Illinois Heritage

In this issue of Illinois Heritage we take a canoe trip with “Ernie” Hemingway and his chums down the Des Plaines and Illinois rivers, meet a celebrated children’s author and artist from Macomb, investigate Chicago’s “Babbling Burglar” and his gang of bent cops, plant trees in Kewanee with some enterprising high school students, and explore the evolution of the Illinois prairie into an agricultural incubator for farming innovations around the world.

This issue of the magazine highlights two themes:

1. Sesquicentennial houses of worship around the state.
2. Agriculture and related topics throughout the state.

Sesquicentennial Churches are chosen from across Illinois based on the following criteria: Minutes of early church board meetings, marriage or baptismal records, grant of official charter, contemporary newspaper advertisements or articles, old city directories. ISHS looks forward to honoring more than 33 Sesquicentennial Churches for the fidelity and witness to others over 150 years of faithfulness to their calling.

Agriculture in Illinois has a long and quite amazing history as one follows the movement and settlements which sprung up in, during and long after pioneer period. Karl Bodmer, a Swiss artist (circa 1832) painted a scenic view of a farm on the southern prairie. It is a good study of the French style of an American Bottom settlement.