Every day is just like the rest: Lewistown, IL

LEWISTOWN, IL

POPULATION: 2,522

AREA: 1.8 Sq. Mile

COUNTY: Fulton (County Seat)

      MOTTO: None. Which is really fucking fitting.

I really hate to say this so soon, but man, these towns are starting to get tedious.

At some point, they all just bleed together, y’know? You’ve got the old court hourse:

You've got the giant old churches:

You’ve got the local paper named after a political party:

You’ve got the little diner, populated mostly by the elderly:

...and specializing in biscuits and gravy:

And you’ve got the references to history:

Well, okay, the references to Lincoln:

And that’s charmingly juxtaposed with fleeting stabs at modernity:

And all of that stuff is fine. Fun, even! But if you’re a blog devoted to finding out what’s special and unique about each and every town*, well, finding this much that is the same in all of them gets really tiresome.

*- This may be just such a blog.

Fortunately- for Lewiston and my general sanity- there is one thing about this place that makes it stand out from every other small Illinois town. It seems that this place was the home of Edgar Lee Masters, and it’s cemetery, Oak Hill Cemetary, was the inspiration for his Spoon River Anthology.

See? Proof of what I say.

Which, okay, as far as exciting goes, that’s not. But it is cool to see a town that turns someone besides Lincoln into an icon.

(Okay, maybe I’m just really reaching for something, ANYTHING to justify this entry)

But this town actually cared about Masters. I talked to a woman who worked at city hall, and she seemed genuinely disappointed to learn I’d never read his poetry. Which was refreshing, because at least when it came to my father, the disappointment usually stemmed from knowing TOO MUCH poetry.

On the other end of town, my waitress could recite some lines from some poem of his, but, as usual, if it didn’t involve biscuits or gravy, I wasn’t listening.

Even the court house had to recognize!

So, at least, it was interesting to find a town that idolizes someone besides Lincoln, and to see a town that kept it’s historical figures so close to its heart. But that only gets you so far. I was still left wondering what people do in this town and why they chose it over any other. I suppose, at some point, I could just ASK someone that question. But no, that’s exactly what they’d be expecting.

Other notes:

A word from the DTL sports desk:

Please note that the DTL sports desk is time insensitive.

And Any Ghosts There Will Remain: Kickapoo, IL

VITAL STATS

Population: Who knows? 500 maybe? (Wikipedia say 3,573 in the greater Kickapoo area)

Area: I would say about, "oh so big"

Cast Members: Dr. Doctorman, Mr. Marlo

Visited On: August 13, 2010

Weather: Balmy

Oh you wish you were a town, don’t you, sweet Kickapoo? You wish you were a recognized municipality, just like nearby Hanna City, Dunlap, and Princeville. You wish it so bad that you’re willing to lie with signs that say things like "Kickapoo 2 miles" and "Kickapoo, a great city to raise your family". You stoop Kickapoo, didn't you know we'd love you for who you really are?

A few weekends ago, friends of the blog Jon and Kevin Klesterates got married at Prairie Wildlife Park just outside Peoria. This was appropriate because it 1.) Was near me, and 2.) lead to the inevitable tidal wave of our friends washing up on the shores of Whiskey Town only to lay about drunkenly the next day. After the heady rush and swell another wonderful wedding came and went, not to mention the dancing of Troy Hayes, I found Mr. Marlo washed up in my basement, sleeping peacefully. Left with a Saturday to while away together, we decided to go ’splorin’.

Kickapoo seemed a natural choice. It’s plenty close and is often thought of by Peorians as "reachable rural". Not to mention they are alleged to have a kick-ass winery. Thus we were hopelessly pulled to this local Charybdis.

YIB tells me that he always (sometimes) does a solid 5-10 minutes of research on a town before blogging. Kickapoo proved a stranger nut to crack. I went into my search assuming I’d finding the usual a/s/l, but instead the internet came back to me with a, "Kickapoo where? Who? Did you mean the park by Danville? Love the blog, by the way."

