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Show 1836- 1837] Fogg's Far West 119 while in another depressed and confined, and the extensive alluvion lying between the two great rivers opposite, it is believed, will always render it more or less unhealthy; and its unenviable proximity to St. Louis will never cease to retard its commercial advancement. The ciiy of Alton, as it is now styled by its charter, was founded in the year 1818 by a gentleman who gave the place his name;* 1 but, until within the six years past, it could boast but few houses and little business. Its population now amounts to several thousands, and its edifices for business, private residence, or public convenience are large and elegant structures. Its stone churches present an imposing aspect to the visiter. The streets are from forty to eighty feet in width, and extensive operations are in progress to render the place as uniform as its site will admit. A contract has been recently entered upon to construct a culvert over the Little Piasa Creek, [ 91] which passes through the centre of the town, upon which are to be extended streets. The expense is estimated at sixty thousand dollars. The creek issues from a celebrated fountain among the bluffs called " Cave Spring." Alton is not a little celebrated for its liberal contribution to the moral improvements of the day. To mention but a solitary instance, a gentleman of the place recently made a donation of ten thousand dollars for the endowment of a female seminary at Monticello, 81 a village five miles to the north; and measures are in progress to * Alton, twenty- five miles above St Louis, is the principal city of Madison County, Illinois. In 1807 the French erected here a small trading post. Rufus Easton laid out the town ( 1818), and named it for his son. The state penitentiary was first built at Alton ( 1827), but the last prisoner was transferred ( i860) to the new penitentiary at Joliet, begun in 1857. Alton was the scene of the famous anti- Abolitionist riot of November 7, 1837, when Elijah P. Lovejoy was killed.- ED. * Captain Benjamin Godfrey donated fifteen acres of land and thirty- five thousand dollars for the erection of a female seminary at Godfrey, Madison County, Illinois. The school was opened April iz, 1838, under the title of the Monticello Female Seminary, with Rev. Theron Baldwin for its first principal.- ED. |
