Oregon ( ) is a city in and the

county seat A county seat is an administrative center, seat of government, or capital city of a county or parish (administrative division), civil parish. The term is in use in five countries: Canada, China, Hungary, Romania, and the United States. An equiva ...

Ogle County, Illinois Ogle County is a county in the northern part of the U.S. state of Illinois. According to the 2020 United States census, it had a population of 51,788. Its county seat is Oregon, and its largest city is Rochelle. Ogle County comprises Rochelle ...

, United States. The population was 3,721 in 2010.U.S. Census Burea
Population, Age, Sex, Race, Households
/ref>

History

The land Oregon, Illinois was founded on was previously held by the

Potawatomi The Potawatomi (), also spelled Pottawatomi and Pottawatomie (among many variations), are a Native American tribe of the Great Plains, upper Mississippi River, and western Great Lakes region. They traditionally speak the Potawatomi language, ...

and Winnebago Indian tribes. In fact, later, settlers discovered that the area contained a large number of Indian mounds, most in diameter. Ogle County was a

New England New England is a region consisting of six states in the Northeastern United States: Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Rhode Island, and Vermont. It is bordered by the state of New York (state), New York to the west and by the ...

settlement. The original founders of Oregon and Rochelle consisted entirely of settlers from

. These people were "

Yankee The term ''Yankee'' and its contracted form ''Yank'' have several interrelated meanings, all referring to people from the United States. Their various meanings depend on the context, and may refer to New Englanders, the Northeastern United Stat ...

s", that is to say they were descended from the English

Puritans The Puritans were English Protestants in the 16th and 17th centuries who sought to rid the Church of England of what they considered to be Roman Catholic practices, maintaining that the Church of England had not been fully reformed and should b ...

who settled

in the 1600s. They were part of a wave of

farmers who headed west into what was then the wilds of the

Northwest Territory The Northwest Territory, also known as the Old Northwest and formally known as the Territory Northwest of the River Ohio, was formed from part of the unorganized western territory of the United States after the American Revolution. Established ...

during the early 1800s. Most of them arrived as a result of the completion of the

Erie Canal The Erie Canal is a historic canal in upstate New York that runs east–west between the Hudson River and Lake Erie. Completed in 1825, the canal was the first navigability, navigable waterway connecting the Atlantic Ocean to the Great Lakes, ...

. When they arrived in what is now Bureau County there to forest and prairie ecosystems, the

New Englanders New Englanders, also called Yankees, are the inhabitants of the New England region in the Northeastern United States. Beginning with the New England Colonies, the name "New Englander" refers to those who live in the six New England states or thos ...

laid out farms, constructed roads, erected government buildings and established post routes. They brought with them many of their

values, such as a passion for education, establishing many schools as well as staunch support for abolitionism. They were mostly members of the

Congregationalist Church Congregationalism (also Congregational Churches or Congregationalist Churches) is a Reformed Christian (Calvinist) tradition of Protestant Christianity in which churches practice congregational government. Each congregation independently a ...

though some were

Episcopalian Anglicanism, also known as Episcopalianism in some countries, is a Western Christian tradition which developed from the practices, liturgy, and identity of the Church of England following the English Reformation, in the context of the Protes ...

. Culturally Bureau County, like much of northern

Illinois Illinois ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Midwestern United States, Midwestern United States. It borders on Lake Michigan to its northeast, the Mississippi River to its west, and the Wabash River, Wabash and Ohio River, Ohio rivers to its ...

would be culturally very continuous with early

culture, for most of its history. The first European to visit the land was pioneer John Phelps. Phelps first visited the area in 1829 and returned in 1833 hoping to find a suitable site to settle. Phelps found a forest and river-fed valley which impressed him enough that he built his cabin there. Other pioneers followed Phelps to this site, and Phelps helped create the first church, school, grocery store, blacksmith shop, and post office in Oregon.Oregon History
", ''City of Oregon'', official site. Retrieved 4 July 2007. By December 4, 1838, due in large part to the efforts of Phelps and his brothers B.T. Phelps and G.W. Phelps, the land was claimed, subdivided and certified by the Ogle County clerk as Oregon City.Behrens, pp. 13-14. The name Oregon means "River of the West". In 1839, Oregon City was renamed Florence after a visitor compared the scenic beauty of the Rock River to the Italian city of the same name. Florence was used for only about three years when the city opted to revert to its original name, without the word "city," in 1843. By 1847 the town had a

general store A general merchant store (also known as general merchandise store, general dealer, village shop, or country store) is a rural or small-town store that carries a general line of merchandise. It carries a broad selection of merchandise, someti ...

sawmill A sawmill (saw mill, saw-mill) or lumber mill is a facility where logging, logs are cut into lumber. Modern sawmills use a motorized saw to cut logs lengthwise to make long pieces, and crosswise to length depending on standard or custom sizes ...

ferry A ferry is a boat or ship that transports passengers, and occasionally vehicles and cargo, across a body of water. A small passenger ferry with multiple stops, like those in Venice, Italy, is sometimes referred to as a water taxi or water bus ...

