Portal:Illinois

Illinois (/ˌɪlɪˈnɔɪ/ ^ⓘ IL-in-OY) is a state in the Midwestern region of the United States. It borders Lake Michigan to its northeast, the Mississippi River to its west, and the Wabash and Ohio rivers to its south. Of the fifty U.S. states, Illinois has the fifth-largest gross domestic product (GDP), the sixth-largest population, and the 25th-most land area. Its largest urban areas include Chicago and the Metro EastofGreater St. Louis, as well as Peoria, Rockford, Champaign–Urbana, and Springfield, the state's capital.

Illinois has a highly diverse economy, with the global cityofChicago in the northeast, major industrial and agricultural hubs in the north and center, and natural resources such as coal, timber, and petroleum in the south. Owing to its central location and favorable geography, the state is a major transportation hub: the Port of Chicago has access to the Atlantic Ocean through the Great Lakes and Saint Lawrence Seaway and to the Gulf of Mexico from the Mississippi River via the Illinois Waterway. Chicago has been the nation's railroad hub since the 1860s, and its O'Hare International Airport has been among the world's busiest airports for decades. Illinois has long been considered a microcosm of the United States and a bellwether in American culture, exemplified by the phrase Will it play in Peoria?.

Present-day Illinois was inhabited by various indigenous cultures for thousands of years, including the advanced civilization centered in the Cahokia region. The French were the first Europeans to arrive, settling near the Mississippi and Illinois River in the 17th century in the region they called Illinois Country, as part of the sprawling colony of New France. Following U.S. independence in 1783, American settlers began arriving from Kentucky via the Ohio River, and the population grew from south to north. Illinois was part of the United States' oldest territory, the Northwest Territory, and in 1818 it achieved statehood. The Erie Canal brought increased commercial activity in the Great Lakes, and the small settlement of Chicago became one of the fastest growing cities in the world, benefiting from its location as one of the few natural harbors in southwestern Lake Michigan. The invention of the self-scouring steel plow by Illinoisan John Deere turned the state's rich prairie into some of the world's most productive and valuable farmland, attracting immigrant farmers from Germany and Sweden. In the mid-19th century, the Illinois and Michigan Canal and a sprawling railroad network greatly facilitated trade, commerce, and settlement, making the state a transportation hub for the nation.

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The Chicago Board of Trade Building houses the Chicago Board of Trade, the world's largest futures and options exchange. It is located at 141 West Jackson Boulevard, Chicago, Illinois, in the Chicago Loop community area. First designated a Chicago Landmark on May 4, 1977, the building was subsequently listed as a National Historic Landmark on June 2, 1978. The building was then added to the National Register of Historic Places on June 16, 1978. The tallest building in Chicago for over 35 years the structure is known for its art-deco architecture, sculptures and large scale stone carving, as well as large trading floors. A popular sightseeing attraction and motion picture location, the building has won awards for preservation efforts and office management.

The Chicago Board of Trade occupies 33 percent of available space, with financial and trading concerns occupying 54 percent of the 3-building complex. The landmark has been the site of a number of visits by dignitaries, including the Prince of Wales in October 1977. Trading operations have been used as scenes in movies such as Ferris Bueller's Day Off, and the streetscape in the LaSalle Street canyon is used in the movies The Untouchables and Road to Perdition. (Read more...)

Selected biography

Leona Woods (August 9, 1919 – November 10, 1986), was an American physicist who helped build the first nuclear reactor and the first atomic bomb. Woods was born on a farm in La Grange, Illinois and earned her BSinchemistry from the University of Chicago in 1938, at the age of 19. At age 23, she was the youngest and only female member of the team which built and experimented with the world's first nuclear reactor (then called a pile ), Chicago Pile-1, in a project led by her mentor Enrico Fermi. In particular, Woods was instrumental in the construction and then utilization of geiger counters for analysis during experimentation. After the war, her research involved high-energy physics, astrophysics and cosmology. In later life she became interested in ecological and environmental issues, and she devised a method of using the isotope ratios in tree rings to study climate change. She was a strong advocate of food irradiation as a means of killing harmful bacteria. (Read more...)

Did you know...

• ... that four course records were broken during the 2023 Chicago Marathon (women's winner pictured)?
• ... that the restaurant CosMc's is named after a character from McDonaldland?
• ... that Salty Parker, who spent 60 years in organized baseball, described his lifelong love of the game as "a beautiful disease"?
• ... that authorities said the killing of Wadea al-Fayoume in Illinois was a response to the 2023 Israel–Hamas war?

