In 1895 the center of Libertyville was mostly destroyed by a fire and quickly reconstructed. One happy consequence is the rare architectural unity to the preserved downtown area today. Not only is downtown Libertyville attractive, it’s bursting with stores and dining establishments, and has a dynamic events calendar, especially during the summer. Many of these …
The seat of Kane County is a delightful city on the Fox River, featuring a downtown area brimming with beautiful Victorian architecture, and enticing independent stores and restaurants. In the early 20th century Geneva was home to the millionaire textile industrialist, George Fabyan, and his estate, Riverbank, is now encompassed by the Fabyan Forest Preserve. Geneva …
A leafy suburb on the north side of Chicago, Morton Grove is on the banks of the North Branch of the Chicago River. The river’s floodplain has been kept completely free of development, and the 20-mile North Branch Trail makes its way through a string of forest preserves with wildflower-rich prairie and oak woodland. A …
Over the last couple of decades this city opposite Peoria on the Illinois River has witnessed some big changes. In a kind of symbiosis with its immediate neighbor, East Peoria’s downtown has become a big shopping and dining destination along Interstate 74, with an improved waterfront for walks and bike rides. East Peoria’s modern history …
The diverse village of South Holland is in Southland Chicago, roughly contained to the south by Interstate 80 and the east by Illinois Route 1. Running east to west through South Holland is 162nd S (U.S. Route 6), where there’s an unending line of eateries, many of which are family-run spots that have been around …
Immediately south of Chicago’s city limits, Dolton is a mostly residential suburban village bounded to the north by the Little Calumet River. The name comes from one George Dolton, who settled in the area in 1835 and whose son became the village’s first postmaster in 1866. Around this time Dolton became a base for major …
This fast-growing suburban community in the Fox River Valley has more than tripled in population since 1990. The history of South Elgin goes back much further, and from the late 19th century was hooked up to an interurban railway. That line is the origin of the excellent Fox River Trolley Museum, which runs antique trolleys …
On the Illinois river, Pekin is a city of 35,000 in Central Illinois. The name was chosen in the late 1820s when it was thought that this spot was at the exact opposite point on the globe to Peking, in China. A real point of pride in Pekin is Mineral Springs Park, which was landscaped …
In the last decades of the 19th century this suburban city on the Fox River was a center for windmill manufacturing, a fact remembered by the windmill on Batavia’s logo. A fascinating thing about Batavia is that many of those old factories, built from the pale local limestone, are still standing. This old architecture brings …
On the Kishwaukee River in Northern Illinois, Belvidere is in the Rockford metropolitan area, but has its own story to tell. The county seat of Boone County, Belvidere took shape in the 1830s as a stop on the stagecoach line between Chicago and Galena, passing through on the north side of the river. Later the …