Grand Ridge Map
Grand Ridge is a village in LaSalle County, Illinois, United States. The population was 546 at the 2000 census. It is part of the Ottawa–Streator Micropolitan Statistical Area. It is a part of the geographic region known as Streatorland.
In 1860, Judge John T. and Phebe J. (Finley) Porter moved to Illinois with their son Ebenezer F.(b. 1859 at New Salem, Fayette County, Pennsylvania), and located near Grand Ridge, LaSalle County, where they lived on a farm until 1872. J. T. was at first a farmer, and afterward a lumberman and grain dealer. In 1872, he moved into the town of Grand Ridge, and built and operated two grain elevators until 1876. In 1882, he moved to Florida and engaged in the lumber business. He founded the town of Grand Ridge, Florida, naming it in honor of his old Illinois home.
In 1868, Mr. Nelson Jones (b. May 24, 1819, in Ross County, Ohio), Republican and Methodist, bought two houses, two lots and a shop valued at $800 and followed the same occupation for forty years; he was the first blacksmith in Grand Ridge Village. In 1870, the Fox River Division of the Chicago, Burlington and Quincy (CB&Q) Railroad was completed and put in operation. The first business house was built by E. Core the same year.
Nearby cities include Ransom, Seneca, Tonica, Oglesby, Lostant.