Excerpt from Documents and Biography Pertaining to the Settlement and Progress of Stark County, Illinois: Containing an Authentic Summary of Records, Documents, Historical Works and Newspapers Relating to Indian History, Original Settlement, Organization and Politics, Courts and Bar, Citizen Soldiers, Military Societies, Marriages, Churches, Schools

Istory is the pith or substance of collected biographies or of the lives of men and women of a State. It is the drama of set tlement and progress - a link of golden truths which binds us to the past. History is also the monument, built during our own lives, to be our instructor, and beyond this present time it looks into the future as a warning teacher. Local history is not only history as defined, but also history and biography - grasping the most minute details connected with the persons and events identified with the progress of a county, township or village. The past and present the whole fabric of society the home, school, church, literary and benevolent societies, governmental and military organizations, agriculture, commerce, manufactures and all these institutions which draw men's interests together, should be traced to their humble beginnings, and every name and date placed in such form as to be a treasure for all time; for Old Father Time will one day call up such records. Local history, while embracing all such details of men and women and events, should not revel in records of vice and decay. Its teach ings should be pure, and, to have them so, he who would lead the people of the present time to a higher nobility of character and purpose must not give the story of decay and vice, and shame and crime in detail.

The introduction to this work is peculiar in its practical character. It is not here to enlarge the volume or to comply with any known literary style; but to place honestly before the people a concise instruction in the whole history of the United States and of Illinois, while leading down to the period when the little commonwealth of Stark came into existence.

The general history of the county is embraced in the first fifteen chap ters, each one exhausting its subject, without detracting from the details of township, village and family history, contained in the eight great chap ters which follow. The plan of township history is simplified by making the personal sketches and reminiscences of the people of each division of the county, a part of the division chapter, arranging them alphabetically. This plan, however, will not place before the reader at once all the family history of a township because, owing to change of location, a pioneer of one division, may be an old settler of a second, and a modern resident of a third township. To provide a ready reference in this case, a list of the families treated in this volume is given and the contents table made very complete.

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