Elijah Lovejoy, an Abolitionist and Newspaper Publisher, Murdered in Alton, Illinois, on November 7, 1837.

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In historical writing and analysis, PRESENTISM introduces present-day ideas and perspectives into depictions or interpretations of the past. Presentism is a form of cultural bias that creates a distorted understanding of the subject matter. Reading modern notions of morality into the past is committing the error of presentism. Historical accounts are written by people and can be slanted, so I try my hardest to present fact-based and well-researched articles.

Facts don't require one's approval or acceptance.

I present [PG-13] articles without regard to race, color, political party, or religious beliefs, including Atheism, national origin, citizenship status, gender, LGBTQ+ status, disability, military status, or educational level. What I present are facts — NOT Alternative Facts — about the subject. You won't find articles or readers' comments that spread rumors, lies, hateful statements, and people instigating arguments or fights.

FOR HISTORICAL CLARITY

When I write about the INDIGENOUS PEOPLE, I follow this historical terminology:

• The use of old commonly used terms, disrespectful today, i.e., REDMAN or REDMEN, SAVAGES, and HALF-BREED are explained in this article.

Writing about AFRICAN-AMERICAN history, I follow these race terms:

• "NEGRO" was the term used until the mid-1960s.
• "BLACK" started being used in the mid-1960s.
• "AFRICAN-AMERICAN" [Afro-American] began usage in the late 1980s.

— PLEASE PRACTICE HISTORICISM —

THE INTERPRETATION OF THE PAST IN ITS OWN CONTEXT.

 

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Silhouette of Elijah P. Lovejoy

Elijah Parish Lovejoy (1802-1837), owner and editor of the Alton Observer Newspaper, accepted the delivery of his third new printing press on November 7, 1837, at 3:00 AM. 

In the 1820s, Elijah Lovejoy was a reform-minded northeastern transplant to the Midwest. Americans uncomfortable with the transformation wrought by the Market Revolution turned to various reform movements in the early 1800s. The temperance movement emerged alongside many others, including mental health reform and Transcendentalism (character, thought, or language). At the same time, other Americans formed utopian communities that challenged mainstream views, like individual property ownership and monogamy. All were trying to come to terms with life in a modern industrial society, and Lovejoy was no different.

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The first attempt to organize a national movement for women's rights occurred in Seneca Falls, New York, in July 1848. Women's suffrage movements began in Illinois as early as the 1860s, although attempts to grant women the right to vote as part of the 1870 Illinois constitution failed. In 1873, a statute was passed giving women the opportunity to run for any school office not created by the Illinois Constitution.

Elijah's father, Rev. Daniel Lovejoy, was a Congregational minister. His mother, Elizabeth Pattee, was the daughter of respectable parents in one of the adjoining Maine counties where Elijah had grown up in Albion, Maine.

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Congregationalism in the United States consists of Protestant churches in the Reformed tradition that have a congregational form of church government and trace their origins mainly to Puritan settlers of colonial New England. Jesus Christ alone is the head of the church.

Lovejoy threw himself into civic life in Alton. Among other activities, he started a lyceum, an institution for popular education providing discussions and lectures for the public regarding important issues. His paper's circulation steadily increased, from fewer than 1,000 subscribers to the first issue to more than 2,000 by early 1837. At the same time, Lovejoy was becoming more actively involved with the organized anti-slavery movement and becoming still more absolute in his views. On February 9, 1837, he sent a letter to Asa Cummings of the Portland, Maine-based "Christian Mirror" newspaper. Lovejoy wrote one of his most potent descriptions of slavery. To be a slave, Elijah wrote:

“Is to toil all day … with the bitter certainty always before me, that not one cent of what I earn, is, or can be my own. … My first-son, denied even the poor privilege of bidding his father farewell, is on his way, a chained and manacled victim, to a distant market. … It is to enter my cabin, and see my wife or daughter struggling in the lustful embraces of my master, or some of his white friends, without daring to attempt their rescue.”

After five years of running his school, Lovejoy's life changed. 

Lovejoy drew public wrath in St. Louis in 1833 as editor of a Presbyterian newspaper, the St. Louis Observer. His object of vituperation (verbal abuse or castigation) was Catholicism. He soon expanded his list of targets to include "the Irish and pro-slavery Christians." The city's slaveholding leadership wasn't amused. Lovejoy used the paper to preach against slavery and argue for its abolition. He immediately faced death threats from the city's pro-slavery residents. 

The final break came on April 28, 1836, when a mob dragged a free Negro man from the St. Louis jail and burned him to death on a tree near 10th and Market streets. The victim was Francis L. McIntosh, a steamboat cook who had stabbed a sheriff's deputy to death after being arrested in a scuffle on the levee.

Lovejoy's St. Louis Observer described the lynching by fire as an "awful murder and savage barbarity." It published the gruesome details as local leaders sought to bury the story. The Observer attacked Judge Luke E. Lawless (his real last name), an old adversary whose instructions to the grand jury virtually assured no charges would be filed. And there weren't any charges enforced.

