Marseilles Hydro Plant

Beside the Illinois River at Marseilles stands a hydroelectric complex built to power an early electric railway. Its main generator building, a Classical Revival structure of concrete, brick and steel, was begun in 1906 and finished in 1911 for the Northern Illinois Light and Traction Company. Engineer C. W. Humphrey directed its design and construction. Water diverted by the Marseilles Dam flows through a head race and forebay to turbines that drive the generators, some of them original Westinghouse and General Electric units still working. The 7.6-acre site also holds a storehouse, an oil shed, the ruins of a coal-fired steam plant used in icy winters, and a 1956 substation. Power from the station fed the interurban lines that ran along the old Illinois and Michigan Canal and connected the valley towns. That role in early electric transportation, along with the archeological potential of the steam plant site, is the basis for the property's listing. Exterior and interior remain largely as built.