Testimonials for Community History Web Site of Lincoln, IL

Hello - so glad we found this web site. What is the current status of Lincoln School? Where can one obtain information about residents, especially looking for information about children's ability to care for self, etc, etc. Thank you. Wendell R. Anderson

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----- Original Message -----

From: "Lee Walker" <LeeW@RealtyTitleCompany.com>

To: <dlh105f@smsu.edu>

Sent: Friday, March 26, 2004 2:11 PM

Subject: Lincoln, IL

> Your website is absolutely amazing. I first found it perhaps a month ago. I was amazed! There's another human being on the planet who is as fascinated with Lincoln as I am! It's mazing, and a little eerie that you have photographs of some of the places that I think of as almost sacred ground. My now ex-wife and I spent the first year of our marriage in a little one bedroom apartment on the west side of Stringer Avenue, just about half a block south of the Old Mill Tavern. We met and courted while attending Lincoln Christian College. I will write some more later if you don't mind.
>
> Thanks again,

Lee Walker

----- Original Message -----

From: "John Mathews" <jmathews2002@hotmail.com>

To: <dlh105f@smsu.edu>

Sent: Friday, April 23, 2004 9:54 PM

Subject: Lincoln, IL

> I would like to thank you for the many different articles on Lincoln that you have put together. My finacee goes to school (LCCS) and so I have made several trips up there to visit her. Soon I will be living there. I came across your website while searching for information on Lincoln Developmental
Center (LDC) that closed in 2001 or so. We drove by it, on the way to the YMCA, and it was just a beautiful campus a few years after it has been closed. Ideas have been racing in my mind about the campus, and some business ventures. Your site has been very informational on LDC. However, comments of reopening have been talked about, but from the research that I have done, nothing seems to be sticking to that situation. So, if it reopens or not, I wont know till I get to talk to some officials in Lincoln.
>
> Again thank you for a very informational site.
>
> John Mathews
> Belleville Illinois
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----- Original Message -----

From: Stephen E. Hartnell

To: dlh105f@smsu.edu

Sent: Monday, May 10, 2004 8:44 AM

Subject: Lincoln IL Website

Thank you so much for creating this website! I'm a Lincolnite in exile, have been an avid reader of Nancy Gehlbach's historical newsletter, and occasionally long for the home town.

Helen Hartnell (great-granddaughter of Adeline Gillette Bates Hartnell)
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----- Original Message -----

From: DGaydosh@aol.com

To: dlh105f@smsu.edu

Sent: Monday, May 10, 2004 9:26 PM

Subject: Congratulations

Leigh:

Congratulations on the recognition of all your hard work! I see you are still earning A's after all these years.

Dan Gaydosh

----- Original Message -----

From: "Paul Ross" <cubbie98@webtv.net>

To: "LeighHensonSMSU" <dlh105f@smsu.edu>

Sent: Monday, May 10, 2004 9:26 PM

Subject: Re: LCHS, 5-10-04

> Congrats on the award, and much deserved. Keep up the excellent work. I am quite sure many former lincolnites, and a few of us who never managed to leave dear old Lincoln, look forward to your updates. I particularly enjoyed the recent ramblings by and about Jim Knecht. He and I continue to be close friends and converse and see each other often. He certainly came a long way from the days we played together on Sangamon street and later shared a "friendly" game of 9-ball at Hickey's.
>
It was good to see you at Mello-Cream recently; even though it took a look or two to recall the beardless face. Your dad and share a jab or two about every day, he about my Cubs, and me his Red Sox. It has been a long dry spell for both teams......maybe this year.
> Keep up the good work. Regards..Pete

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Original Message -----

From: Gwen Koda

To: LeighHensonSMSU

Sent: Monday, May 10, 2004 11:23 PM

Subject: RE: LCHS, 5-10-04

Congratulations!!!!! I am so glad you got some recognition for all your

hard work. I can't begin to tell you how much it has all meant to me. Thanks again.

Gwen

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----- Original Message -----

From: "Steve Goebel" <sgoebel2001@yahoo.com>

To: <dlh105f@smsu.edu>

Sent: Tuesday, June 01, 2004 1:30 PM

Subject: Congratulations for the ISHS award

> Leigh,
> Sometimes I am amazed at what the internet brings to me. The chain: Page D4 of the Decatur Herald and Review - June 1 - I see a name I don't recognize, but a Lincolnite. I read on. The website looks interesting and I check it out and find familiar names listed and you as a '60 graduate. You wouldn't know me but for an older brother who is listed on your credits. Interesting. Congratulations for succeeding in the world of news and acclaim.
> Steve Goebel, Class of '65 - currently a grade school
> principal at Cowden-Herrick Schools - south and west
> of Shelbyville, IL.
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July 4, 2006

Dear Mr. Henson:

Thanks again for your website. (You're probably getting sick of hearing that.)

