Western Illinois Magazine Issue 7 — Fall 2012

Western Illinois Magazine

Decker Press: The day the poetry died in Praire City

Final Words: The Last Interview With Neal Gamm, Governor of Forgottonia

Fred Francis’ Fantastic Freaky Forest Flat Fall 2012: Forgotten Illinois

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Western Illinois Magazine Vol. 1 No. 7

T h e o n l y m a g a z i n e i n t h e w o r l d t h a t g i v e s a d a m n a b o u t We s t e r n I l l i n o i s

S TA F F Editor:

Reilly Maloney

Managing Editor:

Michelle Baranauskis

Art Director:

James Needham

Staff Writers/ Photographers: Alyse Thompson

Bill Welt

Hannah Schrodt

Sarah Tomkinson

Kathryn Brotowitz

Josh Twidwell

Steve Lutz

Nicole Capone

Ryan Stoops

Advertising Sales:

Emily Johnston, Taylor

Brace

Business Manager:

Danielle Balbach

Assistant Business Manager: Lauren Barrett Distribution: Brandon

Rusciolelli,

Samantha Maki,

Greg Pappas

Advisor:

Richard Moreno

Secretary:

Kellie Arnold

Letter From The Editor Welcome to the Fall 2012 issue of Western Illinois Magazine. In our seventh issue, we chose the theme of “Forgotten Illinois.”

The staff and photographers have dug into the past and present of Western Illinois to spotlight people, places and events that have been either forgotten or are not very well known. My fellow writers have done an amazing job of capturing the history and interesting stories of Western Illinois.

Every town has a history and a great story to tell along with it—so let this magazine be your journey to those stories and facts.

This issue is filled with a number of memorable stories, including history and photos. James Needham’s poignant final interview with Neal Gamm, the Governor of Forgottonia; Steve Lutz’s wonderful story and photos of Kewanee’s unique Woodland Palace — featured on our cover — which was built in the 19th century by an eccentric inventor named Fred Francis; Bill Welt’s feature on retired Western Illinois University professor Gil Belles, who restores graveyards around the Macomb area; and Kathryn Brostowitz’s haunting story of the mysterious “Gooseneck Ghost,” which once roamed the Macomb/Colchester area.

Other stories in this issue include: the murder and suicide that marked the end

Western Illinois’ once prestigious Decker Press by Hannah Schrodt; a tour of the Keokuk Power Plant, which helped to tame the Mississippi, by Alyse Thompson; the fascinating history of Golden’s Windmill by Sarah Tomkinson; Josh Twidwell’s feature on the mysterious Macomb fire starter; Nicole Capone’s fun take on Fulton County’s annual Spoon River Drive; and my piece highlighted the quirkiest things I have found in Western Illinois.

So I invite you to take a look into Western Illinois Magazine, the only magazine that gives a damn about western Illinois. I hope you appreciate all the hard work my fellow writers and contributors have put into making this an enjoyable excursion into our region. I would also like to thank our managing editor, Michelle Baranauskis, art director, James Needham, and our staff advisor, Richard Moreno, for all their hard work with this issue. And when you’re done, let us know what you think. We’re always looking for feedback and/or new story ideas. You can contact us at westernillinoismagazine@yahoo.com.

Thank you, Reilly Maloney Editor Contact Info: A Western Illinois Publication 1 University Circle Macomb, IL 61455 (309)298-1876, ext. 7 Westernillinoismagazine@yahoo.com

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Table of Contents

Spoon River Scenic Drive By Nicole Capone A small town adventure in Fulton County.

Decker Press: Murder, Suicide, Poetry

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Prairie City’s murder-mystery love

By Hannah Shrodt story

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Tale of the Gooseneck By Kathryn Brostowitz Ghost Woodland Palace: Inventor’s Refuge

Up in the sky. Look! What is it?

What does it want?

Air conditioning and

By Steve Lutz automatic doors in 1890?

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By Sarah Tomkinson

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By Bill Welt

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First Dam Story on the Mis- By Alyse Thompson sissippi Golden’s Windmill Road to Restoration

The power plant in Keokuk Iowa an engineering first.

A forgotten jewel in Golden, Illinois.

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Nowhere Man: The Story of By James Needham Neal Gamm Hidden but not Forgotten

The governor of Forgottonia’s last interview.

A man’s quest to restore Western Illinois graveyards

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The Quirkiness of Western By Reilly Maloney Illinois Mystery of the Macomb Firestarter 200 Mysterious fires plague a family. Is

By Josh Tidwell a little girl to blame?

A photo shoot of a few odds and ends — mostly odds...

Forgotten Illinois

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Decker Press

Murder.

Suicide.

T

Poetry.

Dorothy Decker (left) lays slumped over in a pool of blood from a selfinflicted gunshot wound. Dorothy killed Ervin Tax, her boss and lover before she took her own life in May of 1950. The circumstances surrounding the violent act have forever been steeped in mystery.

By: Hannah Schrodt

he scene of a long forgotten story of lust and murder, Prairie City is a tiny town near Highway 41 in west central Illinois. Once shocked and saddened by the sudden deaths of Ervin Tax and Dorothy Decker, residents of Prairie City and west central Illinois

no longer remember the birth, growth, and decline of The Decker Press.

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All photos courtesy of Western Illinois University Special Collections

A Hopeful Start and Quick Growth

James A. Decker (above) was always interested in the printing business. In fact, he had a small toy printing press when he was a child. His affinity for ink continued past college when he finally decided to open his own printing press in his grandfather’s drugstore with his sister. Decker was called away to World War II for a few years but soon returned to his hometown of Prairie city and his printing press — still in business, thanks to his sister.

James Decker was born in 1917 to Arthur and Ulah Decker. His younger sister, Dorothy, was born a few years later in 1921. From the young age of 10 years old, James showed a strong interest in printing. He even had a toy printer he played with.

His interest continued into high school and college.

After he graduated from Park College in Parkville, Mo., he worked as an editor of a monthly religious magazine in Kansas. He eventually returned to Prairie City in 1937, where he decided to combine his two interests into a business.

Though he didn’t have much money, Decker soon started a printing press of his own. He worked out of his parents’ basement with Dorothy’s help. The basement was small and cluttered, and Decker soon began searching for a better location. Only a year later, he set up shop in his grandfather’s drugstore With his new business attracting more customers, the James A. Decker Press printed several magazines and books of poetry. His first few printing jobs were “Upward,” a quarterly publication, “Compass,” another magazine, and “Unchanging Gold” by Warren Van Dine — Decker’s first book.

The press published several other books and a short-lived newspaper soon after.

Perhaps the most famous poet to have a book printed by the James A. Decker Press was Edgar Lee Masters, author of “Spoon River Anthology”.

It was a dream of Decker’s to print Masters’ work, and this dream became a reality when Masters agreed. He thought it was only suitable that a printer based in the Spoon River counties publish his poems about the Spoon River counties. The press published two of his works, “Illinois Poems” in 1941 and “Along the Illinois” in 1942. The printing of Masters’ work brought Decker a significant increase in customers.

Soon promoted as “the largest publishing house in America devoted exclusively to the printing of poetry,” the press published works that became well known and received good reviews.

Though his business was doing well, Decker took a few years off to serve in the US Army in World War II. The press didn’t come to a complete stop, however.

Dorothy took over while her brother was away. By September of 1945, Decker was back in Prairie City.

Filled with bright, new ideas for the press, Decker returned to work with high hopes for his business.

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When word about James A. Decker Press circulated, he was contacted by poets from across the nation.

With this rise in production, the future of this small town business seemed promising.

A Steady Decline

The Decker Press (above), once a premier site for the printing of poetry, not sits abandoned (below), and missing its second story, in Prairie City.

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A generous man, Decker continued charging the same $100 for 200-300 copies after the war. The generosity soon caught up with him and Decker had to take on new contracts in order to pay for previous ones, which was a formula for financial ruin.

By 1946, the monetary truss collapsed and Decker had to sell his dream business to Harry Denman, a Prairie City resident who owned a lumberyard and several other businesses, for $2,000.

Denman bought all of the physical property, as well as the name. He also employed Decker and his sister for $30 per week. However, with the financial situation being as bad as it was, Denman quickly realized he had bitten off more than he could chew and was soon eager to pass off the failing business to someone else.

Aspiring writer and former soldier Ervin Tax was an author waiting anxiously for his work to be published. After asking his brother, a professor at the University of Illinois Chicago, for help, the manuscript eventually ended up at James A. Decker Press.

A restless Tax took a trip down to Prairie City to talk to the owner of the press about getting his work printed. Denman proved to be a good salesman and convinced Tax to stay and take over the press. By September 1948, Tax had bought all the rights to the press and became its sole owner. Not yet wanting to leave the business he founded, Decker stayed on as an editorial director.

Tax felt like a certain change was needed, so the James A. Decker Press became The Deckwr Press. Even with this new, hopeful change in leadership, the press underwent more strain as Decker went back to his old ways. Tax wclaimed that Decker had cashed a $15 check for himself that actually belonged to the press.

He had Decker arrested for embezzlement.

Decker pleaded guilty in 1949 and moved to Kansas City, Mo. where he found a job working for a publishing house.

But Dorothy continued working for The Decker

Ervin Tax sits slumped over with a gunshot wound form a .22 caliber rifle to the back of his head. When officials found his body and that of Dorothy Decker, there were no clues as to why Dorothy committed the murder/suicide. It is still a mystery.

