Morris, Illinois

City: Morris

County: Grundy

State: Illinois

Lat/Long: 41.3500, -88.4167

When Grundy County was created from La Salle County by act of the Illinois General Assembly in 1841, it was ordered that a county seat be located along the Illinois and Michigan Canal, on the lands of the canal. What became the town of Morris was platted in 1842 to fulfill this requirement, and received a U.S. Post Office that same year. In 1853 the General Assembly recognized the town as the county seat. It was named for canal commissioner Isaac N. Morris. Morris is located in northeastern Illinois, twenty miles southwest of Joliet. Abraham Lincoln spent the night in Morris on August 20, 1858, in order to arrive in Ottawa for the first Lincoln-Douglas Debate the following day.

Merriam-Webster’s Geographical Dictionary, 3rd ed. (Springfield, MA: Merriam-Webster, 1997), 770; Edward Callary, Place Names of Illinois (Urbana and Chicago: University of Illinois Press, 2009), 236; An Act to Create the County of Grundy from the County of La Salle; “An Act Supplementary to an Act Entitled ‘An Act to Create the County of Grundy from the County of LaSalle,’ Approved Feb. 17, 1841,” 10 February 1853, General Laws of the State of Illinois (1853), 154-55; The Lincoln Log: A Daily Chronology of the Life of Abraham Lincoln, 20 August 1858, https://www.thelincolnlog.org/Results.aspx?type=CalendarDay&day=1858-08-20.