When bridges spanning the Illinois and Fox Rivers first replaced ferryboats, builders recouped expenses through tolls. Toll keeper Daniel Beers would later recount the story of how he allowed free access to a local celebrity, Chief Shabbona. The Pottawattamie Indian Chief had become a hero for befriending the whites during the Black Hawk War.

Allen Park is named for Edwin Allen, a former mayor who donated land along the river in 1887. The grove that bears his name has long been a favorite picnicking spot for residents.

At one time in history, a "Taste of Ottawa" was bottled and sold far and wide. A mineral springs that sprouted at Allen Park produced water bottled under the name Sanicula Mineral Springs and valued for its medicinal virtues. A five-gallon container sold for 98 cents. When the Starved Rock Dam was created in the 1930s, the spring was flooded and made unsafe to drink, so it was sealed beneath a seawall.

Do you wonder why, with two rivers at its doorstep, a canal was built through Ottawa? The vision of a water route between the Illinois River and Lake Michigan - and beyond to the world - was proposed by explorer Louis Joliet. The Illinois and Michigan Canal - named for the Illinois River and Lake Michigan, the two water bodies connected - was hand-dug beginning in the 1830s and revolutionized commerce in the Midwest. Along its banks, towns like Ottawa and Chicago flourished. Boats and barges would travel up the Mississippi River to the Illinois, and passengers and wares would transfer to canal barges at La Salle for the ride north. It took 20 hours to travel along the canal to Chicago (compared to 5 hours by rail), yet the pace was revolutionary compared to sluggish wagon travel by poor roads.

In the 19th century, an industrial spur carried water and barge traffic south from the I&M Canal to a large basin at what is now the Lincoln Place parking lot on the north side of the Illinois River, and emptied into the nearby Fox River. The "lateral canal's" flowing water powered turbines that kept Ottawa industry humming. After the commercial use of the canal ended, Mayor Hubert Hilliard organized a program that put hundreds of men idled by the Great Depression to work filling in the "ditch" and mining a vein of coal from the canal.

Ottawa was once a seat of higher learning. Brown's Business College, founded in 1888, was located downtown and produced more than 3,000 graduates by 1914. Pleasant View Luther College opened in 1896, and by the early 1900s had graduated 350 graduates who had studied "academic, normal, commercial and musical courses." A nursing home at that site carries on the name Pleasant View and used some of the original college buildings.

Ottawa adopted its present commission form of government in 1911. Prior to that time, city aldermen represented wards within the community.

In 1856, Abraham Lincoln made a political speech here on behalf of the Republican Party's first-ever presidential candidate, John C. Fremont. Lincoln would appear on his own behalf two years later when he debated U.S. Sen. Stephen A. Douglas for Douglas's Senate seat. The series of seven debates that began in Ottawa's Washington Square would cement Lincoln's place in history and carry him to the presidency in 1860.

Ottawa hosted Illinois State Fairs in 1872, 1875 and 1876.

In 1830, Ottawa was created as the village of Carbonia, drawing its name from the carbon deposits found in the area. Originally, the town stretched only as far north as Madison Street, as far south as Van Buren Street, as far east as the Fox River and as far west as Canal Street. Ottawa became the county seat in 1831 when La Salle County separated from Peoria County.

Ottawa's love for horse and harness racing resulted in construction of the Ottawa Driving Park in the late 1880s, at what is now Lincoln-Douglas Park. The track, an amphitheater and barns cost $15,000. In 1912, the La Salle County Fair Association purchased the property as the fair's permanent headquarters, but 32 years later, moved south to the present 4-H Fairgrounds.