would be no trace of “The Elm” in the 1861, 1871, 1887, or 1893 directories.

The 1885 Sanborn map of Pekin shows a small unidentified building, hardly large enough to house a business. By 1892, though, the Sanborn maps show that a large structure had been built at 110 and 112 Court St. – 110 Court was then the site of an unidentified saloon, while 112 Court was vacant.

It is only with the 1895 Pekin city directory that we find a business listed near the site of 110 Court St. The directory that year shows “Eagle Bottling Works, 112 Court, Wm Friedrich prop.”  But that was next door to 110 Court St., which seems to have been unoccupied that year.

In the 1898 directory, we find “Model Steam Laundry, O. D. Ramsey, propr.” at 112 Court, but again 110 Court is not listed. The Sanborn map that year shows 110 Court St. as the site of a saloon that had gone out of business, located next door to a steam laundry.

The next directory in our collection is for 1903-04. During that five-year gap in our directory collection, it is quite possible that “The Elm” was in operation at 110 Court St. as the mystery trade token would indicate. Notably, the 1903 Sanborn map again shows an unidentified saloon at 110 Court St., while 112 Court St. next door was vacant.

The 1903-04 city directory is the first to show a business at 110 Court St., for that directory includes this entry: “C. C. Glasford, prop. Glasford House, propr., cor 3rd and St. Mary, saloon, 110 Court.” That would mean Glasford House was at the corner of Third and St. Mary streets, but Glasford also operated a saloon at 110 Court St. (no doubt the one shown on the 1903 Sanborn map). The directory does not tell us the name of Glasford’s saloon. Could he have named his saloon “The Elm”?

This is 110 Court St. as shown in the 1885 Sanborn map of Pekin:

Next, we see a larger building at 110-112 Court St. in the 1892 Sanborn map of Pekin:

The same building appears in the 1898 Sanborn map of Pekin as the site of a steam laundry (at 112 Court St.) and a closed saloon (at 110 Court St.). Was the saloon called “The Elm”?

Finally, we see a saloon at 110 Court St. in the 1903 Sanborn map:

Our next city directory is from 1908, when we find 110 Court St. listed as the residence (or possibly the business site) of a certain man named Ed Forest. The directory does not shed any light on who Ed Forest was or whether he operated a business at that location.

The 1909 Pekin city directory says 110 Court St. was then the location of “Rasmussen & Ingrah’m.” These are probably Carl E. Rasmussen and Harry Ingraham, who are both listed in that directory as owning or working in a saloon, and both living at 114 Ann Eliza. Again, the directory does not specify the name of their saloon, so perhaps it was the mysterious “The Elm” we’re looking for.

From that point on, the record of businesses that operated at 110 Court St. is fairly complete in the city directories, and none of those businesses is said to have been named “The Elm.” Following is a table of city directory entries from 1913 to 1961:

1913       Van Boening storage (110-12 Court) – that must be Oscar Van Boening, proprietor of Pekin Livery Co., corner of N. Capitol and Ann Eliza.

1914       Same entry as 1913

1922       Vacant

1924       C. A. Hardt & Co. auto tires – Carl A. Hardt (and his wife Minnie)

1926       Pekin Auto Radiator & Tire Co., 110-12 Court, Stanley B. Griffith (which was next door to C. A. Hardt in 1924)

1928       Vacant

1930       Jones-Koeder Co. band instrument manufacturers; Halbert G. Jones, pres., Theophil M. Koeder, sec.-treas.

1932       Same entry as 1930

1934       Majestic Band Instrument Co., Halbert G. Jones, manager

1937       Superior Machine & Welding Works, Robert Nolan

1939       O. L. Carey & Son agricultural implements, owned and operated by O. L. Carey, of Lilly, Ill.

1941       Warehouse for Frank Rosenberg’s furniture and Lakeview Cemetery Lots Co., 109-19 Court.

1943       Same entry as 1941

1946       Same entry as 1941

1948       Eagle Insulating Co., 110-12 Court, Glen K. Hubbard

1950       Same entry as 1948

1952       Same entry as 1948

1955       Same entry as 1948

1958       Eagle Insulating Co., home improvement, 110 Court, James R. Burkett

1959       Same entry as 1958, but with the additional reference to “aluminum products and siding”

1961       Vacant

After 1961, and for the rest of the 1960s, “110 Court St.” doesn’t even appear in the directories. That would suggest that the building had been torn down, or perhaps was part of another business in that block of Court Street and thus did not get a separate directory entry. By this time, businesses in Pekin had ceased using trade tokens, so we can be sure “The Elm” was not around during the 1960s or later.

At this time, the mystery of “The Elm” and who owned and operated it must remain unsolved.

