(upbeat music) - [Narrator] "Illinois Stories" is brought to you by The Corporation for Public Broadcasting, Illinois Arts Council Agency and by the support of viewers like you.

Thank you.

- Hello.

Welcome to "Illinois stories".

I'm Mark McDonald.

Between Hamilton and Nauvoo are 10 acre tree houses.

One of the most unique lodging experiences you'll probably find anywhere in Illinois.

And another unique thing about this.

You're gonna learn what a tree house is but the man that put this together, built these all by himself, designed and built them all by himself.

So here's a look at 10 acre tree houses.

Bob Hopp, you've got three places here where people can stay Two are tree houses, - Yep.

- And one's an old log cabin.

We'll get a chance to see all three of them here but we're standing in front of your first tree house.

- Right.

- When did you build this one?

- This one built in 2013.

It was just a whim I had.

I'd watched "Treehouse Masters" on TV and kinda got the idea to make and do something.

And it was just gonna be my little man-cave kind of thing, hang out.

And when it turned into a rental, I showed it to a friend of mine from Nauvoo who has rental property.

And he said, you should rent this out.

And I was like, really?

(Mark laughs) I didn't think it would be that big of a deal.

But I went online and looked at other places and thought, "Well, maybe it would be."

So I did a profile and put it out on the web.

And I had my first book in 24 hours.

- Is that right?

- It was a couple from Chicago.

- Yeah.

- A Chicago PD police officer and a Chicago school teacher and their three dogs.

And they came down.

(Mark laughs) - So you allow dogs in the tree house?

- I do allow dogs and kids.

(Mark laughs) And they wanted to get out of the city for the 4th of July.

And that's when they came down here to spend, you know as my first guests.

- You've got a construction background.

So for you to put together something like this, pretty easy for you because you can feel like, well, you know you take a look at what materials you have and then sort of design- - Kinda, you can tell.

I use a lot of reclaim.

So there's a lot of barn wood, and then there's old, rusty tin.

And I just did the basic platform, which is a basic deck.

And then I'd go from there.

I built the walls and then windows.

I'd get windows wherever I could find them, doors.

- So you don't work for a blueprint?

- No - No.

You just say, "Okay, this is what I got."

"This is what I want."

And you start building.

- Whatever comes out, comes out.

(Mark laughs) - Well, listen, this is really fit, let's go inside.

Okay?

- Okay.

- Because the inside it's very small, but it's very utilitarian.

- Yeah, it's very cozy.

(Mark laughs) It's the word I hear.

(door creaks) - Cozy, huh?

- Yeah.

- Now this one has- They all have a theme, right?

All three units.

- Yeah, they all have a theme.

- What's this one called?

- This one's "The White tail".

- Okay.

And why is that?

(Mark laughs) - Well, my brother is a deer hunter and he offered up his first deer mount of the first deer he ever shot.

- Okay.

And that's the fellow we're looking at here.

- That's that one there.

The old looking guy.

- That's really a very fine looking animal.

- Yeah.

- And that was his first?

- Very first one he'd ever got.

Buck, I would say.

I don't know if it was first deer, but yeah.

So that's where the name came from.

- And again, now this looks like- You put a lot of new material in here and you had a lot of material that you just had hanging around.

- Yeah, yeah.

This one, I did use more like new material but then like the ladder you can tell is old.

That I made.

- You have to wanna climb because if you're gonna use the bedroom, which is, again, it's very close to the door, so you climb up and then there's a loft and then there's a queen bed.

- Queen mattress up there and that's strictly a sleeping loft.

- Refrigerator?

- Aha - Coffee pot.

- Microwave.

- Microwave.

And everybody wants to know about the bathroom of cause.

Now you run into some problems here because you have to turn the water off in the wintertime.

- Exactly.

'Cause the pipes will freeze.

And so I provide a five gallon crock for washing hands and brushing teeth and things like that.

- And how does the toilet work?

- The toilet.

It's a compost toilet.

It's very simple design.

It's just a five gallon bucket with sawdust.

And so you use it- Instead of flush, you put sawdust in it.

- Okay.

Okay.

(Mark laughs) And every unit has an outdoor shower.

- Exactly.

- Yeah, this time of year- (Mark laughs) - Even if you had water, you wouldn't be out there in the shower.

- But you do have it heated for when you can turn the water on.

- It's a hot water shower even in the summertime.

- Can we go out?

