A Novel Mode of Transportation Back in 1878

From the June 3, 2020, MidWeek (DeKalb County, Illinois)  "Looking Back."

1878, A Whole Lot of Years Ago.

"Quite a sensation was  created in Mayfield lately by the novel mode of transportation adopted by a visitor from Dixon and one from Batavia.    The Dixon gentleman and Batavia lady made a series of calls in the neighborhood, the gentleman conveying the lady from one place to another in a wheelbarrow.

"Whether this was performed under a wager, or purely for the convenience of the thing, the parties have not stated.  At any rate , it was something out of the usual order, and worthy of notice."

I Barrow You Not.  --RoadWheel

Batavia, Illinois: Windmill Town Becomes The Energy City

From the Dec. 31, 2010, Chicago Tribune.

One of Illinois' three jewels of towns, Batavia (pop. 27,700) is located along the Fox River west of Chicago. These three towns are referred to as the Tri-Cities. The other two are St. Charles and Geneva.

I'd call it small-town living in a big town area. Batavia was called "The Windmill City" during the Industrial revolution, when it was a major producer of...you guessed it. The Fox River provided the energy for windmill production.

More recently, it has renamed itself "City of Energy." Besides the windmill connection, there is also Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory and even New Edison Energy in the industrial park which makes wind turbines.

Its downtown is on the rebound with lots of restaurants and eclectic shops. Then, there is the wonderful riverfront park and its collection of 15 restored windmills, some of which are quite elaborate.

On a historical note, there is a 1906 Frank Lloyd Wright house curently for sale at $1.55 million. Of course, there is also the sanitarium where Mary Todd Lincoln was committed.

Well Worth a Trip. --RoadDog

Mary Lincoln's "Personal Prison" Along the Lincoln Highway in Illinois-- Part 3

Mary Lincoln also started marshaling the support of friends, some in powerful places, and got her release September 10, 1975. She then moved to Springfield and lived with her sister. Time was spent traveling in Europe, before returning to Springfield and dying there at age 62 July 16, 1882.

Today, you can see the bed and dresser supposedly used by her at the Batavia Depot Museum. There is also a hospital ledger with notes on her moods and activities. One of these from may 20, 1875, reads "Case is one of mental impairment which possibly dates back to the murder of President Lincoln-- More pronounced since the death of her son, but especially aggravated during the last 2 months."

I have to wonder if she ever forgave her son Robert?

It is not known for sure which room she was in, but most believe it was on the second floor in what is now Apartment 2A.

The building stands a little ways off Illinois Highway-31 which also used to be the Lincoln Highway (interesting connection). A small brown sign explains the Lincoln connection of the building. Most of the once-sprawling grounds have been sold off, but there is still a garden out front.

Historians have long been divided on whether Mary Lincoln was insane or not. Some believe she was, others think she was the victim of an uncaring son.

But, Something to See Your Next Trip on the Lincoln. --RoadDog

Mary Lincoln's "Personal Prison" Along the Lincoln Highway in Illinois-- Part 2

Mary Todd Lincoln's son Robert, by this time was a prominent lawyer in Chicago, initiated court proceedings to have his mother involuntarily committed. After a three hour hearing, a Cook County jury found Mary to be insane and the next day she was taken to Bellevue Place.

This was not one of those horrible public insane asylums you so often hear about from the late 1800s. Bellevue catered to wealthy women and took more of a modern approach to the insane, advising plenty of bed rest and fresh air as well as activities such as piano and croquet. A period advertisement referred to it as a place "For the insane of the Private Class." Definitely not your pc-speak of today.


LIVING IN A PRISON

Even so, Mary Lincoln considered this place akin to prison.

An August 1875 letter said "It does not appear that God is good, to have placed me here." She said prayers three times a day to let her out, but to no avail. "I have worshipped my son and no unpleasant word ever passed between us, yet I can not understand why I should have been brought out here."

Historians report that she constantly lobbied for her release and that as time went on, she became more incensed that he would have placed her there.

No Place for a First Lady. --RoadDog

Mary Lincoln's "Personal Prison" Along the Lincoln Highway in Illinois-- Part 1

August 2, 2006, Chicago Tribune "Mrs. Lincoln's 'prison'" by Colleen Mastony.

Go to Batavia, Illinois, and there is a building called Bellevue Place apartments. Today people live here by choice if they have enough money, but back in the 1800s, it was an insane asylum for mentally disturbed female patients. In 1875, one First Lady Mary Todd Lincoln was involuntarily committed there by her son Robert.

There is a picture of the building with resident Chris Johnson in front of it. He occupies Apartment 2A where Mary is believed to have stayed.

