Southern Illinois Going and Coming Back

Posted on April 19, 2021 by admin

I spent the first 24 hours of my recent trip, as well as the last 18 hours or so, in southern Illinois. Not far from Carbondale, in Shawnee National Forest, is Pomona Natural Bridge, which is the first place I went after a drive down from metro Chicago.

The official trail is a short loop from the parking lot to the natural bridge.

The trail goes over the top of the bridge.

Which looks like this from another angle. You can climb steps down to under the bridge, and that’s what I did.

Though a short trail, the drop to under the bridge is a little steep, and I navigated it carefully, testing my new hiking shoes and walking stick in the field. They proved useful.

The road to the natural bridge passes some farms, complete with an array of rusting equipment, available any time for spare parts.

This building, forgotten by time, stood next to a crossroads.

The next morning, April 10, I drove south, eventually passing through the ruin that is Cairo, Illinois, pop. 2,000 or so, a town that never became St. Louis or Cincinnati or even Cape Girardeau or Quincy, despite its location. One hundred years ago, more than 15,000 people lived there.

Sure, it’s still technically a functioning municipality, and the houses off the main street show that people still call Cairo home, but the main street was like a little piece of the early ’80s Bronx had landed here in low-lying southern Illinois: a parade of empty lots, rubble, recently burned structures, and otherwise vacant buildings, with a scattering of intact buildings, mostly part of one level of government or another, including the handsome public library. Mine was the only moving car, and I saw only two pedestrians.

I acquainted myself with a number of small towns on this trip, also including New Madrid, Mo., Clarksdale and Vicksburg, Miss., Paris, Tex., Van Buren, Ark., and Belleville, Ill., all at least a little more prosperous than the forlorn Cairo.

At the confluence of the Ohio and Mississippi rivers is the 191-acre Fort Defiance State Park, known as Camp Defiance during the war. When I passed by, the park was closed by high water. Too bad. I wanted to see the confluence.

On the night of April 17, I arrived in Belleville, my last stop before returning home. The next morning I strolled along the town’s well-to-do main street, which is populated by restaurants, one-off retailers, and law and other professional offices. No one else was around.

Before leaving town, I stopped at the Cathedral of St. Peter.

The original church was completed in 1866, but in 1912 the building nearly burned to the ground. Rebuilding gave it a Gothic style patterned after the Exeter Cathedral in Devon, though its vaulted ceiling isn’t as elaborate.

A few miles away is the National Shrine of Our Lady of the Snows, a complex featuring not only a large shrine, but also a church, Lordes-style grotto, gardens, conference center, gift shop, residence hall, restaurant and hotel.

The shrine as seen from the slope in front of it.

The design screams 1960 and sure enough, there’s a cornerstone with that date on it. Construction began in 1958 and finished that year, with a design by one Richard Cummings, a 1952 Washington University graduate who worked at the St. Louis firm of Maguolo & Quick at the time.

“It is easily the most Space Age-fabulous building in the region,” asserts Built St. Louis. “Seated at the bottom of a hill that forms a natural amphitheater, the main shrine of Our Lady of the Snows is a complex arrangement of curved forms and overlapping, intertwined spaces, a sort of High Googie architectural style.”

At the back of the shrine are some fine mosaics. Always good to find mosaics.

At the top of the slope is Millennium Spire, a work installed in 1998.

The shrine is a project of the Missionary Oblates of Mary Immaculate, whom I’ve run across before in San Antonio, location of their school of theology. No Space Age-fabulous structures there that I recall.

Southern Loop ’21

Posted on April 18, 2021 by admin

Just returned today from a series of long drives totaling 2,610 miles that took me down the length of Illinois and through parts of Missouri, Tennessee, Mississippi, Arkansas, Louisiana and Texas. Dallas was the prime destination, where I visited Jay for the first time in well over a year.

I drove on crowded Interstates, nearly empty Interstates, U.S. highways, state and county roads, and urban streets, and logged a lot of miles on roads through farmland, forests and small towns. I crossed the Mississippi more than once, including on a bridge that felt so narrow that moving the slightest bit out of your lane would crash you into the side of the bridge or oncoming traffic. Rain poured sometimes, drizzle was common and there was plenty of evidence of a wet spring in the ubiquitous puddles and the lush greenery of the South.