- Sure.

- Let's just go ahead.

'Cause I wanna see something else while we're out there.

Okay Bob, we're on the back deck and of course that's where the outdoor shower is here.

- Your bucket has holes in the bottom.

So it comes out as a shower head.

- Right.

- That's the point.

- Yup.

- And of course in the summertime, that would feel pretty good.

'Cause you heat the water to about a hundred degrees, right?

- Exactly.

- Yeah.

- Yup.

So even in a hot day, it feels good.

'Cause you got the breeze you know, you usually have a breeze.

- Yeah.

(Mark laughs) You got your privacy.

So if there is anybody in the woods, you got your privacy.

- Exactly.

- In the side of the the back here with all these license plates what in the world are we looking at?

- Well, again, that was stuff I had.

And when I was building this, I was trying to, you know decide what I was gonna side it with.

I used to live in Maryland and a friend of mine gave me a box of license plates and I moved that whole box back here from Maryland.

Why?

I don't know.

(Mark laughs) So when I built this, I remembered I had max the license plates in the garage.

So I brought 'em out and I was like, "Well, that's gonna be siding".

- That's right, siding.

I'm gonna use this.

Now I know why hauled all is in here, huh?

- That's right.

- Okay.

Now this was your first unit.

It's a small unit.

- 220 square feet.

- When you built your second one, we're gonna go next and it's around the way here.

You put a little more time, energy and expense into this one.

You can see it's quite a bit bigger.

- [Bob] Well, you know, once I built this and the rentals were doing well I thought, "Well, one's good."

"Two's gotta be better."

So when I built the second one, I was planning on going bigger.

So you could have a family or a bigger group of people.

- [Mark] Yeah.

- [Bob] So that's why I went bigger on the second I was thinking more in the rental idea of, you know I'm gonna be renting this out so.

- Can we go over there and take a look at that one?

- Sure, yeah.

- Bob, you can walk between the tree houses and you have number of bridges that go over the little ravines here and you built the bridges too, didn't you?

- [Bob] Yes.

(Mark laughs) - It's a Marvel to somebody like me.

- Another product of necessity.

- Yeah.

So you built the bridges and you also have on these 20 acres here, you have hiking trails.

- Yes.

- So if you're tired of being inside you wanna get out, the woods at west central Illinois here.

It's wonderful.

Wonderful, beautiful place.

- Yeah.

- It's like the Ozarks.

It's really hilly.

- Yeah.

- Yeah.

- It's nice and people really enjoy it when they come down here.

Especially if you're coming out of Chicago and you're not used to this.

- Oh, yeah, yeah.

- [Bob] It's a big change of pace.

- [Mark] Okay.

This was number two, right?

- [Bob] Number two.

- [Mark] What's the theme of this one?

- This one, I was in the Navy for 25 years.

- Yeah.

- So I wanted to do a nautical theme.

So this one has a nautical theme to it.

Hence the "Captain's quarters" as it's named.

It's called the "Captain's quarters"?

- "Captain's quarters".

- Okay.

You're still decorated for Christmas.

So you got your work aheadof you to get your Christmas- - Yeah, we had that snow and ice and I haven't had a chance to take everything down (Mark laughs) but it makes it look festive.

- It does, it really does.

- Yeah.

- Okay.

As we're looking at the outside of this, how did you plan this?

How did you conceive it in your head?

What was it gonna look like?

- Well again, I knew I was gonna build a basic deck platform and actually there was a tree down here which caused the jog in the base.

It was in my way when I was digging the hole for the post.

So that's why there's a jog in the building.

- Okay, and then you cut the tree down.

- Actually, yeah, I cut the tree down and then it rotted off.

So it's not in the way anymore.

And then I just, you know, I built my walls.

Windows I'd find cheap.

'Cause windows, they're one of the most expensive parts of a build and doors I bought the front doors from a yard sale.

- Is that right?

- Yeah.

And windows, people would give me and- - So for people to understand the term tree house, it's among the trees.

It's not up in the tree.

- Exactly.

It doesn't have to be in the trees, just amongst the trees.

- So what you do is, you build on peers and you go down what?

Three feet?

- Aha, below the frost.

- Sink come in concrete.

- Right.

- And you're good to go.

- You foot it.

- And then you start with the floor of course and work your way up.

- Exactly.

- Well, let's go in and take a look at that.

- Okay.

