Galena's Old Market House and the Lead Boom

Galena, Illinois, was once one of the wealthiest cities in the Midwest, and the reason was lead. The mineral galena, or lead sulfide, lay in thick veins under the hills of northwestern Illinois, and by the eighteen thirties this town was shipping more lead than anywhere else in the country, supplying shot and pipe to a rapidly expanding nation.

The Greek Revival Market House, built in eighteen forty-five, was the commercial heart of that boom, serving as the city hall, courthouse, and public market. The lead ran out and Galena faded, which is why so much of it survived intact. Ulysses Grant lived here before the Civil War, and the historic district today covers about eighty-five percent of the city and holds more than one thousand buildings from before nineteen hundred. The Market House still stands and still serves as a welcome center for the city.