(upbeat music) - Will you consider this?

To make it to the age I am is one thing, but to make it to 200 years old is another thing.

And the City of Canton is doing just that.

I have the executive director of the Canton Chamber of Commerce with me here, Carla Bobell, and the official unofficial historian for the City of Canton, Mike Walters.

Thanks so much for being here, guys.

- You bet, thank you.

- Thank you for having us.

- Yeah, so let's talk about Canton.

We all know where it is.

It's sort of west and a little bit south of Peoria.

There's no real easy way to get there.

- Nope.

(laughs) - But it is still standing, still thriving after 200 years.

So what's the most in, are you a long time, lifetime Cantonite?

- You know, I am not, our historian is, I actually grew up in Elmwood, but moved there by marriage and so have been over there for over 20 years.

So.

- So that counts.

- It does count, you know, once you get past the 20 barrier, I think it counts.

But Mike has been there all of his life.

- All your life.

- I've been there a long time.

As far as Canton, it used to be a factory town.

We had a factory, it was called P&O, named for Parlin and Orendorff, and it sat on 37 acres.

It employed up to 2,500 people, and that's back in 1890 to 1912.

- Wow.

- It employed that many people.

And because of that, the town kept on growing and growing and growing.

We also have had some good school districts and park districts where we do well at that, and that's kept people moving in.

The only devastating thing was December of 1983, International Harvester, who had bought Parlin and Orendorff, they closed the doors on us and that devastated us for a few years.

But I noticed in the last few years, we've been bouncing back and we'll do it again.

- Right, so P&O became Harvester?

- They sold in 1919.

P&O sold to International Harvester for 18 and a half million dollars.

And the family stayed around town and that's why you have some Ingersoll money and some Parlin money and some Orendorff money.

They all come from the same family, which is P&O.

So they left us quite a little bit of money as far as the community, and that helps every year.

- Mm-hmm, but 2,500 people being employed by the company, back in the day, that was really something.

- That's right.

- We were a booming community.

- Yeah.

- When that was happening.

- 1911, we had 11,400 people.

- [Christine] And what is it now?

- About 11,400 people.

(laughs) No, I don't know how many but it's pretty close, I think, so.

- Yeah.

Interesting.

It wasn't easy to get there then either back in those days.

- No, no it wasn't.

- It's always a beautiful drive though, Canton is very blessed with a lot of trees and we have a lot of water.

(Carla laughs) - A lot of water around.

Yeah.

So there were a few coal mines in Canton, but mostly they were- - Outside of Canton.

- Okay.

- Lewiston and Farmington had quite a few of them too.

- All right.

- But one of the first ones started - It was 10 miles south of Lewiston, was one of the first ones.

- One of the first coal mines, all right.

But then that went by the wayside because it's sulfur, high sulfur burning coal, right?

- Very good.

Yes, you're right.

- I remember that much, wish I didn't.

All right, so an interesting thing.

So 1825, January, 1825 is, you were founded.

So what happened?

How did that come about?

Who moved there?

Who decided this was gonna happen?

- Oh, Isaac Swan and Nathan Jones was the two that come there and they were brother-in-laws and they really started.

Nathan Jones gave him some land and said, "If you stay in our catchall," that was called a building, a catchall, "you can build your house and when you're done, you can own your land."

And he offered land, but he also owned the square and the square was businesses only.

So as time went on, that's the way it grew.

The business grew and they gave away the lots and with it, Jones Park, our middle square, being the same.

- Uh huh.

Interesting.

One thing that I did see when I was looking up the Canton history is, we'll talk to you in a little bit.

- Yeah, he's the historian.

(group laughs) - That you had 17 cigar manufacturing company?

I mean, do we grow- - [Carla] With that many people in town, I guess.

- Tobacco around here or what was that all about?

- No idea, I do know down at our museum, they have probably got 40 different cigar boxes for different companies, and there was a lot of 'em.

I mean, there was, but most of the pictures I've got of people, they're standing there with a cigar, the men are.

I mean, yeah, but you're right.

They did sell a lot of cigars and we even had cigar box factories that made boxes for 'em in our town.

- That's just nuts.

And so was I right, were there 17 or were there 71?

I don't remember what the number was, but it was a lot.

I'm just going.

