1860 photo taken 4 days after Mr.
Lincoln visited Lincoln, Illinois, for the last time. Info at 3 below.
This President
grew;
His town does too.
Link to Lincoln:
Lincoln & Logan County Development Partnership
Abraham Lincoln Bicentennial Commission of Lincoln, IL
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April 24, 2004: Awarded "Best Web Site of the Year" by the Illinois State Historical
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Marquee Lights of the Lincoln Theater, est. 1922, Lincoln, Illinois |
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32. The Odd Fellows' Children's Home |
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"The world . . . is not a nice place, and the innocent and the young
have to take their chances." ______________ |
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32.3: Picture Postcard of the IOOF |
32.4: Undated Picture Postcard of the |
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Chronology of the Illinois Odd Fellows' Children's Home in Lincoln, Illinois
32.5: Picture Postcard Showing Main Building and Fountain · January, 1893: Home opened, and 63 children were admitted the first year (Beaver, p. 79). Nancy Gehlbach's "Home, Sweet Home" (Our Times volume 6, issue 4, winter, 2001) presents a complete history of the Illinois IOOF Children's Home in Lincoln. She describes a well-run operation with conscientious administrators, teachers, and other employees. Mrs. Gehlbach's work in this issue presents a full portrait of life in the Home, based on interviews with former residents and employees. She divides her history according to the times of the administrators, following the first superintendent, Mrs. Lizzie L. Morrison. The subsequent periods and administrators are as follows: 1906-1926, Dr. and Mrs. J.A. Lucas; 1926-1940, Superintendent Roy Johnson and his wife, Matron Icie Johnson; 1967--1994, Robert and Darlene Wick. Two themes emerge from Nancy Gehlbach's history: (1) the children who lived in the Home were well cared for, educated in and out of the classroom and on field trips, taught discipline and responsibility, and given various opportunities for recreation; and (2) many townspeople contributed as employees, volunteers, or otherwise expressed friendship toward the children. Helpful townspeople included the legendary Band Director H.O. Merry (p. 5) and such other teachers as John and Paul Beaver and Bobbie Connolley (p. 9). No summary of Nancy Gehlbach's history can convey her interesting and informative material, including the many anecdotes. Here, I offer just one such anecdote: "One night Bob Johnson and Russell Krager snuck out to Lincoln Lakes and took a lifeboat out. They were found by the night watchman, who had a bright flashlight and, says Bob, 'the biggest dog I ever saw in my life.' The watchman let the boys stay all night and took them back on the steam engine in the morning. When he asked Bob his name, he said, "Bob," "Bob White'" (p. 6). That night watchman and
his best friend were less friendly to trespassing town guys when he caught them camping on
"the Island." |
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32.6: 1909 Panoramic View of the IOOF Orphans' Home |
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32.7: Undated Aerial View of IOOF Children's Home This
photo looks south. Buildings of the Home are arranged on the outer
edge of the circular drive. The gym is the building at the right with
arched roof. The double-lane
street at the base of the circle is Wyatt Avenue, one of the main streets in
the original layout of Lincoln dating to 1853. This photo appears in
Beaver, History of Logan County 1982, p. 80. |
32.8: Dining Room of IOOF Orphans' Home (Photo from
Gehlbach, p. 1, originally published in Our Homes, c. 1911.) |
32.9: 1967 Building in Front of (Picture postcard from the Internet) |
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In 1913, the Home consisted of seven buildings that provided for administration, worship, education, and living quarters (IOOF brochure of 1913). "The Home covers 158 acres of land, 120 acres of which is farmed to produce grain to feed cattle, hogs, and chickens, for Home use and market" (Courier, 8-26-53). According to Gehlbach's "Home, Sweet Home," The boys ate their meals in the dining hall in the domestic science building with all the other children. When they heard the a ringing of the cowbell outside the door, they went inside, cleaned up, stood by for inspection hands, and then lined up to go into the dining room and find their assigned tables. After the children sang grace, a little bell was tapped, and everyone sat down. There were 18 tables, usually eight to a table and each one with an older boy or girl in charge. There was a birthday table, too. Unlike earlier years, children could talk to others at their table, but not from one table to another. . . ." "The children ate lots of navy beans, corn bread, porridge, peanut butter, stew, chicken and eggs from the Home's farm -- run first by Raymond Dobbs and later by Ed Wilmert -- and a mixture of ground beef and vegetables called slum gullion. A favorite breakfast was cocoa and toast. "There was plenty of fresh produce from the garden -- presided over by a dignified Englishman named John Wakenshaw -- and plenty of milk from the farm's Holstein cows. There were raspberries, too, picked by the children themselves" (Gehlbach, p. 4). |
