remain on the bridge while turned. He remarked to Casey that the smell was bad that day, and that it must be unhealthy. The old bridge-tender said yes, it was unhealthy until one got used to it. He had in a quarter of a century got used to it, and was all right. So we may conclude that however disagreeable these river smells are they cannot be very dangerous to the health of the citizens.

But from the "floating bridge" of Mark Beaubien and the old foot bridge which was used at Wolf Point, there has been a great change. Instead of fighting over the bridges we are now fighting over the lack of bridges. There are now no jealousies and no fear that one division will get more than its share of the trade. All have enough, and the thirty-six bridges at every other street reaching to the river are kept alternately swinging for the great commerce which comes up the river and the masses of people who are every minute crossing them. The want of the hour is more bridges to accommodate the people, or some means of getting from one division to the other without having to wait for the swinging of a bridge.

THE TUNNELS.

When the city began to spread out so that it was impossible to keep it in bounds, and the great shipping interests began to interfere with the travel across the bridges, Chicago enterprise began to talk of tunneling, and to talk is to do with Chicago people. So in 1853 a company was formed, at the head of which was Wm. B. Ogden, with the object in view of constructing a tunnel under the river. Messrs. W m. Gooding, E. F. Tracy, and Thomas Clarke. proposed plans for the work. Mr. Clarke's was for a structure principally of iron, which the company regarded most favorably, but no decided steps were taken then to carry out any plan. The elevation of the bridges helped the landtravel materially and it was doubted if a tunnel would be a paying investment. From 1864 to 1866 various projects were presented to the City Council and the Washington street tunnel was begun upon a plan prepared by J. J. Gindele. The contract was let to J. K. Lake, Charles B. Farwell, and J. Clark, and the work begun July 25, 1867. A formal opening of the tunnel by Mayor J. B. Rice took place Jan. 1, 1869. The entire cost of the work to the city, including all preliminary expenses up to Oct. 31, 1869, was $512,707.57.

Notwithstanding the great need for more and better means of travel between the South and West Divisions, this tunnel has not settled the problem, for it has been much out of repair, so as to make the travel anything but pleasant, and the grade is too much for heavily loaded teams.

The LaSalle street tunnel was afterward built on a similar plan and cost the city $566,276.48.

CHURCH HISTORY.

THE FIRST WHITE MEN MISSIONARIES.

In her surprising success in business Chicago has not forgotten that the church and school must have front rank in the ideal city. The churches and schools have been kept to the front, and even before we had a community of whites here on the shores of Lake Michigan we find the missionary and the teacher at work in the Indian settle

ment. Fathers Marquette and Joliet of the Roman Catholic Church were the first white men on this soil, and there was a mass said before anything else was done. The place was claimed for the church, and to see the spires which rise from all over the great city now, pointing out where may be found that restful place of communion with the Father of all, one would not doubt that the church still held possession, even though some have given Chicago the name of the wickedest place in the world.

CLAIMED FOR CHRISTIANITY.

Other missionaries from the Catholic Church followed Marquette, and there also came those other pioneers in Christian work, the Methodists, and before there was yet a village we hear of Father Jesse Walker and his school-house, where he lived in one end, and taught school, preached, and held class meetings in the other. And with the garrison troops that came to old Fort Dearborn in 1833 came also the Rev. Jeremiah Porter, who opened the carpenter shop of the fort as a place for religious services, and, on June 26, organized a church, and began a little building, which was dedicated the next winter.

Father St. Cyr came from St. Louis in May, 1833, and founded a Catholic church, and began the building of a little house of worship at the corner of Madison street and Wabash avenue. This was St. Mary's Church, which last May celebrated its semi-centennial. Then came the Rev. A. B. Freeman for the Baptists, who organized the first church of that denomination Oct. 19, 1833.

These were the pioneers in religious work in Chicago, and their work was well begun, for a great record has been left behind.

THE FIRST CHURCH.

