Rockford was founded in 1834 by Germanicus Kent as the village of Midway because it was approximately midway between his home of Galena and the city of Chicago. Kent, a land speculator, established a settlement on the west side of the Rock River and was soon joined by Daniel Shaw Haight, who established a town on the east side of the Rock. While the settlements quickly became known as Kentville and Haightville, the area continued to be recognized as Midway until 1837 when the founders and several respected members of their communities met in Chicago and officially changed Midway’s name to Rock Ford.

Rockford Female Seminary was chartered in 1847. It became Rockford College in 1892, fully coeducational in 1958 and is today recognized as a top liberal arts institution. In August of 1852, the year Rockford was officially chartered as a city, the Galena & Chicago Union Railroad arrived, spurring ecomonic growth in the region. Shortly thereafter, the newly formed Water Power District erected a huge dam harnessing the power of the Rock and facilitating industrialization. By 1872, Rockford was the home of Illinois’ second public library and 1877 it saw the successful launch of a daily newspaper.

While the earliest settlers were from New York and New England, beginning around the 1850’s immigration drove the population growth of the region and it became a virtual melting pot. The Irish arrived in the early 1850’s followed by the Swedes. In many areas of Rockford the Swedish lanquage was as common as English well into the 1920’s. Other ethnic groups also appeared including the Italians, Poles and Lithuanians, and more recently Laotians, Vietnamese and Hispanics.