#110-court-street, #c-a-hardt-co, #c-c-glasford, #carl-a-hardt, #carl-e-rasmussen, #eagle-bottling-works, #eagle-insulating-co, #ed-forest, #frank-rosenberg, #glasford-house, #glen-k-hubbard, #halbert-g-jones, #harry-ingraham, #james-r-burkett, #jones-koeder-co, #majestic-band-instrument-co, #minnie-hardt, #model-steam-laundry, #o-d-ramsey, #o-l-carey, #o-l-carey-son, #oscar-van-boening, #pekin-businesses, #pekin-city-directories, #pekin-history, #pekin-livery-co, #robert-nolan, #sanborn-maps, #stanley-b-griffith, #superior-machine-welding-works, #the-elm, #theophil-m-koeder, #trade-tokens, #william-friedrich

Historic Sanborn maps show daily life’s grid

Here’s a chance to read again one of our old Local History Room columns, first published in January 2014 before the launch of this blog . . .

Historic Sanborn maps show daily life’s grid

By Jared Olar
Library assistant

The resources available in the Pekin Public Library’s Local History Room include an array of vintage maps and atlases of Pekin and other communities in Tazewell County reaching back to the 1860s. Among those maps are three bound collections of Pekin maps that are noticeably different from most other kinds of maps, and that can provide details and information not usually found on a map.

These are the historic insurance or fire maps of Pekin that were prepared by the Sanborn Map Company. The Local History Room’s collection includes three sets of Sanborn maps, from Nov. 1903, Dec. 1909, and Sept. 1925.

The value and usefulness of these historic maps of Pekin are explained by the description included on the maps cataloguing label, which characterizes the Sanborn maps as showing “The Grid of Daily Life.” The label says:

“Sanborn maps are primary sources essential to researchers in history, urban studies, genealogy, architecture, engineering, and countless other disciplines. Originally created for fire departments and risk assessors, they show details such as the outline of each building, construction materials, windows and doors, street names, street and sidewalk widths, property boundaries, building use, water mains, and more.”

The Sanborn Map Company produced this particular sort of map in order to help insurance companies conduct risk assessments on buildings, so fire insurance policies could be suitably crafted. That’s why Sanborn maps include the above listed details. What was originally intended to be useful for risk assessors also proved to be very helpful for municipal fire departments – the information on the maps was often of great help to firemen battling fires, because the maps could tell them what buildings were made out of, or where windows and entrances were located.

With the passing of time, and the construction and demolition of structures in Pekin, the old Sanborn maps now help historians and genealogists to discover the locations of old buildings, or to find out how long a particular structure has been standing, or to learn what a building was used for in the past.

For instance, the Nov. 1903 Sanborn map of Pekin shows the old Zerwekh Building at the corner of Fourth and Elizabeth streets. In those days, as the map indicates, it was the location of a bakery and a Masonic Lodge. Among the fascinating details about the Zerwekh Building that one can learn from this map are that there used to be two bakery ovens beneath the sidewalks along Elizabeth Street, built into the basement foundation on the north of the structure.

Later, the Zerwekh Building became the location of the Pekin Daily Times. The newspaper vacated its building in Aug. 2012, and the former Times Building was demolished this fall. In the process of demolition, several bricked-up passages were noticed in the basement foundation on the north side. Thanks to the Sanborn maps, we know what those “passages” were before they were bricked up by F. F. McNaughton: They were the ovens where Albert Zerwekh and his sons baked their breads, cakes, cookies and pastries.

This detail from the November 1903 Sanborn map of Pekin shows the block of Elizabeth Street between Fourth and Fifth streets, including (at the top) the old Zerwekh bakery and confectionary that later would serve for many decades as the home of the Pekin Daily Times newspaper.

#f-f-mcnaughton, #pekin-daily-times, #preblog-columns, #sanborn-maps, #zerwekh-building

A succession of county courthouses

By Jared Olar
Library assistant

The Tazewell County Courthouse in downtown Pekin celebrated its 100th birthday just last month. Serving the county for as long as it has, the courthouse is neither the first such structure in Tazewell County history nor the first courthouse to be built at that location.
As told in Charles C. Chapman’s 1879 “History of Tazewell County,” the first Tazewell County Courthouse was located in Mackinaw, which was originally the county seat, being located in the county’s center. The first courthouse, a log house 24 feet long and 18 feet wide, was built at a cost of $125 in the summer of 1827 on lot 1 of block 11. Improvements were made to the simple structure in 1830, but in the summer of 1831 the court relocated to the old Doolittle School at the corner of Elizabeth and Second streets in Pekin.

Pekin historian William H. Bates drew this representation of the first Tazewell County Courthouse, located in Mackinaw, for the “Historical Souvenir” that Bates published for the dedication of the new courthouse in 1916.

The court was relocated to Pekin because in Dec. 1830 the Illinois General Assembly had created McLean County out of the eastern portion of Tazewell County, which originally was much larger than it is today. With the redrawing of the border, Mackinaw was now toward the eastern edge of the county, and many county officials thought the new town of Pekin would make a better county seat than Mackinaw.
For the next few years, Pekin would function as the de facto county seat even though it had not been established as such by law. But in 1835 the state legislature appointed a commission to permanently fix Tazewell County’s seat, and the commission opted for Tremont rather than Pekin, because Tremont was close to the center of the county. The court moved to Tremont on June 6, 1836, and a temporary courthouse was promptly erected there at the cost of $1,150. Then in 1837 construction began on a permanent brick courthouse in Tremont for $14,450. That structure was completed in 1839 – the same year that the residents of Pekin formally began efforts to have the county seat transferred back to their town.