Dr. John T. Temple built the first meeting house for religious worship.

Dr. Temple came from Washington in the summer of 1833, and, upon his arrival here, built, first, a house for his family, and then a small wooden meeting house for the Baptist preacher, who was to follow nim from the East, to hold services in. This house stood at the corner of Frankiin and Water streets, and is, with the exception of Father Walker's log school-house, the first building put up for such a purpose. For a time all the Protestant people worshiped in this house, the Rev. Jeremiah Porter and Mr. Freeman preaching on alternate Sundays, and occasionally Father Jessie Walker preached there. The Catholic church was not dedicated until late in the fall, and the Presbyterian church the first of January following.

The Hon. John Wentworth says of his early church-going in Chicago, that he was not able to sustain the expense of a whole pew, and, in partnership with S. B. Cobb, another honored citizen of Chicago to this day, rented a first-class one, paying $12.50 a year.

THE PRESBYTERIAN GROWTH. From this small beginning has been a marvelous growth. The little First Presbyterian Church established its missions, and after a time these became strong, self-sustaining churches, and when it celebrated its fiftieth birthday last June the Rev. Jeremiah Porter, the pioneer pastor, was there, and had the satisfaction of seeing that instead of one lit

of the ablest men to other Sees, and in the last year one of the most popular pastors was appointed Archbishop coadjutor of San Francisco. The church has several schools, all strongly equipped and well supported.

OTHER CHURCHES.

Free

Methodists

Of other churches the Reformed Episcopal has 10, the Lutherans 32. the Jews 14, the Christians 3, the Evangelical 7, the Evangelical Reformed 2, the Evangelical United 5, the 2, the Dutch Reformed 2, the Unitarians, 4; the Universalists, 5; the Swedenborgians, 4; and there are four independent churches and thirteen not classified.

This shows a strong army for the cause of church in Chicago. In 1840 there were six churches in Chicago for the 4,479 people who lived here; in 1851 there were twentyeight churches for 28,269 people; in 1862, eighty-four churches for 109,260 people; in 1870, 187 churches for 298,977 people; and in 1880, 243 churches for 503,501 people, or one church for every 2,081 inhabitants.

PUBLIC INSTITUTIONS.

OUR EARLIEST OFFICIALS.

THE FIRST PUBLIC BUILDING.

Public life in Chicago had a very small beginning, but, like everything else planted in the soil on the lake shore, it grew rapidly. and it will not be disputed that this branch of Chicago has kept pace with all the rest.

We are told that the first public officer in Chicago was John Kinzie, whose commission as Justice of the Peace bore date of Dec. 2, 1823; the first "bench" was no doubt in the old Kinzie House, on the North Side.

But the first public building erected and paid for with the people's money in Cook County was an "estray pen," which was built in 1832 by Samuel Miller, who appears as the first contractor. Mr. Miller was a County Commissioner, one of the first board, but it seems that his official position did not prevent his making a bid and being awarded the

contract for this first public building. The contract price was $20, but because the structure was not completed according to the plans and specifications the contract price was cut down and only $12 paid. Cook County has not followed the example of the first board and cut down the contract prices, but there has been a pull in the other direction, and all the trouble has been over the extras to be paid when contractors did not follow the original plans.

FIRST OFFICIALS.

Mr. Jonathan Bailey was the first Postmaster, and John C. Hogan seems to have been the first Postoffice clerk. John R. Clark is mentioned as the first Coroner, and his first sitting was on the body of a dead Indian.

The Hon. Isaac N. Arnold was the first City Clerk. The first jail was of logs and stood on the northwest corner of the square where now stands the Court House and City Hall. It was built in 1832. The first man hung in Cook County was John Stone, executed July 10, 1840, for the murder of Mrs. Thompson,

and his scaffold stood back of Myrick's tavern, on the lake shore. Such was the beginning of public life in this city.