- It was 71 if you count all of them.

- Okay.

- If you just count a few of them, no, I meant at one time.

- Okay.

- But this guy bought this building, then he did.

It's funny to look at it because you'll see one in a building and then he'll move over two buildings and this one will move over here four buildings and it's sort of cute.

- They're already set up.

They might as well, yeah.

It's recycling at its best.

And so the Ingersoll family now, they did a lot for the community, and Alice Ingersoll Gymnasium, I mean, anybody who's been to any basketball tournament around central Illinois, they've been to the Alice Ingersoll Gym.

So did she donate the money for that, or?

- Yes, I'm surprised you brought that up.

That's great.

There was a Parlin, Parlin and Orendorff, the P, the Parlin had three kids.

No, I'm taking it back.

They had one kid, Alice, a daughter, and then she had three kids.

But during the years, they all passed away without anybody- - Without any children.

- Without any children.

So we do get $3.1 million a year from that family as far as Canton.

It mostly goes to churches, it goes to organizations, it goes to the school, the major part goes to the school district, the park district, the library, they all get a, and the hospital, they all get a major part of it.

And then a lot of it goes to churches, it goes to Elks and stuff like that.

- A few non-profits.

- Yeah.

Nonprofits.

- Could you imagine having your money work still?

- For all those years.

- All those years.

- How long ago did she pass away or do you have any idea?

- I don't remember her.

I know the last child passed in '72, that opened up all the, what I wanna say, all the money coming in.

- Right, gosh.

- He died in '72.

- So that's why I know a lot of people, when they do travel to Canton for a game, the gym that they're usually going to is the Alice Ingersoll Gym, and it's very historical with the barrel roof.

- Mm-hmm.

- And I know a lot of people will say, "Why is the gym not connected to the school?"

And it's because the old Canton High School used to be located over- - There.

- Where that gym is.

- Okay.

- And the school used to be right there on Walnut and Main.

So that is why, and we have kept that gym, 'cause it's just, it's one of those cherished things that we have in our community that we love.

- And there's a lot, you have, what's the oldest building still standing in Canton?

- There's a house over on Avenue C that was built, I believe, in 1861.

And there might be older ones than that.

I'm not sure about that.

- Maybe some farmhouses - Yeah.

Farmhouses and stuff.

- That are now in city limits.

- Exactly.

- That were farmhouses at the time.

- Exactly.

- A lot of the downtown buildings too, even though we've been through a few things with a tornado, one that came through in '75 that tore into the downtown quite a bit.

But there are still quite a few of those buildings that are at least over 100, 130 years old that are downtown still that we love.

- Which is really a testament to preserving the history of the community.

- Yes.

Yes.

- We've had, like the Opera House, we were talking about that earlier, about the Opera House.

The Opera House was there for, it was built in 1891.

In 1893, it got a fire.

And then for the next 113 years, until 2016, it went through two tornadoes, two big fires, and then finally an explosion got it.

But Canton's lost a lot of buildings on the square but it's not because of Canton, it's just- - It's just things that happen.

- Things that happened.

- And the Opera House building, when it was built, it was the place to go for entertainment.

It was vaudeville at its best.

I mean, think about, the town was booming with International Harvester.

And so vaudeville shows, there's a picture we have, isn't it Charlie Chaplin?

- Yeah, Charlie Chaplin was out front of it.

- Was there.

And so, as then it became a movie theater.

And then unfortunately, the theater portion had to be taken off.

But a gentleman came and kind of restored it into business suites.

- Yeah, offices.

Yes.

- So to speak, yes.

It was retail on the main level.

And then offices, in fact, the Chamber of Commerce was up in that building- - At the time of the explosion?

- Of the time of the explosion, which happened in 2016.

- [Christine] And it was a gas explosion?

- It was a gas explosion.

- And did they ever determine exactly where?

- We don't know if they did.

They haven't really let it out.

And there was a person killed in there.

So we sort of.

- It was a life lost through that process.

But I think there was just, there was digging going on for those purposes and it just hit a gas line and- - Boom.

- I guess it just, yeah.

I know it hit national news.

- It did.

- When it happened and so- - [Christine] And it shook lot of the buildings?

- Yes, it did.

- Yes.