Many reform movements were fed or inspired by a new religious enthusiasm sweeping the United States. During this Second Great Awakening, Preachers, also anxious over changes wrought by the Market Revolution, offered hope that individuals could choose between right and wrong and impact the world for good. In the North, much of this religious fervor condemned slavery. Lovejoy was swept up in this religious fervor and left the Midwest to enter the Princeton Theological Seminary. 

On July 21, a pro-slavery mob ransacked Lovejoy's office at 85 Main Street (beneath today's Gateway Arch) and tossed the printing press into the Mississippi River. 

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Although Illinois was a free state, it was hardly a friendly place for abolitionists. Most Illinoisans thought abolitionism was a form of New England extremism. In 1837, the Illinois General Assembly denounced abolitionism. Illinois' Negro Laws.

The Lovejoys moved from slaveholding Missouri to Alton, Illinois' free and supposedly safer streets in 1836.

Lovejoy obtained another printing press and resumed attacks on slavery. After an extra edition announcing his arrival and intentions, the first regular issue of the Alton Observer appeared on September 8, 1836. In it, Lovejoy repeated his declaration that "The system of American Negro Slavery is an awful evil and sin" and that he would never surrender "the rights of conscience, the freedom of opinion, and of the press." From there, his paper became only more anti-slavery.

On August 7, 1837, a mob gathered at the Alton Observer's office and destroyed Lovejoy's printing press. Lovejoy was fortunate to receive immediate support in Alton from two of the wealthiest men in town, a pair of merchants named Benjamin Godfrey and Winthrop S. Gilman. The two men agreed to finance a new printing press to replace the one that had been wrecked. Opponents immediately seized this printing press and dumped it into the Mississippi River.

Lovejoy faced a fierce backlash when he served as chairman of a series of meetings in Alton to form the "Madison County Anti-Slavery Society" in August of 1837.

On August 21, 1837, a mob wrecked his new printing press. The destruction of Lovejoy's second press occurred at an inopportune time, even for Lovejoy's wealthy backers, as the Panic of 1837 was shaking the financial system of the United States.

Even Winthrop Gilman, one of Lovejoy's most loyal backers, had doubts about the wisdom of Lovejoy continuing and wrote him a personal letter saying that he felt he could provide no more aid to him. Instead, Lovejoy was forced to appeal to the public at a time when many were increasingly turning against him.

Lovejoy wrote a letter to "The Friends of the Redeemer in Alton," offering to resign from the editorship of the Alton Observer if the paper's supporters would agree to assume his debts. In response, fifteen men met and debated two resolutions. They decided that the Alton Observer should continue but were divided on the question of whether Lovejoy should remain as editor.

The last significant event preceding Lovejoy's murder was the turn taken by a planned convention in Alton to establish a statewide anti-slavery society. Among his supporters, Lovejoy could count Edward Beecher, the President of Illinois College and an influential figure within the state. (Beecher was also the brother of Henry Ward Beecher and Harriet Beecher Stowe, author of Uncle Tom's Cabin). Although he did not favor immediate abolition at the time, Beecher strongly supported the freedom of the press. Beecher believed the growing threats to Lovejoy's rights and livelihood represented a critical juncture, and the time called for a reframing of the issues. He proposed that the upcoming anti-slavery convention in Alton be opened to all who supported the freedom of the press.

The practical effect of this, however, was not as intended. When the convention met, as planned, on October 26, it was essentially hijacked. The Presbyterian Church at Upper Alton was packed that afternoon by well-known opponents of Lovejoy, who, citing the invitation to all "friends of free discussion," claimed a right to be seated. The opposition to Lovejoy was dominated by Usher F. Linder, a rabid anti-abolitionist, a successful lawyer and a status-seeking politician who had recently been the Illinois Attorney General. Over the next two days, with Linder calling most of the shots, the assembled convention passed a series of resolutions declaring sentiments such as one stating that Congress had no power to abolish slavery, and then the convention adjourned.

When the third printing press arrived on November 7, 1837, at 3 o'clock in the morning, Lovejoy was ready to defend it. Besieged but defiant, Lovejoy and his friends guarded the new printing press inside a Mississippi riverfront warehouse. A mob surged toward them, and everybody had weapons.

"Burn 'em out," someone outside shouted. "Shoot every damned abolitionist as he leaves."

When a man with a torch climbed onto the roof, defenders of the printing press opened fire, killing one rioter and scaring some others into retreat. It was eerily quiet. Elijah Lovejoy stepped outside for a look.

The illustration depicts a mob trying to set the warehouse roof on fire as Lovejoy's men shoot at the arsonists.

A woodcut engraving depicts the destruction of the abolitionist printing press of the Alton Observer on November 7, 1837. The press was attacked, and the editor, Elijah Parish Lovejoy, was shot and killed by a drunken mob.

Five shots riddled him. "Oh God, I'm shot," he yelled as he fell. Lovejoy died outside Winthrop Gilman's warehouse at the foot of William Street in Alton. The St. Louis Commercial, a pro-slavery newspaper, lamented accurately that Lovejoy's "martyrdom will be celebrated by every abolitionist in the land." He was buried secretly in Alton. In 1865, his remains were moved to the old Alton City Cemetery. 

