July 30th, 2021 … Summer of Fun continues! Day 3 Route 66 Caravan – Pontiac, IL

We rallied up in the large parking lot at the Hollywood Casino, to make our caravan to our next destination. We traveled on Interstate 55, from Joliet, crossing over the Chicago River. 

We passed the De Plaines Conservation Area. The Des Plaines Fish and Wildlife Area is situated between the Des Plaines and Kankakee Rivers 10 miles south of Joliet and 55 miles southwest of Chicago in Will County. The U.S. government owned the land until 1948, at which time the Illinois Department of Conservation acquired the site. This state conservation area consists of fields, woods, thickets, marshes and riverine habitat as well as 80 acres of a natural prairie remnant, designated as a state dedicated nature preserve.

We crossed the Kankakee River, which originates near South Bend, Indiana and flows west for about 140 miles until its confluence with the Des Plains River near Channahon forming the Illinois River.  Approximately 5,800 square miles in portions of 22 counties in Illinois and Indiana presently drain into the river. Originally about 80% of the length of the Kankakee flowed through an immense wetland known as the Grand Kankakee Marsh. The size of the marsh is constantly debated; however, the area most of the public would identify as “wet land” was probably near 500,000 acres. Include different types of habitat that support wetland plants and it may have been twice that size.

There is not much to see on the interstate, but I did spot this cool old barn and it makes me wonder about its history. If the walls could talk, I am sure there is so much they could tell us!

We arrived at the Livingston County 4H Fairgrounds, our home for one night. We enjoyed a great lunch at the Pontiac Family Kitchen. We had 4 entrée choices. I got the sweet & sour chicken, but after seeing Charlie’s Broasted Chicken I was reconsidering my choice.

Our first stop after lunch was the Route 66 Association Hall of Fame and Museum. It is the largest collection of Route 66 memorabilia in Illinois! It is free to visit and the museum is home to artifacts, images, maps, and personal histories of some of the men and women who helped to make the Mother Road an important national byway. The Bob Waldmire VW bus and Road Yacht are here, but I will talk more about them later.

Pontiac is home to 23 outdoor murals which, in addition to being beautiful pieces of public art, depict its varied local history. You can follow the red painted footprints on the downtown sidewalks for a comfortable walking tour of all of the murals. You can also use your mobile device to scan the QR code located under or next to many of the murals to guide you from one to the next and hear a bit about their design and significance.

The largest mural is the Route 66 shield found on the back of the Illinois Route 66 Hall of Fame and Museum. At its base are bricks from the original Route 66 alignment running through Pontiac and it is the perfect backdrop for a photo of your Route 66 journey. This is our first mural in Pontiac. It was designed and painted by Pontiac's own Diaz Sign Art. In front of the mural you can drive your car, motorcycle, or other mode of transportation, or just stand on original Route 66 bricks for a photo.

Eighteen of the murals were painted by the “Walldogs.” Who are they? They are a collection of sign painters and muralists who came to town in the summer of 2009. The more than 150 artists painted the entire set of murals in just four days.

Allen Candy Mural was designed by Jay Allen of Machesney Park, IL and is located in the 200 block of West Madison St.

The Bloomington, Pontiac, & Joliet Interurban Railroad mural design comes from Rob Estes of Brushstroke Signs in Paducah, KY. 

Chautauqua Assembly mural was designed by David and Susie Butler and Dan Sawatzky. It can be found in the 100 block of East Madison St.

Daniels Oil mural recalls a time in the past when gas stations provided full service to their customers and were a place to gather all of the community news and gossip. 

The artist for Drink Coca-Cola mural was Sonny Franks, who lives near Atlanta, Georgia. The trolley driver calls it the Corvair mural, because of the planes. He told us that the artist had no idea what he was going to paint for a mural, when he arrived. He was inspired by a veteran's stories about his service and this mural was born.

The Pontiac on Route 66 mural was designed by Tom and Kathy Durham of St. Louis Missouri. The city of Pontiac has many mini-cars around their downtown. I love how this one matches the mural!

