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Work started on the Illinois & Michigan Canal in 1836 and it opened in 1848. This canal completed the first all-water route from the east coast to the Gulf of Mexico by connecting Lake Michigan to the Mississippi River by way of the Illinois River. It went right through Ottawa.At the time the canal opened, nearby Chicago had no railroad, but by 1854 it was "the railroad center of the West." The canal route is now a popular hiking trail. |
Ottawa, Illinois - probably mid-20th century
The first Lincoln-Douglas senatorial debate was held in Ottawa's Washington Square on August 21, 1858. Abraham Lincoln and Stephen A. Douglas stood in the park to deliver the first of seven senatorial debates. .It was estimated that 40,000 spectators gathered to witness this debate . . . We can be pretty sure that at least some of our family was there listening and watching (well, watching, or having a picnic on the grass nearby, anyway).
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| Mary Hannagan (and other spellings) Gilchrist would have been almost twenty years old, married, and expecting her first child (born January, 1859) at the time Abraham Lincoln was in town. Her husband, Thomas Gilchrist, would have been about thirty years old. Truth be told, though, her first child was supposedly born in the town of La Salle, which was about thirty miles west of Ottawa - though her parents probably still lived in Ottawa.
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PAGE LIST FOR THE HANNAGANS
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