In Streetwise Chicago, the 1988 definitive guide to the origins of our city street names, authors Don Hayner and Tom McNamee came up mostly empty on Division: “There seems to be no satisfactory explanation for how this street got its name, but one story is that it was so named because it divides Goose Island, an industrial island in the city, in half.” However, Alfred T. Andreas’s three-volume History of Chicago: From the Earliest Period to the Present Time, published from 1884 to 1886, offers a two-word explanation — “section line” — that might be a clue to a different possibility.

Under the Land Ordinance of 1785, federal land in the Northwest Territory was divided into townships, which were then subdivided into 36 sections each, for sale to settlers. The settlement that grew into Chicago was part of Township 39 North, Range 14 East, 3rd Principal Meridian. Division Street was laid out along a line dividing the plots of some of Chicago’s earliest residents. North of the line were the properties of Lyman Meacham, Harvey Meacham, Jeddiah Wooley, and Ansel Chipman; south of the line, Charles Taylor, Joseph Davenport, William Davenport, and William Fithian.

Why didn’t any of those pioneers have a street named after him, like John Kinzie or Gurdon Hubbard? “Division” may just have been more practical … and avoided jealousies.

Question submitted by Heather Vanderberg, River Forest

Send your questions about the Chicago area to emcclelland@chicagomag.com.