You are now a professor emeritus? - viz- retired? If so, I wish you the best as the rest of us poor "schmucks" labor on. Hope your health is good. We are of course strangers, yet because of Lincoln, I feel some affinity. I believe that the town's allure to my psyche is based on illusion. I would love to live there if I didn't still have to earn a living. Things have probably changed for the better since my (now ex) wife and I lived there in the early seventies. You may remember that we lived in Stringer Apartments, or they may have been called Bartman Apartments back then. They were (and are) a set of four buildings located about half a block South of The Old Mill Tavern on the West side of the street. Washington Street runs South down the East side of Postville Park from Fifth Street. When it gets to First Street, it angles Southwesterly a bit and become Stringer Avenue. I've read on the website, and we've corresponded about, your experiences at the Old Mill. (The proprietor's wife waving around a handgun wasn't it?)

Unpleasant work experiences in Lincoln cloud my otherwise pleasant nostalgic memories of the kind of life we lived in Lincoln. We were poor as church mice. I worked in one of the factories. It was a terribly miserable experience. Bad pay, bad treatment. I'm no socialist, but that place was enough to make the proletariat rise up and take up arms! Yet I should have liked to have continued to live in Lincoln. We spent one year as students at Lincoln Christian College, and one more year as a poor struggling working class young married couple. In '73 we moved to the KC area. I've lived in the big ugly city ever since. The irony of course, I suppose, is that if the economic opportunities were better in Lincoln, it would not be the same Lincoln. With a lot of economic development would come a lot of change. Not all of it would enhance Lincoln's alluring small town beauty. The State School still operated in the seventies. That's gone now. Stetson was already gone by my time in Lincoln. Is PGP plate glass still there? Myers Industries, the cardboard box factory, the pop bottle factory? The population in the early seventies, I think, was in the neighborhood of 17,500, it's now down under 15,000, I believe. In six to nine years, I hope to retire. Perhaps in Lincoln. Who knows?

You by contrast, grew up in Lincoln. I grew up in Rock Island (the Quad-Cities). You are certainly by my measure, a vocational success. A Ph.D. I can't imagine. I never finished my bachelors. I think I needed a little more testosterone in those days. I'm a real estate examiner and certainly not ashamed to have been doing this for twenty some years. So things could have turned out a lot worse.

You had some new "stuff" on the Lincoln Rustic. If I get my butt in gear, I'll send you some old stuff on it. When my wife and I were LCC students, one of the places we frequented, during our courtship, was the Lincoln Rustic. You could buy soft drinks, ice cream, hot dogs, etc. No longer a tavern by this time. The owner or proprietor was a real Abraham Lincoln trivia nut. I think he offered for sale a few books about Abraham Lincoln and a few Abraham Lincoln nicknacks. He had glass case with an "exact" replica of the rocker that Lincoln sat in at the Ford theater when assassinated. Perhaps a little morbid. Of course The Rustic building was the site of the conspirator's meetings to steal poor Abe's corpse. One door toward the square from the Rustic was the Gem Restaurant, another place we frequented. Good food. Also on Pulaski Street opposite the Courthouse, was the Arcade and the Arcade Restaurant. On a visit two years ago the Arcade Restaurant seems to have changed little, although the smoked glass tables have all been replaced.

I'm reminded of Rod Serling's "Walking Distance": going back home and going back in time. All the little landmarks, the places of memory, make me want to come home.

Enough for now - I'll try to write more later.

With all good wishes, yours sincerely,

Lee Walker

From: PetieL8613@aol.com [mailto:PetieL8613@aol.com]
Sent: Sat 7/29/2006 11:16 AM
To: Henson, D Leigh
Subject: Re: William Livingston's e-mail address

Thanks, Leigh. I've been really enjoying reading about Lincoln, Illinois and William Maxwell. What a marvelous website you have! I am 85 and am treated like a precious piece of antique china, instead of broad-beamed, sturdy Irishman I really am.

My daughter says, "Relax, Mom, and enjoy it. You've earned it." Leave it to a librarian.

I remember Dr. Young quite well. He was the anesthetist when I had my tonsils out, an appendectomy, and a resection of the apppy's incision..

Feels like we are in for some more muggy Illinois humidity. Grandad always said it was good for the corn. Gotta be good for something!