On I-20 east of Shreveport, I spotted a small truck carrying mattresses that had stopped on the right shoulder ahead of me. Then I spotted the mattress he’d dropped in the middle of the road, a few seconds ahead of me. The truck was 50 feet or so further than the mattress; he’d probably stopped to pick it up, but fortunately hadn’t got out of his truck yet. To my left another car was just behind me, so I threaded the needle to the right of the mattress and left of the truck, missing both.

I left metro Chicago mid-morning on April 9, making my way to Carbondale in southern Illinois, and took a short afternoon hike to the Pomona Natural Bridge in Shawnee National Forest. Overnight an enormous thunderstorm passed over that part of the state, and intermittent rain continued the next day as I drove through the southernmost tip of Illinois, a slice of Missouri, the length of West Tennessee and into Mississippi, arriving in Clarksdale after dark.

En route I’d stopped for a couple of hours at Fort Pillow State Park and about half that long in downtown Memphis. Dinner that night was Chinese food from a Clarksdale takeout joint called Rice Bowl.

On the morning of April 11, I took a walk in downtown Clarksdale, then drove south — stopping to mail postcards in Alligator, Mississippi — and spent most of the afternoon at Vicksburg National Military Park.

As the afternoon grew late, I walked around downtown Vicksburg and one of its historic cemeteries. The next day I headed west across the Mississippi River into Louisiana, where I stopped at Poverty Point World Heritage Site, locale of an ancient Indian settlement much older than Cahokia, or the pyramids outside Mexico City for that matter.

I stayed in Dallas from the evening of April 12 to the morning of the 16th, mostly at Jay’s house, though I did visit my nephew Sam and his family, meeting their delightful two-year-old daughter, my grandniece, for the first time.

On the 16th I drove north from Dallas, spending a little time in Paris, Texas. In Oklahoma I headed on small roads to the Talimena Scenic Drive through Winding Stair Mountain National Recreation Area, where I followed its winding (as the name says), up and down two-lane path through near-mountainous terrain. In a thick fog. That was excitement enough for one day, but that didn’t stop me from visiting Heavener Runestone Park toward the end of the afternoon. I spent the night just outside Fort Smith, Arkansas.

The next morning I headed toward Fort Smith and chanced across the picturesque Main Street of Van Buren, a large suburb of Fort Smith, or maybe its mate in a small twin cities. I also looked around the Crawford County Courthouse before crossing the Arkansas River to Fort Smith proper, spending an hour or so at Fort Smith National Historic Site. From there a long and tiring drive took me to Belleville, Illinois for the last night of the trip, stopping only for gas, food and a quick look at the Mildred B. Cooper Memorial Chapel.

The place I stayed in Belleville last night was an inexpensive motel at the end of the town’s downtown shopping and restaurant street. Up earlier than usual this morning, around 7, I took a walk in area’s handsome, near-empty streets and sidewalks. Before leaving town I stopped at the Cathedral of Saint Peter, and a few miles away, Our Lady of the Snows shrine.

That ought to be enough for any trip, I thought, till I saw that the world’s largest catsup bottle in nearby Collinsville as a point of interest on my paper map (I now use both paper and electronic, which complement each other). So I went to see that. Later heading north on I-55, I thought, that ought to be enough for any trip, till I saw the pink elephant.

That is, the Pink Elephant Antique Mall northeast of St. Louis, which I’ve driven by many times over the years, but never stopped at. This time I did and it became the cherry on the sundae of the trip.

Springdale Cemetery

Posted on April 7, 2021 by admin

The afternoon was getting long in the tooth in Peoria last Saturday, but I told Ann there was one more place I wanted to go before we proceeded to the highway out of town. Yes, of course, was her mild reaction.

The minor delay was entirely worth it, as far as I was concerned. We soon found ourselves at the entrance to Springdale Cemetery, a wooded, hilly, well-populated stretch of land where gravediggers first turned their shovels in the late 1850s. Roads lead off in various directions through this enormous place, a rare example of a rural cemetery movement cemetery that still retains a rural feeling, even though the city of Peoria is all around.

