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Ridge Historical Society

Carol Flynn

School Series – Profile 2: Percy Julian

This is the second in our series on people who have schools in a Ridge community named for them.

“In a nuclear world where time is of the essence in reaching a solution to the problems of conflicts between groups, peoples, and nations, we either rededicate ourselves to the principles that, though oft unheeded, have urged us on to the “everlasting right way,” or we shall hasten the destruction of civilization.” – Dr. Percy Julian, at a conference on human relations, Highland Park, IL

Percy Lavon Julian (1899-1975) made the above statement in 1962, over 50 years ago. He might have been speaking of today.

Percy Julian was a brilliant research scientist. During his lifetime, he received over 130 chemical patents. He was inducted into the National Academy of Sciences in 1973. This was a break-through – he was the first African American chemist to receive this honor.

Dr. Julian was a pioneer in the chemical synthesis of medicinal drugs from plants. He worked with the Calabar bean, a poisonous legume from Africa, that offered up a treatment for glaucoma. He isolated soy protein which could be used to replace more expensive milk protein in many applications. He synthesized human hormones, progesterone, estrogen, and testosterone, from soy sterols, leading to fertility and other therapies. In 1949, researchers at Mayo Clinic showed the effectiveness of cortisone in treating rheumatoid arthritis. Julian improved the process for producing cortisone, greatly reducing costs.

Through all of this, he dealt with racism and discrimination because he was African American.

Julian was born in Montgomery, Alabama, at the turn of the last century. His grandparents were emancipated slaves; the Civil War had ended just 34 years before.

Obtaining an education was difficult. There were few opportunities for black students. He was accepted at DePauw University in Indiana, but he was not allowed to live in the dorm. The boarding house he found refused to feed him at the table with the other boarders. He went for days without food before he found a place that would serve him. He was years behind the white students academically and he took high school classes at night to catch up while attending college classes during the day. Despite all of this, he graduated first in his class and was valedictorian.

Julian yearned for a doctorate in chemistry. He received a scholarship that allowed him to earn his master’s degree at Harvard University. However, because white students objected to being taught by a black instructor, he was refused a teaching assistantship that would have allowed him to go on for a Ph.D.

He was later awarded a fellowship to the University of Vienna, Austria, and earned his Ph.D. in 1931. In Europe, he was welcomed into a social and intellectual life he was denied in the U.S. He studied classical music and poets. He attended the opera and drank wine at outdoor cafes. His status as a prized student allowed him to develop self-confidence. He made life-long friends in the European community. He helped Jewish friends escape the Holocaust and move to the U.S.

Back home in the States, employment proved difficult. He took a position teaching at Howard University, the historically black university in Washington, D.C. There he met his future wife, Anna Roselle Thompson. Anna was a scholar in her own right and would have many accomplishments in her life.

He accepted a research fellowship at DePauw, and his career as a research scientist began. However, he was denied a teaching professorship there and had to find new employment. The university told him "the time wasn't right" for a black professor. DuPont offered a job to his research partner at DePauw, who was white, but declined to hire Julian, apologizing that the company was “unaware he was a Negro.”

In 1936, he was offered a job at the Glidden Company as director of research of their soy products division in Chicago. He had contacted them previously to obtain soybean oil to use for experiments. An important factor in the job offer was that he could speak German fluently and the company had just purchased a soybean-processing plant in Germany.

Glidden was founded in 1875 as the maker of varnishes and expanded into other chemicals and pigments. The company was eventually taken over by conglomerate PPG Industries and Glidden is now the brand name of the paint division.

Julian took the job with Glidden and moved to Chicago. He stayed with Glidden until 1953. During this time, he did much of his remarkable research work.

Percy Julian was named Chicagoan of the Year by the Chicago Sun-Times in 1950. That same year, Percy, Anna, and their two children were living in Maywood when they decided to move to Oak Park. There were no black residents in that suburb. They purchased a 15-room home that they were remodeling and landscaping when attempts were made to burn the house down. Someone broke in and poured gasoline all over, but the fuse did not light. The following summer, a dynamite bomb was thrown from a passing car, exploding in the flower beds in the front of the house. At the time, their children, ages 11 and 7, were at home with a caregiver and a security guard.

The police reported they could not identify any suspects for the crimes. Many white members of the community were appalled at the treatment the Julians were receiving and formed a group to support and help them. Even so, threats continued for many more years.

In 1953, Glidden got out of the steroid business, which, despite Julian’s innovations, was never profitable. Julian founded his own research firm, Julian Laboratories, Inc., in Franklin Park, Illinois. He continued to work on synthesizing hormones using Mexican and Guatemalan yams. Julian sold his company in 1961 to Smith Kline and Upjohn for $2.3 million.