(footsteps thud) (door creaks) - Well, it is nautical, isn't it?

- Yeah.

(Mark laughs) (door creaks) - Yeah, I wanted to get the feeling that you'd be sitting here with Jack Sparrow from "Pirates of the Caribbean" having a drink.

(Mark laughs) So, hence the- - Sounds good.

- So that was the feel I was going for.

You got you your wheel and your ropes and you got this old picture of the old- - The old salts.

- The old salts from 1877.

- Yeah.

- You don't miss much though.

It's rural, it's rustic, but I mean everybody's got a TV, right?

- Exactly.

- You got a flat screen TV here.

How do you get your TV out here?

- This one is just Blue ray or DVDs.

There's no dish or cable or anything like that.

But doesn't the other one have a dish set up?

- That has dish.

So if you wanna watch the game.

- Yeah, okay.

- That's the one you wanna be in.

- This one you can watch movies if you like.

- Exactly.

- And you could actually- I mean, you could put more than two people in here.

- Oh, yeah.

- I listed four to six.

So you've got a queen bed upstairs.

You've got a sleeper sofa here.

You got a window seat which can sleep, If you've got a couple of kids, they love that.

Small adults.

- Windows are always the most expensive part of a build.

- Usually.

Windows and doors gets expensive - So they determine a lot what you use, how did you make those choices here?

- Like these two stained glass windows in the front here.

For instance, I've got a good friend at peak and has a glass business and she called me and she had replaced 'em out of a China cabinet.

And she called me and said, "Hey I got these two windows, if you want 'em."

And I'm like, "Sure, I'll take 'em."

- And we discussed a little bit about the water issue.

- Yes.

- From December to what I guess April 1st.

- April 1st usually.

- You turn the water off because the pipes will break.

- Right.

- So we understand that, but what about heating?

- Well, the two tree houses are all electric heat and air conditioning.

They're all air conditioned too.

- Okay.

So where is your heater in this one?

- This one has that.

- [Mark] Oh, okay.

All right.

- [Bob] The inverter system.

It's AC heat combination.

And I've got, these are augmented heat.

If it gets really cold, you can turn that in there.

- [Mark] And that's an electric little fireplace right there, huh?

- [Bob] Yes.

- [Mark] Okay, good deal.

And this has a little bigger kitchen of course 'cause it's a bigger house.

- Yep.

- And again, this water would be working but it's not right now.

And then you have this jug of water for people, for drinking and for washing their hands.

- Washing their hands, brush their teeth, washing dishes, that kind of thing.

- Okay.

And here you actually do provide some dishes and you've got a little breakfast nook here.

- Exactly.

Yep.

- That's kinda neat.

(Mark laughs) - Microwave and of course- (fridge door clinks) When you had this in your mind- Look at this, this is a beautiful piece of wood right here.

Part of this has its bark on it and part of it does not.

Did you do that intentionally?

- It's slowly coming off, but yeah, I didn't.

I just wanted to use a post there that was more natural looking than a regular post.

- It's really nice.

- And it helps support the stairs.

- Yeah.

So when you were conceiving this one, you had the lofted bind and that was gonna be a sleeping loft.

That's what it is.

- That was gonna be an actual second floor.

So that's why you got more of a queen suite.

- It is essential.

- Yes, yeah.

- Yeah - Well, the first one's just a loft.

- Right, right?

This one- Okay.

Well let's go up and take a look at that.

- Okay.

- After you.

- Sure.

(footsteps thud) - Natural grab rails here.

I like those.

- Yeah.

They're free.

They're laying out in the woods.

(Mark laughs) - There's lots of them, right?

- Exactly.

Okay.

So here we are in the "Captain's quarters".

An interesting looking headboard.

What's the little door- There's a little door there.

- Well, this was another little thing that came out of necessity.

This is the captain's loop.

(both laugh) So there's jewels in here (jewels rattle) and the blends.

- And a lot of bling, a lot of bling in there.

Yeah.

(Mark laughs) - So that came out when I was building the place, there was a hole here, 'cause that was the attic from below.

And people would always ask me what's that for?

What's that for?

And I'm like, it's nothing.

It's just the attic.

Then when I got the bed, it's just an old antique bed I bought.

I mounted the headboard to the wall and I thought, well, I can make a little compartment.

- Yeah.

- And there's an outlet in there.

So you can plug your phone in, charge it if you want.

- Well, ain't that nifty?