I figured the U.S. census website would help, but the best it could find was information on Kickapoo Township as a whole. Which, now that I think about it makes sense: I didn’t remember seeing a post office, and when I searched the zip code, 61615, it just comes up as Peoria. You will notice that in the picture with Mr. Marlo above, there's no population count on the town sign, it just marks a perimeter. I guess so that the "townies" can think of themselves as a class apart from the mere "townshippers" out in the sticks. But I digress.

We pulled into town in Mr. Marlo’s sweet rental car and everything seemed in order: There was a nice church, a city park, and the requisite 3 antique malls all in view of the main drag. The town is laid out on the T where Highway 18 butts into Highway 150 (known to Peorians as "War Memorial Drive" and know to Kickapooians [ew…] as "Main Street").

Mr. Marlo and I started this trip with the most important meal of the day to the post-wedding-goer: Lunch. A perimeter sweep around "town" revealed only one place, Ludy’s, not that we were expecting more from a "town" of this size. The bikers were a little intimidating though.

We made it inside safely.

I guess this does reinforce what I’ve heard about Kickapoo being a popular gathering spot in the area. And for what it was, Ludy’s did just fine. What you have to remember in an area like this is it’s RIGHT THE HELL NEXT TO PEORIA. Keeping a restaurant open there has to be hard. It’s only 6.8 miles from a TGIF on the exact same road, although I guess TGIF frowns on bike rallies. Mr. Marlo said his burger was excellent, but he didn’t exactly need to say so.

We let geographic Darwinism decide which antique/knick-knack shop we could visit, and decided that Kightlinger’s could probably eat the other two handily. Mr. Marlo spent some time capturing the scene outside while I wandered in. Jim Kightlinger, proprietor, bondsman, etc. was behind the counter and eager to talk about anything and everything except Kickapoo. I gave him the line that we were just passing through town and stopped for lunch across the street.

Me: So what’s it like here in Kickapoo?

Jim: No much like anything. Just boring.

Me: Oh…(looking at a sprinkling can crafted to display pictures)… So what would you say you do to keep busy around here?

Jimmy: Nothing. There’s nothing here.

Me: Ah. Well, so you grew up here then?

James: Me? God, no. I moved here.

Still Me: You moved here?

Jim Kightlinger: Yep!

And then he changed the conversation to me and where I work and what I’m like and refused to go back. It was like he was trying to repress something and didn’t want a headshrinker like me mucking about in his thoughts. Whatever force in heaven or hell caused him to move to what he describes as "nowhere" and open a pretty nice knick-knack shop is completely beyond me. Mr. Marlo came to my aid though, and we interrogated the rest of the shop.

Like Wal-Mart, Jim prescribes to the "never too early for Halloween" theology

He also bragged about the people he attracts from Peoria and even Chicago. Specifically old lady types that come for wine tastings. Again, you have a shop that attracts people from over 100 miles away, and everything you can say about your town I can fit between the butt cheeks of a small hamster. That old pastime of crapping on your town came back to haunt us. I just don't get it. Honestly, if you chose to live in a burned out hole in the ground, shouldn't you try to convince yourself and others that it is, in fact, the best hole in the ground that ever got burned out? And the case goes triple for small towns like Kickapoo. Why take pot-shots at it when you choose to live there? Chaos reigns!

Anyway, after Mr. Marlo and I were thoroughly antiqued, we strolled around town, taking in the sites and snapping a picture or two.

This isn't reflective of the town at large, but, come on! Four satellite dishes?

Actually we didn't get many pictures of the nice parts of town. Because that's boring. For the most part it all came off as pretty nice, though. There really didn’t seem to be any run-down houses or neighbors, save the unmowed lawn or two. I suspect this is because Kickapoo is very much a bedroom community. Sexiness aside, that means that most of the people who live there drive anywhere from 20 to 45 minutes to get to work everyday. That’s simply where jobs are and where people need to be. I do know that a lot of Kickapooians (again, ew…) work at the many Caterpillar plants scattered around P-town, so it only figures.

We also took a turn through the town cemetary, which, honestly, was pretty cool, especially the tiny Catholic church that’s over a 150 years old. And what's hilarious is the pamphlets they had in the little box next to it had a journal entry from around that time that specifically said there weren't many Catholics around then and "maybe this would help attract some". Kevin Costner is Catholic.

