I see that the county I live in, Kane County, will celebrate its 186th birthday this weekend.
From that pic they used, it looks 186. Then I saw on Facebook this shocking piece of news about who Kane County was named for.
So, Kane County is named after former Illinois Secretary of State (that’s good), US Senator (better and very impressive), and slave owner (oops!), Sen. Elias Kent Kane. Local progressive activists are already working on how to facilitate a name change. They are taking suggestions as to a better name for our county rather than being named after former slave owner (oops!) and ardent slavery advocate (oops, again!), Sen. Elias Kent Kane. Of course, I have suggestions. I offered up two possible name changes. I’m thinking of either Elias County or Kent County. What do you think, better?
Jim Flanigan Looks at the World 