Speech of John Hossack on the Fugitive Slave Law
The Fugitive Slave Law of 1850 required the federal government to assist with retrieving runaway slaves even in free states like Illinois. In an act of civil disobedience, businessman John Hossack and seven others helped a runaway slave named Jim Grey escape from federal custody just as he was about to be sent back South. Convicted in a Chicago court, Hossack paid a $100 fine and spent ten days in jail, although he was released each day to dine with Chicago officials and prominent citizens. In his strongly worded defense, Hossack argued, “the parties who prostituted the constitution to the support of slavery, are traitors.”
There Ought to Be School for the Instruction of Women Voters
This cartoon appeared in the Chicago Tribune five days after the Illinois House of Representatives approved women's suffrage in Illinois.
The Liberty Bond Mutual Benefit Association-The Money is Mostly Spent at Home
The U.S. entered Europe's Great War in 1917 as a deeply divided nation. To rally the country to the cause of war, the federal government launched a massive public relations effort drawing on the most talented communicators in business, journalism, and government. In this advertisement from the Chicago Tribune of October 1917, popular cartoonist John T. McCutcheon encourages Americans to support the war effort by purchasing government bonds. With the letters US in the background, a circle of men representing different occupations is united by Liberty Bonds. The poster suggests that only un-American outsiders would refuse to support the bond drive.
Karte von Michigan
John Farmer became the premier cartographer of Michigan in the early nineteenth century, publishing his first map of the state in 1826. This 1834 map, published in German, indicates the location of a number of Native American settlements. Maps like this would have been used by prospective settlers hoping to identify suitable land in the territory.
United States of America Compiled from the latest & best Authorities
Like other maps from the early years of the United States, John Melish's 1818 map claimed territory for the new nation. The odd shape of the state of Illinois suggests the mapmaker's limited knowledge of the region, perhaps due to the fact that most American settlement at the time was closer to the Ohio River. The map includes references to American Indian settlements to the west of the Mississippi River.
An Improved Edition of a Map of the Surveyed Part of the Territory of Michigan
John Farmer became the premier cartographer of Michigan in the early nineteenth century, publishing his first map of the state in 1826. In this map that Farmer published in English in 1835, he neglects Indian villages, unlike the 1834 version published in German, and also shows that an increasing part of the state has been covered by the rectangular land survey.
Memorial Image of Louis Riel
A memorial to Metis leader Louis Riel who was executed by Canadian authorities on the charges of murder and treason. The imagery of cabins and a teepee suggests the close relationship between the Metis and American Indians on the Canadian Great Plains.
Pioneers Entering Kentucky
This drawing appeared in an account of Daniel Boone's early settlement in Kentucky that emphasized the hostility of American Indians to the newcomers.
Heroism of a Pioneer Woman
A tableau of frontier violence. This image accompanied the tale of a 1791 attack on the John Merrill home in Kentucky in which Mrs. Merrill killed five attackers with her ax. Along with stories of white settlers taken captive by American Indians, images like this portrayed settlers as victims of Indian aggression and celebrated the strength of settler women as a sign of the strength of the young American nation.