Papers Of Abraham Lincoln

In force, Feb.[February] 26, 1841.

An ACT to locate a State road.
1

Com’rs[Commissioners] to locate road.

Sec.[Section] 1. Be it enacted by the People of the State of Illinois, represented in the General Assembly, That the road lately laid out and located in Cook county, by John Frink, Lyman Butterfield and Richard J. Hamilton, extending from the western limits of Chicago to the Sand Ridge, in the direction of the Des Plaines river, and known as the turnpike from Chicago to the Sand Ridge, be a State road.2

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Co. com’rs of Cook county to appropriate moneys to keep road in perfect order.

Sec. 2. In consideration that the said road has been constructed, at a heavy expense, by the munificence of the citizens of the city of Chicago, it shall be the duty of the county commissioners' court of Cook county, at the March term of said court, annually, to make such appropriation, out of the county treasury of said county, as will be sufficient to keep said road in good and perfect order; and that the said appropriation shall be expended under the direction of such person as the said court may appoint and direct.

Sec. 3. This act to take effect from and after its passage.

Approved, February 26, 1841.

1Albert G. Leary introduced HB 212 in the House of Representatives on February 6, 1841. The House passed the bill on February 17. The Senate concurred on February 25. On February 26, the Council of Revision approved the bill and the act became law.
Illinois House Journal. 1840. 12th G. A., 341, 371, 419, 503, 528, 530; Illinois Senate Journal. 1840. 12th G. A., 330, 397-98.

2On June 13, 1840, Chicagoians interested in a turnpike held a public meeting at the Saloon Building. Frink, Hamilton, and Butterfield issued a report on the best means of making the road. Those gathered approved plans for a road at a cost of $2,880, a sum to be raised by public subscription. The body appointed Frink, Hamilton, and Butterfield as commissioners to supervise construction. Subscriptions were slow in coming, however, and the scale of the project had to modified to decrease the cost. Contractors completed the western end, but by 1842, work on the road had ceased.
Bessie Louise Pierce, A History of Chicago: The Beginnings of a City, 1673-1848 (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2007), 1:109-110