Yeah, yeah.

So then that became the captain safe.

(Mark laughs) So the kids that'll stay.

They'll find it.

And they'll be all excited about it.

And they'll put it in- - Oh, yeah.

Now this is flooded in natural light.

And I love this idea that you had because you know, it's hard to find big windows, right?

- Right.

- So what'd you do?

Well, somebody gave me these doors they're just full glass doors that they weren't using.

And I just turned them on their side and made windows out of them.

Then the window over there that's just an old farm door.

- You mean that oval, the oval window?

- I just laid it on its side.

- That's such a great idea.

- Yeah.

- It's a great idea.

And it's really tight too, isn't it?

So, I mean, it's really- - Yeah.

- It doesn't let any air know.

- Sure.

- Okay.

And again, here's your vanity in season, you have running water here.

- Exactly, hot running water.

- And let's go out because this stuff still fascinates me no matter how many times I see your outdoor deck here.

- Yeah.

- 'Cause this are facilities.

This is "Al Natural."

- Right.

- Here's your outdoor shower again.

- Yeah, where else can you take a shower 30 feet off the ground?

- That's right.

And you know, really, the privacy is remarkable too.

I mean, you know, really, even if you didn't have it enclosed, you'd still feel pretty private here.

- Yeah.

- Okay.

So there's your hot water shower.

And then you've got an out house built onto the deck here.

- Yeah.

And I kind of changed that from the first one 'cause the first one's inside.

So you have a little bit of an odor factor.

- Yeah.

- So I thought, well, on this one, I'll put it outside but yet it's enclosed and it's heated.

- Right.

And again, it's a compost toilet, right?

- Exactly.

- Yeah.

Okay.

- So that way you're keeping the- - Do you have any plans to build any more tree houses?

- I do.

- Yeah.

I've got several- - You've got property here.

- I do.

- Do you have your locations picked out?

- No, usually that's a last minute thing.

I'll walk around and kinda see what looks good.

I've got the next one I'm supposed to build.

According to my mom is "Grandma, Marty she shed."

(Mark laughs) - That's the theme.

- It's an honor of my mum.

- Okay.

- She's gonna decorate it.

- Okay.

Well then, you know, she'll have a lot of fun with that.

- Oh, sure.

- And you know, you do have some female guests coming, right?

Because you have these ladies that get together every year to go some place.

- I have girls' weekends and yeah.

So I've got a group that comes from de Moines every year.

They've been coming a couple of years now.

They do the winery thing and they just have a blast.

- Oh, that's great.

Now you also have just recently, your newest acquisition, you moved an old 1830s log cabin from Missouri over to here.

- Yep.

- And that's your latest lodging, right?

- Right.

- Can we take a look at that next?

- Sure.

- All right, let's go.

You really need a vehicle like this to get around this place, don't you?

- Yeah, it makes it a lot easier.

Otherwise it'd be doing a lot of walking.

- Oh my goodness.

Especially with this ice.

I mean, it's one step forward, two steps back.

- Right.

(cart screeching) - Nice.

That kinda an anachronistic with the log cabin, but what the heck?

(both laugh) - Yeah.

I mean, it could have a team of horses, I guess.

- Yeah.

That'd be great.

- And a wagon.

- 1830s from Missouri, you say.

- Yeah.

- Do you know where it came from?

Of course you know where it came from.

'Cause you went and got it, right?

- Well originally it came from a community called Fort Henry, Missouri which doesn't exist anymore.

It was a trapper's outpost.

And from what I'm told by the historians down there it was named after a doctor, Henry Fort.

- It was transferred in his name.

- Oh, okay.

- And it was the northern most point in Missouri you could go before you got into Indian territory.

So it's northwest of Moberly I think is where Fort Henry was.

- How'd you find it?

- Well, I had a couple come here for a tour of my tree houses and they really enjoyed it.

And they took me aside when they were getting ready to leave.

And they said, "You know, we have this log cabin" "On our property and we're not using anymore."

"And we think it'd be perfect up here."

So I went down and looked at it.

- You thought it would be too and bought it.

- I always thought it'd be kind of neat to have a little log cabin sitting back here.

- What kind of condition was it in?

I know you've got it really short up and in really- - Most of it, the logs were still good.

The base, some of the bottom logs were gone.

And so I had to replace them with some other timbers.

And then there was a tie log on the end that I had to redo 'cause it was split.

