Articles

By Bill Kemp. Published on August 2, 2009.

The life and times of Bloomington-born Gordon William “Pawnee Bill” Lillie show us that when it comes to the Wild West, it’s often hard...

By Bill Kemp. Published on April 8, 2012.

This July will mark the 80th anniversary of Amelia Earhart’s mysterious disappearance in the Central Pacific while attempting to become...

By Bill Kemp. Published on January 10, 2016.

Born and raised on Bloomington’s west side, Patrick Henry Morrissey became a national labor leader in his early thirties. ...

By Bill Kemp. Published on June 5, 2016.

Someone once said, presumably half in earnest and half in jest, that American contributions to world culture could be reduced to three ...

By Bill Kemp. Published on May 7, 2017.

The collections of the McLean County Museum of History include some 20,000 objects, and everyone one of them has a story to tell....

By Bill Kemp. Published on February 18, 2018.

“Miss Colby was a most unusual person,” noted Helen Marshall in her centennial history of Illinois State Normal University. “She was an...

By Bill Kemp. Published on May 27, 2018.

In the years following World War II, the remains of tens of thousands of American war dead returned stateside for reburial in hometown ...

By Bill Kemp. Published on January 20, 2019.

U.S. President Ronald Reagan was no stranger to Bloomington-Normal, though most of his visits occurred decades before he reached the Wh...

By Bill Kemp. Published on July 21, 2019.

Born, raised and educated in Central Illinois, Christian educator Minnie Vautrin was an eyewitness to one of the most horrific and crue...

By Bill Kemp. Published on September 15, 2019.

One hundred and forty years ago this week, on Sept. 18, 1879, the incomparable Sojourner Truth spoke at Second Presbyterian Church in d...

Articles about People