Iron and stell fabrication west of Chicago was an extension of the steel and
iron industry in the greater Chicago area. The big jumps for this industry in
the mid nineteenth century was the fabrication first of nails and then barbed
wire in DeKalb, Sterling and Batavia. The expansion of the machine tool and
instrument making firms throughout the Fox River Valley dated from the birth of
the telegraph instrument making firms, all generally financed by lawyers and
bankers (some from Ottawa, most from Chicago) and the moving into the area of
businessmen and skilled instrument makers from New England and Germany (The
Elgin National Watch and Clock Company). One of the big names in the Batavia
area was the Aero-motor company that pioneered thesteel frames for agricultural
windmills (and whose successor firm headquartered in Arkansas builds most of
the frames for cellular phone towers). Once one firm got started, the business
community including bankers felt comfortable with that type of firm and
understood the operations enough to haveconfidence in making the necessary
building funds and operating loans available. The best books on steel and iron
are older books on coal, iron and steel in Illinois, mostly published in the
1920s and available through university or college libraries.
The number of stockyards and cattle and pig operations along both the CB&Q and
the CRI&P made the area from Plano west into Iowa big in the agricultural
production of hogs and steers. By 1890 northern Illinois agriculture was almost
entirely a corn and feed lot economy, with dairies along the closein lines to
Chicago. Still the best book on Illinois Ag history is Alan Bogue's From
Prairie to Cornbelt.
>>> mmatalis@s... 04/13/01 08:26PM >>>
While this doesn't apply to all situations, in many cases you have a
situation of a people working at a successful industry basically saying
"Hey, I can do this myself!" and setting up shop in the very same town, and
they in turn begat others.
Mike Matalis
Downers Grove, IL
mmatalis@s...
-----Original Message-----
From: qutlx1@a... [mailto:qutlx1@a...]
Sent: Thursday, April 12, 2001 9:49 PM
To: brhslist@yahoogroups.com
Subject: [BRHSlist] Unique locations
The discussion of Mendota shippers raises another question. What was unique
about Mendota that there were/are so many feed shippers? Fasco
Feeds,FS,Swift,Continental all are reported to be feed mixers/mfgs.So what
is
special about Mendota to attract that industry in such volume?
For that matter why did Aurora have so many office furniture,shelving and
locker mfgs? Lyon Metal,All Steel,Aurora Steel Products,etc,etc? Or how
about
bearing mfgs? Aurora Bearings,Berry Bearing,Stephenson Adamson,etc,etc? Or
earth moving equip mfgs,Barber Green,Cat,Austin Western?
Leo
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