Lovejoy, known for righteous and unforgiving prose against slavery, was almost 35 when he was killed. The mob tossed that printing press into the Mississippi River, too. 

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Why wouldn't the pro-slavery  newspaper, or any other newspaper or print shop just kept Lovejoy's brand new printing press, instead of throwing it away? After all, the owner is dead.

That was the fourth printing press that Lovejoy had lost to people who hated his words. He soon became a martyr to the nation's small but rising wave of abolitionism. In Illinois, a young lawyer named Abraham Lincoln decried the mob violence.

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Abraham Lincoln was one of six dissenters to the Illinois House of Representatives resolution.

Lovejoy's murder galvanized the abolitionist community and shocked others. During his Lyceum Address in 1838 that responded to the murder of a Negro man in St. Louis, Abraham Lincoln, no doubt referencing Lovejoy as well, warned the audience:

"Whenever the vicious portion of population shall be permitted to gather in bands of hundreds and thousands, and burn churches, ravage and rob provision stores, throw printing presses into rivers, shoot editors, and hang and burn obnoxious persons at pleasure, and with impunity; depend on it, this Government cannot last."

Elijah Lovejoy, the man who, with nothing to gain but the approval of conscience and everything to lose but honor, stands forth against overwhelming odds in defense of a great and precious principal and finally lays down his life in that defense, surely deserves from his fellow-men, at least, grateful and everlasting remembrance. 

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Abraham Lincoln ridiculed State Auditor James Shields, who challenged Lincoln to a duel to the death in 1842.

This 97-foot monument was dedicated to Elijah Lovejoy in 1897. It towers above the Alton Cemetery as a monument to a martyr in the causes of abolition, free speech, and freedom of the press.

A piece of Lovejoy's last printing press from the night he was murdered. It was recovered from the Mississippi River shortly after he was murdered.

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Narrative of riots at Alton in connection with the death of Rev. Elijah P. Lovejoy. pub: 1838 

Compiled by Dr. Neil Gale, Ph.D. 

The Circle Restaurant in Charles A. Stevens & Co. State Street Department Store, Chicago, Illinois.

The Charles A. Stevens & Co. Department Store at 17 North State Street opened "The Circle" Restaurant in 1941.

The Circle was explicitly designed to attract women with its casual décor, portion sizes, and awarded service. Decorated with murals depicting the compelling manner in which a man is ensnared by the circles of women" s influence. The restaurant boasted about its custom-designed furniture.

It's unknown when The Circle closed or whether it was redecorated and renamed.

Chas A. Stevens "The Circle" Restaurant, Chicago, Illinois. 1941 Postcard.

Chas A. Stevens started in 1886 as a catalog business and eventually grew to 29 locations in the Chicagoland area. Its flagship State Street store (built 1912) was Chicago's fashion hub in the 1940s, 50s and 60s. 

It featured six floors of exclusively women's clothing and a luxury fur salon. The top floor housed a beauty salon, "The Powder Box," and employed more than 50 operators. The salon was noted for catering to visiting celebrities and dignitaries.

Window displays at the store received several awards for design and display. In 1988 the chain filed for bankruptcy and liquidated.

A detailed 1910 Chicago street scene, "Yesterday's Main Street," at the Museum of Science and Industry, postcard. Charles A. Stevens & Co., with Bowman Dairy Company next door.

Compiled by Dr. Neil Gale, Ph.D.

Taking a Spin in the Cara-Sel Lounge, Springfield, Illinois. (1954-1968)

One of Springfield's more colorful Lithuanian-American businesses was the Cara-Sel Lounge, 7th and North Grand Avenue, operated for 17 years by World War II veteran Tony Yuscius. Tony died at 86 in 2009 and was the son of Lithuanian-born coal miner Joseph and Marcella (Radavich) Yuscius. After Joseph died of black lung disease, Tony's mother, Marcella and her many children fell on hard times. 

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The Cohen family, who operated a grocery, and, later, The Mill Tavern and Restaurant, are said to have assisted Marcella—and many others—with grocery credit.

The hard times known by many Lithuanian families in Springfield, generated by death in or from the mines, not to mention mass mine layoffs, led youngsters like Tony and his siblings to work from a young age to support their families. The same conditions led many to launch small businesses as soon as possible.

Tony's business opportunity came sometime after he graduated from Lanphier. During World War II, he served in the U.S. Army in the European-African-Middle Eastern Theatre, earning three bronze service stars.

It's hard to know how Tony got the idea for the Cara-Sel Lounge. It plays on the word "carousel" with its colorful circus-themed décor and circular bar.

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“Follow our bar round-n- round. You will certainly find your friends here.”

Tony and his wife Carol operated the Cara-Sel from 1954 until 1968. There were many neighborhood tavern and restaurant proprietors in Springfield during that period, so one can imagine it was a challenge to find a niche and stand out in the crowd.

After a more family-oriented start indicated by its circus theme and enlarged kitchen, the Cara-Sel hopped on the "mod" train sometime during the early 1960s, with mini-skirted dancing "go-go" girls at night, like those on popular TV shows "Rowan and Martin's Laugh-In" and "Hullaballoo."

