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IMAGES From Nostalgiaville
ILLINOIS- (TUNNEL HILL STATE TRAIL)-  8-23-06

NOTE: A Click of your Mouse on most of the pictures will enlarge them for better viewing

 The Tunnel Hill State Trail will mesmerize and captivate its visitors by surrounding them with nature's best show.  A hard-pack trail surface provides easy peddling on the bed of a turn of the century railroad lane. You may feel the presence of spirits from the far past or of those pioneers who carved out a place in this southern Illinois forest as you ride effortlessly along the trail.  Don't miss out on this experience.

 

TUNNEL HILL STATE TRAIL

 From 1870 through the next hundred years, trains reigned in southern Illinois.  The presence of natural resources... coal, timber and fertile farmland... led to the establishment of railroad lines to transport goods to distant markets.  Communities grew up along the tracks hoping to prosper from the railroads.  The Cairo-Vincennes Railroad began laying track in 1870 and completed the route in 1872.  It was the first of several companies to own and use this line.

The 1873 depression arid the 1877 national railroad strike hurt profits and the Cairo division of the Wabash, St Louis and Pacific Railroad purchased the line in the 1880's.  It was leased to the Cleveland, Cincinnati, Chicago & St Louis Railroad ("The Big Four") from 1890 into the 1940's on, it was operated by the New York Central Railroad, Conrail and others.  Construction of the interstate highway system began in the late 1950's.  More and more, goods were trucked to market.  By the 1960's, traffic along the once prosperous railroad had dropped sharply.  In 1988, the Norfolk Southern ended operation of the rail line.
RAILS TO TRAIL
The transformation from rail line to bike trail began in 1989.  Tracks and ties were removed leaving the rail bed, bridges, trestles and historic Tunnel Hill tunnel.  In 1991, 43 miles of railroad right-of-way were gifted to Illinois by the Norfolk Southern for the statewide Rails to Trails program.  The first completed sections of the Tunnel Hill State Trail opened in 1998.

 

1 Wetlands Center

 Our adventures on the Tunnel Hill State Trail begin at its southern terminus, the Wetlands Center.  A tour of the center will familiarize one with the history and natural beauty of the area...  and yes, Mabel... there's a bathroom here before we hit the trail.

 

The Henry N Barkhausen Cache River Wetlands Center provides information and exhibits on IDNR's Cache River State Natural Area.

Nature's landscaping around the Wetlands Center is superb and wildflowers have popped up everywhere one looks.

WETLANDS CENTER

 

Mile 0.00

 Let the adventures begin...

 

Mile 0.22

 The first picture opportunity is a chance to absorb a little history of this intriguing area

MAIN BROTHERS BOX & LUMBER COMPANY
The wood for wooden boxes to ship glass jars led the Main brothers to the Cache River area.  Forests of water tugalo and other trees made it an ideal location for a sawmill and manufacturing plant.  Main Brothers Box & Lumber Company was established in 1891.  They purchased land, built a sawmill and the town of Rago, and soon employed 200-300 workers. 
Main Brothers sold this mill in 1905 and moved two miles southeast to gain direct access to the Cincinnati and Eastern and the Cleveland, Cincinnati, Chicago and St Louis railroads.  They built a new lumber and box factory and a new company town named Karnak.  The mill at Rago struggled until 1910, then closed.  Rago slowly disappeared.  The school closed in the 1950's, and Rago's last buildings were razed in the 1970's. 

Main Brothers Cache River timberland exceeded 25,000 acres.  For 29 years, production surpassed 2,000,000 board feet per year in the Big Black Slough area alone.  Selective cutting was practiced as when operations ceased in the early 1970's.  Single stands of high quality forests remained.  In 1970, the Illinois Department of Natural Resources with help from the Nature Conservancy, began acquiring land once owned by Main Brothers to create the Cache River State Natural Area.

 

Mile 0.47

 The first of many bridges across scenic streams and rivers.

 

Mile 0.62

 The second of many bridges....

 

Mile 2.13

 A road crossing occurs just before entering Karnak

 

2 Karnak (Click here for a tour of Karnak)

Shortly after the Chicago and Eastern Illinois Railroad and Big Four Railroad established a junction at the former sites of Cache Town and Oaktown.  Main Brothers Box & Lumber Company moved there (1905).  The company platted a new town named Karnak around the mill that produced egg crates, containers and cypress lumber.

KARNAK

 

Mile 2.69

As the trail rolls through Karnak, we find a first class rest stop and parking area... and yes, Mabel... there's a bathroom.

"I was in the midst of a prairie!  A world of grass and flowers stretched around me, rising and falling in gentle undulations...  What a new and wondrous world of beauty!  What a magnificent sight!... How shall I convey to you the idea of a prairie?"  When Eliza Steele wrote these words in 1840, Illinois had approximately 22,000,000 acres of prairie.  Today, fewer than 2,500 acres of high quality prairie remain.

