HE ae Ha Pat fae DIET iii tie [msrasypestsenapepueaieneeseersatpeepieionstigenmeemanteceterasderdoioaietarpiem aie temereeared hari eeeereaenes ieteerieaen eaten eee ee SITTER E NESS nT aS SSeS STDS TORS E Ie et ER ARAN SIRS ER SH CONS ARERR TIS Sit SEALS NAILED IPL REA AR IPE CD NES SA IN OE ES eae a SE SSS SRN ea eae te ype ee ee eee eee Milhit OSGERECLOPAREAEDIEAER AES DOABAICROREAEL RA Lait basi ienee iene 1 PRGA BOSERASSSSAEDIERLE SERIE SRLSEE RSL aaee Ea ae? ‘ ‘ ry ; a - j ‘ 3 i en % o it i v4 ‘ i¢ 4 vo 'd i - ‘ ; { iv? x Pd ; va ere ae . a pas mA a > + aye i) THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES THE Camp GuarpDIAN THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES By GEORGE A. BRENNAN Illustrated from Photographs By Frank N. HOHENBERGER INDIANAPOLIS THE BOBBS-MERRILL COMPANY PUBLISHERS CopyriGHT, 1923 By THe Bopsps-MErRRILL COMPANY Printed in the United States of America Dee. 9, 194), ML, Hwang. G - 4 c ww A tt Fr. QL Ger Sept 4 7 <= pe a = Se ae Pee To MY WIFE SOPHIA M. BRENNAN A PIONEER OF THE CALUMET REGION WHOSE ASSISTANCE HAS BEEN OF GREAT VALUE THIS BOOK IS DEDICATED For For For For For THANKSGIVING ee all Thy ministries, morning mist, and gently-falling dew; summer rains, for winter ice and snow; whispering wind and purifying storm; the reft clouds that show the tender blue; For the forked flash, and long tumultuous roll; For For For For For For For For For mighty rains that wash the dim earth clean; the sweet promise of the seven-fold bow; the soft sunshine, and the still calm night; dimpled laughter of soft summer seas; latticed splendor of the sea-born moon; gleaming santls, and granite frontled cliffs; flying spume, and waves that whip the skies; rushing gale, and for the great glad calm; Might so mighty, and for Love so true, With equal mind, We thank Thee, Lord! JoHN OxENHAM INTRODUCTION Just a little beyond our eastern gateway lies the Dune country,— the vast garden of mid-America. Within easy reach of millions, it has remained practically unknown. But have we not always been blind to the great treasures of the out-of-doors? Man allows himself in his own conceit to do things that make him forget he is an inseparable part of nature, and that, in wild beauty untrampled by his kind, he may find himself. The Dune country possesses all the charm, mystery and beauty that primitive America has to offer anywhere. Countless ages are written in its sand-hills, and its to-morrow is in the making. High above the Dune woods loom the gray heads of the Dune giants, where the west wind and the sand play tag over carpets of bearberry, among gnarled oaks centuries old. Farther down, in the blowouts and on the Dune meadows, friends of pleasanter climes, like the cactus, have found shelter and protection far away from their ancestral homes. Here the North, the South, the East and the West meet in cheerful rivalry, each selecting as its own, the place to which it is best adapted. It is a native arboretum of vast instruction to those who seek knowledge in the out-of-doors of plant and animal life. It is a shrine for solace and quietness in contrast to the turbulent life of the great city. Here you will find intimate beauty and hidden treasures of the flower world, besides great dramatic expressions in the moving sands and the forest-covered Dunes of long ago. Here you may wander among buried woods of unknown ages and sit in contemplation on lands of to-day. Trails of bygone times, blazed by Indian and pioneer, and shaded by a host of centenarians, give thought for reflection and historic reminiscence. Magic are the Dunes where they meet the sea—the sea that bore them. There is an ocean-like grandeur in the broad stretches of beaches; the waves, chasing one another in madness, pitch high; the INTRODUCTION west wind roars and the sand blizzard rules; seagulls fill the air like giant snowflakes. Then the Dune country is in its making, and a grand drama is enacted on those Indiana shores. Spring, when dogwood and shadbush vie with each other in gar- landing hills and valleys; when violets and columbine cover the forest floor with a carpet for fairies only to tread upon;.when seas of lupines invade the Dune meadows, and the love songs of mating birds fill the air! Summer, in deep green, with shadows refreshed by cooling breezes from. the lake. ; Autumn, when the Dune partakes of every ray in the rainbow; when sand-cherries set the beaches aflame; and the sand and wind- beaten pines look at it all in amazement, reflected in the turquoise sea. Winter, in its white mantle of snow, a fairy-land marked by the footprints of its native inhabitants. A people possessing love for this country will never sacrifice this out-of-doors shrine. With zealous eyes they watch over it and guard its destiny far into the to-morrow. Jens JENSEN. FOREWORD For many years the Dunes, with its beauty and wealth of scenery, has been the author’s favorite haunt. The rambles there presented many opportunities for enjoying the beauties of the Dunes and becom- ing acquainted with their geography, plants, animals and history. When Higley and Raddin, in 1891, published the Flora of Cook County, Illinois, and Lake County, Indiana, for the Chicago Academy of Sciences, it was the good fortune of the author to be of some assistance in the preparation of that work. For a number of years his attention has been given to the study of the history of the Chicago Dune region. Many interviews with old settlers in different sections have been held; many trips over old Indian trails and pioneer roads have been made on foot and photographs taken; interesting and historic places, now forgotten or even passed away, have been visited; libraries in Illinois and Indiana have been consulted for data on the early history of this region so that the historical events here chronicled may be accurately recorded. So little is known of the beautiful Duneland by the majority of people, that the author has been urged by his friends to write a book describing both its natural features and its history. For that purpose this book has been written. It is not a scientific-historical treatise, but a popular description of the Dune region,—that Mecca of the nature lover and the brain weary—by one who has often found rest and inspiration there. The author would express to the following friends his great appre- ciation of aid rendered: Doctor Frank M. Woodruff, Curator of the Chicago Academy of Sciences, who is the leading authority on the birds of the Chicago region; Mrs. Gertrude M. Walker, of Chicago, for her interesting notes on a number of the birds observed in the Dunes, with dates of appearance; Mr. Richard Lieber, Director of Indiana Department of Conservation, for his very great assistance; Honorable Martin T. Krueger, the patriotic, public-spirited former Mayor of Michigan City, Indiana, for some very valuable history of FOREWORD that region; Mr. M. T. Green, of Tremont, on history of the Tremont region; Mr. Daniel Kelly, of Valparaiso, Indiana, on the early history of the Calumet River and Miller; Mr. Jens Jensen, for his charming introduction; Miss Caroline M. McIlvaine, Librarian Chicago Histori- cal Society; Mrs. Jessie Palmer Weber, Secretary Illinois Historical Society, Springfield, Illinois; Mrs. Harriet Taylor, Assistant Librarian Newberry Library, Chicago; Miss Jessie M. Woodford, Assistant Librarian, Chicago Public Library; Miss Irene C. Murphy, Librarian Illinois Society, Sons of the American Revolution, Chicago; and Mr. Louis M. Bailey, Librarian Gary Public Library. To the members of the various organizations that are cooperating for the preservation of the Dunes, and who have taken so warm an interest in the preparation of this book, the author would express his sincerest appreciation; especially to the Prairie Club, the Out Door Art League, the Arche Club, the Chicago Nature Club, the Chicago Woman’s Club, the Wild Flower Preservation Society and the National Dunes Park Association. —G. A. B. CONTENTS PART ONE History CHAPTER I THe PREHISTORIC PEOPLE Il THe AMERICAN INDIANS III THe FrencH Occupation IV Ferpinanp La SALLE V Tue CoNQUEST OF THE Nee iente VI Tue Cuyicaco MASSACRE VII PioneER LIFE : VIII Loc Casins, PRAIRIE Seda eiee AND Gane IX JosepH Bartty—THE Fur-TRADER X Mr. Joun G. Morcan XI PeEr1op or EXPANSION XII Praces or INTEREST XIII THe Worx or TIME XIV Dunes Nationa Park PART TWO THE WoNDERS OF THE DUNES XV Tue BEAvTIES oF THE DUNES XVI GEOGRAPHY XVII PLants XVIII FLowers or THE Dunes XIX ANIMALS XX Brirps XXI Pe eeContiived XXII Orner Anima LIFE : ConcLusion: Wuy THE DUNES Snniin Br ives PAGE 1] 22 32 45 62 73 100 114 128 137 151 163 183 191 210 223 242 263 280 313 323 wt : 7 “a Al j ‘ . ' ‘ > . i i. i. 9 i i yy } } . a4 ‘ x ‘ . 1 ¥ ,. t Li ! ' wa + \ ) an > 7 ‘a Oe vi , | ; ree ia ae ‘ ‘ i RY, ’ ii . ‘ A ; ; ng ‘ 4 d i) j 7 if ‘ Fi i + 7 ’ 4 \ a! th i) ne a a ea , ‘ey po) ae ie j 1 f : ae ms i . ' } ue au Fe { ; it i \ “Are ' i pA) i Hen ir j ‘ nu’ TA i” a Gy ‘ 1 ate 2 AN CPOE aye . . eM ls Pil : 1 he Wy, Ld “+ is * ia At, A } ee ; wae ‘ i JS ae ar , ( ’ wat . / f a a Od 2 : ' 1% eernee lt, Tie Vy, , rn ’ ; | | ri, ’ am, ti £ y : : } io 2 ‘ Rw ae ‘ { i ; ‘ y | i * 7 iis ' \ * ; ‘ < ' 4 wif To Ta | * " aoe i ; , . Pl A ' fi ; i ; x is \ , * \ F) 4 ’ . . % : \ ‘ : ( 5 f i | ‘ ) " : ‘ P ' ; f i ‘ g ‘ J } yee f ie r i H 3 . . - ‘ i ; dite | f ‘ } F ’ ' T i ‘ £ a ‘ ’ é : aid \ ) f ‘ . abe ‘ ‘ ‘ ‘ : > aS 9 } / ‘ ¢ ian "i ‘i oe | t ‘ ‘ i | (EA Prater et ga b rs ae i Pay Mae } j ' * , it 2 ret i Tau x af ' i,t ah : J 4 . Pei CAN eae ‘ag { i ‘i 7 fF a) ; j 1 1 AGEN A a ea | eee She al See aN | # An , i ‘ , * | # : ; ti ‘ in , 4 Laan) } ‘ | rive | : ; PM ic Sih. itee eA — ) ] } a AT ae 4," ua 1 ae y vo Me ad Heel wo, a : ait & er y 1 ~t h oe ak ? : 4 iy 2 4 7, ' is! ; ~ + hie 4 ‘ af > ' ¢ 4 | ‘ i ‘ ' 7 ‘ ‘ ‘ ne %\ st ~ a af : 1s " of) t? , } + mes ; A ' y ' ‘ yi a _ PART ONE HISTORY Wh i be ie a i+ ' { > : : ‘ 4 is rr is Bd J PD, ; cur i ’ y% Bi: ' d ‘ J y | + . j , fi ! i aia! ¢ 7 , Ban eral 4 ] t ra i ‘ ’ ¢ ' ’ } ae . J A i Lt ee iy | \ ~ af +B! . fy A a7 , ) 1] ) nh ¥ - t \ j : t ‘ i . : " , j . f . '] : 5 ’ : rh j tf ‘ { : ) L : i . » 3 \ ) j . J } ‘ t “| # t ‘ n »- i j : ‘ ) oa i ‘ ev . ivr > , [ \ sy ys —_ : 1 i ne ¥ . ' ‘ . hi a ’ . | , { ie 4 | 4 : | : : ‘ f 7 eh la Fa ‘ i. i i A Daa) ‘ eA is , 7 MTS > Hy: Pe oF The Wonders of the Dunes CHAPTER I THE PREHISTORIC PEOPLE For ages the Chicago Dune region, ranging from Wauke- gan to Michigan City, has been one of the centers of life and activity on the American continent. Here was every- thing to attract settlers in primeval, prehistoric days. The many large animals found in the woods bordering the shores of Lake Michigan and the rivers and lakes connected with it; the myriads of fish and water fowl; the great beds of shell-fish; the wild rice everywhere in the inlets, rivers and great marshes,—furnished everything that prehistoric dwellers needed for food, clothing and shelter. According to a scanty tradition these prehistoric people were undoubtedly of a very low type; they may have be- longed to the same type as those who have left the great shell mounds along the Atlantic coast and the many rivers leading into it. They were probably the ancestors of the Skraellings, or Eskimos. While it is not known definitely who they were, it is believed they were living here at the end of the Glacial Period, and possibly with the ancient lion, tiger, mastodon and mammoth. I 2 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES The tradition of the Rune Stone Expedition to the Great Lakes in Minnesota in 1362, via the Dunes, was based on a tradition that some of the Norsemen took a trip to the West on an exploring tour. This trip is mythical. The Rune Stone was a stone tablet with Runic letters cut in it, dug up at Kensington, Minnesota, purporting to have been buried there by the Norsemen, in 1362. It is not stated in the report of this mythical trip of the Norsemen to Kensington, Minnesota, who the savages were that killed some of these explorers; whether Skraellings or Indians. About this time, 1362, the Indians undoubtedly must have spread through the country, driving the Eskimos north, and occupying a pretty large territory. The Indians of the present tribes were not the first inhabitants to dwell in the Mississippi Valley. The first dwellers in the Chicago Dune region were probably savage, primitive people of prehistoric times, who may have been the ancestors of the Skraellings or Eskimos. They may have been pushed north and east by the com- ing of a new race from the West, probably the Chippewa Indians; these were pushed up north in their turn by an- other race that evidently came from the south, whom we call the Mound Builders, because they have left so many mounds of various kinds. There is a great diversity of opinion among historians and scientists as to whether the Indians are descendants of the Mound Builders. It is very probable that the later Indians from the West killed the more civilized Mound Builders, and married their women as is the usual custom among primitive races. The Indian was also a Mound Builder; but our present- day Indians are not able either to plan or execute the won- THE PREHISTORIC PEOPLE 3 derful mounds erected by the inhabitants of the Mississippi Valley many centuries ago, probably long before the landing of the Norsemen. On some of the mounds, great trees have been found dating several centuries before the landing of Columbus. If the Indians were descendants of the Mound Builders, it is likely they would have retained much of the skill of these people. It is possible that the Mound Builders came to the United States from Mexico, which had been settled for many cen- turies, and these Mound Builders may have considered this country Mexico’s colony. Perhaps they were mixed with some white blood from Europe or northern Africa. At- lantis may have been the West Indies before the great cataclysm that destroyed her. The Mayas of Mexico had traffic with Cuba for many centuries as Cuba was her colony. It is absurd to believe that America was settled from Siberia only. | The Dewey collection of twelve thousand relics dug up in New York, and recently presented to the New York State Museum, sheds light on the early settlement not only of New York, but also of the whole northern part of the United States, and southern part of Canada, from the Great Lakes to the Atlantic coast. Doctor Arthur C. Parker, the noted State Archzologist of New York, states that these relics came from many different tribes and classes of Indians. He says: “In the most ancient cities explored by Mr. Dewey unques- tional vestiges of a people strongly resembling the Eskimos were discovered. In cities of the next later period relics of the early Algonquins appeared. Still later appear the Mound 4 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES Builders, and the specimens found by Mr. Dewey are among the most remarkable ever discovered in this state. “The collection shows evidence that the Mound Builders were displaced by later people, perhaps another branch of the Algonquins from the West. In their turn these later comers were displaced by the war-like Iroquois, who expelled all other tribes from the region we now know as New York State, and claimed it as their own. “For instance, among the articles which are evidence of the Eskimos’ occupation of New York is a beautifully made semilunar knife, having near its top a natural inclusion of calcite—crystal of lime—which spreads out in ornamental form like some strange Mongolian symbol. It must have been highly prized both by owner and maker who took such care to preserve the natural design on the stone. It was used in splitting open the fish found in the Genessee River and its tributaries. It is difficult to say how old this specimen is, but it is not improbable that it dates back ten thousand years. It is much like those used in the north by the Eskimos.”’ Doctor Parker goes on to state that remains of camps of these people have been found around Lake Ontario, Lake Champlain, and the Mohawk and Hudson Rivers. Doctor Parker thinks the Eskimos migrated from the North by means of dog sleds, because the bones of dogs are some- times found with their relics. This is undoubtedly true, but evidently some of their traveling was done in their skin boats, as described by the Norsemen at Vinland, who said the Skraellings were so many that their canoes darkened the ocean. The mounds that are scattered through the Mississippi Valley are of different kinds and are often surrounded by or set in combination with earthworks of various forms. The large mounds are of different forms, such as the Altar Ure bniec is) ORIG PEOPLE 5 Mounds, Burial Mounds, Temple Mounds, Animal Mounds, and small ones that may have been raised for dwelling pur- poses, as was done in the Old World and parts of the New by driving piles in the water. These low mounds, from one to five or six feet in height, and from thirty to over one hundred forty feet in diameter, are found from the Gulf of Mexico to the Arkansas Valley and in Texas. The state archeologist of Oklahoma has explored thousands of these mounds lately. They have remains of poles fastened to a central post, like a huge umbrella, making a circular dwelling. This was covered with brush and sod. Some central posts were ten or fifteen feet high, with poles twenty to thirty feet long, radiating from the branched top of the central post. One large mound had thirty-five crushed skeletons in it. They are also found in the southeastern part of the Mississippi Valley and extend to Canada, following the Mississippi with its tributaries, and especially the Ohio. The Cahokia region around East St. Louis, Illinois, has a number of mounds, the chief of which is the great Cahokia Mound, Monk’s Mound, which may have had a temple or temples on its flat top, which was four hundred and fifty feet long and two hundred feet wide. It is supposed that religious festivals or meetings were held on this mound, which is considered by some writers as partly natural. Doctor W. K. Moorehead, of the University of Illinois, studied these in 19ZzI and 1922 and found them artificial. “The Origin of the Cahokia Mounds,” by Doctor A. R. Crook, in the Bulle- tin of the Illinois State Museum, is the very latest word on that subject to date, May, 1922. The Altar Mounds were peculiar, and formed of several 6 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES distinct layers of sand and dirt heaped over a baked center on the ground, of burned bodies or articles belonging to some person. A small mound was placed over it and then several layers placed over this. Beneath these mounds were placed the articles to be preserved, though they were gen- erally melted. In the Burial Mounds, one or more people of prominence were buried and many of their goods were buried with them, such as spear-heads, arrows, flint knives, stone axes; occasionally knives and spears of copper. Doctor Frederick Starr, the eminent anthropologist of the University of Chicago, is of the opinion that the present Indians are descendants of the original Mound Builders and that the following types of mounds are characteristic of these Indians: | The Animal Mounds of Wisconsin, some of which are several hundred feet in length, he attributes to the ancestors of the Winnebagoes. | The Cherokees he considers as the builders of the regular Ohio Valley Mounds, while the Shawnees may be the de- scendants of the Stone Grave people. These stone graves were very striking. The makers dug a grave and lined it with pieces of flat stones, generally limestone or sandstone, all put together with skill and almost perfectly tight. Doctor Blatchley, in the geologic report of Lake and Porter Counties, Indiana, for 1897, states that the Mound Builders for many centuries had made this region their home, as everything they needed was here; fishes and mussels in the streams and lakes; wild fowls by myriads; buffalo, deer and game in untold numbers inhabited the THE PREHISTORIC PEOPLE ~ - prairie, while the beaver, otter and muskrat crowded the basins of the Calumet and Kankakee. 7 On the “sand islands” and high spots of the prairie and marsh were their mounds and burial-grounds. ‘Many speci- mens were found of ancient bones, and arrow-heads of obsidian, like glass, that speaks of commerce with ancient Mexico and its volcanoes, just as the finding of copper in the mounds of Southern States generally speaks of the Lake Superior region. In many of the mounds, articles of native copper have been found; some apparently cast, though mostly beaten out by stone hammers and other tools. Some of these copper knives have been tempered as hard as steel, the secret for which was lost for many centuries, though it is now recovered and is in use. One great mass of copper, weighing over six tons, was found in the Lake Superior region, eighteen feet under- ground, raised on a bench five feet high. From the num- ber of heavy stone hammers and other tools found there, many people must have been at work. As they were not farmers, there must have been some trade established even with the tribes down south. An explorer on the Isle Royale, Lake Superior, found in 1822 remains of a large town there, with tools used for mining copper. Very ancient. In the mounds in Wisconsin have been found different implements of copper, such as long spear-heads, axes, chisels, arrows, etc., often hard tempered. Some have been found in the Chicago and Dune region and also all kinds of artifacts or things made by these ancient people; for example, a chisel of hammered copper three and one-half 8 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES inches long, one and one-half inches wide and one-fourth of an inch thick. This was taken from a wolf’s burrow just west of Cedar Lake. Other relics that have been taken from mounds in this region are great stone axes, spears, hammers, skinners, arrows, pestles, rolling pins, awls, ornaments of various kinds, vases, pipes and beads. Some of the mounds were quite large; the finest group was situated near Boone Grove, Porter County, consisting of eight mounds, on an area of thirty acres. One of the large mounds was about seventy feet across and ten feet high. When several of the larger ones were opened in 1897, no skeletons were found, only ashes and an arrow- head. The largest mound, one hundred feet in diameter and twelve feet high, was examined, and a skeleton was found in the center, ten feet from the top, with head pointing to the south. Most of it crumbled to dust on removing it. No artifacts or relics of any kind were found. An extensive group of mounds close to Tremont Sta- tion on the South Shore Electric is described by M. T. Green and his uncle, John Wheeler, of Tremont. This group was crossed by the Valparaiso Road, about one block south of Green’s house, and is in the little valley below Frank Koskowski’s house, extending from east of Carlson’s house past Miss Myer’s house on the west, to the Olson farm, a distance of a mile. Skinner says that many mounds have been found in the Kankakee region of Porter and Lake Counties, as well as farther north. Mr. Wheeler, who was born in the old Wheeler house— now Carlson’s—on the border of this Mound Valley sixty- THE PREHISTORIC PEOPLE 9 six years ago, and Mr. M. Green, who played on them fifty-five years ago, both say at that time there were nearly one hundred mounds in the little valley, and this is con- firmed by other old settlers. These mounds ranged from twenty to fifty feet across and were from six to ten feet high. Most of these mounds were round, but some were ellipti- cal, and from ten to forty feet long. The old settlers called these mounds, “Indian graves.” The valley would be flooded and the water would freeze in winter; and Mr. Green said that in skating, the mounds, all of which had trees on them, made capital resting places. Much of Mound Valley was then covered' with trees. Green, when a boy, wished to see what was in the mounds, and excavated one. He found part of a skeleton, the skull apparently pointed toward the center; this crumbled into dust upon exposure to the air. A number of stone arrow- heads, knives, hammers and pieces of pottery were obtained ; also the remains of a long steel knife with bone handle were found. When he drew it out, the blade fell entirely to rust, and nearly all of the bone handle likewise crumbled. This looks like a later burial. Much of the soil of the mounds was reddish. In the course of time many of these mounds were dug into by people and the contents appropriated. The mounds were leveled by the plow as the space was needed for farm- ing, and the contents scattered. Most of them had all kinds of stone relics. Few steel knives were found. In the spring of 1917, Mrs. Brennan, Mr. Green and myself visited Mr. Koskowski, the owner of that part of Mound Valley west of the Valparaiso Road, and in- 10 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES spected the sites of various mounds, especially the large one about forty feet across. We noticed that the sandy ground there was more reddish than the surrounding soil. No artifacts or relics were found in the soil, as they had been removed long before. Remains on Carlson’s farm were also inspected. CHAPTER II THE AMERICAN INDIANS THe American Indians differed from one another in language, stature, color and habits, the most civilized be- ing the Troquois, who had progressed so far as to have settled towns, with rows of apartment-houses, one story high, called “long houses,” fruit trees, gardens, etc. The most progressive of the Algonquin tribes were the Chip- pewas, or according to the Indian name, Ojibwas; of which the other name is a corruption. They had also the largest territory, and may have been the first arrivals from the West that Doctor Parker mentions. This tribe was one of the very oldest in America, and became noted for its intelligence, especially on account of its literature. Hiawatha was an Ojibwa or Chippewa, and Longfellow made use of these remarkable legends. The Chippewa language is considered one of the most interesting of all the Indian languages, and was spoken by the leading Indians of almost every tribe; this is still so in Canada. It is also the lingua franca of the Algonquins. It must have taken many centuries to develop this literature and acquire this commanding position. Doctor Rowland B. Orr, the learned Director of the Ontario Provincial Museum, says in his article on the Chip- I! I2 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES pewas in the 1918 Archeological Report, that the Algonquin long houses differ but little from those of their hereditary enemies across the lake, the Iroquois. These long houses were of various sizes, from twenty, and forty feet, to even sixty to one hundred feet long and twenty feet broad. In building these houses basswood was preferred; the bark was taken off in strips from six to nine feet long, then pressed flat. The splendid collection of Ojibwa myths and legends described in these archeological reports by Colonel G. E. Laidlaw, is most interesting and instructive. While the ordinary conception is that the Indian brave was lazy and the squaw was compelled to do all of the work, the truth is that both were workers. The Indian was obliged to get animal food, flesh, fowl, and often shell-fish ; to get furs and skins for clothing and tents. To fight the enemy ; either in defense, to get better hunting lands, or to avenge the loss of some brother. All this called for hard strenuous labor. The squaw was a good housewife, whose heart was in her wigwam, whose highest ideal was in taking good care of her husband and children. She took great pride in his prowess and gladly did all in her power to make her home happy. She was not only a cook, but also a tailoress, making the family clothes; ornamenting them in various ways, staining them different colors, by using different plants; golden seal and osage orange for yellow; bloodroot for red, and butternut husks for brown. She was likewise a gar- dener, raising tobacco, corn, beans, squash and pumpkins, and she gathered crabapples and nuts. She became an expert in making pemmican, that mix- THE AMERICAN INDIANS 13 ture of fine, sun-dried buffalo meat, mixed with delicious buffalo fat, and dried berries, very nourishing and kept for years without spoiling. When buffalo were not obtainable, bear or deer meat was used, but it was not so palatable. Buffalo fat was very easily digested, some writers declaring they could drink a pint of it without bad results. Their houses were built in various styles. The long type of house was often made warmer by fastening on furs or skins, and the earthen floors likewise were covered with them. When winter tents were used, these were made warmer by using two or three thicknesses of skins, and having a double or triple wide band extending from half- way up on the inside to the bottom of the tent and covering the floor for some feet, to prevent the cold air from entering. Their implements of warfare were mostly made of wood, reenforced by sharpened stones of various kinds, generally flint, quartz or occasionally obsidian brought from the West. Their bows were made of second-growth hickory, ash, oak or other hardwood. The ordinary bow was of a single piece, but was sometimes made of several pieces, of bone or horn lashed together with sinew. They had various kinds of arrow-heads, made of stones, with shafts of wood; sometimes reeds or canes. Their spears were of various types, ranging from a short javelin to a long spear for close combat. Their tomahawks were of stone, sharpened at the end, with a handle of wood or hide. The war-club sometimes had flat edges or was pointed at each end. Knives were of flint also. The Indians were glad to get steel knives and tomahawks, and very'eager to get guns and pistols. A scalping knife from the old Indian cemetery, adjoin- 14 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES ing the eastern part of Jens Jensen Blowout, in which the Dunes Pageant was held at Waverly Beach, was dug up by the writer several years ago. Upon digging it out of the sand, part of the bone handle fell to dust, showing its extreme age. The blade is badly rusted. Captain Charles H. Robinson, the leading expert on arch- zology of the Prairie Club, states that it is identically the same pattern as those used by the Indians in the Revolu- tionary War and may date from that period. Major Henry Lee thinks it was found on Lieutenant Du Quindre’s battle- ground, the spot claimed by Du Quindre, near which he claimed to have defeated Hamelin and Brady in 1780; but as Du Quindre was a fraud, and was not in any fight, that claim must be abandoned. One weapon, not generally known as being used by our American Indians, is the blow-gun. Doctor Orr, in the Ontario, Canada, Archaeological Report of 1918, says: “The. blow-gun, though once very common, is now, a weapon of the past in this province. Morgan describes it as a wooden tube six feet long and an inch thick. In the half- inch bore was placed a slender dart, two feet long, sharp- pointed, and with a ball of thistledown at the base. “The dart could be discharged with great accuracy by blowing below it in the tube. One of these guns was pre- sented to the museum by Mr. Parish, who secured it in the interior of British Guiana, and differs only from those de- scribed by Morgan, in that cotton was used instead of thistle- down, and the sharp point of the dart was dipped in poison.”’ (Probably “quiarra.” ) Miss Frances Howe speaks of the Indians coming from a great distance, even from Northern Michigan and Wis- THE AMERICAN INDIANS 15 consin, to the Dunes for the poison of snakes—rattlers and copperheads—and of poisonous plants, which were used in making deadly poison; one in which the points of the ar- row, and probably the points of slender darts for the blow- guns, were dipped; and the other, the “black medicine,” very poisonous, was dropped into food or water. One loathsome habit the Indians had, and which was the occasion of much work and worry on the part of the early missionaries, the Jesuit Fathers, was the habit of canni- balism. It was much more prevalent in those early days than is generally believed at the present time, and early accounts speak of it. Prisoners captured in war were often killed and eaten. Parkman speakes of the naked Indian cannibals. When Langlade, about 1752, made his famous march with a body of Ottawa warriors from Mackinaw through Michigan to Kekionga or Miami Town, now Fort Wayne, his force captured the town and the Miami chief, La- Demoiselle, as well as some English traders. His men killed LaDemoiselle, boiled him and ate him, to the great horror of the English traders. This beastly action gave such a feeling of disgust to the civilized world, that, ac- cording to Bancroft, it was one of the inciting causes of the great Seven Years’ War, which included our French and Indian War. Many records of Indian life from early Colonial times have been handed down to the author from his relatives who have met Indians from Plymouth to Philadelphia, and sometimes have been obliged to battle with them, and this account of their cannibalism is part of the record. A beau- tiful and exceedingly rare Indian club was given to an ancestor, Colonel Sebastian Bauman of New York, the 16 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES Father of American Artillery, by a Mohawk chief, about 1760. An old Sioux chief, Seven Mountains, nearly a hun- dred years old, who saw this lately in the Brennan collection of old family relics, at the Chicago Historical Society, ex- pressed great surprise and pleasure at it, and said he had not seen one like it since he was a young man, and that it be- longed to some great medicine man and chief. No ordinary chief was allowed to have one like it. Charles F. Gunther, the historical collector, said he thought it came originally from the Pacific Islands. That might explain its bis. and possibly its religious character. Another relative, Captain John Atswood, iikeistene of Milford, New Haven Colony, was one of the commissioners from New Haven to the New England Confederation in 1643, which, was formed to protect the colonists against the Indians. Other relatives settling at Plymouth, 1620, Bos- ton, 1630, Newark, New Jersey, in 1666, along the Hud- son River, in New York and in Pennsylvania, from 1700 to 1760, lived in Indian territory for many generations, and knew them and their habits thoroughly. ‘Most of this information handed down from old Colonial and Revolutionary relatives has been found to be reliable. Before Marquette came to the Chicago Dune region in 1675, the Illinois Indians occupied the greater part of the Illinois and Indiana region, especially around Lake Michi- gan and also held much territory along the Illinois River. Their trail along Michigan Avenue to One Hundred Twenty-seventh Street, thence to Blue Island, thence south- west to old Kaskaskia, is called the Illini Trail. They were gradually forced south by the Miamis, and when Marquette came in 1675, the Weas, a branch of the THE AMERICAN INDIANS 17 Miamis, occupied the Chicago and Dune region, while the head tribe of the Miamis, the Twight Weas or Crane Miamis, had their headquarters at Kekionga, now Fort Wayne, at the Maumee-Wabash Portage. A large and noted village of these Crane Miamis was later located at Maramech, Illinois, near Elgin, on the Fox River. The Weas were gradually forced south along the lower Wabash by the Pottawottomies, who followed the Miamis down the Wisconsin shore of Lake Michigan, and occupied the lake region from Milwaukee to St. Joseph, extending inland for some distance. The Ottawas were north of them in Michigan. The Kickapoos or Quicapous, who seemed to be related to both the Pottawottomies and Ottawas, began to work their way into Illinois from the Northwest in 1675; both they and the Illinois had come from Iowa. The Pottawot- tomies were first mentioned in the book, Jesmt Relations, 1640, as being located on the north bank of Lake Huron. Among the Indians who came to the Dune Region were the Hurons and the Iroquois. The Iroquois Confederacy, called by themselves the Ongwehonwe, or “Superior Men,” was a confederation of Indian tribes living in New York and Canada, formed for protection against the Algonquin Indians who surrounded them on all sides. The Y-endots (Wyandots), or Hurons as the French called them, on account of their peculiar head-dress, belonged to a tribe of the Iroquoian stem; but through some difference of feeling, they and their cousins, the Eries, did not wish to join with them, and moved to the western part of Upper Canada near Georgian Bay, where they became independent tribes. The Hurons may have been the first of. the Iroquoin tribes 18 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES to come up north, and may have become very friendly— perhaps intermarried—with the Algonquins, and so had a kindly feeling toward them. Hence their refusal to combine against them. The other Iroquoian tribes, the Mohawks, Cayugas, Oneidas, Onondagas and Senaca tribes formed a highly organized confederation, 1572, and called themselves the Five Nations. They had a highly organized federal government consist- ing of a grand council of fifty chiefs, an unequal number from each tribe, who formed a regular council, making and executing the laws for its government. Their constitution stated that their main object was to abolish war and murder; to spread their principles and territory by peaceful expan- sion and for all the Indian tribes to adopt their principles and live peaceably. Their plan of expansion was much like that of Mahomet; ‘The Koran or the Sword.” The Iro- quois were at first southern Indians, and were more civilized than the Algonquins. They were farmers as well as hunters, and built community houses, planted crops and fruit trees. At first they were peaceable, but were thrashed so often by the Algonquins that they combined together for protection. For many years they were noted for their excessive cruelty and bloodshed. They had, at an early date, received guns from the Dutch of New York with whom they were very friendly. They then organized raids upon the Indian tribes, ranging from the Abnakis of Maine to the tribes bordering on the Mississippi, and from the Hurons and Ottawas of Canada to the Cherokees of the South. It is possible that there was an admixture of white blood in them, as they came from Southeastern United States. THE AMERICAN INDIANS 19 Their plan of confederacy shows a knowledge of govern- ment that is surprising. They thought nothing of a raid on a tribe one thousand miles away. To them, distance was nothing. They raided the Ottawas in Canada, the Foxes in Wisconsin, the Hurons around Georgian Bay, and the Cherokees in the South. The Hurons lived in Canada, and as they would not join the [roquois Confederation, a separation took place, in 1572, the Hurons moving to the West, along the ancient route from the Ottawa River to Lake Huron via the Lake Nipis- sing route. This route has been very accurately described by Doctor R. B. Orr in the article on the Hurons in his Arche- ological Report of 1920. They were gradually driven west by the Iroquois until they were located around the shore of Lake Huron which was named after them by Champlain. Their original name as given by the Iroquois was a variant form of Wyandotte, spelled by different writers in many different ways. They called themselves “Ouendats.” They were called, by the Llroquois, Quadoche; also Quatoghie. In various old maps of the eighteenth century the region of the Sand Dunes was marked as Quadoche and was a puzzle for many years, as it was not known whether it referred to the Dune Region or to the people who in- habited the Dune Region. As the Huron Country was often spoken of as Huronia, so the region of the Dunes must have taken its Indian name, Quadoche, from the Huron people. This region had been claimed as part of their dominion by the Iroquois. When they gave up their title to this Chicago Dune region to Great Britain, they gave their ZO THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES western limits as the Chicago Portage; and at a later treaty as the Grand Calumet at the foot of Lake Michigan. They stated that Quadoche was their name for the Hurons. Charlevoix, the great missionary, who traveled through this Chicago Dune country in 1721, says that the real name of these Indians is Y-endot (Wyandot) which with its vari- ant spellings of Wyandot, Wyandotte, Ouiendot, and Guyandotte, trends back into the old Quadoche, Y-endot, and Ouendat. The name of Hurons was given to them by Champlain, who, looking upon these barbarians with their hair clipped short and rising from their heads in a peculiar fashion which gave them a frightful appearance, exclaimed on first meeting them, “Quelles Hures!’ (‘What boar heads!) Since then the French call them Hurons. The Ottawas, who lived next to the Hurons, also had their heads dressed in a somewhat similar crest and were called by Champlain, Raised Hairs. This nickname appealed to the French so strongly that they gradually forgot the old name, Y-endot, Quadoche or Wyandot, and spoke of them continually as Hurons. The Iroquois drove the Hurons, as well as the Ottawas, to the West, and the Hurons gradually moved to the lower part of Michigan. For some time, they stayed around the Dunes and the northern part of Indiana and Northeastern Illinois, but soon the Miamis began to press on them and they gradually moved to Eastern Indiana and finally into Ohio where they were called Wyandots, but were gradually known to the settlers as Mingos. While in Ohio, during the latter part of the eighteenth century and in the nine- teenth century, they do not seem to have been persecuted so THE AMERICAN INDIANS 21 much by their kinsmen, the Six Nations, as they were before. There were five tribes that made up the Iroquois Con- federacy, which was then known as the Five Nations; the Mohawks, the Senecas, the Cayugas, the Onondagas and the Oneidas. They remained so for many years until, in 1712, a branch of the family called the Tuscaroras, from North Carolina, applied for admission to the Confederacy, which was granted, and they became known as the Six Nations. This confederacy lasted for over two hundred years and is still in existence. CHAPTER III THE FRENCH OCCUPATION THis Chicago Dune region was most admirably suited to these early settlers. Not only were their primitive wants supplied, but they also lived on what later became the great routes of travel from the North to the South, the East to the West. The people from the South began to come up the [linois River and passed through the Chicago or Calu- met Portage to Lake Michigan, and thence to the Great Lakes, returning the same way. The southern shore of Lake Michigan also became known as the great highway for those who wished to explore the country east or west. As the country from the Atlantic to the Mississippi and beyond was an almost solid mass of forests, people located on bodies of water or on rivers, where there was an abundance of food and a chance to move about more freely. The first white explorer in the interior of Canada was Cartier in 1534. The greatest was Champlain, who ex- plored nearly all Southern Canada. Then came the fur- traders, who went everywhere. Close after the fur-traders came the missionaries, mainly Jesuits. History furnishes no nobler examples of heroism and devotion to duty than were performed by these priests. Some were killed out- 22 )? THE FRENCH OCCUPATION 23 right and eaten; some tortured and burned at the stake. But still they came, until by their bravery, fortitude and ability to stand privation and suffering, they won the respect, then the admiration, and finally the love of the Indians. The first priests who visited the Chicago Dune region were Fathers Allouez and Dablon. These missionaries were here as early as 1672. Father Dablon succeeded Allouez as the superior general of the Mission of the Lakes, and inspected the various missions. He, as well as Allouez, was often in this region along the southern shore of Lake Michigan. The most famous of all these missionaries is Marquette. Born in France, in 1635, of an excellent family, he early began to plan for a religious life, and came to America in 1661. After serving in Canada for several years as a mis- sionary, and learning the language of various Indian tribes, he was sent to the Mission of the Lakes, on Lake Superior. While preaching to them, he heard much of a great river which he thought would lead to the South Sea. In 1673 an expedition was formed under the command of a famous trader, Louis Joliet, who had studied to be a priest, but had not completed his course; with him was Marquette, who was sent to preach the gospel to all people they would meet. They went through the Fox River, made the portage to the Wisconsin River, and then floated down to the Mississippi, the first white men to record having seen it since De Soto. haa There is no doubt that hunters and fur-traders had visited the Mississippi before this, as it has been spoken of as a well-known river before Marquette and Joliet had started on their trip. They went down the river below where De 24 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES Soto had been buried, and then returned by way of the shorter route through the Illinois River and the Chicago Portage to Lake Michigan. At an Indian village on the Fox River, they were received by the warriors of the Kickapoos, the Mascoutins and the Miamis. Marquette found here a large cross standing in the middle of the village. He also relates that near Alton they saw on a high bluff two awful monsters. “As we coasted along rocks, frightful for their height and length, we saw two monsters painted on these rocks, which startled us at first and on which the boldest Indian dare not gaze long. They are as large as a calf, with horns on the head like a deer; a frightful look, red eyes, bearded like a tiger, the face somewhat like a man’s, the body covered with scales, and the tail so long that it twice makes the turn of the body, passing over the head and down between the legs, and ending at last in a fish’s tail. This is pretty nearly the figures of these monsters as I drew it off.” This monster was called the piasa bird, though Jacob Piatt Dunn, the scholarly Secretary of the Indiana Histori- cal Society, declares the correct name is paisa bird (pro-. nounced pah-é-say). He says: “There is no such word as- piasa in the Illinois language. The rocky bluff on which the pictograph was made was called Pai’sa Rock by the Hlinois Indians, and Paisa was one of the little people, corresponding to our elves, spirits, etc. The monster is a representation of the Manito of the water, and is called the Man-Cat by the Miamis.” The article, “The Piasa Bird,” by Clara Kern Bayliss, in The Illinois Historical Society Proceedings for 1908, is Courtesy of Ontario Provincial Museum MARQUETTE, THE WARRIOR OF THE CRoss ae THE FRENCH OCCUPATION 25 very interesting, for she deals with the myths about this “thunder-bird.” The piasa myth was very popular with the Chicago Dune Indians, and was often told to the white ex- plorers and settlers here. It was supposed to feed on human flesh as well as ani- mals, and was finally destroyed through the bravery of a young warrior who had himself fastened to some strong stakes in front of the monster’s cave. When the latter returned from its long flight, he discovered the warrior, and tried to carry him off to his cave, but the monster be- came entangled in the thongs, and the other warriors killed it with poisoned arrows. It would seem that there is better ground for this tradi- tion than just a myth. Some writers think that this myth is based upon the predatory habits of the eagles and their screaming defiance. However, much interest has been caused by the Aeenere of that ancient cemetery of prehistoric animals and birds,— the La Brea asphalt pits—near Los Angeles, California. Many bones of different animals, birds and reptiles have been found there. One striking find recently was that of the almost entire skeleton of a gigantic bird, the Teratorms, which means “‘monster bird,” and is called the giant vulture. It is much larger than the condor, and must have been able to carry off a large animal; the large bones of the wing indicate that the spread when fully feathered must have been between eighteen and twenty feet. There is no doubt that this “terror of the air,” that evi- dently lived in ancient days, when the mastodon, cave bear and saber-toothed tiger lived, and whose bones are found in 20 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES ~ the same pit, exacted toll from every kind of animal it could master; and, like the present condor, did not confine its menu to dead bodies, but captured the living also. This California giant vulture is not known to have lived until recent times, when man appeared upon the earth; but, in this same asphalt pit, this natural trap, were also found the bones, almost the entire skeleton, of a female human being. Doctor Arles Hrdlicka, of the Smithsonian Institution, thinks they are much later than the bones of this giant vulture and the other animals; Doctor Merriam, of the Uni- versity of California, thinks they might be of the same age. [t is impossible to determine this. Man may have been on the American Continent much longer than some of our anthropologists, who pin their faith to the immigration from Siberia alone, will acknowledge. The prehistoric natives of the most ancient days in this California region may have seen some lingering specimen of this great bird, or a connecting link between that and the present California vulture. If not, they may have seen the bones of the giant vulture, for it seems absurd to think that the bones of the bird recently found in the La Brea asphalt pit are the only ones ever seen. Even the sight of such a giant skeleton should have been sufficient to arouse the wonderment and fear of the primi- tive people and Indians, who have such a wealth of folk- lore about animate nature; for here is a physical basis for their belief in the thunder-bird, or as the Miamis call it, the man-cat. As the Indians migrated eastward to various places, they undoubtedly took with them the story, with embellishments, THE FRENCH OCCUPATION 27 of this giant vulture, which ranged in those very ancient days along the Pacific coast. The Miamis, who were first found by the French in Wis- consin, say that when they first came east of the Mississippi, they lived at Alton, Illinois, and they and the Mitchigamies, one of the Illinois tribes, whose earlier habitat was evidently the shores of Lake Michigan, used to fight, and that while they were at one time in battle the two thunder-birds swooped down on them and each one captured a Miami chieftain and carried him away to its cave. The others were all so startled and discouraged that they could not fight, and the Mitchigamies defeated them badly. The Miamis then retreated to Wisconsin, where Marquette later saw them, and from which they retreated later to the southern part of Lake Michigan to escape the Iroquois. They then crowded out the Illinois; also the Hurons, who moved away from the Dunes toward the south and east into Ohio. This piasa bird, therefore, seems to be of historic as well-as of poetic derivation, and it certainly left a deep impress on Marquette and Joliet, as it has upon all of the Indian tribes of America. On his way up the Illinois River, Marquette stopped at the Indian village at Kaskaskia, near Starved Rock, where he preached to the natives and established a mission. Mar- quette was pleased to find that some of these [linois Indians were among those who had been at his mission at Lake Superior. Historians disagree as to which portage he used on his homeward trip, the Chicago Portage or the Calumet Portage. The Chicago Portage favored those who came down the 28 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES west coast of Lake Michigan, as there is a strong southerly current there which turns north on the east side. The Calumet Portage would favor those going northward be- cause the current would help them. The fact that a portage was worn through the marsh between the Little Calumet, near the mouth of Lake Calu- met, and the Grand Calumet at Hegewisch shows that it must have been used a great deal, and is so put down in the early maps, such as Hutchin’s in 1778, Andrew’s in 1782 and General Hull’s in 1812. Mr. Daniel Kelly, of Valparaiso, an eminent lawyer, has a relic that speaks of the early missionaries. It is the silver lid of a small lavorium or baptismal font, used by the priest to baptize new members, and was found in the dried-up bed of the old mouth of the Grand Calumet River at Miller. This lid is about three inches long and two inches in width, is semicircular in form, and has on it the image of a lamb, the Agnus Det, or Lamb of God. Mr. Kelly consulted several authorities, even sending the lavorium to Paris. He was told that it was evidently made in the sixteenth century. Another piece of lavorium was found near the same spot some years before by Father Goodman, who sent it to the Paris Historical Society. These things show that the Calumet was used by early explorers to a great extent. The Grand Calumet and Little Calumet Rivers flow through great marshes which were so extensive and at times so flooded that the early French explorers, hunters and travelers said it very much resembled the Louisiana Country. Marquette wrote a letter, with a map, to his superior gen- eral, Father Dablon, which has been preserved. Joliet, who THE FRENCH OCCUPATION 29 had been in command of the expedition, was bringing a very full account of it, together with maps and other papers, to Frontenac, Governor of New France, but his canoe was overturned in the La Chine or Chinese Rapids near Mon- treal, and his crew and the papers were lost. He saved his life through his skill as a swimmer. In 1674, Marquette again went forth to preach the gospel to the Illinois Indians. After great suffering, he reached the Chicago River in December and his men built a rude cabin about two leagues up the river. Here he stayed all winter. In the spring, he went to the Illinois and again preached to the Indians. Feeling himself failing rapidly, he wished to die at his home mission at St. Ignace on Lake Superior. The Indians, at the village of Kaskaskia, sent men along to take care of him. They reached the Chicago Portage, passed through it to Lake Michigan, went to the east and up the eastern shore. It is most probable, that on this trip, with Marquette dying, they took him by the easiest route. This was via the Sag and the Calumet Rivers and no more difficult than the one by the Chicago River, and it saved over forty miles of lake travel, which in the mis- sionary’s condition meant a great deal. The South Bend historians think he came up the Kankakee, used the portage and took the St. Joe to Lake Michigan. As he journeyed, he stopped frequently and took shelter in the different creeks and rivers that pierced the Dunes, camping there overnight and also in bad weather. He preached often to the Indians, and camped on the shores of the Calumet River, Fort Creek, Trail Creek,—the Riviere du Chemin,—St. Joe and others. 