Dayton, IL

Dayton is a LaSalle County community on the Fox River a few miles north of Ottawa, where waterpower made a small settlement unusually busy. John Green and other arrivals began building around the river in the late 1820s, and Dayton was platted in 1837. The rapids supplied power for a flouring mill, a woolen mill, sawmills, a tannery, wagon and chair shops, and later a paper mill. A feeder canal connected the river to the Illinois and Michigan Canal, turning the local water system into part of a larger transportation network.

The Fox River still gives Dayton its shape. The village's original blocks run parallel to the river, the dam and power house remain part of the local story, and the old railroad corridor follows the valley. Dayton's early industries have faded, but the place retains the feel of a river settlement built around work—mills, farms, trade, and the people who came through the water route. Dayton is an Illinois Fox River community whose history is written in rapids, mill foundations, a canal feeder, and streets laid out beside the current.