May, 2022
When heading east the spring of 2022 our route afforded a sojourn into the heartland of Illinois and a 3-day stop-over in Bloomington-Normal for a long overdue visit with sister Karen, niece Terri and family. Our visit was essential and epic and unassailable and mandatory and incontrovertible and, well, it just flat out had to happen!
But wait a minute…who names a town Normal? We’ve heard about Metropolis (Illinois, and yes, the local newspaper is called the Daily Planet), Two Egg (Florida), Soda Springs and Slickpoo (Idaho), No Name (Colorado), Fishkill (NY), Hell (Michigan), and the sister cities of Burnt, Bald, Long and Sheep Porcupine (Maine). Pennsylvanians have had to put up with Mars, Bird-In-Hand, Virginville, Blue Ball, Big Beaver, Intercourse and Climax. There’s a Springfield in every State, and NPR’s Robert Siegel does an entire show featuring e-mails from Texas towns with unusual names (is White Settlement really that unusual a town name for Texas?).
But Normal? We wish there was a sexier answer, but the name is taken from the French ecole normale translated as an “institution of higher learning.” In the 19th Century a normal university trained students to be teachers. Illinois State Normal University was in Bloomington, Illinois. Eventually Bloomington became Bloomington/Normal, which then split into respective independent municipalities around 1867. In any event, it’s still Bloomington Normal to the locals.
The Wonderful Wizard of Oz was written by L. Frank Baum, who named the beloved main character Dorothy in remembrance of his deceased 5-year-old niece. Infant Dorothy Gage is buried in Evergreen Cemetery, and in 2018 a likeness of Dorothy and Toto was carved into a dead oak tree.
In all fairness there are other well-crafted wood carvings throughout the cemetery.
Who would have ever thought that there’d be a town in Illinois named Lincoln? Turns out that Lincoln practiced law there from 1847-1859, and the town is the only one that was named in honor of Honest Abe before he was president.
Lincoln is about 30 miles southwest of Bloomington, and is home to the Phone Booth on a Roof. While in town, and you know we couldn’t help ourselves, we found a few examples of what artists in the heartland can do…
…but we did pull into town to see the Phone Booth on a Roof…
A phone booth was placed on the roof of Lincoln City Hall around 1951/52 to expedite emergency communication when bad weather was approaching. By tradition the newest unmarried firefighter was sent to the roof as the look-out for bad weather and/or tornado activity. This practice discontinued into the early 1980s. How wonderful that the phone booth remains.
And we couldn’t leave Lincoln without visiting the World’s Largest Covered Wagon, which just happens to be piloted by, you guessed it, “Big” Lincoln! It’s known simply as the Railsplitter Covered Wagon, and the display sits along Old Route 66.
On the way back to Bloomington, we stopped for a few minutes in Atlanta, Illinois. Atlanta is one of, and I’m guessing here, a thousand or so small towns that were part of Route 66 and still commemorate the Mother Road’s history.
If you find your way to Atlanta, be sure to stop and visit a spell in wonderment of a giant Paul Bunyon holding a hot dog! The statue is one of the iconic Route 66 “muffler men.” We’re not sure about why the name, but muffler men are large molded fiberglass sculptures that were placed as advertising icons, roadside attractions or for decorative purposes. In this case the hot dog was added as an advertisement for a local restaurant. BTW – it’s worth a google search to find out about Chicken Boy, the Gemini Giant and the family of muffler men.
What we were reminded of is that there are curious things everywhere…you just have to care enough to look.
About an hour and a half north of Bloomington is the small farming community of Peru. Barb and Dale Holloway are friends from Mesa, and since we were in the neighborhood we had to stop in – so we kidnapped Brian’s sister Karen and off we went. We had the chance to see their home, the campground home away from home 5th wheel, and have a pretty great meal at a local dive bar and grill – someday ask Brian about their giant chicken wings!
We don’t visit often enough with Terri and family, nor especially with Karen. It is easier to let geographical distance define the relationship. We all know too many families in which some slight, cross word, or poor action puts up a barrier that becomes a lifelong estrangement. Then a lifecycle event occurs and there are new pledges to be closer, which slips away as soon as everyone goes their separate way. But we’re talking about family…
It was truly touching to just hang with our family for a couple of days…made our hearts smile.
Barbara and Brian
“It’s not what you look at that matters, it’s what you see.“ – Henry David Thoreau
Aimless Wanderings 
Awwww … you guys! What a sweet entry! I love, love, loved all the little murals, so many of which seemed to be so clearly referential to other artists. (Or all of them, maybe?) Also: the wooden carvings in the cemetery were pretty cool! And I’m left to wonder: how do they maintain the phone booth on the roof? Is it incredibly well-secured (to withstand bad weather, like tornado activity)? Is it still functional? Who would they call? (I mean, probably not Ghostbusters, but I imagine it depends on the scenario!)
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Thanks…never know what we find (have I said that before?). The phone booth was disconnected around 1980 when technology reached the heartland, and the weather services became the go to for emergency weather. I think the City makes sure the icon is secure in all kinds of weather.
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My heart was smiling also. Nothing like family!💙❤️
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