In fact, at that time, that's kinda how I got involved in the chamber.

The chamber director at that time, it affected all of the businesses, really, downtown.

It didn't really maybe affect their buildings completely, but the windows, 'cause when the explosion went out and then it sucked back in and it sucked all the windows out onto the sidewalks from those buildings.

That was the, so then you have exposed buildings with no windows, so.

But there was no looting that happened.

Nothing ever happened.

The town really pulled together.

And at that time, Amanda Atchley, who's the chamber director, was always having meetings for those downtown businesses.

And my husband has a business downtown.

So I was going to those meetings and I'm like, "I wanna help you.

I don't know what we need to do here, but I want to help."

- Let me know some way.

- Yeah.

- Somehow.

- Yes.

- And thus you are the executive director.

- And then she hired me as her assistant at that time and now I'm the director.

But it was just a time that we really all came together.

But that opera house in our community was the jewel building downtown.

- It was beautiful.

- It was beautiful.

- It was beautiful.

- And it's been kind of sitting there.

- Empty lot.

- Looking kind of sad.

For all of us, it's just a bad memory when we look at it and when folks come into town for when we have events, you know, it's just kind of an eyesore.

But.

- Ah ha, here we go.

- That is all about to change.

That is all about to change.

We are working with the city.

We actually have a committee that's been put together on designing a green space for that lot.

It's big.

Like that building was big.

It was three stories for us and downtown was big.

And so we have been actually working with Farnsworth Group and they have been designing and they are going to start, digging, I guess.

- Digging.

- Breaking ground in the end of, towards the end of this month and next, beginning of the 1st of October.

- Okay.

- And it's a beautiful green space and the coolest part, I love this part, is we're gonna have a brand new stage with someone who plans events.

It's really needed.

The stage will be sitting exactly- - Where the old stage was?

- Where the vaudeville stage and the old stage for the Opera House- - Wow.

- Was, and so we're still going to call it the Opera House Plaza.

- I love that.

- We're just gonna keep that history, the entrance is going to mimic- - The arch.

- The beautiful entrance arch that it had on there and they're gonna mimic that.

So there's a lot of nods to the history of the opera house and we wanna continue that.

- Well, and it will be an outdoor stage?

- It will be.

- Yes.

- All right.

But it can be used for any number of things?

- Any number of things.

- You'll come up with something new.

- I mean honestly, you could have weddings.

I know, we're looking forward to maybe some new events we could actually host there and wanna bring music in the park back little more on steroids, right?

'Cause we'll have that opportunity since we'll have this new stage and it's just a beautiful space.

It'll be a beautiful space.

- So technically, January of 2025 is the 200 year birthday.

But then you'll move into, have different activities, and one great big week in June.

- Yes.

- So what exactly will go on?

How will you start in January?

What are your plans, and having this historian, is he gonna, are you gonna point out certain things from certain dates throughout the history?

- Well, yes.

We're going to, first thing, we've got a time capsule that we've got, and we've had it now for, back in 1925, when they had a centennial then.

- Okay.

- 100 year birthday.

And when they got done with that, they said, "We need to send something on to the future."

So they sent on a, like a stage coach money box, and they filled it full of all different stuff.

A lot of people around here and other places will bury 'em.

They had the chance of taking it to the library that was a pretty decent new building.

So they left it there.

54 years later, in 1950, 1958, they tear down, or don't tear down.

They tear down a house and they build another, huh?

- The new library?

- Yeah, the new one and it was a new library and it was about four blocks away.

Well, the first thing everybody worried about is, is that time capsule still in there?

Well, about six years ago, I go down to the library for the fun of it and they take me back in the back and sure enough, there was a bunch of stuff on it, but there was that time capsule.

- It was being used as a stool probably.

Or I guess a step stool.

- That's exactly right.

So in the meantime, a lot of towns will bury theirs and then they got water in 'em or whatever.

Ours have never seen rain and it's gonna be 100 years old next September.

So we're gonna open that time capsule right then and there.

And I'm hoping that there's a lot of stuff that's gonna be left to Canton people that their relatives, their great great grandpa wrote a letter and there's some, I've got a list of what's in there.

There's pretty good merchandise and stuff like that.

So it's gonna be fun to open it.

And we're not gonna open it as a group.