30 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES It is stated by Mr. Coughlan, who heard it from the In- dians, that when Marquette stopped at Trail Creek, a dele- gation of Indians who had heard him preach before met him and begged him to come up to their village a short distance away. He did so and found that they had a village in a most beautiful grove and plateau called Council Grove, which now belongs to ex-Mayor Martin T. Krueger of Michigan City and is a part of his Springland Farm. On the western slope of this historic plateau is a spring, which Marquette blessed, and which the Indians called Mar- quette Spring. or many years, this was the Mecca of the Indian tribes, who came for miles to get the water of that spring, which they said was ““good medicine.” Marquette was so worn out by his strenuous activities that he died before he reached St. Ignace, in 1675, and was buried near Ludington, Michigan. A large red cedar cross was erected over the grave. Later his bones were removed to his mission at St. Ignace on Lake Superior, but the cross was left. It was gradually covered by the sands, but in 1818, Gurdon $. Hubbard, the Chicago fur-trader, discov- ered it sticking two feet out of the sand. He repaired it but it was soon covered and was not seen again until a few years ago, when it was found almost free of the sand and again restored. A relic that might speak of Marquette, Allouez, or Dab- lon is in the collection of the author. Blanchard states that in 1696 a mission was established on the Calumet. This relic is a small stone Bible nearly three inches long, two inches wide, and an inch thick, which was dug up two feet underground at the corner of Wentworth Avenue and One Hundred Eleventh Street, Chicago, on the shore of the THE FRENCH OCCUPATION Sr Wentworth Avenue Creek, which formerly flowed into the Calumet River at Clark Street. This stone is cut into the shape of a little Bible and is a relic of the early missionaries, one of whom may have lost | it here in the early times, as this section.was very much frequented by the early explorers and missionaries, since it was only a few blocks from the great Illini Trail at Michi- gan Avenue. The trail on One Hundred Eleventh Street was a natural highway to the West, as it cuts through the western hills near Summit, striking the Sauk Trail. During the many hardships of the early missionaries, the printed Bibles were often destroyed; as a symbol of their faith, a stone Bible, small so as not to be too burden- some, was used. Another relic of early times, found near the same place, is a heavy steel battle-ax. It seems to be a relic of the Spanish Expedition of 1781. This battle-ax was found about forty years ago on a farm near One Hundred Eighth Street and Wabash Avenue near the Illini Trail on Michigan Avenue, Chicago. It is made from a bar of steel, hand- forged, of a most beautiful pattern, and with its curved handle, originally hung from a belt. The end of the handle was so much worn that it slipped from its belt. These articles show that this region was traversed by both mis- sionaries and explorers. CHAPTER IV FERDINAND LA SALLE THE greatest of all French explorers was La Salle, one of the most heroic and most unfortunate men in history, a man to whose genius France has been indebted for her com- manding position in America. He, like Marquette, had heard of the Great River that perhaps flowed into the Great Sea or Pacific Ocean. But by his explorations in the Great Lake region he became convinced, even before Marquette and Joliet returned from their first voyage, that it flowed into the Gulf of Mexico. La Salle is chiefly known to us as an explorer, a leader and a statesman. But he was chiefly known in New France as the great fur-trader. When his keen vision saw the great value of a chain of forts reaching from Fort Frontenac to the mouth of the Mississippi River to hold the country for France, King Louis XIV told him he could build them, but it was at his own expense; therefore La Salle was appointed as the head of the fur-traders. To do this took money, and for a number of years La Salle was the most active fur- trader in New France, trading with the Canadians and the western and southern Indians, and punishing free traders, thus creating many enemies. He was a man with a vision. He was the John Jacob Astor of his time. He traded every- 32 FERDINAND LA SALLE 33 where and thus acquired an intimate knowledge of the Chicago Dune region, for it was one of his best hunting- grounds. In 1677 he started for the Illinois country, making the portage from the St. Joseph River to the Kankakee River near South Bend. This portage was very much traveled and started up the hill from the St. Joseph River at the exact spot where the targets of the Indiana State Rifle Range are now situated. The trail goes through the cemetery and the path upon which the little concrete building containing the targets is placed is the old original Portage Trail that La Salle followed in going to the Kankakee. After great hardships La Salle reached the [linois coun- try. Some of his men from Canada joined him with a re- port that his new vessel, the Griffin, had been wrecked and everything lost. He built a fort, that he named Creve Coeur or Broken Heart, on the banks of the Illinois near Peoria, and placed Tonty in charge of it. Tonty was an Italian, who had lost his right hand in battle in Europe, and to take its place he had a powerful iron hand made, which he could use very efficiently. The French sometimes called him Main de Fer or Iron Hand, which the Indians readily took up and called him exclusively. LaSalle then with a few other men started to walk back to Montreal, a distance of twelve hundred miles. As he speaks of having been chilled by the breezes off Lake Michi- gan, he must have passed through the Chicago Dune region on his long walk. He probably took the Illini Trail up to Michigan Avenue and One Hundred Twenty-seventh Street, thence followed the old Pottawottomie Trail through River- dale, Tolleston, Miller, along the Beach or the Dunes to 34 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES Michigan City, then east to Detroit and to Montreal. He only reached it after terrible privations and sufferings. He heard later that some of his men had blown up the fort and were on their way back to Canada; he intercepted them and hanged them. He again went to the Illinois country, and found that the Illinois Indians had been badly defeated in 1680 by the Iroquois, and all their villages de- stroyed. He then went down the Illinois River and sailed some distance on the Mississippi, finally going back to the Illinois country and establishing a trading post there, Fort St. Louis, on Starved Rock. Here he organized a great confederation to combat the Iroquois who were steadily extending their power west- ward and who claimed jurisdiction to the Mississippi River. This confederation of the Illinois, Miamis, Pottawottomies, Ottawas, Hurons, Kickapoos, Shawnees, Mohicans, and parts of other tribes was successful in holding the Iroquois in check. But when La Salle was killed in Louisiana by one » of his soldiers, the confederation broke up like a house of cards—exactly like the great Indian Alliance of Major De Linctot in the Revolution—and each tribe sought safety either in his own territory or by combining with others. As the Miamis were very much exposed to the incursions of the Iroquois, who often came to the Dunes, they founded a Miami Confederacy composed of all the different branches of the Miami tribe, and for years this was a force to keep the Iroquois from attacking them. La Salle in his last voyage from France came to New France via Louisiana. His admiral was very unruly, and missing the Mississippi River, landed La Salle in Texas. He stayed there for two years; not because he was lost, but FERDINAND LA SALLE 35 because he had other plans, one of which may have been to capture the silver mines of Northern Mexico. Some tradi- tions might indicate that, for Spain and France were un- friendly at the time. He was too great a traveler to stay lost in that corner, since he could easily have made his way north. Apparently he was biding his time, or waiting for orders from the French government. When no aid came from France, and his men began to desert and mutiny, he realized his powerlessness, and started north to his colony, but was murdered on the way by one of his men. After La Salle’s death, the French realized what a great man he was, and the worth of his plans for saving the country for France. The French now carried out his idea of a great chain of forts at strategic points to command New France, and also to act as centers for the fur trade. These forts became the nuclei of small settlements, and were surrounded by woods that stretched in an almost solid mass from the Atlantic coast to the Great Plains, broken only by lakes, marshes, and the numerous spider-like threads of creeks and rivers which for ages were used as means of travel. As communities of both the Indians and later the whites were established, trails from one to the other were gradually made through the woods, and these were used as the routes of land travel. Portages were sought to make travel easier. The principal ones in the Chicago Dune region were the Chicago-Desplaines Portage, the Calumet-Sag, the Little Calumet to the Grand Calumet at Hegewisch, and Lake Michigan to the Calumet River at Dune Park. The other principal portages were the Fox-Wisconsin Portage in Wis- consin, the St. Joe-Kankakee Portage near South Bend, the 36 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES Maumee-Wabash Portage at Kekionga (Fort Wayne), and the Erie-Allegheny Portage in Pennsylvania. In the early part of the eighteenth century, the Fox In- dians became angry at the French, because the latter had sold guns to the Sioux, which enabled them to whip the Foxes in battle. In retaliation, the Foxes closed the Fox- Wisconsin Portage to the French for nearly forty years, compelling them to take a southern route. The northern route from Quebec and Montreal lay through the Ottawa- Nipissing-Georgian Bay. Thence to Mackinaw, and the Wisconsin River. The southern portages were the Chicago, Calumet, St. Joe and the Maumee-Wabash or Kekionga Portages. This diversion of routes caused the French explorers, traders and officials to take the most convenient, which was said to be the Maumee-Wabash route, the portage being controlled at Kekionga, or Fort Wayne. The Governor of New France, desirous of having the Miamis together, gave those at the noted village, Maramech, near Aurora, peremptory orders to move to Kekionga, where they could protect that portage. In their eastward journey, they pushed the Hurons, or Wyandots, from their Duneland home to the southeast, and occupied this land themselves, until in turn they were pushed out by the Potta- wottomies, who occupied the southern shore of Lake Michigan. The Fox Indians in the meantime were faring ill; from a great, powerful tribe, their prowess was diminishing. In 1712, they, with some Mascoutins, marched from Wiscon- sin, following the shore of the Lake, through our beautiful Dunes, to besiege Detroit, which was then a fort with few FERDINAND LA SALLE a7 houses. The French were assisted by the Miamis and other tribes, and defeated the Fox and Mascoutins who retreated through the Dunes on their homeward trip. The Iroquois, though they also hated the French, were greatly enraged at the Foxes for daring to come into their territory, as the Iroquois claimed all of the land to the Mississippi River and considered this a great insult. After minor skirmishes for several years, the Iroquois in the snowy winter of 1721-22 decided to attack the Foxes so fiercely and unexpectedly as to strike terror into them. Accordingly, in 1721, a picked body of Iroquois warriors, numbering a hundred, started from New York to attack the village of the Foxes, in Wisconsin, at the Fox-Wisconsin Portage, a trip of over six hundred miles. As the winter was very snowy, they were compelled to use snow-shoes, in the use of which they were experts. It was a fearful journey. They came through the Dunes, along the lake front and past the present Beach House of the Prairie Club. When they reached Chicago, a number of the warriors were so exhausted from the terrible trip and the fast pace, that they were left behind to rest and recuper- ate, to be picked up on the return trip of the main party. The others—fierce, rugged warriors and wonderful snow- shoemen—rested a while and then started for the Fox Portage. They reached it undetected. The Foxes, never dreaming of attack, were terrified when this body of fierce warriors from the East suddenly burst in upon them, shoot- ing, slaying and scalping. The Foxes rallied and fought bravely but were taken at such a disadvantage they were soon defeated. They fled in all directions; but as the Iroquois had snow-shoes and the 38 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES Foxes were caught unawares many were hunted down and massacred. | The Iroquois, after looting and burning the village, started for home well laden with spoils and scalps, and took along captives to carry the burdens. On reaching Chicago, they rested for a time, and then with the other members of the party, who had regained their vigor, they started to their eastern home passing through the Dunes. While this trip of over one thousand two hundred miles was not so long as the mythical trip of the Norsemen from Vinland, to Kensington, Minnesota, in 1346, it is the longest trip for a large snow-shoe party on record. This bloody battle attracted wide attention, and undoubt- edly caused the British to curb the western aspirations of the Iroquois, since a treaty a few years later made their western, boundary the Chicago Portage, as given in Mitchell’s map, 1755, of the Chicago Dune region. The Foxes were stunned by their defeat. To have that band of fierce warriors burst upon them like demons when they thought they were over six hundred miles away shat- tered their courage, and they sought peace. They and the Iroquois, had one thing in common, both hated the French. The Foxes therefore not only begged for peace, but also asked to be allowed to join the [roquois under the protection of the English. This was granted, and a large body of Foxes worked their way toward the south and settled in the famous old Miami town of Maramech, on the Buffalo River, near Aurora. This river was named after them, Fox River. They intended gradually to work their way eastward to join the Iroquois, but the French from Fort Chartres, FERDINAND LA SALLE 39 Illinois, and from Fort St. Joseph, with some Pottawot- tomies, Illinois and Miamis, attacked them, and after a stubborn battle defeated them very badly, the survivors retreating northward. The [Ioxes stayed in Illinois and Wisconsin, their power broken. The indians of the Chicago Dune region were strongly in sympathy with the French, and were protected by them from the Iroquois marauders. Fort St. Joseph was built to protect their fur trade, as well as to command a strategic point, and a smaller fort, very strong, was built near the mouth of a little river at Tremont, Indiana, and called Petite Fort—Little Fort. It was a stockade fort, what the French call a tassement or palisaded blockhouse. While occupied mainly as a trading post, the name Petite Fort showed that it was at times garrisoned by regular military. When war broke out between France and England in 1754, the Indians of the Chicago Dune region sided with France strongly and sent volunteers to Fort Du Quesne, and later to Canada to help the French. The Pottawottomies, Miamis, Kickapoos, Ottawas and many others took vigorous part against the British. They were very much grieved when the French were defeated and New France was ceded to Great Britain, as the French and Indians got along well together, sometimes intermarrying. The Miamis, in the meantime, kept shifting to the south- east so that the Weas by 1765 had moved from Chicago and the Dunes to Ouia, above Vincennes. The other families of the Miamis moved eastward into lower Indiana and along the border. The Pottawottomies had followed the Miamis and occupied the shores of Lake Michigan from Milwaukee around the lake to St. Joseph, 40 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES and extended inward for some distance; the Ottawas were a little north of them in Michigan. The Kickapoos had begun, in 1675, to work their way into Illinois from the northwest; both they and the Illinois tribes had come from the west, from Iowa. The Potta- wottomies were first mentioned in the Jesmt Relations in 1640 as being located on the north bank of Lake Huron. In 1668 they were on the west bank of Lake Michigan. The Chicago Dune region was formerly one of the fav- ored localities of the [linois Indians when they were in possession of this territory. The trail leading from the Chicago River on State Street down Vincennes Avenue to South Englewood, then southeast to State Street and Ninety-third, then south through Michigan Avenue to One Hundred Twenty-seventh Street, west to Blue Island and thence southwest, was the old Illini Trail used by Illinois Indians coming from their home town of Kaskaskia, and leading all the way up along the west shore of Lake Michi- gan to the northern part of Michigan. The name given to Lake Michigan by Marquette was Lac Illinois. After the end of the French and Indian War, Pontiac, chief of the Ottawas, refused to be bound by the surrender of New France by the French government and tried to raise a great Indian conspiracy to kill the English. He accord- ingly captured Mackinaw, which was taken by one of his young chiefs, Siggenaak, the chief of the Milwaukee Pot- tawottomies. Saginaw is the name given by the whites. Pontiac captured both Fort St. Joe and Little Fort, at Tremont, in the Dunes. ‘The futility of attempting to van- quish the English was soon shown to him, and he declared FERDINAND LA SALLE 4I peace with the English government. A short time afterward he was at Kaskaskia on the Mississippi, where he was mur- dered by one of the Illinois Indians, the price being, it is said, a barrel of whisky offered by a trader. Pontiac had been a very famous Indian chief and was highly respected by the Indians of the Mississippi Valley. When they heard of his assassination they were furious and three of the great tribes of Illinois and Indiana got together to avenge his death. They were the Miamis, the Pottawottomies and the Kickapoos, with a few Indians from most of the neighboring tribes. These Indians started to attack all Illinois Indians in the northern part of Illinois and Indiana. It is claimed they drove them past Chicago and that a great battle took place between the Pottawottomies and the Illinois Indians on the banks of the Calumet River, at the southeastern foot of Blue Island, near where the electric power-house now stands. The Pottawottomies of the Dunes took active part in the battle against the Illinois Indians. The trail from Riverdale to Blue Island, near the southern bank of the Calumet River, was called Bloody Trail by the Pottawottomies. Mr. Ferdinand Schapper, the historian of the Blue Island region, who recently died, informed me that when he was a small boy, an old trapper who had lived with the Potta- wottomie Indians many years ago told him that they used to speak often of the great battle fought at Blue Island, where they had defeated the Illinois Indians with great slaughter, and had driven them along the Illini Trail to the South. Other tribes had also fought the Illinois Indians and had killed most of them, until the latter had been so 42 THE WONDERS OF.THE DUNES badly defeated that they were compelled to flee for defense to the famous Starved Rock, upon which La Salle had built his fort of St. Louis so many years before. This rock contains a little over an acre and is about one hundred and fifty feet high, with almost perpendicular walls, except on the west side, where a foothold is possible. This was fortified and the Illinois Indians were able to stand off the enemy, who, as soon as they found they could not capture the place by assault, determined to capture the Ilh- nois through starvation and thirst. They would not allow anybody to leave to get provisions or water, and numbers were killed while trying to flee. Finally, the defenders began to perish from starvation and the allies were able to break in and capture the place, killing nearly all of the garrison. It is commonly said that all— men, women and children—were killed, but this is not true. It is stated that eleven of the Illinois escaped by diving into the river, made their way to safety at St. Louis, where they were called the Silent Men, as they would never tell to what tribe they belonged. There were also a few of the Illinois tribe not up there, because the government afterward had dealings with the Illinois tribe and these people acted as their representatives. After the close of the war with the Illinois Indians came the period of reconstruction among these Indian tribes. The Illinois nation, as a nation, was destroyed, though scattered members still remained. The question arose as to who should inherit the valuable, broad, fertile and wooded lands that the Illinois Indians had owned. It was the same prob- lem that is now troubling the world as a result of the World War. FERDINAND LA SALLE 43 The Miamis claimed the greater part of them, as with the guns that they possessed, they had killed most of the Illinois; but the Pottawottomies and Kickapoos objected be- cause they had furnished the most men. They could come to no decision so they had a battle in 1770, with the Miamis on one side and the Pottawottomies and the Kickapoos on the other. The result of it was a draw, although the allies claimed it. Frequent clashes occurred, and in 1772 another pitched battle took place in which the Miamis claimed they were victors, though not decisively; but in September, 1775, the Pottawottomies and Kickapoos made a proposition to the Miamis to have another battle, to be fought in Indian style, and the victors to keep all the lands. Each side picked three hundred warriors to decide the affair. There were to be no guns or other weapons of the white man. They must use the Indian weapons, such as the bow, arrow, knife, tomahawk, spear, or any other Indian weapon, including, of course, the blow-gun, and have a genuine Indian battle. The Miamis accepted this chal- lenge, and each side picked its best warriors. The battle- field was selected at Sugar Creek, twenty miles from the Wabash River, in Indiana. The battle lasted from sunrise to sunset and extended over a great stretch of country. At the end of the day, there were left five Miamis against seven Pottawottomies and Kickapoos. The Miamis then fled, leaving the Pottawottomies and Kickapoos as victors; among them, Shick-shack, Sugar, Marquette and Shady, famous warriors, who had also been among the warriors who stormed Starved Rock. The Miamis were conquered, and by their agreement gave up all 44. THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES claim to the hunting ground of the annihilated Illinois, and retired east of the Wabash River. The Pottawottomies and their allies, the Kickapoos, then became the successors of the Illinois. Soon after this final battle, they divided this territory between themselves, the Kickapoos taking all of the Illinois territory west of the Wabash to a line running north and south through Oliver’s Grove in Livingston County, Illinois, the Pottawottomies all the Illinois territory west of that line. This interesting account of the battle between the Miamis, Pottawottomies and Kickapoos is taken from Osman’s H1s- tory of Starved Rock. It was first published in the Morris Reformer in 1873 by Honorable P. Armstrong, who re- ceived much of this information when a boy from some of these Indians who had participated in this battle. There is a somewhat similar account in a book entitled, View of the United States of America, Pe by an English traveler in 1820. ETA ohn, THE CONQUEST OF THE NORTHWEST AFTER the British had conquered New France and an- nexed it to the English Dominions, they strengthened the French forts and garrisoned them with British troops. The principal forts in the Northwest Territory were at Detroit, Vincennes, Kaskaskia and Mackinaw, with small ones at St. Joseph, Cahokia and Fort Miami, near the present Fort Wayne, and also Little Fort, at Tremont, Indiana. When war broke out between the colonies and Great Britain, the French sided with the Americans. Governor Patrick Henry, who claimed the Illinois country for Vir- ginia, knew of this state of feeling and resolved to profit by it. When Governor Henry was ready to attack the Brit- ish in that region, he selected as the leader one of the promis- ing young soldiers in Virginia, Colonel George Rogers Clark, whose brilliant deeds have rendered him famous. With the details of the plan worked out, Colonel Clark obtained troops from Virginia with which he carried out that wonderful series of victories amid direful privations that made him famous as a great, skilful and sagacious general—the Hannibal of the West. The record of his voyage down the Ohio; the march through a narrow trail through the wood from Fort Massac 45 40 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES to Kaskaskia; its capture; Father Gibault’s march through the Hunters’ Path, from Kaskaskia to Vincennes, and Vin- cennes’ surrender to the Americans; the capture by Hamil- ton, with the awful march and the re-capture by Clark and his devoted followers, will be an inspiration to the lovers of liberty while time endures. While the honor of conquering the Northwest belongs to General George Rogers Clark, he was assisted greatly by his associates, chief of whom were Father Pierre Gibault, Colonel Francis Vigo, and Major Godfrey De Linctot. Gibault was the scholarly, self-denying spiritual adviser ; Vigo, the earnest, generous fur-trader; and Linctot, the fearless soldier and Indian commissioner. All were earnest, energetic patriots, who did all in their power to bind the people of the Northwest to the American cause. Gibault prepared the minds of the people to receive Clark and the American rule; Vigo aided Clark in personal serv- ice, loaning his entire fortune to the government; and Linctot, by his military skill and unceasing vigilance against the British and their Indians, combined with his wonderful influence over his Indians, acted as the Guardian of the Frontier. | General Clark sent De Linctot to the north throughout the Indian country to rouse that region and to overcome the propaganda that Langlade was using to persuade the waver- ing Indian tribes to unite against the Americans, and De Linctot did great service in this region. He visited Chicago and also Little Fort at Tremont, in the Dunes, as the British had concentrated their forces in the Chicago and Dune region at Fort St. Joseph, and Mack- inaw. THE CONQUEST OF THE NORTHWEST 47 The Little Fort at Tremont was considered untenable by the British. One of De Linctot’s spies was said to be Chicago’s first settler, the French mulatto, Jean Baptiste Point au Saible. On his Illinois trip, Captain Langlade, who was the noted half-breed British Commander of the Chicago Dune region, drove Au Saible out of Chicago in 1779. Lhe latter went to Trail Creek, near Michigan City, where he was later captured by Lieutenant Bennett and sent to Mackinaw, under suspicion as Linctot’s spy. Major De Linctot, a French officer, stationed at Cahokia, was of the greatest value to General Clark. He knew the Dunes thoroughly, having traveled them many times. He had been a guest of every Indian tribe and spoke many Indian languages; was also a great fur-trader. While Major De Linctot tried to get the Indians to join the Americans, Captain Langlade, who was working for the English, strongly opposed him.. Both were very well known, and well liked by their own people. Langlade was a half-breed French Indian. His father was a French trader of fine family, and his mother, the daughter of an Ottawa chief. It was he who started the French and Indian War, by coming down from Mackinaw with a band of Ottawa Indians, among whom was Pontiac, in 1752, and capturing Kekionga, now Fort Wayne. In 1779, the Indians of the Northwest, including the Pottawottomies of the Chicago Dune district, were called upon by the British Commander, Major DePeyster,. of Mackinaw, to unite and drive Clark and the Americans out of Ilinois and Indiana. Captain Langlade commanded the Pottawottomies of the Dunes and the Ottawas of Mich- 48 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES igan. But the British and Indians were so badly defeated they retreated to the north. In 1780, the Chicago Dune Pottawottomies were again called upon, as the British intended to send troops down on a larger scale to capture all places under American rule, as Vincennes, Kaskaskia, Cahokia, etc.; somewhat like the Burgoyne expedition. Again the British and Indians were defeated and gave up all attempts to capture the Illinois and Indiana region. Major DePeyster, the British commander, gave special directions for capturing Major De Linctot, the American Commissioner of Indians, because the latter in organizing the great Indian Alliance, was a formidable enemy. But many of the British Indians liked Linctot, and would not allow the other Indians to kill or capture him. Linctot- chased Langlade to Chicago, reaching there with his three hundred troopers from Peoria a short time after Langlade left in haste for Mackinaw. When Linctot arrived in Chi- cago, the garrison at Fort St. Joseph was abandoned tem- porarily, as rumor said the American commissioner was on his way through the Dunes to capture Fort St. Joe, and join General Clark in attacking Detroit. Major DePeyster’s address to the Indian tribes at L’ Arbor Crouche—Crooked Tree—Wisconsin, on July 4, 1779, was later put by him into doggerel rhyme, which is very interesting historically, since he explains the allusions to various persons and places: THE CONQUEST OF THE NORTHWEST = 49 Observe the wretched Kickapoose ; What have they gained by Linctot’s news? (Linctot)—A runagate Frenchman who Used to communicate every favorable Event attending the enemy (Americans). Await the Kitchimotomans—(Big Knives), Or show yourselves more brave and wise, Ere they are joined by such allies; Clark, soon repulsed, will ne’er return— While your war fire thus clear doth burn. Observe the wretched Kickapoose. What have they gained by Linctot’s news? The Attogams—(Foxes), Pioreas and Sacks Have scarce a blanket to their backs. To Detroit Linctot bends his way. I, therefore, turn you from the Pay; (Fort Le Peé at . Peoria) To intercept the Chevalier (a nickname for Linctot) At Fort St. Joseph’s and O Post (Vincennes). While I send round Lake Michigan, To raise the warriors to a man! Who on their way to get you, Shall take a peep at Eschicagou (Chicago). (A river and fort at head of Lake Michigan.) Those rungates at Milwaukie, Must now perforce with you agree; Must with Langlade their forces join, Sly Siggenaak and Naakewein; Or he will send them tout de diable, As he did Baptiste Point au Saible. 50 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES DePeyster refers to the tribes that had joined the Amer- icans—the foxes, Peorias, Sauks, Kickapoos, and the Mail- waukie Pottawottomies under Siggenaak and Naakewein. He ordered Langlade to drop the expedition to capture Fort Le Pee, at Peoria, and try to intercept Linctot before he could capture Ifort St. Joseph. Langlade chased Au Saible out of Chicago, saying the latter was one of Linctot’s spies. Au Saible trekked through the Dunes to Trail Creek, and was later arrested by Lieutenant Bennett and brought to Mackinaw. His cabin at Trail Creek was probably the one located near the Indian Council Grounds there, and later occupied by Coughlan. Colonel La Balm was a French officer under Washington as Inspector General of Cavalry, but resigned his position and came to Illinois. When the British forces were driven from Southern Illinois and Indiana, in 1780, La Balm thought that they were so cowed that it would be possible to assemble a force of French and Indians and capture De- troit. But in this he lacked the judgment of General Clark and Major De Linctot, who had decided it was too danger- ous to attempt to pass through the country of the hostile Miamis without a strong army back of them. La Balm called upon the French to enlist a large company, promising that he would lead them to Detroit and capture it, but not many listened. He got to Kekionga—now Fort Wayne—and captured it, because Little Turtle and his Miamis were on their southern hunting trip. They soon returned, and about November 7, 1780, attacked and de- feated the French and Ilinois Indians, killing La Balm. This engagement, though little more than a skirmish, had far-reaching significance. If it had succeeded, and had THE CONQUEST OF THE NORTHWEST © 51 La Balm pushed forward instead of waiting for the reen- forcements that never came, he might have captured Detroit. Had that happened the probability is strong that La Balm would have held it for France instead of for the United States. As it was, the British killed La Balm and defeated his expedition. This increased their prestige among the In- dians very much and seriously diminished that of the Amer- icans, A short time after La Balm left Cahokia and Kaskaskia, a small party of people left Cahokia to capture Fort St. Joseph, in revenge for the burning of part of Cahokia by the British. As they went past Peoria, where Fort Le Peé was situated, and which also may have been burned when the British marauders burned that town in 1780, a few people from that place joined them. The belief some people have entertained that this party was part of La Balm’s force, detached for the express pur- pose of capturing Fort St. Joseph, and thus aiding La Balm, does not seem to be justified. They had pack horses and it was their intention undoubtedly to loot the fort, which was full of choice furs. They reached the fort and found the place deserted by the warriors, as the Indians were off on their annual hunt. They looted the place, and started with twenty-four bales of choice furs for home, via the Chicago Portage, taking the trail that led from Fort =:.-fseph; at Niles, to the Riviere du Chemim—Trail Creek—Michigan City, then down the beach through the Dunes to the Chicago _ Portage. Word was sent to Monsieur Etienne Champion, the head trader of that district, and he hastily collected a force of ‘% oe 4 | we”) wid as thrsiigs dont Keo 52 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES Pottawottomies and rushed after the Americans. He over- took them at Trail Creek, near Michigan City, and attacked them on December 5, 1780. They had hoped to reach Petite Fort—Little Fort— which was in American hands, situated near the mouth of Fort Creek and Tremont, about eleven miles west of Michi- gan City and about one-half mile southwest of Mount Tom. The writer has located the site of this fort on a high bluff, about a half-mile from Lake Michigan, as fixed on the map of the Chicago region made for General Hull in 1812, and also the site of this battle. As a result of this fight at Trail Creek, the Americans were badly defeated.’ The leader, Captain Baptiste Hamelin, a half-breed, and several others were killed, a number wounded or captured and a few others escaped in the thick woods. Lieutenant Thomas Brady was captured, but later escaped. : After Champion had won the fight, Lieutenant Dagneux Du Quindre, the military commander of that district, claimed the honor of having defeated the Americans and notified Major DePeyster, of Detroit, that he had defeated them at Petite Fort. Lieutenant-Governor P. Sinclair of Michill Macinac—Mackinaw—denied this very vigorously in his letter to Secretary Matthews, January 1, 1781, and said that Champion had that honor; that he had defeated Hame- lin at Trail Creek and that Du Quindre, the military com- mander, was not on the job at all. Sinclair wrote again to Governor-General Haldimand, of Canada, on date of May 1, 1781, stating that Du Quindre had very greatly imposed on DePeyster; that Champion had won the fight; and that he—Sinclair)was sorry that Du THE CONQUEST OF THE NORTHWEST © 53 Quindre had not attended to his post at Fort St. Joseph, when the Spaniards captured it. On the first of June, 1781, Secretary Matthew states that his excellency had received Sinclair’s letter, and requests him; to reward Champion for his good conduct in defeating the Americans. This correspondence, which in places is quite snappy, is published in full, with references, in the author’s “Biography of Major De Linctot, the Guardian of the Frontier,” in the Journal of the Illinois Historical Society for October, 1917. The entire biography is worth reading, as it deals with the romantic life of that brave, chivalrous Frenchman, Major De Linctot, who seems to have been a splendid type of one of Dumas’ Three Musketeers, especially D’Artagnan. This correspondence settles the question of the winner and the location of the fight between the Americans and British on December 5, 1780, as it was officially acknowl- edged by General Haldimand that Lieutenant-Governor Sinclair’s assertion that Champion defeated Hamelin at Trail Creek decided the matter. This battle-field at Trail Creek belongs to the original Springland Farm of over six hundred acres, owned by ex-Mayor Krueger. The fleeing Americans would be obliged to ford Trail Creek and would camp at Marquette Spring on the side of the ancient Council Grounds where there were fine springs. Here they were probably surprised by the pursuing Pottawottomies, led by Champion, and were badly defeated in a running fight. Most of this battle took place on this Springfield Farm, and a monument to these Ameri- cans should be erected by Michigan City in the Memorial 54 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES Park presented to the city by Mr. Krueger, which is part of the original battle-field. Mason says it was fought in 1779 near the Calumet ( Mil- ler) ; Currie places it at South Chicago; Major Lee fol- lows Du Quindre, and says it was near Little Fort—La Petite—at Waverly Beach, near the mouth of Little Fort River; while Champion, the man who really defeated Hame- lin and Brady, says it was at Trail Creek. General Haldi- mand gave his sanction to the Riviere du Chemin—Trail Creek—location, with Champion as the hero. The results of this apparently insignificant skirmish were far-reaching and very helpful to the British cause. When the Americans had captured Fort St. Joseph, there had been no one to oppose them, but as soon as the British traders and Indians appeared, the few Americans, sixteen in num- ber, were easily disposed of. However, it had great psychological importance; for, coupled with the defeat of La Balm, it seemed as if Amer- ica’s influence was waning, and consequently her prestige was sadly impaired. The British began to labor more boldly with the Indians, and with success. When the survivors of the Hamelin expedition to St. Joseph returned to Cahokia, and reported the defeat of their expedition, a desire for vengeance swept over the com- munity. When these men reported how easy it was for a strong force to capture Fort St. Joseph, a company of volunteers was raised in Cahokia. The Spanish governor of St. Louis, M. Cruzat, was will- ing to raise a company to aid the Cahokians. The entire force, according to the Americans, consisted of thirty Span- . iards, twenty men from Cahokia—Americans and French— Roap NEAR WAVERLY BEACH THE CONQUEST OF THE NORTHWEST | 55 and two hundred Indians, among them Linctot’s friend, Siggenaak, chief of the Milwaukee Pottawottomies. The Spaniards, later, claimed that there were sixty-five Spanish militia and sixty Indians, omitting mention altogether of the Americans and French. The Americans claimed that when they were ready to start their expedition, a vote was taken for a commander of the expedition, with only the white men voting, and the Spanish captain, Don Eugenio Pierrot, was declared com- mander. They started up the Illinois River in boats, as far as Peoria, and from there struck three hundred miles across country, through a wilderness to St. Joseph; they, may have marched up the [lini Trail to near Joliet, then taken the Sauk Trail to the northeast, that led directly to St. Joseph. They were obliged to use a regular trail, in order to get through the woods, swamps and jungles. They reached there February 12, 1781, and attacked the fort. There was very little resistance, as Lieutenant Du Quindre was again not on the job. The British flag was hauled down, and to the unspeakable indignation of the American and French soldiers, the Spanish flag was hoisted in its place, and Captain Pierrot took possession of the whole Northwest Territory in the name of the king of Spain. Thus the Chicago Dune region was claimed by Spain, and considered as Spanish territory. The people from Cahokia were very angry, but Pierrot declared he was acting under instructions from his gov- ernment, and that everything would be fixed up all right by their respective governments. Don Pierrot destroyed much of the captured material, 56 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES spiked the three guns, and retained the best of the cap- tured furs. He stayed twenty-four hours, burned the fort, and started back for home February thirteenth, taking with him the English flag, which he presented to Governor Cru- zat, who sent it to the Spanish king, telling him his brave Spanish soldiers had captured this important British post, and annexed this great territory to Spain. This trip to St. Joseph took six weeks, three weeks to Peoria and three by land from there to St. Joseph. The report that the return trip from St. Joseph was made by the early part of March should be the latter part of March. A possible relic of this expedition is an ancient iron halberd that was found on the old Michigan Road, near the Calumet River, close to Dolton, by Mr. Berger. Possibly the little ax found near Wabash Avenue and One Hundred Eighth Street, Chicago, is another relic of the same expedition. Both the little ax, eighteen inches long, found at One Hundred Eighth Street and Wabash Avenue, Chicago, and the halberd found by Berger, near Thornton, were found near the Detroit-Chicago Road, that goes to Michigan City, thence east through Niles—Fort St. Joe—to Detroit, and is called the Michigan Road. The halberd was called by the English, the Pole Ax. Major De Linctot, whose health had become sadly im- paired after his almost superhuman work organizing the Indian Alliance, and who was then under a skilful doctor’s care in St. Louis, writes General Clark from there on July 31, 1781, that an express had just arrived, telling them that Governor Galvez, of New Orleans, who was the Spanish commander, had by some very brilliant trench work just captured Pensacola and Mobile, as well as Natchez, thus THE CONQUEST OF THE NORTHWEST 57 obtaining all of Florida, both East and West Florida. Galvez sent the flags of both cities to Spain and the king annexed the territory south of the Ohio to Spain, just as he had the Northwest Territory a short time before. Spain accordingly felt as if she had a right to all of the vast territory between the Mississippi and the Alleghanies, and so laid claim to it at the peace conference; but her claim was reduced to the Floridas. The cession of the North- west Territory to France and the Southwest to Spain, ac- cording to the plan desired by these two countries, was badly defeated by the United States, as we were in actual possession of this territory by conquest and occupation, and therefore successfully maintained our rights to it. General Clark desired very much to attack Detroit, but could not get enough soldiers to make such an expedition advisable. His great commissioner of Indiana, Major De Linctot, in whom General Clark, Governor Thomas Jeffer- son of Virginia, and the Continental Congress had the great- est confidence, as shown in their letters of praise, tried several times to organize such an expedition, which alarmed the British very much; but he was unable properly to equip such a force effectively to march through a hostile region. Major DePeyster, in his speech to the Indian Conferences in 1770, states there was a fort at Eschicagou, or Chicago. It was really a blockhouse, with a fence of palisades or logs, set up on end, about fifteen or twenty feet high, set deep in the ground, and fastened together with heavy strips of wood. The Chicago Little Fort, the Little Fort at Tremont, and Little Fort at Waukegan were abandoned by the British soldiers or traders after their defeat in 1780; even Fort 58 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES St. Joseph was abandoned for a while in 1779-80, when it was rumored Linctot was on his way to capture Detroit. When the Spanish commander captured Fort St. Joseph, and in 1781 annexed the Chicago Dune region, as well as the whole Northwest, to Spain, the Pottawottomie allies, who had been faithful to the Americans, especially Sigge- naak, the Pottawottomie chief of Milwaukee, were very much disgusted with the Americans for allowing Captain Pierrot to capture this territory and annex it to Spain. Siggenaak knew Major De Linctot would not have allowed it but the major was sick then and in the hospital. Linctot died in the summer of 1781, worn out from his almost incredible activity. At his death the last active influence in keeping the Indians on the side of the Ameri- cans was removed, and Linctot’s great Indian Alliance, ex- tending from Pennsylvania and Virginia to the Mississippi, collapsed like a house of cards. Nearly all of the Indians, including Siggenaak, then became active allies of the Brit- ish. The treaty of peace with Great Britain was signed on September 3, 1783. The United States was recognized by Great Britain to be a free and independent country, extend- ing from the Atlantic Ocean to the Mississippi River, with the exception of the eastern part of Louisiana, and the Floridas, which were granted to Spain. These had been captured by the brilliant campaigns of Governor Galvez of New Orleans.- The Chicago Dune region was again American, In 1787 the region north of the Ohio was organized into one great territory, called the Northwest Territory, of which THE CONQUEST OF THE NORTHWEST 59 the Chicago Dune region is a part. Among the ordinances adopted were the following important ones: 1. The General Assembly shall consist of a Governor, the Council and the House of Representatives, consisting of one representative to every five hundred male inhabi- tants. There shall be freedom of religious belief and practice. States may be admitted into the Union when the pop- ulation will justify it. 4. Slavery shall not exist within the territory northwest of the Ohio River. 5. Section 16 in every township shall be kept for the needs of the schools in said township. wh But, even with the treaty of peace signed, and the gov- ernment of the United States organized, the Northwest was not yet conquered. The Indians had conceived such contempt for the Americans, as a result of the Spanish claim for the Northwest Territory, that, despite our final victory, we had “lost face’ with them. The British gave so many valuable presents to the Indians of the Northwest that they attached themselves to the Brit- ish in large numbers, and later defeated the Americans in several severe battles. Most of the Pottawottomies from the Dunes and neighboring Kickapoos took part in these battles. Generals Harmar and St. Clair were defeated. Har- mar and many soldiers were killed by these Indians in Brit- ish pay, who said they would drive all American whites out of the Indian country. There were Indians there from Milwaukee, Chicago, Tremont, Hegewisch, Thornton, Trail Creek, Liverpool, St. Joseph, etc. 60 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES If Major De Linctot, with his wonderful influence over the Indians had been alive, he might have been able to prevent this Indian War. But the great fighter, diplomat and Indian commissioner had passed away with none to take his place. General Clark had been mustered out of the army and was ill. General Washington looked around for a man who could command the situation in the West. He selected the man best fitted, General Anthony Wayne— Mad Anthony—as he was called, on account of the many desperate chances he took in defeating the British. Washington himself trained General Wayne in the best way to fight the Indians, insisting on eternal vigilance. He was to march in open order, keep his command together, stop marching in the afternoon, and build a log barricade around the entire camp, wherever they stopped. Wayne spent ¢wo years in training his men before he was ready to march against the Indians. By that time he had several thousand men, both infantry and cavalry, most of them trained soldiers; many of them frontiersmen. He had re- peatedly trained them in all kinds of Indian tactics. Never was the value of preparedness more clearly shown than when in 1795 he marched north with his army from Cincinnati, building strong forts at strategic points, and following Washington’s instructions to the letter. He was harassed by the Indians at every step and finally attacked at Fallen Timbers, Indiana, by a large body of them, in- cluding many from the Dunes and the Chicago region; from St. Joe to Milwaukee. General Wayne defeated them with great slaughter, and. thus avenged the crushing defeats of Harmar and St. Clair. He then built a very strong fort at Kekionga, or Miami Pea eCONOQUEST OF THE NORTHWEST. 61 Town, and called it Fort Wayne. This commanded the portage between the Maumee and the Wabash Rivers, that Pontiac said was the “Gateway to the West.”’ In 1795, the great Treaty of Greenville was concluded at Fort Greenville, Ohio, All the leading Indian tribes of the Northwest were represented—Pottawottomies, Ottawas, Kickapoos, Wyandots, Shawnees, Weas, Miamis, Chippe- was, etc. Little Turtle was so impressed with the bravery, skill and fair treatment of Wayne that he and his warriors refused to fight against the Americans in all future Indian troubles. This treaty, presided over by General Wayne, is im- portant, not so much from the amount or the value of the land given to the United States, as it is the strategic value of the places ceded. The general feeling of peace declared between the United States government and all the Indian tribes who took part in the treaty was also a great gain. The Indians, who had formerly despised the American commanders of the West, since Clark and Linctot, had now the greatest respect for Mad Anthony Wayne. So in this treaty, the Indians not only declared their allegiance to the United States and swore to be always friends with the Americans, but they also ceded about sixteen tracts of land, strategic points, that comprised all the principal trading posts and portages in the territory that now comprises Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Wisconsin and Michigan, including Macki- nac Island, “‘and one piece of land six miles square at the mouth of the Chickago River, emptying into the southwest end of Lake Michigan, where a fort formerly stood.” They referred here to the little tassements, or palisaded block- houses, that, at different times, were formerly located here. CHA ORY. THE CHICAGO MASSACRE In 1800, the population of the Northwest Territory had so increased that it was divided. All that part of the terri- tory west of the present state of Ohio was set off as the Territory of Indiana, and William Henry Harrison ap- pointed its governor. The United States realized that the Indians of the North- west were not loyal to the United States, but preferred the British, who gave them many rich presents. Mackinac was still held by the British, and proved to be a great source of trouble in stirring up the Indians against American rule. The president, Thomas Jefferson, saw that something must be done to protect the settlers of the northwestern region from the wrath of the Indians, who were in British pay, and, seeking the best location for a fort, decided that Chicago, at the head of the great portage, was of the utmost strategic value in controlling the Northwest. He accordingly in 1803 decided to locate a fort at Chi- cago, under the command of Captain Whistler, and called it Fort Dearborn, in honor of General Henry Dearborn, at that time secretary of war. To appreciate its isolated nature, we must realize that from Chicago to New York and Philadelphia stretched an almost unbroken forest, pierced here and there by winding rivers or dotted with 62 THE CHICAGO MASSACRE 63 beautiful little lakes or numerous swamps, so that Fort Dearborn was really the outpost of civilization. Lieutenant Swearingen, who marched overland from De- troit to Chicago, must have used the old trails from Detroit to Michigan City, passing through the Kinzie’s Improve- ment, at Niles, which is on the site of old Fort St. Joseph, through New Buffalo, and at the mouth of the Portage River, or Trail Creek, where Michigan City now is. On August 15, 1803, he records that they proceeded on the march at five o'clock in the morning, camped at nine o'clock in the evening, near an old fort which is possibly Little Fort of the Revolution, which General Hull locates a little southwest of Mount Tom, at Tremont. When the Tracy, with Captain Whistler, the commander, reached Chicago, she was not able to make the shore, but was obliged to anchor a half-mile out, as the water was too shallow there. The cargo was carried to the shore in Mackinaw row-boats and stored on the south bank of the river, near the mouth of the stream. Here Fort Dearborn was located, and completed in the summer of 1804. There were only four buildings then in Chicago. They belonged to French trappers, among whom were Ouilmette, Lemai and Pettell. Lemai’s cabin was the one originally erected by Baptiste Point au Saible, the famous French mulatto, who had been arrested by Lieutenant Bennett in 1779. He later sold his cabin to Lemai, moving back to Peoria, after he had been “turned down” by the Pottawot- tomies, Ottawas and Chippewas, as their hereditary chief. They preferred later to have Alexander Robinson as their head. It was getting toward fall and Captain Whistler began 64 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES work on the fort to have it ready before winter. While the fort was building, the ladies occupied the little cabins of the French trappers. Since there were no horses or oxen to be obtained and since the Indians had gone to their own villages or off on their hunt, the soldiers were compelled to get the timbers themselves. They worked during the winter and dragged the logs for several miles, undoubtedly on rude sleds. The fort, strong and well arranged, was completed in the summer of 1804. It was considered one of the strongest forts in the West and was surrounded by a stout stockade of oak pickets fourteen feet high, enclosing a square of about six hundred feet. After the fort was put up, John Kinzie, the Silverman, and his family arrived in the spring of 1804 and became residents of Chicago. He bought Lemai’s cabin on the north side of the river, facing the fort, and improved it and the grounds somewhat elaborately for that time. The fur trade of Chicago was under the Fur-Traders’ Headquarters at Mackinaw. All business was based upon the fur trade. The furs were brought to Chicago from all over the Chicago and Dune region, and even much farther away. The fur-traders would visit the various tribes, bring- ing their exchange goods with them, such as needles, thread, beads, tobacco, ribbons, liquor, guns, ammunition, spears, tomahawks, knives, blankets, traps, cloth and other things that were in demand. John Kinzie, who was an expert silversmith, made silver bracelets, rings and chains, and was very popular among the Indians of the Chicago Dune district, who called him Shaw-ne-aw-kee—Silverman. Most of the fur-traders and the trappers were French, THE CHICAGO MASSACRE 65 descendants of the old settlers of the Northwest. These French voyagers were strong, energetic, good-hearted peo- ple, who were equal to the very hardest kind of work. Many of them were married to Indian wives who soon became accustomed to the customs of the French women in Canada, the Northwest and the Illinois region. The children were very often well educated and well mannered and were sought in marriage by many of the leading French, English and American settlers of this region. A feeling of worry began to take possession of the settlers of the West as the Indians became more insolent and turbulent. In 1810, a meeting of all the chiefs of the north- western tribes, under Tecumseh, with the exception of the Miamis,—who under their great chief, Little Turtle, had remained faithful to the whites,—gathered at Tippecanoe on the Wabash in a great council. They had returned from a meeting at Fort Malden, Canada, where they had received further instructions from the British government. Many of the Indians from the Chicago Dune region attended this conference. It soon became known that the Indians intended to go on the war-path, and small forts or blockhouses were built everywhere and everything put in a state of defense. Gen- eral W. H. Harrison took command and marched with seven hundred soldiers from Vincennes against Tecumseh. In August, 1811, he defeated the Shawnee chief and burned the village of Tippecanoe which stood a few miles above the present City of Lafayette, Indiana. Many of the Pot- tawottomies from this region were fighting with Tecumseh. Shabona, afterward the great friend of the white people, was Tecumseh’s chief aid at this battle. 66 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES After this defeat, Tecumseh fled into Canada. The tribes scattered but soon reappeared in various places. The defeat of Tecumseh does not seem to have been sufficient to quell them. The Prophet, the brother of Tecumseh, had gone all over the eastern part of the Mississippi Valley and induced the Indians to make common cause against the whites. The Pottawottomies, who had never given any trouble in the Chicago region before, began now to come in large numbers to Chicago, making boasting speeches. One of them, a chief of the Calumet region, stated to a companion that these officers’ wives, who were playing battledore, a kind of tennis, would be hoeing corn in the Indians’ fields before very long. The settlers around Fort Dearborn felt no particular worry until April 7, 1812, when a band of eleven Winne- bagoes from Wisconsin appeared at the Lees’ farm-house, and killed Mr. White and a French voyager. A soldier and a young son of Mr. Lee made their escape and quietly went down to the town and warned the Burns, Wilmette and Kinzie families, and the soldiers. Troubles with Great Britain multiplied and on the nine- teenth of June, 1812, the United States declared war against Great Britain. This immediately started operations in the West and on the sixteenth of July the English captured Fort Mackinac from the Americans. Gurdon Hubbard, who first stopped at Chicago in 1818, states that it was said by people there to be a well-known fact that Pierre LeClaire first brought the news to Chicago of the declaration of war against Great Britain, having been sent by Major Robert Forsythe to the latter’s uncle, THE CHICAGO MASSACRE 67 John Kinzie. Quaife thinks it was after the middle of July, 1812. | LeClaire started from the mouth of the St. Joseph River before daylight, traveling along the lake shore to Chicago, a distance of fully ninety miles. He arrived at Mr. Kinzie’s house, ate his, supper, crossed the river again and reported the news to the officers of Fort Dearborn before nine o’clock that evening! He is certainly the champion Dune hiker! He undoubtedly also used the old Indian trails through the Dunes, which were cooler and firmer. He seems to be the same man who acted as interpreter at the Chicago Mas- sacre. The officers at Fort Dearborn were without official news of these events until the seventh of August, when the sentry on duty at Fort Dearborn perceived an Indian hastening along the trail from the south with great speed. As he approached the fort, he was recognized as Chief Winnemuc, or Winnemac, of the Pottawottomies, who had come from Detroit with a most ominous message from Gen- eral Hull, stating that the United States had declared war against Great Britain, and Captain Heald was ordered to evacuate Fort Dearborn, distribute the goods among the Indians, and proceed to Detroit with the troops via Fort Wayne, to take part in an expedition against Canada. Hull had undoubtedly received information of the fall of Mackinac. Most probably the officers of Fort Dearborn had also. Chief Winnemuc and several of the officers advised Cap- tain Heald to leave as soon as possible, before the Indians heard of his order to abandon the fort, but Captain Heald refused to do this, for he thought the Indians were not 68 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES hostile, and his orders stated he must distribute the goods among them. He accordingly waited until over six hundred Indians, most Pottawottomies, from Milwaukee to St. Joseph, were gathered around the fort, and then asked them to give him a friendly escort of five hundred warriors to Fort Wayne, which they readily—too readily—promised to do, though Mr. Kinzie and the younger officers begged Captain Heald to hold the fort, as it was strong, well garrisoned, and had food and ammunition enough for a six months’ siege. Chief Black Partridge came to the fort and gave up the peace medal given him by General Wayne at the treaty of Greenville, because, as he said, the younger Indians had determined to capture the fort. He, together with Chief Topinabe, Chief Winnemuc, Chief Pokagon of Michigan, Chief Alexander Robinson and Chief Billy Caldwell—the Sauganash, or Englishman—tried to get the Pottawottomies, Kickapoos and Ottawas, who ' were closely allied, to remain friends with the Americans, but they could not overcome the eagerness of their younger Indians to declare war. On the eighteenth of August, Captain William Wells arrived from Fort Wayne with an escort of thirty friendly Miami Indians. He was the Indian agent there, and was celebrated as a great warrior. He had been brought up among the Miami Indians and had married a daughter of their great Indian chief, Little Turtle. After his arrival, he recommended strongly that the liquor be poured into the Chicago River, and the guns be broken up and together with the ammunition be thrown into the FIVEt, THE CHICAGO MASSACRE 69 By that time, the Indians were assembling from Wiscon- sin, the northern part of Illinois and Indiana, and also from Southern Michigan; the great majority of these were Pottawottomies, though there was a sprinkling of Winne- bagoes, Ottawas and Kickapoos; also a few Sacs and Foxes. It was determined to abandon Fort Dearborn on the morning of August 15, 1812, and march through the woods, along the Indian trails, to Fort Wayne, Indiana. While there were about one hundred and twenty men, women and children in the fort, there were only forty men in good fighting condition; the others were sick. The thirty Miami Indians were considered good fighters too. Mrs. Kinzie and her children were placed in a large boat under the protection of Chief Topinabe of the St. Joseph Pottawottomies, who wished to take all of the Kinzies, in- cluding their daughter, Mrs. Helm, who, however, insisted on staying with her husband, Lieutenant Helm. Mr. Kinzie thought he would be of some assistance to the garrison if he stayed with them. Mrs. Kinzie was a witness of the awful scenes that soon followed. The garrison marched out from the fort, along the Indian trail bordering the lake, with the women and children in the middle of the line in wagons. Captain Wells was in the lead with some of the Miamis. Captain Heald brought up the rear, leaving the abandoned fort to be plundered. The band played the Dead March. The Indians to the num- ber of five hundred rode on ponies along the lines, osten- sibly as an escort to protect them. It was a most harrowing march—a modern Via Dolorosa —one of the worst in history, with the bloodthirsty pack of savages surrounding them; but this was made still more 70 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES agonizing, when the great body of Indians disappeared be- hind the sand-dunes about where the Auditorium now stands and rode ahead behind this ridge, for about a mile. Oh, the agony that must have filled the souls of these fugi- tives, on this awful march! The women and children, dreading the awful fate that might await them; the men, fearing for these dear ones, but grimly resolving to battle to the death for them. It was certainly a Via Dolorosa— a Road of Sorrow. As the fugitives approached what is now Eighteenth Street, they were attacked by the Indians, who had formed an ambuscade at that point. The troops formed in line to repel them. The Miami Indians became panic-stricken and fled for home, as the Pottawottomies and Kickapoos were not on friendly terms with the Miamis since their battle with them in 1775. The women and children were guarded by a company of soldiers at the cottonwood trees near the foot of Eighteenth Street where the Fort Dearborn Massacre Monument, given to the Chicago Historical Society by George M. Pullman, is now placed. This dreadful massacre continued for more than an hour. The soldiers had been given twenty-five rounds of ammunition, and sold their lives dearly, ware half of the Indians being killed. The garrison surrendered on condition that if they were not ransomed by friends, they were to be delivered to the nearest British post as prisoners of war. But, as soon as they surrendered, the savages treated them in a most hor- rible manner, and especially the wounded. They killed all but twenty-five soldiers and eleven women and children. Captain Wells was struck down after he had killed eight iiareChicCAGO MASSACRE 71 Indians by his own hands. He was so fearless a man that his heart was eaten by the Indians that some of his bravery might thus pass to them. Mrs. Helm was badly injured by an Indian who tried to kill and scalp her, but while struggling hard with him, she was seized by an old Indian and borne to the lake near by and her head dipped under water. She soon found the Indian was not trying to drown her and on looking at him closely found it was Black Partridge. The prisoners were distributed among the different Indian tribes, to be held as slaves or returned if a large enough ransom was paid for them. Mrs. Kinzie, and her family, including Mrs. Helm, finally reached St. Joseph. Lieu- tenant Helm was taken by the Pottawottomies to the Kanka- kee River region, and finally ransomed, especial credit being due a noted half-breed chief, called Shadney by the Ameri- cans, the original name probably being Chaudonnais. That ancient chief, Siggenaak, carried some captives to Muil- waukie, as it was then spelled. The news of this awful massacre shocked the ‘entire country, and also the British officers, who hastened to deny any connection with it, saying it was done by a lot of irresponsible savages. The British commander immediately gave orders to have all of the prisoners looked up and re- turned to the nearest British posts so that they could be restored to their families, which was done as soon as possible. The splendid bronze monument representing the Fort Dearborn Massacre shows the Indian about to kill and scalp Mrs. Helm, John Kinzie’s—the Silverman’s—daughter, who is trying to get his scalping knife. The chief who is bidding 72 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES the Indian stop is Black Partridge. There are four bronze panels on the pedestal. One shows Black Partridge giving up his peace medal to Captain Heald, in the fort; 2—the march from the fort; 3—the battle and the death of Captain Wells; 4—the prostrate figure is Doctor Van Voorhis, and the child represents the little children who were tomahawked in the wagon. CHAPTER VII PIONEER LIFE WHEN Alfred Jennings, delegate from Indiana Territory, put a resolution through Congress in 1816, extending the state of Indiana ten miles to the northward, taking that much from Michigan Territory, so that Indiana could have a decent lake harbor, afterward located at Michigan City, he did not realize that he was establishing a most valuable precedent for Illinois. In June, 1816, the United States government sent Captain Hezekiah Bradley to rebuild Fort Dearborn, which was made very strong. Hubbard says that the stockade and all the buildings were neatly whitewashed and presented a neat and pleasing appearance. There was great talk of constructing the Illinois and Michigan Canal, and to obtain undisputed possession of this, it was found necessary to get a strip of land from the In- dians that would cover the land needed for the canal. Accordingly, in 1816, the Treaty of St. Louis was signed in which the Indians ceded to the government a strip of land twenty miles wide, bordering on Lake Michigan, ten miles on each side of the Chicago River, and extending from Evanston to South Chicago. It extended southwest to the mouth of the Fox River on the north and the Kankakee on the south, protecting the entire Chicago Portage. 