During his lifetime, Julian received awards and recognition. Some examples are included in the accompanying images. He died in April of 1975, and that fall, the Percy L. Julian High School opened at 10330 S. Elizabeth Street. Since his death, recognition has continued. In 1993, he was featured on the Black Heritage stamp, a series initiated by the U.S. Postal Service in 1978.

There is so much more information available on the life of Percy Julian. Readers are encouraged to Google his name to access the numerous websites that share his story.

After he retired, he said of his life and career, “I feel that my own good country robbed me of the chance for some of the great experiences that I would have liked to live through. Instead, I took a job where I could get one and tried to make the best of it. I have been, perhaps, a good chemist, but not the chemist that I dreamed of being.”

Despite the burden of racial discrimination, Percy Julian achieved great things – by any standards, he was much more than just a “good” chemist. Chemistry was the break-through “technology” of the early and mid-1900s. How much more might he have contributed if he had been given the chance?

Ridge Historical Society

Good-bye to “my” World War II veterans

By Carol Flynn

Five years ago, I had the honor and privilege of interviewing four World War II veterans for a Memorial Day feature for the Beverly Area Planning Association Villager and for the Ridge Historical Society newsletter. These men had been invited to be the Grand Marshals for the annual parade. Although they were in their late 80s and 90s, they welcomed me into their homes, and shared their stories and pictures with me. Each of the visits is a cherished memory.

Since that time, one by one they have passed away. The last of them, Norm Lasman, will be laid to rest this week. I would like to briefly recap their stories in tribute.

World War II lasted from 1939 to 1945, although the events leading to the conflict started well before that, and the aftermath lasted long after. Globally, this war was the most widespread and deadliest in history. Over thirty countries and at least 100 million people were involved, with an estimated 25 million deaths. Sixteen million Americans served, with over 400,000 fatalities.

Frederick Pennix was a young husband and father when we was drafted into the U. S. Army infantry. His units were segregated because of race. Pennix was with an anti-aircraft artillery quartermaster company that was shipped to Iwo Jima in March 1945. In the midst of some of the fiercest and bloodiest fighting in the Pacific, his company unloaded ships and delivered supplies, including ammunition, throughout the war zone. The war ended that Fall. Returning home, Pennix had a distinguished career in law enforcement that lasted 60 years.

Bill Sandstrom was accepted into the Great Lakes Naval radar training program in 1944. There, he encountered another kind of deadly enemy – scarlet fever. Infectious diseases have always been a major problem during war times, resulting in many deaths. Sandstrom’s life was saved by a new miracle drug – penicillin. By the time he was recovered and trained, the war was ending. He returned home and, making use of the new G.I. Bill, went to college to become a chemical engineer.

Jack Lyle became a Tuskegee Airman with the 332nd Fighter Group of the U. S. Army Air Forces in 1944. These were the first African American aviators in the U.S. armed forces. He flew twenty-six combat missions and shot down a German fighter plane in a dogfight. Returning to Chicago as a first lieutenant, he was refused further training at O’Hare Airport because “there wasn’t a program for colored pilots.” Lyle owned horse stables in Washington Park and was a police officer with the park district, and ran a tree business for 32 years.

Norm Lasman served in the U.S. Navy from 1942 to 1946. In 1945, his ship, the USS Bunker Hill, was struck by two Japanese kamikaze (suicide) planes, putting the ship out of commission and injuring and killing hundreds of the crew. Lasman, below deck, was overcome by carbon monoxide from the resulting fires. He came to on deck – he had been rescued, the only survivor from the engine room. He had no memory of the incident and did not speak of it for many years. The book Danger’s Hour, by Maxwell Taylor Kennedy, the son of Robert F. Kennedy, recounts the story of the attack. Lasman and Kennedy became friends. Lasman was part of the building of Evergreen Plaza, where he managed a Pador’s clothing store for many years.

Although these four men came from different backgrounds, and had different war time experiences, they had one thing in common – none of them considered himself any kind of a hero.

They were young men put in situations not under their control – they did what they had to do. None of them romanticized the war; there was nothing "glamorous" about it any way. They were in horrifying situations – a bombed ship, aerial combat, a deadly disease, a bloody battle. They all said the same thing – they got lucky, they survived.

Lasman shared a quote from another World War II veteran: “To be honored is one of the most humbling experiences I have ever had.”

Well, they deserve to be honored. Rest in peace, Norm Lasman. And to all four, thank you.

The Ridge Historical Society

Carol Flynn

School Series – Profile 1: Alice L. Barnard

It is graduation time, and while the emphasis is on the graduates at this time, recognition is also due the teachers who encouraged the students along their paths of exploration and discovery. “Teachers” is used in a broad sense here to include professional educators as well as other role models and advisors who made lasting impressions.

There are dozens of Chicago public schools in Beverly, Morgan Park, Washington Heights and Mount Greenwood. Nineteen of them are named for individuals who made contributions to education and other important fields. This series will look at those people.