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32.10: Domestic Training (Photo from IOOF 1913 brochure) |
32.11: Manual Training (Photo from IOOF 1913
brochure) |
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"We maintain a modern
manual training school for our boys and a domestic science school for our
girls, in addition to the eight grades of the common school. While
many of the children in our Home have come from parents who have suffered
and died from tuberculosis and are therefore in a low state of physical
development, our system of life at the Home, with its wholesome and
nourishing food, its fresh air and pleasant surroundings, has made a
wonderful record for turning out physically and mentally perfect young men
and women" (1913 IOOF brochure). |
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32.12: IOOF Orphans' Home Co-ed Band (Photo from IOOF 1913 brochure)
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32.13: Band from IOOF Orphans Home--Lincoln, Illinois, at the Abraham Lincoln Home in Springfield, Illinois, in 1923
(Photo of a photo -- causing glare -- from IOOF Web site, address below in Sources Cited; photo in the IOOF museum that
was housed in the Home on Wyatt Avenue, Lincoln, Illinois) |
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Extracurricular activities included basketball in the gym, baseball, and music, including the Home's band. "Home, Sweet Home" contains a photo of the band in front of the Home's bus in 1936. The caption notes that during the Johnson years the band consisted only of males. The above photos, however, show that females were in the band in 1913 and 1923. "Professor H.O. Merry was the director of the band, in a day when kids' bands were still something of a novelty. The band played at lodges across the state, often heading up parades in the little towns they visited. They played at the Old Folks' Home in Mattoon and went with the home kids on the interurban to the Odd Fellows picnic in Bloomington. "Professor Merry was also
the high school band director, and many of the Home kids played in that
band" (Gehlbach, p. 5). |
| Memoir of the IOOF
Children's Home
A Townie Remembers the IOOF Home I was one of the countless hometown kids who benefited from the recreational facilities of the IOOF Children's Home. In pre-teen years, I played in the "Pony League" baseball program. Games were often held on the Home's baseball field. It was well maintained and had dugouts and an outfield fence with advertisements of local businesses. Playing there seemed like being in the majors. Unfortunately my most vivid memory was being struck out by bubblegum-popping neighbor Leonard Newton, whose fast ball froze me in terror. I rationalized that his superior strength resulted from his being a few years older. During my freshman year in high school, I was on the B squad of the freshman basketball team. Practices were held in the IOOF gym, and Duane Woltzen was the coach. I recall that for a while he liked to join us during scrimmages. That strategy, however, was modified. It seems during one scrimmage he became impatient for some reason or other, and play heated up. The result was that a couple of my larger teammates sort of conspired to be physical with him under the boards. That lit his infamous short fuse. Coach then sidelined himself in subsequent scrimmages. Leigh Henson dlhenson@missouristate.edu. Dave Marrs Remembers Life at the IOOF Home Leigh... Fred [Blanford] has asked me to come up with some experiences of my 12 years of living under the auspices of the Odd Fellows Orphan's Home, which existed there off Wyatt Avenue in Lincoln for a good many years... needless to say, us "Formers" as we were called who lived there over those years are regretful for it's no longer being a viable institution... but, as the saying goes: "Time Marches On". As for me personally, I am humbly grateful that it did exist for me for a short time (now I say that)... I really do not think that I would have amounted to a "hill of beans" had it not been for the "education" I received from the good people who led us on thru life as we grew up... I wish now I could have an opportunity to give thanks to each and every one of them... as the old song goes "too late, too late to say you're sorry"... but perhaps some of them might just be looking down on us from their positions in God's Heaven... if so, I do beg your forgiveness for the neglect and hope to see you again one day... It was on my 5th birthday (Feb. 3, 1927) that my mother passed away... sometime later, Dad who was an itinerant farm laborer, had to do something with the 7 kids whom he could not care for all by himself... on June 4th, 1927, three of the youngest four were committed to this Orphanage and the next year the youngest one came there, too.... we were all placed in the boys building, aptly called the Main Building, being built first and containing the Superintendent's offices... At that time he was Roy Johnson and wife... this building had 4 floors and a basement. ... it also had a slate roof.. I remember this as I was out on it more than once, although it was strictly