Some Baylor Land in Downs Township

     Yesterday, we learned from the McLean County, Illinois History that Jacob Baylor had arrived in McLean County about 1837.  The county history stated that he had purchased 80 acres about 1839.  Shown above is a record that Jacob Baylor had obtained 40 acres from the government in 1840. He probably purchased additional land from other people and these transactions were recorded at a governmental agency other than the Federal Land Office.

      The image shown below is from an 1874 county atlas which shows land owned by Jacob's widow, Nancy Baylor and two of his sons, A. S. Baylor (Albert Simpson Baylor) and D. Baylor (David F. Baylor). The 40 acres which were purchased in 1840 is the north half of the land in section 8 owned by N. Baylor. 

     Not shown is an additional 80 acres owned by David Baylor about 5 miles south. Each section is usually a square with each side one mile in length. Other Baylor family members owned land in various townships in the county.

1874 McLean County, Illinois Atlas¹

An enlargement of sections 7 and 8 

I don't believe that there is any connection with the A. Armstrong shown in Section 7 and John M. Armstrong who eventually married Isabelle Maria Baylor.


1. Ancestry.com. U.S., Indexed County Land Ownership Maps, 1860-1918 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2010. Original data: Various publishers of County Land Ownership Atlases. Microfilmed by the Library of Congress, Washington, D.C.

Jacob Baylor, a Successful Teamster and Farmer

     In today’s vernacular, a teamster is a truck driver or a member of the union, International Brotherhood of Teamsters. Teamster originated as a term describing a person who drove a wagon pulled by a ‘team’ of horses or oxen. 
     Jacob Baylor was a teamster under the original meaning of the word. And he must have been a rather successful one.
    Jacob Baylor, who was born in Pennsylvania. May 16. 1805.  He moved westward to Ohio, where he married Nancy Beaty (Beatly) in 1830 and about 1837 he moved westward again to McLean County, Illinois.  By 1839 he had purchased 80 acres in Downs Township. 
     Jacob made frequent trips with his team traveling north to Chicago and southwest to St. Louis, taking grain to market and returning with goods for Bloomington merchants.  Each trip took two weeks.  By 1848 he had been able to purchase additional acreage for his farm until he had accumulated a total of 200 acres.  
     Who knows how successful Jacob could have been if he had lived longer.  Jacob died in 1848 at the age of 43.  

Freight Wagon

     

Sitting by a Warm Fire

     While sitting by the fire in our room at the Timber Lodge and watching the snow come down I started to think of our ancestors who couldn't get out of the weather and probably didn't enjoy the snow as much as we enjoy it.
     The Mannen family was visited by tragedy with two weather related deaths about a year apart.  In March, 1863 Henry Harrison Mannen was serving with the 94th Illinois Volunteers in Missouri.  He was sent out to forage for food for his company near Mountain Store, Missouri.  He accidentally fell into a stream and as a result  got pneumonia and died.  [This is an example of the hard times that the Civil War soldiers went through. Twice as many soldiers died from illness and disease as from battle wounds.  It is also a shame that the soldiers had to forage for their own food.]
     News of this reached his sister, Annetta Rebecca Mannen Baylor back in Downs, McLean County, Illinois and must have affected her terribly. Another brother, Thomas M Mannen was serving in the 12th Kansas Volunteer Infantry. A year after Henry died, Annetta was traveling to town to get word of Thomas and got caught in a sudden spring storm, took ill and died.  Henry left a widow and young son, while Annetta left her husband with two very young children.  Annetta was my 2nd great-grandmother.
    Below is an image of a letter from the army surgeon verifying his death.  This document is in the widow's pension file.  Henry's widow, Sylvia was attempting to get help from the government to help raise Henry's son.

Letter from army surgeon verifying Henry's death^1,

Link to image of Henry's Tombstone

Link to Annetta Baylor's Tombstone

1.   "Mannen, Henry H (WC80217) › Page 8 - Fold3.com." 2012. 9 Oct. 2013 <http://www.fold3.com/document/287474497/>

James David Armstrong - Part IV: Luggage Handlers

     A few weeks ago as I was claiming my suitcase at the carousel at the airport, someone else's suitcase came by all busted up with the items spilling out.  Someone had tried to tape it back together.  It made me think of the horror stories that you see every once in awhile on news programs.  I am glad it wasn't mine.
     The suitcase reminded me of a story in the Obituary of James David Armstrong¹.   
     "In 1858 he came to Illinois, reaching Bloomington by way of Chicago, where he recalls an incident to prove that the roughness of the baggage handlers of those days was not the fiction of  a paper joke but an unpleasant reality.  Mr. Armstrong had to borrow a hammer and nail up the pieces of his oaken 'kit' which the railroaders had wrecked."  
    Seems like the more things change the more they stay the same.  
 
1.   “Passing of a Nestor” Pantograph, Bloomington, Illinois March 30, 1906  

A Tempest of Shooting Stars

       Last night’s talk on the news about the Perseids meteor shower reminded me of a story about my Great-great-grandmother Elizabeth Homan.  Elizabeth was Lizzie Fox Pickett’s mother.     
     In 1833 Elizabeth Homan’s father, Joseph, a blacksmith decided to move his family from Rockingham County, Virginia to Ohio.  He settled in Muskingum County for five years, before moving to Licking County for ten years and eventually to Delaware County.  He traveled rather late in the year because we know that the family was on the road to Muskingum County on November 12, 1833.  We know the exact date they were traveling because of the family story about shooting stars.  
     The Grundy County, Illinois History¹ states 
     “. . . while en route [the family] witnessed the remarkable phenomenon of shooting stars which occurred that year. They made their journey westward with team and wagon, and one night took refuge in a school-house, in which place they saw the wonderful astronomical display. . . ”
     It is because of this astronomical display that we know exactly when they were traveling.  Contemporary accounts tell of the shooting stars falling about half as frequently as  flakes of snow in a snowstorm.  It was estimated that about a quarter of a million meteors were visible during the night in Boston.  There were at least 40 per second.  It frightened people half to death.  Nov 12, 1833 is still considered to be the greatest astronomical display in recorded history.  This was the Great Leonid Meteor Shower of 1833.
     In the summer of 1969 I participated in a sailboat race from Los Angeles to Honolulu.  About 2:30am on the morning of July 15, I spotted an incredibly bright shooting star.  As I wrote in my log, "spotted brilliant shooting star...lit up the whole sky... and left a huge vapor trail".  I remember that I could have read a book, it was that bright.   It left quite an impression on me. 
     I think that if I had seen that starry night in 1833 that it would have made quite an impression also.

NASA article regarding Nov 12, 1833
1.  Biographical & Genealogical Record of LaSalle & Grundy Counties, Illinois, Volume II, Chicago, 1900, p708-711