Press. The story doesn’t end here, however, as a strange romance ending in tragedy is what ended the press forever.

A Romance Ended in Murder-Suicide Dorothy, a lonely, heavyset woman who wasn’t considered attractive by many, and Tax, a small man filled with drive and determination, soon developed a connection. Their relationship was somewhat of a mystery to others. Though they spent a lot of time together, several people believed that while Dorothy was completely in love with him, he didn’t feel the same way.

Whatever kind of relationship it was, it didn’t last long.

On May 10, 1950, officials from Fulton and McDonough counties found the cold, dead bodies of Tax, shot from behind on the front seat, and Dorothy, slumped over in the back seat with a self-inflicted gunshot wound and a .22 caliber rifle. The Decker Press died along with them.

All that is known for sure about the situation is that Tax had been in Chicago the past few days and was due back the night of May 10. Dorothy had left to pick him up from the train in Galesburg, but neither one of them showed up for work. How they ended up dead eight miles from Prairie City is unknown.

Local newspapers reported incidents that supposedly took place before the murder-suicide, such as Tax once firing Dorothy and locking her out of the building. There were also rumors from employees

of the press that said Dorothy had once threatened to kill Tax. Their odd and complicated relationship was never fully understood.

There was no note left by Dorothy and no one close to her knew why she killed her lover then herself. The murder-suicide of Ervin Tax and Dorothy Decker will forever be a mystery, and the story of The Decker Press, though since has been forgotten, will always be a strange part of the history of west central Illinois.

*The information from this story was taken from a transcript of “The Little Press on the Prairie: Prairie City’s Decker Press” by Jeff Hancks of WIU Archives and Marla Vizdal.

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Woodland Palace: Inventor’s Refuge Fred Francis, the undeniable genius of the late 19th century, leaves behind a window into his brain, in Kewanee.

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Photos and Story by: Steve Lutz

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ocated a mere 80 miles from Macomb in Kewanee, “The Hog Capital of the World,” is Woodland Palace, arguably the oddest house in the state of Illinois.

Fred Francis started its construction in 1890, but it was never actually finished. Woodland Palace is a home with countless unique features. Just off Route 34, northeast of Kewanee, curious travelers stop in at Woodland Palace during the months of AprilSeptember every year for a tour.

Perhaps a little bit about the man will help explain why this house is a worthy reason for a detour. Fred was known as an engineer, mathematician, architect, builder, inventor, painter, carver, poet and more. He was born in 1856 near Kewanee, and considered gifted from a young age. He attended the Illinois Industrial University (or the University of Illinois, as it is known today) in Urbana. But in lieu of paying tuition, he gave them the patent for a steam engine he designed.

After graduating in 1878, he took a job for the Elgin Watch Company and created a tool that increased the success rate of inserting watch springs from 50 to 90 percent. In 1889, Fred left the watch company but continued to get royalties for his patents. When they reached $50,000 (roughly $1.2 million in today’s money), he informed the company that it was all the money any man would need to live a long and prosperous life and asked them to discontinue his checks. They happily obliged.

When it came to Fred’s personal life, he was an odd character — especially for the times. Fred married Jeanie, a woman who was his opposite. He was an atheist, she attended church every Sunday (he drove her on his bicycle and waited outside). While Fred was a vegetarian who believed in reincarnation, Jeanie ate meat regularly. He used a curtain to separate them during meals and had her eat on a separate tin table.

To add to his unorthodox beliefs, Fred was a Physical Culturist, which meant he would walk 5 to 20 miles a day barefoot in order to absorb minerals through the soles of his feet. For rare trips to Chicago, he had a custom made pair of metal-soled shoes to prevent pollution from making its way in to his body. Perhaps the most interesting aspect of his belief was the fact that he was a devout nudist; something that bothered his neighbors.

In 1889 with his fortune, Fred moved with Jeanie back to Kewanee and started construc-

tion of the Woodland Palace. Almost all the elements of the house he custom made. He handpicked all the bricks on the house and chipped away at each to give it an individual look. The story goes that Fred brought the bricks by bicycle from Kewanee, 5 miles away.

Woodland Palace has a number of innovations not seen in other houses until years later. Four feet underground, Fred built a tunnel out of clay tile. It extended 350 feet out into the woods, which kept the air in the tunnel a constant 55 degrees. Fred used a windmill to pull the air from the tunnel in to his house, providing cool air in the summer and warm air in the winter.

Another interesting innovation was Fred’s filtered and pressurized water system. Rain would flow through sand and charcoal into a custom built pressure tank, giving them access to hot and cold running water. When Jeanie would have company over, he would connect the system to a spout in the backyard and have the water shoot 15+ feet in the air to show off.

It is said that Fred had a notorious dislike of flies and other pests, and the entrance to the palace reinforces the claim. There he designed and built a complex system of gears and belts into the entrance’s 2 sets of double doors. When the contraption was finished, Fred could simply step through the first set and on to a pressure plate that closed the doors behind him. Once the doors were closed, he could look around for flies before proceeding in to the house. Fred’s device not only allowed for him enter the house with his hands full, but the doors also closed automatically so he couldn’t leave them open accidentally.

Above all, Woodland Palace was built to suit the needs of Fred and Jeanie. There are several hiding spots throughout the house where parts of the woodwork pull out or slide up, giving Fred a secure place to keep valuables. Another major need-based feature that showed Fred’s softer side is the solarium. An addition to the original house, the solarium was built for Jeanie who contracted tuberculosis, which would ultimately take her life. It had a number of things built for Jeanie. For example, the design of the windows allowed her to refresh the air in the room every 60 seconds. There is a special boiler located under the solarium, which Fred used as a thermal siphon radiator to keep Jeanie warm in the winter.

To allegedly keep impurities out of his body, Fred Francis used a pair of metalsoled shoes on his trips to Chicago (top).

Among his many inventions was his automatic doorway that used a pulley system (middle) and a pressure plate. While building the Woodland Palace, Francis etched abnormalitiies into the bricks (bottom) to make each one unique.

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Fred Francis built the solarium (left) for his wife, Jeanie, who contracted tuberculosis. The room holds more shining examples of Fred’s many inventions, like windows that would refresh the air for his sick wife every 60 seconds and a thermal siphon radiator, built underneath (the entrance to which can also be seen at left). When she died, Fred placed a monument for her (right) in the solarium.

Located in the middle of the solarium now is a marble monument that Fred designed and had carved in Italy as a tribute to Jeanie after her death.

One thing is certain about Woodland Palace: it is something that needs to be seen in person. The little details created by Fred are unbelievable. Rocking chairs and beds are designed for the exact body size of his wife and himself. Screened sitting porches, several paintings done from memory found in frames Fred made himself, intricate hand carved benches with mother of pearl inlays and a room modeled after stagecoaches of the day — complete with a custom made railroad lamp chandelier. It’s no surprise this house has become a tourist attraction.

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In 1926, Fred Francis committed suicide. He shot himself in such a way, as the bullet did not pierce his body. It was a part of his Physical Culturist beliefs — no markings on the body. No piercings, tattoos or even gunshot wounds. Fred left his unfinished house (he always said that he would put the finishing touches on it on his 100th birthday) to the city of Kewanee, under a number of stipulations that he referred to as his “rules.” The rules went in to detail about keeping windows screened, how to stock the fire (a single log was needed in the efficient house) and locations of drains and pipes.

There was one final stipulation: his cremation. He had built a wire basket for his cremation, which he

wanted done on his property. But due to state law, he was cremated in Davenport, Iowa.

Since his death, Kewanee took possession of Woodland Palace and most of it has remained unchanged. But in the 1960’s, there were a number of renovations made to the palace, like his cement roof (something Fred was told couldn’t be done, but managed to pull off) being replaced with a cedar one and a windmill being torn down.

While a few things have changed, the site is still very impressive. So if you find yourself in Kewanee near the home of legendary inventor Fred Francis, make sure to pop in and visit the incredible home he built.

Fred Francis referred to the sitting room as the “coach room” (inset) because it was modeled after the railroad coaches of the time. Fred hand-carved all of the furniture with painstaking detail. The most impressive example is in the middle of the love seat where Fred created a three dimensional carving of a young girl kneeling on the shore of a lake. He used mother of pearl inlays to give the back a look of shimmering water. A staunch conservationist, Fred obtained most of the materials he used from the railroad, including the chandelier in the middle of the room. The light was crafted by combining four railroad coach lamps together. The chandelier might look crooked, and it is — on purpose. Fred built it that way to prevent the soot from the lamps from blemishing its appearance. Directly off the coach room are Fred and Jeanie’s separate bedrooms. The two rooms are unexpectedly small and each contain only a bed and a dresser. Each of the bedrooms can be closed off individually using the curtains or a partition. The coach room also leads to Fred and Jeanie’s separate screened in porches (above).

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O

nce upon a time...

Photo by Ryan Stoops

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By: Sarah Tomkinson

The flour made at the Prairie Mills Windmill in the small Western Illinois town of Golden was —well— golden.

In the late 19th and early 20th century, the Prairie Mills Windmill was renowned for the high quality of its flour. In 1874, Prairie Mills flour won first prize in a St. Louis competition for best quality flour on the market.

