Winnebago County, Illinois

Winnebago County is a county located in the U.S. state of Illinois. According to the 2010 census, it had a population of 295,266, making it the seventh most populous county in Illinois behind Cook County and its five surrounding collar counties. Its county seat is Rockford.Winnebago County is the central county of the Rockford Metropolitan Statistical Area.HistoryWinnebago County was formed on January 16, 1836 out of Jo Daviess and LaSalle counties. It was named for the Winnebago Tribe of American Indians. At the time the county was founded its inhabitants consisted almost entirely of New Englanders and New England transplants from upstate New York. These were "Yankee" settlers, meaning they were descended from the English Puritans who settled New England during the early 1600s. They made up virtually all of Winnebego County's inhabitants during the first several decades of its history. In this regard the county was similar to most of the northern portion of the state of Illinois, and almost all of the neighboring state of Wisconsin. After the conclusion of the Black Hawk War there was an additional surge of immigration from New England. As a result of this heritage the inhabitants of Winnebego County considered themselves, and functioned as, a cultural expansion of early New England culture. In the Presidential election of 1860, Abraham Lincoln won 3,985 votes in Winnebago County, whereas Steven Douglas only won 817 votes.