EVENT: Haish New Research Roundtable at Glidden Homestead

Jessi Haish LaRue Hosts Jacob Haish New Research Roundtable at Glidden Homestead

DEKALB, IL – New research and artifacts on Jacob Haish’s barbed wire and other business ventures are turning up in local archival research.

At Glidden Homestead at 2 p.m. on Sunday, November 21, 2021, Jessi Haish LaRue will host an interactive, hands-on experience looking at and talking about new research on Jacob and Sophia Haish found locally. Attendees will be able to handle and closely examine copies of recent important historical items.

Also, noon-4, visit and tour the home where Joseph Glidden and his family lived when he created his most famous invention, see a working onsite blacksmith shop, and walk where Glidden walked. Programs at Glidden Homestead are made possible in part by the Mary E. Stevens Concert and Lecture Fund.

LaRue, a Haish family descendant, is a writer who blogs regularly about Jacob Haish at JacobHaishStory.com. The blog shares photos, interviews and news articles which relate to Haish's life. LaRue has been documenting her 4th great uncle's story since early 2016 in an attempt to spread the story of the "underdog of barbed wire."

“Jessi, with her deep understanding of Haish, has recently turned her attention to locally archived documents and records,” says Rob Glover, executive director of Glidden Homestead. “Even though she’s only in the earliest stages of this line of her research, what she’s already uncovered here is truly remarkable and is something to be seen.”

Haish is renowned for his “S barb” patented in 1875. Jacob Haish was born March 9, 1827, in Germany and came to America in 1835 when he was nine years old. In his youth, he learned the carpentry trade from his father and “possessed natural mechanical ingenuity and displayed ready aptitude in the use of tools.” At 19, he moved to Illinois and then to DeKalb in 1853 where he entered the lumber business. He built many of the city’s most notable buildings, past and present, including the Glidden Homestead.

Haish’s first barbed wire patent is dated January 20, 1874. His “S barb” was patented August 31, 1875. He followed these with many later designs for wire and other innovative devices.

This year’s theme at Glidden Homestead is “A Treasure at 160.” 2021 marks the 160th anniversary of Joseph Glidden’s 1861 home. A National Register of Historic Place site, it is the home where Glidden lived when he invented barbed wire. The home was extensively remodeled in 1910 by a prominent architect and continued as a Glidden Family residence until it became a museum in 1998.

A full season of programs highlighting “A Treasure at 160” wraps in December at the Glidden Homestead in 2021. A program listing can be found at http://www.gliddenhomestead.org/events.html. The Glidden Homestead, located at 921 W Lincoln Hwy, is now taking reservations for tours. Admission is $4 per adult and free for children younger than 14. For more information, visit www.gliddenhomestead.org or e-mail info@gliddenhomestead.org or call (815) 756-7904.