The Dutch-style mill (one of only two still standing in downstate Illinois) became a local landmark and its reputation a source of local pride—which proved important in the late 1980s, when the windmill, abandoned for several years and deteriorating, needed the support of local residents to be saved.

“It just looked sad,” said Ken Flesner, who now gives guided tours of the windmill. “It used to be the jewel of the town.”

In 1986, after another town made an offer to purchase and relocate the mill, the Golden Historical Society was formed to raise funds to purchase and restore the structure. In 1995, the society, after acquiring the mill, brought in a renowned millwright and preservationist, Derek Ogden, to oversee the restoration, which began a year later.

In a report to the society, Ogden noted, “The construction of the Prairie Mills Windmill is of a very high standard, both structurally and mechanically.

The machinery in this windmill is one of the finest I have seen in the United States of America and certainly up to the highest standard I have seen in Europe.”

Despite the optimistic report, undoing 70 years of later renovations—the mill served as a supper club, private home and a tavern over the years—and neglect took time.

“They tried to keep as much of the original mill as possible,” Flesner said. “The entire west wing was still in good shape, and the structure of that area is 100 percent original.”

Although the one wing, which is now a gift shop, was in decent shape, the rest of the mill needed a lot of help.

By 2002, however, the mill was back in a state where it could properly run again using its original millstones (which were still in place) and most of its wood gear mechanics.

“You can tell the renovations from the original because the renovations were done in a lighter wood,” Flesner said.

Today, while wandering through the mill, visitors

will observe rooms with mismatched woods as well as a complete redone room that talks about the history of Golden.

During a recent tour, Flesner explained exactly how the mill worked, from grinding the grains to packaging them. At nearly every step, he described how manpower and gravity—and no electrical power—were efficiently utilized to produce the flour.

“Everything was done by manpower for this windmill,” he said. “The workers lived in houses across the street, so that way whenever the wind was right, night or day, they would be able to leave home and come to work quickly.

At the top of the windmill, in an outside patio area, Flesner pointed out the last original home built for the workers as well as Golden’s first hotel and a little tribute garden. Companies, church groups and individuals who donated to help restore the mill have their names written on granite bricks displayed in the shape of a windmill.

“Without the community support this wouldn’t have been able to happen,” Flesner said. “We acually had so many donations that we were able to expand the area.”

Flesner along with many other members of the community are pleased with what has become of the windmill. The society’s next project is to replace the windmill’s giant wooden sails, which are falling apart.

History The Prairie Mills Windmill was built in 1872-73

by Hinrich R. Emminga, a German millwright who came to the Golden area two decades earlier. In 1854, Emminga erected the Custom Mill on land about a mile and a half northeast of Golden. He operated it for about nine years before selling it and returning to Germany with his family (where he built another mill).

Emminga returned to Golden in 1872 and began building the Prairie Mills Windmill. The structure, which has four 35-foot-long sails, began milling grain on September 1, 1873, and shipped its first flour to Carthage, Ill. on November 8, 1873.

In 1878, Hinrich Emminga sold the mill to his son, Harm, and returned to Germany, where he died in 1886. The Emminga family continued operating the mill until 1923, when it was sold to F.B. Franzen (ironically, the grandson of the man who purchased the Custom Mill in 1863).

In 1924, a windstorm tore off two of the sails and the mill was closed for a short time. Franzen rebuilt the sails and modified the mill to operate using a

Photos by: Ryan Stoops Millstones (left) grinded grain, that was fed to them through the hopper (upper left), into flour. The mill ran on a system of gears (lower right) that moved when there was enough wind.

gas-powered engine. The market for milled flour declined, however, and it closed for good in 1930.

Today Despite its regal name, Golden was originally swampland. According to local history, no one wanted to settle in the area until a group of northern Germans arrived. They cleared the land and raised the surface area above the water level.

Soon, the new town had regular rail service from the Wabash and Burlington Northern railroads.

Today, Golden is a town of about 600 people, most of German descent. Located near Adams County Highway 17, the town still has a close relationship with its trains—about 32 of them go through the town on a regular basis—as well as its windmill, which stands as a shining example of the power of local pride.

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Hidden but not forgotten Western Illinois graveyards and a man’s quest to restore them.

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ear the small town of Colchester, Ill., a former slave lies underground. Buried in the middle of nowhere, “Jack the Black” rarely has visitors. But, he can be found if curious sightseers want to see him.To find his grave, visitors have to take a winding country road and traverse a horse trail by foot past a space normally reserved for trappers. Once trekking through the forested area, travelers will stumble upon his burial ground—Atkinson Cemetery.Upon finding his tombstone, believed to have been erected sometime between 1860 and 1870, visitors will read: 14

By: Bill Welt

“To the Remains of JACK The black Man of JOHN McCORD”

Interestingly, he is not buried alone; he is surrounded by the McCords, the family who owned him before and during the Civil War. No one knows why he is buried with the McCord family. But some speculate he shared a very strong relationship with his owners, believing he may have stayed with them even after slavery was abolished.

For whatever reason, Jack the Black lies in the same area next to whites, almost as an equal.

Stories like Jack the Black’s have motivated one retired Western Illinois University professor to identify and preserve cemeteries in McDonough County.

Professor emeritus Gil Belles has helped locate 96 cemeteries in the county, to be exact.

Belles started this initiative about four years ago when he served as president of the McDonough County Historical Society. However, he didn’t realize how many cemeteries he would have to restore when he launched the preservation project. But, he said, it’s been worth the effort.

“It’s been a lot of fun because there’s a story in every cemetery,” Belles said. “It’s either a person or community or an event that’s commemorated by the cemetery. That’s one of the reasons that I have pursued this because, as a historian, I didn’t want some of that to get lost. And it’s very easy to do because it only takes two or three summers for a cemetery, that’s been totally clean and restored, to get overgrown and disgusting again.”

Belles said visitors can learn much about the region by visiting one of these cemeteries. He explained that they can not only trace the ethnic origins of the first white settlers in the area, but also discover the hardships they experienced after coming here. He particularly noted the Bailey Cemetery, located just south of Macomb.

“They start looking at the headstones and say, ‘Oh my God, look at all those little kids that died; they died as infants, one year old or two years old. My God, they just died like flies.’ Yeah, they did,” he said. “Out there at Bailey’s Cemetery, there’s a family that had eight infants, two pairs of twins, who died at young ages under three. But, they had 14 kids, so they did have survivors. So, that’s why they had a lot of kids, because you just assumed only one out of two kids would make it.

“That’s one of the educational things to confront modern people with: people didn’t necessarily live to college or high school age back then,” he added.

Belles said this past year has been quite special for his cemetery project, because of the 200th anniversary of the War of 1812. This American-British conflict

has strong ties with the founding of this region.

Immediately after the war, the federal government granted bounties of land in the Western Illinois region to veterans of the conflict. In fact, Macomb and McDonough County derived their names from American war heroes Army General Alexander Macomb and Navy Commander Thomas Macdonough.

“A lot of people in town are looking for the headstones of 1812 veterans,” he said. “Those are kind of the hooks we’re going on. We’re really just trying to preserve them and respect the people who were buried there 150 or 160 years ago.”

Two War of 1812 veterans, Thomas Smithers and Jeremiah Whitten, may be found in the Old Macomb Cemetery, located off Wigwam Hollow Road. Unfortunately, this cemetery has suffered from serious neglect over the years.

“There’s a whole bunch of headstones just piled up under trees,” he said. “When they widened Wigwam Hollow Road, they just threw the headstones under the trees. We have to build a memorial site for all those fragments that don’t represent the grave.”

But, Belles and others have started to restore the cemetery by installing a $15,000 fence around the burial site. He expects Old Macomb to be fully restored in two to three years. “It’ll be an educational opportunity for teachers who want to bring their kids and look at the forbearers of Macomb: the 1812 veterans and the families who were founders of our city.”

However, other cemeteries are not so lucky. Take for instance the Almshouse Cemetery, located south of Macomb. In the early 20th century, this site served as the cemetery for the McDonough County Almshouse, which no longer exists.

“The (federal) government found out that one of the Civil War veterans had been in the poor house and died there,” Belles said. “They insisted the county board to put an official Civil War headstone.

“They were so embarrassed because they had no markers for all the other people,” he continued. “They went out and bought a dozen white ceramic doves and they just put them down around the headstones. Now, they are broken up and they’re just all over the place.”

To properly honor the cemetery’s dead, he placed a public marker next to each cemetery to provide all of them recognition.

“Today, a family will spend over $10,000 for a funeral to get a high-end coffin, embalming and all of those things,” Belles said. “And, they’ll just spend a fortune to get a plot (of land) some place and they’ll

have a big, elaborate funeral. They will not expect that to be a cow pasture 50 years from now. So, why do we in our arrogance and modernity think that the people who spent the same kind of time, labor and tears on a funeral deserve to have their relatives treated that way?”

“Now, I may be totally opposed to modern funerals and today’s burials, because I do [oppose them],” he added. “But, people in the 1830s did not believe that and a lot of people today still don’t. We ought to respect the memory and history of those people.”

Photos by: Alyse Thompson The grave of Jack the Black (above) can be found in Atkinson Cemetery (opposite) near Colchester. The man is thought to be a slave who didn’t leave the company of his owner’s after abolition of slavery.

He was subsequently buried next to his owners in the graveyard that now lies in a remote location.