- Was it sitting flat on the ground or was it on a platform the way you have it?

- It was on the ground.

And it had been sitting there since '86.

I think is when they moved it.

And so they're white Oak logs.

So they're heavy.

- It had been moved once, huh?

- It had been moved from its original location.

- And then you went and got it.

So you had to dissemble it.

- Went and got it.

- What goes into that process?

- Well, you know I started watching "Barnwood builders" then.

(Mark laughs) And so you gotta tag everything because they all fit together one way.

So you gotta tag all the logs so you where they go.

- Right, sure, sure.

- To restack 'em.

- And how did you transport it?

- Just two trailer loads of logs.

Strapped them down and came home.

- Yep.

How long did it take you to put it back together?

- It took me two years from the time I got it till the time I had my first guests.

- Yeah.

- 'Cause you know, you stack the logs and then they're not straight.

So you gotta move them around and hit 'em and restack them.

- Did you do this by yourself?

Or did you- - Pretty much.

- Man, that's heavy stuff to be moving around by yourself.

- Yeah, if I hadn't had my tractor, that would have been impossible.

- Yeah.

Now how about the chimney?

You had to build the chimney that didn't- - The original cabin didn't have a fireplace.

It probably had a wood stove from what I was told.

- Yeah, yeah.

- And a dirt floor.

- Yeah.

But it came back together pretty nicely.

- Yeah.

Let's go and take a look.

'Cause it looks very inviting.

- Okay.

(footsteps thud) - Wow.

It sure is cozy in here.

I love that fireplace.

- Yeah.

- They were crazy not to have a fireplace.

I'll tell you, you know, I mean, that is so nice.

- It just makes the inside look really smart.

- Is that real stone?

Bob, did this stone come from here?

- No, actually my sister made all this.

- Oh, she did?

- Yeah.

- Out of concrete.

She does the mold?

- Did the concrete and then painted 'em.

My sister, Judy Harle.

She's the artist in the family and she did all this.

- Wow, I love the colors that she chose.

- She did all my chinking too between the logs.

- I was gonna ask you about that because that's a difficult thing to do.

- [Bob] It is.

I can't do it, but she made it look easy.

- [Mark] Yeah.

It's really smooth.

And those are big, big spaces too.

So in the original layout, that's the way they were spaced, right?

- [Bob] As far as I know, yeah.

I mean, that's how there was.

Of course, originally it would have been mud.

- Yeah.

- Mud, corn cobs, and yeah.

- And anything else, horse hairs, whatever.

Stuff they could- - They said when they tore it down, it was Missouri red clay and had horse hair it and grass.

- Horse hair really holds things together.

- Yeah.

It's the bonding agent that keeps it.

- Yeah, yeah, yeah.

So how long did it take you to- Did you say it took you two years or something?

- Took me two years from the time I got it here to the time I had my first guests.

It took two years.

- Yeah.

And you have a full-time job.

- Yes - So you're working basically weekends.

- Evenings and weekends.

- Yeah, yeah.

You're a workaholic, right?

- Well, it turns into kind of a hobby, I guess.

I like building things.

- Yeah.

Oh, you're really good at it.

Okay.

So you can sleep too here.

- You got a queen bed.

- Now there is a loft and it's very small.

We're not going to go up there.

'Cause we knew how tight the quarters is.

But there's a queen mattress up there.

- Queen mattress up there, memory foam.

So it's comfortable sleeping.

Kids love the lofts so when you got a family, that's usually where the kids go - And it's good to get 'em out of the way, get 'em back there.

And then they can play with their phones while they're up there.

- Do you get a signal out here?

Do you get- - No.

(Mark laughs) And nobody really cares.

- That's great.

- They like being out of life for a while.

- Get those kids off those phones.

- Yes.

- And there's of course, your little kitchen out here just like the other ones.

- Yes.

- And you've got a nice big refrigerator, which is good.

And then the water is always an issue but here you've got that covered with a jug.

- That's the one, the five gallon crock.

- And again, at the end of March or April that water turns back on and everything's back to normal.

- And you can take your shower.

- Now we are fascinated by your window choices again.

And like you say, you didn't have that much leeway here because those spaces were already- Were they already cut or did you cut them?

- Yes.

Those were already there.

And those windows actually came with the cabin.

So they're not the original windows.

- [Mark] Right.

- [Bob] They were the windows that were in it when I got the cabin.

