Filed under: Illinois
Dad was heading to Chicago to see friends. Very last minute I decided to go too. Not to see sick friends but to see my sister Katie and be the ultimate tourist downtown Chicago for a gorgeous afternoon of sun and 70 degrees. It was so much fun. The Art Institute was closed, which while sad made me do different fun things. I took the train downtown, walked around to soak up some downtown ambiance and then headed to at least say hello to the Art Institute lions and Millennial Park. Sadly even the Bean was under repair but I got to the fountain spit and then headed to Navy Pier.
First walking from Millennial Park to Navy Pier is probably the most expensive real estate in the Midwest. Whoa. Lots of private parks and chauffeurs (and not mom-chauffeurs either!). I hadn’t been to Navy Pier or years. There were people around but it wasn’t busy. The wind is exactly what you expect from the windy city but the views are spectacular and the air feels fresh. I stopped in to see The State of Sound highlight Chicago musicians. It’s a free, quick fun stop. I saw some folks I expected to see like Nat King Cole, John Prine, Louis Armstrong and Jeff Tweedy. I saw one of my lost favorites, Naked Raygun. I saw someone I watched play over the weekend -Shemekia Copeland.
Then Katie finished work and we met at the Museum of Contemporary Art. (More amazing addresses enroute!) There was a farmer’s market outside of the gallery – bonus for a Tuesday. So we got a picnic lunch and ate on the museum patio. We saw a few exhibits but the most striking to us was Public Enemy by Gary Simmons. He has been using art to call out racism and classicism especially in popular culture and everyday life in American since the 1980s. His most famous works are smudged chalk drawing that capture images from popular media. (Apparently one of his first studios had a large chalkboard, which goes to show you the power of happy accident.) The images are recognizable but ghostly in the smudge. He recreates the works in the studio – so that when the show closes, the MCA will just paint over it and the message will remain hidden in the walls.
Also he uses regalia without people to represent situations or conditions. He had a piece where tennis shoes (Puma, Nike, Adidas) were dipped in gold and places in front of a police witness lineup wall. The message is clear. Even without people in the shoes, we are trained to have a certain view. There’s another wall with tall, narrow, white chalkboards hung up furnished with white chalked places inches in front of a row of old school wooden desks representing the white washing of education. Finally, on the opposite was a bare bones school closet with several size 6x (think kindergartener) Ku Klux Klan costumes. The MCA always makes me think.
We stopped by my favorite consignment shop in Evanston on the way home. (Got new shoes.) And them Katie, Dad, Dan and I went to our favorite D&J Bistro in Lake Zurich for an amazing French meal. The folks there are so good and friendly. The food is amazing and I never need to eat again.
Now 12 hours after leaving the restaurant, Dad and I are halfway home to St Paul!
Dad and I have a tour of the Midwest going this week. We start in Naperville to see a friend of his. (OK, only dad stopped in to see his favorite high school teacher Jack Lane.) I walked around the Naperville Century Walk, a downtown riverwalk peppered with artworks. I’ll share a few pictures. The highlight was the big statue of Dick Tracy; well-place because the creator of the comic book hero is from Naperville.
We also checked out the Morton Arboretum. We have been there before. Sadly, the summer sculptures were not out yet. But we did get to see some gorgeous flowers. Even better, we got to smell them! I’ve always said the best thing about coming from Minnesota is that anywhere you go has better weather and that is doubly true this year. It was warm and spring had sprung and I could almost be tempted to move this year.
I had a work meeting in Bloomington (at the Illinois Soybean Association). Quick nod to best refurbishing of a former Gold’s Gym and nicest hospitality. I heard heartwarming stories of rural counties on the path to getting better broadband. But I’ll save those notes for my work report.
Springfield
After the meeting we set out to St Louis, but not without a stop to see historical sites in Springfield. We checked out Lincoln’s family home – by that I mean with Mary Todd and their kids. Here we were given a fantastic free map that pointed out just about anything and everything you might want to see in the areas related to Lincoln.
