Huntley

By Nancy S. Bacheller

Huntley was founded in 1851. Its first boom years the 1850s to 1920s saw the town prosper thanks to the local dairy industry. Prolific dairy farmers provided milk for the many local condensing plants and cheese factories and sent huge surpluses into Chicago by train each day. It was said that the Huntley area produced more milk per square mile than anywhere else in the world. Businesses, homes, and churches all grew with the population. Village founders, movers and shakers of a century and more ago, as well as everyday workers and village residents are captured here in vintage images, showing what life was like in Huntley in years gone by.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Arcadia Publishing
• Release date: Mar 9, 2009
• ISBN: 9781439621103

Nancy S. Bacheller

Nancy S. Bacheller is a local history coordinator for the Huntley Area Public Library. She holds a degree in journalism from Northern Illinois University in DeKalb and wrote a weekly newspaper column about Huntley for 18 years. Bacheller sits on the board of directors for the Huntley Historical Society and is a member of the McHenry County Historical Society. She and her husband have lived in Huntley since 1985, raising their two sons there.

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INTRODUCTION

It was milk that made Huntley grow big and strong. Milk made Huntley prosper.

When the Native Americans vacated the northern Illinois area following the Black Hawk War, white immigrants from the east took up residence. The new settlers traveled for weeks by wagon, often bringing with them broods of children and several of their best dairy cows. They purchased their sections of land from the federal government and took up farming.

From the 1830s to the 1850s, the main purpose of the farms was for subsistence for the families, but the fertile soils of the northern Illinois area proved to be a boon to the farmers. A surplus of farm products developed, and entrepreneurs found a way to bring these products to market. Creameries, cheese factories, and milk processing and condensing plants were built around the area. The arrival of the Chicago and North Western Railway line into Huntley in 1851 brought the farmers a means to ship their excess milk, eggs, butter, cattle, and other farm surplus into the big city and beyond.

The newly emerging village of Huntley prospered and grew as a result. Feed and seed supply stores, hotels, general stores, blacksmiths, wagon makers, livery stables, and numerous other businesses began to emerge to support the local farmers and their growing milk trade.

The July 21, 1894, edition of the Huntley News reported, Farmers in the district surrounding Huntley produce more milk to the square mile than any other area in the world. The same article reported on one particularly successful enterprise, noting, The Huntley cheese factory owned by Messrs. Weltzien and Cornell is the largest in capacity and output of any in existence. It further stated, The average receipts of the creamery are not less than ten tons of milk for every day in the year. It was these early successful businessmen and farmers who built the town of Huntley.

Thomas Stillwell Huntley already was a wealthy man when he arrived in the area from New York in 1846 with his wife and three children. He purchased several hundred acres of land, including 80 acres along what was to be the railroad line. He maintained his many farms, but donated and platted what was to become a village. He set aside land for churches and a cemetery, sold other lots for businesses and homes, and opened a general store.

With the growing milk trade came continued prosperity for Huntley. From the late 1850s through the 1920s, the village was a growing, bustling community center with an active, thriving downtown square.

The town, known first as Huntley Grove or Huntley Station, incorporated in 1872 as the Village of Huntley. John Cummings, the son of one of the area’s earliest settlers, was named village president.

In 1839, the first religious services in the area were held in the home of early settler Prescott Whittemore. He and his wife, Lucy Geer Whittemore, had arrived in the area in 1838 with their brood of 10 children. Their family was among the first to hold local offices, to run a local hotel, and to name the township Grafton in honor of their New Hampshire home.

More organized religious congregations developed over the years. Three churches were established in the village: Lutheran, Catholic, and Congregational. All three were built on property donated by Huntley, a deeply religious man. He was a founder and active member of the First Congregational Church.

As the town grew, so did the need for educational facilities. The first school was established in a log cabin to the west of the future town in 1842. The first teacher was Cynthia Thompson. In 1860, a school was established along east Main Street, then later moved to Church Street to make way for a newer, more modern brick building. That school, built in 1875 to the east of the Congregational church, and the various one-room rural schools that dotted the countryside served Huntley-area children for many years.

In January 1920, nine rural school districts voted to combine with the Huntley town school to form McHenry County’s first consolidated school district. Busses brought rural students into town for education. The large brick edifice that already had been expanded in 1909 no longer could house all students from elementary through high school. A new high school was built in 1924 east of the earlier school. That building was in use until 1955. During the late 1800s and early 1900s, as more students funneled into the town school, the community continued to grow.

In the 1920s, trucking made it possible to ship whole milk to larger, more modern factories near Chicago where pasteurization was available, and Huntley’s local milk plants began to close. Farming and dairy production continued to be the area’s main industry.

When Grafton Township was founded in 1850, the area population was recorded at 440. By 1870, the township population had grown to 1,359. The U.S. Census Bureau recorded Huntley’s town population in 1880 at 505 and in 1910 as 773. But by 1920, the population had begun to decline. As elsewhere in the country, trade and social activities suffered during the Depression years of the 1930s. A cultural highlight for Huntley residents at that time was the weekly free movies in the town square park, as businesses attempted to draw customers into town.

With the milk factories closed, many residents took jobs in other communities, especially the watch factory in Elgin.

When what previously had been only a local dirt road known as Vine Street was paved and extended in 1936, Huntley residents could travel to Woodstock and beyond along Route 47.

With the milk factories closing, other manufacturers took over use of the plant facilities. After prohibition ended in 1933, beer was produced at the former Jelke milk factory. Bel Boy, Indian Maid, and Copperhead beer were brewed at the site on south Church Street that most recently housed Catty Corporation.

The Route 47 facility now occupied by Union Special was once Borden’s milk plant, a much-noted landmark and the jewel in the