around 1900, including a tale from
1901 of three market hunters tak-ing
3,008 ducks in eight days
near Bath. Harvests of this
magnitude, whether common
or rare, may have led to legisla-tion
and regulation, including
daily bags limits, season dates,
firearm type and the elimina-tion
of market hunting.
Sport hunters included
wealthy businessmen who
formed clubs and bought land
along the Illinois River to start
duck hunting resorts managed
by local residents. By 1918, the
40-mile area above and below
Beardstown was thickly populat-ed
with private hunting clubs. In
the 1970s, 76 clubs were registered in
Mason County. Among the clubs were
the Duck Island Club (founded
in 1880 at Banner), Central Illi-nois
Hunting Club (built in
1902 between Browning and
Bath) and Treadway Rod and
Gun Club (established about
1919 as the first private duck
refuge and located on a lake
where the Sangamon joins the
Illinois). This local investment,
while privatizing some land, led
to auxiliary businesses and ser-vices
that employed citizens of the
area as boat builders, decoy carvers,
gunsmiths and guides.
Fishing
“From time to time we came upon
monstrous fish, one of which
struck our canoe with such vio-lence
that I thought it was a great
tree, about to break the canoe to
pieces.”
—Father Jacques Marquette, 1673
The slow-flowing Illinois River
teemed with huge populations of native
fish, providing sustenance for Native
Americans, French explorers and mis-sionaries
and Euro-American settlers.
The central part of the Illinois River
contained many small lakes, marshes,
sloughs and ponds until the 1920s,
when agriculture was expanded
through the building of levees. The
lakes were fed from rainwater and
springs in the low-water season, and
during floods their volume increased by
as much as 100 times, inundating the
area. Frequent and prolonged flooding
provided wetland habitat and food sup-ply
for many species of fish.
The Illinois River also was interest-ing
because of its slow fall—averaging
only 3 inches per mile. From the cen-tral
region at Banner to the river’s
mouth, the fall of the Illinois averaged
only 1.5 inches, causing the speed of
the water flow to average only 1.5-2.5
miles per hour.
As demand increased, fishing
became an important industry and way
of life for 19th century Illinois “river
people.” With the fishing industry grew
up peripheral businesses, such as mak-ing
and servicing fishing tools, boat
building, net-knitting, fish-trap making,
fish markets, ice houses and other
trades. The industry lasted until the
1950s, by which time the increased
industrial and sewage pollution of the
river habitat had decreased the viability
of many of the commercial species.
Channel catfish, common carp and
smallmouth buffalo made up the great-est
portion of the fishing catch. In addi-tion
to the bottom-feeders, both large-mouth
bass and gizzard shad (used for
bait and smoked for shipping) were
commercially viable species.
Commercial Ice Companies
Before the invention of artificial refrig-eration
in the early 20th century, ice
from the Illinois River was harvested
every winter and stored in large ice hous-es,
the proprietors of which sold ice to
shippers of fresh fish, waterfowl and pro-duce
for train deliveries to large cities.
It is estimated that between 2,600
and 3,500 men worked for ice compa-nies
in Illinois in the late 1800s. In the
Chicago area alone, 22 large ice compa-nies
once existed.
City dwellers had ice delivered to
them by horse and wagon. The iceman
had to lift from 25- to 100-pound blocks,
according to the order, which was
placed by the consumer putting a num-bered
card in the window that corre-sponded
with the number of pounds
of ice they wanted. The ice was car-ried
to a kitchen using ice tongs and
chipped with chisels to fit the com-partment
of the ice box (made of
oak, pine or ash wood lined with
zinc, slate, porcelain, galvanized metal
or wood and insulated between the
walls with charcoal, cork, flax straw
or mineral wool).
The winter of 1890 was so warm
that the supply of natural ice was
insufficient to meet demand, spurring
the invention of ways to manufacture
ice. By 1899 there were 29 artificial
ice plants in Illinois.
Musseling
Many species of fresh-water
mussels were abun-dant
in the Illinois River at the
end of the 19th century, when it was
discovered they could be used for but-ton
making in the new ready-to-wear
clothing industry.
Boats of all shapes and sizes
have plied Illinois’ waters,
harvesting waterfowl, fish
and mussels and transport-ing
goods and people.
Commercial fishing and musseling
industries spurred the develop-ment
of numerous ancillary
businesses along the river.
Prior to the development of manu-facturing
processes, ice was har-vested
during the winter, stored
and delivered as needed by ice
companies, such as the Patterson
& Curran Ice Company (circa
1907).
10 / OutdoorIllinois October 2011 October 2011 OutdoorIllinois / 11
(Photo courtesy Illinois State Museum.)
Crow’s-foot
hook
used in
musseling
(Photo courtesy the Skinner House.)
(Photo courtesy Henry Public Library.)
(Photo courtesy Henry Public Library.)
(Photo courtesy Illinois Natural History Survey.)
(IDNR file photos.)
(Photo courtesy Illinois Natural History Survey.)
(Photo courtesy Illinois State Museum.)
The Illinois River valley once was
popular with market hunters. Today,
sport hunters flock to public and
private waterfowl hunting areas.