Descendants of a Lincoln family lawyer were cleaning out an attic in 2005 and found a trunk with 25 old letters,20 written by Mary Lincoln herself and 11 from when she was at Batavia.


AFTER ABRAHAM LINCOLN'S ASSASSINATION

After Lincoln's death, Mary moved to Chicago, first living in the Tremont House, a fancy downtown hotel, then bought a house at 1304 W. Washington Street in Hyde Park that still stands. I guess there would be too many memories to return to her home in Springfield.

Insanity allegations started in 1875 as her behavior became more erratic. Supposedly, she walked around with $56,000 sewed into her petticoat, visited clairvoyants to communicate with the dead, and even reported that someone on a train had tried to put poison in her coffee.

Crazy or Not? You Decide. More to Come. --RoadDog

Chicago Route 66's Lincoln Connection

Mr. Chicago Route 66, David Clark, had an article in the Spring Illinois 66 News about "The Lincoln's in Chicago."

This, of course, in honor of the 200th anniversary of his birth.

After Lincoln's death, Mary Todd Lincoln and her sons Robert and Tad moved to Chicago and lived in several different places. Mary traveled after Tad's death of pleurisy in 1871, but returned to Chicago in 1875. She didn't get along with Robert's wife, so she took a room at the Grand Pacific Hotel on Jackson Blvd between LaSalle and Clark streets. This site eventually became part of Route 66.

Robert became concerned about his mother's mental health and a trial led to a verdict of her insanity and she was to be committed to a sanitorium. The evening after the trial, Mary went to the druggist at the Grand Pacific and asked for a mixture of laudanum and camphor to ease the pain in her arm. The druggist knew of the trial and gave her caramelized sugar and water instead. Mary drank the entire bottle in what probably was a suicide attempt as the stuff she requested would have killed her. The next morning, Robert took her to Bellevue Place Sanitarium in Batavia, Illinois (on what later became the Lincoln Highway).

In 1893, Robert Lincoln became the general counsel of the Pullman Palace Car Company and then president when George Pullman died in 1897. His office was at the Pullman Building at the southwest corner of Michigan Avenue and Adams Street. In 1953, Adams became the westbound lanes of Route 66.

Pictures of the two buildings accompanied the article.

I understand from a trip through the Lincoln Home in Springfield, that many of the household items from there were lost in the Great Chicago Fire.

It's a Lincoln Thing. --RoadDog

Lincoln Highway in Aurora, Illinois

AURORA, ILLINOIS PUSHING LINCOLN HIGHWAY-- The April 24th Fox Valley Villages Sun had an article about what Aurora is doing to tout its role in the first transcontinental highway.

It said that many people don't even realize the road runs through their town. They only think HEAVY TRAFFIC. Tourism leaders want to get folks interested in it.

This summer, a Lincoln Highway gazebo will be erected outside the visitors center and a 10 by 20 foot mural painted on the La Quinta De Los Reyes restaurant on New York Street in downtown Aurora, one of 34 murals planned for the country.

They also mention that the first White Castle and A&W Root Beer stores opened along the Lincoln Highway. Wikipedia showed the first White Castle at Wichita, Kansas, and first A&W in Lodi, California.

Another LH site is Moosehart between North Aurora and Batavia. In the early 1900s, Moosehart raised $12,000 to pave the section of LH in front of it.

There is hope that all this will get people to cruising the Lincoln Highway like they are Route 66.

Sure Can't Hurt. --RoadDog

Dead Page- Part 4: Friend of the Illinois Prairie

DR. ROBERT F. BETZ 1923-2007

Friend of Illinois prairies

Died April 5, at his home.

Dr. Betz probably did more for restoring Illinois prairies than anyone else. The first settlers encountered mile after mile of this landform and made it their goal to turn it into farmland. Even today, one of Illinois' nicknames is "The Prairie State."

They succeeded admirably, so well, in fact, that by the 1950s, there was hardly any prairie left. Enter Dr. Betz, who, as a biology professor at Northeastern University, campaigned to have the acreage that the Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory near Batavia, Illinois, was looking to turn over, restored as a prairie. This became the 1,200 acre Robert F. Betz Prairie.

He was also responsible for identifying and preserving prairie tracts including the Gensburg-Markham Prairie, the Wolf Road Prairie, the Santa Fe Prairie, the Hinsdale Prairie, and over 40 settler cemetery prairies. No doubt, he influenced the creation of the Midewin Tallgrass Prairie south of Joliet, Illinois, on the site of the old Joliet Arsenal. This, by the way, is located on old Route 66.

Quite a remarkable man who has done much to keep a part of Illinois' past for future generations.

Obituary in the Chicago Tribune, April 18, 2007. By Patricia Trebe.