Hidden Logos

Posted by Ted:

I recently attended a session by Shea Lewis from Arkansas State Parks about graphic design. It changed my life… and not for the better. I am cursed with seeing the arrow in the FedEX logo. Have you seen it? Now I am obsessed with seeing the arrow when a FedEx truck drives past. And, to make things worse, I am spreading the disease.  All the way to Chicago on our recent I-55 trip I kept asking LuAnn, “Look! Do you see the arrow?” Other strains of the disease include seeing the 31 in Baskin Robbins signs and noticing nothing but O and U’s (for University of Oklahoma) in the Conoco signs. LuAnn and I will use the websites below to spread the “do you see it?” disease to our readers.    Actually we think it will be a fun diversion for road readers to spot and discern the deeper meanings of these amazingly creative symbols. You might want to check out the websites yourself to see how clever graphic designers make their logos contagious.   

http://www.famouslogos.org
http://www.graphicdesignblog.org/hidden-logos-in-graphic-designing

From Wind Farms to the Windy City

Posted by Ted:
If there was one constant on our trip through Illinois it was wind.  As the prairie zephyr buffeted our vehicle mile after mile, I was struck by how this invisible force has influenced people both past and present. Pioneers sailed across the sea of grass on prairie schooners – the wind filling the sails attached to their wagons. This same force turned windmills that pumped life giving water from the ground for people and livestock. Without these windmills, settlers would never have been able to settle away from lakes and rivers.  The same breezes that cooled, carried, and quenched prairie dwellers, also brought destruction in the form of tornados and wind-swept wildfires. Today wind is still both friend and foe.  Sometimes we want it to blow and other times we go to great effort and expense to stop it from blowing.  The most obvious interaction with wind along I-55 is the wind farms that harvest energy from the atmosphere and convert it to electrical energy.   These modern day windmills come with controversy LuAnn is working on that story for the book.  I recently did a story on how farmers block the wind with rows of trees called shelterbelts or windbreaks. These are planted to hold soil in place and to keep homes and farmsteads warmer in winter and cooler in summer, as well as to reduce the wear and tear of the wind on farm buildings.  Much of life in this part of Illinois is still devoted to capturing or blocking something many of us take for granted - the wind.

What's in a Name?

Today is my daughter’s 12^th birthday. Her name is Rose. The choice of her name didn’t originate from the delicate, yet thorny shrub in the garden; although it was sealed after a rose banner was unfurled in our church a few weeks before her birth. The choice of her name sprang from her mother’s literary desires. I named her after Rose Wilder Lane, daughter of Laura Ingalls Wilder, who became a successful journalist in San Francisco and then helped her mother write the memoirs of her childhood. Was it my hope that if I didn’t become a writer my daughter would become one, or would even help me find my way there?

Ted and I drove I-55, from Springfield to Chicago, this week. We rolled through towns named Shirley, Joliet, Elkhart, Bloomington, Coal City, Lincoln, Odell, Funk’s Grove, Towanda…each of them with their own story of how they were named. Many towns were born along the lines of the railroad, the steel Caesarean section that sliced across the belly of the prairie and opened up communications from town to town. Some towns were simply named for the person who ground his boots into the soil first: like the railroad engineer, William H. Odell, or the settler Isaac Funk. Funk’s Grove may be my favorite town along this stretch—a beautiful area of sugar maple trees still tapped for their sirup (not “syrup”), an oak savanna dotted with prairie wildflowers, an old family cemetery, and a peaceful chapel under the cathedral-like canopy of the woods. Lincoln—well, that one is obvious in this state with the slogan of “Land of Lincoln.” 

Other towns were named for their landscapes; surveyed with a nostalgic eye that searched for a comforting piece of their former home in the strange new land they were settling. Jesse Fell brought the name Towanda from his birthplace in Pennsylvania. Atlanta was named for Atlanta, Georgia.

My literary side delighted that Mrs. Corydon Weed named the town of Shirley after the heroine of a novel. The same was for Divernon (south of Springfield), the heroine, Di Vernon, of Sir Walter Scott’s Rob Roy. While Joliet would naturally be named for the French colleague of Marquette, there is another story that it was once Juliet, to complement the town of Romeo (now Romeoville) nearby. Aw, the romance! Elkhart was also recorded in the name of love. According to one story, the daughter of an Indian chief had to choose between two suitors. When an elk wandered by, she said she would choose the one who shot the arrow closest to the elk’s heart—and she did.

The fact that my alma mater, Illinois State University, sits near an area once called Keg Grove, seems too ironic. Like any name, we see the connections of that name to its place even hundreds of years later. It seems we always name well—we find the right connection to see its significance.

Rose is twelve today and her tenderly mature heart balances with the thorns she wields when she must. And speaking of Romeo(ville) and Juliet (Joliet), “A rose by any other name would smell as sweet.”

Patience...

“Patience, patience, patience,” says Anne Morrow Lindbergh, “is what the sea teaches.” I must say that patience is what I’m learning in writing a non-fiction book like this. Research, writing, interviews, more research, more interviews, more research, and then finally the writing… My writing hand must be patient until it can get the accurate accounts and details. Then my creative pen (or typing fingers) can weave the facts with imagination—that’s where the patience proves plentiful. 

