289 – Retaining Wall & Mystery Road off High St.
Peoria Landmark #289
Scio: “I think this is a retaining wall from one of the houses on High St. Looks like this picture was taken from the dead end road that curves off High St. and goes halfway down the bluff about 2-3 houses down from Giant Oak Park.”
That is precisely where this is located.
The road was paved with brick all the way down to where it ends behind the U of I College of Medicine. Just past this very impressive retaining wall, the road curves down and to the right at which point the road resembles more of a creek bed than anything else, but curbs and steps to non-existent places still remain. It appears the road used to extent to N. State St (see map).
May 11th, 2009 at 8:20 am
I was with PI when he “shot” this, so I can’t reply. Pretty amazing structure (and this is just a section of it) and I wonder how old it is. There are also other very interesting things in the same “neck of the woods” where this is found
May 11th, 2009 at 2:07 pm
I think this is a retaining wall from one of the houses on High St. Looks like this picture was taken from the dead end road that curves off High St. and goes halfway down the bluff about 2-3 houses down from Giant Oak Park.
May 12th, 2009 at 2:44 pm
Yeah, I was gonna say the resevoir over there at the back of Moss Avenue, but pretty close to the High Street area.
May 13th, 2009 at 6:21 am
“Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall!!!!”
Am I close?
May 23rd, 2009 at 2:34 pm
Is it the bridge where MacArthur Highway goes over Garrett, down the hill from Moss?
May 25th, 2009 at 11:28 am
Leave it to PI to find something interesting off the beaten path.
May 25th, 2009 at 12:40 pm
probably where the mob buried a bunch of dead boddies, LOL
May 25th, 2009 at 2:46 pm
I just happened to walk down that road a few months ago (forgotten roads disappearing into the woods always peak my interest). When I came back up the dead end road to High St. the lady that lives in the house on the right at the top of the dead end road was outside and wanted to know what the hell I was doing. Eventually she backed off when I told her it was a nice day and I was just going for a walk. Can’t say I blame her though, if I lived there, I’d be suspicious of anyone popping up from the bottom of the bluff on a defunct road.
I’ve noticed that there are a couple old crumbling defunct roads that lead from the bottom of the bluff to Moss Ave and High street. I guess those that live at the top of the bluff don’t want to many paths up these days.
May 28th, 2009 at 9:27 am
The State Street reference by PI made me think (OK, that and an ample amount of boredom at work). After a short web search, I came across a Peoria, IL street map from 1896. The map showed that the dead end street that veers off High Street is actually a remnant of State Street. State Street used to run unbroken from High Street, down the bluff through town, around the now gone “State House Square” and then turn into “Chestnut street” which is actually State Street today.
Anyway, random interesting things.
May 29th, 2010 at 7:03 pm
This is a picture of the retaining wall behind a home on High street. The
wall was facing State Street. I played on top of the wall many times as a
child. My family lived in a Victorian style apartment that was located next
door to this home with the wall. Our apartment was owned by a gentle-
man named Ron Schneider. (I think) My neighbor on the other side was
Mrs. Maude Bradley.She owned a very beautiful Victorian home and the
land on which the Giant Oak stands today. Mrs Bradley allowed us to play
on the great oak a few times when I was a kid.
State Street started at High Street, right across from the great home of
a Dr. McGrath, and went down the hill into downtown Peoria.
I attended Washington Elem. School on Moss Avenue from 1952 to1957.
I now live in Riverside, California, but still have some great memories of
my time in Peoria
July 19th, 2010 at 4:59 pm
That wall is what we used to call Witch’s Wall when I was a kid and lived in the area. That was back in the 80′s. A rather forceful lady who seemed protective of the area around her house lived there then too. Wonder if that is the same lady Scio had the “pleasure” of meeting? Couldn’t be, right? Anyway, at that time there was a trail that lead up the corner of the bluff where the street now ends. Being the children we were, we tried to climb that trail and shimmy out onto the retaining wall overlooking the street. This always ended with someone (usually an old lady) coming out of the house screaming. Someone always came back hurt from these expeditions, usually due to rolling an ankle or falling while we “ran for our lives” down that steep trail to the field below. Natural that someone would get injure doing silly things like that, but when you are a child, the only explanation is that a Witch lives there and caused it.
January 19th, 2011 at 12:36 pm
When the University of Illinois Medical Center building was built in (I think) in the late 1970′s, basically most of this entire neighborhood was demolished to make way for it. I’m talking about the area just down the hill from High Street west of Main Street. Several streets were eliminated from use as a result – for example both Glen Oak and Globe Streets continued West of Main until the demolition of the neighborhood but not after. A street called “Gwinnerton” existed in the area which is now gone and Hillyer place, which barely still exists today, was much longer then. I have not been able to find any pictures online of the area that was destroyed pre-demolition, but if you do a Google search for “Peoria street car map” there is a website online with a somewhat hard-to-read map that shows how different the streets were in that area before the demolition occurred and the Medical Center was built.
January 20th, 2011 at 7:10 pm
OK for the record, groundbreaking for what is now known as the University of Illinois College of Medicine at 1 Illini Drive took place in 1974 and the facility was completed in 1976. That means the area was probably demolished in 1973-1974 so that’s when State Street got cut off from High Street along with lots of other changes. I’ve not been able to find much info on what was in the area before the demolition – at some point there seems to have been a bar called the “Globe Street Tap”.
January 24th, 2011 at 10:54 am
The mystery road going down the hill from High St. was called “Montague”, technically it was not State St.
March 27th, 2011 at 11:48 pm
I lived next door to Mrs. Maud Bradley from 1952 to1957-58. I could read very well and the sign on the corner of the mystery road going down the hill from HIgh St. read STATE STREET. Sorry, Greg. I passed that street everyday on my way to and from Washington Elem. School. Remember this was in the 1950′s, it may have been changed later. The house above the mystery wall was owned by a Mrs. North ( I think ). She lived there with her daughter.