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Kendall County, Illinois
Kendall County Courthouse
Location in the U.S. state of Illinois
Illinois's location in the U.S.
Founded	1841
Named for	Amos Kendall
Seat	Yorkville
Largest village	Oswego
Area
• Total	322 sq mi (834 km2)
• Land	320 sq mi (829 km2)
• Water	2.0 sq mi (5 km2), 0.61%
Population
• (2010)	114,736
• Density	358/sq mi (138/km2)
Congressional districts	11th, 14th
Time zone	Central: UTC−6/−5
Website	www.co.kendall.il.us

Terminal moraines, such as this one in central Kendall County, rise dramatically from the surrounding plain.

Kendall County is a county in the U.S. state of Illinois, within the Chicago metropolitan area. According to the 2010 census, it has a population of 114,736.^[1] Its county seat is Yorkville,^[2] and its most populous municipality is Oswego.

Kendall County is part of the Chicago-Naperville-Elgin, IL-IN-WI Metropolitan Statistical Area. It was the fastest-growing county in the United States between the years 2000 and 2010.^[3]

History

Kendall County was formed in 1841 out of LaSalle and Kane counties.

The county is named after Amos Kendall.^[4] Kendall was the editor of the Frankfort, Kentucky newspaper, and went on to be an important advisor to President Andrew Jackson. Kendall became the U.S. Postmaster General in 1835.

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  Kendall County at the time of its creation in 1841
  

  
  

  
  

Geography

According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the county has an area of 322 square miles (830 km²), of which 320 square miles (830 km²) is land and 2.0 square miles (5.2 km²) (0.6%) is water.^[5]

Kendall County is a small but rapidly growing county that has the majority of its population in the northeast, and along the Fox River (the only river in the county) which runs through the county's northwestern section. Many new subdivisions have been constructed in this county, which has produced considerable population growth. Southern Kendall still remains largely agricultural. Kendall County has two primary ranges of low-lying hills formed by what is known as an end moraine. Ransom, the more predominant of the two moraines, runs through the west and north-central part of the county. This moraine has created elevations of over 800 feet (240 m), in contrast to elevations in southern Kendall County that drop to the lower 500 feet (150 m) range. Minooka, the other major end moraine ridge in Kendall County, runs along its entire eastern border with Will County. The two moraines intersect at almost a right angle in the township of Oswego. The county's only designated state park is Silver Springs State Fish and Wildlife Area.

Climate and weather

In recent years, average temperatures in the county seat of Yorkville have ranged from a low of 10 °F (−12 °C) in January to a high of 84 °F (29 °C) in July, although a record low of −26 °F (−32 °C) was recorded in January 1985 and a record high of 111 °F (44 °C) was recorded in July 1936. Average monthly precipitation ranged from 1.52 inches (39 mm) in February to 4.39 inches (112 mm) in July.^[6]

Major highways

• 
  Interstate 80
  


• 
  U.S. Highway 30
  


• 
  U.S. Highway 34
  


• 
  U.S. Highway 52
  


• 
  Illinois Route 25
  


• 
  Illinois Route 31
  


• 
  Illinois Route 47
  


• 
  Illinois Route 71
  


• 
  Illinois Route 126
  

Adjacent counties

• 
  Kane County - north


• 
  DuPage County - northeast


• 
  Will County - east


• 
  Grundy County - south


• 
  LaSalle County - west


• 
  DeKalb County - northwest

Demographics

2000 census age pyramid for Kendall County

As of the 2010 United States Census, there were 114,736 people, 38,022 households, and 30,067 families residing in the county.^[12] The population density was 358.2 inhabitants per square mile (138.3/km²). There were 40,321 housing units at an average density of 125.9 per square mile (48.6/km²).^[5] The racial makeup of the county was 83.6% white, 5.7% black or African American, 3.0% Asian, 0.3% American Indian, 5.0% from other races, and 2.3% from two or more races. Those of Hispanic or Latino origin made up 15.6% of the population.^[12] In terms of ancestry, 28.0% were German, 16.0% were Irish, 9.5% were Polish, 9.4% were Italian, 7.5% were English, and 3.2% were American.^[13]

Of the 38,022 households, 47.9% had children under the age of 18 living with them, 65.8% were married couples living together, 9.2% had a female householder with no husband present, 20.9% were non-families, and 16.4% of all households were made up of individuals. The average household size was 3.01 and the average family size was 3.41. The median age was 32.9 years.^[12]

The county's median household income was $79,897 and the median family income was $87,309. Males had a median income of $64,048 versus $42,679 for females. The county's per capita income was $30,565. About 2.9% of families and 3.9% of the population were below the poverty line, including 4.6% of those under age 18 and 3.4% of those age 65 or over.^[14]
It is one of seven out of the 364 largest counties in the United States that has a higher median income for African Americans than White Americans.^[15]

Kendall County was listed as the fastest-growing county in the US from 2000 to 2009, experiencing a population growth rate of 110.4% in this period.^[16] The reason for this growth is heavy suburbanization from the metropolitan Chicago area.

