In Lincoln's Shadow: The 1908 Race Riot in Springfield, Illinois

Chapter 2. The Community

CHAPTER 2 The Community EXCEPT for the presence of the state government, a relatively ample railroad service, and a large number of coal mines close at hand, Springfield in 1908 was an average middle-size midwestern city. The capital developed a diversified and vigorous economy, but only a few diehard civic boosters expected it to become an industrial and commercial giant like Chicago. First settled about ninety years before the riot, until the late 1830s Springfield remained but one of a number of small and undistinguished prairie villages in central Illinois. I Many of its early settlers came from the South-especially from Kentucky and Tennessee-but the 1820s also saw the arrival of migrants from the North. Several distinct streams of Americanborn settlers merged in central Illinois, and the region also attracted a significant number of German and Irish immigrants before the Civil War. By the 1860s Springfield was culturally diverse, though the presence of southerners in terms of numbers and outlook was more prominent than it would be later in the nineteenth century.2 Springfield's Economy The acquisition of the state government lent Springfield political importance and prestige, but it was the discovery and exploitation of massive coal resources that, along with railroads, stimulated population growth after mid-century (see Table 2.1). Springfield is situated near the center of a massive coal bed that underlies nearly three-quarters of Illinois.3 Before the 1860s coal in Springfield and elsewhere in the state was harvested in small quantities for local use 56 The Sociogenesis of a Race Riot Table 2.1 Population of Springfield, Illinois, 1840-1920 Year Number Percent Increase 1840 2,579 1850 4,533 75.8 1860 9,320 105.6 1870 17,364 86.3 1880 19,743 13.7 1890 24,963 26.4 1900 34,159 36.8 1910 51,678 51.3 1920 59,183 14.5 Compiled from U.S. Bureau of the Census, Sixteenth Census of the United States: 1940, Population (Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1942), 1:294. from surface seams. Test holes drilled near the city in 1865 revealed wide coal seams a little over two hundred feet down, and the first shafts were operating within two years. Springfield's residents recognized the significance of the discovery of a seemingly inexhaustible supply of coal, and, when the first load was hauled in 1867, they marked the event with a day of celebration.4 By the early twentieth century Illinois was second only to Pennsylvania in amount of coal mined, and the mines near the capital were prominent in this production . Sangamon County (including Springfield) enjoyed a sixyear stretch, beginning in 1900, in which it mined more coal than any of the other fifty or so coal-mining counties in Illinois. From 1906 to 1908 it stood second only to Williamson County in productivity . In 1908, 37 Sangamon County mines provided employment for some 6,553 workers, most of whom were miners who extracted the coal with pick and shovel. Several years after the riot an intensive study of Springfield conducted by the Russell Sage Foundation mentioned that the 17 mines within four miles of downtown Springfield employed nearly 3,000 of the city's male workers. A few coal mines actually operated within city limits. "By the time the last shipping mine shut down in 1952," according to one account, "all but the central core of Springfield and much of the surrounding territory was undercut by abandoned coal mine tunnels.,,5 Railroad lines, in part attracted by the availability of coal, helped spur local development. The Northern Cross Railroad was the first to lay tracks into the capital in 1842, but this initial enterprise got off to a shaky start. Within a few years both tracks and rolling stock were in disrepair, and at one point mule teams temporarily took the The Community 57 place of locomotives. By the 1850s, however, effective and efficient rail service was in place. Three railroads served Springfield by the 1870s, and construction of three more was scheduled for the near future. In 1904 a local historian noted with pride that Springfield, served by a half dozen major railroad lines, had become one of the state's more important transportation hubs.6 The twin blessings of ample fuel and good transportation facilities would seem to have invited the development of industry in the city, but manufacturing never did...