The Interior of Cara-Sel after remodeling.

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"You'll enjoy a visit to the newly redecorated Cara-Sel . . . where there's always a Merry-Go-Round of fun amid the Circus Murals and rich, Confetti Colors. Serving Luncheon and Dinner Daily from the sparkling kitchen . . . and the smoothest of Mined Drinks from the Curvacious Bar."

The establishment really made an impression on those who still remembered it:

• "When I went there, it was a nice place for a couple of girls to go, have some drinks and maybe meet a couple of guys. I also went there on dates, like after a movie."

• "Go-Go girls would dance on the bar and in front of the bar—also in the back room."

• "I used to walk by the Cara-Sel on my way to Edison Middle School and Lanphier High School. Recently, I discovered that a girl I went to school with worked there in the 1970s."

• "When I was a boy, my father drove a truck and would arrive home on Saturday mornings, when I would accompany him to the Carousel for lunch. Late at night, there were cages and go-go girls, and still being in grade school, I would not have been welcomed. The Teamsters had their office directly across the street. One block to the east was the Pantheon Theatre, and next door was Palazollo's Soda Shop, where all the Lanphier students gathered. Noonan Hardware Store and Ben Franklin 5¢ & Dime were on the same block."

• "They had a left-handed/right-handed drinking club, and you had to drink with whichever hand behind the bar was lighted. We paid to join, and there was a fine for getting caught drinking with the wrong hand. The reward was a free meal and drink party once a year for the members. Neat place."

In an ironic twist, in the early 1970s, Tony and his wife Carol completely reversed direction and opened the "Northtown Child Care Center," a daycare they operated for 20 years. Tony had two brothers, Stanley and John Yuscius, and five sisters, Mary Yuscius, Ann Asher, Josephine Pavletich, Ardella Dodd and Patricia Bietsch.

Compiled by Dr. Neil Gale, Ph.D.
Contributor, SandyB52

Hilltop Drive-In Movie Theater, 1800 Maple Road, US 6 (Old Rte 66), Joliet, Illinois. (1955-2001)

Hill-Top opened in 1955. This popular 1950s vintage drive-in, with a large, single screen and capacity for 623 cars, suddenly closed in the middle of the 2001 season. It has remained abandoned, falling victim to vandals and disrepair. 

On August 10, 2020, a straight-line wind storm knocked over about 80% of the drive-in's brick screen. Hill-Top was razed later in 2020.

Hilltop Drive-In Entrance.

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In 1940, Route 66 was realigned to pass through Plainfield and bypass Joliet. Multiple additional alignments were done over the subsequent years while building the Interstate at the time called the freeway, in accordance with a 1943 bill.

Route 66, Illinois Road Map showing all 3 alignments. [in high-resolution (+/-)]

The movie reel projection booth.

Car speaker pole.

 

Projection booth equipment.

Razed in August 2020.

VIDEOS

Hilltop Drive-In Joliet, Illinois 1991

Hill-Top Drive-In Theatre, Joliet, Illinois, after vandalism

Compiled by Dr. Neil Gale, Ph.D.

Jeffery Theater, 1952 East 71st Street, Chicago, Illinois (1923-1997)

The Jeffery Theater was constructed in 1923 in the heart of the South Shore neighborhood’s commercial center at 71st Street between Euclid Avenue and Jeffery Boulevard.

It opened in 1924 as a vaudeville and movie house for the Cooney Brothers circuit.

The Neo-Classical style Theater could seat 1,798 and was designed by architect William P. Doerr (who also designed the Neo-Georgian style East Park Towers in Hyde Park). It had a tall vertical marquee that rose over the facade of the Theater and could be seen up and down 71st Street.

The Jeffery Theater was operated by Warner Brothers in the 1930s and 1940’, under a movies-only policy. It was later run by the Coston family, which operated South Side houses like the Beverly Theater and the Hamilton Theater.

1955

The Jeffery Theater, a long-time South Shore landmark, was demolished in 1997, except for its facade and lobby area, which now houses a bank. A drive-up was located where the auditorium formerly stood. In September 2017, plans were proposed to demolish the remainder of the building to build a Cinegrill on the site. In August 2020, a demolition permit was released for the façade and lobby of the Jeffrey Theater and the Spencer Arms Hotel.

Compiled by Dr. Neil Gale, Ph.D.

Fern Isabel Coppedge, an American impressionist painter, born in Decatur, Illinois, 1883.

Born Fern Isabel Kuns on July 28, 1883, in Decatur, Illinois. Coppedge dreamed of being an artist since the age of thirteen, after being inspired by the dazzle of sunlight reflected on snow and sea and by the marvelous creative possibilities she discovered while visiting her older sister's watercolor class. Her husband, Robert W. Coppedge, himself an amateur painter, encouraged her to pursue this ambition. She attended the Art Institute of Chicago, the Art Students League of New York, and the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts

Born Fern Isabel Kuns on July 28, 1883, in Decatur, Illinois. Coppedge dreamed of being an artist since the age of thirteen, after being inspired by the dazzle of sunlight reflected on snow and sea and by the marvelous creative possibilities she discovered while visiting her older sister's watercolor class. Her husband, Robert W. Coppedge, himself an amateur painter, encouraged her to pursue this ambition. She attended the Art Institute of Chicago, the Art Students League of New York, and the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts.