Springdale isn’t over-thick with stones, though there are plenty. It isn’t thick with sizable memorials, though a few rise over the others.

Deeper in the 223-acre cemetery are rows of soldiers’ stones, beginning with those who fought to save the Union and peppered with later participants in later wars.

Even deeper in, the forest becomes as thick as any I’ve seen in a cemetery. In early April, the trees are still bare, but it won’t be long. The warm air was alive with birdcalls while the din of city traffic — so much part of a “rural cemetery” in our time — was far in the background.

We saw just a handful of mausoleums. I suspect there most be more in other parts of Springdale, since Peoria had a long stint as a prosperous industrial town, and that’s the kind of thing that captains of industry used to buy for themselves. But we only had time for the handful.

Zotz was a German newspaper publisher. The mausoleum door isn’t original. In fact, it’s a recently created trompe l’oeil.

Nearby were more modest, but still compelling stones. About 78,000 people lie in Springdale.

A gorgeous place, all in all. One that would be worth seeing during the seasons other than spring, I believe.

West Moss Avenue, Peoria

Posted on April 6, 2021 by admin

During our stroll around the Bradley U. campus on Easter Saturday, Ann and I also ventured into the surrounding neighborhood to the south. One of its streets is the amusingly named Fredonia Ave., which sports ordinary student houses and apartments.
Further south from there is the wide W. Moss Ave., with its sizable houses/enormous lawns on one side, green and beginning to flower.

The lawns are smaller on the other side, but the houses just as pleasant.

We came across a particularly distinctive stack of bricks. Looks like a Frank Lloyd Wright, I said. It was. Guess I’ve seen enough of the diminutive genius’ genius work, which impresses one with its genius aspect, to know when I see one. Well, it is impressive bit of work, anyway.

It’s the Francis W. Little house, dating from 1903. The FLW Trust says: “With its ribbon windows, low-pitched roofs, projecting eaves, and walled terraces, the Francis Little house is typical of Wright’s mature Prairie style designs. The Little house windows are similar in design to those found at the E. Arthur Davenport, William Fricke, F.B. Henderson, and Edwin H. Cheney houses.

“The glass designs found on the interior of the house, which include a variety of skylights and built-in bookcases with glass doors, exhibit more elaborate color schemes and came arrangements than those found on the exterior walls.”

Those elaborate color schemes aren’t for the enjoyment of the public, or at least that fraction willing to pay to tour a FLW house, but rather for the current owner.

Not far from FLW on Moss is the Westminster Presbyterian Church.

“The construction of Westminster Presbyterian Church was concluded in 1898. The architect, Herbert Hewitt, designed an English Gothic structure with Norman spire,” the church web site says, only to explain that: “Other than periodic upgrades, this church remained unchanged until 1985 when it was destroyed in a fire.”

The congregation rebuilt: “The current church was completed and dedicated in April 1989. The architect of the new building was Ben Weese, a member of the Chicago Seven, a first-generation postmodern group of architects in Chicago.” (Not to be confused with the other Chicago Seven, or Eight, depending.)

Bradley University Walkabout

Posted on April 6, 2021 by admin

Before each Easter comes around, you don’t know whether you’ll get a pleasant early spring day or a chilly late winter one, at least at my latitude. This year, as if to echo the glory of the holiday, we enjoyed a flawless spring day.

Easter Monday and Easter Saturday were pretty nice, too, and on the latter of those two, Ann and I spent much of the afternoon in Peoria, Illinois. During this Vaccine Spring, appointments have proven hard to book close to Cook County, and so I’d found one for her at a pharmacy in Peoria, not far as it happened from the campus of Bradley University.

Since driving down to Peoria, getting the shot, and zipping right back seems like an opportunity wasted to me, we didn’t do that. Bradley was close at hand, so after the shot we took a walk in the springtime sunshine around campus.

Bradley isn’t the grandest or prettiest or most historic campus I’ve ever seen (UVA would contend for all of those, actually), but it had its interests, such as the Hayden-Clark Alumni Center, which fronts a wide lawn.