They still use it a couple of times a year, which, as a church-goer myself, I really like because it mixes things up a little.

Catholic Mom: Kids, hurry up, it’s time for church!

Catholic Kids: Aww…

Catholic Mom: Come on kids, it’s in the graveyard!

Catholic Kids: Hellz yeah!1! Roxorz!!!!one!!!

Because apparently all Catholic children speak in 2002 Leet.

And if your name is Heinz, this cemetary is for you!

The walk back revealed two more businesses: A used car lot and a monument/2nd best knick-knack shop in town. Not to mention a lighthouse/clubhouse in some folks backyard.

"Bottles" was certainly a motif around Kickapoo

At that point we’d had enough and decided it was time for THE WINERY.

I’d been here one time before for a graduation, and it was just fine. The inside was simple but also really nice. Mr. Marlo and I enjoyed our 5 tastings, plus a secret 6th taste. Getting mellow on wine certainly makes any DTL project end on a sweet, port-flavored note.

And the summary. Do I vote Kickapoo? Maybe! While not a town and completely willing to let you go on believing it is, it did have several businesses and amenities that you might not expect in a town 7 miles away from a town of 100,000. But therein lies the reason, because I’ll bet people like to maintain a small amount of locality there. But not too much: There was no bank, no post office, and no grocery store. There were two bars and a gas station, though. If I had to guess, I would say that Kickapoo has stabilized with the larger draw of Peoria. Everyone we met did seem to be smiling and more than a few people we saw in there yards and on the ballfield waved happily at a couple of strangers wondering their streets.

Beats other places we’ve been.

And here’s a bunch of other shots Mr. Marlo took around town. He’ll leave you his website in the comments section. Also congrats again to Jon and Kevin, you no longer bachelors you!

Signing off,

Dr. Doctorman

DTL on the Nerdy Nothings Podcast

A very sincere DTL "Thanks" to Eric Garneau over at Nerdy Nothing for hosting Your Intrepid Blogger and Doctor Doctorman on his lovely podcast this weekend. If you want to hear us try to contextualize our adventures so far, head over to Nerdy Nothings. If you don't want to, I'm just going to appear outside your window, blasting the podcast on a boom box. So you might as well at least listen to it on your own terms.

Words are Flowing Out Like Endless Rain: Marion, IL

MARION, IL

Population: 17,193

Area: 13.5 Sq. Mi.

County: Williamson (County Seat. Woot?)

Motto: "The Hub of the Universe" (no...really.)

I actually visited Marion a couple months ago, but I kept holding off on writing it up. I just couldn’t put a coherent post together; I saw a lot of interesting stuff while I was there, got some good pictures, but none of it really flowed together. I like to have a unifying idea for these things, a sort of thesis to make the whole thing hang together. And one was not presenting itself for Marion, and I didn’t really want to go searching for one. For god’s sake, I’d already driven to Marion, you mean I gotta go further?

            So, I consulted DTL’s official Southern Illinois (Or: “SO ILL”) correspondent*, Ryan “CashMoneyHos”Lenghrer. I told him I’d visited Marion, but that I was having trouble writing about it. I needed some perspective. And in response, Ryan said, “Oh god, you went to Marion?”

            And whaddaya know, that did the trick!

            Because really,that was just par for the course in Marion. When I got there, I went to this bar:

            And inside, I got to talking to some people. I talked to a lawyer who’d lived in Marion for about 20 years. When I asked him for a good place to eat, he said, “Well, your basically in CULINARY HELL!” And he repeatedly called Marion “CULINARY HELL!” And he yelled it every time. A few times, little spittle came off of his lips.

            Meanwhile, the bartender insisted that SHE was the best thing about Marion, and I mean, I believed her, but she was only about a 6, and she seemed to know that. I’d put a picture up so you could judge yourself, but, no, gross. 

            No one could tell me any cool things to do, or good places to eat. No one told me what they did for fun. The best they could come up with is that they went to Paducah.

            In other words, the civic pastime of Marion appears to be shitting all over Marion.