Archive

Image 2Martyrdom of Joseph and Hiram SmithinCarthage jail, June 27th, 1844. This unusual black-and-white lithograph has a second yellow-brown layer on top of it.
Image credit: G.W. Fasel (painter); Charles G. Crehen (lithographer); Nagel & Weingaertner, N.Y. (publishers); Library of Congress (digital file); Adam Cuerden (upload) (from Portal:Illinois/Selected picture)

Image 3The Cairo Mississippi River Bridge near the confluence of the Mississippi and Ohio Rivers at Cairo, the lowest elevation in the state. The bridge was built in 1929 by the American Bridge Company and the Missouri Valley Bridge & Iron Co.
Image credit: Nick Jordan (photographer), Fredddie (upload) (from Portal:Illinois/Selected picture)

Image 4A illustration of the Upper Bluff Lake Dancing Figures repoussé copper plate, an artifact of the Mississippian culture found at the Saddle Site in Union County, Illinois.
Image credit: H. Rowe (from Portal:Illinois/Selected picture)

Image 5Plants of the Midewin National Tallgrass PrairieinWill County. Tallgrass prairie once covered around two-thirds of Illinois. Midewin is the only federal tallgrass prairie preserve east of the Mississippi River.
Photo credit: User:Alanscottwalker (from Portal:Illinois/Selected picture)

Image 6Lincoln Home National Historic SiteinSpringfield. The house was built for the Rev. Charles Dresser in 1839. Abraham and Mary Todd Lincoln purchased it in 1844, later adding a second story.
Photo credit: Daniel Schwen (from Portal:Illinois/Selected picture)

Image 7Lithograph advertisement for the CH&D Railway showing the interior of a Pullman dining car, 1894, with a Pullman porter serving two men at a table.
Image credit: Strobridge & Co. (lithographers), Library of Congress (digital file), Mu (upload) (from Portal:Illinois/Selected picture)

Image 8The Mendota Hills Wind FarminLee County. Built in 2003 by Navitas Energy, Mendota Hills was the first utility scale wind farm in Illinois.
Photo credit: Dori (from Portal:Illinois/Selected picture)

Image 9The "Chunkey Player" is an 8.5 inch (22 cm) high by 5.5 inch (14 cm) wide Missouri flint clay statuette depicting a player of the ancient Native American game of chunkey. Believed to have been originally crafted at or near the Cahokia site in Illinois, it was found in Muskogee County, Oklahoma.
Photo credit: User:TimVickers (from Portal:Illinois/Selected picture)

Image 10This 1941 photograph shows the maze of livestock pens and walkways at the Union Stock Yards, Chicago.
Image credit: John Vachon, Farm Security Administration (photographer), Darwinek (digital retouching) (from Portal:Illinois/Selected picture)

Image 11Vandalia State House, the former state capitol. It was built in 1836 and is maintained by the Illinois Historic Preservation Agency.
Photo credit: Art davis (from Portal:Illinois/Selected picture)

Image 12Apyrite disc, also called a "miner's dollar," from a coal mine in Sparta.
Image credit: Cccefalon (photographer and digital retouching) (from Portal:Illinois/Selected picture)

Image 13A mural by Chicago artist Louis Grell in the Springfield Amtrak station. The mural depicts a quote by Abraham Lincoln, a map of the post-1947 Gulf, Mobile and Ohio Railroad, and the seals of the seven states that the railroad served.
Image credit: Louis Grell (painter), RI-Bill (photographer) (from Portal:Illinois/Selected picture)

Image 14A tobacco hornworm (Manduca sexta)inUrbana.
Image credit: Daniel Schwen (from Portal:Illinois/Selected picture)

Image 15A street view of the Frank Lloyd Wright Home and StudioinOak Park. Wright built the house in 1889 and added the Studio and Connecting Corridor in 1898. The Frank Lloyd Wright Preservation Trust has restored the property to its appearance in 1909, the last year the architect lived there with his family.
Photo credit: User:Banewson (from Portal:Illinois/Selected picture)

Image 16"Hon. Abraham Lincoln, Republican candidate for the presidency, 1860," a lithograph by Leopold Grozelier, et al. According to the Library of Congress, "Thomas Hicks painted a portrait of Lincoln at his office in Springfield specifically for this lithograph."
Image credit: Thomas Hicks (painter), Leopold Grozelier (lithographer), W. William Schaus (publisher), J.H. Bufford's Lith. (printer), Adam Cuerden (restoration) (from Portal:Illinois/Selected picture)