“Adjoining the circa-1897 Bradley Hall, the center welcomes alumni, students and visitors in a three-story, multi-use building for tours, meetings and special events,” Peoria magazine wrote of the building, which was completed in 2011. “The center’s Shaheen Hall of Pride has become a popular destination, featuring 22 display cases, dioramas and videos that chronicle the university’s growth and influential history.

“Designed by architectural/engineering firm Dewberry, the building incorporates elements of collegiate gothic architecture, such as arches, buttresses and a crenellated tower. The façade is constructed of Indiana limestone, like Bradley Hall and other historic campus buildings.

“Four hand-carved limestone gargoyles sit atop the center. In a gesture of appreciation to the past, two of them are replicas of existing gargoyles on Bradley Hall. The other two are original, overlooking a new view to the west. Technically, they are ‘grotesques,’ rather than gargoyles. Gargoyles are functional — usually as waterspouts and drains — but these are ornamental.”

I have to appreciate a 21st-century building that bothers with gargoyles. Elsewhere, there’s a bronze of Lydia Moss Bradley (1816-1908) in her later years.She founded Bradley Polytechnic Institute in 1897, later to become a university. The statue was erected for the centennial of the school in 1997.

Other campus details that caught my eye follow. A small sampling.
That last one is another bit of Bradley art, “Split Figure: Woman,” by Nita K. Sunderland, an art professor at the university who died only last year.

Chestnut Park

Posted on March 31, 2021 by admin

According to Google Reviews, or at least one reviewer, Chestnut Park, which is part of the Hoffman Estates Park District, is a good place to fish. Nice to know, though I don’t plan on fishing there. The other day I stopped by for a look at the park. Why? Because I’ve been driving by it for years — nearly 18 years — and never had done so.

It’s a pleasant pocket park, surrounded by houses and probably put in by the subdivider 50-odd years ago, with the fishing pond as the central feature. Maybe we can detect the hand of Jack Hoffman himself in the configuration of the park, or least one of his draftsmen.

Note that the grass has turned green. That seems to happen overnight around this time of year, sometimes in early April, but this year in late March.

As I was leaving, I noticed a plaque on a rock. I’d never noticed that before, either.

One of the large genre of sad plaques. It isn’t hard to learn what happened to Meghan. Not even 15 years old, she was killed crossing a major street near the park.

Not long afterward, the Illinois House passed a resolution honoring the girl, promising to build pedestrian overpasses at the major roads near Hoffman Estates High School, to prevent such a thing happening again. I drive by that location often, and I have to report that the Meghan Krueger Overpasses were never built here in chronically cash-starved Illinois.

Jelke Creek Bird Sanctuary

Posted on March 29, 2021 by admin

One thing leads to another, especially on the Internet, and yesterday I found myself curious about the township as a unit of government. That led to a document published by the Census Bureau, which tells me (p. 80) that there are 1,431 township governments in Illinois, at least as of 2012. There are townships in one form or another in 20 of the several states, and in Illinois, 85 of the state’s 102 counties have townships within their borders.

I looked into townships when I found out that Jelke Creek Bird Sanctuary is a township park, not part of the Forest Preserve District of Kane County. Specifically, the sanctuary is overseen by Dundee Township, which occupies almost 36 square miles in the northeast corner of Kane County.

Last weekend was another divided one, at least as far as the weather was concerned. Saturday was pleasant and warm, while Sunday proved blustery and chilly. So on Saturday we headed mostly west and took a walk at Jelke Creek Bird Sanctuary. We took a loop through the property that didn’t happen to pass by Jelke Creek, which is a tributary of the Fox River and, of course, ultimately the mighty Mississippi.

Why there? I found it by one of my usual techniques: scanning Google Maps.

The sanctuary is fairly new as a public space. “This open space site was formerly owned by Chicago Elmhurst Stone and the Schuetz family,” the township explains. “The property was purchased as two separate parcels in 2000 and 2001 with grants from IDNR’s Open Lands Trust program at a cost of $4,128,709. The site’s 244 acres are partially protected by an IDNR easement.”

Saturday was a good day for a walk there. Summer would be less pleasant, since there isn’t a lot of shade along most of the trails.

