McHistory

Wherever humans gather, there is garbage. And getting rid of it is a challenge. The start of trash removal in Bloomington dates to the start of the 20th century and to a man known in his day as the King of Swedes.

The way Black people were treated in Bloomington-Normal got a lot worse in the 20th century than in the years before, and that's saying something. Those conditions produced jarring juxtapositions in people’s lives, such as that of an intelligent churchgoing Black woman who worked for the family of State Farm royalty and in a brothel to make ends meet.

One doesn’t think of Bloomington and central Illinois as a lurid hotbed of crime. But it certainly seems it could have been that way during the mid-to-late 1800s as portrayed by the three city newspapers of the day.

Coming from nothing, an illiterate Black man from Bloomington-Normal — long before the civil rights movement — found a niche in the national market for cleaning products. In this episode of the WGLT feature McHistory, hear about a floor polish and the man who invented and sold it.

Ellen Ferguson was a champion of women and women's suffrage. She made Bloomington-Normal her home in the 1870s.

Bloomington-Normal has a long and distinguished history of business entrepreneurship. One less than distinguished, but very successful, business, had a continent-wide spread in the late 1800s.

Bloomington-Normal has a tie to famed actor John Wayne and legendary filmmaker John Ford — a hardware store clerk turned noted author, Harold Sinclair.

There is not much prairie left in Illinois. Once, there was a waving sea of tall perennial flowers and grasses across much of the state. Now there is .01% of the original prairie left in Illinois.

A 19th century Bloomington doctor was a respected physician who was accused of stealing corpses.

In 1913, the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) was founded in Bloomington to stop the defamation of Jewish people by appealing to minds, morals, and the law. Sigmund Livingston served as its first director.

McHistory is a co-production of WGLT and the McLean County Museum of History.

McHistory is a co-production of WGLT and the McLean County Museum of History.

This week's episode of McHistory recounts Eleanor Roosevelt's visit to Bloomington-Normal in 1937.

In this episode of McHistory, a look at the McLean County Poor Farm, where living conditions were often inhumane.

The National Liver and Kidney Cure was said to be made from vegetables and herbs—and may have had some alcohol in it for an extra kick. It was made right here in Normal.

On this month's episode of McHistory, you'll meet Florence Mae Risser Funk of Bloomington, who played a key role in getting women the right to vote.

The McLean County Basketball Tournament is one of the longest running basketball tournaments in the state of Illinois.

Here is a profile of a man who drove vice presidents and governors, wealthy landowners, visiting artists, and the prominent of Bloomington-Normal all about town more than a century ago.

The early 1900s saw an influx of racism and discrimination in the Midwest, from anti-Catholic, anti-immigrant, and anti-African American sentiment, to race riots in Springfield, Chicago, and Tulsa, Oklahoma. The Ku Klux Klan became a force in central Illinois. Segregation grew in Bloomington-Normal and what had been a thriving black middle class was gradually destroyed.

Bloomington-Normal had only one documented lynching.