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Mystery of the

Macomb

Firestarter

By: Josh Twidwell stock.xchng 16

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mong the ashes of a burned down house near Gin Ridge, lie memories that are now buried in the country soil. The ashes, still warm with secrets, were born on August 13, 1948 when the Western Illinois city of Macomb was unexpectedly thrust into the national spotlight . For two weeks much of the nation’s attention was focused on the Willey family farm, located about 10 miles south of Macomb, and the series of mysterious fires that erupted throughout their home and surrounding property. During that time, more than 200 fires broke out on Charles Willey’s farm, but as to the cause of those fires— even today there is still has no clear-cut answer.

In fact, the only clue to what happened lies with a young woman named Wonet McNeil.

In most news accounts, Wonet McNeil was described as a normal child, who was “obedient and well behaved.” Wonet’s parents divorced when she was 12 and she was forced to relocate to Macomb with her father and brother, despite her desire to remain with her mother in the Bloomington, Ill. area. The three of them— Arthur McNeil, Arthur Jr. and Wonet—moved into Charles Willey’s farmhouse on July 6. By all

Photo by: Josh Twidwell Today, one of the only reminders of the strange events on the Willey farm is the Willey Family Cemetery just outside of Macomb where many of Charle’s Willey’s relatives are buried like John Willey (above).

accounts, Charles Willey and his wife, Lou, were kind, hardworking people. Both were in their mid-60s when they took in the McNeils. The remote farm, however, was a very different place for the children, who were used to living closer to other people and having children to play with.

Additionally, chores and farm duties filled up much of their day. But as time went on, strange things began to happen. An ordinary farm would soon turn into a picture of devastation.

At the beginning of August, unexplainable fires began erupting throughout the Willey house, sometimes right before their eyes. The first was a small flare-up behind the kitchen stove, which burned the paper up the wall. While this fire was small, it seemed to unwrap what appeared to be a uncontrollable evil into Willey’s house. Later in the week, small fires would break out on the wallpaper in other rooms. The fires would start with small, brown spots that would burst into flames that covered the entire wall. For the most part the family controlled the fires—when several of the blazes appeared, the Willeys were ready with buckets and cups of water. Soon, however, the relentless fires were spreading along to the porch and to curtains in the house. A worried Charles Willey decided to move everyone to the garage hoping to escape whatever was causing the mysterious flaming outbreaks.

On August 13, around 8 a.m. several fires erupted nearly at once and burned down the house.

Within minutes, the fire incinerated the structure and left only ashes for the family. The Willey’s had lived in the house since they had married 26 years earlier. The family was baffled. Charles Willey could only tell a local newspaper that “mysterious fires had aroused in the house all week.”

Thinking that the wallpaper might be flammable, Macomb Fire Chief Fred Wilson had previously asked Charles to bring in a piece of it for testing, but nothing could be found that explained why the paper had suddenly burst into flames. The baffling fires soon attracted crowds of local citizens who wanted to come and see the spectacle. After the house burned down, news spread about the mysterious fires attracted the attention of regional media, including newspapers from as far away as Chicago.

Despite visits from a variety of fire investigators, military officials and others, no one could come up with a satisfactory explanation for the strange fires. Some claimed the hot sun caused the flames while others blamed it on a flammable fly spray that had been used around the farm.

Still others traced it to alleged carbon dioxide leaks in the ground. Perhaps the most bizarre theory was that the fires were caused by high frequency radio waves or radioactivity sent from an enemy country. Each theory appeared in the media, which in turn, generated even more publicity about the strange phenomena. Newspaper reporters from Tuscaloosa to Miami arrived to see the Willey’s fascinating fire-cursed farm.

Despite all the attention, the fires continued. Following the loss of the house, mysterious blazes destroyed the Willey’s two barns and other out buildings. The Willey’s were forced to live in a makeshift tent. Newspapers reported more than 200 fires on the farm, none of which were explainable.

The Willey’s, along with Arthur and his two children, would soon rent a house a mile and a half away from the farm. Yet despite the move, the spirits of the fires seemingly followed them to their new rented home. Officers investigating the fires at the original Willey house would also experience additional “ghost fires.” Then, about two weeks after it had all started, the rash of fires seemed to stop.

The media quickly moved on to something else.

The only person still interested in the cause of the fires was Deputy State Fire Marshal John Burgard, who would ultimately be the man responsible for uncovering the truth about them.

Burgard started interviewing the family. He found that no one had any idea on how the fire had started, except for 12-year-old Wonet. After interrogating her for more than an hour, Burgard was able to get the girl to admit to starting the 200 fires during the two-week period that destroyed two barns, a chicken coop and the Willey house. Despite losing the home in which had spent most of his life, Charles Willey decided not to prosecute Wonet.

Many would later say Wonet was pressured into confessing to starting the fires. Some say she may have never started them in the first place and there were other, more supernatural or paranormal culprits. Wonet would later go live with her Grandmother Daisy Johnson in Marseilles, IL and the bizarre story of the fires of the Willey house would slowly fade away. Still, one can’t help to wonder whether a little girl’s boredom could be the cause of the events that attracted the nation’s attention for more than a week. After all, despite her confession, no one has completely explained how a 12-year-old girl could start more than 200 fires without being noticed by the host of fire professionals, specialists, investigators, and military personnel on the scene. Maybe only the ashes of that old house know the real truth.

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S

cenic poon River drive

Story and Photos By: Nicole Capone 18

T

he Spoon River winds through the hills of Fulton County giving the added charm of running waters to an already picturesque view. This region is so beautiful during harvest when the leaves of the many trees that cover the river valley change their colors for all to see.

People from all over fall upon this county touring the Spoon River Scenic Drive.

Fulton County is in the middle of what is called Spoon River Country. The Spoon River is a tributary of the much larger Illinois River. It is said that the Spoon River was named by the Native Americans as far back as 12,000 years ago.

During the first two weekends in October hundreds of vendors from all over the area setup their shops in large tents in every town in the county and along every well traveled highway traveled.

Visitors can find anything from crafts of the local merchants to the homemade cooking of locals.

Historical sites are also open for visitors to tour and explore.

Earlier in October I experienced my first scenic drive along the river. I visited Ellisville and London Mills, two of the fifteen towns and attractions that participate in the scenic route.

My first impression of Ellisville was that it was a very small burg with close knit people. Everyone I met was friendly and welcoming. Every corner held local vendors who inivited me into their shops and every local said hello with a smiling face.

Major renovations have been done to the Ellisville Opera House through the efforts of community volunteers who organized to restore and preserve one of Ellisville’s most precious building.

Inside, the opera house, I was greeted with the smell of fresh cinnamon apples. The house split off into two rooms. The first one was full of various vendors who had set up tables to sell handmade jewelry, holiday decorations, and other handmade items.The other room sold homemade baked goods, the source of the delicious smell.

I purchased an apple dumpling with ice cream .

For five dollars I tasted one of the best desserts I have ever had in my life made from mouthwatering fresh ingredients.

After indulging in the taste of my apple dumpling, I walked up and down the main street in Ellisville. I came across Mount Pisgah Park, a privately owned property located at the site of an early Indian village.

In the park, various teepees and tents were set up that featured crafts for sale. Also in the park was a local blacksmith who was making horseshoes. Many tourists and townspeople gathered around the his tent and watched him construct various objects from iron.

Ellisville is a very welcoming community that is sure to make anyone feel right at home from the beginning, my time spent in Ellisville was plesant and a good change of scenery from constantly being in Macomb.

The next stop was London Mills, which was about a fifteen-minute drive.

On the way, my eyes again filled with shades of red, green and yellow. Cascading trees towered over the winding roads leading me to the next destination. The trees and landscape were so beautiful that at times I almost stopped to get out of the car and gaze into the distance for a better view.

London Mills is located at the north boundary of

For five dollars, the apple dumpling (bottom right) from Ellisville Opera House was a deal. Outside, vendors set up teepees (bottom left) while people browsed their goods. Fifteen minutes away in London Mills, Jon Harper and Ron Smith (top) sold restored furniture from their tent.

Fulton County where Spoon River makes its way into the county.

It is home to around 450 people — definitely busier and more populated than Ellisville. Upon entering town, we were greeted by local law enforcement who directed traffic and pointed visitors to places where they could park their cars.

After finding our own parking spot, I walked around town browsing local shops and street vendors. London Mills featured an extensive selection of antiques and homemade furniture.

I came across two local carpenters, Jon Harper and Ron Smith. The pair were selling their quality wood furniture like tables, chairs, and desks.

Fine Junque, a furniture store, opened over ten years ago and is owned by Harper who’s customers are mainly from west-central Illinois.

Jon, a skilled craftsman, creates exquisite new pieces from old furniture. He takes pride in recycling an old, dusty piece of furniture and transforming it into a masterpiece that will accommodate any room or any taste. The pieces were sturdy and built with pride.

After browsing through Jon’s shop, I continued to walk the streets of London Mills. I was immediately drawn towards a building selling Amish pies. The pies were a very popular item with customers and were quickly selling out.

But the pies weren’t what caught my eye. Along with other types of homemade Amish food, local vendors sold other goodies like blooming onions, nachos, and different types of roasted nuts. London Mills in my opinion was a great place for visitors to eat. Everyone could find something they liked.

After browsing the many food items, I stumbled into a huge white tent filled with rows of boxes selling everything from scarves to toys with the tell-tale “Made in China” sticker found somewhere on them.

