How to Get Lumber from Hobart to Chicago in 1849

Early in the autumn of 1849, the more famous Wicker brother ordered some lumber to be sent to Chicago from George Earle's sawmill in Hobart. What's interesting is how they got it from here to there.


(Click on image to enlarge)
Image courtesy of the Hobart Historical Society.

They rafted it. I've heard of rafting cut trees down a river, but I knew nothing about rafting lumber on a lake. And now I learn that in the mid-19th century it was the most common means of moving lumber around the Great Lakes. You can find a discussion of lumber-rafting on Lake Superior here. And here is a photograph of a bag-boom raft of lumber heading out onto a lake:



This photograph comes from Michigan State University via Lost Arts Press.

The writer of our ledger lists the men who accompanied the lumber over the lake: Chancey Wheeler, Jesse Jeffcoat, and Huggins Curtis. I cannot read the name of the man who measured the lumber.

Chancey (whose name also appears spelled as Chauncy or Chauncey) was born in New York circa 1817. The earliest I can find him in this area is 1846, when he married Jerusha (or Gerusha) Curtis (Indiana Marriage Collection). The 1850 Census shows the young couple with one daughter, living in the household of (I'm guessing) Gerusha's parents in Portage Township. Sometime that same year, Chancey bought the first of several parcels he would own over the years in Hobart Township (Early Land Sales, Lake County). The 1860 Census shows the family in Hobart Township, where Chancey worked as a butcher. I can trace him only as far as the 1880 Census (still in Hobart Township). The date of his death and the site of his burial are unknown. What, if any, relation he had to the more famous Wheelers in northwest Indiana — I leave that for people with time on their hands to discover.

I can't find any information on Jesse Jeffcoat or Huggins Curtis.