The Roszell's Soda Shop mural was designed by Pontiac's own Joe Diaz. Although the representation here is fictional, it recalls an earlier time when soda fountains were staples in almost every American small town.

The Scatterday Soda mural was designed by Carole Bersin. 

The Vermilion River flows in a northerly direction from its origin in Livingston and Ford Counties in north central Illinois, eventually emptying into the Illinois River, near Oglesby. This mural was designed by Francisco Vargo in his trademark postage stamp style and is fittingly located next to the Vermilion River.

The Weekly Sentinel mural design is by Nancy Bennett of Dannco, Inc

We took a private trolley tour of Pontiac, where we enjoyed the murals and the swinging bridges. Pontiac has three unique swinging bridges for pedestrian traffic. All three bridges cross the Vermilion River.  Although the wooden walkways on the bridges have been replaced many times, the ironwork on the bridges is original.  Flooding has damaged the bridges often in the past, but the City always rebuilds them and makes them safe for pedestrians. One might ask, why does Pontiac have swinging bridges? Beginning in 1881, Pontiac began to attract shoe manufacturing businesses. Over the course of about 50 years, there were eight companies making shoes in Pontiac. In the early days, there was only one bridge across the Vermilion River, the Mill Street Bridge. Since show factories were located on the north end of town, this meant that any workers who lived on the south side would have to travel west to the bridge in order to get to work.

The oldest bridge was built in July 1898 by Joliet Bridge Company and spans the Vermilion River from Riverside Drive to Play Park. Anchored by a concrete and iron structure, 190 feet long and 4 feet wide and supported by cables swung from masonry piers, the bridge was originally constructed to allow workers who lived on the south side of Pontiac to get to the shoe factories on the north side quickly, and with minimal effort. The current bridge has a wooden walkway.

The second bridge spans the river and allows pedestrians to cross from Play Park to Chautauqua Park. It was built in 1926. This bridge served two very useful purposes:  It was used by people to get easily to what was then called Riverside Park to attend a Chautauqua assembly.  This bridge, for many years, also served thousands of young children as the quickest way to get from the south side of Pontiac to the City's Camp-Humiston swimming pool that opened in 1925.

The third bridge was built in 1978. It was engineered by Illinois Contractors, Inc. This third bridge is located in Humiston-Riverside Park at the same site as an old Bloomington, Pontiac & Joliet Electric Railway bridge over the Vermilion River. 

The Bob Waldmire Experience is a must see! It is located on the 2nd floor of the Pontiac Museum Complex. The exhibit traces the artistic and spiritual development of Route 66 artist, preservationist, naturalist, and icon, Bob Waldmire. 

On the first floor you can see Bob's famous VW van, and a mural he painted on it over several years.  Then we made our way out back, behind the museum, where we could see the outside of his renovated 1966 school bus, commonly referred to as his "Road Yacht."

While working on a poster of Missouri, Waldmire became obsessed by the rich Route 66 history of the state. A small color map he did for National Parks Magazine in 1987 inspired him to make a detailed map of the entire Mother Road. It took four years of painstaking research to create the ten-page map. Waldmire used Rapidograph pens made in Germany for the map’s finer details. 

As Waldmire gave up his nomadic life to work on the map, he settled for a time back home in Springfield, laboring over his creation at the Cozy Dog. He had his own key to the business, so he could come and go as he pleased. It was around this time that Waldmire met Michael Wallis and began getting involved with the Route 66 Revival community. As writers like Wallis, Jim Ross, and Jerry McClanahan explored the history of the Mother Road through prose, Waldmire studied by charting its anatomy. Obsessively tracking down the capillaries of forgotten alignments and illuminating the bones of steel bridges.

Pontiac is also home to the last piece that Waldmire ever made; a map of the route painted on a wall 66 feet long. It was painted by his friends and family, just before his passing. It was “signed” by the artists, by leaving their hand prints in the paint. Can you see them?