William H. Jaques
SOURCE: "Early History and Pioneers of Champaign County, Illinois," by Milton W. Mathews and Lewis A. McLean, editors of the Champaign County Herald, published by the Champaign County Herald, 1886
SURNAMES: DUNHAM, JAQUES, PORTER, WHIPPLE
WILLIAM H. JAQUES—Mr. Jaques was born February 8th, 1820, in Geauga county, Ohio, then known as New Connecticut or Western Reserve. But little is known of his father, Henry JAQUES, who was born in the city of New York, in 1789, of French parentage, and was apprenticed to a shoemaker in Hartford, Connecticut, in 1803. He married Elizabeth PORTER, in 1814, and settled in munson, Geauga county, Ohio, in 1819, and built a "log cabin" in the midst of a dense forest. He died in February, 1829 leaving a widow and family of seven small children, four of whom are still living, the mother having died in 1880, at the advanced age of eighty-three years. W. H. JAQUES, the subject of this sketch, settled in Joliet, Illinois, in 1845, and worked at his trade, (a practical tinner). He married Eliza P. DUNHAM, in 1846. Two children, a son and daughter, were the fruits of this union. J. H. JAQUES, the son, is still living and resides in Tolono, in this county, with whom his father, William H., makes his home, his wife and daughter having died in Joliet, in 1852. When the gold fever was raging, Mr. Jaques became infected and crossed the plains in 1850, and worked with varying success in the hill sides and gulches, mountain tops and valleys, river banks and river beds, for two years; he returned to Joliet in July 1852 having accumulated little money but a great deal of experience. He came to Urbana in October, 1852 and established the first stove store and tin shop; he manufactured the first tin ware ever made in Champaign county. He exhibited tinware of his own make at the first fair ever held in the county. He was married to Sarah A. WHIPPLE in February, 1854; she died May 1st, 1857. He then sold out his business to Sutton Brothers and in 1859 returned with his mother and children to Ohio. He enlisted in 1862, as a private in 103rd Ohio Volunteer Infantry, and served until the close of the war. He returned to Champaign county, in 1866, located in Tolono, and engaged in the sale of hardware, stoves, agricultural implements, and in the manufacture of tinware. Mr. Jaques has never sought or held any office, but was a whig of the Clay and Webster stamp. He believed then as he does now that it was the duty of the government to levy a tariff with a view of protecting home industries. He early imbibed a hatred of American slavery and when the republican party was organized to check its progress he eagerly joined its ranks, and is to-day as he himself expresses it, a "died in the wool" republican, because that party advocates his ideas of protection to American labor, and meets his views upon other questions as well. Mr. Jaques can always be relied upon in business matters as well as politics. You always know where to find him. Quiet in his demeanor, charitable where there is any just claim, truthful, honorable, and reliable, he is a good type of the successful business men of the west.