A good place to start is with Alice Lucretia Barnard (1829 – 1908) whose namesake school is at 10354 S. Charles St., because it was education that brought the Barnard family to the Blue Island Ridge in 1846 in the first place.

Alice’s brother was William Barnard, a graduate of Amherst University in Massachusetts. Deciding to seek new opportunities in the West, he made it as far as Chicago, where he had a chance encounter with Thomas Morgan, the wealthy Englishman who bought thousands of acres of land on top of and surrounding the Ridge and gave his family’s name to Morgan Park. Morgan talked William into taking a job as tutor for Morgan’s children. William moved to the Ridge, and other family members soon followed.

Alice was educated in Massachusetts and later she attended Mount Holyoke Seminary which she left after two years because there was “little independence in thought.” She was an early “progressive” teacher, believing in “the opportunity to study from life” and not just the memorization of facts. She advocated for better education opportunities for women and was disappointed she could not study chemistry and other sciences in a laboratory.

Alice began her teaching career at age 17 in Chicago in a one-room schoolhouse. After a few years, she found herself at the Dearborn School, at Madison and Dearborn. At the time of the U.S. Civil War, she angered some school officials by writing a paper favoring the rights of children of color in school. The teachers and children marched in a procession to the Court House to view President Lincoln’s body lying in state after his assassination in April 1865. She met past President Gen. Ulysses Grant when he visited Chicago in 1879.

When offered the position of principal at the school in 1867, she declined because she would have been paid a lower salary than men in the same position. This was considered rank insubordination and the head of the education board called for her to be fired, but wiser heads prevailed and she took the job of head assistant instead.

She had the support of “Long John” Wentworth, the very powerful past mayor of Chicago, U.S. Congressman, and newspaper editor. A few years later, in 1871, she was named principal, one of the first women in the city to receive an appointment, and she was paid the same rate as the men. But that position was short-lived. The Dearborn School site was destroyed in the Great Chicago Fire in October 1871.

She was principal of Harrison School for a year, then in 1873 moved to Jones School as Head Assistant, at 12th Street and Wabash where a new school building had just opened. That school was destroyed by fire the following year and rebuilt in 1875. In 1876, when the principal resigned, the teachers petitioned to have her appointed to the position. She became principal of the school, where she stayed until retirement. That school is now Jones College Prep.

Alice never married; back then women teachers were usually required to give up outside employment if they married. She invested her money independently in real estate.

She was a member of Bethany Union Church, and also the First Presbyterian Church. She lived with her sisters and brothers in a charming house at 103rd St. and Longwood Drive, across from Givins’ Castle, and cultivated flowers. She entertained her students there, and she regularly decorated the classrooms at Jones with fresh bouquets. Her nephew later started a seed farm there. Today a CVS drug store is on that site.

Alice received considerable newspaper coverage in her lifetime – she was a celebrity in Chicago. The Inter Ocean ran a full page story about her in 1891 when she retired. It was hoped she would become a member of the Board of Education but that did not happen. Perhaps she was content to live in Washington Heights, the name for the area before "Beverly Hills" became popular, and tend her peonies.

In 1890, the Washington Heights School was severely damaged by fire. It was closed for a few years while it was rebuilt, and in 1892 the school reopened, now named for Alice L. Barnard. Such an honor is usually awarded after a person’s death, but Alice was still very much alive.

When she fell ill in 1908, it was covered in the Chicago papers. Alice was described by the Chicago Tribune as “one of the best known teachers in Chicago.” Upon her death, many tributes were given to her. She was laid to rest in Mount Greenwood Cemetery.

Ridge Historical Society

Carol Flynn

We took some pictures of "now" to go with "then" for the real picture postcard of Wood Street we posted the other day. The first two houses in the postcard are still standing, with some alterations.

Ridge Historical Society

Carol Flynn

Real picture postcards (RPPCs) were the rage around 1910.

Thanks to George Eastman of Eastman Kodak Company, camera technology had advanced to the point that hand-held box cameras preloaded with film were now available. Once the pictures were taken, the entire camera was sent to the company for processing. The consumer could choose prints or postcards. The camera was reloaded with film and returned to the customer.

These early cameras allowed people to begin capturing everyday images – children at play, social gatherings, local scenery, natural and man-made disasters. Itinerant photographers roamed the country snapping pictures of everything from parades to floods. The postcards started to be sold as local souvenirs.

RPPCs have become valuable with time as visual documentation of local history. They are often referred to as “folk photography.” Needless to say, RHS is a collection point for RPPCs of the Ridge communities.

These two RPPCs popped up on eBay recently and have now been purchased for donation to RHS. They are of the “Tracy” area, which was centered around 103rd Street (which was called Tracy until Beverly annexed to the City of Chicago in 1890) between Longwood Drive and Wood Streets. The postcards are labeled from their viewpoints.