Image 17Photograph of Shoeless Joe Jackson, Black Betsy in hand, in 1913 with the Cleveland Naps, prior to his seasons with the Chicago White Sox.
Image credit: Charles M. Conlon (photographer), Mears Auctions (digital file), Scewing (upload) (from Portal:Illinois/Selected picture)

Image 18A poster for the Century of Progress World's Fair showing exhibition buildings with boats in the foreground..
Image credit: Weimer Pursell (artist); Neely Printing Co., Chicago (silkscreen print); Jujutacular (digital retouching) (from Portal:Illinois/Selected picture)

Image 19The Twenty Acre Dairy Barn, first of the experimental University of Illinois round barns. The barn was designed by James M. White and Kell & Bernard for the University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign in 1908
Photo credit: Daniel Schwen (from Portal:Illinois/Selected picture)

Image 20Magnolia ManorinCairo, built by businessman Charles A. Galigher in 1869.
Photo credit: MuZemike (from Portal:Illinois/Selected picture)

Image 21The Willis Tower (formerly the Sears Tower), the world's tallest building from 1973 to 2004. The tower's innovative bundled tube structure was designed by Bruce Graham and Fazlur Khan.
Photo credit: Soakologist (from Portal:Illinois/Selected picture)

Image 22A mill belonging to the grain company Bunge Lauhoff in downtown Danville. The facility was built in 1947.
Photo credit: Daniel Schwen (from Portal:Illinois/Selected picture)

Image 23ACanada goose (Branta canadensis) swimming in Palatine.
Photo credit: Joe Ravi (from Portal:Illinois/Selected picture)

Image 24Photograph of suffragette, social worker, philosopher, and Nobel Peace Prize winner Jane Addams in 1924 or 1926.
Image credit: Bain News Service (photograph), Adam Cuerden (restoration) (from Portal:Illinois/Selected picture)

Image 25The Old State CapitolinSpringfield. Designed by John F. Rague in a Greek Revival style and completed in 1840, the building housed the Illinois General Assembly until 1876.
Photo credit: Agriculture (from Portal:Illinois/Selected picture)

Image 26A tiger swallowtail butterfly (Papilio glaucus)inShawnee National Forest.
Photo credit: Daniel Schwen (from Portal:Illinois/Selected picture)

Image 27Chicago, Burlington and Quincy Railroad 1926, a Railway Post Office preserved at the Illinois Railway MuseuminUnion.
Photo credit: Sean Lamb (from Portal:Illinois/Selected picture)

Image 28The Chicago Theatre. Designed by the firm Rapp and Rapp, it was the flagship theater for Balaban and Katz group.
Photo credit: Daniel Schwen (from Portal:Illinois/Selected picture)

Image 29The water tower and barracks complex at Fort Sheridan in 1898. The principal buildings of the fort were built between 1889 and 1910 by the firm Holabird & Roche.
Image credit: Detroit Photographic Co.; Bathgems (upload) (from Portal:Illinois/Selected picture)

Image 30The Garden of the GodsinShawnee National Forest. The unglaciated gray sandstone of the wilderness area is more rugged than most of Illinois.
Photo credit: Daniel Schwen (from Portal:Illinois/Selected picture)

Image 31The coat of arms of Illinois as illustrated in the 1876 book State Arms of the UnionbyLouis Prang.
Image credit: Henry Mitchell (illustrator), Louis Prang & Co. (lithographer and publisher), Godot13 (restoration) (from Portal:Illinois/Selected picture)

Image 32Architectural details of Altgeld Hall at the University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign. Designed by UIUC professors Nathan Ricker and James McLaren White, the building is one of Altgeld's castles.
Image credit: Kevin Dooley (photographer), Smallbones (upload) (from Portal:Illinois/Selected picture)

Image 33The Museum of Science and Industry in Chicago. The building was designed by Charles B. Atwood for D. H. Burnham & Company to house exhibits for the 1893 World's Columbian Exposition.
Image credit: zooey (photographer), Jasenlee~commonswiki (upload) (from Portal:Illinois/Selected picture)

Image 34Shore of Lake MichiganatIllinois Beach State ParkinLake County.
Image credit: Yinan Chen (photographer), Slick (upload) (from Portal:Illinois/Selected picture)

Image 35Map of the Multilevel streets in Chicago.
Image credit: User:SPUI (from Portal:Illinois/Selected picture)

