Midwest Adventures: Visiting America's Theatrical Royalty
Bikers stop to check out an eye-catching Route 66 mural painted on the side of a building in Pontiac.
Picturesque Pontiac
Artists Paint The Town In Central Illinois
Story and photos By RANDY MINK
Special to the Journal & Topics Newspapers
As if it didn't have enough photo opportunities, the small town of Pontiac, Ill., now has 19 outdoor murals for visitors to admire.
Its downtown landscape changed forever the last weekend in June after more than 150 artists from around the country---a creative contingent known as the Walldogs---gathered to paint 18 wall-size murals commemorating the town's commercial, social and cultural history. The new artwork joins Pontiac's stunning Route 66 shield mural on back of the Route 66 Hall of Fame and Museum, its top tour attraction.
Besides paintings, visitors to this Central Illinois town can pose with impressive examples of architecture and sculpture. On the grounds of the Livingston County Courthouse is a life-size bronze statue of Abraham Lincoln leaning on a fence, his stovepipe hat on the post. The statue, dedicated in 2006, is a memorial to Lincoln's many visits to Pontiac, where the young lawyer tried cases in the circuit court. The grandiose 1875 courthouse, with its ornate clocktower, is a sight in itself and listed on the National Register of Historic Places.
Through August, groups in Pontiac also can pose with some of the artist-created dog sculptures stationed around the courthouse square. The fiberglass dogs, including ones decorated with an Illinois cornfield and a Chicago Cubs jersey, will be auctioned off at the end of the summer.
Many visitors to Pontiac make a beeline to the free-admission Route 66 Hall of Fame and Museum, a treasure house of Mother Road memorabilia. Exhibits focus on iconic Illinois restaurants, motels and gas stations that served motorists on the historic highway that ran from Chicago to California. The trip down memory lane continues with 166 color photographs by Michael Campanelli, a professional photographer who toured Route 66 from one end to the other on a road trip in 2002. Some of the second-level galleries occupy old jail cells, their heavy doors, window bars, cement floors, even sinks and a toilet, still in place---another photo op. (The 1900 building once housed the city hall and fire department.)
Also housed in the old brick municipal complex are the Livingston County War Museum and Old City Hall Shoppes, a collection of shops selling antiques, gifts and Route 66 souvenirs. The excellent war museum, staffed by veterans, covers American military history and heroes from World War I to current operations in Iraq and Afghanistan.
The giant Route 66 mural on the building's back wall, the ultimate photo op, was recently landscaped with actual bricks from the original Route 66, which ran through Pontiac on its way from Chicago to California. A new addition to the outdoor exhibit area is a wishing well that originally stood at the Wishing Well Motel in Countryside, Ill.
One of the most popular new murals also pays homage to Pontiac's Route 66 heritage. Sponsored by the Route 66 Association of Illinois, the sunset scene shows a bright yellow late '50s Chevy.
One mural recalls Lincoln's visit to a Pontiac home, where he attended a reception after a speech at the Presbyterian church. A Coca-Cola mural depicts World War II planes and a pilot drinking a bottle of Coke, while the RCA Victor wall design shows the iconic white dog and a vintage Victrola.
More nostalgia surfaces in the Palace of Sweets mural that remembers a 1920s candy store and soda fountain. The Allen Candy Co. mural depicts a local factory founded in the 1890s.
Another design chronicles the Chautauqua Days assemblies held in Pontiac from 1898-1929. The summer cultural fests, inspired by the Chautauqua Institution at Lake Chautauqua, N.Y., brought to Pontiac the best speakers, preachers and entertainers of the day.
Historic Chautauqua Park, surrounded on three sides by the Vermilion River, has two of Pontiac's three swinging bridges. The trademark bridges were built so workers living on the south side of town could get to factories on the north side. The third bridge, in Riverside Park, was built in 1978 for recreational and aesthetic value. The new Vermilion River mural, in the form of a postage stamp, shows a swinging bridge and a 19th century gristmill.
Besides art and history, downtown Pontiac has restaurants, cafes and specialty shops.
The Old Log Cabin, a landmark eatery on the edge of town, abounds with Route 66 nostalgia. When it opened in 1924, it faced Illinois Route 4 (later to be called Route 66) but was lifted up and moved, literally by horsepower, to face Route 66 when it was repositioned and became a four-lane highway.
Historic homes open for tours include the 1858 Jones House, the oldest brick home in Pontiac, and Yost House Museum, an 1898 home that portrays the life of an upper-middle class family around the turn of the 20th century.
Pontiac is located just off Interstate 55, about two hours southwest of downtown Chicago.
Contact: Pontiac Tourism, 800-835-2055, www.visitpontiac.org.