Any messages on the backs of the cards are usually also intriguing. Who was “E. O.?” RHS is looking into the exact locations from which these pictures were taken, in order to record then-and-now. And maybe we’ll find E. O.‘s identity.

By the way, the study and collection of postcards is known as “deltiology.”

Ridge Historical Society

Carol Flynn

National Geographic has an article out right now titled “How polar explorers survived months of isolation without cracking” which relates of course to the current pandemic protocol we are experiencing.

The article tells us that “few people have experienced isolation like the early Antarctic explorers…. They could expect to be cut off entirely from family, friends, and the whole of human society for at least a year, left to their own devices in a sterile void of ice, darkness, and bitter cold.” They would at best have occasional radio contact with the outside world.

According to survivors of the experience, the key was “to learn to be content in yourself." And what worked best was to keep to a routine, keep busy, entertain yourself (music, games, novels) and believe in the future.

Admiral Richard Byrd is mentioned in the article. He said, "The ones who survive with a measure of happiness are those who can live profoundly off their intellectual resources, as hibernating animals live off their fat." He was described as the “ultimate self-isolator.”

You can find the article here: https://www.nationalgeographic.com/history/2020/05/how-polar-explorers-survived-months-isolation-without-cracking

Which brings us to the story of Admiral Byrd and his visit to the Ridge.

Rear Admiral Richard E. Byrd, famous for his visit to the South Pole (Antarctica) in 1928-30, visited Morgan Park High School on December 4, 1930. He was accompanied by his Smooth Fox Terrier, Igloo. Igloo was a huge media star in his own right.

The dog was a stray found by a friend of Byrd’s who talked dog-lover Byrd into adopting him. The terrier became Byrd’s constant companion, accompanying Byrd to Antarctica in 1928 where the dog received the name Igloo, or Iggy for short. Igloo shared Byrd’s solitude during the harsh winter and had to be dressed in polar clothing to withstand the blizzards.

Upon returning to New York, Igloo shared the glory of a Broadway ticker-tape parade and was presented to President Hoover at the White House. The dog became the subject of news dispatches and even a book "Igloo" in 1931. He was also the first dog to fly over ‘Santa Claus’s home’ at the North Pole. People around the world became enamored with the Fox Terrier breed, thanks to Igloo.

Sadly, Igloo died prematurely at the age of 6 from food poisoning. Byrd was away at the time, and chartered an airplane to rush home, while a group of veterinarians worked to save the dog, but it was too late. Buried in a pet cemetery in Massachusetts, Igloo has a marker shaped like an iceberg and his plaque reads “Igloo-He Was More Than A Friend.”

On December 12, 1930, the school newspaper, The Empehi News, ran two articles about Byrd’s and Igloo’s visit, along with a cartoon drawn by a student. The articles are reprinted here, complete with errors. The illustration is attached.

First article: Admiral Byrd Tells of Desire to “Visit New Places” All His Life

By Muriel McClure

“I am an explorer,” said Rear Admiral Richard E. Byrd, “because it was born in me. I have always felt the urge to see new places. You know I traveled around the world alone when I was twelve.”

Admiral Byrd spoke at the high school both in the afternoon and evening of December 4. During this interview he was seated in Mr. Schoch’s office waiting his curtain call. Admiral Byrd is a thin, robust man. He has an easy, charming way of talking.

“I think my last trp, to the South Pole, has contributed the most to science, for the reason that we had the funds and a greater chance to combat the dangers than we had on our other trips.”

When he was asked what he thought was the most important quality of character young people should develop, he replied, “Loyalty I hold before all else, even before honor. I would a hundred times rather have a dishonest man who is loyal than an honest man who is disloyal. Yes, I think one should develop loyalty to church, morals, country and home above all things. Now take dogs for instance, the dogs we had in the Antarctic were the loyalest of animals. Give a dog a chance to serve you and that will be his reaction.”

Commander Byrd’s own fox terrier, igloo, is a loyal pal. He has gone to the North Pole and the South Pole with his master. Igloo, during the interview, lay at the admiral’s feet.

“Our Antarctic stay was something new to all of us, said Mr. Byrd. “The Antarctic is so different from the Arctic because it is just in the process of evolution which the Arctic underwent thousands of years ago. The Antarctic is perennially frozen over, of course. While the Arctic is mostly land, the antarctic is ice floating above 10,000 feet of water. There is very little life in the Antarctic and in the Arctic there is abundant animal and human life.”

In his lecture Admiral Byrd showed movies taken of the two-year exploration trip, as well as giving a short talk as an introduction to the polar regions. He told of days 72 degrees below zero, when the men’s eyelashes froze together, and other hardships.

As Admiral Byrd left the school je said, “I have enjoyed my visit very much, in spite of the fact that I had to speak!”