To-day the county has a granite Court House which cost $2,248,307, and furnished at an expense of over $100,000. Now the public officers and employes of the county in the courts and various institutions number 677, and they cost the people about $650,000.

Uncle Sam has a goodly number of men here now in the Custom House, Collector's office, revenue office, Sub-Treasury, and Postoffice, who add to the public life. Counting the Postmaster and all the men employed in the office, the collectors of customs and internal revenue and all their employes, the men connected with the courts, the pension office, the treasury, and the Marshal's office, there are 950 men, and they cost Uncle Sam nearly $900,000. The cost of the new goyernment building where all these officials are engaged was about $4,000,000.

CHICAGO'S EXECUTIVES.

William B. Ogden was followed in the Mayor's chair by Buckner S. Morris, Benjamin W. Raymond, Alexander Lloyd, Francis C. Sherman, Augustus Garrett, Alanson S. Sherman, John P. Chapin, James Curtiss, James H. Woodworth, Walter S. Gurnee, Charles M. Gray, Isaac L. Milliken, Levi D. Boone, John Wentworth, John C. Haines, Julian S. Rumsey, John B. Rice, Roswell B. Mason, Joseph Medill, Harvey D. Colvin, Monroe Heath, and Carter H. Harrison.

A long list of city officials would follow these to show the number of men who live at the city crib. In the City Council we now have thirty-six men instead of twelve as in the first council. Counting the Mayor, Aldermen, heads of departments, clerks, poice, and firemen, there are in the city employ 1,405 men, and if the laboring men employed in the streets and other departments of Public Works were counted, it would increase the number to about 4,000 or more, and the money appropriated by the city last year to run the city government for twelve months was $4,450,506. 13.

This will give one

some idea

of the patronage Mayor Harrison has, and may explain how he succeeds in being re-elected, when we understand that he has between 4,000 and 5,000 men electioneering for him who are in his own employ, besides the friends on the outside.

STARTLING FIGURES.

The figures are rather startling when we come to get them together, showing that outside of the street laborers and school teachers there are 3,032 people in Chicago connected with the Federal, county, and city governments, and that the cost of government was this last year $6,000,506. But this is Chicago, and nothing startles her people.

Chicago has been the scene of some of the most remarkable political struggles this country has ever known. It was the place selected for the National Republican Convention of 1860, when Abraham Lincoln was nominated, which was the first note of alarm to the South. Then in 1864 there was another memorable meeting here when the Democratic party gathered in National convention and nominated as their candidate for President General McClellan. In 1868 the Republicans came to Chicago again on May 20 to nominate a candidate for President, and General Grant was made the standard bearer. Then in 1880 came that mem

orable struggle where the third term idea was the bone of contention, and after six days' struggle General Garfield was nominated on the thirty-sixth ballot. Each of these conventions has been followed by the most important events in the history of the country.

THE POSTOFFICE THEN AND NOW. A FRONTIER POSTMASTER.

The first record of a postmaster's appointment at Chicago is March 31, 1831, and Jonathan N. Bailey, an Indian trader, opened his office on the east bank of the river, in the store of John S. C. Hogan, at the corner of Lake and South Water streets. Mr. Hogan was practically the Postmaster, and kept the office; and at the breaking out of the Black Hawk war, in 1832, Mr. Bailey left and Mr. Hogan became his successor. John Bates, still a jovial old settler of Chicago, who celebrated his golden wedding but a few weeks ago, was a clerk in this store, and says he kept the postoffice in a candle-box. The letters were thrown into this box loose, and whenever any one came for a letter they were allowed to look them over to see if the one wanted was in the bunch.

one

The mail arrived at first twice a month, and sometimes oftener and did not contain more than a dozen letters at any time. The time of the arrival of the stage-coach was not always known,

but the driver's horn announced his approach and the people gathered at the store to give him a welcome. The Postmaster would often satisfy the whole town and distribute all the mail then and there by calling out the names as he went over the letters. When a New York paper came it was handed over to some one with a good

voice who would read aloud to all others. After Long John Wentworth came to Chicago he was by common consent chosen reader, and perched upon a dry goods box in the Postoffice, which was then on Franklin street, at the corner of Water, he read to those who gathered around him, and they then discussed politics or whatever happened to be uppermost in the minds of the people It was here Long John had his first lessons in public speaking.

