About Quincy, Il

from BEF Junior National Championships - Event Guide

Meet the Board (cont.)

Founded in 1825 and known as “Gem City,” Quincy is named after President John Quincy Adams, who was in office at the time of the community’s inception. Quincy was a thriving transportation center linking riverboats and rail service to western destinations and cities along the Mississippi River.

Quincy celebrates its history as a key link to equality for those fleeing slavery, genocide and religious persecution. In 1838, Quincy found itself filled with members of the Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints fleeing hostility in Missouri. The influx of more people than the population of Quincy presented quite the challenge, but residents ensured the congregants were housed and fed. Later in 1838, the town was again host to the Potawatomie Tribe as they were forcibly relocated from Indiana to Kansas.

The founding of the Chicago, Burlington, and Quincy Railroad in 1855 and the construction of a rail bridge in Quincy was a major force for creating a transportation hub in the region. It is during this time that the population of the city grew enormously, from a little under 7,000 in 1850 to 24,000 by 1870, helping Quincy surpass Peoria in becoming the second-largest city in the state, at the time.

In 1858, three brothers founded one of the largest breweries in the United States in Quincy. In the early part of the 20th century, Dick Bros Brewery was larger than Anheuser-Busch. When the Dick brothers built their original brewery, it had an annual capacity of about 1,500 barrels of beer, within the next 15 years, it would produce about 70,000 barrels. Prohibition and finally the effects of WWII caused the brewery to be auctioned off under bankruptcy in 1951.

The matter of slavery was a major social issue in Quincy’s early years. The city was separated from the slave state of Missouri only by the Mississippi River. This made Quincy a hotbed of political controversy. Dr. Richard Eells, a staunch abolitionist, built his home in Quincy in 1835 and sheltered people escaping enslavement on their way to Chicago, making it a major stop on the Underground Railroad.

The divide over slavery climaxed in 1858 when Quincy hosted the sixth Senatorial debate by U.S. Senator Stephen Douglas and his challenger, Abraham Lincoln.

Throughout the 19th Century, Quincy progressed from a backwater hamlet along the Mississippi River and became one of the state’s most important cities and ports. It was during the early decades of the 20th Century that many of the historic buildings in the Downtown Quincy Historic District were constructed, including the city’s first skyscraper, the Western Catholic Union Building, in 1925.

In 1930, the Memorial Bridge, a two-lane truss toll bridge, was opened connecting Quincy to Missouri. In 1987, the cable-stayed Bayview Bridge was constructed to help alleviate traffic on the aging Memorial Bridge. Today, both bridges complement each other by carrying westbound (Bayview) and eastbound (Memorial) traffic.