The Kankakee County Courthouse in Courthouse Square is a historic building in Kankakee, Illinois,

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territori ...

that has been home to the government of

Kankakee County Kankakee County is a county located in the U.S. state of Illinois. According to the 2010 census, it has a population of 113,449. Its county seat is Kankakee. Kankakee County comprises the Kankakee, IL Metropolitan Statistical Area. History St ...

since 1912. The current structure, the third county courthouse, took three years to build and is considered a fine example of

Beaux-Arts architecture Beaux-Arts architecture ( , ) was the academic architectural style taught at the École des Beaux-Arts in Paris, particularly from the 1830s to the end of the 19th century. It drew upon the principles of French neoclassicism, but also incorp ...

History

The area now known as Courthouse Square in Kankakee, Illinois was originally used by the Potawatomi as a council ground. European settlement began in 1832 with the Treaty of Camp Tippecanoe. In 1851, the

Illinois Central Railroad The Illinois Central Railroad , sometimes called the Main Line of Mid-America, was a railroad in the Central United States, with its primary routes connecting Chicago, Illinois, with New Orleans, Louisiana, and Mobile, Alabama. A line also c ...

decided to build a station in what is now Kankakee. The Associates Land Company, formed by supporters of the Illinois Central, purchased and

plat In the United States, a plat ( or ) (plan) is a cadastral map, drawn to scale, showing the divisions of a piece of land. United States General Land Office surveyors drafted township plats of Public Lands Surveys to show the distance and bea ...

ted the land around the station, calling it Kankakee Depot. When

was formed in 1853, Kankakee Depot competed with Momence to be named

county seat A county seat is an administrative center, seat of government, or capital city of a county or civil parish. The term is in use in Canada, China, Hungary, Romania, Taiwan, and the United States. The equivalent term shire town is used in the US st ...

. The influence of the Associates Land Company, who offered to donate a large block of land and $5000 for a courthouse, swayed voters to select Kankakee Depot as seat. The first Kankakee County Courthouse was built shortly thereafter. The three-story building became a social center and trading place in addition to its capacities in county government.

Stephen A. Douglas Stephen Arnold Douglas (April 23, 1813 – June 3, 1861) was an American politician and lawyer from Illinois. A senator, he was one of two nominees of the badly split Democratic Party for president in the 1860 presidential election, which wa ...

gave a speech in front of the courthouse during his 1858 Senate Campaign. On May 17, 1861, it was home to Kankakee County's only case of capital punishment when an African-American man was hanged from the second floor for the murder of a white girl. On October 5, 1872, the courthouse was destroyed in a fire. The limestone walls were cleaned and re-used in the second courthouse. The new courthouse was built to similar specification as the first. The main difference was the

cupola In architecture, a cupola () is a relatively small, most often dome-like, tall structure on top of a building. Often used to provide a lookout or to admit light and air, it usually crowns a larger roof or dome. The word derives, via Italian, fro ...

, which was railed higher than the first. The courthouse opened in October 1873. By the 1900s, it was evident that the county courthouse was too small for the county's use. The county population had recently grown to 37,000, an increase of 8,000 over the previous decade. In November 1908, voters approved the construction of a new courthouse, the current structure.

Zachary Taylor Davis Zachary Taylor Davis (May 26, 1869 – December 16, 1946) was the architect of several major Chicago buildings, including St. Ambrose (1904) Old Comiskey Park (1910), Wrigley Field (1914), Mount Carmel High School (1924), and St. James Chapel of ...

was awarded the commission for the building. It was built by

Lafayette, Indiana Lafayette ( , ) is a city in and the county seat of Tippecanoe County, Indiana, United States, located northwest of Indianapolis and southeast of Chicago. West Lafayette, on the other side of the Wabash River, is home to Purdue University, whi ...

contractor W. F. Stilwell for $187,000. Construction began on October 2, 1909 and finished in July 1912. In the 1930s, a protest with 200 farmers gathered at the courthouse to demand changes in property tax laws so that they would be paid after the harvest. By 1950, the population of the county exceeded 73,500 thanks to an industrial boom in the late 1940s. The courthouse has remained in use since its 1912 opening. On March 7, 2007, the building was recognized by the

National Park Service The National Park Service (NPS) is an agency of the United States federal government within the U.S. Department of the Interior that manages all national parks, most national monuments, and other natural, historical, and recreational propert ...

with a listing on the

National Register of Historic Places The National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) is the United States federal government's official list of districts, sites, buildings, structures and objects deemed worthy of preservation for their historical significance or "great artistic ...

. A shooting took place at this courthouse on the morning of August 26, 2021, where an unknown shooter killed 2 and injured 1. According to Mayor Christopher Curtis, the suspect has been apprehended.

References

{{Illinois county courthouses Government buildings completed in 1912 County courthouses in Illinois Courthouses on the National Register of Historic Places in Illinois Renaissance Revival architecture in Illinois Beaux-Arts architecture in Illinois Kankakee, Illinois 1912 establishments in Illinois National Register of Historic Places in Kankakee County, Illinois