I’m researching information on the Lewis Thomas mansion on I-55 at mile 76 Northbound. When I was in my early teens I remember passing by this mansion often as my father drove from Springfield to Gillespie to pick up my niece on the weekends. My brother would tell me it was a haunted mansion. My mother told me that slaves used it during the Underground Railroad. Well, now as a grown woman, I’m finally trying to unravel the truth about this intriguing mansion situated so prominently along I-55, just 20 miles south of Springfield. The Montgomery County Historical Society has been extremely generous in helping me find the history of the first homeowner of the residence, Lewis Thomas. 

In 1851, Lewis Thomas’ estate covered these interstate lines and spread out for 970 acres across Montgomery County. Before he built this mansion, he built up the grounds of his estate with natural fences and timber groves. His estate became known as the Union Grove Stock Farm where they managed horses, sheep, cattle, hogs, and chickens along with other atypical farm animals such as peacocks, deer, and bears. This most impressive estate in the county even had its own boardwalk connecting it directly to the Illinois Central Railroad station that was built just west of his home. Thomas lived here until his death in 1909.

Two fires, many owners, and almost 150 years of wear have made the mansion almost indistinguishable from the design that Elijah E. Myers created in 1863 for landowner Lewis Thomas. Myers, who had designed the Macoupin County courthouse in Carlinville and the George Brinkerhoff home in Springfield, designed this home with Italianate Villa features that were popular in the 1850s and 60s. This mansion was once dressed with arched windows, eaves that dripped with intricately carved brackets, and a very ornate top to the tower. But in 1888, a fire destroyed much of the home; and when it was rebuilt, Italianate had been booted from the architectural runway and replaced by Queen Anne, the new fashionista of the time. Just like straight hair and bellbottoms were replaced by fluffy perms and parachute pants, Queen Anne’s rectangular windows straightened out the Italian curves,… 

Now, I await the latest news of this mansion. Who owns it now? What has happened to it since 1909? It looks like it is for sale. What will happen to it? Will the next owner renovate it, try to find the stories hidden in the walls, nurture it back to health? The phrase, “if walls could talk…” perfectly describes the intrigue that this house has aroused in local communities. Until bricks grow lips, I will have to dig in for some research, interviewing, and patience, patience, patience, until those long-awaited stories find me or I find them.

Funeral Train

This past week I was in Springfield, Illinois-- brought home by the passing of my grandmother. Each day as my mother and I made our daily trips through downtown, coming home from a day of  packing memories into boxes at my grandmother's apartment, I passed the train station where Abraham Lincoln's body was brought back to Springfield.  Today it is the Amtrak station and rush hour traffic disregards the famous depot where on May 3, 1865, his friends gathered to say their tearful farewell to him. The railway tracks along I-55 are perhaps just as casually and unintentionally forgotten as a place of such historical significance-- seen as a commuter railway from Chicago to Springfield rather than a famous funeral route in US history. This week I also read an article sent to me by Bill Kemp, a librarian from the McLean County Museum of History, which details that train ride home. Kemp wrote of funeral arches that spanned the railroad tracks..."The Bloomington arch carried the message, "Go to thy rest," while the town of Lincoln's read, "With malice to none, with charity for all," and the one in Williamsville, "He has fulfilled his mission." Thanks, Bill, for those incredible images that decorate our vision and bring an emotional attachment to those steel rails!

The Walt Bodine Show - Driving Across Missouri and Kansas

The Walt Bodine Show - Driving Across Missouri and Kansas
Here's an interview Ted and I did last spring for our book on I-70 through Missouri. We were honored to be on NPR, but after realizing that over a million people (ok, at least more than 10) could be listening, we got pretty nervous. It was a great time, though, and the staff was very friendly. After being prepped on how to correctly cough on radio (hit the silent button), we were shuttled down the hall into a tiny recording studio.  They dressed us up with super-huge headsets--artificial ears through which we heard ourselves talk, placed a huge microphone in front of us and asked us politely not to move over an inch for the next hour. I failed at one point, and a guy came out and adjusted mine back in front of my face (all while the audience had no clue)-- ah the secret joy of radio faux pas. This pose was difficult for an Italian woman who needs to talk with her hands and for one who needs smiling reassurance. Because I couldn't turn, I could only see Ted out of the corner of my eye and wondered if his face was full of bewilderment, embarrassment, glee, or fascination while I was answering questions. This was definitely a highlight during our I-70 journey!

Interpreting the highway

Ted and I are both involved in the field of Interpretation, an informational and inspirational process designed to enhance understanding, appreciation, and protection of our cultural and natural legacy. We both teach interpretive training courses at universities and we are both Certified Interpretive Trainers through the National Association for Interpretation. We hope to encourage and inspire those who want to work in nature centers, state and national parks, wildlife refuges, historical sites, and museums. People interpret poetry, art, and the world around them through their own eyes and experiences. As interpreters we hope to heighten that process by helping people combine that emotional connection with an intellectual one. Now we've taken interpretation to the road!

Interpretation gives highway travelers the ability to perceive and understand the beauty along the roadsides. Through interpretation people can understand and appreciate the beauty in grasses or grainfields, in marshes or meadows. Interpretation may reveal the beauty of courageous or sacrificial acts that took place along the route or the beauty in the utility of a piece of farm machinery. Moreover, interpretation instills in people the desire to experience even more beauty in their travels, and indeed in their lives.