We're gonna do it as a community.

We'll get everybody there and open up this time capsule.

And it's really neat.

The time capsule's really neat.

- It's on display right now at Mid-American National Bank, but it will eventually end up at the Canton Area Museum, Heritage Museum that we have in our community.

So it will be there on display for everyone to see.

- [Mike] If you don't mind me saying, I'm having a blast with this time capsule.

- I bet you are.

- I am.

- I bet you are.

- I'd like to, the chairman of that time capsule, his name was BM Chipperfield, and he was a lawyer, statesman, senator from Louisiana.

I mean, he was all over the place.

Very intelligent man.

And he wrote a letter to the future and you have to keep on writing it to the, like he's chairman, he's gonna write me a letter and then I gotta write a letter to the next one.

- Okay.

- And his letter, if I can just say a paragraph.

- No, let's hear it.

This ought to be good.

- Let's hear it.

- "This, doubtless, will be the first time you have ever received a letter from a respectable shade, all shades being equally respective.

But so far as this is concerned, honors are quite easy, for this is the first time I have written a letter to a person who has not yet been born."

- Interesting.

- And this goes on and on.

And I just love, I've read it five times because it's really cute the way he's done it.

But I think the community's gonna get a nice enjoyment from this time capsule too.

And then we have to place one back for 100 years from now.

- Yeah.

- So we're working on that.

- Working on that now.

- Yeah.

- Well, yeah, so did you find out, did they have any inkling of what the world was going to be like in 100 years, now?

- No.

No.

- No.

- In fact, he says a couple times, he's probably a speck of dirt by now.

He was, I mean, that is what he says.

- That's fair.

- And yeah.

And he says that, "But I will be looking over you and your group to see how the group does and they better do a good job."

- Oh yeah.

- No pressure.

- Yeah, no pressure at all.

- No pressure.

- And his last name was?

- Chipperfield - Chipperfield.

- BM, Bernard M. Chipperfield, and he's buried in Canton.

And we do thing called a cemetery walk and he's gonna be on our cemetery walk this year.

- [Christine] Oh, so you can hear his story then.

- So we can hear his story too.

Yeah.

- That's one of the events that will be going on, when you were talking about, you know, the actual bicentennial begins in January.

- Right.

- However.

- You're gonna make it last.

- We're gonna do an, you know, like the intense week of celebration will be June 20th through the 29th.

So it'll be 10 days and of just all kinds of things celebrating our community.

- Such as?

- And one of those is a cemetery walk that will be done.

And so they've been doing cemetery walks for quite a few years as a fundraiser for the museum.

- Museum.

- In town.

And so now they'll be doing these and they'll be taking from all those years and be doing them and doing them often, honestly.

But we're doing a 5K run, you know, there'll be things like that.

There will also be a historical bus tour of Canton.

So anyone even from out of town, you just love history.

- Mm-hmm.

- This would be an excellent thing to do and Spoon River College is actually hosting that, their outreach center is going to be doing that.

We're going to have some Chautauqua performances.

So those are like educational pieces on people that are performing live, very similar to what a cemetery walk is, that's giving, that's portraying, someone historical in costume and everything.

So there will be some of those performances done.

There'll be a choral with narration called Lincoln to the Dust Bowl.

That performance will be exciting.

And we'll have that.

Kinda ice cream social, kids time.

The Park district is going to do a game night doing different kinds of games from all the 200 years.

So looking back and looking at all the different games that would've been done all through the years.

And so they'll be going to do that.

So.

- So a Canton Monopoly game.

(group laughs) Something like that.

- Yeah, something like that.

Actually is Macomb that has the tag on that, yes.

- I saw that.

- You can go there and actually play that game, so.

But those are some of the things.

We do have a very big exciting thing that we're going to be doing that is a very big part of Canton's history.

But I can't tell you yet.

- But it's a secret.

- It's a secret.

But I will say to everyone who's watching that if you want to find out what that big secret is, you just need to go, we have a Facebook page that's Canton Illinois Bicentennial and that's our Facebook page, which has a lot of history going on right now.

And then if you go to cantonillinois.org, the website, we have a tab on there that you can go and see all of the information.

- Find it all out.

- It'll give, yeah.

