r/Illinoishistory

Spent a couple months researching Galena and ended up making a video about it. The thing that hooked me: in 1845 it was the second-largest city in Illinois, producing about 80% of America's lead, with the busiest port on the upper Mississippi north of St. Louis. Ulysses S. Grant lived there before the Civil War.

Then the rail roads went around it. By 1900 the town had lost more than half its population. About 3,000 people live there today.

Leaned heavily on the Alfred W. Mueller Historical Collection on galenaillinois.com. Anyone from that part of the state — is there local history I missed?

https://youtu.be/QPgKGi7GSJc?si=XspsaUxf4TdFtMKV

Been digging into Cairo for the past few weeks for a video and figured I'd share what I found here.

The thing that surprised me most: in 1920 Cairo's population was 15,203 — that same year Memphis had under 30,000. Cairo had seven railroads running into it, sat at the biggest river confluence in North America, and served as Grant's Civil War headquarters in 1862. By every reasonable measure it should have become a major American city.

What got it instead was a slow structural killing nobody noticed. The 1929 Mississippi bridge crossed south of town. The 1937 Ohio bridge did the same. Suddenly travelers could go between Missouri and Kentucky without ever stopping at the confluence. The ferry industry collapsed. The hotels emptied. By 1960 — before any of the racial unrest most people associate with Cairo — the town had already lost 40% of its population purely from being passed by.

Today there are 1,500 people there. The grocery store shut last year. The hospital closed in '86.

Pulled a lot from the Bonham Museum and the Lincoln Presidential Library archives. If anyone here grew up in Cairo or has family from Alexander County, I'd genuinely love to hear what local memory says I missed.

https://youtu.be/M84ybFM-tpI?si=Hz6MwJ2up4_UkI10