            But y’know what, fuck the haters, I enjoyed myself. Look around this bar: It was practically built for whiney not-as-smart-as-they-think would-be-urbannites like me.

            And it had it’s own special brew of Schlafly’s (Chicagoans: “Schlaflys” is St. Louis-talk for “Goose Island”). It was…well, the important thing is, the bar had it’s OWN SPECIAL BREW.

            And the place was playing the Black Keys, and The Cardinals were winning, and as I had my second glass of the special Schlaflys the bartender kinda creeped up to a 7 ¼, and I found a decent calzone, and it was fun, dammit.

            Maybe more importantly, Marion really had the feel of being it’s own place. The lawyer knew every other lawyer in town, which amounted to about three people, and was on a first-name basis with a judge who walked in. Which reminds me: the fucking judges apparently walk into the same bars as all the rest of us (Granted, it was right off the town square, so maybe it was just a lazy judge. But aren’t they all?).

            Meanwhile, outside, Marion had the usual monuments and stuff, but here’s the thing- they were mostly for LOCAL history.

 

   I didn’t get most of it. Who's John Logan again? Christ I took an IL history class...

   Nonetheless, I now pray to this man every night. For power.

 

            And clearly, Marion had- or was at least trying to get- it’s own little art scene.

 

            And how bad could that be? THAT CAMERA IS HUGE OH MY GOODNESS ITS PICTURES MUST BE EXCELLENT.

            The bar even had a stage and live music once a week. Right there in the town square.

            Now, Marion wasn’t the first place we’ve visited that gets all emo about itself. Out of the roughly one dozen places we’ve visited, it was the 20^th to do so. But it might’ve been the most frustrating one, just because I found cool things to do (okay, mostly drinking), and I was only there for about two hours.

            Someday, in the process of writing this blog, I’m gonna figure out that impulse to keep talking shit about your own town. I’m going to figure out why Chicagoans, Springfielders, and Urbana-ites are, in my experience, the only Illinoisans proud of their damn town. But I’m not there yet, so in the meantime let me just say: Marion? Quit your bitching, okay? Christ.

Odds and Sods from around Marion….

1)    Yeah, let’s talk about that town motto. I admire the way Marion just decided to buttfuck subtlety on that one. When I’m mayor of Springfield, I’m changing its motto to “The Only Goddamn Town That’s Ever Fucking Mattered. Recognize.”

2) Let's talk about that asterix. Yes, Doctor Doctoman is also from SO ILL. But he can't be a correspondent, he's the DOCTOR for fuck's sake. He has to do doctor things, like drive around with me, induce labor (by pushing down on the top of the belly, right?), and use the slightly psychic paper.

3)    As befitting the Hub of the Universe, Marion has TWO City Halls.

Also, every city hall built after 1950 has been uniformly depressing. I want something with a sense of civic grandeur, dammit, not a walk-in tax consultant.

      4) Speaking of depressing: "The city is part of the Marion-Herrin Micropolitan Area and is a part of the Carbondale-Marion-Herrin, Illinois Combined Statistical Area with 123,272 residents, the sixth most populous Combined statistical area in Illinois." -Wiki.  WHAT THE FUCK IS THAT? YOU TRIED TO COMBINE THREE CITIES INTO ONE, AND IT WAS STILL ONLY THE SIXTH LARGEST WHATEVER IN THE THING! CHRIST, YOU SUCK AT LYING WITH NUMBERS! WHERE IS MY VALIUM?

5)    Why does the Marion Public Library have a stuffed camel in the window? Because it fucking CAN. Marion Librarians don’t play by your rules, Mr. Uppity Blog reader.

6)    Oh my god, how did it take me this long to figure out there was a Marion the Librarian pun in here? I’VE HAD THESE PICTURES FOR MONTHS! I’VE WASTED MY GIFT!!!

7)    The town paper is the Daily Republican. At least they don’t give you a picture of Jeb Hensarling every morning. 

8)    Well Justice League, you’ve apparently let all of reality get re-written under your feet, but you’re keeping my comic prices low. Way to nail those priorities, boys (and token girl).

9)    Sometimes, he sneaks into your room at night, just to watch you sleep. Sleep soundly, so, so soundly, my darlings.