There are some water features. Mid-sized and small ponds. A few spots along the trails were muddy, but mostly they were dry.

Not too many people were around, though at one point we did see four horses and riders. Not the Four Horsemen, fortunately.

All together, we walked about a mile and a half, I’d say. The dog seemed to enjoy the walk too, including the opportunity to lap up a little muddy water. She wisely stayed clear of the horses.

As for birds in the bird sanctuary, we heard some singing, but didn’t see more than a few sparrows and red-winged blackbirds. We passed by one small marshy spot and heard the croaking of frogs, which I took to be males in search of females for springtime action. As we got closer to the spot, the croaking tapered off. Maybe the frogs don’t like large animals eavesdropping on them. More likely, they’re as wary as small animals tend to be at the approach of something bigger.

Old Blanco County Courthouse

Posted on March 28, 2021 by admin

While I was footloose in the Texas Hill Country five years ago this month, I paid another visit to the Old Blanco County Courthouse in Blanco. I’d been there the year before, when Jay and I were in search of the Central Texas Bat Trail. It’s a fine old building, restored in recent decades.
Around back.

Blanco isn’t the county seat of Blanco County and hasn’t been for more than 130 years; Johnson City is. So for decades the old courthouse was one thing and another, and now has an interesting little local museum on the ground floor, and office space as well.

The State of Texas recognizes the structure as historic, and the building wears the distinctive Texas Historical Commission medallion.

I remember seeing those medallions for almost as long as I can remember, especially the one on St. Paul’s Episcopal Church in San Antonio, which I found oddly fascinating as a kid. Who knows, that very one might have planted the seed for my later interest in the sort of markers, plaques, medallions and minor memorials that the world tends to stroll by without a glance.

South Suburban Vax Thursday

Posted on March 25, 2021 by admin

Today was fairly chilly, and wind and rain is forecast for the evening. But I’m glad to see croci in the back yard.

The main event today, after filing a couple of stories, was a drive to the south suburbs for my first Covid-19 vaccination (until a few weeks ago, my publication’s style was COVID-19, which was too much like screaming). The site was an ordinary chain drug store. I found the appointment via a non-official web site that tracks drug store-based vaccinations that was set up, as far as I can tell, by Some Guy.

That’s the American way, I suppose. Government action for a big thing, ad hoc initiative to fill in the details. Sometimes that works well enough, sometimes less so.

The process wasn’t quite as efficient as that run by the 101st Airborne, but I didn’t have to wait too long after my appointment time. The injection itself took only a moment, of course, and I was rewarded with my own CDC card, which is sure to be a vaguely remembered relic someday, like ration books.

One jab down, five to go for this household. Three of those are scheduled.

I was far enough south to stop here, at the Chicago Southland Lincoln Oasis on I-80, not far from the Indiana line. On that most congested of metro Chicago highways, especially with trucks.

Here are some of the trucks, resting temporarily from the role as part of the congestion.

The other day I spotted an abandoned booklet in a public park. Even at some distance I could tell the content was religious, so I picked it up, hoping for the strange fascination of a Jack Chick work. I assume that his work has continued, even though the man himself might have died and gone to —

Anyway, it wasn’t a Jack Chick, but another brand by an organization I’d never heard of based in… it doesn’t say, and mostly it offers text, with a only scattering of pictures to illustrate the thing. The booklet is, however, trilingual: English, Spanish and Korean, so I’ve picked up some interesting phrases in Spanish.

Life is short! ¡La vida es corta!

Man is a sinner. El humano es pacador.

The wages of sin is death. Las paga del pecado es la muerte.

One more thing. A web site devoted to an incredibly obscure aspect of popular entertainment.

Maternity of the Blessed Virgin Mary Catholic Church, Bourbonnais

Posted on March 24, 2021 by admin

While visiting Olivet Nazarene University in Bourbonnais on Sunday afternoon, I spotted a church building from a distance that I took to be the campus chapel or the like. I decided to drive over to its parking lot for a closer look.I was wrong. It was Maternity of the Blessed Virgin Mary Catholic Church, which is decidedly not part of ONU, though adjacent to it for historic reasons that I will get into.“The original Maternity BVM Catholic Church, a 110-foot-by-50-foot wood-framed structure, had burned to the ground in September 1853,” Jack Klasey wrote in the Daily Journal, a local paper. “The frame church had been built in 1847 to replace the settlement’s first Catholic house of worship, a small log structure known as the church of St. Leo. The log church had been erected in 1841.