73 74 THE, WONDERS OF THE DONES One concession to the Indians—the Pottawottomies, etc., —made in this treaty is of sentimental value to them, as it gives them the right to hunt and fish within this tract as long as it may continue to be the property of the United States. When Illinois petitioned Congress to become a state in 1818, Nathaniel Pope, the delegate to Congress from Illi- nois, had decided to follow the example set by Alfred Jennings of Indiana, who succeeded in getting ten miles of coast land from Michigan. Pope asked to have Illinois extended up to 42° 30’, so as to control the Illinois and Michigan Canal and also have good harbors, Waukegan, Chicago and South Chicago being then in the territory of Wisconsin. Congress approved this, and on December 3, 1818, Illinois, with three fine harbors, was admitted as a state. The Chicago River, until 1828, according to Gurdon Hubbard, emptied into Lake Michigan at a point known as the Pines, a clump of a hundred or more small pine-trees located at the sand-hills near the Logan Monument. Be- tween the river and the lake, and extending south to the Pines, was a narrow strip of sand, formed by the northern winds, which gradually forced the mouth of the river south of its original outlet at Fort Dearborn. In the spring of 1828, the Chicago River had a very strong current caused by a flood, and taking advantage of this, Captain Fowle, the commander of Fort Dearborn, had his soldiers dig a ditch through the sand spit so as to have the river go directly east into the lake. This was done and the force of the water soon washed a channel fifteen feet deep directly to the lake. This soon began to fill with PIONEER LIFE 7° sand and the river began to shift again to the south and finally emptied into the lake at Madison Street, which posi- tion it kept until the river was dredged out by the govern- ment in 1834 and kept where it now is. The North Branch was then known as River Guarie, named after a French trader, who had tilled the soil there, and whose corn hills were still recognized as such by Hubbard. The United States, after the treaty of Prairie Du Chien, 1829, owned all the country on the east side of the Missis- sippi River from the Gulf of Mexico to the mouth of the Wisconsin River. Black Hawk never acknowledged the au- thority of the chiefs of the Sacs and Foxes who gave their lands to the government in 1804, and when white people attempted to settle on the lands of his village on the Rock River, he objected vigorously. During the war with Black Hawk, in 1832, he was de- feated and captured. The government decided that it was dangerous to leave the Indians in charge of these vast tracts of land as the country was being settled rapidly by immi- grants from the East and the South. They therefore made a final treaty, at Chicago, with the Pottawottomies, Chippewas and Ottawas in 1833. This final session extinguished the Indian title in Illinois and Indiana and left the country open to settlers. This treaty, undoubtedly the saddest of all Indian treaties to the In- dians, was considered of such great consequence that people were present from all over the United States and Europe. The account of this written by an English traveler and writer is most interesting. He says in speaking of Chi- cago: 76 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES “The Indians were encamped on all sides. They consisted of three tribes, among them the Pottawottomies of the Prairie and of the Forest. There were all kinds of people present—horse dealers and horse stealers—rogues of every description—white, black, brown and red. “The little village was in an uproar from morning to night and from night to morning. During the hours of darkness, when the housed portion of the population of Chicago strove to obtain repose the Indians howled, sang, wept, yelled and whooped in their various encampments. With all this, the whites seemed to me to be more pagan than the red men.” As a result of this treaty, the Pottawottomies, Ottawas, and Chippewas gave up all their claims to the Indian lands in the Northwest, and moved to Missouri; then to Kansas and finally to the Indian Territory, though many Indians still remained in Illinois and Indiana in the Chicago Dune region. The Northwest Territory was now ready for white settlers everywhere. After the government in 1816 had obtained the strip of land ten miles on each side of the Chicago River to protect a possible canal there, people from the East began by thou- sands to move to the West. A survey for a road for a stage-coach between Detroit and Chicago was made in 1825, and carried out later. This road followed the old Sauk Road pretty closely, running from Detroit to Bertrand, Niles, New Carlisle, LaPorte, Valparaiso, Westville, and — taking the northern Sauk Road through Chesterton, Porter, Baileytown, through the Dunes near Dune Park to Lake Michigan, and along the beach to Chicago. Frank Knotts, of Gary, Indiana, obtained the original United States sur- vey map of this road, though when built it did not follow PIONEER LIFE a7 the survey everywhere. A later road followed the beach from Michigan City. This stage road, after reaching the old Indian trail at the south of Polk Slide, continued along the inside of the Dunes, following a beautiful winding path that was orig- inally one of the Indian trails. Following past the present Tremont, and through the meadow back of Mount Tom, crossing the Valparaiso Road there; then, trending to the southwest a little, it skirted the edge of a hollow in which was located Hobart’s old mill of 1835. From there it crossed Fort Creek and ascended the hill where the mill dam was formerly made, and where Little Fort was built about 1750 or 1755. From here it followed the south side of the Dunes, through the site of old City West and the ancient Little Fort territory of the French-Indian and Revolutionary Wars; going past the present Waverly Beach Road, passing on the south side of the Dunes through Portchester and Mineral Springs, and through the beautiful Cowles Tama- rack Swamp, where the country road is still visible in spots. Mr. Green says that when he was a boy, fifty years ago, there was a fine corduroy road extending through the swamp, and that it was used a number of years after that. The road then passed on the side of the hill along the swamp until it reached the present Oak Hill Road at the Dunes, and connecting with the old Chicago Post Road there, went to the beach near Dune Park, and thence to Chicago along the beach. This old road is still used occa- sionally by teams to carry supplies to cottages on the beach. The government, later in the ’forties, changed this road, and built the newer Detroit-Chicago Road, northeast from 78 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES Michigan City on the north side of the Calumet Ridge or Beach, and continued it in a southwest direction until it reached the Calumet River at Culver’s Point, named after the hotel-keeper, Mr. Culver. This was a short distance west of the junction of Deep River and a little southeast of Dune Park. The river valley at this point is very wide, and in early times it was flooded the year around. It was shallow there, and a bridge, called Long Bridge or Corduroy Bridge, made of piles and poles, was built there by the government engi- neers, extending from bank to bank, just west of the present bridge at that point. It was very long and very shaky be- cause the young trees and poles were not very solid. Some authorities give it as sixty and others as eighty rods long. One old lady, who went over this bridge when a little girl, said it was so long and so very shaky she feared it would break and drown them all. A later road from Michigan City was made by following the old road on the inside of the Dunes through Dune Park, along the northern shore of Long Lake where the stage road divided. One road went over the Dunes a few miles, making a very pretty road still to be traced as a trail, that came out to the beach about a mile east of Miller, near the old Berry’s Tavern of 1833, and then continued along the beach to Chicago. The branch road that became the Michigan City-Tolleston Road, followed an Indian trail along the Dunes through Miller, and along the Tolleston Ridge, passing through Tolleston and Hessville along the ridge to Illinois in a west- erly direction, and northwest to Chicago, as the Michigan PIONEER LIFE 79 City Road, crossing the Calumet River at Riverdale, on the new Riverdale Bridge. This bridge, by the way, was put up a couple of years after Clark Mathews, the hunter and ferryman at River- dale, left that place for the reason, as he told Perriam, that the neighbors were getting “‘too blamed thick’; and, like Daniel Boone, he “trekked out west where he could breathe freely.” This Michigan Road, from Riverdale, joined at Vin- cennes Avenue and Fighty-seventh Street the Blue Island- Vincennes Road, which was a plank road laid down in 1852, and reached from Blue Island to Lake Street. Mr. Ferdi- nand Schapper, recently deceased, who was the leading his- torian of the Blue Island region, states that Blue Island was so called because it was surrounded by water, either river, creek or marsh, and the mist constantly rising gave a strong, hazy, bluish tint to the high land. This plank road followed the Vincennes Trail, which was used by the people coming from the East. Some of them used the old Chicago Road from Michigan City, crossing at Culver’s Point, and instead of turning north to Thornton, traveled west a few miles farther to Homewood, or Old Thornton, thence to Blue Island and went via the Vincennes Trail to Chicago. Others took the Sauk Trail from Detroit, passing through Niles, LaPorte, Door Village, Westville, Dyer and, going west to the Vincennes Trail, took that road to Chicago, passing through Chicago Heights, or Bloom, Homewood and Blue Island on the way. Some went west from Bloom to Joliet and took the Ogden route to Chicago. Mr. Schapper relates that at times the roads between 8o THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES Blue Island and Chicago were so flooded that for months at a time it was impossible for teams to go through, and Chicago travelers were compelled to try other roads, or the lake shore; and for that reason a plank road to Chicago was a necessity. . Jonathan Perriam, who lived at Wildwood, on the Calu- met, at One Hundred Thirtieth Street, states that in 1840 there were but three houses between his home and Chicago: the Eleven-Mile House, or Smith’s Tavern, State and Ninety-third Streets; Jackson, evidently the blacksmith, lo- cation unknown; and Myrick’s Tavern on Cottage Grove Avenue near Thirty-fourth Street where the two trails, Michigan City-Vincennes and South Chicago, came to- gether. Myrick’s Tavern was still in existence in 1868, and possibly later. The Eleven-Mile House is still there, and is used as a residence. The author, when on a skating trip one very cold day from Normal Park across the great Winnemuc Swamp, took dinner there in 1873. Fifteen below zero! In 1852 when the plank road from Chicago to Blue Island was put down, it followed the road from Myrick’s down Cottage Grove Avenue to Lake Street. Mr. Schapper also says that in 1851 there was not a single settler between Chicago and Blue Island with the exception of the Wilcox home near Vincennes Avenue and One Hun- dred Third Street, and two taverns east of South Engle- wood. He refers here to the Ten-Mile House and the Eleven-Mile House. Mendenhall, in his map of Illinois of 1856, shows the following as the early settlements between Chicago and Indiana : PIONEER LIFE 81 I. Junction, at Englewood, where the Lake Shore and Rock Island Railroads joined and went into Chicago on a common right-of-way. 2. Calumet, or the Holland Settlement, now Roseland, on Michigan Avenue and One Hundred Seventh Street. 3. Portland, or Blue Island; called Portland because Peter Barton and others laid out a subdivision on the southeastern part of the Blue Island Ridge and ex- tended it to the Calumet River. This soon failed and the old name of Blue Island was restored. The Calumet River at that time was so deep and wide that sizable vessels and small steamers came up it to Blue Island, though very seldom up Stony Brook. Some of these vessels even went up the Calumet River to Thorn Creek, which was forty feet wide at the mouth and pretty deep, and went up that creek some distance, getting grain, hay and lumber. Chicago at this time, about 1830, commenced to boom very rapidly, and in 1833 it had increased so much in popu- lation that it took unto itself the dignity of a town. It be- came a city in 1837. The news soon spread over the country that the Illinois and Michigan Canal had actually been started on the fourth of July, 1836. Gurdon Hubbard, who was one of the canal commissioners and the father of the Illinois and Michigan Canal, wielded the spade that started the canal though the work was not completed until 1848. Immediately a great rush to Chicago took place. Prop- erty went up with the boom; roads were cut through the Dunes and wooded regions leading to Chicago. Pioneers from the Northern States began to come by the thousands, 82 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES seeking land in Indiana, Illinois, Michigan, Wisconsin, lowa and other places. The center of business was Chicago. The main travel was through the Dunes, and along the old sand ridges of Lake Chicago a little to the south of the Calumet River. People from all over the country went wild over Chicago property, and plenty of land, much of it worthless, was sold to eastern people at fabulous prices. This boom extended for miles, even to the Dunes. To show how wide-spread the booming of Chicago was and how the colored prospectuses flooded the country the writer gives the following little story. Mr. John Lloyd Stephens, the great American explorer, who was the first traveler to explore thoroughly the ruins in Central America and Yucatan, had also done a great deal of exploring later in Egypt, the Holy Land and Arabia; and his book, published by Harper in 1837, gives some illustrations drawn by himself with descriptions, which make it an interesting and valuable book. In it he speaks about his visit to Mt. Sinai, in order to see the celebrated copy of the Bible, the Codex Sinaiaticus, at that time the oldest known edition of the Bible. There is a large monastery up there and when he visited it, and explained his object, as wishing to see the most celebrated copy of the Bible in the world, the abbot was much gratified at his praise and brought the valued manu- script in himself. Mr. Stephens was greatly interested in it. It was beautifully painted in many different colors; and he says that when he first saw it, he was startled because in its striking assortment of rich colors, it was so brilliant that it reminded him of one of the new maps of the City of Chicago! This was evidently written about the year ATTACKING THE ForeEstT PIONEER LIFE 83 1835 or 1836 and shows to what heights of fame Chicago had attained, even at that early period. It was even then entitled to the name “Windy City.” The success of Chicago not only attracted immigrants from the Northern States, but it also stimulated a number of rival cities who thought they had as good opportunities for settlers as Chicago. Among these that thought they could surpass Chicago were three cities in the Dunes: In- diana City, at the mouth of the Grand Calumet, at Miller; City West at the mouth of Fort Creek, and Michigan City at the mouth of Trail Creek. All of these streams were much larger then than now. Mr. J. O. Bowers, one of the leading lawyers of Gary, in describing Indiana City, Indiana, and City West, says that the main plat of Indiana City seems to have been recorded January 4, 1838. This plat was signed by Robert Stewart and others and subdivided the land immediately south of the Grand Calumet River. This main subdivision comprised twenty-five blocks. The plat of City West was irregular in shape and com- prised about fifteen or twenty acres. It was located at the mouth of Fort Creek and extended south a considerable dis- tance. This plat was recorded July 14, 1837, by J. Bigelow. Michigan City had a few residents, mainly fur-traders, in the late twenties. It was founded by Major I. C. Elston in 1831. It became a city in 1832. When the great rush to the West occurred at that time it began to be a place of some importance, and its inhabitants thought that a harbor should be constructed to give anchorage for ships and thus help the town. City West had the same idea and so had In- diana City. 84 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES The general claim of them all was, “We shall have the greatest city on the lakes; will surpass Chicago, Milwaukee or Detroit.” Indiana City had a few houses put up, and the boomers of Indiana City were even worse, if possible, than those of Chicago, City West or Michigan City in their absurd claims. They relied to some extent upon the near- ness of this proposed town to Chicago and the canal, and also upon the fact that the Grand Calumet River, with a little dredging at the mouth, would be a larger, wider and deeper river than the Chicago River, Fort Creek at City West, or Trail Creek at Michigan City; but business did not materialize and few people came. In fact, Doctor Ball, in his history of Lake County, Indiana, thought no one came; that it was all a paper speculation. Old settlers, however, informed me that a few small houses were built then. When the panic of 1837 came, Indiana City was deserted, and is now only amemory. It has been succeeded by Miller. The very deep snows of 1830-31 must have been greatly instru- mental in widening the Hull Canal between the Calumet River at Hegewisch to the Little Calumet and much water was taken away from the river at Indiana City, thus sanding the outlet. Mr. Williams, a leading lawyer of Gary, thinks that in 1837 a small lighthouse was built near the mouth of the Calumet River. City West fared a little better. That was platted where Waverly Beach now is and where Little Fort of the French- Indian and the Revolutionary Wars was situated. Before the city was platted as a regular city, there was a number of inhabitants. A Mr. Hobart, said to be founder of Hobart, Indiana, erected a large lumber mill there in 1835, a few blocks southwest of Mount Tom, and a couple of PIONEER LIFE 85 blocks directly east of the present little iron bridge at Waverly, at the eastern terminus of the hollow along the creek. It was at the foot of the bluff on which was located the ancient Little Fort of the Revolution. The speculators who were booming City West were very daring, and in filing their plat at Valparaiso, they had on it a proposed canal from Lake Michigan back to the Calumet River, a distance of over three miles, thus antedating by eighty years the great million-dollar Burns Ditch, or Calu- met Canal, which is to connect Lake Michigan through the level part of Dune Park to the Calumet River, and which is to be dug now that the Great War is over. The City West promoters were energetic and succeeded in luring eastern settlers by promising work at the sawmill, and also by declaring they were going to have the harbor put there by the government. An appropriation of five thousand dollars for a lighthouse had been voted in 1837, but old settlers say it was never built. In addition to nearly forty dwellings, some of them plas- tered, were three neat little hotels built to accommodate all the visitors this little metropolis was to shelter. They were the Bigelow Hotel, the Bradley Hotel and the Morse Hotel. The Bigelow Hotel had thirty small rooms in it, a sizable number for a small place. It is said by old settlers that Daniel Webster championed the resolution in Congress to have the proposed Government Harbor for Indiana placed at the mouth of Fort Creek; while Henry Clay was said to be the champion of the Michigan City claim. Old resi- dents claim Daniel Webster was paid five thousand dollars for his services to City West. When the panic of 1837 came, caused mainly by tre- 86 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES mendous speculation and poor banks, the people were com- pelled to forsake City West to procure some kind of a living elsewhere. City West was forsaken so utterly that in 1840, some visitors, who had seen it several years before when it was a bustling little town, found it a veritable deserted village, as there was not a single person living in the whole town. Waverly Beach is now on this site and is booming. It is the property of the Morgan estate. As the star of City West began to wane that of Michigan City began to ascend. As it grew, it needed more buildings. Those at City West were forsaken and a number of its inhabitants tore down their own dwellings and moved them by ox team to Michigan City and helped build up new places there. Other buildings at City West, whose owners had gone elsewhere, were torn down and used either by the farmers of the neighborhood or by settlers of surrounding villages. New City West was thus founded in the early ’forties at the site of the present Tremont, and a sawmill, hotel and cooper shop were built there. Michigan City began to flourish. Its citizens were wide awake and advertised their little town freely. It became a good place for trade, for it was on the main road from Detroit, as well as on one from the north. Its grain mill, Scott’s Mill, was considered the best in the West. Honorable Martin T. Krueger, the patriotic mayor of Michigan City, in a very interesting interview a couple of years ago, said that when he was a little boy in the ’sixties he met a man whose name was either Coffin or Coughlan, who claimed to have lived where Michigan City now is PIONEER LIFE 87 before there was any settlement there, in the ‘twenties. Mr. Krueger said he gave no thought to the man’s claim and it passed from his mind, until many years afterward he met this man, very old, in Michigan City. He remembered having met Mr. Krueger at the time and recalled the incident. Mr. Krueger asked the old gentleman if he could point out that place and he said, yes; that there were two mills there, a sawmill and a grist mill, both Scott’s Mills. Mr. Krueger drove him out and they came to a place known at that time as the Gould farm; but they couldn’t locate the place because so much of the timber had been cut off. Coughlan said if they could locate the old spring called the Marquette Spring, he was sure he could find it. For some time they hunted until finally at the western slope of the Council Grounds, the old hunter pointed to a place covered with a large dead pine, under which was found the spring. After having found the spring, Mr. Coughlan soon sighted the hill upon which he had his cabin and on going up to the hill found it was just across a small stream known as the Rummel Ditch flowing into Trail Creek; but in early days when Mr. Krueger was a boy it was called Cheney Brook, and is now so called. After crossing this small stream, they climbed a steep hill to the west and there at the top of the hill, the highest in the neighborhood, they found the remains of a human habitation in the forest. These consisted of an excavation of an old cellar and some stones which Coughlan had carried from Trail Creek to build a rough fireplace. He had lived here the life of a hunter and trapper, selling or bartering his fur pelts for 88 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES such commodities as were carried by the fur-traders who passed along the trail and who usually camped at this spring because of its good water and fine position. From the high hill he could overlook the Marquette Spring, and the Council Grounds, located about two blocks away toward the northeast and separated from his cabin site by a deep little valley. He had also a sweeping view of the trail winding toward the west at the base of the hill. It is highly probable that Mr. Coughlan’s cabin was built on the very spot on which Jean Baptiste Point au Saible, the first permanent citizen of Chicago, built his cabin in 1779, and from which cabin, at Trail Creek, he was cap- tured by the British and taken to Fort Mackinaw, as the spot was the most famous trading place on Trail Creek. It would be only natural that he had his cabin here so as to have better trade with the Indians for their furs as well as getting some for himself, for this was considered the best hunting district of the Trail Creek region. 3 Mr. Coughlan also reported that in 1831, the year before the Black Hawk War, Black Hawk was at the Council Grounds for two or three months counseling with the Pot- tawottomie and Ottawa Indians and trying to persuade them and other Indian tribes to join him in an Indian conspiracy to drive the white people into the lake, but the Indians of these various tribes refused to have anything to do with the movement. Mr. Coughlan assured Mr. Krueger that he knew Black Hawk personally and had spoken to him a number of times during this visit. The writer had the pleasure of visiting this place several times and at one time Mayor Krueger not only showed the Council Grounds, and Marquette Spring, but also acted as PIONEER LIFE 89 guide in climbing to the top of the big hill and showing the spot where Coughlan’s cabin (probably Au Saible’s also) was located and from which a lookout was possible over the surrounding country. There was a large hollow in the top of the hill, with stones and pieces of mortar in it which had made the chimney. It seemed very old and much used. At another visit, Mayor Krueger escorted Mrs. Brennan and myself over much of this beautiful and historic region, showing us the old ford and bridge site over Trail Creek, | and the old Detroit, Michigan and Chicago stage road of the early days. A branch road, much used, led west from the stage road through the woods to the Indian Council Grounds, and would indicate that travelers often used it as a camping-ground also. The writer dug out another much- used spring on the south side of the plateau. CHAPTER VIII LOG CABINS, PRAIRIE SCHOONERS AND CRIMINALS \WHEN the pioneer was ready to settle, he picked out a location on one of these high wooded ridges near a stream, to get material for a house as well as fuel, and if possible tried to be near a spring of pure water, preferring a spot that had good soil, and was in a district abounding with game. When the pioneer was ready for a log house, the logs were cut to the required size. The neighbors, when there were any, came to help. The logs were notched near the ends so that one could slide over the other and so become locked. A large chimney built of pieces of saplings from four to’ six feet long at the bottom, to two or three feet at the top, was also built on the outside of the house, with the fireplace often large enough to hold heavy logs. The roof was made of thin, rough, uneven boards, gen- erally smoothed some with an ax, adze or a draw-knife and often were nailed on the roof with wooden nails, though sometimes fastened with strips and sometimes thatched with hay and covered with logs as in England. The logs were often peeled to get rid of insects, and to last longer, and the chinks were plastered heavily. go LOG CABINS AND CRIMINALS gl If the family was large, an attic was arranged up-stairs ; to save space, a ladder was used. Bedsteads, or rather sleeping bunks, were made by putting up sticks in the floor, with cross-sticks driven in between the logs. Sometimes these were placed above one another, Pullman style, though they were not quite so comfortable. The bottom of each bunk was formed by putting in cross-pieces, and covering these with hay, corn stalks or corn husks. After things were in good order, and the man of the house had a little time, a regular bedstead was made. The wood generally used for this purpose was the. sassafras, which is exceedingly light and is ready for use, as it grows in sandy soil up north to small trees four or five inches thick; it was also considered good to keep away the insects. In some cases, the posts were left very high, so that the bed- stead could be covered with mosquito netting if desired. The sassafras was sometimes called the Ague Tree. The floor was often made of dirt, generally sand, which was covered in damp or cool weather with skins of animals, as in Lincoln’s home. But, as soon as possible, a floor was made of boards, generally puncheons, which were split logs with the upper part smoothed off by ax, adz or drawing- knife. These were fitted together with strips, so as to make a fairly level floor. In many of these log houses not a single iron nail was used; these were generally used later, when better roads and more traders appeared. The writer has seen many of these log houses and found a number fastened together with wooden pegs of pin-oak which is strong and straight. The house-raising bee was an occasion for great enjoy- ment, some of the neighbors coming from many miles away. 92 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES Between times of heavy work, they rested and enjoyed themselves in all kinds of athletic sports and in shooting, which was a very necessary accomplishment, for they were compelled to shoot straight or go hungry. The expert shots were told to bring in plenty of game, since these house-raising: bees generally lasted about two or three days; and the women-folk put upa dinner that makes our mouths water to think of; it was generally prepared out- side at the camp-fire or barbecue. Bear and venison, wild turkeys, partridges and prairie chickens, wild duck and geese and possibly a young wild swan, the latter said by con- noisseurs to be the most savory of all water fowl, squirrels, ‘possum and rabbits, were on the menu. Then after their toil these pioneers danced to the tunes of Old Dan Tucker and Money Musk. Truly the “good old times,’ with their many dire privations and perils, of which the average American to-day knows absolutely nothing, did have some compensations in the innocent pleasure and rec- reation. It must be remembered that many of these pioneers were of the very best American stock. They came West to have a fuller opportunity; just as, their ancestors did in the East a century or, more before. Many of them were younger sons and daughters. Many were strong, enter- prising people from across the water, who joined hands with the Americans in conquering the wilderness, and ex- tending the American commonwealth. In moving in their great prairie schooners every pound counted and little furniture was included. They always carried some kitchen utensils, plates, etc. These were gen- erally of pewter or tin; crockery ware was too easily broken, and too heavy. Almost the entire equipment was made of LOG CABINS AND CRIMINALS 93 wood, from hollowed out cups and saucers to large bowls. In building a table a very large stump would be left for the dinner table; after a time boards would be cut and placed on the stump to make it larger. Seats would be made by taking a fine pine or tamarack tree and sawing it into proper lengths, carefully taking off the bark. If a large seat was needed, short boards were made and nailed on them to suit the owner. Many styles were worked out by the pioneers, both the men and the women, for the pioneer wife and mother was able to help build a house, till the soil, milk the cows, kill wild animals, including bear and panther, for defense, food or furs; and if necessary, Indians also. In addition to these things, she worked at such minor trifles as keeping house; baking, either in a Dutch oven made of tin, in the fireplace, or in an oven constructed in the chimney just over the fireplace. The pioneer wife was also an efficient business manager, able to reduce work to the minimum and results to the maximum. One very sensible thing that distinguished this housewife was her many-sided efficiency. To save extra work in caring for dishes, some of these progressive house- wives had their husbands construct a table two inches thick, and hollow out spaces for food, which made housework much easier. ‘These tables were kept spotlessly clean by constant scouring with sand. Spoons and forks were also made of wood when necessary; also of cow’s horn. The pioneer mother was also a tailoress. She may have brought some cloth along. If not, she was obliged to de- pend upon wild animals for clothing until she could buy cloth, raise flax for linen, or sheep for their wool. She and 94 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES her husband learned the best way of dressing the skins of the wild animals killed; the way to make the deer skin pliable and soft; to make clothing suitable and comfortable. One of the most satisfactory of the mills for grinding grain was a hollowed-out white-oak stump, which contained the grain to be ground after it had been thrashed out by the rude flails which consisted of a long pole cut in two parts, connected with a hinge of leather. Near this stump a tough young sapling, preferably of hickory, was selected, the branches trimmed off and the top bent down and tied to a heavy stone or oak block that fitted the stump loosely. This was jerked up and down until the grain was pounded fine. The pioneer housewives baked their own bread, cakes, cookies, biscuits, etc., and could not be surpassed by the present Domestic Science experts. Their great breakfast food was mush; samp, which is cracked corn, was also much used. Hominy was hulled corn. Gurdon Hubbard says that the Indians and trappers found dried corn with fat more nourishing than meat. The people who occupy the beautiful West to-day do not realize the hardships that the pioneers were obliged to undergo in settling it. In addition to the danger arising from the Indians, wild animals, bad roads and bad fords, was a still greater one after the Indians had disappeared— the many criminals who infested the highways leading from the East. These criminals had their great headquarters in a cave on the Ohio River in Illinois, called Cave in the Rock, under the leadership of John A. Murrell, the great outlaw. He had at one time twenty thousand members in his bands, and they terrorized the Mississippi Valley. They had LOG CABINS AND CRIMINALS 95 developed their criminality to such perfection that there was a complete organization in different branches, and all under the direction of Murrell. For instance, the horse thieves in the Mississippi Valley had an organization, the Horse Thieves’ Association—with branches in every state, and it was the business of these different centers to ship off and sell stolen horses and also furnish funds to take care of members arrested for such thievery, though very often the courts were spared the expense of such a trial, as the people who captured them very often used “Lynch Law” and hanged them immediately. The Mississippi Valley in those pioneer days was espe- cially cursed with highwaymen who frequented the traveled routes from the East and who were found all over the West. These criminals did not scruple to murder immigrants, sometimes killing the entire family and running off with their stock and goods. These outlaws frequently consorted with other criminals and had a joint camp or retreat. They also had a highly developed organization in every state and territory. Among the early explorers who traveled through the Chicago Dune region in the ’thirties and ’forties was my mother’s uncle, Alexander Freeman, whose folks had come from Milford, New Haven Colony, Connecticut, to Newark, New Jersey, in 1666. He kept a hotel, called for years Freeman’s Tavern, at Perth Amboy, opposite New York City. He did a great deal of exploring in Pennsylvania, Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Michigan, Wisconsin and Iowa. He often spoke of these bands of criminals. He was athletic, always went well armed, was well mounted and was seldom 96 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES troubled. He traveled through the Dunes a number of times on his western trips. Here is one of his experiences. While taking supper at a farmer’s house on the top of the Alleghany Mountains in Pennsylvania, he noticed a large piece of maple sugar at the end of a string, which hung down from the rafter over the housewife. When the hostess asked him which he preferred, “long sweetnin’”’ or “short sweetnin’,” he said he did not wish any; for he did not know just what was meant. The next guest said he would take “short sweetnin’,” whereupon the lady of the house bit off a piece of maple sugar and dropped it into his cup. The next man took “long sweetnin’,’ which was molasses, poured from a pitcher. Uncle Aleck took “long sweetnin’.”’ Mr. Freeman, in his western trips, came upon many traces of “Johnny Appleseed,” John Chapman, that nature lover and humanitarian, who, in the latter part of the eighteenth century and early part of the nineteenth, was in the habit of getting appleseeds from the cider mills of Western Penn- sylvania and planting them in rich glades, sometimes coming pretty far north. The new settlers in Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Kentucky, etc., found many-.of those apple orchards, which proved of the greatest help to them. The Indians protected Johnny Appleseed in his work, considering him a little bit touched mentally. Mr. Freeman’s reports of his explora- tions in the ‘thirties and ’forties were of great assistance in telling prospective settlers where to go. Many of the people from Northern Jersey, Pennsylvania and Southern New York, using his information, came out West via Detroit, following the Dunes and Chicago roads to Indiana, LOG CABINS AND CRIMINALS 97 Illinois, Iowa, Michigan and Wisconsin, as well as more southern routes. The following anecdote about Bishop Kemper, my father’s cousin, the pioneer Episcopal Bishop of the Chi- cago Dune region, we can not vouch for. It sounds like a ministers’ banquet yarn, and was told by a Baptist clergy- man who met the bishop in Mississippi in those pioneer days, later being published in a magazine. The bishop was the traveling Episcopal missionary for the West and went everywhere, hearing services and founding churches, just as his Methodist colleague, Bishop Peter Cartright, did. Kemper Hall in Kenosha is named after him. He was a magnetic preacher, and a noted athlete, and was greatly liked throughout the West. Occasionally he was obliged to act as a militant Christian and thrash some unregenerate church disturber, just as Peter Cartright did. The Baptist minister says he met the bishop down in Mississippi and that the latter had quite a large amount of gold and silver with him that had been donated for church purposes on his swing around the circle from Wisconsin, and that the bishop was on his way home. While traveling through Mississippi, they were held up. When the bishop told the robber he was an Episcopal bishop, he was surprised and gave back the money, saying that was his church, and he could not think of robbing a friend. He added a contribution, declaring he was glad their church was prospering so nicely. He then gave the bishop a most cordial letter recommend- ing him to the robber’s friends, one of whom tried soon afterward to rob the bishop. When the latter showed his letter, the robber was very much ashamed, and said that 98 THE WONDERS OF THE, DUNES this letter would carry the bishop through the whole West. On the bishop’s asking the robber the business of Mr. Brown, the writer of the letter, he was told that Brown was the President of the Mississippi Valley Highwaymen’s Association and others! The bishop says that they were obliged to show the letter a number of times before they reached Chicago, and always received a royal welcome with liberal contributions. While Bishop Kemper told us many tales of his travels in the West, he never told us of this episode. It sounds like Tom Fagg’s trip in Lorna Doone. This Mr. Brown is probably meant for Murrell himself. But, as Murrell had been captured and sent to prison be- fore this, and his gangs, including many prominent men, broken up, it could not have been he. Many criminals were left, however, and they carried out things on a smaller scale. Father’s brother, Sheriff S. M. Brennan, traveled through this Chicago Dune region many times in early days, and lived for many years in Michigan, being a sheriff there in the ’forties and ’fifties. A friend says that when she was a small girl in Michigan in the early “fifties, she can remem- ber Sheriff Brennan coming from another county, and rid- ing through their county past her farm at the head of his posse after a band of horse thieves who were heading for the Indiana Dune region, which harbored many criminals. Their headquarters were at Pine, in the swamps near Gary. He caught them, brought them back and had them sent to prison. He was a big fearless man, and with a troop of deputies of the same type, cleaned out the criminals from LOG CABINS AND CRIMINALS 99 his county. Other sheriffs throughout the country did the same and wiped out these criminal organizations. The third great criminal organization was the Counter- feiters’ Organization, under Murrell’s direction at first. This organization, while as wide-spread as the others, had its own headquarters to insure secrecy and safety. The audacity of the counterfeiters of those days was really phenomenal in its boldness. The wild-cat banks were very plentiful at that time, and the counterfeiters had no difficulty at all in issuing millions of dollars of counterfeit money on mythical banks. Many of the regular small banks could not be located, let alone tracing up these mythical creations. In many cases, the counterfeiters and other criminals were in collusion with some of the leading citizens and bankers, as Sheriff Brennan learned. CHAP LEILA JOSEPH BAILLY—THE FUR TRADER DuRING the ‘twenties and ’thirties, the most important place in Northwestern Indiana was Bailly’s Trading Post on the Calumet River, near the present Porter. This great fur-trader, Joseph Bailly, was born in Canada, and came of good stock. In 1814, he received a license from Governor Harrison as the head fur-trader of the Calumet Region for ten years; and in 1822 established his home and trading post on the north side of the Calumet River, about a mile southeast of Baileytown, Indiana, and a half-mile north of the present Porter. He very soon worked up a fur trade which was so profit- able that he established a trading post at Baton Rouge which promised to be a very good investment, since he received furs from all over the South—buffalo, bear, deer, fox, marten, and even seal skins from the Pacific. He became one of the best known fur-traders in the country, from Quebec to Santa Fe. | His granddaughter, Miss Frances Howe, states in her book, The Story of an Old French Homestead in the North- west, that between Detroit and Chicago, in those early days, there were but two places where a traveler could stop over 100 JOSEPH BAILLY—FUR-TRADER IOI night, one at White Pigeon, Michigan, and the other at the Bailly Trading Post. The Dakota-Wisconsin branch of the great Sauk Trail ran through Mr. Bailly’s place from the northwest past Chesterton, where it joined the main Sauk Trail to the southeast. It was but a few feet from his house. The Pottawottomie Trail went northeast through the woods of the Calumet Ridge to the Council Grounds at Michigan City, where it divided, one branch coming north to St. Joe, the other going east to Detroit. Bailly’s home was famous for its hospitality and its hand- some daughters, as it was the only place on the Chicago Road west of White Pigeon large enough to accommodate travelers. Mr. Bailly purchased from the government a great deal of land, over two thousand acres, some of it situated at Baileytown, Tremont, and a large tract on the Grand Calu- met called Bailly’s Harbor, at the present Miller. Much of the land on the Grand Calumet was suitable for a village, and Mr. Bailly hoped to have one located there, but it did not materialize. The Bailly family saw many Indians pass along the old North Sauk Trail in front of the house. Miss Howe says of the trail and the passers-by: ‘There, too, was the Indian Trail, a deep, wide rut, made by centuries of pacing feet, which the traveling Indians never forsook for white men’s roads, but always used for their coming and going. Their warriors of a tribe in full formation, in a straight single file procession, always made a showy pageant.” But the most brilliant array of savage glory ever wit- nessed here, according to Miss Howe, was on the occasion when the Illinois, Wisconsin, Minnesota and Dakota In- 102 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES dians passed by arrayed as if for battle, on their way to some general meeting near Detroit, across the line in Can- ada at Fort Malden, to receive their annual present of goods from the British government. “First came the Menominees, then the Winnebagoes, then the Foxes, divided according to their totems, and at- tired in all their bravery. The single file passed on in per- fect silence and unbroken order, not one looking either to the right or left; with one uniform stride, not varying one inch, one from another. “This part of the procession the family viewed from the veranda without the slightest fear; but when the servant _ whispered to grandfather: ‘This is the last band of Foxes; the Dacotahs are next,’ the iadies stepped quietly into the house, where the shutters in the lower story were already closed and bolted. The window shades of threaded rushes in the second story were lowered, and the muslin curtains were drawn for the Dacotahs, as the Sacs and Sioux were called by other Indians, were tribes that did not respect women. In this, they differed from the eastern Indians, who might murder women, but never wronged them. “The Dacotahs, however, formed the grandest part of the pageant; their paint was more brilliant, the war bon- nets more expansive, and the display of arms unique. Femi- nine curiosity peered through the crevices in the window shades at the fine stalwart figures of tall, lithe, athletic war- riors of most commanding appearance. “Each warrior’s blanket, passing under his arm and over the shoulder of the other arm, was fastened together by a showy piece of burnished silver. Bows and arrows hung at their backs, one hand grasped a bunch of javelins, and the other balanced a rifle slung over the shoulder. “When the last Dacotah had crossed the river, and dis- appeared in the oak woods, there was a sense of profcund relief felt by all who had seen the broken line of warriors JOSEPH BAILLY FUR-TRADER 103 of all these tribes, passing in a steady stream for two days and a half.” This account was told Miss Howe by her mother, who, as Miss Rose Bailly, had seen the passing of this great pageant. If this wonderful pageant in its colorful array, really took two days and a half, even at broken intervals, to pass the Bailly Post, it was undoubtedly more imposing than the great Dunes Pageant itself, on June 3, 1917. From Miss Howe’s description one can almost see these Indians gliding along the trail through swamps and forests and fording over the Chicago and Calumet Rivers on their distant way from Illinois, lowa, Wisconsin, Minnesota and Dakota! Mr. Bailly was very much interested in christianizing the Indians. In fact, he was a combination of the missionary and the fur-trader. He did much work toward converting the Indians, and he went so far in his splendid religious work that he translated the New Testament into the Pot- tawottomie language. Mr. J. L. Bowers, the Gary lawyer, has a copy of this very rare New Testament. Mr. Joseph J. Thompson, of Chicago, a noted historian, who is editor-in-chief of the Jllinois Catholic Historical Review, says that the Bailly family was one of the most noted in all the region between Detroit and Chicago; noted not only for its prominence, and the culture and beauty of its daughters, but for its religious zeal, and that many Catholic people made use of religious services at its famous little chapel. One day a man stopped at the homestead to see Mr. Bailly in regard to some property wrich the latter had taken for some furs. Mr. John Morgan said he thought it 104 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES was the old Hub Clothing Store place, on State, from Jackson Boulevard to Quincy Street, on the west side of the street. This man was very insolent and abusive, declar- ing that he had a good claim to that property, etc. At night the man went to the inn which had been built to relieve the homestead, and was on the old Detroit-Chicago Road, below the ridge, just east of Oak Hill. Here he filled up on liquor, and said he would start off early by stage and would get every lawyer in Chicago on his side. This was reported to the Baillys and early the next morn- ing, at four o’clock, Rose Bailly, a beautiful young girl, got in readiness to go to Chicago to checkmate his dastardly plot to seize the property. She was a skilled horsewoman, and her favorite horse was an old racer that was faster than any horse in the Chicago Dune region. She mounted this and quietly picked her way out, taking the old original trail still to be seen for part of the way, winding through the low woods, over the hills across the swamps, over the Dunes to the beach, and then to Chicago. She followed old Indian trails, all bending toward Chicago, stopping for dinner at Gibson’s Tavern, which was near the present Froebel School, Gary. She reached Chicago well ahead of the stage, after a fifty-mile ride that would have taxed the most skilful horseman. The guests of the Sauganash Hotel were sitting on the porch that afternoon when their attention was aroused by a horseman galloping toward the hotel. As the rider came nearer they saw to their great surprise a beautiful young lady on a race-horse. Mark Beaubien, the genial host, rushed forward and greeted her in amazement. He was JOSEPH BAILLY—FUR-TRADER 105 an old friend of the family and had been at the Bailly homestead many times, as had the Indian Chiefs Shabona, Topinabe, Winnemuc, Black Partridge, Billy Caldwell, Simon Pokagon and Robinson. Miss Bailly told him the reason that she had taken that terrible trip alone through the Dunes, that were beset by criminals, Indians and wild animals. Mark Beaubien introduced her to his guests as the daughter of a close friend, a French gentleman, owning a great estate in North- ern Indiana. After a good meal, she was introduced to one of the leading lawyers of Chicago, probably Judge Dean Caton, who took up her father’s case, and pushed it through successfully, with the assistance of William B. Ogden, who was the leading real-estate man of Chicago at that time, and later the mayor. When the stage arrived with the sharper, Bailly’s title had been made perfect, to the great discomfiture of the former. Mr. John Morgan, of Chesterton, said that the chief clerk for Mr. Ogden was a fine Connecticut Yankee from Hartford, by the name of Francis Howe, and that he was very much interested in this beautiful, fearless equestrienne ; so much that he became a frequent visitor at the Dunes and the Bailly homestead. He evidently made a favorable impression upon the fair lady, for it was not long before she became known as Mrs. Francis Howe. In the fall of 1830, an old Pottawottomie chief visited the Baillys and told them there was going to be an unusually severe winter, and that they should obtain twice as much wood as usual. He further said that these severe winters traveled in a cycle of eighty years, and one was due at that 106 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES time. The old chief was either a good guesser, or an un- usually keen observer; for the winter of 1830-31 was known as the “winter of the deep snow.” The snow was very deep and is given by Doctor Hildreth as forty-eight inches, with intense cold, way below zero. In the spring of 1831, tremendous floods of rains came. It washed so much dirt into the Calumet Valley between Lake Calumet and Hegewisch that the Calumet River was forced back a half-mile to the southeast. It had previously been near Lake Calumet. Alexander Robinson, the famous Indian chief, who was half French and half Pottawottomie, was a very close friend of the Baillys, and at one time worked for Mr. Bailly. He often visited them at their home and joined in their religious services. He was in 1829 elected chief of the combined Pottawottomies, Ottawas, and Chippewas or Ojibwas. The tribes had so diminished that these three tribes had united and, as Mrs. Bailly had been the daughter of an Ottawa chief, and Mr. Bailly was very well known to all the Indian tribes, they were respected very much by the Indians, and the Indian chiefs visited them often. Bailly’s Post came next to Kinzie’s home as the great visiting place of the Indian chiefs of the Chicago Dune region. The Indian chiefs told Mr. Bailly, when he proposed to build a fur depot at Baton Rouge and trade with the Indians of the West, that the Empire of the Montezumas still ruled all of North America, and that they were most tyrannical oppressors. They said, “We are not ungrateful or treacher- ous; but if our rulers tell us to go on the war-path, we must, sparing neither friend nor foe. You must not find the secret routes over the plains on go to the Far West. If JOSEPH BAILLY—FUR-TRADER 107 you do, we must kill you.” The Indian chiefs also said that messengers from the “Sandy Country” (New Mexico and Arizona) could come to the southern end of Lake Michigan in four or five days by relays of swift ponies. There was a pact of unity between the Aztecs and the Iroquois Indians, who came from the South and may have descended from some colonies of ancient Mexico or Central America. Doctor Frank Cushing, of the Government Bureau of Ethnology, while studying the Moqui Indians in Arizona, was admitted as a member of their priesthood, and took part in their ancient ceremony of carrying some © sacred salt water of the Pacific Ocean to the Iroquois In- dians in New York, who had brought some of their sacred salt water from the Atlantic. Here, with mystic rites, the water of the Pacific and the water of the Atlantic were mixed together and then poured on the ground, as a libation to the memory of the meeting of the rulers of the old mother country in Mexico with the distinguished daughter state in the East. Cushing says it is an ancient ceremony, many centuries old. One of the most sacred shrines of the Aztecs was that of the twin war gods, male and female, in Arizona, on San Juan River; for centuries pilgrimages were made to it by the Aztecs and their subject tribes; perhaps by the ancient Toltecs, who may have been the founders of the ancient Chinese Colony of Fu Shan. Ancient Chinese records often speak of Fu Shan, an old colony they claimed was in a beautiful country, thousands of miles east of China, across the waters. Recent excavations, near Mexico City, show that some statues, dug in the Toltec ruins, had Chinese faces and eyes! A United States surgeon, Doctor William 108 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES Matthews, stationed in Arizona, tells in the American Natu- ralist of 1886, about this mystic shrine, as given by Navaho Indians, who knew its location and history. The female god was probably the reflection of the first image. They said it was at a wild bluff, overlooking a very deep ravine. Here, the Indians said, the war gods showed them- selves at certain times to their worshipers. The Indians assured the doctor that these pilgrims came from all over the country. Doctor Matthews was strongly of the opin- ion that the appearance of the gods was due to some local physical phenomenon. The writer, some years before, read in a magazine that a clergyman who had been exploring in that neighborhood rested with his party on the bank of a high bluff. Looking down into a deep ravine which was misty, he saw a reflection of a man in the mist, somewhat like the Brocken, only much clearer. He had seen something similar; but the remarkable part of it was that around it was a pale circular rainbow. It was a regular “Circle of Ulloa’ without the brilliant colors of the latter, though there were a few places with some color. To make sure it was their own reflection and refrac- tion, the traveler and his companions went through various motions and the images outlined in the mists of the deep ravine responded, showing that these were the images of the people on the bluff. The traveler had never heard of a “Circle of Ulloa;” called it a “circular rainbow.” DeUlloa was a Spanish governor of Panama, and in one of his trips through New Granada—Columbia—he was told by one of the Indian eifides that a few miles away, in a very deep valley of the Andes Mountains, images could be seen at certain times, with a most beautiful colored ring about RESURRECTION ss = i i Le c i ' —~ rm 4 : i 4 ' — i > toe i.e =s 7 w 4 , = | ' i *@ g@ » » ‘ : > 8 hy é ’ | JOSEPH BAILLY—FUR-TRADER 109 each one, and it was thought this was the right weather for them to be seen. Governor DeUlloa marched there with his officers, and his guides asked him to dismount and stand at a certain spot and look into this deep chasm. He did so and gazed down many thousand feet; mist was filling the ravine, and his reflection was thrown upon it, which refracted it to a great size, with a magnificent circular ring surrounding him, so bright and prismatic that it seemed to be a beautiful circular rainbow, made up of brilliant sparkling gems, float- ing in the mist. He recognized that it was a reflection with refraction of himself, and experimented until he was thoroughly con- vinced of it. He then had this phenomenon written down and fully described by his secretary, and sent it to Spain. The wise men there were deeply interested, as it was the first time such a brilliant phenomenon had ever been recorded. This circular, prismatic rainbow, only seen at a very great depth on a misty day, was called in his honor, the “Circle of Ulloa.” It is probable that at certain times the shrine of the Aztec War God also showed color in its “Circle of Ulloa,” as this would make it even more remarkable. The Indian chiefs told much about the Aztecs and their rules to Mr. Bailly, and said that some of the Aztec priesthood had fled to the desert regions, from Mexico City, and by their snake worship retained power over the Indians of North America, often coming here as visitors. They also told Bailly that the white people would never have peace here, until they captured the Sandy Country, and controlled the Aztecs, who gave orders to the Indians to kill the whites. 