Name This Peoria Landmark

Photo courtesy of Morton Malaise.

Located at the near the ramp to the boat docks on the riverfront, just north of Cefcu Center Stage at the Landing.

The Clean River, Healthy Riverfront website describes the problem:

Combined sewer overflows are a century-old problem in more than 700 U.S. communities, particularly in the Northeast and Midwest. Illinois has more than 100 communities with combined sewers, which combine sewage and stormwater into the same pipe.

During dry weather, sewage flows safely through the City’s sewers to the Greater Peoria Sanitation District wastewater treatment plant. However, about 28 times a year melting snow or rainwater can overwhelm the sewers, causing untreated sewage to overflow into the Illinois River.

Peoria must examine its sewer overflows and prepare a long-term control plan that meets Clean Water Act requirements and protects the Illinois River. This plan must be submitted to U.S. EPA and Illinois EPA by December 2008.

Those interested can sign up for an email notification whenever an overflow alert is in effect.

Mover of Mountains and Men

Billy Dennis: “This is the R. G. LeTourneau statue in Glen Oak Park, near the tennis courts. He built a tractor manufacturing plant at the site on North Adans in Averyville that Komatsu now uses.”

LeTourneau Technologies: “The LeTourneau name became synonymous with earthmoving worldwide. R. G. LeTourneau was largely responsible for the invention and development of many types of earthmoving machines that are in wide use today. He designed and built machines using technology that was years, and sometimes decades, ahead of his time, and became recognized worldwide as a leader in the development and manufacture of heavy equipment. The use of rubber tires in earthmoving; numerous improvements relating to scrapers; the development of low pressure heavy-duty rubber tires; the two-wheeled tractor unit (Tournapull); electric wheel drive, and mobile offshore drilling platforms, are all attributed to R. G. LeTourneau’s ingenuity. During his lifetime, he held hundreds of patents on inventions relating to earthmoving equipment, manufacturing processes and machine tools. His factories supplied 70 percent of all heavy earthmoving equipment used by the Allied armed forces during World War II. LeTourneau also pioneered numerous manufacturing processes and the development of specialized machine tools.”

TIME Magazine, Mar 25, 1940: “By 1932 his three-year-old firm of R. G. LeTourneau, Inc. was headed for the rocks after losing money on two big excavation contracts. His backers advised him to give up contracting, concentrate on manufacturing his dirt-moving machinery. He did. Three years later his profits had jumped 1,026% to $586,378 and he had put up another plant in Peoria, Ill., to be near big Caterpillar Tractor Co. which powered his machinery.”

Formerly known as the Sears Block, now known as Caterpillar’s parking lot.

Congrats, BeanCounter.

 

Charter Oak Pond, located off of Orange Prairie Road in the highly desirable Charter Oak Subdivision. The structure in the middle of the pond is some sort of windmill. A more recent photo shows the lake covered in moss and the windmill conspicuously missing. If you look closely, you can still see the base.

Original photos by contributor Gary.

701 W. 7th Street, Peoria’s mineral springs (#237) reside on this property.

Illinois Department of Commerce website:

Peoria Mineral Springs, free-flowing for more than 14,000 years, is Peoria’s oldest landmark. The purity of the water enticed many brewers and helped to create Peoria’s successful brewery industry. In 1850, Ransom Hickey founded the Peoria Mineral Springs Bottling Works on 7th St, across from the springs. The firm operated in a long, red building at the foot of Union Hill. Peach Cider, Lithia Seltzer, and Rose Malt were some of the beverages it marketed.

Peoria Mineral Springs became the site for Peoria’s first utility, the Peoria Water Works, on Feb 1, 1843 when Col A. O. Garrett, Norman Purple, and William Moss received a charter from Gov. Thomas Ford (who is buried in Springdale Cemetery). They built a house on the site to be used as the headquarters. The house has been home to Zealy Moss, William Moss, Ransom Hickey, and Preston Clark. The Spencer Street Hill, which runs by the house, is Peoria’s only remaining cobblestone street.

Notice the CILF (Central Illinois Landmarks Foundation) plaque on the stone gate entrance, and the wood sign on the front of the building.

A guy who was working on his car in the driveway says the house is for sale at a price of well under $100,000. An MLS search turned up nothing.