Image 36AHoward bound Red Line train temporarily rerouted to elevated tracksatRandolph station, Chicago.
Photo credit: Daniel Schwen (from Portal:Illinois/Selected picture)

Image 37Symbols of many religions are carved in concrete relief on the exterior of the Bahá'í House of WorshipinWilmette. The temple was designed by the architect Louis Bourgeois and constructed between 1921 and 1953.
Image credit: ctot_not_def (photographer), Tobias Vetter (upload) (from Portal:Illinois/Selected picture)

Image 38The dome of the Illinois State Capitol. Designed by architects Cochrane and Garnsey, the dome's interior features a plaster frieze painted to resemble bronze and illustrating scenes from Illinois history. Stained glass windows, including a stained glass replica of the State Seal, appear in the oculus. Ground was first broken for the new capitol on March 11, 1869, and it was completed twenty years later.
Photo credit: Daniel Schwen (from Portal:Illinois/Selected picture)

Image 39Downtown Chicago and Lake Michigan (view from the Willis Tower).
Photo credit: Adrian104 (from Portal:Illinois/Selected picture)

Image 40A panoramic view of corn fields near RoyalinChampaign County.
Photo credit: Daniel Schwen (from Portal:Illinois/Selected picture)

Image 41Agreat blue heron (Ardea herodias) flying with nesting material in Illinois. There is a colony of about twenty heron nests in trees nearby.
Image credit: PhotoBobil (photographer), Snowmanradio (upload), PetarM (digital retouching) (from Portal:Illinois/Selected picture)

Image 42The McFarland Carillon is a 185-foot bell tower with 49 bells at the University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign. The tower was built in 2008-09 and was designed by Fred Guyton of Peckham, Guyton, Albers & Viets.
Image credit: Daniel Schwen (from Portal:Illinois/Selected picture)

Image 43The Campana FactoryinBatavia. It was built in 1936 to serve as a factory for The Campana Company, which produced Italian Balm, the most popular hand lotion in the United States during the Great Depression. The Streamline Moderne and Bauhaus design by Frank D. Chase features many innovative technologies, such as air conditioning.
Photo credit: User:MrPanyGoff (from Portal:Illinois/Selected picture)

Image 44"Let Go–But Stand By:" Photograph of Frances Willard from her 1895 book, A Wheel Within a Wheel: How I Learned to Ride the Bicycle. The new safety bicycle became associated with women's emancipation.
Image credit: Frances E. Willard (book author), Woman's Temperance Publishing Association and Fleming H. Revell Co. (publishers), HathiTrust (digitization), Dennis Bratland (upload) (from Portal:Illinois/Selected picture)

Image 45Photograph of Rockford pilot Elizabeth L. Gardner with the WASPsatHarlingen Army Air Field, Texas.
Image credit: U.S. Dept. of the Air Force (photograph); National Archives Catalog (digital file); Junkyardsparkle, Hohum, Bammesk (digital retouching) (from Portal:Illinois/Selected picture)

Image 46Hohenbuehelia mastrucata mushroom growing in Busse Woods, Elk Grove Village.
Image credit: Rocky Houghtby (photographer), Leoboudv (upload) (from Portal:Illinois/Selected picture)

Image 47Chicago and North Western Railway locomotive shops in Chicago, December 1942.
Image credit: Jack Delano, Farm Security Administration (photographer); Library of Congress (digital file); Trialsanderrors and Yann (digital retouching) (from Portal:Illinois/Selected picture)

Image 48Marina City is a mixed-use residential-commercial building complex in downtown Chicago. The complex, designed by Bertrand Goldberg and completed in 1964, consists of two corncob-shaped 179 m, 65-story towers.
Photo credit: Diego Delso (from Portal:Illinois/Selected picture)

Image 49A view of Lake Falls in Matthiessen State ParkinLa Salle County near Oglesby. The park's stream begins with the Lake Falls and flows into the Vermillion River.
Photo credit: Cspayer (from Portal:Illinois/Selected picture)

Image 50American Gothic, a 1930 painting by Grant Wood, has been in the collection of the Art Institute of Chicago since shortly after its creation. The painting is one of the most familiar images in 20th-century American art and has been widely parodied in popular culture.
Image credit: Grant Wood (painter), Google Art Project (digital file), DcoetzeeBot (upload) (from Portal:Illinois/Selected picture)

Image 51An illustration of Kincaid Mounds, a city of the Mississippian culture, at its height. The city was located near the Ohio River on the boundary of present day Massac and Pope Counties.
Image credit: H. Rowe (from Portal:Illinois/Selected picture)