110 THE’WONDERS OF THE DUNES Doctor William Matthews, the American surgeon, in his article, said that Thoyetli, the sacred shrine, was somewhere in Utah, at the junction of some creek with San Juan River, in a very hilly or mountainous country. He also says that the Navajos made trips to this distant shrine whenever they were ready to go on any special war trip and brought some sacred cigarettes to the war gods. If they were not able to go there, they faced in that direction, prayed to the war gods, and burned the sacred cigarettes. The Aztecs and other tribes made similar trips to this distant shrine, for it seemed to be the Mecca for them all. The Moquis, or Mokis, may have been the Druids of the Indian race, since by their superior magic and skill they evidently dominated the other Indian tribes. It is highly probable that some of the medicine men of these other tribes went there to study, as Bailly said the medicine men from the Sandy Country came to the Chicago Dune region. The writer sent in an article to the American Naturalst showing that the clergyman exploring the San Juan region had unknowingly stumbled upon the sacred shrine of Thoyetli, which, as far as is known, has never been revealed toa white man. It might be at the junction of Montezuma Creek, or possibly Aztec Creek, with the San Juan River. Both are deep and rocky. The article sent in by the writer seemed to satisfy Doctor Matthews, as some time later he sent me his booklet on the Moki snake dance. Possibly some one of our readers will be able to work out the connection between the Aztecs and the Indians of the Chicago Dune region, and show to what extent our Indians were under the influence of the Aztecs and their JOSEPH BAILLY—FUR-TRADER LU descendants, the Moki priests. Pottawottomie, according to Jacob Piatt Dunn, the Secretary of the Indiana Historical Society, means “Guardian of the Fire.” Miss Frances Howe was a graduate of St. Mary’s Col- lege, South Bend, and the author of The Story of an Old French Homestead in the Northwest. She was a woman of good education and of strong character; but at times was eccntric. She had a large mausoleum or vault put up in the old cemetery on the ridge at Oak Hill, in which were placed the remains of Mr. and Mrs. Joseph Bailly de Messein, which was the full name, and Mr. and Mrs. Francis Howe. In 1917, the remains of Miss Frances Howe, who had died in San Francisco, were brought here and interred in this family vault. This can be seen from the South Shore Electric Road between Oak Hill and Mineral Springs, on the slope of the Calumet Beach or Morgan Park Ridge. It has been sold with the farm. She had also placed a number of the old log cabins belong- ing to Bailly Post together at the old home, and erected a large beautiful house over them, at considerable expense, to form’ a mansion of the old French type. There still remains the old original story-and-a-half log house, the old chapel, partly renovated, one of the fur storehouses, and a brick dwelling erected about thirty years ago. At the back of the estate can be seen the marks of the old race-track upon which Mr. Bailly trained his blooded horses to run and his daughters in the art of horseman- ship. Through the ground and trending to the southeast can be seen the old North Sauk Trail, as it descends the bluff and soon crosses the Calumet River. Toward the {12 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES west it crosses the road and goes to the northwest on its way to Dakota, passing through lake country between Oak Hill and Lake Michigan. The writer, in company with two school principals, Misses' Parson and Green, from Chicago, visited here in 1916. The caretaker showed us through this beautiful building and the inside resembled a regular historical society. It was filled with all kinds of beautiful, rare or bizarre objects. There were many Indian relics, some of them most beautiful. Hatchets of the old French explorers, one of them exactly like the one dug up by Major Henry Lee, of South Chicago, at Palos Park. Different weapons, sold by the traders; rare clothes of the “fifties and ’sixties; beauti- ful tapestries brought from Europe, and other interesting things. Burglars had been ransacking through the house for gold and silver ornaments, while Miss Howe was in Morida; things were strewn all over the floor. The caretaker, Martin Peterson, who had formerly been one of the author’s pupils at the Van Vlissingen School, Chicago, was well acquainted with the history of the Bailly family and told us many things. Among others he said that Miss Howe informed him that a treaty of peace with the Indians had been signed in that house. If that be the case, it may have been the treaty with the Indians for land for the great Indiana State Road, called Michigan Road— one hundred feet wide—that runs from Michigan City, through Indiana, to Madison, on the Ohio River, or one not ratified by the United States Senate. After Miss Howe’s death, in 1917, the entire collection of the Bailly mansion was sold at public auction and was bought by various historical societies, in Chicago, Gary and JOSEPH BAILLY—FUR-TRADER 113 Valparaiso; and local historians like A. E. Knotts and J. M. Bowers, of Gary, and Professor FE. Bennett, of Valparaiso University. Mr. Bowers, who bought the rare Bible and catechism written by Joseph Bailly and also other books, states that he was amazed at the number and variety of the books owned by the Bailly daughters, as well as the grand- daughter, Miss Howe. Books written by standard English and American authors, as well as books in foreign lan- guages, showed that they were cultured people. This Bailly mansion, with the beautiful knoll upon which it is situated, should be purchased by the state of Indiana or by Porter County as an historical museum. For many years it was the historical center of Northern Indiana. CHAPTER X MR. JOHN G. MORGAN WHILE Joseph Bailly was the first settler and hotel-keeper of the Dune, having settled there in 1822, the next settler was James Morgan, father of John F. Morgan, who settled at Chesterton in 1833, and was for many years one of the leading citizens of the Dune region. One son, John G. Morgan, died in the spring of 1919 at the age of eighty-six years. He was born in LaPorte, Indiana, in 1832, and was one year old when they moved to Chesterton on the new Chicago Road in 1833. He was still in fair physical and good mental condition when inter- viewed for over an hour in July, 1918. Mr. Morgan said that Little Fort, noted in the French, British and American occupation, was located on the south side of Fort Creek, near the old mill dam of Hobart’s Mill. It was on the high ridge along Fort Creek, west of the swampy ground, south of Mount Tom. This is also the spot that is given by General Hull, in his map of the Chi- cago and Calumet region, drawn about 1812, and is the spot that the writer selected several years ago as the site put down by General Hull. This was confirmed by Captain Charles H. Robinson, an expert in military lines, who is the leading archeologist of the Prairie Club. 114 MR. JOHN G. MORGAN 115 Nothing positive is known of the date of erection of this little fort, or of its destruction. It is known that the French erected it and that the British abandoned it after Clark captured Kaskaskia and Vincennes, as they did the little fort at Chicago that is mentioned by Major DePeyster, the British commander at Mackinac, in his speech to the Indians at L’Arbor Crouche, July 4, 1778. Mr. Hubert M. Skinner, who has done so much work on early Indiana history, has a very interesting article on the French tassements in the March, 1916, number of the Indiana Magazine of History. He says that the name of a town, Tassinong, that is in the southern part of Porter County, is really Tassement, as old settlers in that neigh- borhood say that an Indian told them that a very old French trading establishment had been located there many years before, though all traces of it had vanished long ago. Tass1- nong was as near as the Indians could get to the old French pronunciation, 7assemong. Mr. Skinner is an old resident of Porter County. Mr. Morgan was very well acquainted with the Bailly family, for they were his nearest neighbors for years. He had learned the Ottawa and Pottawottomie languages so that he could talk with Mrs. Bailly. Simon Pokagon, Chief of the Pottawottomies, was a fre- quent visitor at the Morgan house, as well as at the Bailly Post, and the Morgans knew him well. John met Pokagon at the World’s Fair, at Chicago, in 1893, and spoke Pot- tawottomie with him. Morgan had first seen young Pokagon, son of the chief, and told him who he was. When he visited their camp at the World’s Fair a few days later with his wife, young Pokagon rushed them in as invited 116 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES guests, telling Morgan that the chief wanted to see him, as he remembered him well. They had a great time, talking Indian, and discussing old times. Pokagon had the Indians go through all the regular Indian dances, and told them that Mr. Morgan was an old-timer, who knew all the Indian dances, and was one of their adopted brothers, and they must do him honor, which they did with great interest. Morgan showed some of the younger Indians how the Pot- tawottomies and Ottawas performed some of these dances forty or fifty years before. Before their dispersal, the Indians had a village along Fort Creek, about a couple of blocks south of the Detroit- Chicago Road, at Tremont. They also had a camp near Mount Tom. They came visiting every year for a while. One day an Indian who was already pretty well “lit up” came to Mr. Williamson of the City West Tavern and wanted some more fire-water, as he said it was very nice and hot. Mr. Williamson refused to give him any more, where- upon the Indian, according to Mr. Green, started toward him with a big scalping: knife. Mr. Williamson jumped to the fireplace, big enough to roast an ox, grabbed the great poker and gave the Indian such a blow on the head with it that it crushed his skull. The other Indians attacked Mr. Williamson, but the white people protected him, and he was advised to skip, which he hastily did. The Lake Shore Railroad had just been built, from Michigan City to Chicago, in 1852, so Mr. Williamson took the train for Chicago, but a collision took place near Baileytown and he was killed. Mr. Alanson Green, who had lived in that neighborhood MR. JOHN G. MORGAN 117 for a number of years, bought the hotel and increased its accommondations and prestige so much that he was com- pelled greatly to enlarge the hotel and put up another enormous barn. It became the center of a group of twenty or more houses within a mile of the hotel, and this little village was called New City West. After a while “New” was dropped and the place was generally called City West. Mr. Morgan said that in the ‘fifties and ’sixties the Green Tavern was the center of the social life of all that region. Great trains of pioneers stopped there on their way to Chicago, or the West, especially during the Pikes Peak gold fever. The large hotel and the immense barns were often too small for the crowds that thronged them. It was also a leading station of the Underground Railroad. The old Valparaiso Road went through the hotel grounds, using from there the same road as the stage line did until they parted company back of Mount Tom. The passengers on the stage line tool dinner at the hotel while the drivers got ready with the new relay of horses. The Indian visitors liked to visit it again, now that Mr. Williamson was gone, and Mr. Green was in his stead. Mr. H. G. Green, the hunter, stated that one day when he was a boy he was roaming the woods a few blocks south- east of the hotel, and met an Indian hunting in the woods, who looked very dangerous, as he carried a gun, knife and tomahawk. But the boy was already known to the Indians -as a pretty bright little fellow, and the Indian asked him if he had seen any sign of deer. Horace told him he had seen a deer going off rapidly to the east a short time ago, in the direction of Furnessville. The Indian thanked him and darted off in that direction, 118 THE WONDERS: OF THE DUNES and soon came upon its tracks. He followed them closely, and catching sight of the deer, stalked it carefully and suc- ceeded in killing it. He felt very grateful to the boy, and the next time he saw Horace, he patted him on the head, and gave him a new name, Little Hunter, which the Indians called him as long as they came to that neighborhood. He later became known in the West as Hunter Green. The circuses all stopped here when in this neighborhood and the people came from many miles around to visit them. Also important meetings, and neighborhood dances, etc., were held here. About two hundred feet west of the hotel was a large cooper shop, which gave employment to a number, of people. A block west of this was a small brick- yard. A mile west of it, east of Portchester Road, a log | railroad, drawn by horses or mules, ran from the Chicago Road in a northwesterly direction to Morgan’s Sawmill, north of Waverly Bridge, just about the center of the great parking stand now placed there. From there it ran to the shore of Lake Michigan, and then out to the end of a large pier, about six hundred feet long, where it brought logs that were cut off this swampy woodland between the Dunes and Chicago Road. This land was swamps and woods, with the exception of Beech Ridge, a ridge about two hundred feet wide, extending from Portchester to Michigan City, and heavily timbered. These logs were sawed into lumber of the required shape and size, and shipped to Chicago in some of the vessels that tied at the Morgan Dock, as it was called. About the end of the ’sixties, the boiler of the Morgan Sawmill blew up, and killed the engineer, besides wounding others. One local report is that the engineer was found on a sand-hill MR. JOHN G. MORGAN 11g along the creek, and part of the boiler on a hill on the other side of the creek. After this accident, the mill was not rebuilt, as the most valuable timber had been cut and there was not enough left to make it pay the expense of putting up anew mill. Asa result, the old log road was abandoned, though it is plainly visible for a great part of its extent. The great pier extending far out into the water, near Fish Johnson’s, gradually fell into decay as the ships for- sook it and there was not enough business to warrant its being kept up. It slowly disappeared with no outward appearance to show that this great pier had ever existed here, though Johnson states that on a calm day one can look into the deep water and see some remains of that mighty pier. The Morgans, and Doctor Schenck, of the University of Chicago, have their beautiful summer homes near there on the high lake bluffs, at the mouth of the old Valparaiso Trail, and from that historic spot can see in their mind’s eye the long wharf, with the ships and barges moored to them and the bustling workmen rushing into them from the Morgan Sawmill with the lumber for Chicago’s great needs. They can vision Little Fort, with the French soldiers and traders; the Indians; the English; De Linctot and the Americans. Also the first settlers, the prehistoric savages. They can see the teams, coaches and prairie schooners, drawn by horses, mules, or oxen patiently toiling along the beautiful trail back of their cottages and resting on the beach below them, before fording the creek and start- ing for Chicago. Another old pioneer is Mr. James L. Monahan of Michi- gan City, Indiana, where he has lived over thirty years. He was born at Springfield, Ohio, March 1, 1825. His father 1ZO THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES was a soldier of the British Army, who came to America in 1812, and liked the United States so well that he stayed here, and married a woman in Baltimore, Maryland, who was a descendant of some of the old Colonial families. Mr. Monahan’s father came from Springfield, Ohio, to Indiana in 1835, in a large prairie schooner, drawn by four horses, with horses and cattle, and settled about four miles from Rolling Prairie, and ten miles east of LaPorte. Here the family lived and throve. The woods around them were filled with game. Bears, panthers, lynx, deer, wolves, beavers, etc., were common at that time. There were still a large number of Indians, chiefly Pottawottomies, who visited there, as they did not wish to go to the reserva- tions or to the Indian Territory in 1833. Some remained in that neighborhood until 1865. Mr. Monahan remembers Daniel Webster very well, as he met the latter on his return trip from the West in 1837. Webster had been out West inspecting some of his property in Illinois. He spoke at City West at the mouth of Fort Creek, near Tremont, which place he was booming in Con- gress as the place for a government harbor. He stopped at Michigan City also and spoke to the people on the future of Michigan City, whose inhabitants believed that Michigan City would be the greatest city on the lakes. They even dreamed of a great railroad to be called the Buffalo and Mississippi Railroad, that would connect New York with the Mississippi River. Daniel Webster turned the first spadeful of earth at Michigan City for this great railroad of the future, amid great rejoicing. Great bonfires and barbecues were given, and Webster was given a piece MR. JOHN G. MORGAN 121 of land, on what was to be their business street. He said he would keep it as it might be useful to him in his old age. Mr. Monahan, then a big boy of twelve, did not go to Michigan City, about twenty miles away, to hear the speech, but his folks did and reported the proceedings. He was driving an ox team along the old corduroy road, near the Little Kankakee River the next day, when he saw the stage coming along, with the four horses running at full speed. The road, being made of rough logs and brush laid across the big swamp, and covered with a little dirt, was so rough that the stage was bumping up and down frightfully. Mr. Monahan was compelled to back his oxen into the swamp to let the coach go by, and he heard and saw Webster sing- ing at the top of his voice, as the coach bobbed up and down: “Rock-a-by baby in the tree top; When the wind blows, the cradle will rock.” He was evidently full of spirits that day. Mr. Monahan says that the panic of 1837 knocked out the Buffalo and Mississippi Railroad; that the Lake Shore Railroad later, about 1851, took over the right-of-way, and from Baileytown sent a spur, or side-railroad, back to Michi- gan City. This lasted for a number of years, and the road- bed can still be seen on the south side of the South Shore Electric line tracks, along the old Chicago and Michigan Road, especially east of Tremont. This short line was called the “plug line” by the natives. The South Electric is on part of this “plug line” right-of-way from Michigan City to Baileytown. 122 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES Mr. Monahan is a good-looking old gentleman, nearly ninety-eight years of age. He is six feet tall now, and in his prime must have been a giant. His long white hair and beard give him a patriarchal appearance, but his voice is as vigorous and his brain as keen as a man of sixty. His eyes are too dim to read, but the widowed daughter does that for him. In a long interview with the author, Mr. Monahan did not show the slightest sign of weariness, and was very much interested in describing this early history. He is cer- tainly the most wonderful specimen of strength and vigor that the author has ever witnessed. When asked for the secret of his great vigor, he said: “I inherited a strong body from my forefathers, and I have kept it so by clean living and exercise. I was for many years a blacksmith.” Also he said, “I think a great deal of it comes from the fact that my folks, besides being strong people, came from a number of vigorous nationalities, and the mixture of strong peoples makes an extra strong, vigorous race. My folks were Irish, English and French, perhaps others.” Since his folks came from Southeastern Pennsylvania and Mary- land, there may also be a strain of German from Colonial or Revolutionary ancestors. Among the things that stirred up the people in those days were the political campaigns. The liveliest one was the Van Buren and Harrison campaign in 1840. Mr. Monahan, then a boy of fifteen, remembers that well, and especially one parade in which two log cabins were hauled on two trucks; one drawn by twenty-four oxen and the other by twenty-four horses. There were twenty-four states in the Union then. These were escorted by twenty-four girls on MR. JOHN G. MORGAN 123 horseback and also twenty-four boys on horseback. Every- thing was decorated with flags and red, white and blue. The stage line from Michigan City to Chicago was started in 1834. In 1842 Mr. Monahan took a trip from LaPorte to Chicago for some steel for their blacksmith shop. They came via Thornton to Riverdale, and down the old Michi- gan Road, through Kensington and Roseland. They had a very tough time through the marshes and sand-hills; camped over night at Riverdale, on Calumet River. It took one day to go to Riverdale from Chicago, and two days more to get to LaPorte with their load of iron and steel. They had two four-horse teams and two one-horse teams. Mr. Monahan’s son, Clarence Monahan, who lives a mile out of Michigan City, at Orchard Lodge Farm, confirmed the story told by his father about an old battle-ground near Rolling Prairie, from which guns have been dug that were changed from flint locks to percussion cap locks by Mr. Monahan, who was an expert blacksmith. I+ may have been the site of a battle between the English and the French before 1763. Before the Civil War many negroes ran away to Canada, and many of them were hid in the Dunes and in Chicago, where they were cared for by anti-slavery people. The negro refugees came north in such large numbers and yet were so seldom seen, that the pursuing slave owners and the northern sheriffs and other officials were often greatly puzzled and mystified in trying to get any track of the fugitives. Some, of course, were captured, but the larger number succeeded in escaping into Canada, via the Dunes, etc., to 124 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES Detroit, and other places. One man finally said that he knew how they got to Canada. It was by an underground railroad. This term stuck, and a slave was said to have gone by the underground railroad if he succeeded in getting to Canada, the stations being the various stopping places in which he was hid. The slaves generally traveled at night by routes that led through the country or small villages, in all kinds of dis- guises, and in all kinds of transportation; under hay, loads of corn, potatoes, etc. One of the leading stations of this underground railroad was the old Holland Settlement at Roseland, founded in 1849, on Michigan Avenue, west of Pullman, and which for many years was one of the leading settlements on the Detroit-Chicago Road, from Chicago to Michigan City. Numerous slaves had been concealed in the big barn of Mr. Cornelius Kuyper, or in his cellar, under a trap-door. Those at night were brought out and disguised or hid and transported to places some miles farther east toward Ham- | mond, or Hohman’s Bridge as it was then called, where they were sent to different places along the Dunes, which was the greatest hiding-place for them on the entire route to Canada. One story Mr. Kuyper was accustomed to relate with great glee. In his official capacity as town constable, he was often called upon to assist in capturing these fugitive slaves. Though he never succeeded in capturing any, his zeal in seeking them was so great that he earned the gratitude of the slave owners and sheriffs for his energy in hunting up all kinds of places where these fugitives should have been concealed. MR. JOHN G. MORGAN 125 On one occasion a slave owner from Kentucky came to him with a deputy sheriff and his posse from Chicago, seeking three runaway slaves that the owner valued at three thousand dollars apiece, as they were exceptional men. Mr. Kuyper was pressed into service, and they went all over the country, even to the Indiana line, without finding a trace of the fugitives. On their return to his house, tired, wet and hungry, Mr. Kuyper gave them a fine meal, and started them off to Chicago, going past the Ten-Mile House at Vincennes Ave- nue and Eighty-seventh Street with them to wish them better luck the next time. When he bade them adieu, the slave owner thanked him exceedingly for his kindness, zeal and hospitality. After he was sure that they were safely on their way to Chicago, he returned to his home and going down into his cellar, shoveled some potatoes off a trap-door and called one of the runaway slaves to come, to supper. He then went to his great barn, and going to the immense mass of hay there, loosened some of it, and called to the other two fugi- tives there to come out. They came to supper, three fine- looking, intelligent men, and Mr. Kuyper told them to get a good meal and then hurry, as they must be on their. way. After this meal, he packed them into the bottom of a large wagon, covered them over with corn on the cob, until they could hardly breathe, and put old sacks over this. He then drove the wagon to the next underground station east of Riverdale, on the Calumet River, at the home of John Ton, one of the young business leaders of the com- munity. This house was about a couple of blocks east of the Chicago and Western Indiana Railroad, on the north 126 THE-WONDERS OF THE DUNES side of the Calumet River. Mr. Ton was made acquainted with the urgency of the case, and he hitched up a team immediately, concealed the slaves as Mr. Kuyper had done, took the corn from Mr. Kuyper’s wagon, covered the ne- groes as before with corn, and departed to a station near Hammond, or Hohman Bridge, where he delivered his load with instructions to pass it along to the next station in the Dunes. This system was repeated until these men reached Canada in safety, as Mr. Kuyper was later informed. Mr. Kuyper, after having delivered his load, came home with an empty wagon, and a very satisfied state of mind. The Indiana anti-slavery people aided greatly in giving these runaway slaves shelter and also in piloting them through the Dunes, along Indian trails and pioneer roads. Mr. Green, proprietor of Green’s Tavern at New City West, or Tremont, was a Connecticut Yankee and a strong aboli- tionist, and he was of very great service in hiding them, and sending them along on their road to freedom. His place was known as one of the leading underground railroad stations in Indiana. Mr. John Morgan, of Chesterton, said that during the Civil War, when there were so many prisoners in Camp Douglas, Chicago, it was pretty well known that the Knights of the Golden Circle, a traitorous pro-slavery organization, many of whom were in Canada, and a number of them in Indiana, Illinois and other states, had figured on attacking Camp Douglas, freeing the Confederate soldiers there, sev- eral thousand in number, and either attack Chicago, try to join the Confederacy, or retreat to Canada. They were supposed to come to the Dunes by boat from Canada, march through the Dunes and there be joined by MR. JOHN G. MORGAN 127 some Knights of the Golden Circle, while others would be ready to join the forces near Camp Douglas. Mr. Morgan says the whole of Northern Indiana was alarmed. Sentinels were placed on the high peaks of the Dunes with signal fires, and two towers were built, one on Mount Tom and another at Miller, for observation purposes. Soldiers at Michigan City were on the lookout, as there was a camp there near Council Grove, called Camp Anderson. Preparations were made to assemble all of the citizens if an invasion were threatened; and the men were drilling and brushing up their rifle practise, so that if these rebels and traitors did appear they would get a red-hot reception. An attempt was made by the Confederate prisoners to break out of Camp Douglas, assisted by some of the traitors, but it was suppressed. When the United States government thought that things had gone far enough with this band of traitors, they arrested the ring-leaders, executed some, and sent many to prison, totally breaking up this select body of Knights of the Golden Circle, greatly to the disappointment of a large number of Indiana and Illinois patriots who were aching and training to do that job themselves. CHA PT ERYXT PERIOD OF EXPANSION CHICAGO soon developed into a real city, stimulating growth in all of the country near it. Many great factories were built in the limits, as well as a large number outside of its boundaries. The Dune region shared in its prosperity, a number of small villages being established, and factories began to spring up in that section bordering Illinois. One of the greatest causes in bringing the Chicago Dune region to the attention of the people, and thus starting the great development of this whole Chicago Dune region, was the great Chicago fire of 1871. The summer and fall of that year were exceedingly dry; far more so than that of 1919; no rain had fallen for.months. Rivers, small lakes and marshes had dried up. Wells almost everywhere were utterly dry. Crops were an entire failure. The great north woods in Minnesota, Wisconsin and Michigan were on fire. On Saturday, the eighth of October, 1871, a fire broke out in Chicago, and burned many blocks of lumber mills and houses on the west side. This was put out by Sunday morning, but on Sunday evening, the ninth, another fire broke out on the west side, in the stable of Mrs. O’Leary, and it swept the city. The writer was over at that house at eight o’clock Mon- 128 PERIOD OF EXPANSION 129 day morning, and inspected the stable, part of which was standing, and showed clearly how the wind had burned it from the southwest to the northeast. The neighbors said it had been caused by a tenant in Mrs. O’Leary’s cottage, who had gone with a lamp to milk the cow, and that the cow, fearful of a stranger, had kicked over the lamp, setting the barn on fire. The writer hunted for part of the lamp, but was told the pieces had been gathered up as souve- nirs; that people had been seen collecting the pieces. That seems to be pretty accurate news, and was gathered but a few hours after the fire started. The fire spread so rapidly in a northeastward direction that in a short time it had jumped the river at Adams Street, and was flaming through the business district, driven by a fierce gale. The writer was able to secure a position on the top of a large three-story brick house near the home of Mrs. O’Leary, and a magnificent view of the great fire was presented. ‘To the northeast the business part of the town near the present library building was still in flames. The great business blocks would take fire and explode from the expansion of the enclosed air. The north side was a roar- ing mass of flames. A wide current of flame was attacking the east side of the city toward Van Buren and Michigan Avenue, and owing to the terrific heat was making its way to the south, even against the fierce wind. It was a wonderful sight. Of them all the most striking feature was the saving of the southern part of Chicago by William Haskell, for many years a superintendent of con- struction for the Board of Education of Chicago. At the risk of his life, he climbed the spire of the Methodist Church, corner of Wabash Avenue and Harrison Street, 130 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES and going down into the church through the burned church spire, with pails of water, he put out the fire on the inside of the church. Long lines of people were formed from Wabash Avenue to the lake, just past Michigan Avenue, and many pails of water were passed along to the church from the lake. The water-works were burned down. Haskell was a wonderful athlete, which enabled him to climb the stone tower where it seemed a cat could hardly climb. When he went into the church on his many trips, with buildings ablaze all around him, thousands of people dropped on their knees and prayed for him. When he came up the last time, black, bloody, with hair gone and clothes burning, and with his arms outspread and said, “Boys, the fire’s out!” it seemed as though the Day of Jubilee had come. Thousands of voices, for there must have been twenty thousand people near there, sang the Doxology, “Praise God from Whom All Blessings Flow;” many prayed aloud in the streets. It was a day of thanksgiving! This church was sur- rounded on the south and west by buildings, many of which were wooden. General Philip Sheridan was commander of the United States soldiers at Chicago, which was under martial law and the buildings opposite the big church were either blown up, or torn down. In the latter event huge chains were thrown around the buildings which were then pulled from their foundations by horses, sometimes as many as twenty or thirty being used. This stopped the spread of the fire on the south side, and the north side was saved after most of the wooden buildings were burned. The light was so intense that it was seen for a hundred miles and more. To add to the horror, the great fires in PERIOD OF EXPANSION 131 the northern woods were destroying many houses, villages and towns, with hundreds of lives. The fires were sweep- ing down the west coast of Michigan toward the Dunes. The great pines along the Michigan shore were ablaze, burn- ing houses, driving people to other sections, and wild ani- mals of all kinds before them, many even into the Indiana Dunes. The Dune marshes were so dry that they were set afire and in many cases the vegetable mold was entirely burned out together with the trees. The desolation of the afflicted city was appalling. Hun- dreds of lives were lost; many thousands made homeless; millions of dollars in property and goods destroyed. But this awful calamity stirred the hearts of the world, and help was given from everywhere. The sick and destitute were cared for. The Chicago people, instead of being crushed, determined to rebuild; better and more lasting. The de- stroyed sections that formerly had cheap wooden houses, replaced these with brick, marble and granite structures. The attention of the world was aroused at this spirit of grit and Chicago was hailed as the “Phoenix City.” Busi- ness interests from everywhere were centered in Chicago, and gradually spread toward the Dune region, as affording great opportunities for industrial growth. The lake, the rivers, the inland lakes, the centers of vari- ous routes that had been so advantageous to the Eskimos, the Mound-Builders, the Indians, the French and the early settlers, were found to be just as advantageous for business purposes on a large scale at the present time. Pullman was founded in 1880, on the western shore of Lake Calumet. Hegewisch, on the shore of Calumet River 132 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES and Wolfe Lake. Hammond and East Chicago were founded across the line in Indiana, and flourished, building up the Calumet region. Honorable A. Frank Knotts, ex- Mayor of Hammond, is the industrial promoter of the Calumet region, as he was instrumental in getting these great industrial plants to locate in the Dune region. As Indiana had been very generous in its treatment of these corporations, the United States Steel Corporation, that had established a great steel plant in South Chicago, decided toJocate in the Dunes, and in 1908, under the direc- tion of .. Knotts, many thousand acres of dunes and swamps were bought and the ‘“‘Magic City” of Gary, named after its president, Elbert C. Gary, was founded, and in a few years this barren waste was transformed into an ener- getic, bustling city, with all modern improvements. It is at present a large city, stretching from Clarke to the end of Miller at the Porter County Line, a distance of eleven miles, with a coast-line of twelve miles. It has at least sixty thousand people, and its boomers claim seventy- five thousand. It is Aladdin’s dream realized, in which unlimited means and unlimited energy have given this city in a few years the prestige and power that would otherwise take a century to produce. It is continually expanding, annexing neighbor- ing territory bordering upon it, and modestly aspires to become the metropolis of Indiana, and may become such. In building up the great Dune cities, two systems were followed. Asa sample of the first, take Gary. The United States Steel Corporation just took about twenty-five million dollars, bought up many thousand acres of land and laid out this city. PERIOD OF EXPANSION 133 Frank Knotts is the representative of the second, or com- mercial system. As mayor of Hammond, at the head of a splendid, wide-awake body of citizens, who backed him, he was empowered to go ahead and get industrial plants located in Hammond. He told the author it was very discourag- ing work at first, as Chicago business people thought that Hammond was out of the world. He finally solved things this way: “Come out and take a look. We will pay ex- penses. We will give you a site for nothing.” On viewing the site, the visitor would say, “‘No street.” ‘We will put itin.” “Nowater.” “We will put it in.” “No gas.” “We will put it in.” ‘No side-track.” “We will put it in.” The visitor would generally say that this was exceptional treatment, and on meeting a bunch of wide-awake business men, who backed up strongly the promises made by Mayor Knotts would decide to locate here. By such treatment and consummate tact, Knotts and his associates succeeded in getting a number of large plants established in Hammond. This is the ideal way to build up a town. He helped build up East Chicago also. As a consequence of this industrial expansion of the west- ern part of the Calumet region, strong efforts have been made to drain the vast valleys of the Calumet by digging a great canal to Lake Michigan. The Knickerbocker Ice Com- pany, now a part of the Consumers’ Corporation of Chicago, owns two thousand two hundred acres of dunes at Dune Park, most of which has a long lake frontage. This com- pany has sold an enormous amount of sand for industrial purposes. Hundreds of acres of dune ridges have been carted off. The process of original deposition can be well seen at Dune Park between the little depot and the lake, 134 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES where the land is perfectly level, and the great ridge border- ing the lake is being razed to the ground. The great canal called the Burns Ditch is to extend from Lake Michigan through the cleared part of Dune Park in a straight line for one and one-half miles to the Calumet River, about a quarter-mile west of the northern curve of the Calumet River opposite Dune Park Station on the Lake Shore, and Wilson on the South Shore Railroad. From this point, it will extend to the east about two miles, going across the Calumet and ending at the mouth of Salt Creek. On the west, it will extend in a southwesterly direction for eight miles, crossing the Calumet River several times and terminating at Deep River, near Washington Street, East Gary. This great ditch or canal is intended not only to drain the rich river bottom along the Calumet River and thus reclaim several thousand acres of rich farming land, but also to furnish sites for industrial purposes; not only along the lake shore, at the mouth of the canal, but also along the canal and the Calumet River. The Calumet Canal was to cost seven hundred and fifty thousand dollars, but the Lake Shore Railroad and the South Shore Electric fought this proposition bitterly, as it necessitated modern, up-to-date bridges with equipment and bridge tenders. They fought it in the Indiana State Courts, but it was finally referred to the United States Supreme Court, which declared that it was a necessary im- provement and should be built. It was so declared in 1916. Preparations were resumed, when it was found that ma- terial and labor had increased so much that it could not be built at that time for less than one million dollars. While HOWagG FHL iO TWN], AH], ts. PERIOD OF EXPANSION 135 new bids were being prepared, declaration of war against Germany was made April 6, 1917, and the government de- cided that as this was not a case of immediate necessity, it must wait until after the war; and so the proposed great Burns Ditch or Calumet Canal is awaiting further de- velopments. It is now halted by an injunction. In the meantime the purchasing of great sites in Dune- land goes steadily on. The Inland Steel Company has pur- chased nearly twelve hundred acres of land in Porter County, including the eastern part of Long Lake and ex- tending back to the Calumet River. It has a lake frontage of over two miles, as well as river frontage. It is looking for more land and expects to establish a great plant that will rival Gary; would like to extend eastward to the Calumet Canal. It should be of great benefit to the community, as the scenic features there are not particularly attractive. The National Tube Company has also bought a very large tract between Miller Park and Gary, and expects to put up a large plant. It is the old AXtna Powder Tract with two miles’ lake frontage. Whiting and Indiana Harbor are growing very rapidly and so is East Chicago, of which Indiana Harbor is a part. Hammond is expanding greatly in all directions. In fact, these four towns are bound together so closely that they should unite and form one city, that would give Gary a close run for supremacy. Indiana City would be an ap- propriate name. If they and Gary should ever unite, it would easily become the metropolis of Indiana. In traveling through the Dune district one is struck with the tremendous number of isolated plants, with switches leading to them, seemingly lost in the Dunes or marshes. 136 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES These seem to be very busy and soon another one is found located near there. Before long, a small industrial center is formed there, and some houses and stores make it a regular little settlement. The government is figuring on developing one of the greatest harbors in the world, by deepening Lakes Wolfe and George in Indiana, and Calumet in Illinois, using Lakes Wolfe and George and part of Lake Michigan for the great ocean route via the St. Lawrence River, and Lake Calumet as the great industrial harbor of the Lake-to-Gulf Route. CHAPTER ATL PLACES OF INTEREST THERE are many places in the Dunes that are very inter- esting, and are visited by nature lovers. The sight of city folk tramping around the Dune region has ceased to be the novelty to the natives that it was a generation ago. At present the Dunes are traversed by all kinds of nature lovers; many in autos or railroad cars—both steam and electric—some in wagons or buggies; but the great majority of the explorers go on foot. They are the true Dune lovers; “Dune bugs,” as they call themselves; “Dune fans,” as they are called by the public. Chris Von der Ahe, that genial and popular manager of the St. Louis Baseball Club for so many years, little dreamed way back in the eighties that the mispronounced word he used would be shortened to become the most popular and descriptive word in all sport parlance—“fan.” He called a friend who traveled with their club a “fan’ a tic’ on base- ball, and the reporters shortened it to “fan.” The question is often asked, “Where are the beautiful and interesting spots around Chicago?’ They are every- where. The most interesting places, filled with beautiful sylvan spots, are the Dunes of Indiana and the Forest Preserve district of Cook County, Illinois. The most inter- 137 138 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES esting places in the Dunes are Miller, Long Lake, Dune Park, Mineral Springs, Portchester, Tremont, Furnessville, Tamarack, Michigan City and Liverpool. Any place be- tween these stations on the South Shore Electric Road is worth visiting, but these have the most striking features. There are but three places in the Indiana Dune Country at which the lake can be reached by auto, and these have always been the centers of influence. One is Miller, an- other Waverly Beach, reached from Portchester and Tre- mont, and the other is Michigan City. There are one or two other places in which a buggy or wagon can plow its very winding and difficult way to the lake over the sand- hills, but they are visited only in cases of necessity. Miller, about four miles east of Gary, is the popular watering place of the Dunes.. Its beach, now called the Gary Municipal Beach, is a beautiful one, about one or two hundred feet from the lake to the Dunes, and extends for miles. Miller is part of Gary. The Carr family settled there in the early ‘fifties when the Calumet River still flowed into Lake Michigan, and built a house at the mouth of the river; this gradually filled up until it became entirely closed in the late ’eighties. There are still the remains of an old scow at the southeast corner of the river at Miller, and Mr. Carr told me about 1908, that it was a shallow boat with scythe attachment, which he used many times in the ’seventies and ’eighties to keep the mouth of the river clear of weeds so as to have a clear channel that would furnish ice in the winter. After Mr. and Mrs. John Carr were married, in the ‘seventies, an old soldier visited them and showed them a soldier’s patent or deed for part of that land. He was PeAGios OF INTEREST 139 treated very hospitably during his visit of a few weeks, and seemed to enjoy it very much. He, with the assistance of Mr. Carr, located and marked out his claim. At the end of his visit he astonished his hosts by making Mrs. Carr a present of the patent of his land, telling her that it now be- longed to her; that they had treated him very nicely and he had had the time of his life. He then left for the East, and they never saw him again. Mrs. Carr showed this patent to her neighbors and in- formed them that the land now belonged to her. After a while the soldier wrote to her, saying that he had learned that the mere giving her his patent of title did not actually make her the owner, but that it must be made out in her own name, and that if she would send it back to him he would have it made out in her name, record it and would send it back to her. She sent him the document, but never heard from him again. This she told me in an interview a number of years ago. As long as the property was merely a wilderness of dunes and marshes to the general public, little interest was mani- fested in it, for it was worth but a few dollars an acre. For farming purposes most of it was absolutely worthless. Its esthetic and educational values were seldom appreciated. But, as soon as Gary was started, the value of property began to increase; then to soar. Interest in Miller Beach began to increase, and the property that Mrs. Carr and her husband: had lived upon for many years was now worth fighting for. Rival claimants appeared, and the Carrs were obliged to put up a very stiff fight; but their lawyer, Mr. Daniel Kelly of Valparaiso, Indiana, an able and very pains- taking attorney, presented such clear evidence of Mrs. Carr’s 140 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES right to the property, that she was confirmed in her pos- session of it. There is a greatly diversified piece of country around Miller and a corresponding fullness of plant and bird life, that can be readily found by the student of nature. It and Liverpool are the best places in the Dunes to study water birds, ranging from the snipe to the swan. Chanute Hill, at the northeast corner of Miller Bridge, is a beautiful, striking hill, and overlooks the old Chanute Aviation Field toward the lake. One can lie in the sand here and dream of changes in aircraft, that have sprung from these experiments in this field, from the biplane glider of Chanute in 1896 to the monoplanes, biplanes, triplanes, gliders and hydroplanes of the present day. Chanute can truly be called the “Father of the Flying Machine.” He used different types of gliders, that can be seen in the Chicago Academy of Sciences Building at Lin- coln Park, but finally concentrated on the biplane. This biplane, used by Chanute in 1896, is the -basis of all the present flying machines. The Wright Biplane is practically Chanute’s biplane glider, with the addition of a motor and an improved rudder. Chanute began to experiment with these gliding machines at Miller in 1896, assisted by Herring and Avery. They would watch for hours the evolutions of some big bird in the air, for Miller in those days was much frequented by eagles, hawks, gulls and other large birds, and say, “When- ever we can master the principle of that bird soaring with- out wing action, we will have come close to solving the problem of-the flying machine.” Doctor Chanute, in his experiments at Carr’s Beach, Mil- PLACES OF INTEREST 141 ler, Indiana, in 1896, was assisted in the work by some of the boys and young men of the neighborhood. The distance from the Miller bridge over the Calumet River to the lake is about two blocks. On the north side of the river, east of the bridge is a high sandy ridge that borders the river for some distance. A few hundred feet north of that is an- other ridge running east and west that is several hundred feet from the lake, bordering a very fine, wide, level beach. The first hill adjoining the bridge, upon the western border of which the sidewalk crosses, is the hill from which Doctor Chanute generally took his flights and was therefore called by the natives of that period, Chanute Hill. Two of the young men that helped him were A. Carlson and William Westergren, now a real-estate broker, both of Miller. These men helped Doctor Chanute very much in arranging the machine, of which he had four or five differ- ent types, and helped him carry them up the hill. They both say that the doctor made many ascents with the different types, that he would take the machine, run with it on the*hill toward the lake and then jump off toward the north and the northeast, trying to clear the valley and the ridge and go to the lake. The main effort, at first, seemed to be to go from the high ridge safely over the valley several hundred feet away. To make this flight or glide, the doctor would hold the plane over his head like a coaster, and in the case of the biplane would sometimes throw him- self on it “belly whoppers,’ and coast to the adjoining ridge; but generally he would go with it held over his head, holding it by a pair of handles from which he was suspended. Mr. Westergren says that a number of the models were tried and discarded as being of no practical value; but when 142 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES they finally adopted the biplane, strongly trussed and with a movable tail, with two handles attached under the center posts with which to control the movements of the tail and machine, much better results were obtained. At times when there was a strong wind from the south, with an upward current, the biplane would be lifted up so high that it would go clear over the ridge and descend to the beach; sometimes it would even go out some distance into the lake, and fall down in it; in which case a boat was required to rescue Doctor Chanute. In a number of cases, the machine would not work properly and he would fall into the valley just north of the hill. At other times, it would hit the ridge and spill the doctor. Again, he would tumble out on the beach, being shaken up pretty severely. Each time he became more and more convinced that he was learning the secret of conquering the air. At each trial his confidence grew. This confidence was shared by his associates, Mr. Herring and Mr. Avery, but nearly every- body else who saw them, or who heard of them, was con- vinced that Doctor Chanute was a crank; that the whole scheme was chimerical and would never be of any prac- tical value. At times, with a favorable and upward current, the bi- plane would soar way out into the lake at some height. The last time the doctor tried his experiment, Carlson was helping him by carrying up the planes, and he said that a very strong wind from the south or southwest took the plane to a great height and was about to carry it far out into the lake when the doctor let go his hold and tried to drop into the water. Unfortunately, he struck the sand in Pee oD UN Bs D 143 a sitting position right near the water’s edge and was very badly injured; so much so that Carlson, who was then a youth, helped to bring him to a house in Miller, where he was taken care of for nearly three weeks until he was in condition to be taken to a Chicago hospital. There is no record that the doctor ever attempted to fly again after this experience, but he kept up his interest in it, and hired a young man to follow his experiments up in the mountains of Tennessee; his interesting note-book is in the Crerar Library, Chicago. The results of these were fol- lowed by a number of people. Mr. George Wright, who was then an automobile manu- facturer at Dayton, Ohio, wrote to Doctor Chanute about them, also visiting him, and Doctor Chanute gave him full information in regard to his experiments. Wright tried the Chanute glider; he then realized the great value of a motor in driving this biplane, applied his genius to it, and evolved a machine which has now become the Wright Biplane. He gives great credit to Chanute. A monument to Doctor Chanute should be erected at Chanute Hill, Miller, Indiana, by the city of Gary. The world has now taken up the prac- tical use of the aeroplane, and Doctor Chanute’s biplane glider, born at the Dunes, has become the car of the air. Chanute never dreamed that the tiny acorns he planted here in his aviation field at the Dunes, would ever bear such giant oaks, for this new science of Aeronautics that Chanute founded, is revolutionizing the world. About three miles east of Miller, on the South Shore Electric, is Long Lake, where there is a little fishing station. Long Lake is small, shallow, marshy, has some bass, pickerel 144 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES and small fish, as well as a few ducks at the proper season. A high footpath runs through the swamp at the west end of the lake. The old stage roads can still be traced there to the east also. They were built on Indian trails, and the present road follows the Dunes from Polk’s Slide to Miller, Tolleston, etc. Long Lake, which formerly in wet seasons received the waters of the Little Calumet at Dune Park, and extended to Miller at the west, emptied them into the Grand Calumet at that point. The plant life in the lake and swamps is fascinating and worth studying. The great sugar maple bush used by the Indians and the early pioneers of this region was situated between Long Lake and Lake Michigan, toward Miller. About three miles east of Long Lake is Dune Park. It is about forty-one miles east of Chicago. This is one of the most interesting spots of the Dune region. The great Calumet Canal or Burns Ditch is to be dug as soon as the present injunction can be dissolved. The bridge over the Little Calumet River, southeast of Dune Park, is just east of the site of the old Long Bridge, and the site there is that of the old Culver Hotel, the point jutting out on the river being called Culver’s Point. The buildings have entirely gone; but some apples and pears remain, the two pear trees being about forty or fifty feet high. This place can be easily reached by getting off at Meadow Brook or Shady Slide, and walking west on the old Detroit-Chi- cago Road for two miles to the Calumet River. The eastern part of Dune Park along the lake is still wild and beautiful, its different ridges and valleys showing very plainly on a cross section, where the sand-dunes to the west PUACES OF INTEREST 145 have been removed. The station of the South Shore Elec- tric at Dune Park is now called Wilson. A few miles east is Mineral Springs, so called from the fine mineral springs found farther south, near Porter. Just northwest of the station, at the foot of the dunes, between this road and Oak Hill, is the Cowles Tamarack Swamp— named after the eminent botanist and leading authority on the plants of the Dunes, Doctor Henry W. Cowles, of the University of Chicago, who has done so much to make it famous. The other Tamarack Swamp, called the White Tamarack Swamp, at Tamarack near Michigan City, is far inferior, both in beauty and in variety of flora. The Cowles Tamarack Swamp should be either taken as a State Park by the State of Indiana or purchased by private subscription, before it is civilized off the earth through draining the marsh and cutting down the beautiful trees, as is being done now. Back of the Oak Hill region is a chain of lakes be- tween the high dunes, making a very attractive section. The old stage road from Detroit to Chicago went piney here in the ’thirties and ’ forties. The dunes along Mineral Springs and Oak Hill are very wild. ‘The highest peaks along the lake there are Mount Tim on the east, and Mount Leman on the west, near Oak Hill. This is named after Mr. W. H. Leman, who owns about six hundred acres of this beautiful Duneland, and has two and a half miles of beach for bathing. He has quite a colony of Chicago people there, who have built some pretty cottages. He is the first summer resorter in the Dunes, having built the first summer cottage in 1893. When built it was placed on posts several feet above the sand, so as to keep dry. It is now a few feet below the 146 THE WONDERS OF THE DURE: sand, which has been gradually piling up against it, and must be continually shoveled away. He has leased this tract for ninety-nine years to Superintendent Wirt of Gary, who will make a wonderful residence suburb of it. Another place to visit from Mineral Springs is the Bailly Mausoleum, between Mineral Springs and Oak Hill on the crest of the Calumet Ridge; also the Bailly home two blocks east and two blocks south. Here can be seen the historical places before described. The next place to visit is Portchester, or Waverly Beach. The gravel road turns east on Green Road for two blocks, to Waverly Beach Road, which now runs north to the lake. The beach at the mouth of Fort Creek is called Waverly Beach and is very attractive, visitors coming during the summer by the hundreds. There is a large cement parking stand near the lake now. The Morgan estate of three hun- dred twenty-two acres, including Waverly Beach and Mount Tom, is now sold for residences. This section from around the mouth of Fort Creek to Tremont, a mile or two to the southeast, was for many years the most important part of the Dunes, as here were Indian villages, Little Fort, City West, and Morgan’s Mill. “Fish” Johnson has a bathing pavilion and a restaurant there in summer, and has many guests. His fish dinners are famous for their excellence. There can be seen the great blowout or slide that is called the Jens Jensen Blowout, in honor of that landscape genius, Jens Jensen. This is where the wonderful Dune Pageant was held in all its glory in 1917. This Jensen Blowout, with its great bowl, hollowed out by the wind, and the sand blown back by the wind until it forms a high plateau about Pies OD IN TEREST 147 fifty or sixty feet high in some places, extends east and west for almost a half-mile. The glistening sand, rolling down- hill, covering trees and filling valleys, makes an impressive sight, and enables one to understand why the old Yankee pioneers called the dunes and blowouts “slides.” The Jensen Blowout and the Furnessville Blowout, are the finest specimens in the Dunes, each one possessing fea- tures not found in the other. Both should be visited and studied. The next stopping place east of Portchester and Waverly Beach is Tremont, the land of the three sand mountains— Mount Green, Mount Holden and Mount Tom; they were called the “Three Sisters,” by the old pioneers. Here was located New City West, that began after the death of Old City West at the mouth of Fort Creek at the present Wav- erly Beach, in 1840; it flourished from 1845 to 1875 with the old Green Tavern—two blocks east of the Tremont Station of the South Shore Electric—as the center of community life. New City West is also a vanished city, the only thing remaining suggestive of it being an old log house, now in ruins, and the little City West schoolhouse, now abandoned, a block east of the station. M. F. Green, who lives opposite the little depot called Tremont Station, is the custodian of the Prairie Club Beach House on the lake, about one and one-half miles north. A half-mile north, where the road is sandy and turns into the Dunes, are two large buildings put up by Wilson & Com- pany, the great packers of Chicago, for the use and pleasure of their female employees. It is called Camp Wilson. This camp is located on the old Link farm, which was formerly 148 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES a thriving little fruit farm, but is now growing up to under- brush. It is the property of J. M. Bowers, of Gary. This social experiment was not a success here. The Prairie Club Beach House was located there facing the lake, because it was considered by the committee on sites who selected it as the most beautiful part of Duneland. It is situated on the innermost of the several beautiful ridges that encircle the southern part of Lake Michigan, and is about sixty feet above the clear waters of the lake, giving a splendid outlook upon it for miles. A few blocks on the west are Mounts Green, Holden and Tom, the latter being farthest west, and having an observatory on it put up by the boy scouts of Kouts, Indiana, after the old government one had fallen. This one was blown down very recently. The old Valparaiso Road runs through Tremont back of the Dunes, as does the old: Detroit-Chicago Stage Road. Little Fort is on Fort Creek back of Mount Tom, and the old Hobart Sawmill was situated in the hollow at the foot of old Little Fort. The creek that empties into this Fort Creek near the old Link House, the camp of our dune her- mit, John Daniels, between the two big buildings of the Wilson Camp, is Furnessville Creek, that comes from the Furnessville Marsh along the foot of the Dunes. To the east are several slides as the old settlers called them. The first one to the east, Dudley Blowout, is Knowles Slide, after Knowles Green, uncle of M. F. Green. East of Dudley Blowout is Waterman Slide or Drury — Blowout. Here one can see a beautiful hill-slide of sand gradually engulfing the trees of the marshy ground at the foot of the dune. Bunch grass is trying to check the ad- vance of the sand. Near the mouth of the blowout Mr. Piece OF INTEREST 149 Drury had his cottage. Following the trail a few blocks east we come to the Big Slide, the Big Furnessville Blow- out. This great blowout, over a half-mile in length, east and west, appears as a gigantic sand toboggan “‘slide”’ from beneath, as well as from above. On the top is a plateau of sand. On its southward journey it has in many spots over- whelmed the forest and is now gradually covering the shrubs and undergrowth of the swamp. In the greater part of its course, it has covered about half of the forest, slowly killing the trees. Here one can see many specimens of climbing poison ivy, some main stems being two inches or more thick. This part of the swampy woods, below the great Furnessville Blowout fifty to sixty feet high, is called the Hothouse or Conservatory, as the ground is protected from the blasts of the north wind, and the sun, beating upon the glistening sand, generates so much heat that the plants are earlier, larger and brighter there than elsewhere. This dune has traveled so far that the old stage road is completely covered in places, and one is compelled to tramp through the swampy woods and undergrowth, or climb the great slide. The view is superb. A few blocks east of this blowout is another large one, called Polk Slide, named in honor, it is said, of President James K. Polk. It is through this Polk Slide, that the De- troit and Chicago stages in early times swung up from the beach to back of the Dunes on their way to Chicago, and in returning drove down to the beach, thence to Michigan City, and from there east and a little north to Detroit. Back of M. F. Green’s house, on Frank Koskowski’s property, below his house, is the old Mound Valley, crossed 150 THE WONDERS OF THE DURES by the Valparaiso Road. It contained nearly a hundred mounds of various sizes, built by the Mound Builders and Indians. The part east of the Valparaiso Road belongs to J. Carlson, and the house was built about 1850 by J. Wheeler. Part of this Mound Valley extends into the southeast corner of the author’s bit of Duneland property. CHAPTER: XIII THE WORK OF TIME Tue Indian village was opposite the old Green Tavern and was on the banks of Fort Creek which was formerly much wider than at present. Indian trails and old wagon roads in this vicinity are many. The old log cabin, for- merly the home of Brown, of Tamarack, and now in ruins, about three blocks east of Tremont, is a relic of New City West, which was formerly a busy little hamlet. A block or two east of the depot is Fort Creek, called Silver Creek by the pioneers, as its bottom was covered with silvery sand. It has worn a very tortuous valley through these high sand-ridges, or Calumet Beach, for a half-mile. Its banks are generally from ten to twenty or thirty feet high, with several fine springs gushing from the ridges at the south end of the valley. This valley is filled with beau- tiful trees and shrubs of all kinds, with many flowers, and in spring and early summer is a paradise, for hundreds’ of birds are found there, including the cardinal, the scarlet tanager, the oriole and the indigo bird. The large spring at the south end is the famous Cold Spring of the earliest inhabitants, the ancestors of the Eskimos, Mound Builders, Indians, French trappers and American pioneers. The high west banks of the valley are I51 152 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES in places covered with moss with a little rusty water at the base, showing that springs are there still, probably cov- ered up. The slide on the east side of Fort Creek is Indian Slide. The whole region here seems to have been especially fitted to be the home of those primitive peoples, with its fine springs, running water and high sandy ground. On the east side of the valley is the site of an Indian village, with innumerable chips of flint, jasper, etc., together with many stones the size of one’s fist, that were used to cook the food, Indian fashion, by heating the stones and then drop- ping them in vessels of water containing the food. Many of these stones show the cracks running from the outside toward the center, owing to the sudden contractions of the heated stones as they came in contact with the water. Often they split in pieces. The Indian village, which extended to Cold Spring and vicinity, was apparently built on the site of a village of Mound Builders, as Mound Valley is just west of it and seems to have included several kinds of mounds, not only. the round burial mounds, but also elliptical ones, just as in other locations of the Mound Builders. The natural features of the Tremont region are also very striking. Its great dunes, encircling ridges, maze of hills and hollows, sheltered glens filled with tropical vegetation ; valleys and swamps with their varied flora; multitudes of birds, including quail, partridge and a wonderful variety of singing birds; an exceedingly abundant and diversified flora. The Tremont region is certainly one to conjure with, in discussing the Dunes! It has been for ages the center of the Dunes—geographically, biographically and historically! THE WORK OF TIME 153 It is the Chesterton region so extolled by Doctor Cowles in his book on Plant Societies of the