A landscape artist, Fern Coppedge painted the villages and farms of Bucks County, often blanketed with snow, and harbor scenes from Gloucester, Massachusetts, where she spent her summers. Coppedge worked directly from nature by tying her canvas to a tree during winter storms.

Coppedge's early work, influenced by American impressionism, was marked by shimmering colors and attention to the effects of changing light upon a landscape. Later in her career, Coppedge moved towards post-impressionism, favoring a more fanciful use of color and a two-dimensional, abstract style.

During her artistic career, she received several awards, including the Shillard Medal in Philadelphia, a Gold Medal from the Exposition of Women’s Achievements, another Gold Medal from the Plastics Club of Philadelphia, and the Kansas City H.O. Dean Prize for Landscape. She was a member of several prominent art organizations, including the Philadelphia Art Alliance, the Art Students League of New York, and the Philadelphia Ten.

She became well known for her work as a landscape impressionist who painted scenes that were blanketed with snow, such as the villages and farms of Bucks County, Pennsylvania. Her famous works include (see images); Autumn Gold, Bucks County Scene, Lumberville, Lumberville Cottage, Old House, The Delaware Valley, and The Delaware Reflections.

Coppedge died on April 21, 1951, in New Hope, Pennsylvania, at the age of 67.

Compiled by Dr. neil Gale, Ph.D.

History of Chicago Executive Airport, Wheeling, Illinois, formerly Palwaukee Municipal Airport (PWK)

After World War I, a barnstormer named Ray Gauthier (or Roy Guther) flew a circuit around the upper midwest that included regular stops near Dam #1 (removed in 2014) on the Des Plaines River.

Dam #1 on the Des Plaines River, pre-2014.

In 1926, two brothers, Frank and Pete Barchard, set aside a 40-acre grassy open area with dirt runways on their farm in Prospect Heights, Illinois, to become a permanent airport. They hired an airport manager and purchased a plane to give flights and lessons. The Airport was known as "Swallow Airplane Field," named after the first plane they acquired. Eventually, the spot gained the nickname "Gauthier's Flying Field."

In November 1928, three North Shore businessmen who envisioned creating a center for commercial aviation on the Northshore purchased the growing Airport. They incorporated it and named it Palwaukee Airport. 

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The Pal-Waukee Airport was named for its location near the intersection of PALatine Road and milWAUKEE Avenue. 

The Airport expanded to 91 acres in the 1930s, and 1933 brought the addition of a Blimp Hangar to the field. The Airport also experienced significant growth during the 1940s when it was developed to cover 109 acres, consisting of a gravel runway and 70 individual T-hangars.

Following WW II, in 1946, the Palwaukee airport was purchased by Park Aircraft Sales & Service of East Saint Louis, Illinois, which already had an established Ercoupe Dealership on the field.

By 1953, Park Aircraft Sales & Service had decided to consolidate its business and sold the Airport to George Priester. Priester Aviation Service continued to develop the Airport for the next thirty-three years. Lighting was installed on the paved runway, and a DC-3 hangar was constructed in 1954. By May 1959, the Airport consisted of four runways. A VOR approach was established for the Airport in 1961. New corporate hangars and a 5,000-foot runway (16/34) were constructed in 1965. The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) commissioned an air traffic control tower at the Airport in 1967.

A 1,600-foot partial taxiway parallel to Runway 16/34 was completed in 1974. In the same year, the FAA began an ILS installation. The most giant corporate hangar constructed to date was built in 2000. Improvements made by Priester Aviation at the Airport continued throughout the late 1970s into the early 1980s until the Airport was acquired by its neighboring communities.

On December 26, 1986, the Airport changed from private to public ownership, as the City of Prospect Heights and the Village of Wheeling purchased what was then Palwaukee from Priester Aviation. Priester continued to operate the only fixed base operation following the purchase. The FAA, the Illinois Department of Transportation and the municipalities contributed funding for the purchase. Funding from Prospect Heights and Wheeling was provided through airport revenues and did not affect the municipal taxes for the two communities.

The Airport has undergone significant construction, upgrading, and development projects. The intersection of two major arterial roadways and a drainage ditch were relocated beyond the runway safety area. A new air traffic control tower was commissioned in 1997. Beginning in 1997, Priester Aviation constructed three new corporate hangars in the east quadrant of the Airport that can provide access for the new transcontinental business aircraft entering service. North American Jet, Inc. began constructing a new second fixed base operator facility in 1998.

Chicago Executive Airport — Click Map for Expanded View

• Chicago Executive Airport has 325 aircraft, including 57 corporate jet aircraft. 
• The Airport logs over 77,000 takeoffs and landings each year and is the fourth busiest Airport in Illinois.
• Chicago Executive Airport has three active runways and covers more than 412 acres.
• It is the fourth busiest Airport in Illinois and plays a crucial role as a reliever for the region, which includes O'Hare International Airport.
• The Airport operates 24 hours a day year-round with three runway options.
• The air traffic control tower is staffed by the FAA and operates daily between 6 AM weekdays (7 AM weekends) and 10 PM.
• The primary users of Chicago Executive Airport include private airplane owners, flight schools, businesses that maintain their company aircraft at the Airport and major national corporations.

