Featured article
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...
Springtime once meant return of prairie flowers
By Bill Kemp. Published on June 29, 2023.
Novelist, poet, essayist and farmer Wendell Berry has said that we live in a time of “punishment and ruins.” This is certainly true whe...
Evergreen Lake groundbreaking 50 years ago
By Bill Kemp. Published on April 27, 2023.
Fifty years ago this week—April 27, 1968—Bloomington officials held a groundbreaking ceremony for the city’s second lake. On that day, ...
Electric cars sparked local interest long before Rivian
By Bill Kemp. Published on February 13, 2022.
The startling success of electric automaker Rivian has shined an international spotlight on Bloomington-Normal. The company’s ever-spra...
Digitized photos recall Thanksgiving Corn Bowl
By Bill Kemp. Published on November 21, 2021.
The not-for-profit McLean County Museum of History recently celebrated a remarkable milestone: The posting of the 100,000th digitized P...
Donated letter window into family tragedy
By Bill Kemp. Published on November 7, 2021.
Death came for John W. Puett on the afternoon of Jan. 12, 1917. The Bloomington grain dealer was at his Twin Grove elevator, located so...
Donated Vrooman letter speaks to wartime loss
By Bill Kemp. Published on October 10, 2021.
Faced with the enormity of the Second World War, it’s often difficult to put a human face on the horror. “One death is a tragedy, a mil...
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...
Bloomington’s oldest park turns 165 this week
By Bill Kemp. Published on April 25, 2021.
“How pleasant it is, immediately after the noontide hour of a hot summer’s day,” mused The Pantagraph in 1857, “to stroll away from the...
For pioneers, river crossings sometimes matter of life and death
By Bill Kemp. Published on March 21, 2021.
Of all the hardships faced by pioneers, the danger of crossing swollen rivers and creeks is one of the more difficult for present-day f...
Picture postcard speaks to power of donations
By Bill Kemp. Published on January 10, 2021.
As a not-for-profit institution, the McLean County Museum of History relies to a considerable extent on the generosity of the public to...
Community Christmas ‘sing’ once annual event
By Bill Kemp. Published on December 13, 2020.
The COVID-19 pandemic has led to the cancellation of countless holiday gatherings, school pageants, office parties, concerts, dinner da...
Bloomers photo features bevy of big leaguers
By Bill Kemp. Published on October 20, 2020.
A single photograph can open a door into a lost world. This Bloomington Bloomers team photo, for instance, taken at Fans Field during t...
Virtual cemetery walk showcases amazing Florence Funk
By Bill Kemp. Published on September 20, 2020.
The not-for-profit McLean County Museum of History celebrates local history in all its complexities and in all sorts of ways. There are...
Donation illuminates Earhart’s 1936 visit to Twin Cities
By Bill Kemp. Published on July 19, 2020.
Although the COVID-19 pandemic has forced the McLean County Museum of History to temporarily close its doors to the public, the Library...
Museum collections window to East Bay’s early years
By Bill Kemp. Published on June 22, 2020.
The COVID-19 crisis has taken many things from us—above all, the lives of 125,000 Americans. We have also lost, for a tim...
Baby Fold donation shines spotlight on architect
By Bill Kemp. Published on April 5, 2020.
One of the primary missions of the McLean County Museum of History is to acquire objects and papers that speak to the history of the ar...
Influenza pandemic brought Twin Cities to standstill
By Bill Kemp. Published on March 15, 2020.
“Do Not Fear Influenza,” read a local Red Cross notice from October 1918. “Learn how to avoid it—How to care for those who have it—What...
Undertaker’s invoice window into Bloomington’s rich past
By Bill Kemp. Published on February 9, 2020.
As a not-for-profit institution, the McLean County Museum of History depends on the generosity of the public to “grow” its object and a...
Joe Johnson, self-appointed Courthouse ‘traffic director’
By Bill Kemp. Published on January 26, 2020.
In the 1960s and into the early 1970s, visitors to the McLean County Courthouse would see two figures stationed at the center of the ma...
Moraine View park opened in 1959
By Bill Kemp. Published on January 5, 2020.
There are few lovelier corners of McLean County than Moraine View State Recreation Area. Situated several miles north of LeRoy, the 1,6...
New Year’s Eve 1919 meant hope for better times
By Bill Kemp. Published on December 29, 2019.
One hundred years ago, New Year’s Eve 1919 brought hope for better days to come. After all, the nation had been deeply scarred by the t...
Spirits high for Depression-era Christmas
By Bill Kemp. Published on December 22, 2019.
During the 1936 Christmas season, Americans faced an Ebenezer Scrooge writ large — the hard times of the Great Depression. Even so, mos...
Eastland Mall transformed Twin Cities
By Bill Kemp. Published on December 9, 2019.
“A shopping trip takes on all of the glamour and excitement of the space age when you visit the beautiful new Eastland Shopping Center....
Dr. E.D. Churchill, savior to wounded GIs
By Bill Kemp. Published on December 8, 2019.
Winning a war is not only about killing—it’s also about saving lives, especially if those lives are wounded soldiers fighting on your s...
Cigar shop was where old men came to talk (and nap)
By Bill Kemp. Published on December 1, 2019.
In the late 1800s, there was no better place in Bloomington to grumble about the “gov’ment,” debate the issues of the day, recount a we...
Last local Corn Bowl held in 1953
By Bill Kemp. Published on November 24, 2019.
Sixty-six years ago this week—Thanksgiving Day, Nov. 26, 1953—a disappointingly small crowd was on hand to watch the last Corn Bowl in ...
Phoenix Hall site of Lincoln’s last speech in Bloomington
By Bill Kemp. Published on November 17, 2019.
On April 10, 1860, five-and-a-half weeks before accepting the Republican nomination for president, Abraham Lincoln was in Bloomington t...
President Johnson receives ‘stern rebuke’ from locals in 1866
By Bill Kemp. Published on November 10, 2019.
There’s plenty of handwringing these days over the corrosive effects of political polarization. And yes, things are pretty bad today. T...
Area’s deadliest cholera outbreak in 1855
By Bill Kemp. Published on November 3, 2019.
During the summer of 1855, cholera swept through Bloomington and outlying communities. It was one of the largest outbreaks of this drea...
Thrilling World Series captivated nation back in 1926
By Bill Kemp. Published on October 27, 2019.
Football, it’s been clear for several decades now, is the national pastime, having assumed the mantle long held by that most American o...