, 44

household A household consists of one or more persons who live in the same dwelling. It may be of a single family or another type of person group. The household is the basic unit of analysis in many social, microeconomic and government models, and is im ...

s and a population of 225. The population continued to grow through the 1850s and 1860s, a fact demonstrated by the increasing number of churches in those decades and the building of a railroad in 1871. Industry followed the railroad and Oregon became home to an oatmeal mill, furniture factory, chair factory, flour mill and a

foundry A foundry is a factory that produces metal castings. Metals are cast into shapes by melting them into a liquid, pouring the metal into a mold, and removing the mold material after the metal has solidified as it cools. The most common metals pr ...

, Paragon Foundry, which operated until the 1960s. The city of Oregon was first organized under an act of the

Illinois General Assembly The Illinois General Assembly is the legislature of the U.S. state of Illinois. It has two chambers, the Illinois House of Representatives and the Illinois Senate. The General Assembly was created by the first state constitution adopted in ...

which was approved on April 1, 1869. By the 1870s the town of Oregon and nearby area was home to around 2,000 people. James Gale was elected the city's first

mayor In many countries, a mayor is the highest-ranking official in a Municipal corporation, municipal government such as that of a city or a town. Worldwide, there is a wide variance in local laws and customs regarding the powers and responsibilitie ...

on March 21, 1870, and four other men, Christian Lehman, W.W. Bennett, George M. Dwight and George P. Jacobs, were chosen as

aldermen An alderman is a member of a municipal assembly or council in many jurisdictions founded upon English law with similar officials existing in the Netherlands (wethouder) and Belgium (schepen). The term may be titular, denoting a high-ranking membe ...

. On March 29, 1873, the city was reorganized because of an act of the Illinois legislature which allowed the municipalities to incorporate as cities and villages. In 1920, the Oregon City Hall was constructed on the perimeter of the city's commercial district and it has been the center of city government ever since.Novak, pp. 34-35. The

Ogle County Courthouse The Ogle County Courthouse is a National Register of Historic Places listing in the Ogle County, Illinois, county seat of Oregon. The building stands on a public square in the city's downtown commercial district. The current structure was comple ...

was built in 1891 on the corner of Washington Street and Fourth Street ( Illinois Route 64 and

Illinois Route 2 Illinois Route 2 (IL 2) is a north–south state highway in northern Illinois. It currently starts at Illinois Route 40 in Sterling, Illinois, Sterling and ends at the Wisconsin state line in South Beloit, Illinois, South Beloit, very near th ...

). Between 1908 and 1911, on a site just north of the city, sculptor

Lorado Taft Lorado Zadok Taft (April 29, 1860 – October 30, 1936) was an American sculptor, writer and educator. Part of the American Renaissance movement, his monumental pieces include, ''Fountain of Time'', ''Spirit of the Great Lakes'', and ''The ...

erected a 50-foot tall statue he had designed and originally named ''The Eternal Indian''. Located on a bluff overlooking the Rock River valley, the sculpture is now known as the Black Hawk Statue, named after Black Hawk, a chief of the Sauk Indian tribe that once inhabited the area. The city of Oregon annexed nearby Daysville, Illinois, in 1993.

Geography

According to the 2010 census, Oregon has a total area of , of which (or 96.65%) is land and (or 3.35%) is water.

Demographics

As of the

census A census (from Latin ''censere'', 'to assess') is the procedure of systematically acquiring, recording, and calculating population information about the members of a given Statistical population, population, usually displayed in the form of stati ...

of 2010, there were 3,721 citizens, 1,630 households, and 941 families residing in the city. The population density was . There were 1,789 housing units at an average density of . The racial makeup of the city was 95.9%

White White is the lightest color and is achromatic (having no chroma). It is the color of objects such as snow, chalk, and milk, and is the opposite of black. White objects fully (or almost fully) reflect and scatter all the visible wa ...

, .9%

African American African Americans, also known as Black Americans and formerly also called Afro-Americans, are an Race and ethnicity in the United States, American racial and ethnic group that consists of Americans who have total or partial ancestry from an ...

, 0.1% Native American, 0.8% Asian, 0%

Pacific Islander Pacific Islanders, Pasifika, Pasefika, Pacificans, or rarely Pacificers are the peoples of the list of islands in the Pacific Ocean, Pacific Islands. As an ethnic group, ethnic/race (human categorization), racial term, it is used to describe th ...