Here’s the best part: everything was under $10. The tent had many items bulked in rows of boxes with swarms of customers rummaging through them trying to find the best deals.

I joined in the fun and purchased a pair of headphones for a dollar. I guess I felt that I needed to leave with something and didn’t want to pass up the deals My time in London Mills was filled with non-stop activity and good company. The town made me feel right at home . It was hard to not feel happy in any of the places I visited.

I would suggest the scenic Spoon River drive to anyone. My experience on the felt like a small vacation right here in west-central Illinois. As it turns out, excitement, new places, faces and adventures are waiting, right here in the heart of Illinois, for anyone who looks for them.

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20

By: Kathryn Brostowitz

I

am sitting alone in my apartment drinking apple cider and listening to the wind whistle past my window on a particularly cold October evening. As I flip through articles given to me for this assignment, I’m reminded of the ghost stories my friends and I used to share with each other at slumber parties when we were young. The only difference between the ghost stories we used to tell as girls and the one I’m reading now is the fact that this one is real — or so it seemed.

The Gooseneck Ghost is a local phenomenon that first appeared in January of 1908. Unlike many popular ghost tales throughout the area, the sightings were covered in countless newspaper articles and treated as legitimate news isntead of simple gossip.

The Macomb Journal described the apparition as a “bright light” that traveled along the railroad tracks and through the fields near Colchester Road, just west of Macomb. One of the earliest sightings involved a man named Joe Morton and his son who were headed home late one Saturday night. He claimed the ghost “flashed his light” right at them. Their team of horses got startled and started to run wildly.

A more chilling sighting involved a group of men who worked for the railroad. They said they repeatedly saw a man near the railroad tracks whom they had never seen around town before.

While it’s reasonable to assume he was just a visitor, the men went on to explain that when they approached the man, he “stepped from the railroad and mysteriously disappeared.” wWhile a few people claim the ghost appeared as a person, most sources described it as the light. There were countless suggestions as to what the light could be, if not a ghost.

Many suggested it was a will-o’-the-wisp, a light caused by gas often seen over marshes. Others believed it to be a lantern carried by a kite.

As fear of the ghost spread, people became suspicious of any newcomer who visited the area. People watched for the ghost night after night, and speculation grew as to who the ghost could be and what he could possibly want.

Eventually, a plan was devised to solve the mystery once and for all.

In the summer of 1908, a picnic was planned for the purpose of capturing the ghost. The Macomb Journal stated the following in an announcement: “There are two objects in this meeting. First, to have a general good time; second, to use the means available to solve this mysterious light that hangs as a shadow over Gooseneck and Vicinity. Everybody is cordially invited to come. Boys are requested to bring flashlights and snapshots and we will do all we can to help get a good picture of the light.”

The night of the ice cream social slash ghost hunt, horses and buggies surrounded the grove.

Despite the thick summer air and clouds of dust rising from the road, parents and children gathered around excitedly. As the day slowly turned dark, people grew anxious to catch a glimpse of the apparition they had heard so much about.

Lora Lemmer, who was a young girl at the time of the events, wrote about the experience in a short memoir. She described her first experience with the ghost earlier in the summer as she was cleaning the kitchen. Her father called her outside to look at the light floating in the distance.

“Sure enough,” she wrote, “There was a light overhead, bigger than a star, and moving.”

When she wrote about the ghost hunt later in the summer, she emphasized the enthusiasm she felt radiating through the crowd. Finally, after the sun had set, the action began.

“About nine o’clock a shout went up. ‘There it is! There it is!’ And sure enough a little ball of light was slowly rising over the railroad tracks way down in the west. It grew larger as it sailed slowly down the railroad tracks, toward the picnic grove – then just before it reached it, it disappeared. But – the “Gooseneck Ghost” had appeared!”

The Macomb Journal also reported on the event, pointing out that it had a “woman’s curiosity” and it “appeared at regular intervals … but then only for a very short space of time” before it finally disappeared in the woods.

“It was later believed to be a hoax,” Lemmer continued, alluding to reports that someone had found a Japanese lantern where the light had been seen. “But it was a ‘nine-days-wonder’ while it lasted. But – ghost, kite and lantern, will-o’-the-wisp – whatever it was – it was real!

I saw it.”

The ghost seemed to go into hiding shortly after the picnic, and talk of the events dwindled to a minimum until it seemed forgotten. Then, 7 years later in February of 1915, the light appeared again.

In an article published in the Macomb Daily Journal, it is noted that the ghost’s “favorite haunt seems to be in the vicinity of the railroad where Mr. Rousch’s death occurred, at the old well where two men met their deaths by the black damp and near the place where stood the old tree from which a resident of that vicinity hung himself years ago.”

As people tried to make sense of the phenomenon yet again, curiosity turned to anger as the article states “a more through investigation will be instituted in hopes that the Gooseneck ghost, so well known but so universally disliked, will be banished for all time.” [sic] As the years went on, people still talked about the events that happened so early in the century. Paul Carson Jr. wrote an article for Macomb Daily Journal in 1966 in which he compared the Gooseneck events to claims of UFO sightings that were so prevalent in the 1960’s.

“To some eye-witnesses, the object appeared to chase after them along lonely country roads at night, flying at low altitudes, sometimes diving right at them,” he wrote. “That seemed to eliminate the common explanation that it was marsh gas.”

Over a century after the first reports of the Gooseneck Ghost were published, the mystery still has never been solved. Stories still circulate about whether or not it really was just gas or a lantern, or if it could possibly be something that can never be explained. On this lonely fall evening, it’s much easier to believe the ghost story.

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First DAM story on the Mississippi

Photos and Story By: Alyse Thompson 22

Historic Photos courtesy of WIU Special Collections

Barges, like the one shown above, can be seen pulling in to Lock and Dam 19 in Keokuk. The dam was the first built on the Mississippi. Before it was erected, barge captains navigating the stretch of river would have to unload their cargo to make it over the Des Moines Rapids. They would later reload the goods after they were transported to other side of the shallow stretch.

J

ust outside of Keokuk, Iowa, a white ship silently pushes a string of barges down the Mississippi River. Like many before it, the vessel glides along the west side of the Keokuk Power Plant, passing 900 feet of concrete and nearly 100 years of history.

Slowly, the ship eases its way into Lock No. 19. With inches to spare on each side, the barges slide toward the end.

Behind the ship, a walkway suddenly emerges from the muddy water, dripping. It gives

way to a wall, and then the ship sinks foot by foot until the water level matches the one at the lock’s base. It opens, and the ship is on its way.

Day after day, handfuls of vessels and tons of water pass through the unremitting plant, lock and dam, making Keokuk a “Gate City” — or that was the idea, at least.

Almost a century after taming the Mighty Mississippi for the first time, that has yet to be seen. But, with the plant, lock and dam still working in perfect harmony, Keokuk is going to celebrate.

Reclaiming the River By the late 1800s, the people of Keokuk needed to do something different.

Cargo ships had traveled the Mississippi since the 1820s, but the Des Moines Rapids — a perilous stretch of shallow water between Keokuk and Nauvoo, Ill. — kept boats from reaching the riverside cities.

In 1877, the U.S. government finished a 12-mile canal that would allow vessels to bypass the rapids, but utilizing the canal was23

not an easy process, according to Western Illinois historian John Hallwas, author of “Keokuk and the Great Dam.” “Using the canal … involved bring(ing) boats up (and) usually unloading them because they were so heavily weighted, they were very deep in the river,” Hallwas said.

“Then you hauled the freight by wagon while you floated the boat over the shallow water up the rapids. Several miles up the river, they reloaded the boat again. It meant that boats could go further up the river, but it was a complicated kind of business.”

For the sake of river travel, the rapids had to be eliminated. That, though, meant doing the impossible: damming the Mississippi.

“Many people thought it just couldn’t be done,” Hallwas said. “After all, you’re talking about damming the Mississippi River, one of the great rivers of the world. It put out so much water that people thought, ‘It’s impossi-

ble to dam a river like that — it can’t be done.’”

Hugh L. Cooper was not one of those people. A young, self-taught engineer, Cooper had the ability and experience to design and oversee the first attempt to build across the Mississippi.

But that’s not all he would do, according to an article written by Hallwas that appeared in the Macomb Journal in 1983. By also designing a hydroelectric power plant, he would help Keokuk harness the river’s power instead of simply changing its landscape.

“Cooper was a remarkably talented figure that they were very lucky to get to take on this kind of risky, problematic job,” Hallwas said. “They had wanted some engineer to take it on ever since at least the 1890s, but they couldn’t get anyone to do it because it was so large, so expensive, (and) so many engineering problems had to be solved. But, Cooper was the kind of person

The Keokuk Power Plant was originally built with not only the town’s power needs in mind, but those of St. Louis, over 160 miles downstream. The dam opened up to the public for the first time recently since the events of 9/11 in New York City.

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who enjoyed challenges. So, he signed on and threw himself into it and really was a remarkable figure.”

With the backing of the Keokuk and Hamilton Power Company, construction on the plant, lock and dam began in January 1910.

Two crews worked from both Keokuk and Hamilton, Keokuk’s Illinois sister-city, according to Hallwas. But, even with a division of labor, several complicated engineering issues faced the teams.

One, of course, was figuring out what to do with all that water.

“They had to actually build temporary enclosures and then pump all of the water out of it so they could work and put down the footing for the power station,” Hallwas said. “They were working often down below the actual water level in order to put in the footings and build parts of the dam.”

