Driving east on I-72 on a crisp fall Saturday, you may encounter carloads of orange-clad Illini fans, heading to Champaign-Urbana to tailgate outside Memorial Stadium or cheer the football team inside. While fall can be fun on the University of Illinois campus, the twin cities offer a multitude of treasures in spring and summer. Several […]
Mary Bohlen
Mary Bohlen is a retired journalism professor who is a regular contributor to Illinois Times. She specializes in writing about interesting places in Illinois and nearby states worthy of day or weekend trips.
Posted inArts & Culture
Pontiac is museum central in central Illinois
David Estes should ask Ancestry.com to check his DNA for a museum-founding gene. His mother, Betty, late tourism director for Pontiac, Illinois, founded the town’s popular Route 66 museum in 2004. Not to be outdone, David’s father, Dal, built the Livingston County War Museum upstairs in the same building a few months later. These days […]
Posted inArts & Culture
For President’s Day, visit Lincoln and Washington
Illinois claims four U.S. presidents so President’s Day should put us in the mood to commemorate. We can head a bit north and take in Lincoln and Washington, two central Illinois cities boasting the names of the most famous chief executives. History buffs will find lots of links to Lincoln in that city, but shoppers […]
Posted inArts & Culture
Exploring early Illinois with Pierre and Popeye
Editor’s note: This article marks the first in a series of monthly travel columns focusing on Illinois in honor of the state’s bicentennial year in 2018. It’s a good thing early state leaders moved the capital away from Kaskaskia in southwestern Illinois. Otherwise we might all be living west of the Mississippi. As students of […]
Posted inArts & Culture
Three million lights and Puff the Magic Dragon
East Peoria claims its Festival of Lights is “one of the largest, lighted nighttime festivals in the Midwest.” While such a boast is difficult to prove, visitors will encounter enough colorful, twinkling wattage to satisfy even the Grinchiest among them. The festival, which runs nightly through Dec. 31, features a drive-through park filled with displays […]
Posted inSpecial Issues
Effingham is for foodies and car lovers
Effingham, population 12,500, seems an unlikely locale for a renowned gourmet restaurant and perhaps the largest Corvette party in the world, but this town at the crossroads of I-57 and I-70 is full of surprises. While most interstate exits feature the usual dreary assortment of fast-food spots and chain motels, Effingham, 100 miles southeast of […]
Posted inSpecial Issues
Zoo, Shakespeare and history
Holding my nose in the zoo building full of big cats and apes, sampling goodies from laden family reunion tables, anticipating the first July Fourth fireworks bursting over a small lake – that’s what Miller Park meant to me as a child growing up east of Bloomington-Normal. My family also trekked to the twin cities […]
Posted inSpecial Issues
Peoria putting the play in playhouse
While Springfield has struggled for years to get a children’s museum up and running, Peoria has found the right formula for fun. At the Peoria PlayHouse, kids can splash away at a massive water table, send colorful balls whooshing through tubes and create music merely by crossing a bridge. It being Peoria, they also can […]
Posted inArts & Culture
Titanic exhibit comes to Peoria museum
Ever since Leonardo DiCaprio and Kate Winslet stood on the bow in that blockbuster movie, crowds have flocked to exhibits dedicated to all things Titanic. Swinging a trip to museums in Southampton, England, or Halifax, Nova Scotia, would be a stretch, but soon your heart can go on with a day visit to Peoria. “Titanic: […]
Posted inSpecial Issues
For Rt. 66 nostalgia, visit Atlanta
For a quick fix to get your kicks on 66, pile the family or friends into the coupe and head north to Atlanta, Illinois. Fewer than 50 miles from Springfield, Atlanta is chock full of enough Mother Road memorabilia to make your own memories. You can snap a photo under a 19-foot, hot dog-holding Paul […]
Posted inArts & Culture
Travel through history on the National Road in Illinois
PHOTO BY BRENT BOHLEN A sitting Abraham Lincoln statue across the street from the old Statehouse in Vandalia commemorates Lincoln’s term as a state legislator there. He and others succeeded in moving the state capital to Springfield and thus away from the National Road. “Road trip!” can evoke images of fun and freedom for family […]
Posted inArts & Culture
A quick trip down Memory Lane
Hungry visitors to the Do-Drop In Cafe in Mason City get a warm smile, a full stomach and a trip to nostalgia. The wall clocks have been a feature of several Mason City restaurants for decades. PHOTOS BY Brent Bohlen. When I was in seventh grade, my friends and I got our parents to drop […]
