*Sold*Intermediate Mount.*Sold*

Although settlements had occasionally existed in the area, they were not permanent. In 1824, surveyors for the Illinois and Michigan Canal which would extend from Chicago's Bridgeport neighborhood to the Illinois River, a tributary of the Mississippi River, arrived in this area of the Vermillion River, followed by homesteaders by the 1830s. In 1861, miner John O'Neill established a trading post called "Hardscrabble" (ironically an early name for the Bridgeport neighborhood), supposedly because he watched loaded animals struggle up the river's banks. Another name for the new settlement was "Unionville". Streator received its current name to honor Worthy S.