Once we make that big announcement, which will be sometime in October, I think, which we're very excited about, they will, then it'll have the whole schedule on there.

- Awesome.

- You can still go on there now even though- - Yes, you can.

- Because they've always got a quiz every day about something and you can figure it out.

- [Christine] Were you responsible for the quiz?

'Cause it's history, right?

- He's not allowed to say that.

- But anyway there's a quiz and then- - We wouldn't be doing this without Mike.

(laughs) - You can read on there and figure it out and the next day it gives the answer and it also tells things that's in the time capsule box.

So you can keep track of that before, it's gonna end just the day before we open it, so it works out perfect.

You can track and see what all is in that time capsule.

- That's in there, yeah.

- One at a time.

- Yeah.

- One thing that a lot of people don't know is that Canton was a stop on the Underground Railroad long before, long before even the Civil War, I think, was it?

Is that true?

- They don't know exactly what year, there was not anybody.

We do know it went as far as Farmington, but we're not sure what's what in Canton.

That was, we were founded there in '25, but that's been added on and taken off because of knowledge as time goes on.

But you're right, it did get close to us, if not there, so.

- [Christine] We don't know that much though.

- Yeah.

- Okay.

- I think the underground was everywhere, I feel like.

- Pretty much.

I think so.

I think so.

- Yeah.

- So what do you look forward to most?

We have about maybe three and a half minutes left, about this big celebration.

That you made it to 200 years- - I know.

- Is pretty amazing.

- Well, we've been planning, we are a small committee of five, of five of us, and Mike is our chair and as the chamber director, it just makes sense that I would be a part of that.

But our committee is now taking any type of event registration, so we're inviting any organizations or businesses that would like to host an event to submit those to us by the end of this year.

And then if they do that, then we will include them in all of our marketing and everything that we are going to be doing.

But I just, you know, we're getting special banners to put up on the polls downtown and it's just going to be fun to see how everyone wants to get involved.

- As far as me looking forward to next year for this happening, I can't wait, number one.

Number two, I hope everybody enjoys how much time this has taken.

I hope they wake up in the morning and they say, "What's going on today in Canton?"

- Right.

- You know, and the next day, because 1975, they had a sesquicentennial and people just- - And then the tornado.

- Exactly, and then the tornado.

That's exactly right.

And then, but everybody that went there, always comments about everything that happened that year.

We'd like to be part of that and them to say, "You know what, they did a good job at doing that."

- It'll have the traditional opening ceremonies and closing ceremonies too.

- But that will be in June?

- Those will be in the June.

Yes.

- There'll be little things- - Concentrating.

- Big things going on, we're hoping.

- Yeah, throughout the year, I think there will be different things.

Our chamber, the Canton Area Chamber of Commerce, is celebrating 100 years in 2025.

So we will be doing something extra special at our annual dinner that's usually in the first quarter of the year and doing something along with the bicentennial.

Our fall festival happens in September, so their focus is going to be on, the theme would be Bicentennial, and then the Spoon River Community Chorus, the Spoon River College Community Chorus, we will be doing a performance in December and that will probably have a little bit of a touch with the bicentennial.

So there'll be some things going on throughout the year, at least that I know of.

But a concentrated celebration that we invite everyone to come and enjoy in that June 20th to 29th in 2025.

- We'll it'll be a fun time.

- And we also have to pack the time capsule for the next- - Yes, that's right.

- That's right.

You really have to think about what you put in there.

- That's right.

- Okay.

Well that sounds like a challenge.

Another challenge.

- Another challenge.

- But wait till the end of next year or wait till you have to start stuffing it.

- Yes.

(laughs) Or have ideas already.

- Yeah, or I guess, take notes, yeah, just take notes on it.

Well, thanks so much for being here and sharing this.

It's very exciting.

We'll have to take a trip down there.

- Yes.

Please do.

- June 20th to?

- 29th.

- 29th.

- 2025.

- Sounds like a good plan.

All right.

- Thank you.

- And thanks to your small committee for putting all this work in too.

- Thank you.

- And thank you for being here.

Don't forget that if you need a road trip next year, that might be one of the places to go.

- Absolutely.

- Thanks for joining us.

- Thank you.

- Be well.

(upbeat music) (upbeat music continues) (upbeat music continues)