The ones up above I added just for extra light.

- [Mark] Yeah.

Can you imagine how dark it would be.

They probably didn't have any windows originally when they built this thing.

- [Bob] No, not many.

- 'Cause it's just dark at night, all the time.

- Yeah, you'd loose your heat.

- Yeah, have candles on, maybe light candles all the time.

- Exactly.

- And you're flooring.

I noticed that you're not really insistent on doing the floors as they would have been done.

You like the modern materials for floor flooring, right?

- [Bob] These are again, my sister, the artists, these are tongue and groove, one buys.

And she painted them to make them look more like an old floor.

- [Mark] Well, they do look good.

- You know, I nailed them down and there's no- - Oh this is not a floating floor, huh?

- No, it's nailed down to the floor joists.

'Cause I wanted somewhat of a modern floor.

So it's easy to clean, but you know I didn't want to do like barn wood.

It just wasn't a nice finish.

- No, you get splinters and that's kind of tough.

- Exactly.

- Yeah, yeah.

You know what I like about these?

If you look at these logs from the inside here that this was made of, you can see the hue marks - Yep.

- From where the ax hit.

- And I have a new appreciation for the pioneers that did this stuff 'cause that's a lot of work.

Yeah.

- [Mark] Well, you know, 'cause you were moving it around.

You can imagine if you had a mill it, you know, get it milled and then- Wow.

Okay.

So you had some recent excitement here.

You had a film crew out here.

- I did.

I had a director from New York found me on the internet and found pictures of my log cabin and he called me and said, "Hey, I wanna do a film."

'It's civil war film."

"And I'm looking for a log cabin I can rent."

And so he asked if they can rent it for a film.

And I was like, "Sure."

- What was it called?

- It's called "Ashburn".

And it's a short film.

Civil war period - Was "Ashburn" the name of one of the characters?

- Yes.

And so they were here for three nights in October, 2019.

And they filmed all night and I had to move everything out of here.

- And they stayed in your tree houses while they were- - They stayed in the tree houses.

- That's nice, yeah.

So they paid their way, right?

- They did.

- Yeah?

Good.

- They did.

- And "Ashburn" is sort of initial out here on one of your logs.

So that's sort of the second name of the place.

- Right.

I've kind of gave it that name for a nickname kind of thing.

- "Fort Henry/Ashburn".

- Exactly.

- Okay.

There's not much more to see in here except out of necessity, you had to have a toilet here somewhere and it wasn't gonna fit in here.

- No.

- So let's go see what people do when they need to relieve themselves.

(footsteps thud) Hey, I love this old wagon too.

- Yeah.

- Where did you get it?

- I got that out of someone's front yard.

I just asked them if they wanted to sell it - You just stole it.

- I didn't steal it.

(Mark laughs) I bought it.

- Yeah.

It's nice.

It fits perfect here.

- Yeah.

- While we're looking at this, you know, where you put the chimney, originally back in the 1830s, that was the door in.

- As far as I know, that was the front door.

- Yeah, yeah.

- Where the chimney was.

'cause those logs were already cut out as a door.

- Yeah, yeah.

It's nice.

I like it a lot better this way.

We were talking about the outhouse.

Now this is gonna be what it is whether they have running water or not.

This is where they're gonna come to- - Yeah, but I do have plans for an addition off the back of the log cabin for a small kitchen and a bathroom, eventually.

- Okay, yeah, eventually.

- But for right now, what we have is- Then again, we'll just take a minute and we'll- - If you stay in a log cabin, you gotta have an outhouse.

- Yeah, you do.

And it's perfectly usable and clean and everything.

And like it 'cause it's sawdust and a way you go.

- Yes, same toilet as in the other two.

(door creeks) - Well, this has been very, very interesting.

I wanna thank you for the tour.

I mean, I'd heard of tree houses and I thought, 'Well, I gotta find out more about that."

So I came to the right guy.

- Yeah.

I guess.

(both laugh) - Thank you, Bob.

- You're welcome.

Thanks for coming.

- I asked Bob a little earlier.

How old a man are you?

And he said he just turned 59.

I said, "Well, you you've got three or four" "More three houses you need to build."

And he doesn't quite agree with that but he does agree that he's scouting his 20 acres here to see where the next build is gonna be.

With another "Illinois story" between Hamilton and Nauvoo, I'm Mark McDonald.

Thanks for watching.

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Thank you.

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