1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Pekin

PEKIN, a city and the county-seat of Tazewell county, Illinois, U.S.A., on the Illinois river, in the central part of the state, about 11 m. S. of Peoria, and about 56 m. N. of Springfield. Pop (1910), 9897. It is served by the Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fé, the Chicago & Alton, the Chicago, Peoria & St Louis, the Illinois Central, the Cleveland, Cincinnati, Chicago & St Louis, the Peoria Railway Terminal Company, the Peoria & Pekin Union and (for freight between Peoria and Pekin) the Illinois Valley Belt railways. Situated in a rich agricultural region and in the Illinois coalfields, Pekin is a shipping point and grain market of considerable importance, and has various manufactures. The value of the factory products in 1905 was $1,121,130. Pekin was first settled about 1830, was incorporated in 1839, and re-incorporated in 1874.