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This is a FREE page on the Grundy County ILGenWeb site (http://grundycountyil.org/). "Let the record be made of the men and things of to-day, lest they pass out of memory to-morrow and are lost. Then perpetuate them not upon wood or stone that crumble to dust, but upon paper, chronicled in picture and in words that endure forever." --Kirkland REPORT FROM COMMITTEE ON DIAMOND MINE DISASTER Source: Journal of the Senate of the Thirty-Fourth General Assembly of the State of Illinois, Begun and Held at Springfield, January 7, 1885; Page 112. Springfield, ILL: Journal Co., State Printers, 1885. To his Excellency, the Governor of the State of Illinois: The General Assembly of the State of Illinois, at its session in the year 1883, having appropriated the sum of $10,000.00 to relieve the sufferers by the Diamond Mine disaster at Braidwood, and appointed the undersigned a committee to distribute the same, we beg leave to report the following disposition of our trust. We annex hereto an itemized statement of our expenditures, showing the amount paid out to date ($5,728.90), and the amount still on hand ($4,273.10). The committee deemed it for the best interest of those committed to their charge, first, to surround them with the comforts of a home, and then reserve as much of the fund as possible to educate and provide for the children until such a time as they could help themselves. Accordingly the amount already paid has been largely for the purpose of giving all the families comfortable homes, and assisting those who desired to remove to relatives and friends at a distance. At the time of the disaster, there were 39 widows with 93 children left destitute. The committee have assisted 18 widows and families to remove to other localities, where, we are assured, they are comfortably situated among friends and relatives. We have now under our immediate charge, at the mines, 17 widows and 54 children. These families are all pleasantly situated and the children being educated for future usefulness. The funds now on hand are being used for the support of those families by payments every two weeks to each mother in proportion to the number of children. The committee hope that the balance of the State fund, together with that donated so generously by the public, will be sufficient to care for those families for two years to come, after which time it is believed that all will be able to help themselves. In reporting the present comfortable condition of all those who suffered by this terrible mine disaster, the oommittee cannot but express their gratification that the wisdom of the General Assembly, in making this generous appropriation, has been fully justified by the results. Robert Huston, E. W. Felton, W. H. Odel.
Robert Huston, E. W. Felton, Wm. H. Odell. Braidwood, Ill., January 1, 1885.
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