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BroMenn donation speaks to 125 years of community service
By Bill Kemp. Published on July 4, 2021.
Carle BroMenn Medical Center has undergone one transformation after another since its modest beginnings 125 years ago. It opened on May 8, 1896, as the 22-bed Deaconess Hospital—this nearly a quarter century before the discovery of antibiotics. Today, the medical center offers everything from cardiac electrophysiology to interventional radiology. About the only thing that hasn’t changed is its central location—where Franklin and Virginia avenues meet in Normal. Deaconess Hospital owes its origin to a group of local doctors who believed Bloomington-Normal was ready to support a second traditional hospital, specif...
Solar superstorm awes locals in 1859
By Bill Kemp. Published on July 31, 2016.
It was known as “the week the sun touched the earth.” In late August and early September 1859, two geomagnetic solar superstorms wallop...
WW I home front featured French-Belgian relief
By Bill Kemp. Published on July 24, 2016.
The War to End All Wars, as the First World War was once called, brought out the best and the worst in Americans. On the ...
Church organ sparked conflict in Heyworth church
By Bill Kemp. Published on July 10, 2016.
“The devil was completely knocked out at Heyworth this morning at 2 o’clock,” declared The Daily Leader of Bloomington on Feb. 9, 1891....
Courts offered women few protections in cases of rape
By Bill Kemp. Published on June 19, 2016.
Rape was the “least-reported, least-prosecuted, and least-punished” of crimes in the 19th century. On Feb. 18, 1874, Lyma...
Duke Ellington big draw in Twin Cities
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 ...
South side firehouse built after Great Fire of 1900
By Bill Kemp. Published on May 29, 2016.
Although it hasn’t served as a Bloomington Fire Department station for well over seven decades, old Engine House No. 4 on South Main St...
Stevenson faced anti-U.N. mob in 1963
By Bill Kemp. Published on May 15, 2016.
On United Nations Day 1963, U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. Adlai E. Stevenson II didn’t come back to his hometown of Bloomington. Even so,...
Dance marathons, walkathons once talk of the town
By Bill Kemp. Published on March 13, 2016.
Although born out of the Roaring Twenties, dance marathons and walkathons peaked in popularity during the 1930s and the Great Depressio...
Community fund drive kept C&A Shops in Bloomington
By Bill Kemp. Published on March 6, 2016.
Local and state governments often offer incentives to keep existing businesses or attract new ones. These inducements—in the form of la...
Notorious silent movie drew local protests
By Bill Kemp. Published on February 7, 2016.
The 1915 silent film “The Birth of a Nation” is acclaimed today as one of the greatest achievements in motion picture history. At the s...
Early African-American doctor faced segregated Twin Cities
By Bill Kemp. Published on January 31, 2016.
African-American physician Eugene G. Covington came to Bloomington about 1900 to open a medical practice. This being thir...
Labor leader product of west side railroad shops
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. ...
Lightning a menace, past and present
By Bill Kemp. Published on May 17, 2015.
On May 20, 1897, a heavy afternoon shower accompanied by a “brilliant electrical display” passed through the Lexington area, catching 1...
War’s end makes Christmas ’45 extra special
By Bill Kemp. Published on December 28, 2014.
On Dec. 22, 1945, President Harry Truman switched on the twinkling lights of the nation’s Christmas tree. This White House ceremony, no...
Taps for last Bloomington Civil War veteran in 1940
By Bill Kemp. Published on September 14, 2014.
Today the median age of Korean War veterans is 88 years old, and as the ranks of these old soldiers get increasingly thinner there will...
Bloomington inescapably linked to Springfield Race Riot
By Bill Kemp. Published on August 10, 2014.
The Springfield Race Riot of August 14-15, 1908, when thousands of white residents rampaged through the city’s black areas destroying l...
Bloomington’s Oakland School a modernist architectural gem
By Bill Kemp. Published on June 25, 2013.
The post-World War II era marked a dramatic evolution—if not revolution—in the design of school buildings. In Bloomington...
Normal’s rich past dealt blow with razing of Fell house in 1980
By Bill Kemp. Published on June 25, 2013.
Beginning in the 1960s, many fine, sturdy single-family homes dating from the 19th and early 20th centuries were unceremoniously bulldo...
Cuban ‘Chico’ Hernandez star of 1938 Bloomers
By Bill Kemp. Published on May 19, 2013.
Well before Jackie Robinson broke the Major League Baseball color line in 1947. Latin Americans had already made inroads into the lily-...
First brick street in U.S. myth endures in Bloomington
By Bill Kemp. Published on September 30, 2012.
At the southwest corner of the Courthouse Square, near the intersection of Center and Washington streets, stands a historic marker of b...
Honeybees sweetened 19th century life in Central Illinois
By Bill Kemp. Published on May 20, 2012.
In November 1887, a poor local honey harvest led The Pantagraph to predict scarce inventories and high prices. “Biscuit will have to be...
‘Aviatrix’ Amelia Earhart twice visitor to Twin Cities
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...
Standpipe once towered over Twin Cities
By Bill Kemp. Published on October 16, 2011.
For 36 years, from 1876 to 1912, the tallest structure in the Twin Cities wasn’t a downtown Bloomington office building. No, towering a...
Passage of 1920 suffrage amendment end of long struggle
By Bill Kemp. Published on August 29, 2010.
On August 26, 1920, U.S. Secretary of State Bainbridge Colby signed into law the 19th Amendment granting women the right to vote. The i...
In 1955, downtown Bloomington 'dressed in holiday style'
By Bill Kemp. Published on December 20, 2009.
Back in 1955, Bloomington was less than half its current size, toys were still made in America, stores offered free home delivery of ev...
Depression-era art show one for the ages
By Bill Kemp. Published on October 19, 2009.
In the spring of 1939, area residents flocked to the Bloomington Consistory to gaze upon paintings by the likes of Rembrandt, Renoir an...
Airship pays visit to downtown Bloomington in 1910
By Bill Kemp. Published on September 13, 2009.
For Bloomington, the age of aviation arrived on September 14, 1910. On that date, a one-man airship known as the Comet sailed over the ...
Wild West legend ‘Pawnee Bill’ got start in Bloomington
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...
Railroad shops center of deadly 1920 typhoid outbreak
By Bill Kemp. Published on May 10, 2009.
For much of its first 100 years, Bloomington’s formerly unreliable water supply threatened to hold back the city’s growth and industria...
Before railroads, stage lines crisscrossed the prairies
By Bill Kemp. Published on April 1, 2009.
One of the more striking modern day conveniences we take for granted is the ease of long distance travel. Before commercial airlines, c...