William H. Bates reproduced this photograph of the old Tazewell County Courthouse in Tremont for the 1916 “Historical Souvenir” that he published for the dedication of the new courthouse.

The contentious rivalry between Pekin and Tremont continued throughout the 1840s, and Chapman relates that, in their efforts to retain the county seat and to slow or halt Pekin’s growing prosperity, Tremont is said to have lobbied the General Assembly several times to have portions of Tazewell County sliced off and assigned to neighboring counties. After the election of May 1843, Chapman writes, “a stop [was] made to this dividing up and cutting off of Tazewell’s territory. Had they continued it much longer there would have been nothing left of the county but Pekin and Tremont. Then, we doubt not, a division would have been made and both towns have at least gained a county-seat.”
Further on, Chapman comments, “During these twenty years of local war, of course bitterness of feeling was intense, and great injury was done to all parts of the county. Many of the older citizens attribute very largely the prosperity and commercial advantages by Peoria over Pekin to the bitter feuds engendered during this long and eventful strife.”
The conflict ended in 1849, when the citizens of Tazewell County voted to move the county seat to Pekin, where it has remained ever since. A new courthouse was then built in Pekin in 1850, at the site of the present courthouse. “The question [of the county seat’s location] having been finally and definitely decided the courthouse was immediately erected by the citizens of Pekin, in fulfillment of their promise. The last meeting of the Board of Supervisors . . . that was held at Tremont was Aug. 26, 1850, when it moved in a body to their new and more commodious quarters, and on the same day dedicated the edifice by holding therein their first meeting in Pekin,” Chapman writes.
The old Tremont courthouse remained in use as a high school for several years, later being used as a community center and dance hall, until at last the ground level was used as tenements before the dilapidated structure was razed around 1895. The old county histories note that Abraham Lincoln practiced law in both the Tremont courthouse and the 1850 courthouse in Pekin.
“Pekin: A Pictorial History” notes that for the construction of the Pekin courthouse, “Gideon Rupert (his residence is the current homesite of the Noel-Henderson Funeral Home) contributed $600 and with others’ generosity, raised the needed funds for the building. The cost was $8,000. Local products of sandstone, quarried five miles northeast of Pekin, and bricks, fired at the Jansen and Zoeller Brickyard on the East Bluff, were used.” The building also had white marble columns.

The layout of the Tazewell County Courthouse Block in November 1903 is shown in this detail from a Sanborn fire insurance map of downtown Pekin. In addition to the courthouse, the block also encompassed a band stand, the county jail and Sheriff’s dwelling, and the county offices building. The courthouse, band stand, and offices building were demolished in 1914 to make way for a larger, even more grand courthouse.

Also helping to defray construction costs were prominent local landowners David and Elijah Mark, who each gave $500. The heirs of the Mark estate would eventually donate the land that would become James Field in Pekin.
The 1974 Pekin Sesquicentennial records the tradition that, “Older Pekinites claim that the columns of the old County Court House were painted black up to the height of the first floor doors because the white marble was marred by the hand and fingerprints of the loungers who leaned against them.”
The 1850 courthouse remained in use until 1914, when it was razed to make way for a new and larger edifice – the current structure, which was built over the next two years at a cost of $212,964.
“Wide marble steps and Italian-imported white marble banisters graced the ‘architecturally noteworthy’ interior of the courthouse dedicated on June 21, 1916,” according to “Pekin: A Pictorial History.”
“Thousands attended the dedication services with Illinois congressman and candidate for governor, W.E. Williams, as the featured speaker. According to the Pekin Daily Times, Congressman Williams, ‘spoke for an hour and fifteen minutes . . . .’”

his vintage photograph shows the laying of the new Tazewell County Courthouse’s cornerstone in 1914. Standing next to scaffolding in the foreground is William H. Bates displaying the time capsule to the crowd before it was sealed in the cornerstone.

Shown is a key to the old 1850 Tazewell County Courthouse that was preserved in the 1902 Pekin Library Cornerstone time capsule. Another key to the old courthouse was included in the 1914 courthouse cornerstone time capsule.

Though the old 1850 courthouse is long gone, some of the marble was claimed by Pekin’s pioneer photographer Henry Hobart Cole for use in the home he built in Tuscarora Heights in Peoria County.
Other surviving mementos of the 1850 structure are two courthouse keys. One was placed in a cornerstone time capsule at the construction the old Pekin Public Library in 1902. That time capsule was opened when the old library was razed in 1972, and that courthouse key and the other contents of the cornerstone, which were found to be in a very good state of preservation, are kept in the library’s historical archives. Another courthouse key was found in the recently opened 1916 courthouse time capsule.

The layout of the Tazewell County Courthouse Block in September 1925 is shown in this detail of a Sanborn fire insurance map of downtown Pekin. The courthouse’s cornerstone was laid in 1914.

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