, 1.2% from other races, and 1.1% from two or more races.

Hispanic The term Hispanic () are people, Spanish culture, cultures, or countries related to Spain, the Spanish language, or broadly. In some contexts, Hispanic and Latino Americans, especially within the United States, "Hispanic" is used as an Ethnici ...

or Latino of any race were 4.2% of the population. There were 1,630 households, out of which 22.1% had children under the age of 18 living with them, 42.3% were husband-wife families, 10.9% had a female householder with no husband present, and 42.3% were nonfamily households. 36.3% of householders lived alone, 20.1% of which were female and 16.1% male. The average household size was 2.18 and the average family size was 2.83. In the city, the age distribution of the population shows 79.6% over the age of 18, with 19.6% aged 65 years or older. The median age was 43.5 years. The median income for a household in the city was $47,971 and the median income for a family was $60,625. Males employed full-time had a median income of $49,958 versus $29,792 for females. The

per capita income Per capita income (PCI) or average income measures the average income earned per person in a given area (city, region, country, etc.) in a specified year. In many countries, per capita income is determined using regular population surveys, such ...

for the city was $24,832.U.S. Census Burea
Income, Employment, Occupation
/ref> 11.9% of all residents lived below the poverty level, including 11.6% of families with related children under the age of 18. Of families with a female householder with related children under 18 years and no husband present, 34.4% lived below the poverty line.

Culture

Oregon has a rich history in the arts. As of Feb. 2021, renovations are planned for the historic building known as the Oregon Coliseum, which will create a new museum and cultural center. The community hosts several major events a year, including the annual Autumn On Parade Candlelight Walk ShamROCK The Town and more

The Arts

In 1898, sculptor

founded the Eagle's Nest Art Colony on a bluff overlooking the Rock River, north of Oregon. Taft and his art colony began to exert an influence on the city of Oregon and its culture. The artists who gathered during the summer at Eagle's Nest would leave a mark on the city below them. One result of the colony's location near Oregon was the inclusion of a second story

art gallery An art gallery is a room or a building in which visual art is displayed. In Western cultures from the mid-15th century, a gallery was any long, narrow covered passage along a wall, first used in the sense of a place for art in the 1590s. The long ...

in the Oregon Public Library when it was built in 1908. Art colony members were required to contribute to the local culture by giving art shows, lectures and plays. In 1904, Taft created ''The Blind'' and then began focusing on more monumental works including '' The Eternal Indian'' located just north of Oregon in Illinois' Lowden State Park. Several other Taft works are located in and around Oregon, including The Soldiers' Monument on the courthouse lawn.Novak, pp. 55-56.

Notable people

* Norene Arnold, All-American Girls Professional Baseball League player * Neva Burright, Illinois harness racing driver and first woman to win a Grand Circuit race * James H. Cartwright, Illinois Supreme Court justice * Sherman Landers, 5th place triple jumper for the

1920 Summer Olympics The 1920 Summer Olympics (; ; ), officially known as the Games of the VII Olympiad (; ; ) and commonly known as Antwerp 1920 (; Dutch language, Dutch and German language, German: ''Antwerpen 1920''), were an international multi-sport event held i ...

Team * Frank Loomis, gold medal and world record-setting 400m hurdler for the

Team *

Frank Orren Lowden Frank Orren Lowden (January 26, 1861 – March 20, 1943) was an American Republican Party politician who served as the 25th Governor of Illinois and as a United States Representative from Illinois. He was also a candidate for the Republican pre ...

, the 25th Governor of Illinois, kept an estate on the river just outside Oregon * Mabel Newcomer, Vassar economic professor and government advisor, born in Oregon * Fred Roat, third baseman for the

Pittsburgh Alleghenys The following is a history of the Pittsburgh Pirates of Major League Baseball. Franchise beginnings (1870s–1899) Early baseball in Pittsburgh and the American Association An early mention of "base ball" in the region is found in an issue of t ...

and Chicago Colts *

, sculptor and friend of

Frank Lloyd Wright Frank Lloyd Wright Sr. (June 8, 1867 – April 9, 1959) was an American architect, designer, writer, and educator. He designed List of Frank Lloyd Wright works, more than 1,000 structures over a creative period of 70 years. Wright played a key ...

References

External links

Oregon official websiteOregon Public Library websiteOregon School District Homepage
{{authority control Cities in Ogle County, Illinois Cities in Illinois County seats in Illinois Populated places established in 1833 Rockford metropolitan area, Illinois 1833 establishments in Illinois