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Runway 16/34 — 5,001-foot long by 150-foot wide precision runway served by an ILS to runway 16. Both ends of the runway are served by a four-light PAPI visual slope indicator and an Engineered Materials Arresting System (EMAS), 243 feet long by 170 feet wide at each end of the hard surface.

Runway 12/30 – 4,415 feet long by 75 feet wide, served by a four-light PAPI visual slope indicator on both ends. The threshold of runway 12 is displaced 295 feet, while the runway 30 threshold is displaced 432 feet.

Runway 6/24 – 3,677 feet long by 50 feet wide. Only runway 6 includes a PAPI visual approach indicator. The threshold on runway 6 is displaced 372 feet, while the threshold on runway 24 is displaced 1,249 feet

ACCIDENTS

• October 30, 1996, a twin-engine Gulfstream IV business jet with three crew members and one passenger lost control upon takeoff and crashed immediately to the north of the Airport. All four aboard perished.

• January 30, 2006, an eight-seat twin-engine Cessna 421B with four passengers crashed about one mile south of the Airport. The aircraft was heading from Kansas to Palwaukee. There were no survivors.

• January 5, 2010, a Learjet 35A crashed into the Des Plaines River in the Cook County Forest Preserve about a mile south of the Airport while on final approach. The jet, operated by Royal Air Freight Inc. of Waterford, Michigan, was empty during the crash, and the pilot and co-pilot were killed.

• November 28, 2011, a Piper PA-31 crashed on approach to Chicago Executive Airport. The aircraft was operating as a medical transport plane. The pilot, the patient, and the patient's wife were killed in the crash. Two other people on board survived. National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) investigators determined the accident to be caused by "the pilot's inadequate preflight planning and poor in-flight decisions," resulting in the loss of power due to running out of fuel during the approach. The pilot's decision to operate an aircraft after smoking marijuana caused the accident.

Flight from Chicago Executive KPWK (with ATC) to Chicago. 

Cessna 172 - N9831G, Filmed 9/2022, in 4K. [runtime 18:00]

VISIT OUR PALWAUKEE AIRPORT SOUVENIR SHOP

Compiled by Dr. Neil Gale, Ph.D. 

The Gazette Building, Champaign, Illinois, (1876-1927).

The Champaign County Gazette was built between 1875-76 on the land procured by the estate of J.W. Scroggs ($3,500) and B.F. Harris ($4,500). 

The cornerstone was laid on July 18, 1875, and the building was completed in time for the Centennial year celebrations on January 15, 1876. Before this time, the Gazette has been operating on the upper floors of 28 Main Street. 

The building was designed by architect Seeley Brown and constructed by Mr. E.F. Gehlman. Due to several weeks of rain, the project was delayed a bit, with the staff hoping to move during Christmas or what they describe as the week of "jollification." 

However, only the presses were moved during this time, and the building was completed in January. The building shared occupancy with three additional businesses, Terbush's Barber Shop in the eastern portion of the basement, Dr. Brown's Drug Store on the south end of the first floor, and a U.S. Post Office on the eastern half of the first floor.

Compiled by Dr. Neil Gale, Ph.D.

Chicago born, Walt Disney and Family History, the Development of Disney Cartoons and the Disney Parks.

Walter "Walt" Elias Disney was the son of Elias Disney, a carpenter, and his wife, Flora (Call) Disney. The couple married in 1888. The first of five children, Herbert, was born later that year. Raymond, the second child, was born in Chicago in December 1890. In subsequent years, the family grew with the birth of Roy in 1893, Walt in 1901, and a daughter, Ruth, in 1903.

A baby photo of Walt Disney, circa 1902.

In Florida, Elias sought to provide for his wife and child through various jobs and ventures, including hotel management and, finally, as owner and operator of a citrus grove. A killing frost brought Elias' investment in the citrus grove to an abrupt end, inspiring him to move on again, his destination being Chicago in 1890.

Upon arriving in Chicago in 1890, Elias established himself in the carpentry trade, hoping to claim a share of the booming construction business in the rapidly growing city. For their home, the Disneys soon rented a small cottage on the Near South Side at 3515 South Vernon Avenue (demolished), erected initially when the area was an isolated prairie. Ironically, the neighborhood had subsequently become a fashionable residential area, with the Disney's modest home being sandwiched amid costly brick dwellings of well-to-do Chicagoans. Even though the Disneys had little money and probably paid a small rent for their modest cottage, they nevertheless became residents of one of the city's most exclusive neighborhoods.

Elias Disney found an outlet for his carpentry skills in the massive construction project for the buildings and grounds of the World's Columbian Exposition held in Jackson Park in 1893. Construction on the fairgrounds began early in 1891, with Elias probably commuting to the Fair's site from the nearby 35th Street Station on special worker trains run by the Illinois Central Railroad.