Grasses and wildflowers dominate prairies.  Trees are absent or scarce.  Topography and soil differentiate the prairie types of Illinois... black soil, hill, shrub, dolomite, sand, and gravel.  Most Illinois prairies are "tallgrass" prairies in which the types of plants vary with the amount of available moisture.

PRAIRIE BLAZING STAR (Liatris pycnostachya)
This colorful plant flowers in August and September.  It is widely distributed in Illinois prairies.

BIG BLUESTEM (Andropogan gerardii)
Named for its purplish-blue stem and its height (to 8 feet), it is the tallest and most widely distributed prairie grass in Illinois.

BLACK-EYED SUSAN (Rudbeckia hirta)
Common on hill prairies, it blooms from mid-spring through fall.  The flowers yield a yellow dye.

PALE PURPLE CONEFLOWER (Echinacea pallida)
Often found on hill prairie sites, its flowers begin to appear in June and bloom through July.  Its roots were used in a wide range of herbal medicines.

EASTERN PRICKLY PEAR (Opuntia humifusa)
This cactus is common in sandy prairie soils.  Its fruit and pads are favorite foods of the eastern box turtle.

RATTLESNAKE MASTER (Eryagium yuccifolium)
This adaptable plant occurs in most prairies.  Native Americans used it in medicine to induce vomiting and as an antidote for snake bites.		 The Illinois Department of Natural Resources, with the help of other groups around the state, is working to preserve, maintain, and restore Illinois prairie environments.  Prairie management includes periodic burning to keep trees from taking over.  Prairie plants are adapted to grow back after a fire.

 

Mile 3.30

 Guess what... found another bridge.

 

Unseen, but on or near the trail are three "ghost towns".  Sounds ominous, doesn't it? There are probably some ghosts of times past in these quaint stopovers, but none appeared suddenly out of the bushes along the trail.
Cache Town was established along the Cairo-Vincennes Railroad with a post office and nearby lumber mill.  It survived only two years, probably a casualty of the five-year depression that began with bank failures in 1873.

CACHE TOWN SITE
Forman had a large lumber mill in the 1870's.  Eventually the timber ran out, but in 1910 when the new Chicago Burlington and Quincy Railroad was routed through Forman and crossed the Big Four, the town survived.  The prosperity was short-lived, and Forman was almost deserted when a tornado finished it for good in 1957.

FORMAN SITE
U S Highway 45 crosses the old railroad right-of-way at Bender.  When occupied, the town had just one building.  It served as housing and offices for railroad workers.

BENDER SITE

 

Mile 4.3

 The Jean Campbell Farwell Memorial Overlook is a rest stop for cars as well as trail trompers, accessible from the trail by crossing the road

 

JEAN CAMPBELL FARWELL MEMORIAL OVERLOOK

THE RESTORATION VISION
The promise is being fulfilled.  The hardwoods have attained their healthiest size, the cypress already show their potential for future majestic growth.  The forest canopy has been restored.  The new natural wetland is a paradise for waterfowl.  By the year 2050, this significant 2,800 acre project will have represented a milestone in preservation history, and make a distinctive contribution to strengthening and restoring the unique bio-diversity of the Cache River Wetlands.

THE EARLY YEARS OF RESTORATION
The return of water to the original wetlands has worked its magic.  Various wetland forbs, swamp grasses, sedges and species such as smartwood, millet and rushes, some of which ???? lain dormant for years, have sprung to life.  The response of frogs, salamanders, reptiles and aquatic invertebrates has been dramatic, attracting shorebirds and waterfowl again to these ancient feeding grounds.  Seedlings planted from native seeds are emerging above the grass.  These indigenous tree species replanted as part of the restoration plan include cypress, tupela, overcup oak, pin oak and various birches.

GRASSY SLOUGH
An artist's conception of the view from this point as it might have looked when John J Audubon explored the southernmost tip of the Illinois Territory in 1810.  He found the wet swamps and low ridges teeming with birds such as the piliated woodpecker, ivory billed woodpecker and passenger pigeons.  Another early traveler eloquently described the wetlands as "the ??? impact of swamp and ??? beyond the reach of the eye... a vast forest of leafy trees raising the impression of vast green and level roof formed by branches of huge and living column that rises out of the water".  Another noted that large flocks of parquets are seen chattering in the trees or seen sporting their bright green plumages in the sunbeams".

The mission of the Nature Conservancy, a private nonprofit conservation organization, is to preserve the plants, animals and natural communities that represent the diversity of life on Earth by protecting the lands and waters they need to survive.  This 2800 acre site, now undergoing restoration, represents the largest single contribution of land to the Cache River Wetlands Joint Venture Project.  Its purchase and preservation was made possible by supporters of the Illinois Chapter of The Nature Conservancy.

 

Mile 5.08

 Another crossroad is carefully crossed Just beyond Mile 5.08, I encountered an encampment of wild carnivores.  Lucky for me, they had made an earlier kill and were not hungry.  Needless to say, I dismounted from the bicycle and tip-toed timidly  by.

