One in the vicinity of the once Hunter-Doherty Lumber yard was so large and fast-flowing that the indigenous people from that area had an encampment there.

Springs still feed the pond of water at the foot of Number One slag dump on East St. Paul Street.

The building of Spring Valley was the enterprise of Henry J. Miller, one of the first settlers of this area, and his son-in-law, Charles J. Devlin.

Charles Devlin had lived in Peru, Illinois as the manager of the Union Coal Company in LaSalle.

[6] They conceived the idea of establishing a coal metropolis, in the Valley and on the slopes of the bluffs bordering Spring Creek, in the southeastern corner of Bureau County.

Saunders of St. Paul, Minnesota, a director of the Chicago and North Western railroad, Mr. Taylor of What Cheer, Iowa, and William L. Scott of Erie, Pennsylvania.

In the residential section of the city property line, lies 25 feet (7.6 m) from curb and ample room for expansion.

In less than four years, by 1888, the Chicago North Western railroad had laid a line from DeKalb, Illinois, four mines had been sunk and the town had 3,000 people.

[10] In August 1895, Spring Valley experienced the state's most destructive race riot to date, out of which came major legislation prohibiting companies from bringing in squads of men to replace existing workers.

Governor John Peter Altgeld's response to the August 4 attack on the black community by displaced Italian miners ultimately revealed his support of fellow immigrants over African Americans.

[12] Black victims of the riot took their attackers to court and used their status as citizens to win the case against the new immigrants.

[13] Spring Valley remained a brawling, boisterous place until the competition from cheaper Southern Illinois coal fields forced the mine to close in late 1927.

The English, Scottish, Irish, Welsh, and Cornish from the Coal fields of Great Britain, from Northern France and Belgium.

Polish, and Germans, Swedes and Lithuanians from opposite shores of the Baltic Sea, Slavish peasants from Central Europe and immigrants from sunny Italy.

The Hall Township High and Vocational School training in shop, carpentry, printing, drafting, cooking, sewing, typing, shorthand, bookkeeping and banking.