City of Champaign history

Busey died on December 13, 1852, but not before he had discussed station sites with the railroad.

By July 1853, construction crews had begun erecting depot buildings on the northern portion of the holding – the first buildings of any sort in the future city.

Beginning on March 22, 1854, several large additions were surveyed and recorded in what was to become Champaign.

The Union reported that on January 7, 1856, the first election in the “West Urbana” precinct had occurred; 84 votes were cast electing two justices of the peace and two constables.

Also in January, 1857, the Union announced the anticipated spring opening of the Cattle Bank.

Undercapitalized, the venture came to a halt by the summer of 1860.

In the meantime, on February 21, 1861, West Urbana received full legal sanction from the State Legislature to function as the City of Champaign.

The University of Illinois was one of the land-grant universities created by the Morrill Act of 1862.

Cunningham described the opening event: “… on the 17th day of August, 1863, the one car – the total of the rolling stock of the corporation – propelled by a team of mules, rolled into Urbana from the West.” “The railroad,” he continued, “was north more than it cost Urbana.”

The University of Illinois (founded in 1867) is the community’s chief economic asset, but agriculture (mainly corn [maize] and soybeans), food processing, distribution, high-technology industries, and manufacturing (plastics, ceramics, and office supplies) are also important.

The earliest, absent important details, was related by Lothrop in his first history of Champaign County (1870).

Bids for the new City Building were opened February 19, 1889.

In 1896, the Burnham Athenaeum building was opened to the public, allowing the library to move into its first “permanent” home.

Probably the most important reason for questioning them is that they do not agree with the version related by Cunningham, who wrote in 1905:

Finally, on July 13, 1937, the Council formally accepted the finished building from the contractors.

Mayor Flynn, in his bid for re-election in 1939, offered an accounting of the total expenditures for the City Building.

An undergraduate division of the university opened in Chicago in 1946.

One of those changes occurred in 1960 when, during the first term of Mayor Emerson Dexter, the Council moved the formal council chamber from the relatively small tower quarters on the fifth floor to the second floor auditorium.

Parkland (community) College was founded in 1966.

Visually, and functionally, a much more significant event occurred when, on May 28, 1967, the Champaign Fire Department moved out of the first and second floors of the east wing to the new central fire station located at 207 W. White Street.

The stone arch bridge which carried the tracks across the Boneyard survived, albeit in a most neglected condition, long enough to be restored in 1981 by the Champaign Park District.

In 1982 Chicago Circle merged with the University of Illinois at the Medical Center to form the University of Illinois at Chicago.

On June 20, 1983, the police vacated the City Building, as well, for their facility at the corner of University Avenue and First Street.

By fall 1986, the east wing was completely gutted; only the exterior walls remained.