Another involved producing a strong enough current to reach St. Louis — the main recipient of the generated power.

“The idea was that they weren’t just creating electricity for the little town of Keokuk, they wanted to create electricity and did create electricity for St. Louis, the largest community on the Upper Mississippi,” Hallwas said. “In order to get the electricity to go from where they were generating it in Keokuk down to St. Louis, you had to develop a series of boosters so that the electricity wouldn’t slowly fade in the wires and not be able to make it down where it was needed.”

After three and a half years of bitter winters and hard labor, workers poured the last bucket of concrete on May 13, 1913. By June, boats were passing through the 358-foot lock and 15 spinning turbines were sending electricity to St. Louis.

Upon the project’s completion, the 2,500 men involved had removed 1.7 million tons

Building the Keokuk lock and dam took over three years, used 8 million feet of lumber, 3 million bags of concrete and employed huge crews like the one seen above in this historic photo of the dam’s erection.

of rock and earth from the site, according to Hallwas. They used 8 million feet of lumber, 3 million bags of cement and 2.3 million tons of building materials to create the first of more than 20 dams on the Mississippi.

Naturally, people took notice.

“It was a great achievement at the time, in fact, it was something of international note,” Hallwas said. “Groups would come from foreign countries to watch the operation — this tremendous construction proj-

ect where they were damming this huge, famous river for hydroelectric power. It was quite a feat.”

But would it be enough to bring industry and acclaim to a little Iowan town?

Keokuk could only hoped.

The operation today Though the ownership has changed — and some of the parts have been replaced

— the plant, lock and dam still function as the same hydroelectric symphony composed 99 years ago.

Water still crashes through the dam’s 119 spillway gates, although it has been less, as of late.

In October, the Mississippi flowed at 20,000 cubic feet per second — only about a third of its normal capacity, thanks to a dry summer.

As a result, the plant has been running only 4 or 5 of its 10-megawatt turbines, generating about 45,000 kilowatts of power 25

Hydroelectricity is genterated through dam’s 15 spinning turbines (above) — the same number there were when the dam was first built (inset). Even though a few things have changed about the dam, like its ownership, the basic design has stayed the same as can be seen in these two photographs.

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for Illinois and Iowa. At maximum capacity, the plant can produce 142,000 kilowatts, or 71,000 times more electricity than what is required by a high-power microwave.

To ensure it runs smoothly, 32 employees take turns staffing the 24-hour plant owned by the Missouri-based Ameren Corp., Superintendent of Administration David Elschlager said.

But, after running for nearly a century, some elements of the plant and the almost mile-long dam have needed replacement.

Many of the dam’s spillway gates are new, and all but four of the turbines have been replaced. Elschlager hopes to see all new turbines by 2018.

The most notable renovation, though, came in 1957 with the addition of a new lock almost four times longer than the original one.

Kirk Brandenberger, executive director of Keokuk’s tourism bureau, says this lock — one of few 1200-foot locks on the Mississippi — further simplifies river travel.

“Most of the locks are only 600 feet long, and the barges have to break apart, tie up and use two times to get through the locks.

So, that slows down traffic tremendously, but the lock in Keokuk is 1200 feet.”

Keokuk residents and tourists alike could see the active lock, as well as the plant’s inner workings, in person until Sept. 11, 2001. Following the terrorist attacks, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security closed the plant to public visits for safety reasons.

For one weekend in June, however, that changed. In honor of the plant’s 99th anniversary, and as a precursor for its centennial, plant employees hosted tours for curious visitors. And, according to Brandenberger, there were many.

“We thought a few people would show up, and we had around 7,000,” he said. “There’s great

interest in this power plant and lock and dam.”

There always has been, it seems. Just as tourists flocked to watch crews construct the revolutionary plant, lock and dam in the early 20th century, fascinated visitors today want a glimpse at the stoic structures and all they represent.

What that is, may have changed, however.

Keokuk: Gate City?

Coined in the mid-1800s, the term “Gate City” alludes to the features — or limitations — posed by the region’s geography, according to Sue Olson, president of the Lee County Historical Society. “(Keokuk) was as far north as you could go on the Mississippi because of the rapids,” she explained.

At the time, those travelling on the Mississippi had two options, Olson said.

They could continue north by taking the difficult canal, or they could head west.

In that way, Keokuk became a gateway for not only river travel, but also westward expansion.

Consequently, manufacturers of items needed by families starting anew came to Keokuk.

“They had a lot of dry good stores, two shoe manufacturers, furniture makers, wagon makers — they provided everything a family would need to move west,” Olson said.

Upon the completion of the power plant, Keokuk hoped providing inexpensive electricity, in addition to various dry goods, would launch it to major metropolitan status.

That never happened. “(The plant) didn’t do what they thought it would do,” Brandenberger said. “They thought that many of the eastern industries would locate here because they thought that the hydroelectric power would be much cheaper to produce than

the coal power of the day. If you remember history, WWI came along and hydroelectric power wasn’t quite as cheap as they thought it would be to produce. They had visions of it becoming a major city because of the Mississippi River and the river traffic it could provide.”

While some manufacturing took root in Keokuk, it soon dwindled, and the population followed. In 1960, the U.S. Census Bureau recorded 16,316 Keokuk residents. In 2010, it recorded 10, 780.

Keokuk, it seemed, was a gate out.

Nevertheless, the town wants to celebrate the impact of the plant, lock and dam. In June 2013, according to Brandenberger, visitors will again tour the struc-

tures that once astounded the world — for a weekend, at least.

“We hope that each year we can have it open,” Brandenberger said. “As a tourism director, I want to continue to work towards opening the dam, but I don’t know if we’ll get that done on a regular basis.”

Continued access or not, the plant, lock and dam will always be important parts of the region and Keokuk.

“It was a great example of a small town doing a very big thing,” Hallwas said. “Of course, by lining up the right kind of leader and putting the right kind of investment project together, (it was) a remarkable achievement, indeed.”

Seven thousand people toured the inside of the Keokuk Power Plant last June in honor of the plant’s 99th anniversary. It was the first time since Homeland Security closed it to the public in 2001. There is talk of opening to visitors again in June 2013 in celebration of the plant’s 100 years.

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Historic Photos Courtesy of WIU Special Collections 28

By: James Needham

As this issue of Western Illinois Magazine was going to press, we received sad news.

Neal Gamm, the subject of James Needham’s article unexpectedly passed away on November 16. According to his obituary in the McDonough County Voice, Gamm, 65, died in his home in Ipava. His friends say he passed away in his sleep. The story noted that Gamm was a U.S. Army veteran of the Vietnam War, serving from 1967 to 1969, who attained the rank of second lieutenant with Battery C, 6th Battalion, 11th Artillery, 11th Infantry. He was a member of the Ipava Masonic Lodge, a life member of the VFW Post #1643 in Bend, Ore. and a member of Ipava American Legion Post #17.

“He was also the governor of Forgottonia,” the article noted in passing.

Searching for Neal Gamm, Governor of Forgottonia

A

fter hearing all the stories about Neal Gamm, to say I was nervous about meeting him would be an

understatement. I’d heard he was a recluse and a burned-out Vietnam War Vet who didn’t suffer fools. I’d been told he was wary of the media. It was even whispered that he would explode if he thought your questions were stupid or if he didn’t like you.

Nearly everyone I had talked to described him as not only volatile but maybe, according to one source, even “bi-polar.” Plus there was one other thing: he didn’t know I was coming.

And yet I wanted to meet him. I knew that when he had been in Vietnam and later, as a Western Illinois University student, was the frontman of the whimsical 1970s campaign to create an independent republic in Western Illinois, which he had called “Forgottonia. He was named the benevolent governor and created his own money, stationary and official symbols. He’d named the tiny hamlet of Fandon, located a few miles south of Colchester, as the capital.

I had read in a newspaper article that Neil was back in town. He had returned to Western Illinois after a 40-year hiatus. No

one seemed to know where he had gone or what he had done in that time. His fame in the 70s had faded just as quickly as it had appeared.

The only pictures I had of Neal were a recent mug shot from his own webcam on Facebook and one of him in front of a bridge in 1972 donning his signature long-tailed coat with boutonniere. He sported shaggy, dark hair and was holding up a toll sign in front of a bridge.

“Welcome to Forgottonia, region of little return on tax dollars. Please have your visas ready,” it read.

I heard rumors that he hung out at the local bar in Table Grove, Sharee’s Place.

He was retired and had moved back to his old stomping grounds. Sharee’s Place had a shaky reputation. Every time I would talk about going out there to meet him, people would say, “Good luck. Don’t get in a bar fight.” So, you can understand my reticence at looking for him there.

I pulled into the town “square,” which, it turns out, is home to the bar, a tiny post 29

office and a few abandoned businesses. My colleague, Josh, was waiting for me when I arrived. We made small talk in the parking lot before reluctantly approaching the front door.

When we opened it, a plume of cigarette smoke slammed into my eyes, making them water. Loud ‘60s rock ‘n’ roll blared and a woman, who looked to be in her late 50s, danced wildly while five other men drank domestic brews and shouted at each other in a slurred dialect.

Time stopped. Every eye was on us. It was obvious from our clothing, ages and unfamiliar faces that we were outsiders — naïve students who had stumbled into the wrong address. I swallowed hard.

