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Jacobson signs grant application
McHENRY COUNTY DIVISION OF TRANSPORTATION MAKES DISCOVERY
Historical find
Village president defends prior decision on veterans shelter By STEPHEN Di BENEDETTO sdibenedetto@shawmedia.com
Photos by Kyle Grillot – kgrillot@shawmedia.com
McHenry County Division of Transportation Project Design Engineer Ernest Varga describes documents that spell out how the county’s road system first was established. An old document from the 1930s that was found this spring that led the DOT on a quest that eventually uncovered more than 300 pages of road papers.
Old documents lay out county road system By KEVIN P. CRAVER kcraver@shawmedia.com WOODSTOCK – An unusual finding at the bottom of a drawer at the McHenry County Division of Transportation led to the discovery of more than 300 old documents that laid the foundation for much of the county road system we know today. The “Harmony linen,” as employees have come to call it, is a document typed and drawn on a 28-by-19inch wax-preserved Irish linen that settled a land dispute filed by a property owner along Harmony Road, which stretches from Huntley west to the Boone County line. But to Project Design Engineer Ernest Varga, who stumbled across it, the linen represented a mystery to be solved. No one had seen anything like it before – it was dated 1939, and referenced state road laws dating back to 1847, or just 11 years after the county’s founding. “This had to have been done for a reason. This was not done on a lark,” Varga said. A penciled-in note referenced another “road paper” supposedly held at the county clerk’s office, Assistant County Engineer Jeff Young said. While the linen stumped the county clerk’s office employees, longtime clerk Kathie Schultz recognized the clerk’s signature and the seal authenticat-
HEBRON – Village President John Jacobson on Monday signed a grant application for a homeless veterans shelter in Hebron, but he defended his original decision to withhold his endorsement to try to have the shelter’s owners fund water improvements. He also used a former village president to help make his case during the Village Board meeting. Addressing a room full of veterans, Jacobson and former Village President Frank Beatty detailed a long history of Transitional Living Services refusing to cooperate and build a larger water main underneath the New Horizons homeless shelter, despite a 14-year-old annexation agreement requiring one. Jacobson said he added extra conditions to a water main project the board approved Oct. 20 to try to secure a firmer commitment from Transitional Living Services. One of those conditions involved TLS paying the owners of nearby Hoops Bar and Grill $5,000 to help them construct a new water well within the
“Our board and our town need a commitment, and that’s what I would like to get – a commitment. I want to sign [the application]. I have no problem with signing it. Just give our board a commitment.”
John Jacobson Hebron village president
See GRANT, page A6
Illinois marks anniversary of ’13 tornadoes An old notice describing the plans to create a road, and the process of voting for or against the road sits Friday at the McHenry County Division of Transportation in Woodstock. BELOW: Varga points out documents that spell out how the county’s road system first was established. building, where Records Manager Bill Draths found the box of road papers from more than 1,800 stored at the facility. The 303 documents, handwritten with quill and ink, detail how roads in the county got their start, including parts of major thoroughfares such as Routes 31, 47, 14 and 23, Varga said. Landowners back then, mainly farmers wanting ways to get their goods to market, had to petition what was then the Board of County Commissioners to have ing the document. She pro- in 1964 approved separating a road built. The process at vided an important clue what are now the recorder’s the time not only included about where related docu- and circuit clerk’s offices. collecting signatures but ments would be. The counDirection from Circuit also posting a bond to prove ty clerk’s office at the time Clerk Katherine Keefe and the request was serious. also oversaw the recording Recorder Phyllis Walters of documents until voters led to the county archive See FIND, page A6
“It’s fascinating because now we’re actually seeing the original documents before there were roads anywhere, and why they needed them.” Jeff Young, assistant county engineer
The ASSOCIATED PRESS WASHINGTON – From memorial services to dedications, residents and elected officials marked the oneyear anniversary Monday of deadly tornadoes that tore through central and southern Illinois, leaving more than half a dozen people dead and destroying numerous homes and businesses. Among the hardest hit was the central Illinois community of Washington, where more than 1,000 buildings were destroyed and three people died. Mayor Gary Manier said the recovery process has brought people together. “As we get through life, we get so busy. Sometimes we don’t know all our neighbors. Now, everybody’s holding block parties. They’re all friends because they helped each other out of basements. They helped clean debris off of other properties with each other,” Manier told Chicago’s WLS-TV for a story published online Monday. “It just made us even closer.” About two dozen tornadoes hit Illinois on Nov. 17 of last year. Seven people died
See TORNADOES, page A6
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At a glance About two dozen tornadoes hit Illinois on Nov. 17 of last year. Seven people died in the aftermath and injuries played a role in the January death of an eighth person. The communities with some of the worst damage included Pekin and Gifford in central Illinois, and Brookport in southern Illinois. Washington was also hit hard. More than 1,000 buildings were destroyed and three people died.