About Taming the Wild Prairie:
A History of DeKalb County

This project represents a collaborative effort by the Joiner History Room at the Sycamore Public Library, the DeKalb Public Library, the Ellwood House and Museum, the Northern Illinois Regional History Center and Northern Illinois University Libraries. These institutions have shared their resources to bring original historical materials shedding light upon the early history (from first settlement to circa 1920) of DeKalb County, Illinois to the public.

These materials include texts and images. In addition to memoirs and other first-person accounts, these texts include newspaper stories, local publications, and manuscripts. Image materials include original photographs and engravings from DeKalb County as well as selected other materials illuminating conditions in nineteenth-century northern Illinois.

In addition to these historical materials, this World Wide Web site also includes interpretive materials, including a streaming video presentation of Dr. Jeffrey Chown’s prize-winning documentary "Barbed Wire Pioneers" and James Macon’s "Wade in the Water," an account of the Underground Railroad in DeKalb County during the decades before the Civil War.

The project collaborators hope that these materials will provide residents of DeKalb County and other members of the public with an opportunity to explore their history in the detail permitted by the use of primary source materials.

Funding for this grant was awarded by the Illinois State Library, a Division of the Office of Secretary of State and State Librarian Jesse White, using funds provided by the Institute of Museum and Library Services under the federal Library Services and Technology Act.

©Copyright 2003 Taming the Wild Prairie Digitization Project