against the rules... wasn't meant to be tromped around on, but boys will be boys, I guess. I recall the basement too, as there was where the band did their practicing under a nice old geezer named Herbert O. Merry... yes, this band was named the Home Band (wonder why?) and a home boy was always designated as a leader... and as far as I know he always played a trumpet (or cornet)... I honestly can't say whether our oldest brother at the home, Omer was his name, made it to be leader or not, but he did play a trumpet so he probably did, but I do know that Claude (next in line) did and was leader until he graduated from grade school, and then I came up next and was leader until I graduated also... don't know if Dale, the younger made the position or not (he did not play a trumpet, but his was a baritone, later a bass horn, I believe)... sometimes information one should treasure in his memories manages to fade away, not that it is unimportant, but because of ones failure to grasp it as important... know what I mean?.... and also, remember that I now was on my way to a fuller life out there somewhere... Speaking of the band... we always had a rather good one, to my thinking.. and you can blame that onto the old professor who taught us... he was a friend to us all, but a strict believer in doing ones best in each situation... he never accompanied us on our "band trips" which we did each summer after school was out... I am sure there are a lot of the towns in Illinois where we did not perform, but probably each town we did give concerts in very likely had a Odd Fellows chapter also... not sure of this as at that time, who cared anyway or even gave it a consideration? We were, after all just kids out for a good time... we had uniforms and our own bus and our driver, named William Vehrs, was in charge of us. Oh, before I forget, Mr. Johnson would travel with us the greater part of those times and would give speeches before each concert.. and or course he was the #1 caretaker of us all... After concert time was over,we stayed in peoples homes over night and they fed us before leaving again for the next destination. Incidentally, Mr. Vehrs much later became superintendent of the Home... this was after I had been released out on my own... I do know he was also a wonderful man... most often during these band trips we would stay out at least 2 weeks at a time... a most enjoyable time... and in several of the towns we would have baseball games during the days when no concert was to be done...and these were usually in the evening time, anyway, which would allow the people to attend who spent the daytime at their job... It has been mentioned in other communications about the interurban lines in the city, and I must now admit that I am not at all familiar with this topic, as we had no occasion to travel away on it, except... just a minute here... now I think on it, we did, too, do that... in my early days at the home, long before our band had the bus, we did too travel one day each summer on it to Bloomington... I had almost completely forgotten this... one day each summer we had a picnic at some park in Bloomington... as we loaded onto the train, we were each handed a "box lunch" to guard while we traveled... don't really remember whether we ate it on the trip traveling or saved it for the picnic... seems like we ate it while traveling and had a picnic lunch later in the day after getting there... do remember it was a day we looked forward to each summer, though, as it occasioned us a get away from the usual... this was long before the band days... long before... how time flies......... enough for this time........ more later, if I can just remember........hm..hm..hm As
of 6-09, Dave is on Facebook. |
| Sources Cited Beaver, Paul J. History of Logan County Illinois, 1982. The Logan County Heritage Foundation. Dallas, TX: Taylor Publishing Company, 1982. Gehlbach, Nancy Lawrence. "Home, Sweet Home." Our Times volume 6, number 4, winter, 200l. Sam Redding, Publisher. Prairie Years Press. 121 N. Kickapoo Street. Lincoln, IL 62656 Gleason, Paul E. Lincoln, Illinois: A Pictorial History. St. Louis, MO: G. Bradley Publishing, 1998. Material from Mr. Gleason's books is copyrighted with all rights reserved. Mr. Gleason's material used in this Web site is with permission from the G. Bradley Publishing Company, 461 Des Peres Road, St. Louis, MO 63131. Call 1-800-966-5120 to inquire about purchasing Lincoln, Illinois: A Pictorial History (1998) (200 pages of rare photos and text) or Logan County Pictorial History (2000) (also 200 pages of rare photos and text). Visit www.gbradley.com/. "Homeless Children and Orphans Find Haven at Lincoln Odd Fellows Home." Lincoln Evening Courier, centennial edition, section 3, page 2, August 26, 1953. IOOF brochure, 1913. No title, no publisher, and no place of publication. IOOF Web site: http://www.ioof.org/. When you get the password window, just keep canceling, and shortly the homepage will appear anyway. Maxwell, William. Time
Will Darken It. NY: Vintage Books, 1948. William Maxwell's works are available at
www.amazon.com and
www.barnesandnoble.com. |
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"The Past Is But the Prelude" |
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