the county prepared to construct a new courthouse, the debate over county seat was reignited. This time, it was the city of DeKalb that sought to wrest the title of county seat away from Sycamore. Two of DeKalb's most prominent citizens, Jacob Haish and Isaac L. Ellwood, each promised to donate $20,000 to help absorb some of the new building's cost. The city of Sycamore responded, raising funds of their own, and after some back and forth and legal wrangling, the issue was settled in Sycamore's favor. Later settlement Following the end of the second county seat controversy, in 1839, the first DeKalb County Courthouse was built in the city, as well as Sycamore's first hotel. A year later the settlement consisted of 12 houses, which increased to 18 by 1844. Sycamore then began an era of steady growth marked by population increases in 1848 to 262, 1849 to 320, 1850 to 390, 1851 to 435. The Sycamore and Cortland Railroad arrived in the late 1850s and a station was erected in Sycamore. Sycamore was home to 41 commercial and industrial business by 1855. In 1858, Sycamore was incorporated as a village. Following the American Civil War the railroad began to assist Sycamore's growth and the settlement was incorporated as a city in 1869. Maria Ridulph murder Sycamore is the location of a notable cold case, the 1957 abduction and murder of 7-year-old Maria Ridulph. On the evening of December 3, 1957, Maria disappeared while playing outside her family's Sycamore home. She was last seen by her playmate Kathy Chapman (née Sigman) with a young man who called himself "Johnny" and had approached the girls offering them piggyback rides. A search and investigation by local and state police and the FBI failed to locate either Maria or "Johnny", and the following April, Maria's body was found in a field approximately 100 miles from Sycamore. The case remained unsolved for over 50 years until in 2011, Jack Daniel McCullough, a former neighbor of the Ridulphs, was arrested and convicted of kidnapping and murdering Maria. The case received national news coverage as the oldest cold case in US history to result in a conviction. However, in April 2016, McCullough's conviction was overturned and he was released from prison after a post-conviction review of the evidence indicated that he could not have committed the crime. 2010 earthquake On the morning of February 10,