“Like many of his parishioners, [Rev. Isadore Lebel] had been born in Canada. The plan that he brought to Bourbonnais Grove reflected the church architecture of his native Quebec province. It is believed to be based upon a church in Cap-St.-Ignace, located on the south shore of the St. Lawrence River, a short distance downstream from Quebec City… Construction work was probably begun some time in 1855 or 1856 and not completed until 1858.”

I was certain the building would be locked (as it was, too bad), but I got out the car for a look anyway. Then I noticed a patch of land next to and behind the church that seemed worth investigating.
A grotto.

Maternity BVM has an informative walking tour on its web site for downloading. The centerpiece of the grotto, it tells me, is a shrine built to Our Lady of Lourdes.

“Br. John Koelzer, a Viatorian brother, began building the grotto just over 100 years ago, in 1915. It took three years to complete [and] is fashioned (using stones carved by local residents) in the image of Our Lady of Lourdes, when she appeared to young Bernadette.

“Over the years, she has interceded for the safety of soldiers as far back as World War I, as well as countless school children, bridal couples, rosary groups and worshippers of all ages who have sought her protection.”

The Viatorians — another group I’d never heard of till I researched a place I’d been — are “an international Roman Catholic religious congregation comprised of priests, brothers and lay associates, headquartered in Arlington Heights, IL. Collectively, the congregation is known as the Viatorian Community.”

“Fr. Louis Querbes (1793-1859) founded the congregation in Vourles, France in the 19th century during the years following the French Revolution. Realizing the need to provide education for youth, Fr. Querbes’ vision was to send religious brothers and lay catechists of deep faith and competent learning to parish schools in the countryside.

“As patron saint of the congregation, Fr. Querbes chose St. Viator, a young, 4th century catechist-lector of the cathedral church of Lyons, France.”

True to their education focus, the Viatorians who found their way to Bourbonnais from Canada set up a school that became St. Viator College in 1868. The Depression put an end to the school, however, and the site was sold to Olivet Nazarene University.

The church and the grotto remain. As does a cemetery on the grounds. I wasn’t expecting that.

“Now take a look around the cemetery/grotto and you will also notice several headstones scattered throughout the space,” the tour says. “The cemetery was opened near St. Leo’s Chapel in 1842. By 1884, the old graveyard had no more empty spaces as hundreds are buried here. Many of the grave markers have deteriorated over the years, but there are approximately 30 headstones that still exist and have legible engravings. The earliest legible burial was David Spink, 1848.”

Deteriorated indeed.
Elsewhere on the grounds is a sundial.

When I stood in front of the sundial, it was about 3:30 CDT, or 2:30 by the sun, a time I could have indeed told by the shadow. The sundial was a gift from the St. Viator College Class of 1917, dedicated on June 13 of that year. Eleven members of that class are listed on the sundial plaque, including the class treasurer, Fulton J. Sheen. He had quite a career ahead of him, with influence in unexpected places.

Near the entrance of the grounds is a boulder with a plaque askew.

The plaque has been in place almost exactly 100 years, having been dedicated on Decoration Day, 1921. It honors the aforementioned “sturdy Viatorian pioneers” (the plaque’s term) who founded St. Viator College.

Just as we were about to leave — I was already back in the car — I spotted yet another plaque, one considerably harder to see, under a bush. In spring or summer, it might be impossible to see.
“I have to see one more thing,” I told my family. They’re used to that kind of thing. But I knew if I ignored it, I’d wonder about it later. I was well rewarded by my curiosity, since the plaque made me smile. It wasn’t anything remotely like I expected.
A home plate memorial. Listen closely on moonless nights, maybe, and you can hear the faint cheers of late 19th-century Catholic collegians playing base ball.

Been There, Seen That

By Dees Stribling

Category Archives: Been There