 

3 Belknap (Click here for a tour of Belknap)

 Belknap incorporated in 1873.  Prosperity came with the Cairo-Vincennes Railroad, and Belknap became a thriving town of some 1000 people.  But in the late 1800's, Belknap suffered economically from national crises and strikes, and when the new rail line by passed it in 1910 and the highway was rerouted in 1918, the town declined.

BELKNAP

 

Mile 5.41

 Belknap is another class entry point for the trail with ample parking

 

Mile 6.57

 Watch out... here comes another bridge

 

Mile 7.25

 A closed section of trail results in a short detour

Mile 8.08

 

Mile 8.46

 The lower end of Tunnel Trail crosses much low laying, swampy areas, creating a need for many bridges.  It's worth a pause at the bridges to observe Nature doing what she does best.

 

Mile 8.91

 The Mile 8.91 bridge is a long one.  The middle span is an original rail bridge called King Bridge, built in 1912
Many shades of brilliant greens and browns cover the swampy water.

Birds roost in stark picturesque trees

 

Mile 9.94

 A convenient tunnel provides trail access under Highway 45 connecting Metropolis with Vienna.

 

Mile 10.25

More dangerous animals were encountered beyond this bridge... raptors disguised as horses... believe it!

 

Mile 10.72

Chocolate milk flowed below under this bridge

 

Mile 13.13

 The last bridge is crossed before reaching Vienna.

 

Mile 13.23

Approaching the Vienna Welcome Station and parking area for the trail, Highway 145 is crossed.

 

4 Vienna (Click here for a tour of Vienna)

 Vienna didn't officially exist when it was decreed the Johnson County seat in 1818.  The post office opened in 1821, and the town was incorporated in 1837.  By 1900 it had 1200 residents.  Tragic fires in 1900 and 1936 and the Great Depression took their toll, but the town's location near major highways and a state prison has helped it survive.

VIENNA

 

Mile 13.29

After 27 miles on the Tunnel Hill Trail (out and back 13+ miles), my enthusiasm for this trail is high and I will be ready for another section soon

 

5 The rest of the trail... awaits another day and another time.

 

In the 1800's, Bloomfield made an unsuccessful bid to become the Johnson County seat.  The town was mostly a stagecoach stop with one claim to fame: its tavern, unlike most, was a safe place to stay.  In the 1870's the railroad gave Bloomfield a boost, but today just a few houses remain.

BLOOMFIELD

 

Early Sanburn general store and post office.

Sanburn was a construction camp for "gandy dancers" (track layers) for the Cairo-Vincennes Railroad.  When the depot was built at Tunnel Hill, Sanburn became a flagstop.

SANBURN SITE

 

Tunnel at Tunnel Hill about 1910

Though not incorporated until 1873, buildings were erected in 1871 to house railroad workers who carved the 800-foot-long tunnel through shale and sandstone.  Access to the railroad prompted farmers to plant crops of early apples for shipment north.

TUNNEL HILL

 

Parker was built at the intersection of the St Louis, Alton, and Terra Haute Railroad and the Big Four Railroad.  Hotel, dining rooms and barber shops thrived on business from salesmen traveling on trains.  With the decline of rail traffic, Parker disappeared.

PARKER SITE

 

The town was named for Civil War General Ambrose Burnside who encouraged the construction of the Cairo-Vincennes Railroad to transport coal from southern Illinois mines.  New Burnside was a home to over 1200 people by 1876.  Over the years, as its mine and the railroad declined, the population decreased.  The town of New Burnside isn't the only thing named after Ambrose Burnside.  The way the general wore his whiskers has given us the word burnsides, or sideburns.

NEW BURNSIDE

 

Stonefort was settled in 1858 close to an ancient (A D 500) structure that might have been a defensive enclosure.  Boulton, founded nearby in 1872 as a railroad town, was later renamed Stonefort.  The original site of Stonefort is deserted.

STONEFORT

 

New Castle developed in 1880 around a slope mine along the C C C and St Louis Railroad.  The coal mine closed in 1906.

NEW CASTLE SITE

 

In 1872, Carrier Mills was a single house owned by William H Carrier.  It prospered with coal mining and the railroad.  More recently, Carrier Mills gave its name to a large, 1970's archaeological project in the area.

CARRIER MILLS

 

The first mine to ship coal by the railroad began here in 1873.  By the late 1800's, Ledford was a booming community of 1200.  Adverse economic conditions forced the mine to close in 1930.  The population has since dwindled.

LEDFORD

 

Harrisburg is the largest town on the Tunnel Hill State Trail.  It became the county seat of Saline County in1859 because it was more centrally located than Raleigh, the existing seat.  Originally 20 empty stores and two streets, Harrisburg had stores, homes and a brick courthouse when incorporated in 1861.

HARRISBURG

 

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