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A visiting correspondent for Chicago’s Press and Tribune describes Sandwich only a few years after the town began taking shape on the prairie.
In March 1860, a correspondent for Chicago’s Press and Tribune spent a week in Sandwich and the surrounding countryside. His letter, dated March 17 and published four days later, provides a remarkable glimpse of the young community through the eyes of an outside observer.
Sandwich was still a very new town. Its post office had been established in 1850, the railroad arrived in 1853, and the original town was platted in 1854. Yet by the time this visitor arrived, the settlement had already developed into a surprisingly active community.
The correspondent described Sandwich as “comparatively a new town,” observing that only five years earlier its site had been “nothing but a broad expanse of prairie.” He credited the Chicago, Burlington & Quincy Railroad, and the efforts of citizens from nearby Newark seeking a station, with bringing the community into existence.
That was the writer’s compressed version of Sandwich’s beginnings. Whatever its imprecision, it shows how quickly the town appeared to have risen from the prairie in the eyes of a visitor.
A Town of Nearly Fifteen Hundred
According to the correspondent, Sandwich had grown to nearly fifteen hundred residents by 1860. He counted approximately twenty stores, two hotels, and four Protestant churches.
He also noted that most of the town’s residents had come from the eastern states. In the language of his time, he remarked upon what he described as the absence of a “foreign element” in the community. The observation tells us something about both the settlement patterns of early Sandwich and the attitudes of the writer who described them.
More impressive to him was the quality of the town itself. Sandwich’s settlers, he wrote, had generally constructed “a better class of dwellings” than those commonly found in new western towns.
The community also appeared to possess an unusual degree of public spirit.
“The settlers here have as a general rule, built a better class of dwellings than is generally found in new Western towns, and they appear also to have more public spirit than many others.”
Plank Sidewalks and Shade Trees
Evidence of that public spirit could be seen along the streets. The correspondent described broad and substantial sidewalks, well planked throughout much of town.
Residents were also planting shade trees, an effort that he believed would eventually give Sandwich the appearance of a New England village. But he saw something more lasting in those young trees. They would beautify the town while encouraging future generations to value and take pride in their homes.
“They show much taste and a love for the beautiful, in planting shade trees, which in a few years will give Sandwich the appearance of a New England village.”
The writer anticipated that his praise might sound like the advertisement of a man with land to sell. He therefore assured his readers that he had no financial interest in any nursery or property in or around Sandwich.
His admiration, he insisted, was genuine.
If he were choosing a place to settle in Illinois, he wrote, “there could not be found a more attractive locality than this.”
Springtime in the Countryside
The correspondent had also traveled in several directions outside Sandwich during his stay. Throughout the surrounding countryside, he found farmers busily planting spring wheat.
After an unusually mild March, the farmers appeared hopeful that the long promised good times had finally arrived. All that was needed, he believed, was a warm rain to start the grass growing for the livestock.
It is a small passage, but an evocative one: fields being planted, livestock waiting for fresh grass, and farmers looking toward the coming season with cautious optimism.
Sandwich and the Coming Election
The closing portion of the letter captured another kind of anticipation.
The Press and Tribune was a prominent Republican newspaper, and the correspondent reported that both its daily and weekly editions were widely read in Sandwich. He found “hosts of ardent Republicans” preparing for the Republican National Convention soon to be held in Chicago.
Their preferred candidate was a fellow Illinoisan whose national future was still uncertain:
“It is their wish and hope that their own Lincoln may secure a place either as first or second on the ticket.”
The letter was dated March 17, 1860. Two months later, the Chicago convention nominated Abraham Lincoln for president.
The correspondent had preserved Sandwich at a particular moment, before the convention, before Lincoln’s election, and before the Civil War transformed the country. Local Republicans were preparing for a political contest whose outcome they could not yet know.
A Young Town Looking Forward
The letter does not provide a complete or impartial history of early Sandwich. It is one visitor’s account, written in the language and attitudes of his own time. Its population, business, and institutional figures are those reported by the correspondent and should be understood as his contemporary estimates.
That is also what makes the account so valuable.
The writer saw a confident young railroad town with substantial homes, busy stores, plank sidewalks, newly planted trees, productive farms, and residents who believed their community had a promising future.
Only a few years removed from its original plat, Sandwich was no longer merely a station on the prairie. It had begun to look and feel like a town that intended to remain.
About the Newspaper
The letter appeared in Chicago’s Press and Tribune. The newspaper carried that name from 1858 until later in 1860, when “Press” was dropped from the masthead. It was a predecessor of today’s Chicago Tribune.
The Sandwich letter appeared beneath the heading “Letter from the Country” and was signed only with the initials H. H. L.
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Facts at a Glance
Date of letter: March 17, 1860
Published: March 21, 1860
Newspaper: The Press and Tribune, Chicago
Location: Page 2
Correspondent: Identified only as “H. H. L.”
Reported population: Nearly 1,500
Reported businesses and institutions: Approximately twenty stores, two hotels, and four Protestant churches
Notable observations: Substantial homes, plank sidewalks, newly planted shade trees, prosperous farms, and an active Republican community
Historical moment: Two months before Abraham Lincoln received the Republican nomination for president in Chicago
Source
“Letter from the Country,” The Press and Tribune (Chicago, Illinois), March 21, 1860, page 2. Letter dated Sandwich, DeKalb County, Illinois, March 17, 1860.