Image 52The Lincoln TombinOak Ridge Cemetery, Springfield, where Abraham Lincoln is buried alongside Mary Todd Lincoln and three of their sons. The tomb, designed by Larkin Goldsmith Mead, was completed in 1874.
Photo credit: David Jones (from Portal:Illinois/Selected picture)

Image 53Chris Young winding up for a four-seam fastball in the bullpen while warming up before a 2007 game. Behind Young can be seen the Wrigley Field scoreboard and bleachers.
Image credit: TonyTheTiger (photographer) and Jjron (editing) (from Portal:Illinois/Selected picture)

Image 54The LaSalle Rail Bridge and Abraham Lincoln Memorial Bridge over the Illinois River. The LaSalle Bridge was built by the Illinois Central Railroad in 1893, and the Lincoln Bridge was built in 1987 with the construction of Interstate 39.
Image credit: Joseph Norton and Ronald Frazier (photographers), Alanscottwalker (upload) (from Portal:Illinois/Selected picture)

Image 55"The Great Presidential Puzzle": This chromolithograph cartoon about the 1880 Republican National Convention in Chicago shows Roscoe Conkling, leader of the Stalwarts of the Republican Party, playing a puzzle game. All blocks in the puzzle are the heads of the potential Republican presidential candidates. The cartoon parodies the famous 15 puzzle.
Image credit: Mayer, Merkel, & Ottmann (lithographers); James Albert Wales (artist); Jujutacular (digital retouching) (from Portal:Illinois/Selected picture)

Recent news

• November 17, 2021:

  

  The John Deere strike (pictured) ends after more than a month when workers approve a third contract offer.
• November 14, 2021: The last department store in Illinois belonging to Hoffman Estates-based Sears closes in Woodfield Mall.
• November 4, 2021: J. B. Pritzker speaks alongside Governors David Ige, Kate Brown, and Jay Inslee at the 2021 United Nations Climate Change Conference.
• October 26, 2021: Workers for Chicago-based McDonald's in ten cities go on strike to protest the company's handling of sexual harassment in the workplace.
• October 18, 2021: The Chicago Police Department reports that more than a third of its officers have failed to meet a deadline for reporting whether they have received a COVID-19 vaccine.
• October 17, 2021: The Chicago Sky win the 2021 WNBA Finals, defeating the Phoenix Mercury in four games to win the team's first-ever championship.
• October 14, 2021: 10,000 UAW workers go on strike (pictured) in Midwestern plants of Moline-based John Deere.
• October 12, 2021: The Chicago White Sox lose the American League Division SeriestoHouston in four games.
• October 11, 2021: David Card, former professor at the University of Chicago Booth School of Business, is awarded the Nobel Prize in Economics.

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Here are some tasks awaiting attention: Article requests : Executive branch of the government of the State of Illinois, Fort Gage, History of European exploration in Illinois, Morris Selz, Pre-Columbian history of Illinois, Wayne Motley, Western Wheel Company, Citizens Utility Board Assess : Category:Unassessed WikiProject Illinois articles and Category:Unknown-importance WikiProject Illinois articles Collaborate : WikiProject Chicago/COTW: Sears Copyedit : Category:WikiProject Illinois articles needing attention and Category:Illinois articles needing expert attention Deletion sorting : WikiProject Deletion sorting/Illinois Expand : Government of Illinois, expand bios on List of Governors of Illinois, Casimir Pulaski Day, Constitution of Illinois, Democratic Party of Illinois, Economy of Illinois, Flag and seal of Illinois, "Illinois", Illinois Republican Party, Illinois Secretary of State, Illinois state parks, expand list and introduction on List of battles fought in Illinois Featured article candidates : Improve to Featured Article status - Illinois, Springfield, Illinois Geographical coordinates : Category:Illinois articles missing geocoordinate data Infobox : Category:Illinois articles needing infoboxes Maintain : Portal:Illinois Map : Category:Wikipedia requested maps in Illinois Photo : Category:Wikipedia requested photographs in Illinois Stubs : Category:Illinois stubs, Category:Illinois geography stubs, Category:Illinois politician stubs, Category:Illinois school stubs Unreferenced : Unreferenced BLPs and Category:Unreferenced WikiProject Illinois articles Other : Find articles that belong in Category:Illinois or its subcategories, and add them to the category; tag those articles with {{WikiProject Illinois}} on their talk pages, as well as any new, untagged articles that might appear in one of those categories.

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