Communities

Cities

• 
  Aurora (part)


• 
  Joliet (part)


• Plano


• 
  Sandwich (part)


• 
  Yorkville (mostly)

Villages

Census-designated place

• Boulder Hill

Other unincorporated communities

• Bristol


• Helmar


• Little Rock

Townships

The county is an 18-mile (29 km) square which is divided up into 9 townships. Each township is divided into 36 1 mile square sections, except that the Fox River is used as a Township border, resulting in Bristol being the smallest township with the extra area being assigned to Oswego and Kendall Townships. There are also two exceptions to the section grid to reflect Indian land grants under the Treaty of Prairie du Chien in 1829: the Mo-Ah-Way Reservation in Oswego Township and the Waish-Kee-shaw Reservation in Na-Au-Say Township. These areas were eventually sold to European settlers.^[17]

Government

(As of December 2016)

County Board members run in two districts. All other officers run county-wide:

• County Board Members: John P. Purcell, Judy Gilmour, Matthew G. Prochaska, Robert "H.D." Davidson, Audra Hendrix, Elizabeth Flowers, Lynn Cullick, Scott R. Gryder, Matt Kellogg, Tony Giles


• County Board Chairman – Scott R. Gryder


• Forest Preserve President – Judy Gilmour


• Clerk of the Circuit Court – Robyn Ingemunson


• Coroner – Jackie Purcell


• County Clerk and Recorder – Debbie Gillette


• Sheriff – Dwight Baird


• State’s Attorney – Eric Weis


• Treasurer – Jill Ferko

Politics

Kendall County’s political history is typical of the “collar counties” and more generally of Yankee-settled Northern Illinois. In its early elections Kendall was a stronghold of the Free Soil Party and was one of nine Illinois counties that gave a plurality to Free Soil nominee and former Democratic President Martin van Buren in the 1848 presidential election. Its Yankee population made it natural that Kendall would turn into a Republican stronghold following the creation of that party in 1854: and indeed Kendall County was rock-ribbed Republican for the following 150 years.

Between the 1856 and 2004 elections, the only time Kendall County did not give a plurality to the GOP Presidential nominee was in 1912 when the Republican Party was mortally divided and Progressive Party candidate Theodore Roosevelt won 57.56 percent of the county’s vote against conservative incumbent President William Howard Taft. Moreover, only one Democratic Presidential candidate – Franklin Delano Roosevelt in 1932 and 1936 – ever cracked forty percent of Kendall County’s vote during this span of thirty-eight presidential elections.

Since the 1990s, the gradual shift of power within the Republican Party towards Southern Evangelicals has meant that Kendall, like the other “collar counties”, has trended Democratic. Illinois native Barack Obama became the first Democrat to carry the county since Franklin Pierce in 1852, and the first Democrat ever to obtain an absolute majority. Obama did not repeat this feat against Mitt Romney in 2012, but opposition to the populism of Donald Trump amongst the mostly affluent population meant that Hillary Clinton came within seventy-seven votes of emulating Obama in 2016.

Property values

Kendall County was the fastest growing county in the US, more than doubling in population between the 2000 and 2010 censuses.^[19]

All five Kendall County communities analyzed saw their real home prices fall dramatically from 2007 to 2015, from a low of 17 percent in Montgomery to a high of 44 percent in Plano. Minooka and Oswego both saw their home values fall 34 percent. In Yorkville, they fell 36 percent.^[19]

Education

• Lisbon Community Consolidated School District 90


• Newark Community Consolidated School District 66


• Newark Community High School District 18


• Oswego Community Unit School District 308


• Plano Community Unit School District 88


• Yorkville Community Unit School District 115


• School District #101


• School District #201


• School District #202


• School District #429


• School District #430 (Sandwich Community School District #430)

The northern half of the county is in Community College District 516 and is served by Waubonsee Community College in Sugar Grove, Aurora, and Plano. The southern half is in Community College District 525 and is served by Joliet Junior College in Joliet.^[20]

In popular culture

Locations within and around the City of Plano were stand-ins for Clark Kent's hometown of Smallville, Kansas in the 2013 film Man of Steel as well as the 2016 film Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice. Plano has also been used in the film Witless Protection, with both films having been filmed in Plano's historic downtown area. Filming has also taken place south of Plano at the Farnsworth House, a modern architectural landmark for documentaries and commercials.

See also

• National Register of Historic Places listings in Kendall County, Illinois

References

Specific

General

• 
  Forstall, Richard L. (editor) (1996). Population of states and counties of the United States: 1790 to 1990 : from the twenty-one decennial censuses. United States Department of Commerce, Bureau of the Census, Population Division. ISBN 0-934213-48-8.CS1 maint: Extra text: authors list (link)
  

External links

• Official website

Coordinates: 41°35′N 88°26′W / 41.59°N 88.43°W / 41.59; -88.43