Second article: Byrd-dog Grants Reporter of Empehi an Interview

Igloo, the famous Byrd-dog, for probably the first time in his illustrious career as a polar explorer, granted an interview to a newspaper reporter last Thursday, December 4.

Igloo was very calm, cool and indifferent to everything, possibly due to training at the South pole. As he had very little to say, we could get nothing but a description of him.

Igloo possesses two brown ears, big brown eyes, brown spots on his back, all the rest of him being white. The famous “pooch” wore a plain black collar with no name on the name plate. He was dark under the eyes, from staying up all night at the South Pole probably!

While at the South Pole he obtained a scar during a fight with his enemies, the penguins. It makes us wonder how the penguins looked.

During his stay under the desk in Mr. Schoch’s office, he posed for Mary Jane McAllister. He took his posing very seriously, holding himself quite steady for a dog. When he did move, the artist tried to make him turn back by making a noise like a cat, but cats were of no interest to the pup. Due to the lack of cats at the South Pole?

The dog was nearly, if not, as popular as his master, Rear Admiral Byrd. Igloo had quite an aydience, but to that mob he paid not the slightest heed.

If all dogs were only like Igloo, quiet, reserved and peaceful (?) but alack! They are not!

Igloo, here’s your chance to open an etiquette class! for dogs.

The moral of this story? The companionship of a friend like Igloo surely eases the loneliness of isolation.

Ridge Historical Society

Part IV for Memorial Day – The Civil War and the Ridge

Carol Flynn, RHS Communications

Women joined the war effort, also. At least three U.S. Army Nurses who served during the Civil War have been identified from Blue Island.

Thousands of women served as nurses during the Civil War, first as volunteers, and then as paid members of a nurse corps established through the efforts of Clara Barton in 1861. Dorothea Dix organized nursing efforts in the Washington, D. C., area, and Mary Ann Bickerdyke did likewise at the military camps in Cairo, Illinois.

Nursing as a profession was in its infancy, and there were no nursing education programs. At first women were considered too delicate to cope with the demands of caring for the sick and wounded, but they soon proved themselves through their determination, hard work and sacrifice. Women nurses were paid $0.40 per day. Male nurses in the same situations were paid over $200 per month.

Nurses came from many sources, including wives who had accompanied their soldier husbands to camps, women who lived by the camps, and members of religious institutions and relief organizations.

Mt. Greenwood Cemetery identified the grave of one Civil War woman veteran buried there, Catherine Near, U. S. Army Nurse. Her maiden name was Catherine Fay and she was known as Kate.

The Fay family came to Blue Island in the early 1850s. Kate was living with her mother and a son from a first marriage, with a sister and brother in town, when the war broke out. The exact sequence of events that led Kate to become an Army nurse are not yet documented, but records show that she married John H. Near, a soldier from Blue Island, in December of 1861 in Alexander County, which includes Cairo as the county seat. Cairo, at the southern tip of the state on the Mississippi River, was the site for many Union camps, a point from which the soldiers embarked for campaigns in the South.

So far there is no documentation of Kate Near’s experiences as a nurse. The 1870 U. S. Census reports John and Kate Near and her son living in Grand Tower, Illinois, in the far southern part of the state in Jackson County. It appears the marriage later broke up, with Kate and her son returning to Blue Island, and John Near relocating to Missouri.

Army records show that Kate received her own pension from the Army. She died in 1908 at the age of 73. The cause of death was listed as accidental gas poisoning, assumedly from a gas leak.

Kate’s brother, Jerome Fay, bought property for farming at the junction of the Calumet River and Stony Creek, which became known as Fay’s Point. Jerome married John Near’s sister, Lydia. So a Fay brother and sister married a Near brother and sister.

At the entrance to Memorial Park on 127th Street in Blue Island is a display of old tombstones dating back to the days when the park was the Blue Island Cemetery. One of the stones belonged to Clarissa F. McClintock, U. S. Army Nurse.

The McClintock family came to the Ridge in 1850 and was among the “intelligentsia” of early Blue Island. Clarissa’s mother, Laura (Mrs. Thomas), and her sister, Marion, ran a private school in their home on Vermont St. Her father Thomas allowed his large collection of books to be borrowed by the townspeople, starting the first Blue Island “library.” McClintock's occupation was as a county surveyor.

Both Clarissa and her older sister Marion were listed as employed in 1863 at Jefferson Barracks, Missouri, as commissioned nurses. As with Kate Near, no documentation of their experiences have been uncovered yet.

Clarissa was born in 1842 and died young, in March 1867, “after two years’ illness.” It is possible she contracted a lingering illness during the war. She was buried in the Blue Island Cemetery. That cemetery was closed and turned into a park. Most, but not all, of the graves were moved to other cemeteries. Her old gravestone is still in Blue Island but the location of the McClintock family graves hasn’t been looked into yet by RHS.

