PIONEER HUNTERS OF THE ICANKIAKEE 

 of timber and sand as far as the timber line. It 

 was several years before the grade was com- 

 pleted across the marsh to the dry land. This 

 was the last of the toll gate system in Porter 

 County. In fact, it was the last in Northern In- 

 diana. When Baum built the bridge it stayed 

 in. This was knov/n, and is to this day, as 

 Baum's Bridge. And yet Eaton built a bridge 

 across the river at the same place fourteen 

 years prior to the building of the Baum's Bridge. 

 It was at this ford that /Aajor Irwin crossed the 

 Kankakee when he was giving notice to all the 

 Indians along the Kankakee Swamps to be 

 ready to leave in the early summicr for their 

 homes beyond the /Aississippi. Also it was at 

 this ford where General Tipton crossed the river 

 while gathering up the children of the forest to 

 their far-off hunting grounds toward the sunset. 

 In 1878 a party of hunters from Pittsburg, Pa., 

 built a club house at the bridge and they put on 

 the river a small steamer, "Little Rhoda" which 

 played between English Lake and Long Ridge. 



106 



