Kane

Formed January 16, 1836 (63^rd county)

Kane County (516,520), Geneva (21,392), Aurora (180,526)

A Romanesque style dark red/brown brick 1892 courthouse sits at 3^rd Street between Campbell and James streets in Geneva.  Illinois State Highway 38 is one block north of the building.  W. J. Edbrooke and Franklin P. Burnham are the architects.  A Judicial Center was added in 1996 in Saint Charles.  The building features a dome and the grounds have veteran memorials and canons.  Kane County was created on January 16, 1836 out of La Salle County as the 63^rd county with Geneva as the only county seat.  United States Senator Elias Kane is the namesake for the county.  Geneva is named for Geneva, New York. 

Kane County government consists of a sheriff, an attorney, a coroner, a clerk, a treasurer, and an assessor (executive).  It has 25 Board Members (legislative.)  Twenty-eight Circuit Court Judges and a court clerk serve Kane County (judicial.) The county is in northeast Illinois in the western part of the Chicago Metropolitan Area.  Chicago, Illinois is east and Rockford, Illinois is northwest of the county.  The county center is 10.1 miles Northwest of Geneva in Campton Hills.  The county is surrounded clockwise by McHenry, Cook, Will, Kendall, and De Kalb counties.  The county is a tall rectangle that shifts the top quarter slightly east.  Geneva is located in the eastern quarter of the county.  Aurora is in the southeast corner extending over into Du Page, Kendall and Will counties.  Geneva is the county seat and Aurora is the largest city.  Geneva is 4.1% of the county population while Aurora is 35.0% of the county population. 

The area of the county is 519 square miles.  It is 50 out of 102 in the state.  It ranks 5 out of 102 in population in the state.  It has a density of 995.2 persons per square mile making it 4 out of 102 in the state.  Kane County has 88.3% of its population in its incorporated areas.  Interstate Highway 88 crosses the county east to west from Du Page County to De Kalb County.  Interstate Highway 90 goes east to northwest from Cook County to McHenry County.  United States Highway 20 parallels Interstate Highway 90 from Cook to McHenry counties.  United States Highway 30 crosses the southwest corner of the county from Kendall County, south, to De Kalb County, west.  United States Highway 34 cuts the southeast tip of the county from Du Page County to Kendall County.  This county is in the Chicago-Naperville-Joliet Metropolitan Statistical Area.