With the work on the fair well underway and two children in the household, Elias Disney began to plan for the future. On Halloween Day, 1892, Disney paid $750 for a 25' x 125' comer lot on Tripp Avenue in the Hermosa neighborhood on the Northwest Side of Chicago. The area had been annexed into the city in 1889 and soon became a desirable location for working-class families to buy lots and build homes independently. When Disney purchased his lot, Tripp Avenue had been improved with city sewers but was otherwise largely undeveloped. This changed rapidly within a decade as the vast tracts of vacant land became densely built with small cottages and two-flats. Many of these closely resembled the Disney cottage in appearance and scale.

Walt Disney's Birthplace, 2156 North Tripp Avenue, Chicago.

Elias Disney chose to wait to build on his land, possibly due to its remoteness from his employment at the World's Fair site. Within a year, however, the work on the fair was essentially complete, and the family was expecting the birth of a third child, Roy, born in June 1893. Free of the necessity to live on the South Side, the Disneys began plans to leave their rented cottage and erect a house on the Tripp Avenue lot. Flora Disney later recalled the modest circumstances of the Disney family when the house was constructed.

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in 1892, Elias earned an average of $7 a week,  $364 a year. That's $12,000 a year today, far from the highlife. He borrowed the money to build his house, but already had the lot.

On November 23. 1892, Elias obtained a building permit to build a two-story, 18 x 28-foot wood cottage, costing approximately $800. Elias could keep the costs for the cottage low by acting as his own contractor and doing much of the construction work himself. It is doubtful that a professional architect was consulted, but family reminiscences suggest that Flora Disney was instrumental in working out the floor plan and securing the construction materials. 

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In a 1967 interview, Roy Disney recalled how his parents made a business of erecting similar houses for their Northwest Side neighbors. Dad had his contacts where he could get help to get a loan, and he would draw the plans and build the houses. Mother was the architect, and between the two, mother drew the plans and bought the materials, and dad was the builder, and they worked like a team.

The Disney house was similar to the typical low-cost, wood frame workers' homes built throughout the city at the time. The house was a clapboarded, two-story, gable-roofed structure, probably planned with a parlor and combined kitchen/dining room on the first floor and bedrooms above. An early photograph taken circa 1905 suggests that the house was initially built at grade, without a basement. The entrance on Tripp Avenue was accessed by a simple open platform porch. Roy Disney later recalled the exterior being painted "white with blue-grey trim." He also remembered the apple tree in the backyard.

The Disney family settled into their new home by early 1893 and, in the subsequent years, witnessed the surrounding of their once-isolated home with other small cottages and dwellings. Elias and Flora Disney invested in this neighborhood real estate boom by erecting two additional dwellings on Tripp Avenue for income purposes: a bungalow at 2118 North Tripp which was constructed in 1899 and sold upon completion, and another at 2114 North Tripp, erected in 1900 and retained by the Disneys as a rental income property,

Unfortunately, the peaceful environment the Disneys chose for raising their family soon began to change. By the turn of the century, the quiet, isolated neighborhood that Elias found in 1891 soon showed signs of some of the negative aspects of being part of a large city, one of the most disturbing aspects being the proliferation of nearby saloons. Elias sought to organize the parishioners of St. Paul's Church into a protest against the saloons and resulting displays of public intoxication. He soon realized that he was facing a losing battle. After nearly fifteen years of living on Tripp Avenue, the Disneys decided it was time to move on. After purchasing a farm near Marceline, Missouri, Elias and Flora severed their ties with Chicago by selling the house on Tripp Avenue in February 1906 to Walter Chamberlain, who was listed in the city directory as a "clerk."

At the farm in Marceline, Missouri, young Walt Disney was intrigued by the animals and wildlife of his new rural environment and soon displayed an aptitude for drawing. He often chose animals as his subject matter, perhaps forming the foundations of his later career. Walt stayed in his rural environment from age four until he was eight, when his family moved again. He settled in Kansas City in 1910, where Elias established himself in the newspaper delivery business, assisted by his young sons.

By 1917, the family was again in Chicago, where Elias had invested in a soft-drink manufacturing company. For their new Chicago residence, the Disneys chose not to return to their former Northwest Side neighborhood. Instead, they rented a large frame house at 1523 West Ogden Avenue, Chicago, just east of Ashland Avenue (demolished and was on old Route 66), located on the Near West Side near Union Park.

THE BEGINNING OF WALT'S CAREER

Walt Disney enrolled for his senior year at McKinley High School, where his drawing talents were used to provide humorous cartoons and illustrations for the school newspaper and yearbook. He also sought to hone his skills by taking night classes at the Academy of Fine Arts, a private art school located on Madison Street near Michigan Avenue, and by closely following the work of cartoonists who appeared in the Chicago newspapers and national humor magazines. Many of Disney's early cartoons drawn for the McKinley High School publications involved patriotic subjects promoting support for and participation in World War I. Disney's patriotic fervor led him to lie about the year he was born to enlist as a Red Cross ambulance driver in 1918, serving in France during the war's closing months. Even in France, Disney used his artistic talents to make signs, posters, and drawings for the benefit and amusement of his fellow ambulance drivers. 