Dunes, as Chesterton was the railway station at that time. | Over a mile east of Tremont is Furnessville, so named in honor of the Furness family who settled near here in the ‘forties. The old road that ran from the Furnessville Sta- tion on the South Shore Electric to the Dunes, over both the Furness and the Wells estates, is now abolished as a road, and is a mere trail through high weeds, brambles and swampy places. There was a foot-bridge over Furnessville Creek, but it was recently burned in the big fire. The Furness farm, between the South Shore Electric Road and the Wells estate, is a striking case of a change of vegetation. We see so many cases in the Dunes of sand gradually burying forests and filling marshes, and develop- ing desert-like plants ; of swamps being drained and growing common plants and grains, that it seems startling to see a fine large farm formerly growing grain, potatoes, large and small fruits, etc., reverting to the original conditions of many years ago. Yet that is the case with the Furness farm of several hundred acres north of the electric road. The cleared ground, about two hundred acres, was formerly in a high state of cultivation; in addition, a large stock farm was maintained in the eastern part of the farm. The entire cleared farm, from the electric road to the big marsh, was laid with four-inch tile, two hundred feet apart, to give it good drainage. It was difficult to lay the drains properly, owing to the large amount of soft bog-iron ore, or limonite, found in this swampy ground, some of the pieces weighing several hundred pounds each. A large piece of this type of iron ore that was dug up on Green’s 154 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES farm, farther west, in the same swampland, is very soft and crumbly. About fifteen years ago the Furness farm was abandoned as a farm, as the drainage was getting poorer, and the land more marshy, and getting covered with young alders and white poplars. It is really a saddening sight. The old house on the hill near the Furnessville Trail, was occupied by Mr. Wells’ caretaker, Mr. Nicholson. After- ward Mr. Wells built another house at Tamarack and Mr. Nicholson was transferred there. He was succeeded by Mr. Brown. This old house was known as “The Haunted House,”’ by the hikers; no one has as yet seen any spooks, though many weird tales are told of it. It is reputed to be the home also of woodchucks, foxes, badgers, ‘possums, coons and skunks, as their tracks were found all around it. The old barn had as tenants some of the largest and liveli- est woodchucks imaginable. In early December of 1918 we watched a flock of nearly two dozen quail feeding near the old barn. The Haunted House and old barn are now torn down. Here one follows the old Dune stage road east for about a block, where it turns to the Dunes for over a half-mile to save going through a troublesome brush-covered trail at the foot of the dunes. This trail, however, is the Pine Tree Trail that leads to the Big Pines. Soon the stage road joins it where the going is better, and for over a mile this trail leads through woods, the edges of swamps and tall oaks until it strikes the Big Pines, scores of them, some nearly a hundred feet high, with trunks over two feet in diameter, rearing their crowns heavenward. The old stage road follows the ancient Indian trail through THE WORK OF TIME 155 here to Polk Slide, and turns to the beach. The Indian trail goes on to Michigan City and beyond. For blocks the ground here is covered with pine needles, and the air is perfumed with their odor. One can picture the Indians as they went through these trails to their homes, or arrayed in their war paint, stealing quietly through the country to attack and scalp their ene- mies. Even the Iroquois in their attack on the Miamis, the Hurons, the Foxes, or the Illinois, came along the beach of Lake Michigan and often took the inside trail through here. From Polk Slide the road east is a recent wagon road, made for the Wells estate, and much neglected. It runs east toward Michigan City through the woods for about three miles, or even five, following its various crooks and turns, until it reaches the house in which lived Mr. Brown, the superintendent of the Wells estate. The place is called Tamarack, owing to the White Tamarack swamp there. This road to Tamarack is a beautiful one, going through marshes and jungles, over hills and along ridges, winding in and out in a most bewildering manner through the re- gion. Ex-Mayor Krueger, of Michigan City, says that the post road did not go through the Dunes from Michigan City to Polk Slide, but took the beach to Polk Slide. Mr. Stamford White, President of the Chicago Board of Trade, and a very public-spirited citizen, who recently died, had a summer home on the lake shore of Tamarack. He was the trustee of the Wells estate, and owned part of it. About fifteen or twenty years ago an effort was made to make a regular English country estate of the Wells prop- erty. A wire fence was built between the higher ground and the marsh. Live stock of fine quality was introduced: 156 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES horses, cattle, sheep and pigs. But they did not thrive. The ground was not suitable for it; much of the stock died. The wolves got away with many of the sheep; poisonous reptiles and plants may have finished others. The ground was not rich enough to provide much food, and the farm project was abandoned. The ground is now kept as a great estate, with a caretaker who looks after it. Mr. White’s death may cause a change in matters. As this is a private estate, visitors are not allowed to roam through the grounds without permission. Several miles beyond Tamarack is found Michigan City, which is fifty-seven miles from the Chicago Loop. This is situated on the shore of Lake Michigan at the mouth of the Riviere du Chemin, or Trail Creek. West of the mouth of the river formerly stood a great dune called by the pioneers, “Hoosier Slide.” The description by Harriet Martineau, in the ’thirties, of a sunset on Lake Michigan as seen from the top of Hoosier Slide, is most charming. Nothing pub- lished recently in praise of the Dunes can surpass the won- derful imagery and vivid word painting of this gifted English writer. Hoosier Slide was formerly almost two hundred feet high and quite wide, and with its twin dune, Yankee Slide, on the east side, guarded the mouth of the Riviere du Chemin, like the Twin Pillars of Hercules at the Strait of Gibraltar. This little river, piercing the Hoosier Ridge, left the two great peaks as its sentinels. Hoosier Slide, which stood there for many centuries, has been sacrificed to commercialism. The sand was sold and removed, gen- erally for filling-in purposes; and now a small desert plain remains. THE WORK OF TIME 187 Some years ago the officials of Michigan City, led by their mayor, Martin T. Krueger, and backed by the wide- awake people of Michigan City, decided to save their beau- tiful east dune, Yankee Slide, from demolition and passed a law adding it to their park system, making it now a part of Washington Park; it is to be protected as much as pos- sible in its natural state. This high dune is situated on the banks of Trail Creek at the northeastern corner of Washington Park, next to Bismarck Bluff. : The Michigan City Beach, at Washington Park, is a very fine broad beach and in summer is occupied by thousands of visitors who find it of great pleasure and value. A couple of miles or so up the beach and connected with it by an excellent automobile road, are other beaches called Sheridan Beach, Long Beach and Duneland Beach. Here are many beautiful summer cottages which are used by people from different parts of Indiana, Illinois and Michi- gan. The houses are sheltered from the sun by the spread- ing pines found on the Dunes and in the sheltered glens and valleys. Here at Michigan City is not only a magnificent view of the lake with its harbor and its government lighthouse, its many ships, yachts and smaller boats; but also in the Dunes to the north and east are a variety of flowers and birds in the woods and fields. Michigan City is being boomed as the Gateway to the Dunes by its Chamber of Commerce, W. K. Greenebaum, Secretary-Manager. In the eastern part of Michigan City and beyond it is a large tract of land, in which centers some of the most remarkable events in the history of the whole Dune region. This tract is called the Springland Farm and is owned by 158 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES Martin T. Krueger. In this beautiful tract are situated the Marquette Spring of 1675, the old Indian council and dancing grounds, the site of the Revolutionary battle with the British and other historic places. Right across a gully, Cheney Valley, from Marquette Spring, was situated the cabin of Mr. Coughlan, the trapper, at the time of Black Hawk and it is supposed that the cabin of Jean Baptiste Pointe au Saible was located on the same site in 1779, when he was captured by the British and taken to Mackinaw. In the eastern part of this big tract occurred the famous skirmish of the Americans and British on December 5, 1780, when the Americans were defeated. This is the battle that some authors locate at South Chicago, but which Lieu- tenant-Governor Sinclair says was fought at Trail Creek. The old Post Road from Detroit to Chicago passed through this place, crossing Trail Creek near the Club House and winding its way along the pines that cover a great part of the tract. It can easily be traced for a long distance. This spot has hills and ravines and many beautiful trees of various kinds, especially a very large number of magnifi- cent white pines, the finest in Northern Indiana. Mr. Krueger has a home among the hills at the west end, near the former site of the famous Scott Mills. Here is where he enjoys himself looking after his woodlands, espe- cially after a hard day’s work in his law office down-town. Mr. Krueger has presented eighty acres of the central part of his beautiful Springland Park to the people of Michigan City as a Memorial Park in honor of the boys who went to the front in the great World War. In this park will be THE WORK OF TIME 159 reserved a spot for the interment of any soldier, sailor or marine of the World’s War from Michigan City who passed away. Mr. Krueger will be known in history as the “Patriotic Mayor of Michigan City.”’ About a half-mile east of Marquette Spring, on the grounds of the Pottawottomie Country Club, Mr. Krueger showed us the original crossing over Trail Creek, through which ran the old road and over which later a bridge was built for the accommodation of the stages and the great prairie schooners that migrated by the thousands toward the West. Mrs. Kinzie, in Waubun, says that a petition for a “Brigg” at Michigan City in 1831 was filed by the garri- son of Fort Dearborn and sent to the government. This is the old one near the club house. Two bridges were built here at Michigan City: one at this crossing, only twenty rods west of the club house, in 1831, and the other at a later period over Trail Creek, near Scott’s Mills, below Mr. Krueger’s house. The present bridge at Franklin Street was located there still later. This was to accommodate traffic that came down from the north, along the shore, as well as to connect the central part of town with the lake. The banks of Trail Creek, as a rule, were so high and steep that the traders were compelled to go for miles to find a suitable fording place; and it was here, around the ford, at Trail Creek, that the battle was fought December 5, 1780, between the pursuing Indians, under Mr. Champion, the head fur-trader at Fort St. Joseph, and the Americans, when they caught up with and defeated the Americans and French from Cahokia, who had captured and looted Fort St. Joseph, Michigan, of many bales of choice furs. As the battle was 160 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES also fought on the hills on the west side of Cheney Valley, the place which is now the Memorial Park should have a monument to the American soldiers killed there in the Revolution, as well as those in the Civil, Spanish and World Wars. Camp Anderson was near Trail Creek in T864. Springland is about a mile east of Sheridan Beach, in the northeastern part of Michigan City. It is very easy to reach by auto, and fronts on Springland Avenue. The easiest way to reach it by railroad is to take the South Bend Express on the South Shore Electric to their big office building a couple of miles east of Michigan City, getting off at Carroll Avenue. Springland Park is only a block north of this. From Michigan City on Franklin Street, take the East- port Electric Car. The Michigan Central depot is near Franklin Street, so that passengers can get on there. The terminus of the Eastport line is on the same street as the South Bend Electric, Carroll Avenue, and a walk north a half-mile on a fine graveled road brings one to Spring- land Park. Another remarkable spot, one of the great centers of southern dune life, though not generally considered as part of the Lake Michigan Dunes, is that section of high dunes and ridges that is bordered by the Little Calumet River and which is part of the original Glenwood and Calumet beaches thrown up by ancient Lake Chicago. In the center of this system of high dunes and ridges, is Liverpool, part of East Gary, near the mouth of Deep River, which flows through these very high dunes. Liverpool is surrounded by great dunes and ridges interspersed with THE WORK OF TIME 161 beautiful glens, in many cases covered with deep forests. These are filled with very rare flowers, among which are different kinds of orchids, including the beautiful purple lady’s slipper as well as the smaller ones, the Arethusa, pitcher plant, trailing arbutus, Pogonia and Calopogon or grass pink, with numerous others. One of the most suc- cessful students of plant life in the Dune region is Mr. George Pinneo, of Gary. He has done a great deal of work in the Liverpool and East Gary district. Sundew are sometimes found on the hillsides, some of them having a few small insects in their pretty leaves. It is very interesting to watch the leaves trap, kill and digest the insects. Patterson Camp, Liverpool, is reached by the Hobart car from Gary, which passes within a few blocks of it. Autos go right past it, since it is on the Ridge Road through East Gary. The Michigan Central stops at Liverpool. In 1915 a trip was made to South Bend to see Mr. George A. Baker, the secretary of the Northern Indiana Historical Society, whose booklet on the St. Joe-Kankakee Portage is very full and scholarly. He and Doctor Montgomery, the president, kindly drove the writer to the old portage, north of South Bend, exactly where the targets of the State Militia Rifle Range are placed. We explored that part, took the trail by foot through the cemetery, and then climbed into the doctor’s auto and drove as closely as possible along the trail to the Kankakee River point. On returning to South Bend, the writer asked the hosts if they had marked this route in any way, and they confessed that they had not, stating that requests had been made to the Indiana Legislature and also to Mr. Studebaker, 162 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES the great philanthropist of South Bend, to put up fine cement pillars, with bronze markings, but without results as yet. The writer remarked that they had put in fifty years studying that region, knew it better than anybody in the world, and should put up some markers along the route, even if they were only four-inch posts with a board across; that they were mortal and might be called away at any time; therefore they should rush it through. They were exceedingly kind and helpful, and made this South Bend trip most interesting. About two weeks later, Mr. Baker sent a conden letter in which he said they had followed the advice of the writer and had gone over the entire La Salle Portage between the St. Joe and the Kankakee and had placed eight-inch posts with markers. A postscript to the letter said this: “To think that a Chicago man had to come out here and tell us what to do.” Mr. Baker passed away a short time ago, leaving Doctor Montgomery and ex-Treasurer Knoblock as the greatest living authorities on the St. Joe-Kankakee Portage. Mr. Baker was a very enthusiastic historian and archeologist. CHAPTER XIV DUNES NATIONAL PARK OF ALL the agencies that have contributed toward making the Dunes known to the public, the greatest is the Prairie Club of Chicago. It has made the Dunes famous. It is known throughout the world, and is ranked as one of the leading outdoor clubs in existence. Its motto is “Health and Service.” In 1914, the Prairie Club, under its president, Jens Jen- sen, the “Apostle of the Dunes,” leased a large tract of land fronting on Lake Michigan at Tremont, Indiana, in the wildest, most picturesque part of the Dunes and put up a Beach House. This added greatly to the popularity of the club, and it has grown rapidly. It now owns this land. The Prairie Club has been in the habit of celebrating Me- morial Day by giving Memorial Services at the Beach House, and then carrying out a program in the woods or on the dunes. Among these beautiful plays is the Spirits of the Dunes, a most artistic one, given in 1915 at Dudley’s Blowout, the first one east of the Beach House. In 1917 a new idea was followed. For a number of years the author had been studying the history of the Dunes very closely, and among other things had found the loca- tion of both the Revolutionary battle of 1780 at Trail 163 164 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES Creek, Michigan City, and also the site of Little Fort 1750- 1800, a short distance southwest of Mount Tom, on a high bluff bordering the small stream called Fort Creek. Also he had traced ancient mounds, Indian trails and villages, stage roads, etc., in the Dunes, and had interviewed many old residents; had shown and described a number of these historic places to members of the Prairie Club, and other friends, who were amazed at the richness of the historic material found in the Dune region; and had also lectured upon the same subject to different organizations. For over thirty years he had labored to have the Dunes made a State Park by Indiana. As a result, after the Memorial Day exercise on May 30, 1916, the help of the author was asked by numerous mem- bers of the Prairie Club in furnishing material for an his- toric pageant on Memorial Day, 1917, portraying the history of the Dunes from the earliest times, with the successive occupations by the different nations that had occupied this Northwest Territory. This would call attention to the beauty of the Dunes, so we could work better for a National Park. This request was granted and material prepared. In the meantime much interest was developing on the question of a National Dunes Park. Doctor Cowles’ report about the great reputation of the Dunes in Europe astonished the public greatly, and aroused much interest in the Dune region. The people of Indiana now began to speak proudly of “our Dunes.’ There was much talk of a National Dunes Park, and Senator Thomas Taggart, of Indiana, who had visited the Dune region and was strongly impressed with its wild beauty, had a bill passed in Congress in 1916, calling for a committee to in- HOVAG ATYAAV M if \ DUNES NATIONAL PARK 105 vestigate the desirability of having the Dune region from Gary to Michigan City set aside as a National Dunes Park. Mr. Stephen T. Mather, of Chicago, Assistant Secretary of the Interior, and Director of National Parks, was au- thorized to call: a meeting on October 30, 1916, at the Federal Building in Chicago to discuss the question of mak- ing a National Park of the Dunes. At this meeting a large number of Dune lovers were present to give their views on the proposed National Dunes Park. There were botanists and zoologists; geologists and geographers; artists and sculptors; authors and actors; poets and historians; preachers and teachers; clubmen and club women; statesmen and officials. Nature lovers all. Mr. Mather gave a splendid talk in which he made this point clear. The government had never condemned any land for park purposes but had used its own land. It had, however, bought land for conservation purposes so as to ‘conserve the head waters of large rivers. It had also bought small tracts that were situated within a National Park. He also explained the difference between a National Park and a National Monument. The National Park must be approved by Congress and the president, and so far all have been taken from government property. The National Monument is any piece of public property noted for scenic beauty, historic associations, or other interest, and made into a National Monument by proclamation of the president alone. A National Monument may be made from private prop- erty, state park, etc., if approved by the president, and accepted as a Monument. These pieces of private or state 166 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES property must be donated free to the government, which, if it accepts the gift, assumes all the authority. Congress does not need to approve these. The National Monument is generally on a smaller scale than the National Park; but, both are parts of the National Park system, and both are supported by the government. Mr. Mather stated that in his estimation the Dune region was wild and charming enough to be made into a National Park. After this scholarly presentation of the case, Mr. Mather called upon some of the leading Dune lovers to express their views. Many splendid talks were given and much valuable information imparted. A full account of the meeting is given in the Report on the Proposed Dunes National Park, given out by the Department of the Interior, and it is to be hoped that every reader will be able to get a copy of it from the government. A striking scene was that in which a gentleman speaking in behalf of the Pottawottomie Indians stated that they re- nounced their claim to the Dune region and wished to re- cord themselves as being in favor of a great National Dunes Park. The interest in the Dunes National Park project had be- come so wide-spread before the spring of 1917, however, that a number of organizations begged to be allowed to participate with us, and produce an Historic Pageant on a larger scale. After some discussion, this was granted, on condition that the Prairie Club still have general control of it. A new organization, called the Dunes Pageant Association, was formed February, 1917, with Mr. James L. Houston, Jr., as DUNES NATIONAL PARK 167 president, and Mrs. Frank M. Durfee as secretary, both of the Prairie Club. As the Dunes Pageant was now to be planned on a large scale, the Committee decided to employ Mr. Thomas Wood Stevens, President of the American Pageant Association, as Pageant Author. Mr. Stevens was at first elected director of the pageant, so the author turned over to him the history of the region that had been prepared for the Prairie Club Pageant, with additional information’ which he used for his new play, with further assistance from Miss Caroline Mcllvaine, of the Chicago Historical Society. PROGRAM PAGEANT OF THE DUNES THE DuNES UNDER Four FLAGS CAST OF CHARACTERS Episode No. 1 Beem LOUNGE At eo oe Sa Donald Robertson 1675—Marquette Scene --_----_-__- University of Chicago CST ee Ot aU ERS CRT i LI R. A. Talcott Episode No. 2 1661—La Salle Scene ___.___-~_- Prairie Club of Chicago Wendell Phillips High School Nicholas Senn High School EU ct seas 0 i RS OOS ae al G. H. Fenn Episode No. 3 1780—De Linctot Scene—Notre Dame University, Indiana DEC AOC LOL reeene ear rerek John Lemmer 168 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES Episode No. 4 1781—Spanish March ___--_-_ De Paul University, Chicago Captain Don Eugenio Pierrot__---_-_ Robert Ward Episode No. 5 1804-12—Fort Dearborn Scene Turner Society of Chicago Captain Nathan riealcie see ea F. Roebeneck Episode No. 6 | 1834-1840-—City ‘West ao luo eee Gary, Indiana Daniel W ebstenuswom. eee een Harvey Watson Director of the Dune Dances——————Mary Wood Hinman Director ot; Music: oa) 4S ees pear C. Gordon Wedertz Designer of Costumes _____--- Mrs. Dan Sayres Grosbeck The scene of the pageant was laid in the great hollow or blowout called Jens Jensen Blowout, bordering’ on Lake Michigan, about two blocks west of Fort Creek, at Waverly Beach, and on a direct line north from the Portchester Road. The bottom of this natural bowl is several hundred feet across, and near the north end of it a high stand for the speakers was erected, facing this great amphitheater. From the top of the great, wide, sand plateau at the south of the blowout, can be seen Mount Tom, about a half-mile to the east, with its two neighbors to the east, Mounts Holden and Green, so closely bound together in their beau- tiful chain of glistening sand, lofty pines and oaks, bosky dells and protecting vines, that the early settlers named these three beautiful peaks “The Three Sisters.” DUNES NATIONAL PARK 169 When the day of the pageant arrived, great throngs wended their way to the natural amphitheater used for the occasion. The various committees had worked hard and had succeeded in getting things into proper shape. The people arrived on foot, by carriage, wagons and autos; the majority, many thousands, by train from the South Shore Line stopping at Portchester, just west of Tremont. They settled themselves in front of the stage and on the sloping hills on every side, which gave admirable seats from which to view the pageant. Over thirty thousand were present, and if the weather had not been so threatening, double that number would have been there. As it was, it was an impressive sight to see that vast body of people present to show their sympathy with an ideal—the ideal of beauty. The pageant was scheduled to begin at two-thirty in the afternoon, but many visitors made a day of it in the Dunes. The large number of actors and actresses in their beautiful, rare or bizarre costumes were striking, and aroused much interest. The soldiers of the different countries made a particularly martial and impressive appearance. The weather looked very ‘threatening, but finally the pageant was started with Donald Robertson as the Pageant Master. In a rich, solemn, and rolling voice that swelled over that vast audience, he depicted the love of the Indians for the Dune country, and their sorrow at leaving it. At one time he called on Great Manitou to show his love for the Indians and their beloved home, the beautiful Dunes, and then stood with upraised arms, awaiting an answer. The words had hardly been uttered, when a most dramatic 170 THE WONDERS OF THE. DUNES and remarkable incident occurred. As if in answer to the Prophet’s appeal for protection to the red men, while still in his pose of supplication, the heavens opened with a fierce electric display all over the lake and the Dunes, followed by continuous, deafening crashes of thunder, reverberating through the hills and valleys, which continued for some time. It was thrilling; yea, awe-inspiring! This was followed in a few minutes by rain; not a gentle shower but a veritable cloud-burst, in keeping with the previous electric and thunder-storms. The pageant was momentarily suspended, while people looked for shelter. The advantages of this natural amphitheater were at once apparent. Many of those seated in the hollow who were without umbrellas retired to the sides of the hills, and like those already there, dug holes two or three feet across and the same in depth. ‘They carefully seated themselves in these pits and partly covered themselves with the sand, in some cases clear to their shoulders, saying, “Better wet heads than wet feet.” They looked so comfortable that many people with um- brellas followed suit, sheltering their heads with the umbrellas. It was an odd sight indeed to see the hillside dotted with hundreds of these people in their little dugouts, some with umbrellas, most without; but, it showed good judgment. After this first deluge, attempts to continue the pageant were made several times, but the rain storms became so frequent that it was finally called off until the next Sunday, June third, and the ticket holders were notified that they would be admitted free on that day. DUNES NATIONAL PARK 171 It was a great disappointment to the many thousand spectators, as well as to the many hundreds who had worked so hard to present this pageant in a fitting manner. It was a very sensible idea, however, to have two performances, in case the first one should be a failure through bad weather. The following Sunday, June third, was a beautiful day, and thousands of people were present to enjoy the famed Pageant of the Dunes. The level ground directly in front of the grand stand was packed, and the slopes of the great amphitheater were well filled by the people from many cities and towns. The brilliant costumes of the soldiers of the different nations that claimed this region; the quaint and picturesque regalia and the ornamentation of the various Indian tribes, for both warriors and squaws; the fleecy, brightly-colored costumes of the many wood nymphs, spirits and elves, to- gether with the buckskin and fur costumes of the hunters and pioneers, lent such an air of brightness and enchant- ment to the landscape that it seemed a bit of Fairy-land. _ The pageant was rendered in a most beautiful, fascinating and impressive manner. Everybody was in earnest— actors, officials and assistants—because the motive of this beautiful pageant was a great idea—the saving of the Dunes —by calling the attention of the people to its wonderful beauty and wonderful history. The pageant closed with a grand review of the seven hundred actors in this magnificent Pageant of the Dunes. It was a glorious sight when all of the people, radiant in bearing and bright and beautiful in costume, rallied to the colors, behind 172 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES THE CALUMET FRENCH FLAG BRITISH FLAG SPANISH FLAG AMERICAN FLAG: and the Prophet, at the head of the Grand Parade, bearing the AMERICAN FLAG, led this vast assemblage of twenty-five thousand people in singing The Star-Spangled Banner! It was a beautiful finale to this magnificent pageant; and as the swelling tones of our national anthem, led by the wonderful voice of the Prophet, ascended unto heaven, this feeling and desire stirred the hearts of all; “May this beautiful Duneland be a heritage of the people forever more !”’ This question has often been asked, “Was this great pageant worth while?’ Yes, it was. For here were crys- tallized the different phases of Dune character—its beauty and its desolation—its restful peace, and the terrific evidence of its storms—its primitive wildness and the everchanging newness of its neighboring cities—the birch-bark canoe and the palatial steamer that plows the azure waters of the mighty inland ocean that washes its sandy shores—the poor Indian with his untutored mind and savage nature, and the cultured American enjoying this historic portrayal of the life of the Dunes. All of these sights have brought to the onlooker the true life history of the Dunes, and have portrayed them so vividly that they stand out as real things. They have burned into his consciousness the belief that the Dunes should be DUNES NATIONAL PARK 173 a thing apart from commercial, industrial or urban life, and should be preserved as a great park for the people. The World War checked all efforts to acquire the Dunes as a National Park. Congress was too busy in preparing for and prosecuting the war. When this was successfully finished, national interest had abated to a great extent, and very little effort has since been made to carry it out as a National Park, until the National Dunes Park Association was formed. Mr. W. B. Gleason, of the United States Steel Corpora- tion, of Gary, is president, and Mrs. Frank Sheehan, a mem- ber of the Indiana D. A. R., is secretary. The Association is working hard to get a National Park; if not that, then a State Park. It is painfully evident that if we are to have any kind of a large Duneland Park it must be a State Park at first. At present there is quite a call from the people of Indiana for a State Dune Park. They are proud of the Dunes. This seems to be the most feasible plan. It would be a disgrace to have all of this wonderful Dune country given up to industrial plants, for it is needed as a resting-place and playground for the myriads of people who will event- ually dwell in this marvelous industrial region. A large tract, including the wildest and most picturesque part of the Dunes should be condemned by the State of Indiana, and should extend from Meadow Brook on the west to past Tamarack, on the east, making a tract eight miles wide, four miles on each side of the Valparaiso Road, at Tremont. This tract should extend from Lake Michigan to the Chicago, Lake Shore and South Bend Railway, taking in about eight thousand acres. 174 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES It would contain the charming hill and chain-of-lakes region from Meadow Brook to Oak Hill, and also the beau- tiful Cowles Tamarack Swamp at Mineral Springs; the Leman Ridge of sand-dunes from Oak Hill to Portchester ; the Mount Tom Ridge, from Waverly Beach to Polk Slide, and the Wells Ridge, from Polk Slide to the section line a short distance east of Tamarack. It would also take in the great Jens Jensen Blowout, near Waverly Beach, and the great Furnessville Blowout; include the site of Little Fort, many Indian trails and post roads, and the beautiful Pine Tree Trail with the grand, impressive groups of great pines from Drury’s to the Furnessville Blowout, and the famous Polk Slide. Truly, a wonderful park! Mr. Richard Lieber, the highly efficient director of the Indiana Department of Conservation, has made a careful study of the Dunes. Its wonderful beauty, its many rare plants, birds and animals, and its remarkable history, have so impressed him that he is booming it for a State Park, taking in the eight miles of beautiful hills, lakes, creeks and marshes, from Meadow Brook to beyond Tamarack. He and the Indiana Nature Club, which under its presi- dent, the late Doctor Frank B. Wynn, paid a visit to the Dunes on May 15-16, 1920, were entertained at the Beach House by the Prairie Club. They explored the Dunes, and showed themselves to be an unusually well informed club on all phases of natural history. They were astonished and delighted at the wonders of the Dune region, and said they would work very hard toward having the Dunes made a State Park. Senators Charles J. Buchanan and Colonel Robert L. Moorhead, of the Indiana State Senate, who visited the DUNES NATIONAL PARK 175 Dunes in February, 1921, reported to the Indiana Legisla- ture regarding the advisability of purchasing part of the Dunes as a State Park. A number of Dune experts were invited to meet them and show them the leading features of the Dunes, the author specializing on its wonderful history. Both Senator Bucha- nan and Colonel Moorhead are sportsmen and hikers; out- of-door men; and they were pleased with the beauty, rare plants, birds and animals of the Dunes, and especially its wonderful history. They thought that some beautiful part of the Dunes should be preserved for a State Park for the benefit of the people. They also said they would ask for an appropriation to mark historic sites and trails through- out the state. It will cost about two million dollars to purchase this beautiful Duneland Park. The Indiana idea was to have the Indiana Legislature appropriate one million in ten annual installments, provided that outside parties or organizations subscribe an equal sum, on the same terms. As the out- siders seemed unwilling to do that Governor McCray has postponed action. In the latter part of June, 1922, the Indiana Federation of Women’s Clubs, under the leadership of Mrs. Frank J. Sheehan, Chairman of the State Department of Conserva- tion, and also Secretary of the National Dunes Park Asso- ciation, held a series of meetings for two weeks at Tremont, to further the efforts toward making a State Park of the Dunes. Prominent Indiana clubwomen, members of the Indiana Legislature, historians and nature lovers, were present, and many interesting talks were given and papers read. The 176 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES Federation of Women’s Clubs, on their day, outlined their plans to aid in making a State Park of the Dunes. On Historical Day, the historical societies of Lake, Porter, LaPorte and St. Joseph Counties gave some inter- esting accounts of the early history of this region. After their meeting, a pilgrimage was made to the Bailly Home- stead, which is now a religious home, and Reverend Eberly, who is in charge, gave the visitors a cordial reception, showed them around the place and also the Bailly cemetery, recently sold to a farmer. On Statesmen’s Day, a number of members of the Indi- ana Legislature were present at the Beach House. They visited the leading points of interest of the Tremont region, and were amazed and pleased at the beauty of the Dunes, and its rare plants and birds. They thought part of this re- gion-should be preserved and were of the opinion it would be better to start with a small State Park, say about three miles, and add to it later. Unless very quick action is taken, it will be too late to have a real Dune Park, as the Dunes are being destroyed. no The whole program was a great tribute to the unceasing labor of Mrs. Sheehan, who has done so much toward mak- ing a State Park of the Dunes. In October, 1922, the Indiana State Conservation Com- mission, with a number of members of the Legislature, vis- ited the Dunes, and expressed the greatest interest and pride in them, as a most beautiful section of Indiana. Mr. Lieber, the Director of the Conservation Department, said that now was the time to get this wonderful region for a park, and recommended that the eight-mile strip from Meadow Brook to Tamarack, with the center at Tremont, be secured DUNES NATIONAL PARK 177 for a State Park. Mr. Guthrie, the Chairman of the Com- mission, expressed his surprise and pleasure at the beauty of the Dunes, which he considered a most wonderful region. The Dunes have so impressed themselves upon the public eye as an ideal State Park, that the State of Indiana has agreed with the government to construct a most excellent highway called the Dunes Highway, from Michigan City to Gary, a distance of twenty-five miles, on the south side of the Chicago, Lake Shore and South Bend Electric Railroad, or South Shore Electric. It is a half-mile south of the Dunes, and the first section of twelve and one-half miles, from Michigan City to Baileytown follows the old winding De- troit-Chicago Road, which just west of Baileytown trends to the southwest and crosses the Calumet River opposite Dune Park. This road is about level, and has few difficul- ties to conquer. It was finished and ready for use about December I, 1922. The second section of twelve and one-half miles extends from Baileytown to Gary and seven miles of this goes through deep swamps; also part of it over steep sand-hills. It is adjacent to the South Shore Electric on the south. This road is exceedingly difficult to build, as the swamps are very deep, and some of the sand-dunes are over fifty feet high, requiring some deep cutting. The road-bed through the swamps is sand, that is packed so hard by hydraulic pressure that it is practically sandstone, and will stand very great pressure or jarring. The government is supporting this Dunes Highway from a practical standpoint also. It wishes this road to be part of a plan to aid transportation, by building a road so very strong that heavy loads can be hauled between Detroit and 178 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES Chicago. That is its chief aim in building the Dunes Highway. By combining that with the aim of Indiana people to have a splendid road that will skirt the beautiful Dune country, both aims can be utilized. The road is twenty-five miles long, twenty feet wide, and is covered with concrete eight inches thick, put on a very solid foundation, and with a very rough hard surface, to prevent skidding and breaking. Sec- dion one from Michigan City to Baileytown, and the higher parts of section two, are reenforced with five one inch thick iron rods, placed lengthwise, and braced with cross-pieces. The road through the swamp is made unusually strong, and is not yet completed. The parts completed have the sand compressed to sandstone; iron bars are placed across every three inches for reenforcement, and are bolted to- gether. The sides, especially where the road is five or six feet above the swamp, are reenforced with iron bars, all fastened together. Mr. Moe, the Gary contractor, who has this section, says it is the most remarkable highway ever built in this country, and that engineers from all over the country are studying it. There is to be a five-foot path along the sides of this whole road. This Gary-Baileytown section is to be finished before the summer of 1923. This beautiful Dune region of Indiana is supplemented just across the state line by the beautiful Forest Preserves of Cook County, Illinois. Fine concrete and macadamized roads connect both the Indiana and Illinois beauty spots, so that the residents of both states have a splendid oppor- tunity to admire the beautiful scenery of the adjoining territory. Chicago has long felt the need of more park space. She DUNES NATIONAL PARK 179 has one of the best park systems in the world, but the teem- ing population of her great city needs more open space in which to enjoy nature. The Valparaiso Moraine and the Glenwood, Calumet and Tolleston Beaches—the Duneland of old Lake Chicago—that curve through this region, con- tain many most beautiful spots of hill and dale, lake and river, woods and swamps. The Forest Preserve Commission of Cook County has been able to purchase about twenty-five thousand acres of the most picturesque parts of Illinois for the pleasure of the people. They range from the beautiful Turnbull Woods at the northern part of the county, to the very picturesque hilly and thickly-forested sections on the Thorn Creek sections bordering Indiana at Chicago Heights, Glenwood and Thornton, and are connected with the Indiana Dune region by numerous fine roads. Honorable Peter Reinberg, recently deceased, the broad- minded, genial President of the Forest Preserve Commis- sion of Cook County, was as determined to give Cook County the finest system of Forest Preserves of any county in the United States as Honorable Charles A. Wacker, the enthusiastic, energetic President of the “Chicago Beautiful” Commission, is to make Chicago the most beautiful city in the world! Both of these aims are very likely to be realized, as the natural features are present here, and Chicago’s modest motto, “I Will,’ points the way toward achievements and her great public spirit will provide the means. The people of Chicago are doing all in their power to enable Mr. Wacker to carry out his “heart’s desire.” Many of the most interesting and picturesque spots in 180 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES the country are found in these different parks or preserves. They were among the chosen spots of the Indians of the Chicago Dune region, and many of their villages were lo- cated there. Relics of them are abundant, and traditions concerning them are legion. The Thornton region, which General Hull gives as the main Pottawottomie town of the Chicago Dune region, is replete with Indian relics, and steeped in Indian lore. A visit to this park by the author, as guest of the Thornton and Glenwood historian, Mr. Andrew Diekman, is remem- bered with the keenest pleasure, as Mr. Diekman and the author went over the ground carefully, locating Indien vil- lages, Indian trails, pioneer roads, etc. It is strongly to be hoped that these beauty spots and historical places throughout the country be preserved for our children, so that they can enjoy some nature “‘in the wild” as did our pioneer forefathers. They should know and cherish the wild flowers that beautify the landscapes with their dainty forms and colors, and prevent such desecration as harasses that most popular person of the Dunes, Mrs. M. F. Green, of Tremont, when bands of lovely, enthusiastic young girls from Chicago and other cities pillage her straw- berry beds, gathering hundreds of “such fine white violets,” and break off many peach twigs, laden with hundreds of peach blossoms, praising them as “fine wild flowers.” Large, wild, public parks will correct this ignorance; and of them all, none will be of greater service to the nation than a large Duneland Park. PART TWO aHRE WONDERS OF THE DUNES CHAPTER XV THE BEAUTIES OF THE DUNES From the dawn of history the Dune region of Lake Michigan has been one of the centers of interest to the peoples who inhabited America. Its commanding position at the southern shores of Lake Michigan, the center where the trails from the North and South crossed those from the East and the West, where the rivers from Lake Michi- gan are connected by short portages with the Kankakee and the Desplaines, gave it a preeminence that made it a well- known center over all the continent. In addition to its geographical position, the Dune region for centuries has exercised a charm peculiarly its own, that is now being appreciated by people from all over the world. The great sand-ridges, crowned in many cases with living green; the magnificent view of Lake Michigan, stretching northward for over three hundred miles, beautiful in all her moods, whether beaming like a sunny, shimmering mirror, reflecting the azure sky, decorated with drifting bands of fleecy cloud, or agitated by a mighty storm, cast- ing its spray far up on the sandy beach, and baptizing the great dunes themselves; the deep picturesque glens, and low woodlands with their wealth of trees, vines and flowers in almost tropical luxuriance, are all enchanting. 183 184 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES The winding rivers and creeks that pierce the encircling dunes, carrying their toll of glistening sand to the lake; the shallow lakes and great grassy marshes, dotted here and there with lilies, bulrushes and pondweed and harboring thousands of fish and water fowls; all these in their myriad forms present vistas that are beautiful, wonderful and alluring. They reveal continually something new and strik- ing, and compel one to come again for rest and exploration. One who has never seen the Dunes has no conception of their beauty. He thinks of them as mere sand-hills, of bare glistening sand—a veritable Sahara. If he skirts the Dunes in a train or auto, he can see not only the great dunes of elistening sand but also the belts of forest, trees and other vegetation, with the sides bordered by marshes. If his curiosity is sufficiently aroused to take a trip through the Dunes, he will find himself in a new world. The many enchanting views spreading before him; the old, stately trees and beautiful flowers found everywhere; the Indian trails winding over the hills and through bosky glens and dense jungles; the old post road from Detroit and Michigan City that followed the beach from Michigan City to Polk’s Slide near Tremont, thence winding through Dune Park, or Miller, then back to the beach again, along which the road ran to Chicago—all these are beautiful and interesting. After a trip of this kind, one comes home invigorated— physically, mentally and spiritually—for everything in the depths of the Dunes is so charming with its combination of lakes and dunes, forests and flowers that one can appre- ciate the reverent feeling that inspired Linnzus, the cele- brated Swedish botanist, who when he first visited Germany THE BEAUTIES OF THE DUNES 185 and saw the moors of that country covered with the flowers of the heath, knelt down and thanked God that He had decorated those rough and desolate moors with such a beautiful carpet. The visitor should take a good field-glass and climb to the top of one of the dunes—Mount Tom, at Tremont, for example, two hundred feet high—and view the surrounding country. He can see that the prevalent idea that the Dune country is an arid waste is all wrong. People hear of the shifting dunes covering forests; they see pictures of dunes gradually disappearing, but they do not see nor hear much of the rank and luxuriant vegetation that covers the greater part of the Dune region. They do not know that the Dunes were originally covered with giant pines which were still in existence when the white people came in the early days, and when these pines disap- peared, mainly from the lumbering in the first half of the past century, other trees, principally the oak, sprang up in _ their places. The Dunes, disturbed by the fall of these trees, began in places of great disturbance to crumble, and under the in- fluence of the wind, to drift and eventually form great mov- ing dunes which cover forests and marshes. This can be easily seen from the summit of Mount Tom, or its neigh- boring dunes, Mount Holden, which is about one hundred ninety feet high, and Mount Green, one hundred eighty-five feet, and also from Mount Tim and Mount Leman at Min- eral Springs, and others at Dune Park and Miller. To the north is Lake Michigan, the Lac Illinois of Father Marquette; the Mitchigamie or Big Water of the Indians, with its invigorating breezes brought down from the north, 186 THE WONDERS OF "THE DUNES carrying its ozone-laden fragrance with it. Over three hun- dred miles of cool, fresh water on which the breezes in their flight generate such an enormous amount of electricity that it combines with the oxygen of the air and forms ozone-o— a sour-smelling gas or concentrated oxygen, perceptible when lightning strikes near one. This ozone when mixed with the air is so bracing that it impels one to expand his chest, throw back his shoulders and take in all the air that his lungs can hold, until he feels a glow throughout his body and his brain becomes as clear as a bell. All fatigue is gone and one is possessed with a feeling of radiant health. This is also the effect produced upon one by the ozonic air of the seashore or mountain top; but it is not necessary to go to these far-off places for health and recreation, for the same combination of scenery, seashore, hill climbing and ozonic air is found here in the Dune region. Doctor Stillman E. Bailey recommends the Dunes greatly for nervous troubles. That is the reason that a large part of this region should be set aside by the United States government, or the State of Indiana, as a park for the benefit of the large number of people who would be benefited by its use as a recreative, health-giving, historic center. It would be a Mecca for five million people, and should be purchased by the govern- ment or the state. A view from Mount Tom reveals the lake to the north; a black smudge on the horizon shows the passage of a steamer, bound for Chicago. A glimmer of white reveals a dainty yacht out for a pleasure cruise. Along the shore, trim canoes are skimming the waves as they dart along, paddled by athletic youths. The bathing beaches at Miller, Waverly THE BEAUTIES OF THE DUNES 187 Beach, Michigan City and Sheridan Beach section are crowded by thousands of people who have forsaken the city to frolic in the bracing water of Lake Michigan. To the east of Mount Tom lies the Beach House of the Prairie Club, surrounded in summer by a colony of tents and cottages, belonging to the members of the club. To the northeast, about nine miles away, where Trail Creek winds its way between the lofty sand-dunes, can be seen the smoke from the factories of Michigan City, that thriving com- munity that represents the eastern edge of the Chicago region. : To the south, ridges of dunes encircle the shores of Lake Michigan; some covered with verdure, others glistening with their wealth of coral-like sand on its victorious march against the forests, glens and swamps. Three or four main ridges are supplemented by a number of short ones, filled with trees, vines and flowers. Far to the south appear the great swamps, heavily bor- dered with trees on the dune side. On the south side of the swamps are the old ridges of the Tolleston Beach that was thrown up by old Lake Chicago, in ancient, post-glacial days. The elevated ridge or beach, at the foot of which the old Chicago Road runs from Michigan City to Culver’s Point on the Calumet River near Dune Park, and on part of which the South Shore Electric has its road-bed, is the old Calumet Beach thrown up by the waters of Lake Chi- cago in ancient days. Opposite Dune Park, the Calumet Beach, combined with the Glenwood Beach, is found south of the Little Calumet, and is plainly seen at South Gary or Glen Park, as the Ridge Road is built on the old Calumet Ridge or Beach. 188 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES Farther to the southwest is seen the old Glenwood Beach, which separates from the Calumet Beach near Furnessville, and on which the Michigan Central Railroad pursues its way to Michigan City. From the west a large steam freighter approaches, as if on its way to Michigan City. When near Waverly Beach it suddenly turns and steams toward the shore as if it would fain climb the dunes. Just before it reaches the shore, it stops and remains there for a long time, apparently busy at something. It is a giant sand-sucker, getting sand from the bottom of the lake near Waverly Beach for use in con- structing the great Field Columbian Museum at Grant Park, Chicago. This sand speculation is the true basis of the report that a wealthy contractor had bought Mount Tom and was going to sell it for its sand. One report had it that the Indiana Southern Railroad at Dune Park intended to extend its line to Michigan City; another stated that Dune Creek, the old Fort Creek, was going to be dredged out at Waverly Beach so that vessels could come into the creek and receive sand by way of a short railway that was to extend from Mount Tom to Waverly Beach. This report aroused much indignation over the whole country and swelled the popular sentiment toward making a National Park of the Dune region, thus contributing greatly to the slogan, “Save the Dunes.” : Mr. A. F. Knotts, the builder of the Calumet region of Indiana, who bought up Gary for the Illinois Steel Company and who as mayor of Hammond located many industrial plants there, as well as in other sections of the Calumet region, states that the foundation of this story is that THE BEAUTIES OF THE DUNES 189 he was asked whether sand was available from the Dune region for the Field Museum. He told the inquirer that he could have all the sand he wanted, if he would take it from the lake in front of Mr. Knotts’ property near Mount Tom. This the contractor agreed to do. Mr. Knotts told this story to a group of us at Waverly Beach as we watched the great sand-sucker at work only two blocks away, in front of the Jens Jensen Blowout where the Dunes Pageant was staged later. To the east and to the west of Mount Tom, a splendid view opens of the long stretch of dunes that border the southern shore of Lake Michigan for more than twenty-five miles, with their varied and beautiful hills and ridges, cov- ered with highly interesting vegetation. The Beach House of the Prairie Club is but a half-mile east of Mount Tom, at Tremont. Waverly Beach is but a quarter-mile west of it at the mouth of Fort Creek. About six miles to the west of Dune Park, the eastern part of which is still beautiful, is Miller, with its fine beach, scenery and recreation facilities, making it one of the famous places in the Dunes. It has been annexed by Gary, which has a beautiful park and beach here. Four miles west of Miller is Gary, the Steel City of the West and the home of the United States Steel Corporation. This betrays its presence from afar by great columns of smoke and flame that pierce the sky from its many mills which support the people of the city. If one wishes solitude, the Dunes is the place. One can find it from any of the stations that dot the South Shore Electric, by walking northward through the Dunes a mile or more to Lake Michigan. One of the most fascinating 190 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES walks is along the lake shore for miles, with a stiff breeze blowing off the lake, churning the waters into spray as they strike the shallows and come thundering up the beach. CHAPTER XVI GEOGRAPHY AFTER one has visited the Dunes a few times and has discovered some of their beauties and attractions, he is anxious to know more about them: their origin and extent; their plants, birds and animals; the history of the region; the old Indian trails; pioneer routes and post roads; old forts, expeditions and battles of the Northwest. The Dune region in its present entirety embraces the southern shores of Lake Michigan that are covered with sand-ridges or dunes and extends from Chicago beyond Saugatuck, Michigan. This sand has been deposited mainly on the southwestern, southern and southeastern shores, as Lake Michigan has a current that flows south along the Wisconsin coast, following the Illinois, Indiana and Michi- gan coasts, and passing through Mackinaw Strait into Lake Huron. This current has washed away most of the sand- dunes formerly deposited north of Chicago. Some of the sand is blown into the lake, to be cast up again by the waves. The observer can see the waves leave a faint line of sand on the beach, showing where the crest of the wave has reached; sometimes the waves will leave a wider ribbon, of quaint arabesque design. It is a pleasure to tramp along the shore of the lake for five or ten miles, IQI 192 THE WONDERS OF THE: DUNES studying these beautiful combinations, and watching the myriad forms of the waves and breakers as they come thundering in, throwing up the spray as they strike the shallows, and, dashing up the beach, leave their freight of sand as a memento of their visit. In the great storm of November, 1917, with the wind blowing eighty miles an hour, the waves were driven inland with such force that the sand-ridges were washed away for one hundred feet from the lake line. The waves cut away the lake dunes so severely that for many miles it looked as if they had been cut down by soldiers to form a gigantic trench, as the sides of the trench were from three to ten feet high, with perfectly straight walls and level floors. The highest places were near the Furnessville Blowout, about two miles east of Tremont and at the beach near Mount Tom. It was a remarkable sight, as many relics of former beach levels, such as stones, shells, pieces of wood, etc., could be seen embedded at varying altitudes in the walls of the trench. The sand absorbed by the lake is soon deposited again on the shore, and is blown inland by the winds from the north and west, forming encircling ridges of sand, which, with valleys and meshes, constitute the Dunes. Those covered with vegetation, holding the sand and giving the Dunes a more or less permanent character, are called fixed or dead dunes. According to its plant growth, this seems to be a misnomer, but it is accurate from a geologic standpoint, as the dune or hill does not move. The shifting dune, with its material of moving sand, is called a live or shifting dune, because it, as a dune, is mov- ing, although there is not a living plant upon it. These LAOMOTY TWIdAT V GEOGRAPHY 193 terms excite wonderment, and even protest, from many people, who insist that the dune covered with vegetation 1s the living dune, and the shifting dune, devoid of vegetation, is the dead dune. Back of the Lake Michigan dunes from one to ten miles are various high ridges or beaches of sand that were for- merly great dunes and ridges, cast up on the shores of Lake Chicago. These beaches extend from Green Bay in Wisconsin, along the shores of Lake Michigan to Southern Michigan, following the coast line of the old Valparaiso Moraine, which was deposited by the Michigan Lobe of the Second Great Glacier at its southern terminus. From a cause not fully understood, Canada and the northern part of the United States were covered with a vast continental ice sheet, the First Great Glacier, hundreds of feet thick. Some authorities think that this glacial con- dition was caused by the elevation of the land in Upper Canada. Others think it was due to a change of the axis of the earth, or possibly to a change in the orbit, or a com- bination of both, causing more snow to fall in winter than could be melted in summer. Possibly all three causes may have helped produce and maintain this glacial condition. The weight of the ice, plus the very frigid temperature, undoubtedly had great influence in cooling off the whole northern hemisphere, causing pow- erful contraction there; opening old lines of fracture and breaking out in new ones; forming volcanoes that threw out masses of lava, whose intense heat melted and vaporized immense fields of ice and snow. This vapor, drifting away from the heat, became condensed from the intense cold, and was again deposited in the form of snow, to be gradually 194 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES compressed into ice by its continual accumulation and motion. The temperature in the northern hemisphere changed greatly at that time. Before the glacial period, the tempera- ture of Alaska, Northern Canada, Greenland, Northern Europe and Siberia was much warmer than at present, the coal-fields found there showing that a luxuriant vegetation, including even palms, flourished in those Arctic regions, together with wild animals as large as or even larger than those of to-day. This great Continental Ice Sheet had two main centers of glaciation, the Labrador and the Keewatin. The Labra- dor Glacier had its center in Labrador, and the ice from this central point moved in concentric lines from there in all directions, reaching down to the latitude of central Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, and leaving at its foot a gigantic ridge of dirt and stone called the terminal moraine of that glacier. The Keewatin Glacier, or ice sheet, had its center just west of Hudson Bay, and extended west to the Rockies, north to the Arctic, and south to part of the United States, extending in an irregular line from Missouri northwest to Canada. The Missouri River apparently follows the south side of this terminal moraine, just s the Ohio River follows south of the terminal moraine of the Labrador Glacier. These glaciers were not independent, as they were more or less united; but the moving force of one came from the northeast, as shown by the markings of the rocks, while that of the other came from the northwest. Many of the markings show that this ice came also from the north as the scratches or strie are north and south. This ice sheet moved down from the Canadian highlands GEOGRAPHY 195 like a gigantic, irregular snow plow, pushing everything movable before it,—forests, soil, rocks; and even planing off tops and sides of mountains, scraping off everything— coal beds, shales and limestones—until it reached the bare solid rock. This enormous mass of material was carried or pushed along the glacier and most of it deposited at its foot. Much of it was frozen in the ice and served as tools with which to tear away rocks, cut them and with the assistance of the sand, soft soil and the ice itself, to polish them. Many stones have been found that are cut and polished as if by an expert stone-cutter. A striking example of this in our own region was seen many years ago at Stony Island, Chicago, a mile west of South Chicago, by the author, in company with Reverend D. S. McCaslin, of Pullman. We had taken many trips together to different places, and were making a detailed study of Stony Island, which must have been much higher before the glacier came and forced off its peak. It was at that time used as a stone quarry, two of them being in operation, one to the north, now filled by springs, and another, which is dry, at the south. We were watching the workmen stripping off the soil, which was over a foot deep near the north quarry, and were marveling at the fresh- ness and polish of the uncovered hard Niagara limestone, when Doctor McCaslin called attention to a deep scratch in the rock, running from the northeast to the southwest. We followed it for some rods, when Doctor McCaslin showed the chisel that had cut this deep scratch, and which he had found the day before. It was a sharp piece of granite that had been pushed along by the glacier, and being 196 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES harder than the silicious limestone, had cut into it as it was pushed toward the southwest, and had been stopped when brought up against a very flinty piece of solid rock. The rock was so polished that it glistened. The underlying rock of the Chicago region extending to East Chicago, Indiana, is the Niagara limestone, which is hard and flinty, deposited in the ancient Paleozoic Sea, and filled with corals, crinoids and shells, both large and in- numerable microscopic ones, that lived in the shallow sea that covered this section of America. Stony Island is espe- cially rich in fossils of that period, but its limestone is very hard and tough, owing to the partial crystallization, caused by local disturbances which seem to have raised and bent it to a pitch of thirty-five degrees. Some of these quarries that are interesting and well worth visiting are at Stony Island, Cheltenham Beach, Thornton, Blue Island, Lemont, Elmhurst, Lyons, Hawthorne and Bridgeport. The Niagara surface rock extends to the west- ern part of Lake County, Indiana. It then sinks down, east of East Chicago, and from there to South Bend is covered over by the black Genesee shale of the Devonian Age, which becomes grayish when exposed to the air. As the Silurian Age, which formerly included the Ordi- vician, of which the Niagara period is a part, is called the Age of Shells or Mollusks, so the Devonian Age is called the Age of Fishes. Doctor Stuart Weller, of the Chicago Academy of Sciences, has found remnants of a formation of the Devonian Age at the quarry a mile west of Elmhurst, showing that beds of the Devonian Age once overlay the Niagara limestone in this region, but it was scraped off by | the glaciers, ground to powder and furnished most of the GEOGRAPHY 197 clay that formed the Valparaiso Moraine and covered the rocks. “Whatever its nature, the rock formation immediately underlying the drift was at one time laid down as sedi- mentary rock in the bottom of the shallow sea, and ages ago was raised into dry land. The black Genessee shale, which during a very long period formed the surface over the greater part of this region, was soft, composed mainly of sand and alumina cemented together by iron sulphide, and thoroughly saturated by bitumens. These bitumens doubt- less owe their presence in the shale to the slow decomposi- tion of a vast number of marine plants and animals which were deposited with the sand and iron sulphide in the old Devonian sea. “Once so deposited, organisms did not decay, as do ani- mals on land, since by the waters above and the mud and ooze about them they were shut off from the free oxygen of the air, which is the principal agent in decay. They underwent instead a process of slow decomposition, the products or residue of which are known as bitumens. These bitumens, in turn, saturated the surrounding sediment and gave it its distinctive black color, which on exposure to the air becomes a light gray or drab color.’ BLatcHLEY— Indiana Geological Report—189g7. The sand, which is merely fine quartz, undoubtedly acted as the grinding agent in erosion. As Doctor Newberry so graphically puts it, ““With its aid, the glacier became a sort of emery wheel.” The weight of a cubic foot of ice is about fifty pounds, so that where the ice was a thousand feet thick, and weighted with a vast amount of stones, clay, etc., the pressure of fifty thousand pounds or more to the square foot must have made its grinding action rapid and irresistible, 198 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES Some scratches in the hard Niagara limestone show that the glacier in the Chicago and Dune region moved mainly from northeast to southwest, though striz have been found on the outcrops almost east and west, and a few northwest to southwest. When the Drainage Canal was in process of construction, a certain section, much of which was underlaid with rock, was let for excavation. A certain price was to be paid for excavating the rock, which was thought to be solid. During excavation, the workers were surprised to find that the rock was made up of a large mass of rock layers that had been bodily transported there by the glaciers. Judging from the direction of the glaciers, it may have come from Stony Island. The force of nature, whether applied slowly or suddenly, that elevated this ridge, with its covering of Devonian shales and other strata, must have folded it over or lifted it up at this point and the mighty glaciers may have found it a comparatively easy matter to sweep away much of this elevated rocky inland, carry it along and scatter its material along the Valparaiso Moraine. As this was done by the Second Glacier, the mass may have been loosened by the First Great Glacier. If the rocky layers found in this section are of the same nature as those of Stony Island it would appear to prove that it had been moved from there to this spot. After this gradual disappearance of the Great Ice Sheet from the United States and lower Canada, followed by a long period of warmer temperature with Arctic vegetation, such as cedars, sphagnous moss, etc., glacial conditions again arose in Northern Canada, though apparently not so severe as in the great one. The moraines left by this second great invasion are deposited in concentric loops in which were GEOGRAPHY 199 formed the Great Lakes, and also along the northern part of the United States. These connected loops of glacial ice, as they gradually melted, deposited moraines of drift that mark the final southern boundaries of the Second Ice Sheet. The branch of this glacial sheet that covered the Chicago Dune region was called the Michigan Lobe, as it followed the course of Lake Michigan, excavating in the solid rock, making it longer, wider and deeper. The glaciers did not do all of the excavating of Lake Michigan and the Great Lakes, as these were undoubtedly depressions and water- ways many ages before the glacial period; but they were probably used as routes of travel by the glaciers, as they were low and offered less resistance, and so became enlarged by the grinding of the gravel and sand. This Michigan Lobe left a great mass of drift moraine, called the Val- paraiso Moraine, around Lake Michigan, some distance from the present lake shore. In the words of Doctor Chamberlain, “It may be likened in a general manner to an immense U embracing Lake Michigan between arms. ‘This gigantic loop is over two hundred miles in length and from ninety to one hundred and fifty miles in width. The parallelism of this moraine to the lake shore is one of the most striking features.” This parallelism is partly the case with the southern shore of the other Great Lakes. This moraine extends from Green Bay, where it connects with the Green Bay Moraine to the west, then goes southward around Lake Michigan and Northern Indiana, trending northeastward through part of Indiana and Michigan, where it connects with the Lake Huron Moraine. This belt of drift is located from the lake shore to twenty-five miles from the lake. 200 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES The mean altitude of Lake Michigan is 581.28 feet above mean tide at New York, and is generally estimated at 582 feet above sea level. The hills of the Valparaiso Moraine or Ridge in Illinois, Indiana and Michigan range from one hundred to three hundred feet above Lake Michigan. They are much higher than those in Wisconsin, where the Valpa- raiso Moraine is generally spoken of as the County Ridge, some of the hills being from four hundred to seven hundred feet above the lake level, especially Mount Prospect, at Dundee, Fond du Lac County, which is over fifteen hundred feet above sea level. Forest Lake, near Campbellsport, is about twelve hundred feet above sea level, and is surrounded by high hills. Among the Illinois altitudes of places on the Valparaiso Moraine, are Riverside, 618 feet above sea level; LaGrange, 657 feet; Glencoe, 676 feet; Lake Forest, 705 feet; Bar- rington, 832 feet, and Summit, 888. Indiana cities have the following altitudes: Hammond, 598 feet; Highland, 617 feet; Hobart, 622 feet; Hessville, 623 feet; Miller, 625 feet; Dyer, 638 feet; Porter, 668 feet; Chesterton, 670 feet; Furnessville, 670 feet; Kouts, 678 feet; Crown Point, 714 feet, and Valparaiso, 820 feet. All of this clay deposit forming the Valparaiso Moraine, and the sand beaches and sand-dunes covering the clay, were deposited upon the solid rock, scraped clean by the glaciers. The Chicago Drainage Canal is cut through this moraine and the banks of clay on its sides are the drift deposits of the Michigan Lobe of the Second Great Glacier. As the glacier melted, it gradually disappeared in a northeasterly direction, toward its center at Labrador, leaving these de- posits of drift to enrich the soil, preparing it for the needs GEOGRAPHY ZOI of the coming race, as it contains all the elements needed for rich plant growth. As Doctor Blatchley expresses it: “These vast deposits of drift around Lake Michigan formed a natural barrier for the water that accumulated between the Valparaiso Moraine and the receding glacier, and formed a lake. The lowest point of this moraine hap- pened to be to the southwestward, near the present city of Chicago. At this point, a channel was eroded through the encircling moraine belt, and for a long period of many centuries, the waters of the glacial lake found their way to the DesPlaines River, and thence by the way of the Illinois to the Mississippi River. To this channel has been given the name Chicago Outlet and the lake which formed it is known in geological literature as Lake Chicago.” Lake Chicago, at the time of the greatest expansion, was much larger than the present Lake Michigan. It extended from ten to twenty miles on either side to the Valparaiso Moraine. The waters from Lake Chicago had their outlet via two routes, the Chicago-Desplaines Route, and the Calumet- Sag Route, uniting at the west end of Mount Desert Island, one hundred and forty feet high, to form a large Desplaines River, that carried the waters of glacial Lake Chicago to the Illinois, which was then wider than the Mississippi River. The limestone cliffs on the sides of the valley are from forty to sixty feet high and offer fine views of the surrounding country. The maps of the Chicago Outlet show the different stages of Lake Chicago history. There are several distinct stages in the history of Lake Chicago. During the first, or Glen- wood stage, its waters seem to have stood about sixty feet 202 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES above the level of the present Lake Michigan. All this time Glenwood Beach was forming on the shores of Lake Chi- cago, being deposited by waves and currents against the foot of the old Valparaiso Moraine, which constituted the shore line of Lake Chicago, exactly as is being done now by Lake Michigan in the Dune country, and was, in fact, the Lake Chicago Duneland of long ago. For some reason, probably a great recession of the ice dam to the north of Lake Chicago, accompanied by a lower- ing of elevation far to the northeast, and the cutting of an outlet in that direction, the waters of Lake Chicago ceased to flow through the Chicago Outlet. According to Doctor Blatchley, they withdrew wholly from the area which they covered and part of the present Lake Michigan is supposed to have been dry land. The excessive weight of the ice sheet in Canada must have exerted an enormous pressure on the crust of the earth and had some influence in reducing the elevation of the earth in that region. It is thought by some geologists that the subsidence at the northeastward was so marked that a large part of the St. Lawrence Basin was lowered below sea level, so that the ocean covered it, and that marine animals, such as the whale, sea-fish and mollusks inhabited those waters. Doctors Salisbury and Alden think that the upper Great Lakes were so lowered that they were covered by the ocean. Some of the plants found in the Dunes and on the beaches, such as the Beach Plum, Beach Pea, Sea Rocket, Seaside Spurge, Arrow Grass and possibly the Seaside Crowfoot, generally found in the vicinity of salt water, are thought GEOGRAPHY ; 203 to be survivors of the salt-water period. As these plants are found in a wide area, it does not necessarily speak of a marine occupation during the Calumet stage. But there have been salty springs in the Chicago and Calumet regions. Salt Creek, which empties into the Calu- met River near the old Corduroy Bridge at the foot of Chicago Road at Culver’s Point, opposite Dune Park, was probably so called on account of salty springs near there, though old settlers assert that a wagon with a load of salt was upset there. Winnemuc Swamp, between Auburn Park and South Chicago, had a salty crust in dry seasons. Mr. Green, of Tremont, states that when he was a boy, he often visited a salty pool of water about fifty feet across, situated in Hamilton’s low swampy woods, near Portchester Road, north of the South Shore Electric Line, near the Dunes. This pool was called Deer Lick, because it was a favorite place in early days for deer, who came there to lick the salt found around the shore. The water was, in some places, one to two feet deep, and came from a salty spring. A large bosky oak tree, near the shore, had slats nailed on it for the hunters to climb up into its branches and watch for the deer. During the long period when the waters of Lake Michigan used this outlet to the northeast, lowering its level to forty feet above the present Lake Michigan, a change occurred, caused either by the advance southward of the glaciers, or an elevation of the land to the north, or from both. This caused the waters of Lake Chicago to flow again southward through the Chicago Outlet into the Illinois. A new beach 204 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES was formed called the Calumet Beach, because it lies close to the Calumet River, and south of it for much of its course. Salisbury and Alden speak of marine life that is found at the farm of Mr. J. H. Welch, near Chicago Lawn, situated on the broad sand and gravel ridge of the Calumet Beach, thrown up at the period when Lake Chicago was about forty feet higher and larger than Lake Michigan. In Mr. Welch’s field have been found numerous shells and one specimen of coral. An examination of these specimens showed them without exception to be of marine species, whose present range is between Prince Edward Island, Canada, and the West Indies. They seem to have been deposited there by marine waters. The southern range of all of these species would preclude their introduction from the north or the northeast. The shells found by Doctors Bell and Ells in Canada, are all of Arctic species, while the Chicago Lawn shells are of West Indian species. Similar shells have been dug up at New Buffalo, Michigan. If these shells are evidence of an incursion of the sea, their occurrence, as far as known being on the Calumet Beach only, would indicate this stage, or part of it, as the time of incursion. The southern range at the present day of all these species would indicate that the incursion was not from the northeast through the St. Lawrence, but from the south, through a Mississippi inlet. The Calumet Beach is distinguished very clearly in Indiana, as the Calumet River winds along for miles at the foot of it. It seems to unite with the Glenwood Beach, near Ross and continues so almost to Tremont, there sepa- GEOGRAPHY 208 rating from the Glenwood Beach until it again joins it at Michigan City. The Calumet Beach extends from Chicago Lawn south- east to Blue Island Ridge, and passes through Washington Heights to the Calumet River, then northeast through Lans- ing and Highland and joins the Glenwood east of Ross to Crissman. These sand-ridges appear again east of Dune Park on the north side of the Calumet River, which worked its way through the Calumet Beach at the old long Bridge at Culver’s Point; the Glenwood and the Calumet Beaches unite here. Glenwood Beach trends to the east at Furnessville and then northeast, and has the Michigan Central Railroad located upon it. Calumet Beach is a half-mile north of it, and has the old Detroit and Chicago Road and also the South Shore Electric located ‘upon it there. It is about fifteen to twenty-five feet above the surrounding plan. Most of Michigan City is located on Calumet Beach. A fine view of Calumet Ridge is from the bridge over Little Calumet River to South Gary, from which point Calumet Beach can be seen for miles. At its foot is the Calumet Marsh, through which the Little Calumet meanders on its sluggish way to Blue Island. There it is obliged to make a turn to the north, owing to the Calumet Ridge, and to the east of it follows the lowest level, which happens ~ to be north of Tolleston Beach. This Calumet Beach stage of Lake Chicago must have lasted for a long period, as shown by the great beach deposited by it. It was followed by a lowering of the lake to about twenty feet above the present level of Lake Michi- gan and may have been caused by ‘the reopening of the 206 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES northward outlet. During this period, a third beach called the Tolleston Beach, was thrown up along the shores of Lake Chicago, and is so named from the Village of Tolles- ton, Indiana, that is situated upon it. This beach has been traced north of Milwaukee along the eastern coast of Wisconsin, in places, but has been wiped out by the lake from Milwaukee to Kenosha. From Kenosha to Waukegan it is prominent, and is followed by the Chicago and Northwestern Railroad. It reappears at Evanston, and goes through Rose Hill Cemetery to Lincoln Park. It swings to the southwest, and curves to the north- east past Auburn Park, South Englewood and Burnside. It reappears at Michigan Avenue and Ninety-ninth Street and continues along Michigan Avenue, through Rose- land and Kensington to One Hundred Twenty-seventh Street, or [lini Trail, where it curves to the southeast, and crossing the Calumet River, passes easterly through River- dale and Dolton, entering Indiana south of Hammond. It was often called the Holland Ridge after the old town of Roseland that was settled in 1849 at Michigan Avenue and One Hundred Eleventh Street by the Hollanders, and ex- tended north to Ninety-ninth Street. Going eastward it passes through Hessville, Tolleston, Gary and Miller in a line between the Little and Grand Calumet Rivers. East of Miller it curves slightly to the northward and in Porter County is about a mile from the lake shore, and is partly covered with dunes. West of Gary a series of low ridges appear which lie parallel to Tolleston Beach and cover the territory between it and the lake. They rise but five to twenty feet above the level of Lake Michigan and are five to twenty rods GEOGRAPHY 207 in width, with narrow swamps between, most of which become dry in summer. Leverett has counted thirty-two of them on a line running north from Hessville. The writer has counted nearly as many north from Clark and Pine. This peculiarly intricate arrangement of hills, ridges, sloughs and swamps, covered with pines and other under- growth, was formed after the waters had ceased to flow through the Chicago Outlet, and was, therefore, thrown up by the waters of Lake Michigan rather than Lake Chicago. West of Hobart, Indiana, included in the territory covered by the old Lake Chicago, is a high ridge, Hobart Island. This is about four miles long and one mile wide. This was undoubtedly an island at that time, being composed of glacial drift, and is considerably higher than the sur- rounding country. It is about two miles south of South Gary, and is cut through by Gary’s principal street, Broad- way, which is there reduced to a good country road. The glacial drift of the Valparaiso Moraine in Wiscon- sin, Illinois, Indiana and Michigan, is composed of clay, sand, pebbles and boulders, in come cases stratified ; in others mixed together. Among these stones, which are also found in the Beaches and the Dunes, are many specimens of quartz in various colors of white, black, yellow, red, purple and pink; also specimens of flint, jasper, chalcedony and opal. Occasionally pieces of petrified wood are found, some dull, ranging from whitish to black; others, of various colors, bright and lustrous, showing the entire structure of the original wood, which has gradually disappeared and been replaced by tiny particles of silica or sand. Pieces of Huron conglomerate have been found that have been brought down from the original outcrop near 208 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES Lake Huron. This conglomerate is composed of white quartz, in which are embedded small pieces of bluish-red or purple jasper, from the size of an acorn to a walnut, and looks like a piece of rice pudding with big raisins in it. Mr. Ossian Guthrie, of Chicago, had one unusually fine specimen, found in Illinois. The rarest, most beautiful, and most valuable mineral found in the Valparaiso Moraine is the diamond; not that pretty crystal called the Alaska diamond, but the genuine diamond. The government report on the Mineral Resources on the United States, based on the National Census of Ig910, states that three hundred diamonds had been, up to that time, found in Wisconsin alone, the most valuable one being sold for twenty-six hundred dollars. The Chicago Academy of Sciences in its Bulletin of the Minerals of the Chicago Area, calls attention to the fact that the diamond is found in the Chicago region; the nearest one being found at Kohlsville, Wisconsin. They have been found in Minnesota also, and a number have been found in Canada. The Canadian government has instructed its Geologic Survey to give careful attention to finding the mother lode, some extinct volcano, of these diamonds, which were brought from Canada by the glaciers and scat- tered along the road. They may be found anywhere along the line from Canada, through Wisconsin, Illinois, Indiana and Michigan. A few years ago a man created great excitement in Montreal by declaring he had found this mother lode, and had brought along about two thousand fine stones to prove it. They were tested by jewelers of Montreal and found GEOGRAPHY 209 to be quartz crystals of unusually fine water, but not gen- uine diamonds. The American “King Solomon’s Mines” have not yet been discovered, though the one in Arkansas, said by Tiffany to be genuine, is furnishing some diamonds. The extinct volcano in Kentucky, which much resembles Kimberly, may be something better than a mere likeness, when fully de- veloped. GCHAR TE RW VL) PLANTS ONE of the most striking features of the Dune re- gion is its flora, due to the diversified nature of the region. The wealth of plant life found here, unlike any- thing found in other dune regions, which are generally almost devoid of vegetation, attracts botanists and nature lovers from all over the world. The whole country was amazed several years ago when Doctor Henry C. Cowles, of the University of Chicago, told the Chicago reporters at the Convention of the International Association of Botanists, that scientists from Europe declared that the Dunes of Lake Michigan, owing to their beauty and geo- logic and botanic interest, were among the wonders of America, being outclassed only by the Grand Canyon of the Colorado, Yellowstone Park and the Yosemite Valley. Doctor Henry C. Cowles has made an exhaustive study of the flora of the Chicago Dune region, extending from Waukegan to Michigan City, and his book, The Plant Societies of Chicago and Vicinity, is extremely interesting and instructive. It is in the form of a bulletin issued by the Chicago Geographical Society and is well illustrated. Doctor Coulter, in his book, Plant Relations, finds the Dunes especially fitted for the study of plant structures and variations. 210 PLANTS ; 211 Another book, issued in 1891 by the Chicago Academy of Sciences, and now out of print, is called The Flora of Cook County, Illinois, and Part of Lake County, Indiana. It was edited by Doctor William K. Higley and Charles Raddin, assisted by several local botanists, including the author. A revised list of the flora of the Chicago Dune region from Waukegan to Michigan City is being prepared by Doctor Herman Pepoon, of the Lake View High School, Chicago, and president of the Chicago Nature Club. The most majestic of all plants found in the Dunes is the giant White Pine. Some are found on the high sandy dunes and others at their bases; in the wooded glens or at the foot of the dunes, bordering the swamps. The original trees covering the dunes were pines. Mr. James L. Mona- han, the Father of the Dunes, who settled at Rolling Prairie, near Michigan City, in 1835, and has lived in that region since that time, states that when he came here the dunes along Lake Michigan were almost entirely covered with white pine, which was the strongly dominant tree. In places where a pine had fallen it was generally replaced by an oak, which seems to follow the pine. Close observers declare that birds, especially the crow, bring acorns into the pine regions. These lie dormant, buried in the shadow of the pines, until a tree falls, giving sufficient sunlight for the oak to thrive. Doctor E. J. Hill, who assisted Doctor Higley in the preparation of The Flora of Cook County and the Dunes, states that the region around Pine, north of Clarke, had the greatest variety of rare flowers found in the Chicago Dune region. In our work together, we discovered plants new to the Dune flora and one, a thistle, new to science; 212 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES it was named Cunicus hillit, for Doctor Hill. It is now called Carduus hill. Most of these have disappeared through the incoming of industrial plants and railroads, but enough are left to show what the original flora must have been. The fields for the botanist and nature lover lie more to the east; at Miller, Liverpool, Long Lake, Dune Park, Mineral Springs, Tremont, Furnessville and Tamarack. Thousands of people visit the places, and many pluck the beautiful and rare flowers that grow on the hills or in the swamps. This aids in the destruction of the flora, many flowers being pulled up by the roots. This is bad enough; but it makes a nature lover indignant beyond meas- ure to see whole armfuls of beautiful flowers thrown away, to wither by the wayside. It is not harmful for a person to take a flower for study, or to draw, if it is a strange one; but to gather them by the armful is a crime, and should be punished severely. They look far more beautiful in their natural environment. Miller has recently been annexed to Gary, and a public tract of one hundred and thirty-two acres, including the closed mouth of the Calumet River, is being made into a public park. This is a wise and public-spirited move to conserve part of this beautiful spot and furnish a health- giving playground to the public. The northern slopes of the dune ridges seem to have thicker vegetation than the southern, owing to more shade and moisture. While the advancing dune covers one forest, as can be seen all along the southern part of the Dunes, other dead ones are uncovered, as the advancing sand sweeps onward. Such a resurrected forest can be seen at Furnessville Blow- PLANTS 213 out, which is often called “the Graveyard.”’ At Polk Slide, a half-mile east of Furnessville Blowout, a cluster of about fifteen fine white pines is enclosed by the advancing sand in a triangular field, and it is a question of only a few years when these pines, through which the old Detroit and Michi- gan Stage Road pursued its winding way, will be over- whelmed by the resistless advancing dunes. The glens and glades between the ridges are filled with rich vegetation. Here the oaks flourish, mainly the White and the Black Oak. The white oak is of great size and beauty, some with trunks nearly three feet in diameter, and with spreading, umbrageous crowns. A kingly tree. The Pin Oak is also found here, with its finely dissected leaves. Its wood is so straight and free from knots that for centuries it has been used as pins instead of iron nails. Other fine trees found in these valleys are the Tulip Tree, Beech and Poplar. Some of these great tulip trees are nearly one hundred feet high and over two feet thick. The Beech is found sparingly throughout the Dunes, except in the Tremont region, where there are a number. The ridge on which Farmer F. Johnson’s and Hauber’s houses are situated at Tremont was called Beech Ridge by the old pioneers, on account of the many fine beeches to be found upon it. It extended from Portchester Road to near Michigan City. This tree has from primeval times been considered immune from lightning, though it is occasionally struck. It is sometimes called the Lightning Tree because some trees with their crooked, whitish branches resemble lightning flashes. Most of the glens and valleys are comparatively narrow and surrounded by steep dunes, and where thus protected 214 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES from the northern blasts, are regular hotbeds of luxuriant vegetation, such as pines, oaks, junipers, bearberries, service berries, red dogwood, willows, sand cherries, sassafras, or ague tree. The White or American Elm is found here in large numbers, and is exceedingly beautiful with its tall trunk and curving crown. Of the Maples, the most beautiful are the Hard or Sugar Maple, and the Silver Maple. The hard maple prefers the glacial till, with its clay loam. The early settlers utilized a large tract of sugar maple which they called the Sugar Bush, situated between Long Lake and Lake Michigan, near Miller. The Hickory is sparingly found in the Dunes, and is generally the Shell or Shag-Bark Hickory. The Shell-Bark Hickory is more frequently found on glacial moraines, with their admixture of clay, sand and other materials, and is closely associated with the oaks, just as the maples and beeches are generally found together. These latter trees, according to Cowles, are the ultimate forest type and will eventually become the leading type around Chicago, as they can grow in a relatively light oak forest, whereas the oak can not thrive in the denser shade of the maple or beech. Oak forests have been seen with a pronounced undergrowth of beech. This was undoubtedly the case at Beech Ridge, Tremont, and has been observed also in Wisconsin and other states. The Birch family is typically represented by the Paper or Canoe Birch, used by the Indians for canoes. Its outer bark is white and the inner bark can be taken off in sheets. This is not true of the ordinary White Birch, of which only a few are found. [ew trees are as attractive as the paper PEANTS 21 qn birch, whose bark is used for many purposes; not only for canoes, but also for various utensils, ornamental articles, and correspondence. A postal on white birch bark from campers in the Great North Woods is considered “quite the thing.” The sweet Cherry Birch, of fragrant memory, with its tall slender form and delicate branches, reddish brown glistening color, and the aromatic bark and young twigs, is occasionally found in the Dune district by the visitors. The Sycamore, with its queer bark, breaking off into great scales, leaving whitish green blotches, and large angled leaves and button-ball seed-pods, is also found rather spar- ingly in the Dunes, and near streams where there is alluvial soil. They have been seen here in the early days as large as three or four feet in diameter and one hundred feet in height. The sycamore grows to be the largest deciduous shade-tree in America. At a contest recently given by the American Genetic Association, a sycamore, located at Worthington, Indiana, won the prize, being one hundred fifty feet tall, and forty-two feet and three inches in cir- cumference, or twelve feet ‘five and one-half inches in diameter. Of course, it is not so large as the great ever- green trees of California, that range from three hundred to nearly four hundred feet high, and from thirty to forty feet in diameter. The sycamore is now being planted in cities, as experience has shown that this specie may be able to withstand the smoke, dust and gases that soon poison our trees, though Jens Jensen says they can not stand city life. The shrubs and vines that flourish in the lower dunes and glades are very interesting. A shrub that attracts attention is the Witch Hazel. This is not a hazel, but 216 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES has leaves something like one. This plant has aroused the interest and wonder of mankind for many reasons, owing to its flowering in late autumn,. and closing up for the winter, ripening the seeds the next summer and then shooting them out for some distance, as from a pop-gun. _ The four yellow linear petals look like threads of gold, and their blooming when there is frost excites wonderment, and has given rise to many pretty stories of the fairies and their liking for this plant. They are very plentiful through- out this region. Some people call them ‘Monkey Faces” as their peculiar seed-pods resemble a face. They have also a dim resemblance to a witch’s face, with small pro- truding features, and a cowl, or hood, causing them to be still more witch-like. The Dogwoods form one of our finest families of showy vegetation. The most attractive of all is the Flowering Dogwood, with its flower-like bud scales, from two to four inches across, which separate into four white leaves. One most beautiful tree, thirty feet tall, with trunk over five inches in diameter at the base, was seen this spring. The entire crown was covered with a mass of flowers and leaf buds, like an immense bouquet. The Dwarf Cornel grows about a half-foot high, with a pretty little flower, resembling that of the flowering dog- wood. The other species of dogwood found there brighten the landscape and are useful in holding the sand in place. Especially is this true of the Red-Osier Dogwood, which is present in great numbers. It is considered one of the choic- est plants for group planting, spreading by prostrate or subterranean running shoots. It is also found along run- ning streams, and plant-bordered lakes and marshes. PLANTS 217 The ordinary Wild Plum is found in various places, especially on the banks of the streams. The fruit is red and delicious, furnishing a refreshing dessert to the hiker, as well as an additional fount of preserves to the thrifty housewife. It was one of the richest blessings to the pioneer woinen, coming next to the Crab-apple. The Wild Crab-Apple is found everywhere, especially in damp glades and along the river-banks and borders of swamps, where it is able to secure humus and moisture. This is a fragrant little tree when it blossoms, and generally grows in clusters. The trees present a charming picture, with their fragrant white peals, stained with pink. Their fruit makes a delicious jelly. A most beautiful tree in fall is the Pepperidge, or Sour Gum. It is a medium-sized to large tree, with limbs that come out at right angles, often drooping at the end. It has rough, dark-gray bark, and dark-green oval leaves. Hundreds of these can be seen near the foot-hills, bordering the swamps along the Lake Shore Electric, between Gary and Michigan City, on both sides of the tracks. As soon as frost comes, the pepperidge changes color before any of the other large trees, and turns scarlet, resembling a living flame. One tree may show all tints from green to bright scarlet, all changing to a vivid scarlet and crimson. Another interesting tree is the Papaw, a small, straggling sapling. This bears a fruit like a small banana, with sweet insipid taste, which exhales an odor similar to a banana, but more Overpowering. The Willows are interesting to study. They are abun- dant on the lake shore, in the Dune country, where their stout growth, deep roots, and tough nature help them to 218 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES thrive and hold the sands in position, much as the sand- cherries do. Some of these willows are about a foot high, while others, around the swamp, are much larger. There are many kinds. | There is a great variety of shrubs and vines in the glens, glades and forest trending away from the lake toward the south. The Sassafras, that grows from eighty to one hun- dred feet in height down south, with a diameter of from two to four feet, is here about the size of a sapling, and is an attractive little tree, with queer lobed leaves, brownish-green trunk, and bright green branches. Two in Fort Creek Valley are forty feet high, with trunks nearly eight inches thick at the base. Many different kinds of rose bushes gladden the sight. Here can be seen the Early Wild Rose, the earliest of roses, and the Small Wild Rose, found in moister places than the other. These roses are common, often growing in great clumps in different parts of the Dunes. The Chokeberry is a small bush that is found near the borders of swamps, and is often associated with Blueberries and Huckleberries, which are found in the Dunes in great quantities. The chokeberry is like a large black huckle- berry, and is often gathered by the tenderfoot, who con- siders the clusters of “giant huckleberries’’ a wonderful find; but a woeful disappointment greets him when he attempts to eat them. ‘The chokeberry hangs in tassels, and is very puckery, even more so than the huckleberry. The Poison Ivy, and its more poisonous relative, the Poison Sumach, are the Ishmaelites of the vegetable king- dom, always ready to strike. Their sap is poisonous, as it contains a very irritant acid, called Toxicodendric Acid, THe BeautTiruL CowLes TAMARACK SWAMP ‘ ° PLANTS 219 which raises a severe blister on whatever part of the flesh it touches. The more delicate the skin, the easier it is affected. Probably the simplest cure of poison ivy or poison sumach is Grindelia robusta or Gum Plant. It is almost a specific. A solution of this plant in proportion of one part of the solution, Grindelia robusta, to four parts of water, proved to be of the greatest value in curing and drying up the inflammation caused by the intensely blistering and irritating effect of the toxicodendric acid found in the poison ivy, Rhus Toxicodendron, or Poison Tree, as the name indicates. The name is now Rhus Radicans. This toxicodendric acid is found in the poison sumach, also called Swamp Sumach, Rhus Vernix, or Varnish Sumach, but it seems to be in a more concentrated form than in the poison ivy as it is more virulent than the latter. People who seem to be immune to poison ivy have been affected by poison sumach, which, however, has been also cured by Grindelia robusta. The poison sumach is often called Poison Dogwood. The best manner in which to apply the Grindelia robusta is to bathe the affected part with the solution of one to four as prepared by the druggist, which will allay the intol- erable itching, and wrap a thin bandage of cotton batting around the affected parts. This can be kept moist with the solution. If it is not convenient to do this, the bandage may be moistened or changed at morning, noon and night. The poison ivy is found in three forms, due to location and conditions: the low crawling form, the slender shrub and the climbing form, which is often taken for the Virginia Creeper or Woodbine, a cousin of the Boston Ivy. 2z0 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES The poison ivy in its crawling form sends out its roots horizontally in every direction, close to the surface. Shoots are sent up about every foot. These shoots, from six to ten inches high, divide into stalks with a compound leaf of three leaflets looking much like young box-elder leaves, squarish in shape toward the middle of the leaf, and slightly downy underneath. The flowers are borne in a plume or panicle of very small greenish-white flowers borne in the axils of the leaf. They have a bunch of whitish-gray dry berries that hang on the low stem all winter, and are much liked by the birds. These forms of poison ivy are still found at Wildwood, Chicago, on the Calumet River, though not so abundantly as twenty years ago. In a number of cases, the poison ivy vines were over two inches in diameter, and rose to the tops of the oak trees. Some of the branches given off by the poison ivy were from four to five feet long, almost hori- zontal, and one inch in diameter at the base. They were greenish from the oak sap, which they absorbed, resembling the branches of the black oak upon which they were grow- ing. The leaves were the typical three leaflets of the poison ivy, but very large, some being from six to ten inches long. This habit of growth in the oak tree has given the ivy growing in this manner the name of Poison Oak. The poison ivy leaves turn to a brilliant scarlet in the fall. Fall is also a dangerous time, though not as much so as in the summer, as the sap is not so much in evidence. People pluck the beautiful leaves and berries, and many cases of ivy poisoning occur in fall. Beware of these beau- tiful leaves and whitish, dry berries! Poison! The poison ivy grows high among the branches; so does PLANTS 221 the Virginia creeper; but, while the poison ivy climbs by little rootlets, the creeper generally uses tendrils that grasp twigs and bark and wind about them, and also uses flat disks or suckers that hold on to the tree. These tendrils and suckers often give way. That is the reason that the Virginia creeper often hangs for a long distance without support from the trunk of the trees, being anchored from tendril or branch fastened firmly above. The poison ivy is anchored fast to the tree by its myriads of rootlets, which in an old vine completely cover the main stems, even overlapping one another; a mass of pinkish rootlets when alive, but in dead vines black and fuzzy. The Virginia Creeper or Woodbine, has a digitate leaf, with five narrow, wavy, sharp-pointed leaflets. The flower cluster is a flat cluster of small greenish-white flowers. The fruit is a cluster of black berries, the size of. small peas, that look like very small grapes, to which they are related. The Poison Sumach is a shrub growing from ten to thirty feet high, found in swamps or on banks of low creeks and rivers. Like most of the sumachs, it has from seven to thirteen pinnate leaflets, that are entire and not serrate or cut along the edges like the Staghorn Sumach. This shrub, like the poison ivy, has a panicle, or plume, of greenish- white minute flowers, that hang from the axil of the leaves, and are succeeded by a large bunch of grayish-white small dry berries. The pollen is in one plant and the seeds in another plant. Some of these poison sumach shrubs have an immense number of these bunches of whitish berries on them. The swamps of the Dune country are full of them. This shrub has smooth branches, and looks much like the staghorn 222 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES sumach, with which it must not be confounded. The stag-- horn has flowers like a spear at the top of a branch, this spear becoming red in the fall. The Black Sumach is small and has a spear of seeds, like the staghorn. It has entire leaves and is harmless. The stems have wings between the leaflets. If people would learn to recognize poison ivy and poison sumach, much suffering would be avoided. The Hop Tree ranges from a shrub to a small tree twenty-five feet high. Its leaves, which are curiously veined, are compound, of three dark-green sessile leaflets. Its flowers are in clusters, green and minute. Its fruit is flat and circular winged, like large elm seeds, being one inch across. It is an odd-looking bush, used for planting in grounds, and is very showy. The Wild Grape covers trees and banks. It is very com- mon and yields incredible quantites of tart grapes, which are ideal for jellies. The Bittersweet, a twining vine, has clusters of orange berries, enclosing seeds covered with a fleshy scarlet pulp, which fills the seed-pod. The orange-colored pod bursts open and shows the brilliant scarlet pulp. It will remain in this condition for months. This plant is very common in certain parts of the Dunes, and colors the landscape. It is the most striking vine in the Dunes in fall. CHAPTER XVIII FLOWERS OF THE DUNES THE flowers of the Dunes are marvelous. As this region was the meeting-place of the nations going to the North and the South, the East and the West, so it has been the meeting-place of the plants from all sections of the country. The Bearberry, Reindeer Moss, Northern Willow and Trailing Arbutus from the North meet the Tulip Tree, Sassafras, Coffee-tree and Papaw from the South; the Beach Plum, Beach Pea, Saltwort and Sea-Crowfoot from the East, greet the Cactus and other plants from the West. The different flowers and plants, with their many colors and shapes lend beauty and enchantment to the Dunes. Winter has not departed before the sturdy, odoriferous Skunk Cabbage begins to wake, and pokes the tip of its purplish blanket through the ice and snow that cover it. It is generally seen around Washington’s Birthday, some- times before, and keeps on arriving until the middle of April. The great leaves begin to expand in April and in summer they are so large that it deserves the popular name given to it, swamp cabbage. Instead of having the two sets of floral envelopes that are called the calyx and corolla, it has but one. This is like that of its cousins, the Calla and Jack-in-the-Pulpit 223 224 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES —a heavy, blanket-like covering called a spathe—which is wrapped closely around it and gives it protection from both cold and injury. An added protection to the skunk cab- bage is the fetid odor, which serves a double purpose; the one, for increased warmth, the odoriferous particles being pungent and in rapid motion; the other, to attract insects by the carrion smell, thereby fertilizing the flowers more fully. After the plant thrusts its pointed flower through the snow or ice it so warms up the surrounding space that a clear spot is often left around the plant, such as is left around a tree in the snow when the sap begins working. Soon the plants appear. “The Pussy Willows break into bloom, some yellow, some reddish, in graceful catkins, and the bark is filled with profuse, starchy sap. The pollen from the stamen-tassels is either wafted by the wind, or carried by insects to the little seed tassels, which they fertilize. The white birches hang out their golden tassels, whose pollen ripens the small cones or catkins that are on another part of the same plant, like the alders, oak, walnut, and beech. Soon the other flowers begin to spring up and follow the skunk cabbage, willow and poplar. The sheltered dells, glens and glades burst into life and bloom; the borders of the swamps and banks of the creeks and lakes are alive with growing vegetation, soon to be crowned with flowers, some of which are exceedingly rare. The Hepatica blooms here in April, generally before the violet, covering the dunes in certain places as with a carpet. It is found on the lower dunes, the glades and the slides of the great dunes. When in bloom these plants brighten the landscape with pinkish-white blossoms of fine sepals FLOWERS OF THE DUNES 225 and low, silky three-lobed leaves that give them the name of Liver-Leaf. The dainty Anemone, or Windflower, that has a single flower of five pretty pinkish-white sepals, and the delicate Rue-Anemone, with its flowers of from five to ten white or pinkish sepals, with several blossoms on each little plant, add a charm to the landscape. One of the very earliest flowers, sometimes even earlier than the hepatica, is the violet. It is found in many varieties and beautiful in all. The most gorgeous one is the Bird- foot Violet, called by the country children the Pansy Violet. It prefers a sandy soil, and is common to the whole Chicago and Dune region. It reaches perfection in the Dunes, where thousands can be seen on one hill, or in many glades. The Conservatory, as Captain Charles Robinson calls it, located near Waverly Beach, Indiana, is on a side-hill trending to the southeast, and sometimes shows many of these flowers in bloom, making a rare and enchanting sight. The earliest, as a rule, is the modest Arrow-Leaf Violet, which generally blooms in April, and sometimes in a very warm marsh, That is followed by the common Blue Violet, which is larger both in plant and flower; sometimes becom- ing white-flowered. It sometimes blooms as early as the Arrow-Leaf Violet. That curious flower, the Jack-in-the-Pulpit, is found in moist ground in rich soil in April, both in woods and shaded swamps, throughout the whole Chicago Dune area and Calumet Rivers. It does not grow in the pure sand, but needs silt for its development, and is found at the Dunes in the near-by ground. The Dragon-tail Indian Turnip, is very odd and striking, its spathe being in the shape of a 226 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES very long bright-yellow tube, from three to six inches long.. It is not so common as the Jack-in-the-Pulpit. The Jack-in-the-Pulpit is a relative of the skunk cab- bage, and, like it, is wrapped in a colored blanket to keep it warm; it is also warmed by the very pungent sap that is found in its bulbous root. This plant is also called the Indian Turnip, as it is surrounded with a gaudy, purple-and- green covering like an Indian blanket. Its roots, like a small turnip, are also eaten by the Indians after the intensely pungent juice has been removed by drying or washing. It is one of the tests of bravery by the country boys to dare one another, and especially a city tenderfoot, to eat an Indian turnip. It is not poisonous; but oh! so hot! It is undoubtedly a custom derived from the sports of Indian boys years ago. In the Dunes, toward the eastern part, can be found that exceedingly rare and historic flower, the Trailing Arbutus; that charming flower that so cheered the Pilgrims at Ply- mouth, who called it the Mayflower, as it bloomed in that month, and resembled the blossom called Mayflower in England. It is a low, crawling evergreen vine, covered with reddish hair on the stem, with thick shiny leaves ranging in size from one to one and a half inches, and in shape from almost round to heart-shape. The flowers are rose- colored or almost white; spicy fragrant blooms, in small clusters, which are greatly esteemed. Something must be done to protect the arbutus. Every state should put it on a protected list. In the spring of 1918 a woman was seen with a large bouquet of them. She had tramped all around the Dunes to find them and instead of glorying in their dainty beauty, had picked all FLOWERS OF THE DUNES 227 she could find. There are but a few of those rare plants left, and they should be carefully cherished. In the hilly and wooded Dune region, near Liverpool, just southeast of Gary, along Deep River, is a region that should be full of bird life, but in which few are to be found. The silence in that land of great hills, woods and marshes was profound and startling, until Mr. Arthur Patterson, the game warden of East Gary, was appointed. He has lived in that vicinity for nearly fifty years, and is well acquainted with all kinds of wild life. He said that for years the foreigners of Gary, a few miles away, had come to this beautiful region, full of rare plant, bird and animal life, and had killed nearly everything that walked, flew or swam, but, he added, with a flash in his eye, ‘‘Not any more.”’ Another spring flower that is found here is the little Spring Beauty. This has a bulbous root, linear leaves and and white flowers, veined with deep pink. It is one of the earliest, coming out in April and is found everywhere in moist soil. The Dutchman’s Breeches, or Wild Bleeding Heart, with lace-like leaves and delicate spray of quaint white flowers, spread out like miniature wide bloomers, is one of the prettiest of spring flowers and blooms in April and May. It is sometimes tinged with pink and a few specimens have been found with pale blue flowers. The Phloxes or Sweet Williams, form another family, chief of which are the Blue or Wood Phlox, the Pink Phlox, and the Sand Phlox. The wood phlox has large bluish-lilac flowers, and when seen in the low woods by the thousands transforms the rough muddy woods into a 228 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES veritable flower garden. It blossoms in May and June. Its cousin, the Pink Prairie Phlox, is very abundant in the prairies, and sometimes covers them for blocks at a stretch. It is loved and admired by the children who call it the Wild Sweet William. It also grows in open woods. Of the orchids found in the United States, the most beautiful is the Showy Lady’s Slipper. It is a large plant with a leafy stem from one to three feet high, and the flower is large and fragrant. The inflated flower-lip re- sembles a small pink and crimson egg, and is about one and one-half inches long. The other petals and sepals are greenish-white with brownish streaks. It blooms in June and July. The other lady’s-slippers are the Large Yellow, the Small Yellow, the Small White, and the Pink, or Moccasin Flower. The Fringed Orchids have flowers, with strongly cut petals, arranged in spikes or racemes. The principal ones found in our region are the large Yellow Fringed Orchids, and the Ragged Fringed Orchids. In addition to these larger orchids, there are some exqui- site small ones found in bogs and marshes. The Calopogon, or Grass Pink is a very dainty pink flower; it flowers in a loose raceme of five to ten flowers at the top of a scape. The lip of this orchid is at the top. The plant has one long grass-like leaf, and blossoms in June and July. The Arethusa or Indian Pink has a single flower at the head of the scape. Both sepals and plants are alike, and are colored a deep pink. The lip hangs down, and is covered with three to five yellow-and-white-crests, with wavy spotted margin. The flower is larger and thicker than the grass pink, and blooms in May and June. FLOWERS OF THE DUNES 229 The Pogonia, or Snake Mouth, is a delicate little pink orchid, and is quite fragrant. The stem has one flower at its top, with petals and sepals much alike, with crested lip hanging down. A single leaf is midway on the flower stem, and a very small leaf like a bract is just under the flower. The Lady’s Tress, with its twisted white flowers and flower stalk is odd-looking, and is found from July to September. It attracts a great deal of attention. One of the most common and most beautiful flowers found in the Dune region in June and July is the Spider- wort, a cousin of the lily. It grows on a long, jointed, grass-like stem, in large clumps, and has bluish or lilac flowers at the top. The rounded stems are soft and full of very sticky sap, like mucilage. It has three colored petals, three sepals, six stamens and a three-celled pistil, or seed-pod. The flowers are so fragile that they wither a short time after the sun is strong in the heavens. They are called Widow’s Tears in some parts of New Jersey and New York, as they. dry up so soon. They sometimes have four petals, and the author, in 1875, took a four-petaled spiderwort from Pine, now part of Gary, and cultivated it until 1887. It developed in a most re- markable manner, producing flowers with two, three, four, five, six, seven and eight petals, on the one plant. This is wonderful, but the most wonderful part is the regular adaptation to type. All of these flowers had the same number of sepals as petals, double the number of stamens, and the same number of cells in the ovary or seed-pod. For instance, the seven-petaled flower had seven petals, seven sepals, fourteen stamens and a seven-celled 230 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES ovary. The seeds were fertile, and produced plants with flowers as diverse as their parents. The best plants and seeds were sent to Doctor Asa Gray, but died out. The others were accidentally destroyed. These plants were seen and examined by many people. About June 28, 1922, the author found a similar case at Tremont, in the Dunes. It was a spiderwort with five petals, five sepals, ten stamens and a five-celled ovary or seed-pod. A splendid specimen. The writer plucked the flower and studied it very carefully. The place was marked, and some weeks later it was again visited so as to dig up the plant for replanting and cultivating, but it had dis- appeared, and the soil also. These two are the only cases on record. Found only in the Dunes. While I had cultivated the first ones carefully, using much fertilizer, this one of 1922 had begun to “sport” in almost clear sand. Why? Saw a four-petaled one also, not perfect. The Pea Family, or Butterfly Flowers, are in great variety in Duneland. They are called butterfly flowers, because some of them have large colored petals, with wide shield, that look like the wings of a butterfly. Some of them are like the Partridge Pea, or American Sensitive Plant, which has flowers almost regular, like a small yellow rose. All of them have pods enclosing the seeds. The Lupine is the most common early flower in the Dunes, with its great masses of plants, sometimes covering acres. The flowers are purplish-blue, sometimes with white tips, and very rarely entirely white. In favorite glades, they may be seen by the thousands, with their spikes of bright FLOWERS OF THE DUNES 2a flowers about a foot high, looking like clusters of blue sweet-peas. It is the chief flower of the Dunes. A striking Duneland flower is the Prickly-Pear-Cactus, which is a genuine desert plant, growing best in pure sand. To insure life, it is so built that the stem is very thick, with hard bark or rind, and combines both stem and leaf. ‘This conserves moisture. For protection the cacti are orna- mented with spines, from tiny ones on the smaller plants, to large fish-hooks four inches long, or straight ones five _to six inches long on other kinds, that grow in deserts. The prickly-pear-cactus has a number of spines an inch or so long, and a large number of minute ones, even on the seed-pods. Beware of them! Burbank has bred a spineless cactus. This is a great help, but the cactus is not perfect yet. These flowers are two to three inches across; are sulphur color, with a reddish center. Sometimes there will be from ten to twenty flowers on the plant, and then it is a veritable floral treasure-house, with the light yellow flowers and collection of curious, flat, green leaves, of all kinds and shapes, and different shades of green. As the close, tough cuticle of the cactus checks evapora- tion, much of the water brought up by the very deep roots is stored up in the thick stem or leaves. Numerous lives have been saved in the deserts where the tall tree-cactus grows, as thirsty travelers succeeded in obtaining water from the base of the trees by piercing them near the soil, releasing the water held by the cactus stems. This practice was told them by the Indians, who have used it for ages. 232 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES Another very remarkable family of plants is the Com- posite, or Compound Flowers. While the orchids are noted as examples of the beauty, as well as the bizarre in plant life, the compound flowers are noted as examples of effi- ciency. All flowers are more or less efficient in their primal object of production of-seeds; and in some cases, especially with the orchids, this is achieved in very ingenious ways that are worth studying. The Composit, in addition to this, have developed wonderful efficiency in packing flow- ers, etc., into a small space. All of those compound flowers are crowded into a head that seems to be but one flower, but is really a whole bouquet of flowers; in some cases containing over two hundred little flowers or florets. Among the leading compound plants are the Bonesets, sacred to the pioneer housewife as a febrifuge, or fever killer. Who that has lived in the country, during the past generation, does not remember the virtues as well as the bitter taste of boneset tea! Of all the brews used by the pioneer mother, these two plants stand preeminent in her materia medica, boneset and sassafras, with wild cherry and poplar bark, etc., to aid. While the White Boneset, Eupatorium perfoliatum, is the one generally used, the Purple Boneset—Joe-Pye-Weed— Eupatorium. purpureum, seems to have been the favorite fever remedy of the Six Nations of New York. Joe Pye was chief of the Senecas, of the Iroquois Confederation, and he taught its value to the white people in early Colonial days. This name was given to it in remembrance of his kindness. The Joe-Pye-Weed with its purple stem, and flowers from nearly every joint, grows over ten feet high in the Dunes. FLOWERS OF THE DUNES 233 Another family is the Blazing Star, with its different kinds almost covering the prairies and sandy fields, and fairly lighting up the landscape in many places with its large heads and spikes of crimson and rose flowers of various styles and patterns. Of all the large families of plants, none seems more cheery than the