HISTORY OF KANE COUNTY.
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of Elgin, and graduated from the Law College, at Albany, N. Y., in 1871. Two years later he began practice at Elgin, Ill., where he was elected State's Attorney in 1876. He also served as Mayor of Elgin in 1885 and 1886. In 1890 and 1891 he was Corporation Counsel of the city, and in 1891 was chosen Circuit Judge, an office to which he was re-elected to 1897 and again in 1903. He was married in 1874 to Miss Lucy E. Waite, of Elgin.
MILES W. WILLIS, retired farmer and grain-dealer ^Elburn, Ill., born in Erie County, Penn., March 22, 1836, son of Horace and Amy (Miller) Willis, came with his parents to Illinois in 1844. They made their home in Blackberry Township, Kane County, where he completed his education, and became a farmer. He was married, Nov. 13, 18G8, to Isabella Warne, daughter of Henry and Charity (Stone) Warne. Mr. Willis continued farming until 1863, when, in connection with his half-brother, J. W. Swain, he went into the hay and grain business. The following year he disposed of his interests in this connection, and bought largely of western lands. He is a Mason, and is a stockholder in the Kane County Bank. He has done much traveling, in Texas caring for his stock and in Kansas looking after his land investments. At the present time his main business is looking after a farm which he has put into the hands of a renter.
JOHN W. WILSON (deceased), early settler of Sugar Grove Township, was born in New York, Nov. 30, 1812, son of John Wilson, a native of Acworth, N. H., and a descendant of Rev. John Wilson, a Puritan clergyman, who came to Boston in 1830. John W. Wilson, the Illinois pioneer, was reared to manhood in his native place, where he was trained to farming. Coming to Illinois in 1835 he purchased Government land in Sugar Grove Township, for which he paid $1.25 an acre, and which he brought tinder cultivation, making it one of the finer farms of Kane County. A man of intelligence, character and integrity, he was well and favorably known. In 1844 he married Eliza Lamb, born in New York in 1820. His death occurred July 21, 1866, in Sugar Grove, and that of his wife, Feb. 9, 1871. In 1903 their living children were: Theophilus, Aurora, Ill.; Grace (now Mrs. Howard); Jesse, of Colorado; William W. and Joseph, of Sugar Grove.
IRA C. WILSON (deceased), Chicago, was born Jan. 29, 1837, near Batavia, Ill., son of Samuel Wilson, of whom a sketch appears on another page, and was reared and educated in his native town. As a young man he was engaged in the dry-goods business there, but sold out in 1860, and with his young wife, located in Golden, Colo., becoming one of the pioneer farmers of the Rocky Mountain region. After five years spent in the new Territory, he returned to Chicago, where he engaged in teaming business, which he conducted until his retirement from business in 1896. In the course of his long career he had many contracts for the handling of heavy machinery and the erection of monuments, but he was proud of the fact that he never had an accident resulting in the injury of one of his employes. Among the important works which devolved upon him during this period was the placing in position of the immense machinery used at the North Chicago water-works and installing the plants of the Chicago City Railway. His personal standing was of the very highest character, and he was regarded as the soul of business integrity. While in Colorado he and his wife had many thrilling experiences: once having to flee from the Indians, at another time having a tornado sweep away their home, and once barely