After leaving France, Disney returned to Kansas City, where he undertook a career in commercial art and later a job with a commercial slide company that was working in the rapidly developing film cartoon animation industry. Taking an interest in the technical and artistic aspects of the medium, Walt began experiments m the improvement of the processes used by the company and set up a small studio in his garage where he started making animated cartoons of his own. Realizing that the most incredible opportunities in the film industry were in California, Disney liquidated his modest assets and moved to Hollywood in August 1923, where he and his brother Roy opened their own West Coast studio and resumed producing animated cartoons. 

Starting modestly with limited capital, the Disney animation studios soon became one of the country's most remarkable success stories. Many of their early cartoons were well-received shorts featuring animal characters. Walt Disney and his fledgling studio were suddenly catapulted into international attention by introducing a charismatic character known as Mickey Mouse. Initially introduced as a silent feature in 1928, Disney followed the trend towards "talking" movies by giving his third Mickey Mouse cartoon, "Steamboat Willie," synchronized sound. The public response was overwhelming, with the image of Mickey Mouse becoming one of the most popular cultural images of the time, a reputation that continues undiminished today.

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Mr. Ub Iwerks was the artist/co-creator of Mickey Mouse. Ub animated the first Mickey Mouse cartoon, "Plane Crazy," alone and in complete secrecy. During work hours, Ub would place dummy drawings of “Oswald the Lucky Rabbit” on top of his Mickey drawings so nobody would know what he was doing. 

Mr. Ub Iwerks

At night, Ub would stay late and animate on Mickey. He animated the entire six-minute short singlehandedly in just a few weeks, reportedly averaging between 600-700 drawings a night, an astounding feat that hasn’t been matched since.

"Plane Crazy" starring Mickey Mouse; Walt Disney, 1928.

 

By the 1930s, Disney Studio was one of the largest and most successful in the world. The studio gained a reputation for its technical innovations and the creative advancement of animated cartoons as a serious art medium. Facing dire predictions of failure from his associates, Walt Disney undertook the production of what was to become one of the pioneering full-length musical animated features, the 1937 release "Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs," a work which elevated the status of the animated "cartoon" to a level equal to contemporary live-action films. Disney soon became synonymous with quality animated features and the creation of innumerable imaginary characters who have become staples of international fantasy imagery. 

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Rumors of Walt Disney being Anti-Semitic debunked.

The Motion Picture Alliance for the Preservation of American Ideals (MPA) was an American organization of high-profile, politically conservative members of the Hollywood film industry. It was formed in 1944 for the stated purpose of defending the film industry and the country as a whole against what MPA founders claimed was communist [a political theory derived from Karl Marx, advocating class war and leading to a society in which all property is publicly owned and each person works and is paid according to their abilities and needs] and fascist [a government led by a dictator having complete power, forcibly suppressing opposition and criticism, regimenting all industry, commerce, media, etc., emphasizing an aggressive nationalism and racism] infiltration. Over the years, employees stated it was absolutely preposterous that Walt was Anti-Semitic.

The MPA organization was described by its opponents as fascist-sympathizing, isolationist, antisemitic, race-baiting, anti-unionist, and supportive of Jim Crow laws. The MPA denied these allegations, with Jewish writer and MPA member Morrie Ryskind writing in defense of his fellow members, which included Walt Disney. In 1954, Ryskind was a board member of the American Jewish League Against Communism.

Sam Wood, a committed anticommunist, helped found the watchdog group in 1944 and served as its first president. Walt Disney was a member. The Alliance officially disbanded in 1975.

By the 1950s, the Disney studios had branched out into live-action films and a successful venture into the medium of television, with Walt Disney himself acting as the genial host of a long-running program featuring the innovative products of his genius. Again working against the negative pronouncements of his associates, Walt Disney began constructing an unprecedented fantasy recreational park in Anaheim, California, which opened as Disneyland in 1955. Now acknowledged as the progenitor of the medium of "theme parks," Disneyland features rides and attractions based on his own fantasy characters and historical, scientific, and technological themes. 

The result was creating a self-contained "dream city," one Disney biographer speculated derived from the stories Elias Disney told his son about Chicago's World's Columbian Exposition of 1893. The themes of Disneyland were carried further in another park developed near Orlando, Florida, in the 1960s, which was opened in 1971 as Walt Disney World, a project initially planned by Disney to incorporate a model residential community as an integral part of the development, a feature which has yet to be carried into reality. 

With Walt Disney's death at 65 years old in December 1966, the legacy of his ideas and creations was far from over. His creations have remained vital in the public's mind, and the studios and theme parks he founded continue to flourish and maintain a high reputation for their creative vitality.

In terms of international recognition, Walt Disney is one of Chicago's most famous native citizens, yet his associations with the city remain largely unknown. His importance is of sufficient magnitude that the city of his birth has intrinsic value worthy of preservation. By doing so, Chicago can rightfully reclaim its significant role in Walt Disney's life and career.

Complied by Dr. Neil Gale, Ph.D.