FRANKING LOVE-LETTERS.

In those days the postage had not been reduced to 2 cents, and every missive sent through the mails cost the sender 25 cents.

Long John tells a story of how he franked letters for a Chicago lover to his sweetheart in New Jersey, while a Congressman. The young man would write to Mr. Wentworth, and of course the letters went free to the Congressman, who then wrote to the young lady, frankfng his letters, of course. In this way the cor respondence was carried on for one winter, until his friends at Washington began to wonder when Mr. Wentworth was to be married to the New Jersey girl. Then he advised the young man to get married, as he could not frank any more letters in that way.

THE MODERN POSTOFFICE.

This was the postoffice of Chicago fifty years ago. The candle box of that time has several thousand as commodious private boxes in the first floor of the new Government Building to take its place, and instead of the citizens assembling at the office to greet the carrier, the carrier now comes to their doors, bringing their letters

from friends and their papers ready for breakfast. And the office, which cost Uncle Sam $300 when Chicago was incorporated a city in 1837, last year required $613,552 to pay its running expenses, but its earnings were nearly three times this amount, or $1,959,902 for the fiscal year ending June 30, 1883. The balance of $1,343,350 was turned over to the department. And instead of one man looking after the mail, tending store, and running a harness shop, as old John Bates said was the case in 1833, there are now 723 men besides the Postmaster looking after the letters and other mail matter which comes to Chicago. Of this number 432 are clerks, 252 are carriers, and twenty-eight are in the money order department. There are made 751 delivery trips daily and 580 collection trips.

THE LETTERS WE WRITE.

And what is more, these men are all kept busy. On an average the Chicago Postoffice sends out 3,200 pounds of first-class mail matter, or 192,000 letters every day in the week except Sunday, or one letter for about every other man, woman, and child in the city. That shows that the people are intelligent and know how to read and write.

In a year the Chicago people use up over 500 tons, or 1,001,600 pounds, of letter paper, and send out to their friends in other parts of the world 70,096,000 letters, which require $1,401,820 worth of 2-cent stamps to carry them.

But this is not all. Chicago people also send out 1,300 pounds, or 65,000 circulars every day, or 20,345,000 every year, which cost them $650 a day, or $203,450 a year for stamps.

Then of second-class matter as newspapers there are sent out every year 7,090,389 pounds or 3,545 tons, or, to be more explicit. 21,271,167 papers every year. And of third and fourth-class matter there was mailed in Chicago last year 3,867,282 pounds, or 19,This included articles of 336,410 pieces. merchandise, such as silks and laces bought for country cousins, watches for the boys on the farm, and jewelry for sweethearts at home.

AHEAD OF BOSTON.

It should be mentioned here that last year, according to the report of the Postmaster General, Chicago ranked second in the amount of second-class matter sent out through the mails, and that only New York is ahead in the number of newspapers and periodicals mailed. We stand far ahead that city of culture, Boston, where it is supposed by many all the literature of this country is produced. We also outrank Philadelphia and all other cities of the country, with the exception of New York.

of

Chicago receives mail also, about 115,000 letters every day, and about 10,000 circulars. This would make 35,995,000 letters and 3,130,000 circulars received by Chicago people in one year. As for newspapers and parcels, we don't receive so much as we send out, for what could the outside world send to Chicago that would be new and interesting? But we do not object to exchange with our friends on the outside, and as a result we get about five tons or 10,000 pounds or 60,000 pieces every day, or 18,780,000 a year.

In addition to this the Postoffice in one month issued $118,455.55 in domestic money orders and $39,337 in foreign orders, and paid $650,748 domestic orders and