Ok, just act like you know what you’re doing, I thought.

We made a beeline for the far end of the bar, where there were seats open, and sat – feeling very ill-at-ease. A man sat by himself there. He, like nearly every other male patron, had a long, unkempt, white beard and sort of worn and faded clothes.

Without any prompting, the man spoke.

“Don’t worry, I’ll be nice,” he said with a chuckle.

“Well, I guess that means I’ll play nice too,” Josh said. That seemed to suffice.

The bartender, not a day over 22, worked her way over to us and soon we had drinks in our hands. I looked around, even though I already knew Gamm wasn’t in the room.

None of the men matched the photo I had been studying.

Maybe he’s just not here yet, I thought.

Josh looked tense. He didn’t have to say it.

I knew what he was thinking. ‘Now what?’

The truth is, I didn’t have a plan. Hell, I’d been going over in my mind what I was going to say to the man for a couple months and I still didn’t have an answer. After more fruitless thought on the matter, I turned to the bartender.

“Do you know Neal Gamm?” I asked.

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It was rumored that Neal hung out here, at Sharee’s Place in Table Grove. The search here would later prove to be fruitless.

“Neal who?” she said. “There’s a Neal that comes in here every once in a while, but his last name’s not Gamm.”

My heart sunk. “Neal who?” That wasn’t the answer I was hoping for. I was starting to doubt the whole quest. What were we doing here?

I explained to her who I was and why I was asking for a stranger. She looked perplexed at first, and then a light came on.

“Let me ask Jimbo,” she said.

Who the hell was Jimbo? I wondered.

The girl wandered over to the other end of the bar. She exchanged some words with a man wearing a Vietnam veteran’s cap —who had yet another white beard of impressive length. She looked at me as she talked, then

back at the man. Jimbo followed suit. He waved at me. I waved back. She returned.

“Jimbo says he hasn’t been in, in a while.

He’s been working part time at the ‘4Js’ in Ipava,” she said.

What the hell is the “4Js?” Where the hell is Ipava? Who the hell is Jimbo?

I thanked her for the information, even though I felt a bit deflated. What now? I still had half a beer, so I took some time to look around the room. The bar was stocked strictly with a select few domestic beers — a sign of a patronage with very specific tastes — all cans, no bottles, as the bartender had revealed earlier.

There was NASCAR memorabilia hanging crooked on the walls and a well-used pool

table in a small space to our right. One of the recent presidential debates was on TV, with the volume turned off so it didn’t conflict with the country music that had begun to play.

I looked again at the locals. I realized that everyone was wildly drunk.

I know this place, I thought. I’ve been here before.

Well, I hadn’t. But I knew its kind. To an outsider, there are a million places like it.

Lonely hearts clubs where everyone drinks away his or her worries. But to an insider, it’s a place to gather with your own breed and relax into an alcoholic murmur — at least for a night.

The bartender returned.

“Jimbo wants to know why you want to know where Neal Gamm is,” she said.

I looked down at Jimbo who was glaring at me. I started to explain but felt foolish.

So, I swallowed my pride and trotted over to meet Jimbo. He looked like a nice enough guy. I found out through the bartender that he practically lived on his stool – but it was obvious he was among family. So, I thought, why not?

I explained that I was interested in writing about Mr. Gamm and I heard that he hung out in the bar. I wasn’t able to decipher a lot of his responses but what I did understand was this.

“Neil – he’s a real interesting guy. But I wouldn’t cross him,” Jimbo said.

Another warning; I almost expected it. I thanked him for his information and returned to my seat. The man who earlier promised to “play nice” with Josh was now coercing him into a pool game. It would have been all in good fun if he hadn’t prefaced it, again, with, “I’ll play nice. I just like to fight, that’s all.”

So, deciding to dodge that bullet, we left Table Grove Bar empty-handed. But as I parted ways with Josh, I just didn’t feel ready to abandon my journey.

A tip from one of Neal’s drinking buddies pointed to this small bar in Ipava. This photo was shot on the day of his funeral. The small note on the door tells of Neal’s passing.

It reads, “Closed for a funeral. Will be back at 11:30.” Later that day, the bar would be filled with some of Neal’s closest friends and family sharing stories, playing his favorite songs and drinking his brew of choice, Coors.

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‘4Js,’ ‘Ipava—the name kept rolling Whatever happened to Neal Gamm? around in my head. So I headed east.

Table Grove has 400 people and one bar.

The jovial man who met my hand with Ipava has a hundred more people, which an amiable and firm handshake that night apparently meant it had gained the right to couldn’t have contrasted more with the have a second bar. things I had heard about him. He was imStill, I wondered: What the hell is “4Js”? mediately happy to chat, and talk he did — I passed a gas station. Is that 4Js? No. I for two hours — sometimes leaning forward pulled up to a bar. A mercury lamp overon the bar with his fingers interlocked and head shed just enough light for me to read other times turned toward me with one elthe side of the building: “4Js.” This was the bow bent and his fist planted in his hip with place. his other arm resting on the bar. He was I walked through the just another guy on a bar door a little more constool that night, looking fidently in my second to reminisce about the visit to a local den of good ol’ days. And well, purposeful inebriathat was the best part. tion. As expected, time Neal Gamm was a restopped again and markable storyteller. everyone stared at me.

“I got to runnin’ my There were people mouth,” he would later along both sides of say about our conversathe L-shaped bar. I tion. strolled to an open In his slight southern seat at the elbow and drawl, Gamm “ran his ordered a beer. mouth” like it was still I scanned the room. his job — sometimes Damn. I didn’t see breaking out into laughhim. Where the hell ter until his eyes were A picture of Gamm taken by one of his was Neal Gamm? Was 4Js companions. just two slits, other times this going to be strike nodding his head firmly two? and somberly.

Not wanting to waste any more time Today, Neal drives a truck for a fertilizer speculating, I called to the bartender. company in the area. He works long hours “Does Neal Gamm work here? I heard he and on his off time, he plays Xbox with his works here,” I said. nephew. The tiny, dimly-lit bar in Ipava Without a word, she raised her eyebrows is his hearth and home, the first place he and pointed to a man sitting right next to ever had a drink and, as Neal whimsically me with a can of Coors and a pack of Marlreferred to it, his “natural habit” — which boro Reds in front of him. Could this rosymade me wonder, why did he leave for all cheeked, plump man with a bushy, grey those years? mustache and overalls be him? Damned if Well, it turns out, Neal’s story started in it wasn’t him. The bartender walked away. a way that’s all too familiar with men in One-time Forgottonia Governor Neal Gamm every corner of the world—with a girl. Neal turned to me, and I extended my hand. fell sweet on a girl named Sandy who, he beamed, dared him to go to college and be 32

the first in his family to graduate. So, Neal later did just that; twice (first a with Bachelor’s in theater, then with a Master’s in history). They fell fast in love, and the two spent much of their time together. But as Neal watched all of his college-aged friends and neighbors drafted off to war, he got antsy. He wondered when his name would be pulled. So, to avoid being drafted into a battalion full of strangers, he joined the U.S. Army with one of his best friends on the buddy system. If he had to go to war, at least he could do it with a friend by his side. With a promise that so many American war couples have made, Neal and Sandy got engaged, and he left for war.

He and his friend went through artillery school together and soon found themselves in the staging barracks awaiting orders to depart to Vietnam. His company would leave in two waves - his friend in the first and Neal in the second. They said their goodbyes and Neal watched his friend pack off overseas. It would be the last time they would see each other. Before Neal arrived in Vietnam, his friend had been killed. It was an experience that his lifelong buddy, Jack Meyers, said created some “demons” inside Neal. Nevertheless, he did his job amiably earning a bronze star for his efforts.

Neal returned home. But, as was the story for many Vietnam veterans, there wasn’t exactly a welcome party for him. In addition to his stripes and medals, it seemed Neal would also bear a scarlet letter when he came back.

“For years, you didn’t want anybody to know you were in Vietnam,” he said.

It was 1971. Protest and disapproval of the war were both wide spread.

The confusion Neal felt after he returned transcended into his love life. He decided he wasn’t good enough for his longtime girlfriend.

“Once I got home, you know, what can I offer? I mean, you have nothing,” Gamm said.

This Western Illinois barn still bears a symbol of Neal’s 1970s tongue-in-cheek campaign to form a 51st state, Forgottonia.

“I just kind of dropped out of sight and went back to college. I’m sure she’d have stuck with it, but I wasn’t going that route.”

So, the two parted ways and Neal — thinking he was imparting the tough love that she deserved — went to Springfield to work as a bellhop at the St. Nicholas Hotel.

Now, before we go any further, something you need to know about Neal is that, through no fault of his own, he’s always had an affinity for politicians. His grandpa was a county board chairman who also ran for state senate. On several occasions, Neal would wine and dine with state senators

and congressman. Through coincidental circumstances, he would end up with the remaining contents of a $5,000 bottle of wine from Chuck Percy, a U.S. senator. He would develop an arch-enemy —“Walking” Dan Walker – a governor who earned his nickname by taking to foot during reelection season. But Neal’s preferred nickname for him was “windbag.”

As things would go, Neal’s connection to elected officials didn’t stop there. One day, as he went through the daily grind of carrying bags and parking cars at the “old St. Nick Hotel”, as he called it, Secretary of

State Paul Powell pulled up. Powell was a well respected and trusted politician. He pulled strings for a lot of people and was well-liked by his constituents.