Goldenrod, with its golden flowers, bright in color and varied in form. They are found everywhere and are particularly fine in the Dune region. One species is called Silverrod, as it has white or cream-colored flowers. Some of these goldenrods are very large. The prettiest and daintiest of them all is the Canada Goldenrod, as the flower cluster is large and plume-like, and the leaves thin, slender and graceful. The Aster is undoubtedly the prettiest of the large fami- lies of the Compositz, and is found in the Dunes in great variety. They bloom from August to September. Among these are the striking New England Aster, with large purple flowers, and the Smooth Aster with violet-blue flowers, in terminal clusters. These are highly variable, highly orna- mental and easily cultivated. The Panicled Aster is a tall plant, growing up to eight feet high, and has very many light violet asters; many are even white. It is a striking plant, and is extensively culti- vated. The Sunflower Family is one of the gaudiest in the coun- try during the early fall, from August to October. There are many species fairly covering the prairies and lowlands of this region with their myriad numbers that adorn and cheer the landscape. They are called sunflowers because, with their shining golden petals they resemble the sun. The 234. THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES old idea that they face the sun during the day is a fallacy, though they do turn with the sun somewhat, but not as much as some people seem to believe. The large sunflowers are called ‘“‘prairie fuel’ on the plains, as they grow so big they help take the place of wood. The Rose Marshmallow has a large flower two to four inches across, with protruding pistil and stamens. When there is a large patch of them, with their many large, pink blossoms, it presents a most attractive sight. They are cousins of the Hollyhocks. It is worthy of home cultiva- tion. A very large tract was formerly situated at Waverly Beach Bridge. The Impatiens, or Jewel Weed, the Wild Touch-Me-Not, both the Pale and the Spotted, is found throughout the re- gion. It is also called the Bugle Flower, as it is shaped much like one. The Garden Balsam is the tropical form of this flower. When the seeds are ripe, the seed-pods shrink, the parts give way, and a little mechanism inside shoots the seeds out to drop into some other place to grow. Watch them shoot. If you touch them when real ripe, away they go! Hence the name. The plant blooms from July to September. The Shooting Star, or American Cowslip, often called Prairie Pointer by the children, has a flower stem rising from a circle of root leaves. It is crowned with a cluster of rose-pink flowers, with long golden stamens projecting to a point with the petals reflexed, making it look like a floral arrow, or shooting star from the heavens. Among the Heath family, besides the trailing arbutus, wintergreen, bearberry, huckleberry, etc., are such ever- green plants as the Spotted Wintergreen, Prine’s Pine, FLOWERS OF THE DUNES 235 Shin-leaf, Indian Pipe, etc. The spotted wintergreen is a plant found in rich woods. The stalk is from three to nine inches high. It has several white flowers on top of a long peduncle, in July and August. Its cousin, the Pipsissewa, or Prince’s Pine, is found near the last. It has two whorls of six-pointed leaves each around the stems, like a miniature pine, and flowers like the above. The Pyrola, or Shin-leaf, is another evergreen plant with a clump of netted veined root leaves, and sends up a scape, one species with several waxy flowers, another with only one. The Gentians are well represented in the whole Chicago region, and especially well in the Dunes. The Rose Pink is rose-pink with a yellowish star in the center. It is a cousin of the gentian, and is a credit to the family. Of the true gentians, the most popular is the Fringed Gentian, which is famous the world over for its exquisite beauty. The flowers are solitary, on long slender stems ter- minating the stem or simple branches. The corolla is about two inches long, violet-blue, vase form, with four blue petals cut into long delicate fringes, which give it its name. In this flower, the stamens mature before the stigmas are developed, so that it is incapable of fertilizing itself; and the bumblebee with its long tongue, who visits many other fringed gentians, carries pollen with him that is de- posited on any stigma that is ripe. The fringed gentian opens its flowers only on bright days, closing at night or in cloudy weather. They are found sparingly in many parts of the Dunes, as well as in the whole Chicago region. They bloom in the fall. Other gentians found there are interest- ing, the Closed Gentians especially, as the corolla is closed 236 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES so tight that the ordinary insect can not open it. The bum- blebee, with its superior size and weight is the only insect that is able to open the closed gentian to get the nectar at its base and incidentally to fertilize it. There are many plants that have acquired a habit of depending to a greater or less degree upon some one else to feed them. They are slackers, such as we find in our social life, and as the cowbird is in bird life. Some plants take part of the sap from other plants as well as working for themselves. These are real parasites, as owing to the chlorophyl, or green matter in their leaves, they are able to change this acquired sap into starchy foods, that are used in building up the plant. Some live on decaying vegetation of the dead roots of trees and thus receive nourishment from these plants, in- stead of working for a living for themselves. The most striking case of this parasitism is that of the Indian Pipe. This is a weird, ghostly, waxen little plant, with a soft stem and a flower that hangs down, resembling a small white pipe. The Indian Pipe has completely degenerated, and is ' the slacker par excellence, as it has no green coloring matter, or chlorophyl, which has the power of transforming sap into food, but it absorbs food prepared for it by its host. It is found rather sparingly throughout the district, though more common in rich woods. It straightens up when ripen- ing, becoming perfectly straight. It is a true saprophyte, living on dead vegetable matter. The Love-vine or Dodder is also found throughout the Dune region, and is likewise a parasite. This dodder is a most interesting plant. It is a leafless annual vine, yel- lowish or reddish in color, bearing a few scales in place of FLOWERS OF THE DUNES 23 N leaves. The seeds develop in the ground like other seeds; but, as soon as the plant reaches the bark of certain herbs or shrubs, such as goldenrod, sunflower, etc., it fastens to it, and begins to suck the sap from it through minute papilla or spongy growth. Their own roots shrivel, as they are not needed, and they get full nourishment from their hosts. Some plants that generally earn their own living will rob the roots of other plants. The Gerardia, or Downy Fox- glove, does that. Others, like the Mistletoe or the little Comandra, fasten themselves on the branches or roots of a plant, tap the sap fountain and then do the rest of the work themselves by using the chlorophyll in their leaves to trans- form this stolen sap into living food. If a plant fastens itself upon a living plant, it is a genuine parasite; but if that plant dies, and a plant utilizes the de- caying wood, this plant is a saprophyte, or plant that lives on decaying vegetable matter alone. Some of the most remarkable members of the vegetable kingdom to be found in the Dunes are the carnivorous plants ; those that seem to need flesh or protein to keep them in good condition. The most widely known of these carnivorous plants is the Pitcher Plant. The various conservatories in the public parks of our large cities have different species of these rare plants, but Garfield Park Conservatory, Chicago, has one of the most beautiful and varied collections of all. The pitcher plant of the Dune region is the Sarracenia purpurea, which blooms from May to July. The leaves are hollow, about six to eight inches high, sometimes fifty in a cluster, all radiating from a common center, like a rosette. From 238 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES the center arises a strong stem over a foot high with a curious flower at the top. This flower is deep purple and the petals are fiddle-shaped. The top of the stigma is ex- panded like an umbrella. The leaves have a hood and a sort of wing and are mottled green with purplish veins. The plant exudes a little nectar at the lip, which attracts insects, who climb up to the opening under the hood. The throat of the plant is exceedingly glossy and slippery and the insect slips down to the bottom, sliding over the many stiff, sharp, small bristles that point downward. When the insect tries to climb upward he is repelled by those bristles, as well as the very glossy surface. After a while the insect drowns in the liquid that is generally found in one of these hollow leaves, or is killed by the digestive juice that acts directly upon it. In either case, the insect is killed and digested by the plant. It is a very interesting sight to examine some of these leaves, where insects in all stages of decomposition can be seen, with worms of various species feeding on the remains. One has a scythe-like tail, to cut his way out. Another interesting carnivorous resident of the Dunes is the Sundew. The round leaves are covered with hairy glands, that exude drops of a clear, very sticky liquid, that looks like dew. Insects think it is dew, and crawl or fly to it, and get caught. The hairs of the leaf slowly fold about it and the leaf digests it. It is very interesting to watch this operation under a microscope or a powerful reading-glass. The plant really seems to have sentient feel- ing. The leaves form a cluster from which a flower stalk arises to a height of six to nine inches. The flowers are FLOWERS OF THE DUNES 230 small, white, and are found on the top of the branched, reddish slender stem, which is curved. There is another plant, the Bladderwort, found not only in the Dunes but in the whole Chicago region, that is partly carnivorous. ‘This is an aquatic or marsh plant, of different species, most of which grow in the water; floating, branching, and bladder-bearing to keep it from sinking. Some grow in the wet sand. The flowers are deeply two- lipped and spurred underneath, the calyr being also two- lipped. All but one of these floating water plants are yellow. The exception is purple. The leaves of the bladderworts are finely cut, generally into fine threads, many bearing air bladders. Those that float in the water have queer-looking flowers, finely dissected leaves, and little air bladders that keep them up. It has been found that these air bladders on the leaves are not perfectly air tight, but that there is an opening that can be forced open. This is especially so with the large bladder- wort, which has stems from one to three feet long and numerous bladders on the leaves; the flowers are five to ten in a raceme, large, and with short spurs. Recent investigators have found that these bladders catch minute insects and even minute fish, which are digested in them. A number of different species of bladderwort are found at the Dunes, and the author has examined a number of the bladders, finding both minute insects and young fish, as seen under a microscope. These bladders may have power to expand and contract the openings so as to facilitate the entrance of the intruders and keep them in. Many ferns are frequently found in the bogs around 240 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES Miller, Cowles Tamarack Swamp, Tremont. Different varieties of the Asplenium, or Moonwort, are found in different sections. The Lady-Fern is found in moist rich woods and is uncommon. The Aspidium, or Marsh-Shield Fern, is common throughout the Dunes in low grounds and marshes. The Christmas Fern, a species of Aspidium, is evergreen and is rarely found here, but some fine specimens were found in the deep shaded ravines in the Springland Park, belonging to Mr. Martin T. Krueger, near Michi- gan City. The Sensitive Fern is one of the common forms, found especially in marsh grass. The different species of Osmunda, or Flowering Fern, are abundant throughout the Dune region, as well as the Forest Preserve. The Royal Fern prefers the moist rich woods and swamps where it attracts attention by its regal bearing. The Cinnamon Fern is in all its glory in swamps and low places, and is especially common near the lake shore and the southwestern part of this region. These flowering ferns come up by thousands, covering the grounds. They are covered with a great deal of vege- table wool which gives them protection from the cold and wet. With their curious form, as their top is rolled into a ball which gradually unfolds, they bear a striking re- semblance to a fiddle head, which causes the country boys to speak of them as “‘fiddle heads.” The Sphagnum, or Peat Moss, is found here in such great numbers in the bogs that it is gradually helping to absorb the water so as to dry these low regions. Much of our coal is derived from the inconceivably vast amount of Sphagum Moss that grew in the primeval tropical or warm swamps in ancient times, when the world was young, as FLOWERS OF THE DUNES 241 well as from the vast number of tropical shrubs and trees that flourished in the Carboniferous Age. The heat and pressure from so many elevations and de- pressions have changed the peat, and much of it has gone through the various stages of moss, peat, lignite or brown coal, bituminous or soft coal, and gradually burning out the sulphur and other impurities, has passed into anthracite, or hard coal, glossy black and almost pure carbon. Some swamps here are rich in peat which, when dried, makes a first-class fuel. One factory at South Chicago has been producing peat briquettes for several years. Blatchley says that no real coal has been found in either Lake or Porter County. Dark slaty masses that would burn, he says, were pieces of shale saturated with bitumens ; and these did burn for a short time. In Illinois, coal mines containing fine specimens of plants are found farther north than in Indiana. CHAPTER XIX ANIMALS THIs region, in prehistoric times, was the abode of many large animals, among which were the Saber-toothed Tiger with tusks from six to eight inches in length; the Ohio Beaver as large as a bear; the Tapir; the Mammoth and the Mastodon, which were much larger than the present ele- phant. The Mastodon is supposed to have existed here during the glacial period. Doctor Cope thinks that the Great American Lion, part of whose skeleton was found in the Mississippi, may have ranged to this region. Remains of the Saber-toothed Tiger and the Tapir, ac- cording to Doctors Leidy and Cope, who made a critical study of the ancient fauna of Indiana, have been found in caves in Indiana and Ohio. Mr. George A. Baker found an almost perfect skeleton of the Ohio Beaver, as large as a bear, in the ancient marshy ground near South Bend, many feet below the present upper glacial drift, in the ancient swampy forest that grew in the soil left by the First Great Glacier. This remarkable skeleton is now in the Cen- tral Park Museum, New York. There is now in the mu- seum at South Bend a large head, with some teeth, of another Ohio beaver. Another tooth is about five inches long and nearly an inch wide, making a remarkable cutting instrument. 242 ANIMALS 243 The Mastodon was an immense elephant that flourished in this region, as it found food and conditions here to which it was adapted. The forests of various kinds of trees and shrubs, many of a semi-tropical nature; the gigantic ferns, and all kinds of southern marsh plants, made this an ideal region for it. A number of skeletons, or bones, of this great animal have been found in the Chicago Dune region, as well as in different parts of Indiana and Illinois. They were undoubtedly caught in the mire of the great swamps, and suffocated by sinking in the mud. The Mammoth was also found here. The following interesting description of the Ohio River region by Professors Cope and Wortman applies to Lake Michigan and Lake Erie regions, also, as bones of some of these animals have been found there. The Big Bone Lick, of Kentucky, had many bones of these ancient animals. “We trust that we may be pardoned if we indulge the imagination, and endeavor to picture to the mind a land- scape containing a grouping of the more prominent animals as they doubtless appeared on the banks of the beautiful Ohio in the misty twilight of long ago. Huge Mam- moths and Mastodons would have been seen loitering near the water’s edge, or lazily browsing on the neighboring trees; herds of Horses, giant Bisons and Elk grazed upon the adjoining hills, while numerous smaller species of graz- ing animals would be seen in their appropriate places; the Tapir, Peccary, and Peccary-like Giant Hog, would have been found in the dense growths of the swamps and marshes; the mighty Sloths and the Ohio Beaver would also contribute to the scene; while, lurking in the background, the stealthy Lion, and wary Wolf waited to pounce upon their unfortunate victims. Whether this scene was ever 244 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES beheld with human eyes, is a matter which yet lingers in the shadows of uncertainty, but it 1s probable that man was there.” The Saber-toothed Tiger was also a resident of this re- gion. The Bison and the Elks were much larger than those of to-day. The Buffalo, or Bison, was frequently found in this re- gion by explorers and traders many years ago. Marquette speaks of buffalo in this neighborhood, and a section of Southern Michigan was called Parc Aux Vaches, Park of the Cattle or Buffalo, near Bertrand. Bones of the wild cattle, or buffalo, are found there in great numbers. The Indian name of our Fox River was Buffalo River, on ac- count of the very great number of buffalo found there. La Salle described this place. The buffalo, like the passenger pigeon, has practically been exterminated through lust for gold. It has been killed for food, as well as from pure blood lust and finally on an enormous scale for commercial purposes. Hunters have given accounts of great herds of buffaloes, numbering millions and covering the prairies for miles. The southern herds emigrated from Texas to Canada and back; the great northern herds from Canada to Dakota and back. Hornaday, in his American Natural History, gives a clear description of this. Their numbers appeared count- less, but with constant inroads upon them they have grad- ually disappeared, until the American bison or buffalo, as a wild American animal, has become almost extinct, a few hundred being left in Central Canada. Here they have learned that the forests are safer than the prairies, and are ANIMALS 245 called by the local hunters, Wood Buffalo. They do not seem, according to many hunters who have shot the plains buffalo, to be as large as the original prairie one. Probably their food is not so succulent, as they have little or none of the rich buffalo grass. The wood buffaloes are now con- sidered a subspecies, the Athabascan Buffalo. There are a number of fine herds of buffaloes in different parks throughout the country, notably those at the Zoologi- cal Park, New York, and Lincoln Park, Chicago. A number of ranchers have established small herds, some of which have increased rapidly. A notice in the Chicago Daily News of December 18, 1919, is not only interesting, but gratify- ing as well, for it shows that this animal is being saved from extermination, and bids fair to become a valuable article of food. On Buck Leonard’s ranch, Pierre, South Dakota, are over a thousand buffaloes, ranging over ten thousand acres. Leonard’s herds are permitted to run wild, finding their living as they did in the days before the white man took possession of the plains. At killing time horsemen are sent out to the buffalo run with rifles, and the animals are shot down as they were in the time of Buffalo Bill. A report from Yellowstone Park says that a new herd of wild buffaloes numbering twenty-five head was discovered early in July, 1920, in an almost inaccessible part of the park. This brings the buffalo herd in Yellowstone Park up to one hundred head. The herd of buffaloes maintained at Wainwright, Alberta, by the Canadian government numbers now over three thou- sand six hundred, and the government is offering the superfluous animals for sale at two hundred fifty dollars 246 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES a head. The Canadian government has agreed to furnish a number of buffaloes, bear, moose, elk, and other animals to the Forest Preserve Commissioners of Cook County, Ilhi- nois, for McCormick Park, to be established near Riverside. They will present a pair of every wild animal in Canada to the commissioners, if desired. This Zoological Park will be one of the finest in the world, and will contain several hundred acres when completed. It has now over three hundred acres. The largest wild animal to be found in the Dune region in recent years is the Black Bear. In early days it was very common, and one of the pet viands of the hunters was bear meat. They lived in the dense woods that covered the hills and ridges in the Chicago Dune region, and the Valparaiso Moraine district in Indiana and Illinois. Mr. James Monahan, of Michigan City, Indiana, who settled in that region, at Rolling Prairie, in 1835, states that in the early days, there were many black bears in that neighborhood and that the pioneers when tired of venison would go out into the woods and bring in a bear. The last bear seen in the Dune region was in 1871, fol- lowing the Chicago fire. The great woods at Minnesota, Wisconsin and Michigan were on fire and hundreds of people and thousands of animals were burned to death in that terrible fire. The whole eastern shore of Lake Michigan was on fire, and the animals were driven south- ward by the devouring flames, some of them getting in to the Dunes and woods of Indiana. This bear was undoubt- edly one of those driven down by the Michigan fire, and appeared in the Dunes, where it was seen in the woods west of Waverly Beach, near what is now called Juniper 100g IVLSAYD AH, * ANIMALS 247 Valley, which is noted for the great number of wild animals killed there. The Panther or Puma was common in the Dune region in olden times and there were still some left in the days of the early pioneers. The Dune region, with its great sand-ridges covered with pine sand oaks, dense tropical glens, great marshes, numerous deer and other animals that served as prey, was an ideal place for the panthers. Mr. Monahan, of Michigan City, and Mr. John Morgan, of Chesterton, who both came to the Dune region in the ‘thirties, spoke of large numbers of panthers in the Dunes, the beaches and the woods of the Valparaiso Moraine. Early travelers also spoke of them. Some writers on Natural History scoff at the courage ot the panther, or mountain lion, saying that a man with a club could whip any panther and that the stories told by the old pioneers of the panther’s ferocity were imaginary. The writer, whose relatives for generations as pioneers, ex- plorers and sportsmen, have had many battles with these treacherous beasts and have fought them from Plymouth Rock to California, can not accept this. They knew that the panther while generally cowardly was sometimes very daring and ferocious. The Indians have always considered the panther an uncanny and temperamental beast, and the embodiment of curiosity. The magazine rifle has put fear into the hearts of the mountain lions and caused them to shun man. Mr. Alfred KE. Parker, Director of the Lincoln Park Zoo, Chicago, who is considered a great authority on the cat tribe, and has hunted them all over the world, says that the puma or panther is not aggressive but when cornered is sometimes a 248 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES fierce defensive fighter. He also asserts that the largest and fiercest are found in Montana. An account, literally true, by the author’s father of an attack by a hunger-crazed panther shows a side of the panther’s ugliness seldom seen. In 1830-31, the “Winter of the Deep Snow,” my father visited an aunt, Mrs. Doll, in Delaware County, New York, among the foot-hills of the Catskill Mountains. One night a big bear killed a pig near the barn. A few nights later a large panther, the first seen in the Delaware Valley for twenty years, tried to break through the thick oak doors and window shutters that protected this Colonial blockhouse, while the aunt and boy with gun and ax were ready on the inside to fight for their lives. It finally climbed up the lean-to, and from there to the chimney and started a number of times to get down the great fireplace, but the smoke from damp straw that they threw on the fire drove it back. Finally, after a long siege, it left, taking a pig with it. The neighbors were aroused the next morning and followed its trail for many miles, finally shooting the panther in the Catskill Mountains. It was a giant, hunger-crazed female, the largest ever seen in Delaware County. This story is still told there. Gurdon Hubbard, the fur-trader, says that the trappers and hunters who worked for him ate panther, lynx and wildcat with great enjoyment, but would not eat prairie chicken or quail, declaring them unfit for food. This idea, amazing to us, who know the pleasure of bagging and eating this game, is easily explained as an inherited prejudice. The Indians came from the western plains, the “Great American Desert,’ whose chief vegetation was cactus and sage plants. The spines of the cactus protect it from bird ANIMALS 249 and mammal. The sage plants are eaten by the sage grouse and quail, and their flesh becomes too bitter to eat, except the “spring chicken.” The Indians, even in this region, un- doubtedly attribute this same quality of bitterness to our prairie chicken and could not be persuaded it is different. The Canadian Lynx, with its mottled grayish fur, tufted ears, and enormous paws, was one of the most vicious of predatory animals and was seen in this region until recent times. The last one seen in the Dunes was killed by Hunter Green in 1873 at Tremont on Beach Ridge, near the present Johnson house, which at that time was a thickly forested section with swampy woods on each side. Mr. Harry Eenigenberg states that about the same time, while living at Oak Glen, on the old Michigan Road, near Lansing, Illinois, on the Indiana border, he was in the habit of hunting in the big woods near that place and extending his trips toward Thornton and Homewood, and over into Indiana. A neighbor, a recently arrived immigrant, went out hunting along Thorn Creek near Thornton, when he observed a large animal in a tree, and shot it. He then picked up the animal, carried it home and asked the neigh- bors what it was. To their amazement, it was a large Canadian lynx! This animal had not been seen in the town- ship for many years; and, as one of the pioneers remarked, “To think that this rare animal should miss being shot by us old timers, and be left for a greenhorn who had just landed!” | The Bay Lynx, or Wildcat, with his reddish yellow coat, was also found in the early days and was highly respected by the early pioneers for his grit. He was certainly some scrapper! The greatest praise one of those pioneers could 250 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES give a man was to say of him, “He can whip his weight in wildcats,”’ for they were absolutely devoid of fear and would fight as long as they could breathe. Of all the animals found in the Chicago Dune region, the one most appreciated by the pioneers was the Deer. Because of its savory flesh, timid nature, and power of flight, this animal has always been the one most prized by the pioneer and hunter. Its very name indicates this, as the word deer in most languages means the animal. It has been tamed and domesticated. The Dune region with its variety of trees, shrubs and plants, some sweet, some sour, some spicy like the sassafras and spicewood, and ornamented with bosky glens and sunny glades, was to the Virginia Deer a veritable Paradise, and they were found here by the thou- sands, including elk, and in early times, the moose. Their paths along the sides of the great sand-hills were utilized by the Indians as trails, and can still be seen. Mr. J. Monahan states that in the ’thirties, ’forties and fifties, deer in that section and along the Dunes toward Chi- cago were very common, and that settlers often got tired of eating venison and went out to get bear for a change. Mr. J. Morgan says that in the ‘forties, “fifties and ’six- ties, there were many deer all through the Dunes and along the Calumet Ridge, which went all the way to Chicago. They were so very thick along the Calumet River and Thorn Creek that one large creek flowing into Thorn Creek is called Deer Creek. Mr. M. F. Green, of Tremont, says that his father and grandfather killed many deer in that neighborhood and that on Mr. Tlamilton’s farm west of the Portchester Road, about half way between the South Shore Electric Line and ANIMALS 251 the Dunes, was the well-known Deer Lick, beloved by the deer of the Dunes. Mr. Green’s uncle, Hunter Green, who hunted and trapped in the Dune region for many years, stated that even in the sixties, he had seen as many as twenty deer at a time traveling along the deer paths bordering the south side of the Dunes. The last one found in the Dunes was shot in the early ‘seventies, but escaped, although it was badly wounded. This may have been the one whose head, with a fine set of horns, was recently unearthed in a gully near Barton’s shack at Mineral Springs, near the lake front, as it was shot in that neighborhood. Mr. Harry Eenigenberg says that in the “fifties and ’six- ties deer were very common on their farm near the Indiana line, as they had a large patch of heavy woods, and these deer became so tame that they would even come into the barnyard and the bucks would chase the cows away from the hay. He says that one day he tried to chase the deer out of the barnyard and the old buck made a jump at him, just clearing his head, and chased him around the wagon until his father came out with a gun, at which all the deer fled. ‘The old Detroit and Michigan City Road ran through the farm and the presence of so many deer in this neighbor- hood attracted a number of wolves. Deer were also found at Hyde Park, Chicago, and along the lake in the present Chicago itself, in the early days. One of the greatest pests that the pioneer had to contend with was the Wolf; not only the ordinary Coyote, or Prairie Wolf, but also the great Timber Wolf, as large as a large dog and more savage. These wolves were found not only in the deep and sheltered woods, but in the glens of the 252 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES Dunes and also throughout the entire Chicago Dune region. Ferninand Jones, the Chicago historian, told the author that when he was a boy in 1838, he had shot a wolf on Dearborn Street near the Tribune entrance and that wolves and deer were common at that time only a few miles from the Tribune Building. They were also common in the neighborhood of Rose- land, that section on the ridge west of Pullman along Michi- gan Avenue. Many wolves lived in caves or dens in the sandy ridges to the southwest near Halsted and One Hun- dred Fifteenth Street. So many of them were shot or trapped by the hunters there that the place was called Wolf Ridge and people sometimes went there and dug out wolves and brought home little ones to raise as pets. One man who tried to raise an extra fine breed of sheep in that region in those early days had nearly every one eaten by wolves. Mr. Eenigenberg says that the wolves were very common in the big woods at Oak Glen, near the Indiana Dunes. When a boy, toward the end of the ’sixties, two big timber wolves followed him, trying to attack him, and he was forced to climb a big oak for protection. As he did not get home, his father went to look for him in the dusk and hearing the boy cry for help, rushed toward him and the wolves ran off. His father tried to assure him that the wolves meant no harm, but the next morning they came into the farm-yard and tried to steal some chickens, and were very ugly. The father and the boy each got a gun; the boy was able to move faster than the father, and succeeded in shooting one of the wolves, which jumped high in the air when hit. The wolves then vanished. They were not troubled any more. ANIMALS 253 The forests and deep glens at the Dunes have been splen- did hiding-places for the wolves all these years. It is said that there were still a few of them left between Dune Park and Michigan City until 1919. Horace Greeley Green, the old hunter and trapper, said that in 1914, he trapped two big timber wolves in the dense woods some distance east of Dune Park near Oak Hill, and was on the trail of a band of four wolves which he hoped to capture. About 1873, he followed the Indian Trail through the woods along the Dunes from Michigan City to City West or Tremont, about ten miles, with a pack of timber wolves trailing him on the side of the Dunes above him. It was night, but he could see their eyes shining. He carried a rifle, revolver, ax and big bowie knife. The wolves came very near, but did not attack him, though they threatened him repeatedly. He says that he had been in a number of dangerous places, especially in the Rockies, but had never been so glad to be out of the woods as he was when he turned south to the Old Green Tavern, near the old Michigan Road. He had shot many timber wolves, as well as panthers, grizzlies, black bears, etc., in different parts of the country and knew them well, and he assured me that the wolves among the Dunes were the genuine timber wolves and not the little coyotes or prairie wolves. In December, 1917, Mr. M. F. Green and I saw some large curious tracks in the snow between Polk’s Slide and Tamarack which he said were wolf tracks. No wolves have been seen since then, but Mr. Morgan, of Chesterton, in 1918, said he thought there were still a few wolves left in the Dunes. Now there seem to be none. Mr. Horace G. Green said that he had seen a number of 254. THE WONDERS) OF THE DUNES Badgers in the Dunes. They are very strong, powerful animals that burrow during the day and come out in the evening. He discovered them by falling into one of the badger holes and seeing the animal. Here is an opportunity for some of our athletes to see if they can find a badger and dig him out; his muscles are very strong, and he can dig like a whirlwind. The author saw a badger near the Furnessville Blowout in November, 1918, on a day that was really a red letter day, so many interesting things were seen; a large flock of quail; a cardinal bird, a rabbit, a very large gray squirrel, a flock of wild geese just coming up squawking from the lake at Polk’s Slide, flying so low they just skipped the trees, until they got into line; then the badger under the great pines at Furnessville Blowout. While strolling slowly along the beautiful Pine Tree Trail, the attention of the author was attracted by a quite large animal crossing the trail about fifty feet ahead. It was coming from the swamp and heading for the Dunes. Its walk was a curious gliding, waddling walk, different from that of a woodchuck. The animal was nearly two feet long, with a strong body, very short powerful legs, and sharp pointed head, with white stripes. It was covered with reddish-brown hair, with blackish and gray-tinge, on the back and sides, but with very short hair on the under side. It was quite broad, and flat, looked queer. It was a genuine badger, and presented a good view for some distance, as it glided to its burrow in the sand. A visit to the Lincoln Park Zoo the following week to see the badgers showed them to be exactly the same as the one studied at the big pines. The under fur is brown, with ANIMALS 255 long gray hairs. White stripe on nose and side of face. A very clean little animal—makes a good pet when tamed. The curator of the British Zoological Garden at London asserts that our American badger is not a true badger. Differs from the European in dentition, and comes out in the day, while the European comes out at night. He is wrong. These rare animals and birds can not be seen when visi- tors travel in crowds. Solitary trips in which the seeker after knowledge takes things slowly and quietly, studying the landscape, are necessary to bring results. The Porcupine, which was formerly common in the Dunes, was thought to have totally disappeared, but there may be some still in existence there as in 1918 one was attacked by a dog near Furnessville and he filled the dog so full of quills that the dog almost died. The porcupine can not throw quills; but they are so loose that a slight touch re- leases them; he strikes with his tail. Doctor Downing, of the University of Chicago, reports that a few years ago he saw both a wolf and a porcupine in the Dunes. The Opossum is still found in the Dunes in the deep woods. It is very odd and is the only animal found in America, that carries its young in a pouch, just as the kangaroo does. It has a very prehensile tail that it can coil around a limb and it will then hang down for a long time. It is a curious sight to see a mother opossum carrying a “bus load of little ones hanging to her back, with her big tail coiled over her back, and this bunch of little ones with their little tails attached to her large one, so they will not tumble off. These are found down South in great num- bers and as the Dunes have a southern environment the 256 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES opossums feel very much at home there. Many white people in the South think just as highly of “roast” *possum and sweet “‘taters’ as do their colored neighbors. Even north- erners seem to relish it and the habit is spreading. The opossum has a very curious habit if he is startled or scared; he will hang motionless or lie as if dead. One may kick him or beat him; he will not show any sign of life; but, as soon as one moves away from him, he will first open one eye and then the other; when he sees that he is at a safe distance, he will jump up and rapidly disappear. This habit of camouflaging death is called “playing possum,” and is often applied to human beings as well. On October 25, 1919, the author met Mr. Fred Tharp, of Porter, Indiana, north of Cowles Tamarack Swamp, while he was prospecting, and the latter presented him with some wild honey that he had just found in a bee tree recently cut down; the -honey and bees had been captured by the bee hunters. Mr. Tharp says that in 1914 he trapped and shot two wolves in Juniper Valley. In 1915 he shot a porcupine, a few blocks south of Leman’s Cottage, which is on the lake front, directly north of Cowles Tamarack Swamp. That year, 1914, was famous for wolves in the Dunes. Hunter Green killed two there between Mineral Springs and Dune Park, and the caretaker of the Knicker- bocker Ice Company at Dune Park killed one that was stealing provisions there. Link at Tremont declared he killed one also, and showed the pelt. : Mr. Tharp says that he has caught many wolves in the Dunes in bygone years and that to catch them, he selected a young oak tree in the open, and tied a chicken to a branch so as to let it hang six or eight feet from the ground, in ANIMALS 257 which, under the sand, he had buried about a dozen traps. The wolves, excited by the delicious meal waiting for them, would jump frantically for the chicken and come down with so much force that one or more of’the traps would be sprung, catching the wolf. Another animal found here is the Red Fox. It is found in the deep woods and also around some of the chicken coops. There is a family of them near Furnessville Blow- out. Beauties! In earlier times, they were very plentiful. Hunter Green tells about catching not only the Red Fox but also a Gray, a Silver and a Black Fox, about thirty to forty years ago. To one skilled in reading footprints, the trail of the fox can be traced in the white sand of the Dunes. He is the hero of countless myths, among both Indians and whites, and is the embodiment of cunning. The Raccoon is found here, and sometimes the old-fash- ioned “coon hunt’’ is indulged in by the neighbors, who hold a regular jollification meeting over it. This animal is a small cousin of the bear, and is called the ‘‘Wash-bear”’ by the Germans, owing to its habit of washing its food be- fore partaking of it. It is sometimes called the ‘Wood Cat” by the country people. There are many Mink found in the streams and marshes of the Dunes. This bloodthirsty animal is cunning, and it has a very choice fur. It is interesting to watch the experts set their traps; they are very careful. Its big cousin, the Otter, was formerly quite prevalent in the Dunes, and Otter Creek, a branch of Trail Creek, at Michigan City, was so called because of the number of otters found there. They have not been seen here for years. Beaver were formerly very common in the Dune region 258 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES and the early settlers spoke of them as still living here in limited numbers, but they disappeared long ago. Hunter Green saw both otter and beaver here in the ‘fifties. Another animal found here in abundance is the Skunk, that animal of unsavory memory; it yields a fine fur, the best of which is the pure black. The most beautiful one has two broad silver stripes along its sides; but this is too distinctive a brand and too hard to dye, so it is rated as the cheapest one. They are sometimes called Wood Pussies and ignorant tenderfeet have often suffered shipwreck from them. Some Indian tribes, the Sioux especially, wear skunk skins at their belts, to show that they never run from any- body. These are occasionally attached to their feet, to make their bravery more striking, for all animals give the skunk plenty of room. The Muskrat is in his element in the Dune region, living by the thousands in the great marshes to be found there. Who is not familiar with the dome-shaped winter nest, look- ing like a small haycock, out in the swamps! They are sometimes found miles away from a stream, or even a large marsh. One very large one was killed in the spring of 1918 in the writer’s school garden at the Van Vlissingen School, Chicago, on the corner of Wentworth Avenue and One Hundred Ninth Street, in a well settled district. How did it get there? The fur is very good if taken in the winter, and the animal is considered good to eat in late fall and early winter, when it is fat. Some people claim it is really toothsome. It is one of the chief fur-bearing animals in the country. There are plenty of Rabbits scattered throughout this region. It is a pleasure to watch these little animals playing ANIMALS 259 around, as they are at times tame and are often kept as pets. The Mole is exceedingly common in the Dunes, and his burrows can be followed for many feet in the soft sand. His skin is very soft and velvety, and is used for small articles of apparel, purses, etc. He is considered blind by the average countryman, but he has a pair of very minute eyes, covered by the skin, that are just able to distinguish between light and darkness. The Woodchuck or Groundhog is found here by the thousands. Conditions are ideal for him, soft soil, and plenty of food in the low wooded sand-ridges along the swamps and in the gullies, as well as in the meadows. “Groundhog Day” is February second; and the ancient tra- dition is that the groundhog, after waking up from his long winter's sleep, or period of hibernation, steps outside to “take an observation.” If he sees the sun, it is an un- favorable omen; it means six weeks more of winter, so he goes back to bed and resumes his interrupted nap, which is supposed to last until the middle of March. If he does not see the sun on February second, then he feels sure that winter has finally ended, so he stays up and gets to work for the ensuing year. Of all the Squirrels, the most interesting is the little Red Squirrel or Chickaree. It is an attractive animal and very bold, chasing away all of the larger Squirrels in its neigh- borhood. Who has not been amused at its antics, running down the trunk of a near-by tree, with its head sticking out at right angles, and barking at the intruder as if telling him to clear out! He not only stores up the hickory nuts, walnuts, hazel- 260 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES nuts, etc., but if there happens to be a variety of small apple that he likes, he will also take that and cache it. Dur- ing the summer of 1918 at Forest Lake, Wisconsin, we were amused greatly at the maneuvers of some of these squirrels. They developed a great fondness for the Yellow Transpar- ent apple, and gradually, from picking up the windfalls, they climbed the small trees and helped themselves to the choice fruit, climbing with it to a high oak tree and caching it in a fork of two or three branches. The best apples were then picked by us and placed on the south window-sills in the house to ripen. It was amus- ing to see the squirrels ; one little fellow was especially eager, running up and down the wire screen, as if mad, trying to bite his way through, and screaming at the top of his voice. When they found they could not get the nice Yellow Trans- parents, they began on the Tetofskys, or Russian Crabs, and in a few days they almost cleared off a small tree of these red apples. The little chickaree is the deadliest foe to birds known. He eats both eggs and the young birds and older ones if he can get them. That is the reason that there are so few birds in sections inhabited largely by squirrels. That is the reason that Oak Park, that beautiful suburb of Chicago, almost lost her magnificent elms, which in some streets formed a beautiful archway over the streets for blocks at a time. The officials gave undue protection to her squirrels. People who killed them were fined, even though the squirrels damaged houses by nesting in the attics, and destroyed property. As a result, the squirrels killed the birds that formerly killed the insects ; and, the balance of nature being destroyed, AN TIVE Tos) 261 the insects, especially the tussock moth, multiplied to such an incredible extent, that they devoured nearly all living plants. When J. H. Prost, the expert Chicago City Forester, was asked to investigate, he said the residents should have the greater part of the squirrels killed, if they wished trees and birds. When this was done, the birds came back and devoured the insects, and the trees and the plants soon became thriving and beautiful again. The large Gray Squirrel and the Fox Squirrel are more plentiful in the Dunes than their master, the little red chick- aree. Both of these squirrels grow to be very large. One day while walking along the Valparaiso Road at Tremont, a magnificent specimen of the fox squirrel was seen on a young oak tree in Hauber’s Woods. He was getting ready to run down the side of the tree and was stretched out flat to his fullest measure, looming up so large that it seemed to be a small red fox, with its red fur and bushy tail. He stayed there long enough to present this rare view, then ran down the tree and disappeared. The brush was over a foot long and over three inches wide. As large as this squirrel was, it would have fled had the small chickaree been after it. In the summer of 1918, Mrs. Brennan and I took a walk from Tremont through the woods to the old Haunted House at the Furnessville Trail, following the old Detroit- Chicago stage road to the place. While seated on a mossy bank at the side of the Dunes, under mighty oaks, we noticed a large gray squirrel, in a maple tree below the old trail along the swamp. It was about fifty feet away and as we kept very still we had a fine chance to watch him. He would run up and down the tree, swing around to a Vir- 262 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES ginia creeper or an adjoining tree, gather up acorns, and, sitting up on his haunches and holding the acorns between his paws would eat them. We were surprised at the size of this little animal and especially at its exceedingly large and bushy plume, which was even larger than that of the fox squirrel just mentioned. Geko al US cH aD, BIRDS THERE is probably no spot in America that has a greater variety of birds than the Chicago Dune region. Over three hundred species have been found here, some of them exceedingly rare; over thirty species are resi- dents the year around; about seventy-five are summer resi- dents, who nest here in summer and depart for the South in autumn; probably fifteen are winter residents; and a few, about ten, are winter visitors. The remainder are migrants that go through here in the spring on their northern trip and pass through in the autumn on their trip to the South. Let the readers who go to the Dunes keep their eyes open. They may discover a species never found here before, as the Dunes shelter many a rare animal or plant. A sheltered basin extends along the shores of Lake Michi- gan, and includes the hills and forests near it. Mr. Nehling, for many years Curator of the Milwaukee Museum, and an authority on birds, states in his hand-colored illustrated folio on birds, that while he has studied and collected birds nearly all over the world, he has never seen such a number and variety of birds as in the southern part of Sheboygan County, Wisconsin, owing to the nearness of Lake Michi- 262 264. THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES gan, and to the variety of trees and bushes, with their shelter, fruit and berries, and the number of ridges, hills, lakes and swamps there, giving ideal conditions for living and nesting. He speaks especially of the very large number of thorn trees that give food and protection to the birds. This region is much like the Dunes; is, in fact, the Wiscon- sin Duneland and includes the Tolleston, Calumet and Glen- wood Beaches, and the Valparaiso Moraine, just as in the Indiana Duneland, only not such typical lake dunes. It has the same type of hills, forests and small lakes, and the same birds. Here many of the Warblers, who go through the Chicago Dune region stay and build their nests, the Blackburnian Warbler being especially noted. The Ruffed Grouse are plentiful there. The parks of Chicago and other cities are most admir- able places in which to study birds. Mr. Herbert E. Walter, of the Waller High School, Chicago, has published a useful little book, Wild Birds in City Parks. He describes one hundred and forty-five different birds in this book and at present a number more have been discovered. The Birds of the Chicago Area, by Woodruff, is the best book on the birds of this region, especially the illustrated edition, as he quotes from Butler, Nelson, Ridgway, etc., as well as gives the results of his own extended observations. Reed’s Books on Birds are also very helpful to the hiker. Butler’s Birds of Indiana, and Ridgway’s Birds of Illinois are essen- tial to the bird lover. Chapman is very good. Cory’s Birds of Illinois and Wisconsin is also an excellent book. The western part of Duneland, from Miller to Dune Park, and the central part, from Dune Park to Waverly Beach, are becoming well known; the eastern part, from Tremont BIRDS 265 to Michigan City, is but little known, except at Tremont, Furnessville and Tamarack; the rest is seldom traveled. This is the home of rare birds, plants and animals; it even included a small park of wolves, but these have lately been killed off. The very wealth and variety of natural sur- roundings yield a wealth of plant and animal life. The writer, who as a naturalist and historian, has visited and studied the Dunes for forty years, finds something new and interesting every trip. For instance, on a hike through the Dunes on June 5, 1921, a mother Partridge, with her babies, was met in the swamp at Tremont, near the path. It clucked with alarm, and the babies scattered through the leaves. The mother- bird, with drooping wings, crawled under a big trunk of a tree and away. When I stepped down into the swamp, she ran swiftly at me, the picture of rage, with her wings down and her feathers bristling; but as I did not move she stopped at my feet, looked up, and silently slunk away. After I went off, a loud triumphant call was given to indicate the intruder had left, and the babies returned. Of all the birds that have frequented this region, the grandest was the Trumpeting Swan, from sixty to sixty-six inches long, with spread of wings from eight to ten feet. It takes the name trumpeter from its ringing note, which much resembles the blast from a French horn, and is caused by the extreme length of the trachea or wind-pipe, and its peculiar foldings, which give it the sonorous note. The common American Swan, or the Whistling Swan, is not quite so large a bird as the trumpeting swan, and is more common in our region. The old leaders have a note that resembles in a remarkable degree the sound of a common 266 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES tin horn, instead of the mellow tone of the trumpeting swan, and this unmusical tone increases with age. On November 26, 1918, six swans of the whistling species were seen in Lake Michigan, near Miller. Soon three of them flew on to the Grand Calumet River, where they were shot. One of them was sent to Doctor Frank M. Woodruff, the bird expert of the Chicago Academy of Sciences, who had it stuffed and mounted, and it is now on exhibition there. He had a part of the swan roasted for his Thanks- giving dinner and said that it was very appetizing. It isa shame to kill these beautiful birds even for science. Another remarkable bird was the White Pelican. This was formerly very common in Lake Calumet, as well as the lakes and rivers of the Dune region, and is occasionally a visitor. The Canada Goose, that warrior of the air, whose honk! honk! can be heard every spring and fall, as their V-shaped phalanxes come flying to or from the Arctic regions, was formerly a well-known resident of the whole Chicago Dune region, breeding in the Calumet and Kankakee marshes. They sometimes stop in the Dunes now. There are many Ducks in our region, the first of which is the Canvasback, so-called on account of the mixed silvery and black back. Up to the fifties and ’sixties, and even ’seventies, this duck was very common in the Calumet marshes, and especially in Lake Calumet, which was plenti- fully stocked with its favorite food, wild celery or eel-grass. An old copy of Harper's Magazine, published in 1855, gives an illustration showing how they hunted ducks on Lake Calumet in those days. The method does not seem to have changed very much, even in these enlightened days. One BIRDS | 267 man is standing up in the boat with his gun, pointing at a flock of ducks that are evidently circling around, and he seems to be following their motions. Another is “taking an observation” through a large bottle, while a comrade, who has undoubtedly finished his observation, is leaning over the boat, with his gun hanging in the water. Only one man seems to be busy shooting; probably the boatman. The most beautiful of all is the Wood Duck, so-called because it builds its nest in a tree near the water, preferring a branch that overhangs the water. When the little ones fly from their nests in the trees, or are helped out by the parents, they swim off as if they are used to it. Of the ducks that are found here, the most common is the Mallard, the ancestor of our common duck. Both kinds of Teal are also found. The most common of our ducks in the spring migrations is the Pintail, so-called because it has a long tail, the central feathers projecting greatly. It is a beautiful bird. The Waders in our Dune region are many. The numer- ous lakes and marshes furnish them with just the conditions they need, and they thrive here. The Great Whooping Crane was formerly found in this region, and their dis- cordant cries while they are migrating are still occasionally heard. This crane is a magnificent bird, white, with great spread wings; Butler gives it as having a spread of ninety- two inches. The Sandhill Crane was formerly very common in the Calumet marshes, and nested around Lake Calumet in the fifties and ’sixties; it may still be found in the Dunes. The Great Blue Heron is a bird about forty-eight inches high, formerly common in our marshes, but it is gradually 268 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES becoming exterminated in this region. There are still a few left in the Dunes; also a number around Liverpool and East Gary. The author saw one at Silver Creek, Tremont, in 1920. The American Egret, years ago, nested in the Calumet marshes. It recently nested in the Kankakee marshes, some- times on the same trees with the Great Blue Heron. It is a beautiful white heron, forty-one inches high, without plumes, except at nesting season, when they grow out from the back in a long train like that of the Peacock, only these are white and plumy. There is a White Heron in the Dune Panorama at the Chicago Academy of Sciences that was shot years ago at Liverpool, Indiana, by Doctor Woodruff. The Snowy Heron, or Egretta candidissint, is a beautiful White Egret. It is smaller than the American egret, being only twenty-four inches high. Its plumage is white and in the nesting season there are three sets of plumes provided; numerous recurved plumes from the back of the head; a set that hangs down from the breast; and a wonderful recurved set that comes from the back, and recurves toward the back in a sweeping plume. It is a beautiful bird, and many thousands of them have been killed and their families exterminated; yea, even the warders murdered !