The Forge on the Prairie

Those were brave old days, hard old days, dear old days, too, for that matter, back in the early forties. Then William"Uncle Billy" Rantz conducted his forge out on the prairie on the edge of the timber, away beyond Davis creek. There he sharpened plowshares and fashioned wooden mould-boards (as only he knew how), and built breaking plows for that sturdy race of pioneers by whose persistent efforts the prairie wilderness was at last subdued. Time has immortalized the tale of "The Forge in the Forest," and the Armorer's lusty song has added the glamour of romance to it, and why should not we, at this late day, preserve, at least, the memory of "The Forge on the Prairie," dedicated as it was to the arts of peace, leaving to generations yet to come the song, if song there be?

"Uncle Billy" was a genial, accommodating soul, whose all-around skill at the anvil helped. the settler of that day over many a serious difficulty. His services were often sought when a shoe needed to be set, or a link welded, or the share of the breaking plow sharpened. Whenever an emergency arose, especially if it were something concerning tile cumbersome wooden breaking plow and its primitive mould-board of wood, "Uncle Billy" was invariably sought by the settlers from far and near. Mr. Judson Nichols, at the age of ninety-five, has related to us how, as a boy of seventeen, he has stood beside this prairie forge and watched the operations of this old-time disciple of Vulcan with an interest amounting almost to veneration.

'When it came to building a breaking plow, "Uncle Billy" Rantz had few equals. He would go out into the sugar bush that skirted the river and, with practiced eye, select such trees as had a twist in the grain. He would cut the tree, invariably a hard maple, and then saw out the section best adapted to his purpose. From this section he would sometimes be able to split out two, and sometimes three pieces, with the proper curvature for a mould-board and of a sufficient thickness to be worked down to proper form. These wooden mould-boards on a plow, equipped with a coulter for cutting the tough prairie sod, worked admirably except in loose soil, when frequent cleaning of the mould-board became necessary.

Mr. Nichols says that frequently, as he watched "Uncle Billy" at his work, the thought came to him, "What in the world would we do for our breaking plows if “Uncle Billy” were to die?" And with such a vast country to subdue and such a dearth of artisans of the class of "Uncle Billy," the question did, indeed, seem most vital.


Some time in 1847 or 1848 the David Bradley “Diamond Breaker,” with Mould-board of steel, came into the market, and on its advent many of the troubles of the prairie settler vanished. This plow was called the “Diamond”, because of the shape of the mould-board and also because of the fact that the steel of which it was constructed scoured in any soil and shone with all the brightness of a gem. "Uncle Billy,” after a life of unremitting service to his fellowmen, has gone to his reward, lo, these many years; so long ago is it that not only the forge on the prairie has been forgotten, but the log cabin has disappeared, and only a few in this day know of the site thereof. The prairie has vanished along with the wooden plow, and the wilderness that was is now a vast garden of productiveness and a thing of beauty--so beautiful, indeed, that in all the country wide there is nothing that surpasses the panorama of golden harvests which the autumn brings to the Valley of the Kankakee. "Uncle Billy" today, were he to stand in the doorway of his humble log shop, looking eastward, would behold, not more than three miles distant, in a straight line, smoke rising lazily from a huge brick stack and, silhouetted against the sky, the hulks of great buildings, the home of the David Bradley plow, that has been such a tremendous factor in the development of the land. "Uncle Billy" Rantz may have dreamed of something like this as he worked the tough sugar-maple mould-board from day to day, but, if so, it was merely a dream by which the day's work was beguiled. But, just the same, "Uncle Billy," sturdy old scion of a race that met and overcame difficulties,

"Give me a cup; I would drink to you."
From "Legends and Tales of Homeland on the Kankakee", Burt Burroughs; 1923
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