John Wood (governor)
| John Wood | |
|---|---|
 |
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| 12th Governor of Illinois | |
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In office March 18, 1860 – January 14, 1861 |
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| Lieutenant | Thomas Marshall |
| Preceded by | William Henry Bissell |
| Succeeded by | Richard Yates |
| 13th Lieutenant Governor of Illinois | |
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In office January 12, 1857 – March 18, 1860 |
|
| Governor | William Henry Bissell |
| Preceded by | Gustav Koerner |
| Succeeded by | Thomas Marshall |
| Member of the Illinois Senate | |
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In office 1850 |
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| Personal details | |
| Born |
December 20, 1798 Sempronius, New York |
| Died | June 4, 1880 (aged 81) Quincy, Illinois |
| Resting place | Woodland cemetery, Quincy |
| Political party | Republican |
| Spouse(s) | Ann M. Streeter Mary Ann Holmes |
| Occupation | Farmer, Banker, Businessman, Politician |
| Religion | Congregationalist |
John Wood (December 20, 1798 – June 4, 1880) was the 12th Governor of Illinois, serving from March 18, 1860, to January 14, 1861. Wood was a founder and the first settler of Quincy, Illinois.
Wood was born on December 20, 1798, in Sempronius, New York, in the area now known as Moravia. He was the second child and son of Dr. Daniel and Catherine Crause Wood. His mother became estranged from the family when John Wood was five and moved to Palatine, New York. Wood was sent to live with his older cousin, James, and his wife, Mary Armstrong Wood, in Florida, New York.
In the vanguard of adventurous young eastern emigrants, Wood on November 2, 1818, left his New York home. He initially planned to farm in Northern Alabama. In Cincinnati during the winter of 1818-1819, however, he gained access to two books by Edmund Dana, published in Cincinnati in 1818. A resident and surveyor in the Illinois Military Tract, land set aside by Congress as bounty for veterans of the War of 1812, Dana provided the lure that changed Wood's destination. Dana's books extolled the significant advantages of a promontory over the Mississippi River at Illinois' westernmost point. Wood moved west to land near Atlas in Pike County, Illinois, squatted (resided on land he did not own), and became a farmer. Here, Wood met land speculator Peter Flinn, from whom he bought 160 acres (65 ha) of land in the 3.5-million-acre Illinois Military Tract. Wood moved to his newly acquired land and with Jeremiah Rose in 1822 built a small, one-room log cabin on the east bank of the Mississippi River at today's Quincy, Illinois. Rose, his wife, and their five-year-old daughter lived with Wood in the cabin until 1826, when Wood married Ann M. Streeter of Salem, New York, daughter of Justice of the Peace Joshua Streeter.
Intending to speculate in land in the Military Tract, Wood had arrived at the federal land office in Edwardsville, Illinois, where he met Willard Keyes, a Vermont native. Keyes had taught French and Indian children at Prairie du Chien, Wisconsin, for two years and become disenchanted with his profession and disappointed that he had accumulated nothing. Learning Wood had the same idea about speculating in land, Keyes formed an informal partnership with Wood. They journeyed to the site on the Mississippi that had attracted Wood west. It was a limestone bluff that rose nearly 100 feet above the river, at which the pair would found Quincy, Illinois.
At the land office, Wood also met Edward Coles, who would become Illinois' second governor in 1822. Appointed the federal land registrar by President James Monroe, Virginian Coles had released his eleven slaves while on the way to Illinois to take his post. As governor, Coles recruited Wood's help to fight a movement from 1822 to 1824 by the Illinois General Assembly, dominated by immigrants from Southern states, to amend the constitution to make Illinois a slave state. A referendum on August 3, 1824, for a constitutional convention for that purpose failed statewide by a ratio of 57 to 43 percent. In the territory in which John Wood fought the proposal, the plan for a slave constitution was defeated 90 to 10 percent. Wood considered his work to keep Illinois a free state one of his life's greatest achievements.
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