Marion was born in 1835 and died in 1900. She taught German for many years in the Chicago Public Schools. Marion is buried in Rosehill Cemetery.

The McClintock sisters and Kate Near are listed in the Army pension records. They are also listed in the Illinois Roll of Honor, compiled in 1929 to identify the burial places of those who served in any of the wars up to that time and were buried in Illinois. The list was started to aid in honoring deceased veterans on Decoration (Memorial) Day.

This concludes our posts – for now – about some of the Ridge residents who served in the U.S. Civil War. Their sacrifices to preserve the Union and the U.S. Constitution should be remembered.

Ridge Historical Society

Part III – For Memorial Day: The Civil War and the Ridge

Carol Flynn, RHS Communications

Yesterday we posted about the three Wilcox brothers, Wilbur, Thomas, and Willard, who joined Company A First Illinois Artillery Volunteers (“Battery A”) to fight for the Union cause in the Civil War. The Wilcox family was one of the first families on the Ridge, arriving here in 1844.

The Rexford brothers, Roscoe Eugene and Everett Heber, were recruited into Battery A by their friend Wilbur Wilcox. The Rexford family had been on the Ridge since the 1830s. Other Ridge friends also joined Battery A – Harry and Francis Morgan, from the Morgan family that gave Morgan Park its name.

According to a history of the Battery published in 1899, the Rexford brothers were “delighted” to join their friends at Camp Smith, Cairo, Illinois, in July of 1861. But soon, youthful visions of camaraderie and glory gave way to the grim reality of war.

After the Battle of Fort Donelson at the Tennessee – Kentucky border early in 1862, Roscoe fell ill. He was sent back to Cairo, where his father met him. He died before they reached home on the Ridge. Two-thirds of Civil War fatalities were due to illnesses such as malaria, typhoid and pneumonia. Roscoe was 21 years old. He is buried in Mt. Greenwood Cemetery

Everett Rexford became the bugler for the Battery. The men had true affection for the bugler but gave him a hard time for early morning wake-up calls by stealing the mouthpiece of the bugle and other tricks.

The bugler played “taps” when a fellow soldier died. Presumably Everett Rexford had to perform this duty when his friend Sgt. Wilbur Wilcox, 26, was killed in an ambush by Confederate soldiers in July 1863 in Mississippi. Wilcox had volunteered to be part of a group that went behind enemy lines to procure food for the horses.

Everett had a faithful horse named Japhet that had been with him since the beginning of the war. He left the horse with his friend Thomas Wilcox and shortly afterwards, in July of 1864, both Wilcox and the horse were captured by the Confederates during a skirmish outside of Atlanta. Wilcox spent the next eight months in the Andersonville prisoner-of-war camp. What happened to Japhet is not known.

Everett Rexford survived the war, becoming a very prominent citizen of Blue Island. He served as village president and cut a dashing figure for many years leading mounted parades of local Civil War veterans through the streets on Decoration Day, May 30, the forerunner of Memorial Day. He served as musical director of Battery A’s veterans’ association and blew all the old battery calls on his “old war bugle” at their reunions. He was made the National Bugler of the GAR. He died in 1920 at age 78 and was buried in Mount Greenwood Cemetery.

Francis and Harry Morgan were two of the sons of Thomas Morgan, the man who brought his family to the United States from England on his own ship and purchased much of the land on the Ridge.

Francis was educated in a military school in the East and was recognized for his military leadership skills and efficiency. He started as a lieutenant with Battery A and rose to captain. Plagued by health issues, he resigned his commission and returned to Chicago, taking a job on the governor’s staff. He died in 1887 at age 50. The Battery A history noted that Francis was a “thorough gentleman … held in the highest esteem … whose integrity of character and innate honesty has never been questioned.”

Harry Morgan, Francis’s older brother, made it through the war and returned to the Ridge, farming the Morgan lands. He and Everett Rexford became brothers-in-law through marriage when they married sisters Emily and Sarah Robinson, respectively, from another early Ridge family. Harry eventually moved to Blue Island as the family land was sold to developers; some of the land became the Village of Morgan Park. He died in 1893 at age 60.

The Morgan family is buried in Graceland Cemetery on the north side.

There is a monument to Battery A at Rosehill Cemetery on the north side. The names of those who died in service are inscribed in the base. W. J. Wilcox and R. E. Rexford are listed.

These are just a few of the stories of men from the Ridge who served in the Civil War.

Women joined the war effort, also. At least three U.S. Army Nurses who served during the Civil War have been identified from Blue Island. Tomorrow we will share their stories.

Ridge Historical Society

Part II – Memorial Day – More on the Civil War and the Ridge.

