330 ILLINOIS ACADEMY OF SCIENCE 
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History, Vol. 11, pp. 281-303. Plates LXIV-LXXIX, 
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Annual Report of the Department of Geology and Natural Resources of Indiana, pp. 
409-602. 
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of St. Louis, Vol. 20, pp. 59-271. Plates XVIII-XXIV. 
Ridgway, Robert, 1914. Bird Life in Southern Illinois. Bird Lore, Vol. 16, pp. 
409-420. 
Wagner, George, 1913. On a Peculiar Monstrosity in a Frog, Biological Bul- 
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of Illinois, Munsell, Chicago. 
CRANE TOWN DESTROYED 
W. S. STRODE, LEWISTON 
The village of Cranetown was on Spoon River about four 
miles southwest from the little city of Lewiston, the county 
seat of Fulton county, state of Illinois. It was surrounded by 
a great primitive forest of about 300 acres enclosed on three 
sides by an ox bow bend of the river. On the south the bluffs 
arose to a height of 150 feet. These hills were heavily tim- 
bered, but not with such gigantic trees as grew in the valley 
below. At the time of which I write it was one of the finest 
tracts of native timber to be found anywhere in the state. On 
the north, along the banks of the stream, grew several hundred 
hard or sugar maple trees. The timber farther back consisted 
mainly of great unbending sycamores, soft maple, elm, hack- 
berry, cottonwood, buckeye, walnuts of both kinds, and a fringe 
of willows along the river banks. Of the undergrowth there 
were large spaces covered with elderberry, much loved by the 
wild turkeys, patches of blackberry vines, kinnikinick, wahoo, 
several kinds of wild grape vines, both the three leaved and 
five leaved ivies, greenbrier, yellow root vines and in the lowest 
places were acres of wild balsams or touch me nots, much 
sought for by the humming birds for the nectar contained in 
their cub-like blossoms. 
Big spaces were covered with stinging nettles; in places the 
ground was carpeted with a mass of wood violets, many jack- 
in-the-pulpits and an occasional trumpet creeper that climbed 
to the top of the big trees. The urban village of Cranetown 
was builded in the very tops of a half dozen of the giant syca- 
