Illinois Heritage

The Illinois Bicentennial is now entering its fifth month. We hope you and your historical society or museum are finding significant and creative ways to celebrate and commemorate the anniversary, not just for the year, but for the future. Visit us on our website (www.historyillinois.org) and tell us what your community has planned. We’ll do our best to help you get the word out. 

In this issue of Illinois Heritage we celebrate the 30th anniversary of the Illinois Vietnam Veterans Memorial, meet forgotten playwright Charles Dazey, learn how amateur historians and genealogists can change history, and sit down to lunch with Sesquicentennial Church congregations.

Share your Heritage!

The January-February 2018, issue of Illinois Heritage invites its readers to celebrate the state’s bicentennial.  Adventures around the Prairie State take us on a veritable road trip around the state without leaving our hearth.  Art and literature are celebrated with a look a Pulitzer Prize-winning authors Carl and Mark Van
Doren and the art of Irma Rene Koen. Traveling the state with authors Stephen Leonard and Keith Sculle will surely jog a reader’s memory of their own trips.  Finally, be sure not to miss our state’s bicentennial time travel in the first installment of “Illinois in Time.” 

The Prairie State kicks off its 200th birthday party celebration on December 3, 2017, and the Illinois State Historical Society invites you to let us know what you are doing in your county to celebrate this milestone.  Our website features an Events calendar that will highlight your events--bicentennial or otherwise historical--but only if you go to www.historyillinois.org and submit your information.  Let us help you get the word out and while you're there, check out "Today in Illinois History" for a sampling of what people have been doing here for the last two hundred years or so.

Our year-end issue of Illinois Heritage is a veritable feast of delights.  John Hallwas and Kathleen Spaltro highlight writers with Illinois connections and Cindy Reinhardt takes us to the "almost lost" town of Montgomery Station.  Continue farther down into Egypt with photographer Gary DeNeal for a look at misty autumn moments downstate.

As we come to year's end, it's also time to reflect back on our Johnny Appleseed trees--all of which have gone to good homes throughout the state, and look forward to recognizing historic businesses and churches in Illinois.  If you have a business in your town that is 100 years old or a church that is 150 years old (or older), please consider nominating them for recognition by the ISHS.  Applications for both programs can be found in this issue.

Happy, happy holidays! 

This issue of Illinois Heritage has much to offer our loyal readers: A profile of John Wood, Illinois' 12th governor and the founder of Quincy; a history of the Mormon Template in Nauvoo and what archaeologists have recently discovered on the site; a Collinsville landmark that roadside travelers relish; and the story of the Fansteel sit-down strike and how it changed labor relations in the nation. Thanks to our several contributors for making this issue possible. Of course we have included the latest Society news, announcements, programs, tours, and historical marker dedications around the state.

It's all good reading in Illinois Heritage. I suggest a warm cup of cider, a mug of hot chocolate, or your favorite winter beverage to begin your adventure in Illinois history.