Charlie Schlenker

Here is a story of hooligans, pranks, and university hijinks from the early part of the last century. It's part of McHistory, GLT's occasional series using letters, articles, and diaries from McLean County citizens written in times gone by.

And now, one of GLT's recurring features during Sound Ideas using letters, articles, and diaries from McLean County citizens written in times gone by.

Today's McHistory is about the Civil War Battle of Prairie Grove, Arkansas, which took place Dec. 7, 1862.

Next month, the Illinois General Assembly returns to Springfield for its annual fall veto session in which it considers whether to override the governor's rejections and changes to bills passed by lawmakers.

At the turn of the 20th century, a certain woman journalist put out four columns a week. She was a prolific writer turning in 2,000 words at a crack, a wonderful interviewer, and nobody's fool.

Madam Annette talked with everyone from businessmen and public officials to jail inmates. During GLT's recurring series McHistory we hear portions of one of Madam Annette's columns as she explores a coal mine under Bloomington. McLean County Museum of History Development Director Beth Whisman reads the column with comment from Archivist Bill Kemp.

In 1824 the area that would become McLean County had only 15 settler families. By 1830 when the county came into being the population was still very sparse.

We dip into a half century of diaries of life in McLean County by a carpenter and handyman who wrote fiction and poetry and a log of his daily rounds in Bloomington-Normal. Charles Morgan wrote of freight hopping to Kansas City, going to Nickelodeon movies in the 1910s, the 1918 flu which killed more than 3% of the world population.

An early Bloomington settler and one time friend of Abe Lincoln was also a southern sympathizer. Sarah Withers wrote on May 4th 1861, "This day our nation is to be disgraced by the inauguration of Abe Lincoln as President. How Humiliating!"

A selection from the Withers Diary is part of this episode of GLT's recurring series, McHistory.

In this Black History Month edition of our Sound Ideas recurring series McHistory, you'll hear from a Spanish American War Soldier from Bloomington who writes home from eastern Cuba.

Julius Witherspoon returned to Bloomington after the war, but he was not well, perhaps because of a tropical disease. Witherspoon died a few years later at the age of 46.

McHistory is a co production of GLT and the McLean County Museum of History. This episode included the voices of Museum Marketing Director Jeff Woodard, and Librarian Bill Kemp, and was produced by GLT's Charlie Schlenker.

Lobbying days in Springfield happen every year in which interest groups throng to the state capitol to push for certain legislation. As part of GLT's joint project with the McLean County Museum of History, we take you back more than a century to hear what was an important issue of 1909.

This McHistory starts with a Chicago and Alton Railroad Trip.

The hamlet of Danvers once hosted a sanatorium for those struggling with addiction to alcohol. As part of GLT's joint project with the McLean County Museum of History, McHistory examines this particular cure and the era that lead to it.

America's most successful woman playwright is all but unknown today.