But unbeknownst to the people even closest to him, Powell was accepting bribes and checks, some for license renewals and other state fees, all addressed directly to him. He was hoarding cash and personal checks—some $800,000—in shoeboxes for safekeeping. Neal said that his hotel duties called him to Powell’s room one day where he nearly had the chance at the gubernatorial salary he never earned.

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“He had all this money in his god damn closet. I stood right there by this closet and hung up his dry cleaning,” he recalled.

The closet was home to a tower of the infamous shoeboxes.

“I thought they had shoes in them! If I’d ever known them things were full of money, there’d have been two things missing the next morning,” Neal continued. “That’s me and the shoeboxes.”

No matter how many senators, congressmen or money laundering officials he came in contact with, his grandpa would be the most influential politician in his life. He gave Neal a piece of advice that would soon ring true for him.

“You can call these politicians all kinds of a son of a bitch and they don’t do a damn thing,” he said. “But you laugh at them, and they can’t take that.”

Since Neal never discovered his would-be

shoebox fortune and he wasn’t making very much money in Springfield, he moved back to Macomb and started school at Western Illinois University in the theater program. It was a move that ended up changing his life forever.

So began the portion of Neal’s life that’s most familiar to the public. Neal became a broke college student, still trying to forget or deal with his war experiences. But he was happy. He loved his classes. He loved the campus. He loved theater and starred in many productions in his college career.

One night, after a wrap party for “South Pacific,” three men approached Neal from local organizations. They had an idea. It was a publicity stunt. They called it: Forgottonia – an tongue-in-cheek independent republic that Neal was to govern. Soon, they would declare war on the US government, immediately surrender then apply for foreign aide — all to one end.

Fandon (above) was named the capital of Forgottonia during Neal’s political ruse. He would later say that he named it the capital because it had recently been stripped of its zip code because of its size. It was an abashment that Gamm called “the ultimate cut.”

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“To find out what the deal was with the deplorable state of the infrastructure in Western Illinois,” Neal said.

He humbly accepted his appointment as governor of the new nation. It was a decision that would sweep him into a national media frenzy for three months where he would meet with local dignitaries, hold press conferences and appear on national television.

“But the dumb thing of it all was that it got serious. You know, people were pretty desperate at the time and they were grasping at straws,” he said. “The bad thing about that is I did all these public appearances and people were asking questions that were hard for me to answer. It was serious stuff. Then I realized that, hey, people are really looking for someone to represent them . . . and boy, I felt so inadequate to do that.”

But Neal did his job with vigor. Friends said he spent hours studying the part. He went from podium to podium donning his signature boutonnière, silver badge and a double-breasted swallowtail coat he got from an undertaker. He talked about the crumbling roads and the shameful state of the economy. He even found himself at a podium in front of the Illinois legislation.

He came bearing gifts.

“I went out there one night and gathered up pieces of (Route) 136,” he said. “I just dumped them out on the speaker’s rostrum and said, ‘Look you guys. This is what we’re driving on up in Forgottonia. That’s embarrassing.’”

All the commotion he was causing caught the eye of his old sweetheart Sandy who, coincidentally, was working for three state representatives. She got back in contact with Neal who said “all was forgiven” and six months later they were married. The two were married for six years before they split up again.

After their divorce, Neal decided he’d had enough of Western Illinois. He’d rubbed

elbows with Senators, he’d been the center of camera flashes and aggressive journalists, he’d seen the beginning of highway construction and the return of the passenger railway system when Amtrak reinstated regular train service to the region and he’d been part of a complicated love story. It was time to move on.

He went out to Montana to visit a friend— and he stayed for 17 years. He worked at Yellowstone Park. He went into the hunting business, tried his hand at horse wrangling, then worked at a gold mine for eight years.

While Neal said he loved gold mining, it wasn’t enough to keep him in Montana. One day, he got a call from his friend on a ranch just outside of Elko, Nev. “He said, ‘How soon can you be down here?’

I said, ‘Well how far is it?’

He said, ‘Oh, it’s about 500 miles.’

I said, ‘How’s tomorrow night, about sundown?’”

Neal threw his head back into a laugh that started out as a raspy huff and turned into a guttural, booming — “HA HA HA.” This was the rest of Neal’s life — the other part. The part only his closest friends know.

From his days deep in the mine to the saddle and cinch life of a cattle rancher for $600 per month under his “Rock of Ages” manager, Johnny Vasquez. Neal wandered from Montana to Nevada and Oregon; a gypsy, as his friends described him. But soon Neal tired of the life out west and decided to tell Vasquez it was time for him to hit the road, once more.

“When I left, boy he had tears in his eyes.

There are few people you run into in life that just…”

Neal trailed off.

While he becomes reacquainted with his Ipava-paced life, Neal said he still has a cause. While he isn’t speaking to crowds, declaring war on the U.S. or slamming concrete chunks down on a capital-building

podium anymore, he is a huge supporter of veterans. When I mentioned a friend who recently returned from Iraq, Neal went into motion.

“The one thing I will say, boy, tell him to hang in there. Hang in there. It does get better, god damnit,” he said.

It was easy to tell he had given the speech before.

“I don’t envy these guys now coming back from that shit,” he said. “I don’t want to see them treated like we were treated. I think we owe them. We owe them a lot.”

And while Neal stressed the importance

of a warm welcome for now-returning war veterans, there was something he didn’t mention. He didn’t allude to the words the people of Western Illinois should have said when a young, bright-eyed but confused Neal Gamm returned home from Vietnam to a forgotten land. These were the words he was owed when he returned home and then later when he decided that Ipava was the town where he wanted to grow old. He was too modest to say what should have been said to him a long time ago: Welcome home, Neal. Welcome home.

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The Quirkiness of Western Illinois

By Reilly Maloney

What makes an area of land like Western Illinois interesting enough to create a magazine around it is all the history and small town charm found within the region. The small town atmosphere can be seen in any town you venture into in the area and the greatest things about these towns are the truly interesting—and often quirky—stories that are based there and the people who tell them.

With a little research, it is easy to understand why people have been attracted to this part of Illinois.

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Remembering Norma Jean For example, in the summer of 1972, the Clark and Waters Circus came to the small town of Oquawka for a performance.

Norma Jean, a 6,500-pound, 30-year-old elephant, was the circus’ star attraction. On the morning of July 17th, a severe thunderstorm rolled across the nearby Mississippi River and into Oquawka. At the time, Norma Jean was chained to the only tree on the town square. Suddenly, a bolt of lightning struck the tree and electrocuted the giant animal. Because she was so large, the circus decided to bury Norma Jean in the town square, right where she fell. Later, local residents built a headstone and grave for the deceased elephant. Visitors to Oquawka can still find this landmark, which is definitely one of the quirkiest things to be seen in the town.

The Half-Ton Man A grave of another sort can be discovered in the tiny town of Benville, located about an hour south of Macomb. There, in a remote, rural cemetery is the final resting place of Robert Earl Hughes, who at the time of his death was the World’s Heaviest Man. His granite headstone, which reads, “Robert Earl Hughes; June 1, 1926July 10, 1958; World’s Heaviest Man; Weight 1,041 Pounds,” looks like most of the others in the graveyard—but there really wasn’t any ordinary about Hughes during his life.

Hughes was born in the nearby hamlet of Fishhook and became the World’s Heaviest Man because of a malfunctioning pituitary gland. Several years ago, Phil Luciano, a columnist for the Peoria Journal Star, wrote a four-part series on Hughes, who died at the relatively young age of 32 of congestive heart failure. According to Luciano, Hughes has been the subject of a number of misconceptions.

“Robert Earl was not buried in an old piano case, as per an apocryphal story long published in the Guinness Book of World Records,” he said. “Rather, the Embalming Burial Case Co. of Burlington, Iowa, built a custom casket: 85 inches long, 52 inches wide and 34 inches deep. It was made of heavy cypress, reinforced with steel.”

His funeral was the largest ever in Brown County, with more than 2,000 people in attendance to say goodbye to the World’s Largest Man. 37

Abingdon’s Towering Totem Another unusual landmark found in Western Illinois can be found towering over Main Street in the town of Abingdon (12 miles south of Galesburg). There the curious will be able to spot what is called “The Tallest Totem Pole East of the Rocky Mountains.” Even though Native Americans did not build it, the totem pole is still one of a kind and something to see. The 83-foot wooden monumental sculpture was craved by Steve Greenquist in 1969, and recently taken down to be re-painted. Hoping it would attract tourist, the community in Abingdon thought it would be the largest totem pole in the world.

No one knows of the purpose the totem pole holds, but it is believed that the carvings recount for local legends, family ties, and important tribal events. “The Tallest Totem Pole East of the Rockies” is certainly an unexpected sight to see in the town.

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Without a Leg to Stand On Springfield, IL is home to the captured wooden leg of Santa Anna. Santa Anna became a villain in America several wars ago when he ordered his troops to kill Davy Crockett and everyone inside the Alamo in Texas. But not many people knew that Mexican general Antonio Lopez de Santa Anna had a wooden leg. Santa Anna’s real leg was amputated after he was hit by cannon fire during a brawl with the French in 1838. In 1847, his wooden leg captured by soldiers of the 4th Illinois Infantry. The leg is now in the Illinois State Military Museum in Springfield.

It’s rumored Santa Ana was hopping mad after he lost that leg.