Posted on 06/13/2004 12:32:56 PM PDT by Land_of_Lincoln_John
DIXON, Ill. (AP) Ronald Reagan's death has drawn a steady stream of cars down the rural highways leading to Dixon, Tampico and Eureka, the often forgotten small towns where the only Illinois-born president grew up playing football and dreaming of Hollywood.
Five times the usual number of tourists have crossed the porch of Reagan's boyhood home in Dixon daily since his death. Hundreds of others have discovered the Reagan collection at Eureka College, where he graduated in 1932.
``Whenever anyone passes away, it's a time of reflection. I think people want to touch and feel and have a connection,'' said Jan Kostner, deputy director of the Illinois Bureau of Tourism.
Tourism officials hope that interest spreads all along the state's Reagan Trail, and they are considering a new campaign to promote Illinois' ties to three U.S. presidents: Reagan, Abraham Lincoln and Ulysses S. Grant.
But they say there's no way to predict how much tourism might grow or for how long.
History has long been a tourism draw in Illinois, fueled in part by the state's deep ties to Lincoln only shopping and dining rank ahead of history and culture in the state's nearly $22 billion tourism industry, Kostner said.
But until now, drawing visitors to the Reagan sites has been tough. The towns are all at least a few miles off interstate highways, and Reagan had been largely out of the public eye since announcing he had Alzheimer's disease nearly a decade ago.
Officials now hope the wave of publicity since Reagan's June 5 death will rekindle interest in his presidency and his Illinois roots.
Gov. Rod Blagojevich gave their efforts a boost last week by naming part of Interstate 88, which runs within 10 miles of both Dixon and Tampico, the ``Ronald Reagan Memorial Highway'' and ordering signs proclaiming the name.
``When someone dies, we tend to think about the positive things in people's lives rather than the negatives, and I think that draws people to the places they've been,'' said Dixon Mayor Jim Burke, a member of the 11-city Reagan Trail association.
Reagan's boyhood home, the restored two-story house and neighboring museum in Dixon, the town where ``Dutch'' grew up and became a local legend as a football player and lifeguard, has been drawing up to 350 visitors a day over since his death, said site coordinator Marla Trimble.
Just as many are turning up about two hours south at Eureka College, where the late president graduated in 1932 and donated thousands of items for the largest Reagan museum outside his presidential library in southern California.
``It's been a steady stream, probably 20 or 30 an hour. Before, we sometimes went days with no visitors,'' said Ruth Ann Uphoff, a secretary at the college's Cerf Center, which houses the display.
In Tampico, a village of 800 about 20 miles southwest of Dixon, about 80 people toured Reagan's birthplace the day after he died, compared with fewer than a dozen on a typical Sunday, said Lloyd McElhiney, a volunteer at the restored second-story apartment.
``It isn't political anymore, it's history. I think some people thought it was political while he was alive and stayed away,'' McElhiney said.
Kostner said renewed interest in Reagan's Illinois roots could bode well for tourism this summer, based on projections that a rebounding economy will boost vacation travel. She said the state is already promoting the Reagan stops on its Web site, www.enjoyillinois.com.
Visits have doubled or tripled at most stops since the Reagan Trail was established in 1999, said Joe Serangeli, president of the trail association. Where it might go from there is ``a wild guess,'' he said.
When former President Lyndon B. Johnson died in 1973, attendance jumped for nearly a year at his presidential library and museum in Austin, Texas, said library spokesman Robert Hicks. Three decades later, annual attendance has dropped from a peak of about 650,000, but the library still drew more than 266,000 visitors in 2003.
Hicks credits Johnson's ties to civil rights, the Vietnam war and other issues that still resonate today, along with a ``larger-than-life persona'' that he thinks Reagan shares.
``His life story is an amazing story, in itself, and an amazing American story, as was LBJ's'' Hicks said. ``I would be surprised if interest in his life doesn't have the same staying power.''
At Reagan's boyhood home, Trimble agrees.
``He was just such a down-to-earth president. He was a people president,'' she said. ``I think the interest is going to stay because of the type of person he was.''
On the Net:
LBJ shouldn't be mentioned in the same breath as Ronald Reagan. Reagan spent a lot of time trying to fix Johnson's welfare mess that he created.
I seriously thought about deleting that part. Perhaps I should've, but then again, it's nice that someone has pointed the irony out. Here's another: LBJ spent, as far as I know, his entire adult life on the public payroll, but retired as one of the wealthiest presidents. It must have been thrift, coupon cutting, drinking only during Happy Hours and flying coach....
Thats what we're here for on the Free Republic. To critique the leftist propaganda out there.
OK, now I am no LBJ fan, but let me say this, it is still wonderful that in this country two fellows who started with "not much" as I think Bush put it, could rise to be the President. Of course this time we have a choice (the choice is quite obvious, of course) between two fellows who started out with a good deal, but it is this true equality of opportunity that makes America the great and enduring nation that it is.
Growing up as a flatlander bump
A 'me too' bump.
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