Carol Flynn, RHS Communications

Decoration Day, which became Memorial Day, evolved because of the Civil War. This is a continuation of the post started yesterday about the Civil War and the Ridge.

Almost all the soldiers from the Chicago area who fought for the Union in the Civil War were volunteers. Some of these men likely heard Abraham Lincoln speak while he was running for president, at one of the hotels Lincoln frequented, like the Tremont House.

Families started settling around today’s Beverly/Morgan Park area in the 1830s. The entire area was called Blue Island back then. This post will look at four of these families – Rexford, Wilcox, Morgan and Barnard – and their experiences in the Civil War.

The Rexford family came in 1834 and built a large log cabin as a rest stop for travelers around what is now 91st Street, along the Vincennes Road, which they called the Blue Island House. A few years later they moved to the south end of the Ridge, which would become the city of Blue Island. The Wilcox family came in 1844 and took over the Gardner Tavern, another wayside stop which had been built in 1836 at 99th and Beverly Ave. The Morgan family came in 1844 and owned most of the land on top of the Ridge, establishing their estate around 92nd and Pleasant. The Barnard family came about 1846 to join the Morgans; William Barnard was tutor to the Morgan children. They settled around 101st and Longwood Drive. In addition to their other undertakings, the families established farms to grow crops and raise livestock.

The early families of course knew each other well. Two Barnard brothers married two Wilcox sisters. A Morgan and a Rexford married Robinson sisters, from another early family. When the Civil War started, brothers, friends, and neighbors enlisted and went off to war together. They wrote letters home to their families, some of which have been saved. Some of the men from the Ridge did not return.

Alice S. Barnard, whose mother was a Wilcox, wrote in 1924: “The ‘60’s – the decade of the Civil War!

…I was a very little girl. When Lincoln was candidate for president there was held in the North Blue Island school house [likely around 103rd and Vincennes] what was probably the first political meeting of the neighborhood…. Feeling at the meeting ran high….

“The call came for three month enlistments. In the Wilcox family were five sons. The two youngest enlisted. Returning at the end of this term they told the story of the reenlistment. Their company stood in line! The sign of reenlistment was a step forward – one after the other took the step – many hesitated. But finally all but one had taken the decisive step and when he finally came forward, wild cheering rent the air.

“The war went on, the two oldest sons enlisted, leaving the [fifth] brother incapacitated for military service to care for the farm and the aging mother. Of the seven Morgan boys several enlisted and all returned. Erastus A. Barnard marched with Sherman to the sea.”

Brothers Erastus, William and Daniel Barnard all fought in the Civil War, all survived, and are all buried at Mt. Greenwood Cemetery. William had married Miranda Wilcox and was the father of William Wilcox Barnard and Alice Sarah Barnard, the authors of the histories we have been sharing. Erastus had married Mary Lavinia Wilcox. Daniel Barnard, who never married, formed his own company in which he served as Captain. Family lore says he fought in many battles and was never sick or wounded.

Four Wilcox brothers fought in the war, and the family was not as fortunate as the Barnards. John joined his friend Daniel Barnard’s company as a sergeant, and was killed in 1863 and buried at Chattanooga, Tennessee. He was 37 years old and left a wife and two sons.

Wilbur, Thomas, and Willard Wilcox joined Company A First Illinois Artillery Volunteers, which the group itself called “Battery A.” Most of the men were from the Chicago area. Friends from the Morgan and Rexford families also enlisted with Battery A.

Thomas wrote home to his sister from Vicksburg, Mississippi, in 1863: “Have to stay at the guns [cannon] most of the time…. [We] opened on them one morning about three o’clock; for hours it seemed like a stream of fire from one end of the line to the other…. They cannot stand it much longer…. I would like to come home when we take Vicksburg. It seems a long time since I came away. Willard is as strong as ever…. I do not like soldiering, no way you can fix it.”

Unfortunately, Thomas was captured and held prisoner in Andersonville, Georgia, for eight months. His health deteriorated and he reportedly never fully recovered. He did return home, and in 1872 he moved his farm to Indiana, where he died in 1895. Willard also returned home and moved away from the Ridge.

Their brother Wilbur was not so fortunate. He was killed in Mississippi in 1863. He was 26 and single.

The fifth brother, William, stayed home to keep the family farm running during the war years. It was a common, and necessary, practice, to designate a family member to remain behind to continue the family business. He is the only Wilcox brother buried in a Ridge cemetery, Mt. Greenwood.

After the Civil War, the Grand Army of the Republic (GAR) was founded in 1866 as a fraternal organization for veterans of the Union military. A local branch, the Wilcox Post, No. 668, was founded in 1889. It was named in honor of the Wilcox brothers who served in the war.

A stone and bronze marker listing the charter members, created in 1928, is installed at Ridge Park at 96th Street and Longwood Drive. Charter members included Daniel and Erastus Barnard. Austin Wiswall, the young officer written about in yesterday’s post, who settled in Morgan Park after the war and is buried in Mt. Hope Cemetery, was also a charter member.