Pat Littlefield

From: Phillip Hash [mailto:pmh3@calvin.edu]
Sent: Sat 8/12/2006 1:19 PM
To: Henson, D Leigh
Subject: RE: Lincoln Web Site

Leigh,

Thank you so much. This is just what I needed. PHIL

Phillip Hash
Assistant Professor of Music
Coordinator of Music Education
Music Department
Calvin College
1795 Knollcrest Circle SE
Grand Rapids, Michigan 49546-4404
(616) 526-6022, office
>>> "Henson, D Leigh" <DLHenson@MissouriState.edu> 08/12/06 1:58 PM >>>

Hi, Phil Hash,

I appreciate your compliment on my community history Web site of Lincoln, Illinois, and I am glad to hear about your dissertation research. I am soon to head out of town, so your message reached me just in time to avoid a delay in my response. I have scanned the newsletter issue that you cite and attached it as a PDF. The quality is not the best, but it is legible, and I hope it meets your need.

Best,

Leigh

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From: Phillip Hash [mailto:pmh3@calvin.edu]
Sent: Sat 8/12/2006 10:37 AM
To: dlh105f@smsu.edu
Subject: Lincoln Web Site

Mr. Henson,

Thank you for you web site on Lincoln Illinois. I am currently finishing a dissertation on the Development of School Bands in Illinois from 1863-1930 and have included bands from The Asylum for Feeble Minded Children and The Odd Fellows Orphans Home in the document. Could you tell me where I could get a copy of the following article:

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

Also, what page numbers does this article begin and end on? Thank you very much.

PHIL HASH

Phillip Hash
Assistant Professor of Music
Coordinator of Music Education
Music Department
Calvin College
1795 Knollcrest Circle SE
Grand Rapids, Michigan 49546-4404
(616) 526-6022, office

From: Patricia England [mailto:pattiengland@msn.com]
Sent: Thu 8/24/2006 4:01 AM
To: Henson, D Leigh
Subject: Lincoln Website, a gift

Dr. Henson,

It is the middle of the night and I cannot rest until I thank you for your efforts on this personal and intimate look into Lincoln, Illinois. I have such a longing in my heart to learn about the 'every day' life of Lincoln. My mother, Barbara Hoelscher, grew up there and her family roots dig deep into Lincoln for the four generations previous to her. My mother died when I was a young child, and the only thing of hers that I have is a scrapbook that she had during her school years. (She graduated from Lincoln High in 1956, then moved to New York City) My father had severed contact with my mother's family after her death, and I found them only about 10 years ago. However, all of my mother's siblings also died young, before I had the chance to get to know them or their stories. As an only child, without extended family interaction, there has always been a void in my otherwise wonderful life.

I am now a grandmother, and I live in Utah, where family history is a common hobby. I would like to take a trip to Lincoln soon and absorb all that I can. I came across your website for the first time earlier this evening, and have had to read every word and study every picture. I have found names of people in my family tree, and names of friends and places mentioned in my mother's scrapbook. The tears flowed freely when I saw my mothers name mentioned in Memorium on Mr. Johnson's Class of '56 site. I cannot thank you enough.

Family history is a huge part of who we are and what we leave for the next generations, and yet I have not been able to put those pieces together. I have so many questions, the information and stories on your site and the links have been so interesting and personal to me. Thank you again, I'm going to try to sleep now, but I know I will be using the resources you have provided, and getting to know my mother and her family, MY FAMILY.

Sincerely,

Patricia England

From: Jeff Green [mailto:jeffgreen@ftml.net]
Sent: Wed 8/23/2006 5:14 PM
To: dlh105f@smsu.edu
Subject: THANK YOU SO MUCH!

Hey, I'm a new resident in Lincoln, IL... moved here to go to school. and I'm writing to THANK YOU for your amazingly helpful map of downtown. I know you resources are more for visitors, but I found it to be valuable as I try to get adjusted to the town (especially since I come from a big city enviornment!).

-Jeff

From: Joe Anderson [mailto:jjanders@net-magic.net]
Sent: Tue 8/15/2006 5:04 AM
To: Henson, D Leigh
Subject: Your web site

I just learned of your web site and love it.

Are you still adding Lincoln stories?

I may have some that would interest you....especially on WPRC (we lived on Wyatt Avenue next to Raymond Knochel, who owned WPRC, and I worked there as a dejay for several summers).

Is your sister Linda?

My Father, Paul Anderson (who died 4 years ago at age 90), worked for a number of years at LHS with your Dad. They were good friends.

I now live on Amelia Island in Florida....far north Florida on Atlantic side.

Bonnie Keys Thompson (daughter of Ray Keys) lives an hour away on St. Simon's Island, Georgia.

Each year she and several high school girl friends (Georgia Becker, Judy Berg, Patty Sterling, Barb Needham, Jan Sunderland, Connie Hudspeth, Becky Tesch, etc.) get together. They will be doing this in October this year. My wife and I will be having all of them down here for lunch and an afternoon at the beach. I will make sure they all know about your wonderful web site.

Again, thanks for your good work.

Joe Anderson LHS '63