Based on new info from the new map, we also checked out Lincoln’s Tomb. It was cook. It is a big tomb, where he and his immediate family are buried. Apparently, someone tried to snatch his body in 1876, resulting in a bunch of new laws, an onsite groundskeeper and his body moving 10 feet below ground. There’s a bronze casting of Lincoln’s face. Apparently, it’s lucky to run his nose. (I’ll report back if good luck comes my way!) Fun to see the impact of a nose rub on the statue.
St Louis
We spent a couple days in St Louis and the whole family joined. We’re all here to see my niece, Betsy, do her senior dance at St Louis University. She has completed four years of her six-year program in Physical Therapy. But with the fourth-year completion, comes the end to her Dance Minor. So we all came to watch her. You can see why below; this is the dance she choregraphed. We’ll never forget the touching note that Grandma left on Emily’s dance poster – thinking it was Betsy’s. But it was very funny.
We also got to see a few of the sites, such as Forest Park, You can see the video Katie and I made in honor of the Kentucky Derby.
We checked out some nightlife and ate a ton!
… last minute addition: Dad and I stopped in Cedar Lake, Iowa. Dad was a huge Buddy Holly fan back in the day, and remembers the day the music died. Originally we weren’t going to go this way but fates intervened and once you’re getting on 35 near Mason City, you might as well stop by the sites!
Filed under: Illinois
The band is back together. I’m on the road in rural Illinois with Bill, one of my favorite work-road-trip buddies. It’s always a good mix of productive work chat, small town sight seeing, catching up and good advice. We saw a few highlights.
The tourism portion of our trip began with the Black Hawk Statue in Oregon IL. It’s quite impressive at 50 feet and is a memorial to Chief Black Hawk, Sauk leader in what is known as the Black Hawk war 1832. We also did drive-bys for the birthplace of John Deere and childhood home of Ronald Regan.
For work, I got to tour a hog farm with 60,000 hogs as well as soybean fields and processing facilities. (Thankfully, we couldn’t see the hogs because of bio-security issues. Whew!) I’ve toured hog farms before. What’s amazing is that success is made in pennies per pound. So every penny you can save in the nurturing, butchering or process of making the bacon helps and precision ag makes a big difference. Also I got to sit on big tractor. Woo!
Because we were in Carthage, we visited death place of Joseph Smith, founder of Latter Day Saints. We went to the jail where he was shot and we met by tour guides who may or may not have been dressed in period piece attire. They are clearly devotees; super informative but also a little unsettling. Here’s the abridged story (thanks to Wikipedia)…
Carthage Jail is best known as the location of the 1844 killing of Joseph Smith, founder of the Latter Day Saint movement, and his brother Hyrum, by a mob of approximately 150 men.
We spent time in the jail. Creepy! And saw the door through which Joseph was shot and the window through which he thrust himself to save the followers who were with him (in front of the mob) in the small room. Word is, the Smiths knew they were going to die in Carthage but were peaceful that day anticipating the murder.
Our biggest stop was the Abraham Lincoln Museum in Springfield. It is worth av visit! The multimedia makes it feel interactive. The segment on the emancipation was particularly interesting. Even on his own team, some think he goes too far, and some think he doesn’t go far enough. There’s a hallway set up that reminds me of walking the MN Capitol when contentious topics are being discussed. No one listens; everyone shouts. It emphasizes the need to vote for people you think you will actually do the right thing when the time comes.
A striking exhibit is a bronze cast or Lincoln’s face as he started he’s presidency and five years into it. The aging is palpable. Then there are “rooms” that focus on segments of Lincoln’s life that help us see how that fast aging happened. Lincoln not only led the nation during an extremely tumultuous time but he had a lot of person tragedy happening at the same time. Hearing about his plans to focus on the positive on the day of his assassination is heartbreaking.
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