—that some women could have the pleas- ure of wearing these plumes. As a result, the white egret has been almost exterminated, like the Auk and the Wild Pigeon. Early travelers, many years ago, state that it nested in our region and was pretty common. It has not been seen in the Dune region for a number of years. E-xter- minated ! The Great Northern Loon is found here, in the different BIRDS 269 lakes and rivers. His weird unearthly cry suggests some one or something under the influence of the moon, which is supposed to affect the mind of anybody exposed too much to its influence, and makes him looney, or moon- struck, from /una, moon; for the cry of this bird sounds so like the wail of some lost soul, that the bird has received the name of loon or moon-bird. It is interesting to see a loon dive, and then guess when and where he will come up. The Pied-Bill Grebe is the one especially that people call the Hell-Diver, because he can get under water so fast when scared that often you can not see him disappear. The reason is that his feet are placed far back like those of the loon and penguin, and there is no lost motion in getting into action. The Phalaropes, or Web-Footed Snipe, are noted as being the only birds in which the female wears the breeding plumage. She is larger than the male, and is far more brilliantly colored in the breeding season, having a large shining band of red in her coloring, on neck and back. In all of the species, the male does the most of the nest-build- ing and incubation. Mrs. Phalarope is certainly the original woman’s righter. The Woodcock is a most interesting bird with its short, thick body, very long bill, and very large protuberant eyes, which are placed ‘almost on the top of its head to keep them out of the way as much as possible when digging for worms, and also giving it a chance to look out for enemies. It is a very shy, suspicious bird, with gray and white plumage, intershot with a brownish tint, that acts as a natural camouflage, rendering it almost invisible when on 270 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES the nest or at rest. When on the nest, its mother love seems to change its whole nature. It will stay until the visitor is almost up to the nest; and if the latter will go very slowly and carefully the woodcock will allow itself to be stroked or even lifted up and then restored. It is still found in the Calumet and Desplaines regions. Among the shore birds are the Wilson Snipe, and the different species of the Sandpiper. The Jack Snipe is one of the most common. The beautiful Carolina Paroquet was formerly, from eighty to one hundred years ago, more or less common throughout Indiana and Illinois. Travelers and early pio- neers mention it. It has not been seen here for many years. The Belted Kingfisher, that stays with us from April to October, is one of the most common and active birds to be seen around the Dunes. He is a welcome visitor, and is especially so to the fisherman, who often throws a small fish overboard to him, as he waits for his dinner on a stake near by. His raucous rattle sounds quite cheerful then. Our Dune region for years has been noted for its abun- dance of game birds, such as the Wild Turkey, different varieties of Grouse and the Quail. The king of them all was the wild turkey. The early missionaries, explorers and trappers speak of it as very common in Northern Illinois and Indiana. Mr. John Morgan killed many of them in the Dunes in the ’forties. Mr. Holmes, near Bloom or Chicago Heights, said they were very common in those early days in the Dune and Beach regions. The more common game birds were the Prairie Chicken or Pinnated Grouse, and the Partridge, or Ruffed Grouse. BIRDS 271 Those were formerly very common in this Chicago and Dune region, and there are still quite a number of the latter left. The Sharp-tailed Grouse was discovered by a few of us near the Prairie Club Beach House in 1915. We were ascending Mount Holden, where some tracks of a large bird, leading to the hill, were observed. We went quietly up the hill and found the bird at the summit. It was not in the least scared, but allowed us to come within twenty feet of it, giving us an excellent opportunity to examine it, while at the same time it was given a fine opportunity to examine us. After it had watched us sufficiently, it sud- denly sprang up, without the slightest noise, and soared away, first circling over the lake for some distance, and then curving back to the southeast, settling in the deep woods. Mr. Leegwater had a second close view of it in Sep- tember, this time in the swamp adjoining the big woods to the east. He almost stepped on it, and had a chance to get a good look at it. He noted its large size, long neck and rusty buff-color, with dark and white bars, as well as the projecting central tail feathers, and the feathers on the legs to the base of the toes. In tracing up this bird, all indications led to its being the sharp-tailed grouse. But, as it had never before been recorded in Indiana, and has not been seen in Northeastern Illinois since 1864, it seemed too good to be true. Doctor Barrett, State Geologist of Indiana, stated in a letter to the writer that he had examined lists of all the birds found in Indiana, but could find no mention of the sharp-tailed grouse as having been seen there; though it is mentioned by Butler as a probable native 272 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES of Indiana, because it is a native of Illinois. This is the first time that it has been recorded as an Indiana bird. Mr. Millard F. Green, of Tremont, whose father and grandfather kept the old Green Hotel at New City West, now Tremont, from 1850 to 1870, informed the writer that he had shot several of these birds, and thought they were a kind of partridge. Mr. Brown, the caretaker of Tamarack, says that the sharp-tailed grouse has bred spar- ingly in that wild region for many years, and that he has shot them. He noted particularly the larger size, the sharp tail and the feathers on the legs, in addition to the rusty, mottled coloring, which points were different from those of the ruffled grouse. Mr. Hall, of Michigan City, also shot them. The Prairie Chicken, or Pinnated Grouse, is still the most common game bird of Illinois and Indiana, and was for- merly very common in the Chicago Dune region. In 1873- 1878 the country around Englewood and Normal Park, Chicago, harbored many prairie chickens. The region west of these places was particularly abundant in these birds. The author in the ‘seventies was often awakened in early morning, at Normal Park, by the drumming of the male birds a mile away, as they assembled on some dry knoll on the Calumet Ridge, west of Halsted Street, from Auburn Park to Englewood, Chicago, to hold their annual spring love-feast. The Ruffed Grouse, or Partridge, is considered the king of American game birds. It is emphatically a bird of the forest and is found throughout the country from the Atlantic Coast to the Great Plains; from the Southland to Canada. Who can forget his first partridge that he started BIRDS 273 up in the woods. Suddenly, with a long resounding whir-r-r, that sends the heart into the throat, a feathered cannon-ball shoots up from the ground at your feet, and darting through the trees in its winding flight is out of sight long before your heart has settled down from its sud- den frenzied beating. The partridge presents a beautiful sight, especially when he is drumming or preening himself before his flock. This drumming is caused by the wings striking the air near the sides very forcibly, but not hitting the body. They are sometimes very tame. At Tremont, Indiana, I have seen a nest in a fallen log, not fifty feet from the picturesque trail through the hills, woods and swamps. At Portchester, Mr. Martin, of the Prairie Club, discovered a partridge in a nest under a stump on a side-hill covered with trees, only a couple of rods from the old abandoned Michi- gan City State Road. This bird, with its variegated red- dish and grayish brown color, and its bars of white and brown, fitted so closely into its surroundings of rusty stump, russet leaves and whitish sand that it was only by the keenest scrutiny that we could make it out in the midst of its surroundings. The correct name of this bird is the Ruffed Grouse. It is commonly called the Partridge in New England and the East, and Pheasant in the Southern and Western States. In the annual reports of the Game and Fish Commission of Illinois it is officially called the Pheasant. Mr. Andrew Diekman, of Dolton, Illinois, who is well acquainted with the Calumet Region, and whose father settled near Glenwood in 1849, says that his father shot many deer and timber wolves in that region and also around 274 THE WONDERS ‘OF THE DUNES Dyer, Indiana. Birds of all kinds were found there and on the great Indiana beaches also. Turkeys, prairie chicken and partridges were common, the latter coming into the yard and eating with the chickens. One day Mr. Diekman was walking on the old Lousy Ridge Road, as the pioneers called the old Chicago Road along the Glenwood Ridge to Dyer and beyond, on account of the fleas and other insects, when suddenly he was struck in the chest so sharply by a feathered thunderbolt that he was compelled to gasp for breath. It was a mother part- ridge, who had tried to protect her young ones. Mr. Diek- man watched the bird for fully a minute, as she stood there waiting for another move from him; and then seeing he was not dangerous, she tried to lead him away by the old tricks, pretending to be lame, fluttering ahead, etc. The little partridge chicks scattered on every side to escape danger. Of all the wild birds none seems more appreciated by the nature lover, the farmer, and alas! the hunter, than the cheery Bob White. He is such a sociable bird when he is not hunted, that the nature lover has a great fondness for him. The farmer has no greater friend than this bird, which eats innumerable quantities of weed seeds, caterpillars and potato bugs. While the author was standing at the little waiting room at Tremont, in June, 1917, a pair of quail were noticed picking up food along the track, not fifty feet from the station. They made a beautiful sight, with their bright fresh coloring and dainty ways. After a while they flew into the field near by and soon we heard their cheery “Bob White.’ In November, 1918, a flock of eighteen were seen BIRDS 275 just east of the Haunted House, near the Furnessville Trail. Their “Bob-White” was heard at Tremont in June, 1921. As the Virginia quail is often called partridge in some sections, it is now generally called Bob White to distinguish it from the western species of quail, or the ruffed grouse, which is generally called partridge, or in country districts, patridge. The male quail is a pugnacious little fellow who enjoys a scrap. In ancient times the Romans took advantage of this, and had great tournaments in which hundreds of them fought in mortal combat. It is said the Roman soldiers, among other mascots, carried their champion quail war- riors with them, which furnished them with their so-called “sport.” The saddest page in the history of American birds is the disappearance of the Wild Pigeon. It was formerly abundant from Hudson Bay southward to the Gulf, and west to the Great Plains, and often congregated in large flocks, which obscured the sun in their flight. They were formerly abundant in Northern Illinois, In- diana and Ohio, while in many cases they were migrants on their way to their nesting localities in Michigan, Wiscon- sin, Minnesota and Ohio. There were also many that nested in the Chicago area, from Waukegan to Michigan City, and eastward. Mr. Alvin Gale, who as a little boy lived in Sheboygan Falls, Wisconsin, from 1848, says they were there by the million; many of them flew across the lake to Michigan to nest. Sometimes vast flocks would be drowned in awful storms, as an old lake captain told the author many years ago. Their great nesting places, in the northern part of the 276 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES United States, sheltered them in vast numbers. The large trees, dead pines and oaks especially, were filled with nests, which were so crowded that the limbs would break, and many nests would be destroyed. Some pigeons would nest in Northern Illinois, including Cook County, but these were comparatively few as the pigeons preferred Northern In- diana, especially the Sand Dune region, with its great dunes covered with tall pines and oaks, shrubs and other plants, and variety of fruits, nuts, berries and seeds. Their favor- ite nesting place in the Dunes was among the pines at the foot of the Dunes from two to three miles east of Tremont, near the Furnessville Blowout, about three miles north of Chesterton, Indiana, and also around Pine, near Clark. Mr. Millard F. Green, of Tremont, told the writer that when he was a little boy, about fifty years ago, he could remem- ber seeing the vast flocks of wild pigeons that migrated through the Dune country on their way to the Michigan woods, as well as the vast numbers that nested in the Dunes themselves. Some of these flocks of pigeons were blocks in extent, and one flock was so vast that he is positive there were over a million pigeons in it. This is evidently the great flock described by Mr. Patterson, of Liverpool, Indiana. Myriads of pigeons nested in the Dunes, and Mr. Green says that he has gone many times at night with his father to the nesting and roosting places of the big pines and knocked over the birds with a club, taking them home for food. They were so common that the settlers got tired of them. They were plentiful there until about 1880, when they began to diminish rapidly. None has been recorded in the BIRDS 277 Chicago Dune region in many years, ae some people claim to have seen a few. The writer, when living at Princeton Avenue and Seven- tieth Street, Normal Park, Chicago, from 1872 to 1877, had the privilege of witnessing the migration of many birds, as the region from Englewood to South Englewood seemed to be in the migratory belt leading from Wisconsin through Illinois and Indiana. They came in the fall from the northwest and traveled toward the southeast into Indiana, where some pigeons settled in the Sand Dune region, while others went up to Michigan. Other flocks flew across the lake. Some of these flocks of pigeons were large. One, in 1874, seen by the author, at Seventy-fourth Street and the Rick Island tracks, Chicago, was over a thousand feet long, nearly that wide and at least twenty feet deep. It flew to- ward the southeast. The woods of giant oaks along the old “Michigan Road, or Holland Road, on Tolleston Ridge, ex- tending from the old Ten-Mile House, corner of Vincennes Avenue and Eighty-third Street, to the Eleven-Mile House on State Street, near Ninety-third Street, was a favorite place for the wild pigeons, as that was on their route toward the Dunes, and provided much food. The author has shot a number of wild pigeons for food. They were delicious unless an old veteran was served. Very tough. In 1874 a party of Cook County Normal School students went on a combined botanical and hunting expedition to Hog Island, near Stony Island Avenue and Seventy-sixth Street, at that time one of the most famous botanical grounds in Illinois. It was an elevated spot in the great 278 THE, WONDERS OF THE DUNES marshy region called Lake Winnemuc by the Indians, and Hog Lake by the white pioneers. Many wild pigeons were in the woods, and a number were shot by the hunters. Suddenly an awful storm came up, and a regular hurricane developed. Great trees were snapped like saplings; houses were ‘blown down; the black and livid clouds seemed to touch the trees; it became so dark that one could scarcely see his neighbor, except as the lightning flashed. The air was sultry and suffocating, highly charged with electricity, and the nerves were strongly affected. The pigeons also were very strongly and curiously affected by it. They came from the tops of the trees to the lower branches, uttering mournful cries as they flew down, finally coming down almost to the ground, seeking our protection. They were all around us. When the big trees around us began to come down and the floods to descend, it was considered the wisest plan to decamp and seek shelter in the railroad station some distance away. Doctor A. W. Brayton, the noted biologist of the Normal School, now of Indianapolis, who was botanizing a few blocks away, had enough presence of mind to lie down in a field, against a fence post, to which he clung. He said it was the worst storm he had ever seen. The cause of the extermination of the wild pigeon is easily summed up in one word—greed. They were killed for food by the early settlers; later for commercial pur- poses, being shipped to the cities and towns. Another commercial scheme helped to further the destruction, and that was collecting the eggs during the Civil War and _ shipping them to the large cities. About 1864 New York and Brooklyn, and other cities, BIRDS 279 received many millions of these pigeon eggs which were placed on the market at from ten to fifteen cents a dozen. Hens’ eggs were from seventy-five cents a dozen for store eggs, to one dollar or more a dozen for fresh eggs, and these pigeon eggs were brought in from the Northwest to compete. Most of the eggs were good, but some were very bad. Mr. Harry Eenigenberg, who lived on the old Michigan Road, near Lansing, Illinois, says that in the ’sixties and ‘seventies the pigeons were present by the millions; they nested in the big woods there, and in the Indiana Dunes. The pigeons in that region were in large numbers from 1872 to 1874, and the great flocks. of migrating birds were much larger in those years. This statement is corroborated by Messrs. John Morgan, of Chesterton, M. T. Green and J. Wheeler, of Tremont, Arthur Patterson, of Liverpool, Mayor Krueger, of Michigan City, and Mr. Andrew Diek- man, of Dolton, Illinois. The reason for this is undoubtedly the fact that the great woods of Minnesota, Wisconsin and Michigan were almost entirely burned up in 1871, and the pigeons found their nesting places gone. They accord- ingly located south of their usual homes, and settled in the Dunes, the beaches, and other localities having large trees and plenty of food. CHART ER oO) BIRDS—C ontinued OF ALL birds, the most striking, impressive and majestic is the Eagle, which includes both the Golden and the Bald Eagle. The golden eagle has dark plumage intershot with golden brown. It lives in Canada, United States, the north- ern part of Mexico, and Europe; and it is still found in Northern Illinois and Northern Indiana. One was exhibited at Palmer Park, near Pullman, in 1915, that had recently been shot in Northern Indiana, near Kouts. It swooped into a farmer’s barnyard in pursuit of a chicken, and when the farmer objected, attacked him, giving the man a fierce tussle until the son came out with a shotgun and shot the bird, wounding it. It was kept for a while, but was very savage and refused to eat, so it was killed and mounted. The golden eagle, with his plumage, his great spread of wings, from seventy-five to eighty inches, and his majestic flight, which has entitled him to the honor of being crowned the King of Birds, is a most impressive, striking bird. The great Bald or White-headed Eagle—the symbol of Ameri- can Freedom—with his splendid plumage, his stern piercing eye, his majestic, awe-inspiring presence, is still more im- pressive. One magnificent specimen in the collection of the Audubon Club, Chicago, is three feet six and three- 280 BIRDS 281 fourths inches in total length and eight feet and one and one-half inches in extent of wings. The white-headed eagle was formerly common in both Indiana and Illinois, but is gradually being killed off, though it is now protected and a heavy fine is levied for killing one, as they are beneficial birds, consuming enough destruc- tive rodents, etc., to more than pay for any young lambs, pigs or calves that they might destroy. Doctor Frank Woodruff saw a Bald Eagle as late as 1919, at Miller, In- diana, where they previously had a nest. They may still be in the Dunes near Tamarack, Indiana, but it is doubtful. The Turkey Vulture or Turkey Buzzard, with its black feathers, edged with brown, and its head and upper part of its neck naked, with the skin bright red, is a southern bird, but has been seen in the Dunes and Chicago region. It would pay nature lovers to keep an eye out for them. Doctor Woodruff saw one in 1917, near Miller. The Black Vulture, or Carrion Crow, has been seen as far north as Waukegan, Illinois; it also visits the Dunes occasionally. Many species of Hawks are found in the Dune region, the principal ones being the Marsh, Sharp-shinned, Cooper’s, Duck, Pigeon and Sparrow Hawks. The Ameri- can Osprey, or Fish Hawk, and occasionally the Swallow- tailed Kite, are also found here. The kite was noticed at Tremont on May 5, 1918. . Of all these hawks, but three can truly be classed as really destructive to poultry. They are the Sharp-shinned, Cooper’s, and the American Goshawk, and are called Accipiters. The Sharp-shinned Hawk is often called the Little Blue- 282 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES tailed Hawk, while the Cooper’s Hawk is called the Big Blue-tailed Hawk. ihe American Goshawk is a very rare winter visitor, The Big and the Little Blue-tailed Hawks are common and most destructive; they should be called the real hen hawks, as the larger ones commonly called the chicken hawks do very little damage. The little blue-tailed hawk generally attacks the young chickens and will soon destroy a brood. The Cooper’s Hawk is larger, being from fourteen to twenty inches long. The body is bluish-gray. It is found in the northern part of Illinois and Indiana. Doctor Butler says that it is the true chicken hawk and that half of its food examined by him in fall and winter, was small birds. It is the most destructive of birds. The ordinary hen hawk is very slow in getting ready to raid a poultry yard, and seldom gets a chicken; he fills up on mice and other vermin mainly; but the Accipiters, espe- cially the Cooper’s hawk, are so daring and swift that the latter has been known to fly low and suddenly dart over a wall or fence into a barnyard, seize a chicken and be off with it before the dazed farmer could recover him- self. , The American Goshawk or Goosehawk is often called the Big Blue Hen Hawk, and is from twenty-one to twenty- five inches long. Its size and strength, activity and rapacity make it a dangerous pest. Besides poultry, it eats ruffed grouse, quail, doves, rabbits and squirrels, and is often called the Partridge Hawk. He 1s fortunately a rare winter visitor. Mounted specimens of all of our hawks, prepared by Doctor Frank Woodruff, can be seen at the Chicago Acad- BIRDS 283 emy of Sciences at Lincoln Park, Chicago. They make a splendid collection. The Duck Hawk and Pigeon Hawk are true Falcone Doctor Butler says of the duck hawk, “He is the largest of the true falcons, and if the days of falconry were here, he would be considered of great value for such sport.” They are occasionally found in the Chicago Dune region. Doctor Woodruff saw a magnificent one at Liverpool, In- diana, in June, 1918. The small dashing Sparrow Hawk is found in this region. Last summer the author saw a most beautiful one. It was perched on a tree, near the Big Pines, at Furnessville Blow- out, Porter County, Indiana. It eats many smaller birds, mice, gophers, reptiles and is epecially fond of insects, which it captures in great numbers. They are chiefly beneficial and should be protected by law. It is an interesting sight to watch a kingbird chasing this hawk. The circling, doubling and twisting flight makes it very exciting. The Owls of the Dunes range in size from the small Screech Owl to the Snowy Owl, which occasionally visits us in unusually severe winters, like 1876, 1885 and 1880. The Barred Owl was formerly common, but in recent years it has become a rather uncommon resident. It is found in the more heavily wooded regions west of Chicago, and also in Northern Indiana. It is generally known as the Hoot Owl. At my summer home, at Forest Lake, Wiscon- sin, amid the trees and hills, we are favored with a number of hoot owls; they perch on the trees near the cottage, as well as in the woods around us, and their song is very common. The song goes as follows: ‘Who-who-who- who-who-who-who-trr-oo00,” giving an upward slant to 284 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES “who’—a down drop to “r-r-r,”” and an upward slant to “ooo,” giving it the same pitch as who, and also giving the last “who-rr-ooo” in a long drawling manner. The words who are repeated anywhere from two to seven times, but generally seven, before finishing with who and ooo. It sounds like a sort of stutter, with the last part sounding like, “Who are you!” Ridgway describes this hoot in a manner that one can never forget, if one has ever heard it at night in a dark woods, so dark that one could hardly see the path. “This call is far louder than the deep bass hooting of the Great Horned Owls, and is also more varied. Frequently, it is preceded by a very loud, blood-curdling shriek, causing the hair of the uninitiated to rise on his head and his knees to tremble for fear that a panther was prowling in the neigh- borhood.” It is certainly a “schrechliche” scream. The barred owl seems to be the species particularly hated by the other birds, especially the crows. Mr. Coale men- tions one in Indiana, that was attacked by a wood thrush, blue jay, gnat-catcher, great crested fly-catcher, redstart and yellow warbler, all calling and flying at it. The author has also seen that done, and especially so on the Valparaiso Moraine at Forest Lake, Wisconsin, on the road through the big woods to New Prospect. A number of birds were heard yelling and screaming around, over a dozen of them; they were attacking and reviling a barred owl that was in a tree near the roadside. Among these birds were crows, redstarts, kingbirds, vireos, Carolina wren, goldfinch, a Blackburnian warbler, and several other warblers, all busy. The feathers were flying, as the crows were especially vicious. The owl suffered its BIRDS 285 martyrdom for a while, and then flew from the tree to the deep woods, protesting deeply whenever the other birds drew blood, escorted by the two crows and a few of the other birds, while the remainder settled in the tree and held a jollification meeting. Judging from the animosity shown by the birds toward this owl, he must have been a descendant of the original sleepy guardian who failed to prevent the wren who falsely claimed the title of King of Birds, from escaping from the knot-hole in the tree to which he was chased by the indignant birds. This interesting folk story of the trial for the title of King of Birds, will be found fully described in the account of the Carolina wren, and will explain why the wren is sometimes called the King of Birds; also why the other birds assault and revile the owl. The great Snowy Owl, from twenty to twenty-seven inches long, white, with a number of transverse spots or bars of slaty brown, and a small ear tuft, is a bird that comes from the Arctic shores to visit us only in very cold winters. It has been seen in our Chicago and Dune regions, and is a very beautiful bird, being sometimes pure white, especially when old. It was seen often in the Calumet region. It is likely to visit us during any long severe winter, and was much in evidence during the long winter of 1876, when the snow in this region lasted until May, 1877. L. H. Drury, of the Prairie Club, saw a very large and fine speci- men near Drury Blowout in late November, 1919. The Woodpeckers, such as the Hairy, Downy, Red- headed Woodpecker, etc., with the exception of the Yellow- bellied Sapsucker, have a long protrusive tongue, that ends in a sharp barb, with which they catch insects, and they 280 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES can extend it into the insect burrows for some distance, after they have chiseled a road to it with their strong bills. Vhere are many in the Dunes. The Sapsucker, however, has no sharp barbed tongue, like the other woodpeckers, as he is primarily a sapsucker. His tongue has a brush at the end, which is used in brushing up sap, and incidentally any insects that may have been drowned in the sap or are attracted by it. The sapsucker also picks up any insects lying around loose. He is not only a sapsucker, but a sapwood eater, as he has been seen to dig out the sapwood and swallow it, and it has been found in his stomach. It is interesting to see him dig out sapwood and eat insects, as well as suck the sap. The holes he digs in getting sapwood fill up with sap, and so make excellent insect traps also. It is a question whether he is helpful or harmful. The Whip-poor-Will is still common in some parts of the Dunes, though quite rare in general. It nests here also. It is found in trees near Miller, Treniont and other places in that neighborhood. It is a remarkable insect eater, and has long bristles at the base of the bill to protect it from insects. It eats many of the large moths and other insects that infest woods and fields. It must not be confounded with its cousin the Night Hawk. The whip-poor-will has a round tail with white sides; chestnut and black-barred wing feathers, black chin, white throat and deeper-cleft mouth, to admit larger in- sects. The night hawk has a forked tail, the male having a white band across its tail and white band across wing. Its mouth is not so deeply cleft as the whip-poor-will. Some people BIRDS 287 consider the whip-poor-will the “female of the night hawk, because it talks so much!” What a slander! Vhe cry of the whip-poor-will has often been called solemn and prophetic. This is possibly true down south, but certainly not up north, where the weather is more bracing. Its cry is repeated about a half-dozen or more times, in quick succession; then a rest and some more. This may be kept up the whole night, and is especially objection- able about three o’clock in the morning. A giant cousin of the whip-poor-will is the Giant Goat- sucker, or Chuck-wills-Widow. All of this family of night insect-eaters are called Goatsuckers from the old-country idea that the reason they were found so much around the goats, which are the small cows of so mariy old-world peasants, was because they were trying to suck the milk from the goats. The truth was that they were trying to catch the insects that were bothering the goats. This ancient belief is what has given them the old scientific name— Caprimulgus—to this family as well as its common one— goatsucker. The giant goatsucker is also called the chuck-wills-widow from its cry. It had never been recorded in Northern Indiana and Illinois, until, on June 1, 1919, the author was fortunate enough to come across a family of giant goat- suckers or chuck-wills-widows at Tremont, a couple of blocks south of Mount Tom, near Fort Creek, while on a solitary stroll, studying the neighborhood. The goatsuckers were huddled together at the east side of a clump of oak brush. I almost stepped on this flock of two large birds, each one almost as big as a hawk with two smaller ones about two-thirds as large. They made 288 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES an interesting group, mottled something like a partridge with rusty-red, dark and light bars, and white tips. They were at first too startled to fly, then rose and divided, the female with the two smaller ones going off to the west, while the male, uttering a low chuck-chuck- chuck, flew near the ground about fifty yards to the east, where it lit under a bushy tree. Careful stalking brought ine to within forty feet of it and gave an opportunity for careful study. It was a remarkable bird, and although a stranger, was recognized at once. It resembled a giant whip-poor-will, which it practically is. It was much larger than the whip-poor-will. I followed this bird for half an hour, tracking him from spot to spot, generally getting about thirty to forty feet from him, thus having an excellent opportunity for study- ing him. It was the male bird, because the upper part of the tail feathers was white, which is not the case with the female. His feathers were mottled something like the sharp- tailed grouse. I also sketched him. His head was large and flattish, with large protuberant eyes. These were set above the very deeply-cleft mouth which was protected by long, strongly branched bristles. This bird swallows not only large moths and insects, but also small birds, as these have been found in its stomach. It has a whitish-yellow throat band, and is very full breasted, which may explain the popular name, the Dutch whip-poor-will, as given by Ridgway. Every time it got ready to fly, it uttered several notes, Chuck! chuck! chuck! It has soft feathers, and when excited, it puffed itself out, with fluffy feathers, until it looked something like a pouter pigeon. Its mouth was cleft beyond its eyes. Its BIRDS 289 wings were a foot long, and the bird, which gave me the opportunity five times of seeing it fly, had a wing stretch of two feet. Some stuffed ones that Doctor Woodruff has at the Chicago Academy of Sciences measure fully two feet from tip to tip of wings when fully expanded. Doctor Butler says that its northern limit was near Vin- cennes, Knox County, Indiana. Doctor Ridgway says that the northern limit in Ilinois was in Richland County, near Mount Carmel, which is west of Vincennes. Doctor A. W. Brayton tells me he has seen it near Indianapolis. The unusually hot, dry summer of I919 is undoubtedly what caused this pair of chuck-wills-widows to fly so far north. The Humming Bird, with its exquisite coloring and artis- tic nest, is one of our most valued summer residents. It is a pleasure to see this bird, like a butterfly, hovering with pulsating wings whose vibrations are so rapid that they are barely perceptible, before an open flower, with its long needle-like bill protruding to its base, extracting the deli- cious nectar. It is a brave little warrior, and care must be taken that it does not injure one’s eyes, as instances are known of its piercing a person’s face, when the latter tried to examine the beautiful little nests, ornamented with lichens, and con- taining two white eggs the size of peas. The most numerous order of birds is the Passeres, or Perching Birds. It includes many families from the tiny Wren to the great Northern Raven, twenty-five inches long. It includes all of the warblers, sparrows, jays, as well as numerous other families. One of the most interesting is the Kingbird. They are fly-catchers, and are absolutely fearless, fearing nothing in 290 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES the feathered line. They are very noisy and quarrelsome. Their special enemy seems to be the crow. It is a common sight in crow country to see kingbirds pursuing crows, and to hear the crows squawk when an unusually vigorous dig draws blood and takes out one or more feathers. The Phoebe is still a common resident here, and is well known. ‘The usual cry, “Phoebe,” is often heard. It evi- dently likes to nest under a bridge, or similar locality, espe- cially over a stream, as insects are frequent there. The Wood Pewee is a common resident here, and is like a smaller, refined edition of the phoebe, with whom it is often confounded. Its cry is a sad, plaintive pe-a-wee,— pee-wee—much different from the rough cry of the phoebe. The pewee prefers to live in high dry woods, and it builds a most beautiful little nest of fine plant fibers carefully woven together; over this is placed beautiful lichens, so that it resembles a large humming bird’s nest. Among the Crow family are the Ravens, Crows, Jays and Magpies, all of which frequented this region in earlier times. The American Magpie was formerly a visitor here, according to Kennicott, who states that it and its cousin, the Blue Jay, who is one of the same sort, are seldom found together in the same place. No one place is large enough for two such noisy quarrelsome birds. The Blue Jay is very bold, noisy and beautiful, and despite its many bad qualities gives a charm to the land- scape. It is a thief, murderer and cannibal, as it will steal and eat eggs from other birds, and has been frequently seen to kill and eat young birds. It has a raucous, unpleasant call, something like that of a woodpecker and also like that of its cousin, the ubiquitous crow. BIRDS 291 The Crow is preeminently the bird of the country; a born thief and schemer, and brainy withal! Who that knows crows has not some admiration for this rascal, even while he is exasperated at his thievery. There are many in the Dunes. Formerly there was an immense crows’ headquarters of thousands at the Big Pines. The farmer may be compelled to replant his corn several times, because these canny critters will be out at work at three o’clock in the morning in flocks, and quickly dig up and devour the grain that the hard-working farmer has planted the day before, and who did not know that soaking his corn in kerosene or liquid tar makes it so distasteful to the crow that he will seldom eat it; it does not hurt the corn. The farmer, in desperation, may pack a gun with him that day, but never a crow can be seen, except at a distance. If he leaves his gun at home, these unusually keen-eyed birds see that things look normal again and decide to take a chance, and remain to see where the new feeding- ground is to be planted. Righteous retribution. Crow squab, under the name of Italian Woodcock, is now being tried in some Chicago restaurants. It is said to be good. Sometimes the crow has been seen to catch and eat little chickens, and to go into the henhouse and suck the eggs. This has been told the author in a number of cases. Miss Catherine Siewers, of Chicago, while motoring near Hobart, Indiana, in May, 1921, saw a big crow deliberately swoop down on a flock of little chicks, seize one in its bill, and fly away with it. Most of these flesh-eating crows seem to be in Indiana. Why? Colonel Moorhead and Senator Buchanan, of the Indiana State Senate, say they have seen 292 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES crows catch and eat baby chickens and also go into hen- houses and eat eggs. The crow is not only cunning; he shows actual reasoning, as every observer of crow life has noted. The most strik- ing case of such reasoning that I know of happened at Forest Lake, Wisconsin, many years ago. While sitting one spring day on the porch of my cottage with Professor John H. Loomis, of Chicago, viewing the little lake from the top of a high hill, we saw three crows fly to a small knoll near the lake. As the trees were not yet in leaf, we had an excellent view from behind the screens. ‘The largest one had the other two stand in a cleared place, apparently watching them. ‘To our amazement, the two birds sprang forward, and fought bitterly, the feathers flying, while the big one circled around, looking at them. It seemed a regular duel, with the big one as the referee. After a while the smaller bird began to scream in a most awful manner, much like a rooster that is suddenly seized, only louder, and more raucous, and with a long drawn-out scream that was peculiarly agonizing. After hearing this for a short time, the big crow stepped forward and punished the other crow, by pecking him vigorously. They again went ahead, fighting viciously, with feathers flying from both birds. Soon the larger crow must have hit the smaller one below the belt again, for the latter suddenly set up another agonized howl that was even worse than the first. At this the referee stepped forward and gave the aggressor an unmerciful drubbing, the feathers flying in all directions. When he thought that the culprit had been sufficiently punished, he stepped back, and they tried it again for several minutes, fighting furiously; then, the BIRDS 293 smaller found he could not stand the gaff and suddenly flew off around the big hill, with his antagonist and the referee in hot pursuit. A short time after, a crow came slowly winging its way to a hickory tree on this same little knoll, and spent a long time preening his feathers, and undoubtedly licking his wounds, which, owing to his savage fight, must have been deep and numerous. I had seen and studied crows—thousands of them—as a boy, in the Westchester hills near New York City, and also many thousands more in different states. My relatives for many generations had lived in crow country. I never before had seen or heard anything like this. My amaze- ment, however, was as nothing compared with that of Professor Loomis. He had been brought up in Michigan as a boy; had been intimate with Chief Simon Pokagon, of the Pottawottomie Indians; had lived with these Indians for months at a time; was also of old Colonial stock; but he said that he had never heard of such reasoning by crows; and the Indians, who are so full of such wonderful folk- _ tales of beast and bird, never spoke of any such doings while training him in their folk lore about the crows and other birds and animals. They considered the crow and the fox the most cunning of all creatures. This duel of the crows occurred exactly as recorded, and for years was so described by both Professor Loomis and the author, two observers, trained to study nature very closely. There is no “nature fake’ about it. Two explana- tions have been given by naturalists, farmers and nature lovers in general. First, it may have been a regular duel of two males, with an experienced male to act as referee. 294. THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES Second, the duel may have been fought to get possession of the third crow, who may: have been a female; the winner to take the female, as is the usual custom in all animal life. What is your opinion? The Northern Raven, the big cousin of the crow, is an occasional visitor in the Chicago Dune region. One was seen near Waverly Beach in the summer of 1919. The Bobolink is one of our favorite song birds, being found chiefly in the prairies and meadows. Its music is sweet and rippling and its caroling as it flutters down from on high is one of ecstatic joy. When fall comes, it migrates toward the South, dropping its gay plumage; it is called the Reed Bird in the great swamps of the South and Rice Bird where that is found or cultivated. It winters in South America. The Blackbirds are still found in great numbers in the - Dunes, the Red-winged or Soldier Blackbird especially. The Yellow-Headed Blackbird once nested in vast numbers in the Calumet and Dune marshes, but is now very rare. In fact, in most localities it has disappeared. The Meadow Lark, with its striped coat of brown and gray, and its yellow breast, is a familiar friend. Its flute- like whistle as it sings from the grass, fence or tree is most cheerful. It is a harbinger of real spring. One of the rarest and most interesting birds that visit our Chicago Dune region is the Mocking Bird. Mr. Coale saw one in Chicago in 1876. Doctor J. Hancock, notified Doctor Woodruff that he saw a mocking bird in splendid plumage in the south end of South Park in April, 1902. As the weather was quite warm at that time, it undoubtedly attracted the mocking bird. BIRDS 295 In May, 1905, Doctors Frank Woodruff and Frank C. Baker observed a pair of mocking birds in the line of thickets just east of the first ridge of dunes at Miller, Indiana, but did not disturb them, hoping that they might nest and breed there. In June, 1876, I was botanizing in some low woods near Wentworth Avenue and Seventy-first Street, Chicago. While sitting under a tree, whistling, and looking over my plants, | heard a bird in a tree about fifty feet away singing very melodiously and using a great variety of tones, among them some of the strains I was whistling. It sounded like a mocking bird, but owing to its extreme rarity, that did not seem possible. As it was hid by the leaves, its identity could not be determined. I continued to whistle, giving a little at a time, and the bird responded with the same tune. After a short time, in which the strain was lengthened to a full line, the bird became so interested that it flew to a tree about twenty- five feet away, and perched on a branch in plain sight. It was a genuine mocking bird, with ashy-brown back, whitish breast, large whitish patches on its wings, and black legs and bill. It was very much excited and was determined to outsing its rival and for about an hour it gave one of the most delightful musical treats ever presented. After whistling something for it, the mocking bird would repeat it with variations that were fascinating, besides giving imitations of the songs of other birds. It was enchanting, and the sight of the songster, filled with enthusiasm, pouring out such brilliant melody was most inspiring. Unfortunately, after he had been at it for nearly an hour, some one came 296 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES through the woods near the place, and startled the mock- ing bird, who flew away. It has been occasionally seen not only at Miller, but also at other parts of the Dunes, which with its southern trees and plants, and sheltered glens, offers a splendid and congenial place for the mocking bird. One of the most sociable and interesting families is that of the Wrens, ranging from the friendly little House Wren to the larger Carolina Wren. The saucy little house wren, with its familiar habit of calling at the house and selecting a nice convenient place in which to build its nest, is familiar to all of us. His trust, self-confidence, yes, nerve, have made him a member of the household of every farm-house, and many homes in the town and city. It is still found in our region, but in greatly diminished numbers, and seems to be the Western House Wren. But the rarest, and, next to the house wren, the most interesting, is the Carolina Wren; often called the Mock- ing Wren. This is the largest of the wrens, from five and a half to six inches long. It is noted for its loud, cheerful whistle, which, according to Ridgway, in The Birds of Illinois, can be heard for a half-mile. Butler, in his Birds of Indiana, says he has heard it for over a quarter of a mile. It is common in Southern Indiana, but very rare indeed in Northern Indiana. Mrs. John V. Farwell says that she heard one at Lake Forest in I9g00, and it sounded like cher-o-kee, and could be heard for a quarter-mile. The author found one at Tremont, Indiana, in June, 1917, the first time it was recorded in the Dunes, while coming from the Dunes on to the Valparaiso Road. A loud musical song was heard from some distance toward the south, and BIRDS 297 it had the sound of the robin’s song, as is mentioned by Ridgway and also by Dayton, and just as I have heard it at Forest Lake, Wisconsin. The notes kept getting louder and louder, with a rich, clear whistle, until the bird was located on the electric wire in front of the station at Tre- mont, on the South Shore Electric Railroad. He was very tame and kept up his song for fifteen min- utes, resting every little while. He had several styles, pretty well described by Doctor Butler, but the chief one was cher-o-wee! given in a loud cheery tone that was heard nearly a half-mile away. My presence not more than twenty feet away did not disturb it in the least. It gave an even longer entertainment the next day. It had a nest near there which was discovered under the milk platform by Miss Frieda Janssen of the Prairie Club, and it was not afraid of visitors, entertaining them while his wife kept house. This bird, with its loud tone and confident air, acted as if it were a direct descendant of that original wren that claimed the title of “King of Birds.’’ This story is one of the old, interesting Teutonic folk stories, and was told me by a very intelligent Hollander, Mr. Cornelius Kuyper, of Roseland, Chicago, near Pullman, who was a great author- ity on the old Teutonic Myths, and a very keen observer of plant and animal life. The birds quarreled so greatly as to who should be king that a convention of all the birds was called. The eagle claimed the title as he was the strongest and fiercest. After several methods of selecting the king were discussed, it was finally decided that the bird who flew the highest should be chosen king. All of the birds tried, but it finally nar- rowed down to the eagle and the hawk. 298 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES At last the eagle was victorious, and soared above in triumph, screaming that he was king, as he had beaten all the other birds. Suddenly, to his surprise, he heard a voice say “No, you’re not; I can beat you!” and up from his shoulders, where he had been hiding, sprang a tiny wren, who flew high above the eagle, and caroled in a very loud ringing voice, “I am the King! I have flown the highest! I am the King!” The eagle was so enraged at this treachery, that he tried to catch the wren, but failed. Some of the other birds heard the boast of the tiny wren, and soon it became known to them all; they became so indignant that they pursued and tried to kill it. It was too lively for them, but was finally surrounded in a wood, and was compelled to crawl into a tiny knot-hole for safety. To make sure that it would not escape, they selected the owl, on account of his large eyes, and told him, on peril of his life, to keep good watch, and not let the wren escape. They then voted and elected the eagle as King of the Birds. As it was then dusk the owl kept an excellent watch over the wren, and also during the long dark night. When morn- ing came, with its bright light, the owl was dazed and was unable to see clearly. The lively little wren, taking ad- vantage of this, quickly escaped. It was soon found out by the other birds, and they hurried to the place where the owl was, reviled and even attacked him bitterly for what they called his gross carelessness in allowing the wren to escape. Since that time the birds have inherited that same an- tipathy to the owl, especially the barred owl, for his negli- gence in allowing the wren to escape in those days; and BIRDS 299 whenever the owl ventures out in the daytime, the other birds in the neighborhood gather around him, deride and attack him, making the feathers fly, and making his life miserable. The wren, who was the real culprit, does not seem to have been molested, while the poor warder seems to have received all the blame. This kind of judgment does not seem to be confined to birds! The Brown Thrasher, or Brown Thrush, as it is com- monly called by the people of the country-side, is a large bird, with a long tail. It is a bright reddish-brown, with white breast, ornamented with lines of black spots extending up and down its sides. It is also called the French Mocking Bird, as its song is so full and musical that some people prefer it to that of the true mocking bird. It is not a mimic, but has polished and rounded out its own song until it is a joy to the ear, and is somewhat similar to the musical song of the catbird. The Indigo Bunting, a small blue bird, is a common summer resident here. It is a sweet songster; the male puts in a great part of its time singing, the tones resembling those of a canary. It is a small, dainty, real Blue Bird. The Scarlet Tanager is a common summer resident, breeding in our region. It is a gorgeous bird, the male being bright scarlet, with black wings and tail. It is not quite so large as the Cardinal. The Summer Tanager, often called the Redbird, on account of its rosy red plumage, is also found in our district. Its song is sweeter than that of the scarlet tanager. The Song Sparrow is a common resident and is noted for its pleasing song. It is probably the best known and liked 300 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES of all the sparrows. The Fox Sparrow is a common mig- rant; is rather large and attractive. The Towhee or Che- wink is also rather large for a sparrow, and resembles a robin. The Cardinal is a most beautiful bird, with bright red plumage, striking red crest and large bill, like that of its cousin, the grosbeak. It is a very fine singer, and this, combined with its splendid plumage, and amiable nature, makes it one of the favorite song birds of the country. It is also a great insect eater. It is a southern bird, but comes north to Canada. They are found sometimes in the winter in Duneland, where they are sheltered by the dunes and pine forests, finding plenty of food, such as all kinds of berries, seeds, etc. This makes them all-the-year residents. Some were found at Tremont during the cold, snowy winter of 1920. There are many of them in the spring at Tre- mont. ‘Their song is loud and cheery. The song of one male as studied carefully in 1919 sounded greaily like “Beat it! Beat it! Beat it!’ She did not, however. The Rose-breasted Grosbeak, a cousin of the cardinal, is a most beautiful bird, with its black and white regalia, orna- mented with rose on breast and wings; unlike the cardinal, it has not a crest. It has almost as charming a song as the cardinal. One of the prettiest, most musical and most beneficial of all our families of birds is the Warblers. They embrace many songsters and live largely on insects. They can be seen and heard everywhere, but especially in the woods and underbrush. The most beautiful of all is the Blackburnian, with its crown, sides of head, its throat and its breast in- tense reddish orange, ornamented with black and white AdVOSGNV'T ANA AVITINVYA VY i) Pet a Oe : * ae a. | | Mc | | ; : * : P alts Wantee SS P ; o : > % 7 - . ‘Jo : sa , - ee : 5 ee ae peas on 7 - a . cy a ’ : - ~ wo - rs . a Lad : ‘ » only i i re S4 s Pa Sa) i BIRDS 301 stripes. It does not appear to nest in the Dunes, but I have found it nesting at Forest Lake, Wisconsin, south of Fond du Lac, in July. The Yellow Warbler is also known as the Summer Yel- low Bird. It wears a yellow suit, striped on the sides with reddish-brown, and is a welcome visitor in gardens and orchards. The Prothonotary Warbler is a striking little bird, with its whole head and breast a vivid orange yellow, and its back yellowish olive. In fact, all of the warblers are pretty with different markings, and very interesting. The Redstart or Redtail, as the name signifies, is a most beautiful bird, with its black and red uniform, the six large red spots on tail and wings being very vivid. About 1880 a very large wave of them emigrated here in the Chicago Dune region from the South. Since then they are much more common than before. One of the prettiest and most interesting birds found in our region is the Oriole, both the Orchard and the Balti- more Oriole. The Orchard Oriole has a chestnut and black suit and is much rarer than the Baltimore, nesting occasionally around the orchards. The Baltimore oriole, which has a livery of orange and black, the colors of Lord Baltimore, is a common summer resident, and like its cousin, the orchard oriole, is fond of mankind, building nests near the house. | While the nest of the orchard oriole is a beautiful cup- shaped one, placed between the forks of a branch, that of the Baltimore oriole is a hanging one like a pocket, swinging from a supporting limb, and is often ornamented with pieces of colored yarn or fine ribbon that are given them. Of all the birds that are found in the Dunes one of the 302 THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES smartest-looking 1s the Tufted Titmouse or Sugar Bird, as it is commonly called, because it is found so frequently around the sugar camps in the spring. It is a cousin of the Chickadee, but larger, and also gives a “de-de-dee,”’ be- sides a clear whistle, like Peter-Peter; is sometimes called the Peter Bird. It is ashy above, whitish below, with brownish sides, blending together beautifully. The head has a conspicuous flattish crest, and black forehead. This gives it a particularly smart, trig appearance. When perched upright, it seems like a soldier standing at attention. In December, 1918, the author saw a flock of two dozen of them at Tremont, near the Hermitage, and studied them for fifteen minutes. At times they seemed as if on parade, they were so erect and soldierly. Reed’s picture of them in his book on birds is very life-like. The Catbird, which is sometimes called the English Mock- ing Bird, is an abundant summer resident of the Dunes as well as the Chicago region, arriving the last of April and departing early in October. It has a dark-gray suit orna- mented with a black cap and a chestnut red patch at the base of its tail. It is found all over the United States and is popular for its beautiful song, its repeated mews like a cat and its sociable ways. It will follow one through the woods for some distance, mewing and calling, generally at nesting time, trying to scare off a dangerous intruder. Mr. Andrew Diekman, of Dolton, ear Thornton, Illinois, states that about 1900 a pair of catbirds built a nest among some thorn trees about five blocks from his house near Thorn Creek, in a beautiful region of the Tolleston Ridge, near the Indiana Dunes. One day, while going to visit the nest, he observed the two birds carrying something. On BIRDS 303 going nearer, he saw it was a small snake about fifteen inches long. One bird had it by the head and the other by the tail, using teamwork to carry it. It had been so badly pecked it was helpless. When they reached the thorn tree, where their nest was, to the amazement of Mr. Diekman, they began to fasten the snake to one of the sharp thorns. The bird that had the snake by the head placed its neck against a sharp thorn and pulled it strongly and the bird holding the tail also pulled; in spite of its struggles they succeeded in crucifying the snake, so that the thorn went completely through it, making a more thorough job than even the Butcher Bird does. It was a remarkable exhibition. A day or two later Mr. Diekman told a friend about it, Doctor Doepp, who was an old settler and also a keen naturalist, and he scoffed at such a story. On being invited to see the snake hanging up, they went to the thorn tree, when they surprised the birds bringing home another snake, using similar teamwork, one at the head and the other holding the snake near the tail. They put the neck of the snake, just back of the head, against the sharp thorn, and by pushing and pulling succeeded in impaling the snake. The doctor was amazed, and said he had never seen the like before; but, as he had now seen this wonderful feat per- formed, he was convinced. Mr. Diekman said that these catbirds were tireless snake hunters, and during their nesting season had captured and crucified eleven snakes on the thorn tree on which their nest was situated. Question: 1. Were these snakes hung up there for food, as is often the case of the Butcher Bird? 2. From natural enmity? 3. Or were they put up there to scare the other snakes from the vicinity of the nest? The occur- 304. THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES rence was an actual fact. Mr. Diekman was a teacher and is a trained observer. He is the historian of that region. The Blue Gray Gnatcatcher, also called the Blue Wren, is a little bird that visits us during the spring from the last of April to the last of May, returning in the fall from the middle of August to the middle of September. It is a wonderful insect catcher. Its nest is made up of fibers, cobwebs and fine wool, and, like those of the humming bird and pewee, is adorned with handsome lichens, forming a nest that is said by some artists to be even more beautiful than that of the humming bird. The Thrushes form a family of birds that are both beau- tiful and musical. Of these the Wood Thrush and Hermit Thrush are the most musical. The wood thrush is the larg- est of the tree thrushes and its tones are very rich and flute- like. The hermit thrush is smaller than the wood thrush and is considered a remarkable musician. Its song is much like that of the wood thrush, but more varied and not so powerful. _ | The American Robin is familiar to everybody and is probably the most popular bird in the country. Its bright reddish-brown breast made it look so home-like to the Pilgrims that they called it Robin Red Breast in honor of the English Red Breast. The Blue Bird, with the upper parts of its body blue, and throat and upper breast brownish-red, looks as it were a cross between the indigo bird and the robin. It is a very cheerful and sociable bird, living in holes of trees and fence posts; in orchards, or about barns or buildings. It has a pleasant musical song. It is a harbinger of spring, and is considered the favorite bird of the country children, BIRDS 305 as the robin is of the city children. The blue bird seems to be decreasing in numbers. : For the protection of birds, and also for ourselves, cats should be brought under control, as they kill the birds that otherwise would devour the insects that now devour our crops, and thus harm us. These pests can be brought under control in the town and cities by levying a tax upon them just as we now do with dogs. If the cat is a fine one, and there are many such, it is worth paying a tax for it; if not, and the great majority of cats are not worth it, they should be eliminated as soon as possible, as they kill more birds in cities and towns than all other causes put together. Many bird lovers, especially those of the Prairie Club and Audubon Society have kept records of the birds found in the Dunes with date of arrival, description, etc. The fol- lowing list, which gives many of the leading birds, has been compiled by Mrs. Gertrude S. Walker, a member of both the Prairie Club and the Audubon Society, with the assist- ance of other observers: S. R.—Summer Resident. W. R.—Winter Resident. A, Y.—AIll Year. Approximate Bird Arrival Size Description Bittern, American ...... April 25, 30 238 ” Yellowish brown; long legs. ithe PHCASt \'s\. «s.« «/s's April 25, 30 14 ” Yellowish brown; long legs. Blackbird, Red-Winged, ety) Ee OP Aaa a Sa eralen=’ © March 20, 20 93” Black; red spots on wings. Blackbird, Yellowish- HER CEC eam ite! aie sie, a's! March 1, 20 10%” Body black; head and chest yel- low. EMG DEG Sa Wes csi ls: 0's 1 March 1, 20 64” Blue; chestnut spot below. EGON Ris vs sc) s 606 April 1, 20 74” Black below. Yellow and _ white above. Bunting, Indigo, S. R...May LO 52” Indigo blue; wings and tail black- ish. Bunting, Snow, S. R.... Winter rare 7” White; yellowish on wings and tail. 306 S. R.—Summer Resident. W. Approximate Bird Arrival Size Buzzard, Turkey, S. R., Woodruff-Green ...... Very rare 380 7 Cardinal A. Y.........eApril-November 8 ” Catbird, Ss. Re eeoc5aeeee May 143 10 8-9 uA Chewink. ScaRe sie oe SDT LO, LO 83” Chickadee—Black Car KWAbR Wises dae g 53 ” Chickadee, Hudsonian ...Very rare Mrs. Walker Syalle Sieh Leh Chat, Yellow breasted. .May ae 13 73” Chuck-wills-Widow ..... Very rare iby yy (Found at Tremont by G. A. Brennan. First time recorded north of Indianapolis. ) June 19, 1919 Cowbirdy asa eval cule o March 10, 20 Si Creeper, Brown, S. R...‘April 1, 10, 6 7 Coot or Mud Hen, S. R.May, June, July 15 ” Orow, AD oss civeds oe March 1, 15 19 ” Crow, Carrion S., Visi- tor (Black Vulture) very rare Woodruff-Green Crane, Sandhill, 24 ” S. R. very rare—Woodruff..June, 1919 AAR Cross-bill, American Winter visitor....... 6” Cuckoo, Black-billed, Re Me, Pater: May 10, 20 12” Cuckoo, Yellow-billed, Sy RO eae cicces etstelabelets aay LO, 20 el? Dickcissel’ FAMON y foes ek 63” Dove, Mourning, S. R...May Ths Sey mle te Duck, Amer. Merganser, Canvasback—Wood Duck, Mallard, S. R. we Marechal 0-20 seo 32 April 22-29 . Pintail—Teal, Red- heads foteisiees whavevela oLeis March 10, 20 24 ” Eagle, Bald, A. Y.— Rare now. Woodruff —Atwood ........ ane long, 34-43 ” spread, 90 ” R.—Winter Resident. THE WONDERS OF THE DUNES A. Y.—All Year. Description Chestnut-brown. Head red, naked. Bright red with blunt bill. Top- knot. Slate gray; tail. Black above; reddish-brown sides. Chestnut patch under Ashy gray; black throat and cap. Crown and back brownish. Above olive green; below bright yellow. Mottled rusty red, black and white, large mouth extending back Of eye. Dull brownish-black. Brown; streaked with white. Color, slaty; toes with flaps. Black. Black head naked; black. Gray. Top of head naked; red. Body red; wings black. Bill crossed to pick out pine seeds. Olive gray; white below; bill black. Olive gray; white below; lower bill yellow. Yellow, white, gray; black throat patch. Above fawn; below pinkish. Head dark green, back black; wings white with black band. Head green, white collar; black and brown. Blackish-brown, Head and tail white. BIRDS S. R.—Summer Resident. Approximate Bird Arrival Finch, Purple ictee site ADIL Ee a0 IC Ker meee icleis cic e's ele ADIil 10520 Flycatcher, Great CresteGsus.ol..c.e oes April 10 Flycatcher, Acadian, SEA? Aa LS AP Flycatcher, Least, S. Ie Ae a -April 20, 30 Flycatcher, Blue Gray, BPMN sis ses sexe s.eeApril 20, 30 Goldfinch, Amer., S. R.. May ae oa Ws Goose, Canada, A. Y. March 14-Nov. April 27 Grackle, Bronzed, S. R. March 15, 25 Grebe, Pied, S. R..... May 2, June-April 27, Grosbeak, Evening, W. RELATING) nig ws 0 0-0 7- Grosbeak, Pine, W. R. a ICHT OM elses ce ele eis ¢ Grosbeak- Rose-breasted, May aye cake aan Funhouse Grouse, Sharp-tailed (Discovered and identi- fied by G. A. Brennan. First time recorded in Indiana; also seen by W oodford, Robinson, Steward, Ormes, Leeg- water and Leonard.) Very rare. eevee eeee April, Sept. 1915 Grouse, Ruffed, S. R.... March-April, September Gull, Herring, A. Y..... Hawk, Red-shouldered, Hawk Red-tailed, S. R.. Hawk, Sparrow, S. R....March 20, 30 10”-11 Heron, Little Blue, S. R. W. R.—wWinter Resident. 82” Olive; 54” Brown 38 ” 13 ” Bronze; blue-green head. 133” Brownish-black. 24”-25 307 A, Y.—dAIl Year. Size Description 63” Streaked purplish-brown above; lighter below. 123” Black crescent on cinnamon breast; red spot on head. cinnamon tail and feathers; yellowish below. crest; throat and _ breast white; green and yellow tinge; blue and white wings. 3” Olive gray; two wing bars. wing 43” Blue gray white below. 534” Yellow black crown, tail and wings. Grayish brown; black neck; white throat. Whitish white bill, black ring. breast; ” Large bill; dusky olive; with some yellow and black. ” Slate gray, washed with dull rose- red. 83” Black and white; rose red spot on breast. ” Tail long, pointed; yellowish brown; sprinkled with black below. ” Reddish brown; spotted, crested and ruffed. ” Gray above; white below. ” Above reddish brown; below buff ; streaked. ” Above dark brown; below whitish. Wide spreading tail, rusty red. ” Brown, barred with reddish brown. ” Dark slaty blue. 308 S. R.—Summer Resident. Approximate Bird Arrival Heron, Great Blue, S. R. Humming Bird, Ruby- throated, S. R.......May Jaeger, Pomarine— Size 42 ” 19, 22 33” Very rare, Woodruff. .October. Lark, Prairie-horned, Soar Re atbieeie aie siete co cies Larch 120 (eS Lark, Meadow, S. R.....March 25 103” JAY oth IME AH Movi telnet i is Weak Jonco, 8. Ba Gade aks Mare tye oe. Kildeerte Sai Racscrersis eteiers We Kine pind ass mtv etc ets . May TSE O Suz Kingfisher, (Ss Ries « i oe : ; 4 A va y oh We) NA r ‘ r - 1% f \ wf Fise & 5 i ‘ \ ‘ , 4 war ur t WA. i 4 } ea 1 ; . { a : Hi y at an ‘ ‘ * ’ | a 1% ‘ i f . s ' . 4 ! ! ‘ i 2 Fi 7 a ; ve oe t ‘ ’ . : : ‘ ‘ ' + i io ' : j ‘ 4 o } i ‘ i * ‘ ( 7 Oy } eo ee ' i f i A ‘ ‘ ‘ iit i "ny i j | ” ‘ v i ‘ \ ‘ ’ P r A ' i ; } “4 l ‘ bal rit , Ae? i? ji } : 7 Ay f Foun i ’ 1 ep Fad / Te vi Te te j F t pay | ; By. na S| i } f Gt Sa a) 3 rf | ¥ roa 7 “at Dh a , ) fi aye ‘ork ad t E vf oe Spain “? Tit UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS-URBANA