The GAR dissolved in 1956 at the death of its last member. The legal successor of GAR is the Sons of Union Veterans of the Civil War (SUVCW), open to male descendants of Union military veterans.

Next installment: The Rexfords and Morgans in the Civil War.

Ridge Historical Society

Part I for Memorial Day – UPDATED

Carol Flynn, RHS Communications

Monday, May 25, is Memorial Day, the federal holiday when we commemorate those who have died while serving in the U.S. Armed Forces. Originally known as Decoration Day, from the custom of placing flowers on the graves of fallen soldiers, the day was adopted by states after the U.S. Civil War. In 1971, the name was changed to Memorial Day, and it was made a federal holiday to be celebrated on the last Monday in May to create a three-day weekend.

The Civil War, fought from 1861 to 1865, remains the deadliest military conflict in U. S. history, pitting American against American. As many as 750,000 military personnel from both the North and South were estimated to have died. More soldiers died from disease than from injuries; pneumonia, typhoid, dysentery, and malaria caused about two-thirds of the deaths.

Illinois was a major source of troops and supplies for the Union during the war, contributing over 250,000 soldiers. People from the Ridge fought in the war, and they will be profiled tomorrow.

After the war, many Civil War veterans moved to the Ridge. Mt. Greenwood Cemetery has identified over 300 Civil War veterans buried there. Similar numbers would be expected for Mt. Hope and Mt. Olivet cemeteries, and those along Kedzie Ave.

In 2016, a ceremony was held at Lincoln Cemetery, the historic African American cemetery at 123rd St. and Kedzie, to recognize and honor James Harvey, a Civil War veteran buried there. Harvey, born a slave in 1845, served with the U.S. Colored Troops (USCT). These troops consisted of black soldiers, usually ex-slaves, and white officers.

At the end of the war, Harvey received his freedom, but his monetary compensation was given to his former owner. He moved to the Chicago area and was one of the founders of the town of Robbins. He lived at 137th and Sacramento. He died at the age of 100, the last African American Civil War veteran in Illinois.

Several white officers from the USCT are buried on the Ridge. Buried at Mt. Hope Cemetery is Austin Wiswall, the nephew of Elijah and Owen Lovejoy, the ardent abolitionists. Elijah was murdered in 1837 in Alton, IL, by a pro-slavery mob. Owen became the best of friends with Abraham Lincoln, serving as a congressman from Illinois, and a “conductor” on the Underground Railroad.

Austin, born in 1840, a lieutenant in the USCT, kept a diary and wrote many letters home, which are preserved in a collection in Texas. These offer insight into the experiences and mindset of a young soldier.

Much of the work of a young officer was humdrum and routine. In the early days of 1864, Austin was in the Baltimore area, spending his time listening to music and drinking lemonade in his tent. He was bored with drilling recruits, he wanted to see action – he wrote if he did not get into the Calvary, he would resign.

He was sent to nearby towns to recruit men into the colored troops. After one session, on Monday, Feb. 8, he wrote: “Was busily engaged this morning making out my descriptive lists. There will probably be some inaccuracies in them as one of the charming mesdemoiselles of this place was sitting opposite me at the time and distracted my attention.”

Austin did see action later in that year. On August 9, he wrote to his mother, Elizabeth Lovejoy Wiswall, an enthusiastic letter about the new assignment that he was sure would lead to the Calvary.

Unfortunately, a few weeks later, Austin was captured by Confederate forces and held at the infamous Andersonville prisoner-of-war camp, in Georgia. His mother received a letter dated September 2, from Lt. Col. Armstrong, which began, “I regret to inform you that your son Austin Wiswall is now a prisoner in rebel hands and is slightly wounded in the fleshy part of his leg.”

The letter continued that Armstrong had met under truce with the enemy officers and they were impressed with Austin and would do what they could to help him.

After a few months, Austin was released in an exchange of prisoners which was believed to have been arranged personally by President Lincoln.

Wrote Austin on December 19 from the Officers’ Hospital in Annapolis, MD: “I am exchanged but have not ascertained what will be done in my case as of yet…. Exchanged prisoners are constantly arriving at this point from Charleston…. There have been no Officers of Colored Troops paroled since I was. I realize more and more how very fortunate I was to get away from them. There are a great many of the men die very soon after their arrival here. A great many come here [seeking] after their friends and find only their clothes or some little relic left for them in the hands of a comrade…. I will write to mother often.”

The war ended a few months later, and Austin returned to Illinois. He married Martha Francis (Fannie) Almy from Massachusetts and they moved to Morgan Park, where he was very active as a member of the Village Board of Trustees. He died in 1905.

Part II will share the Civil War experiences of the early families on the Ridge.