Illinois Route 1, West Union IL, 6/6/88
Well, it has been a while since our last Street Scenes post, but I have not yet run out of photos, so let’s see what’s in store this week. Here we have a black Pacer station wagon with matching wheel covers. Could it be an elusive Limited, with leather interior?
1397 N. Galena, Dixon IL, 1/31/86
Remember these? This was what Pizza Huts looked like when I was a kid, and many survive to this day, usually as a poorly disguised dollar store or payday loans building. It’s pretty hard to hide that roof style. And I know chrisgreencar will appreciate what appears to be a ’76 Metalime Green Chevy pickup.
721 W. Chestnut, Bloomington IL, 12/10/85
As mentioned in past posts, Midwesterners hung on to their Detroit iron far longer than those on the Left Coast, as evidenced by these Broughamy land yachts shown here, including my favorite B-body, a ’77-’79 Bonneville.
101 S. State Street, Marengo IL, 12/26/85
This photo is pretty interesting, taken the day after Christmas in 1985. There is a nice Buick Estate Wagon just left of center. The building clearly had a taller roofline (maybe even an additional floor) when new, and most likely had a pointy turret roof on the corner. I wonder what it originally housed, as it looks like it had a giant semicircular window at some point in the past. I wonder if the building is still there.
2309 W. Glen, Peoria IL, 3/6/86
Here is what strip malls looked like 25 years ago, before they got prettied up by developers with trees and landscaping and called “lifestyle centers” or some such marketing term no normal person would use. Oh, and there’s a Honda Civic and ’76 Delta 88 hardtop too.
4007 E. State Street, Rockford IL, 8/17/94
Lots of potential CCs in this picture. If you look right underneath that cool, undoubtedly neon-lit at night sign, there is a black Dodge Omni or Plymouth Horizon.
Well, that’s all for this week. I will leave you with this more recent shot from 1996, featuring a 1994-95 Sedan de Ville, appropriately parked in front of the Eldorado Grill. Just a bit ahead of it is what may be the nicest car in today’s set, a ’63 Thunderbird Landau. See you next time!
219 N. Main Street, Galena IL, 6/19/96
I love the downtown shots. When I was in my prime road trip years in the 80’s I made a point of planning our routes away from the Interstates once west of the Mississippi, in large part because of the small-town downtowns.
There are lots of grungy little strip malls like that one in Peoria in the Detroit burbs. Just down the street from the once-nice motels that now look, mmm, questionable, and probably have hourly rates if you ask.
Once again I place my hand to my heart for the dearly departed brands in those pictures…
Nice pics, but the first cannot be U.S. 1 as it runs up the east coast from Key West to Maine.
The Silver Moon is along IL-1.
I was going by the info on the back of the photo. Fixed!
Looks like that 94-95 Cadillac de Ville is parked right behind its arch enemy, the Lincoln Continental…
Since you wondered if the building at 101 State St. in Marengo was still there, I thought it might be fun to Google Map it to see if any CCs showed up in current street shots. Alas, no cars of any interest, but some very cool buildings, including a crenelated stone castle facade across the street. 101 State St. is still there and it is one seriously screwed up building, no doubt due to a series of bad face-lifts and remodels. It hasn’t changed at all since 1985.
I guess I should now introduce all of you to a new show coming on NBC. The show will be a nostalgia filled ‘back to the 1980’s theme’. Since we’re running out of decades to be nostalgic about.
The 1980’s Superheroes of West Union, Illinois!!!
The 1980’s Superheroes of West Union, Illinois are a group of seven men (for now, we might add Mike Ditka in season two) that have spent half their evening drinking Pabst and Schlitz at the local bar. The year is 1982 and the local steel plant has closed. The supermarket has closed. Mel’s Diner down the street has closed. Even the assembly plant that was supposed to build lamp shades and Avon products the next town over has closed.
That’s right. These are seriously pissed off dudes with a lot of free time on their hands.
Through a magical TV located at the end of the wall, that has the voice of Gary Coleman, they get transported to the year 2012.
While taking a semi-drunken drive through the modern day, these guys see our entire society has taken a turn for the worse. It’s time to do something! Stand for America! Or at least start having a little fun for a change.
So these guys randomly jump out of their old pickup’s and Buick’s and attack kitsch ridden antique stores and metro-sexualized Italian bistros throughout the states of Illinois and Indiana. Makes sense… huh… I know… I’m good.
But that’s not all. This show has authentic 1980’s sound effects.
When they punch, it’s not a punch. Each one of their punches has an instant ‘snapping’ sound, a TV punch if you will, that results in whoever gets punched is instantly knocked out.
Every chair or table that they use to smash their enemies automatically gets smashed to bits. For some reason every impact that involves furniture, sounds like a bunch of jenga blocks falling off a small ledge.
When they leave you will always hear skid marks. And when they’re chased, a cliff will magically appear out of nowhere and everyone will fly off of it…. and live… of course… even after the cars get blown up in a big fiery explosion. Sometimes the cars explode while they’re in mid-air… and everyone still walks away without a scratch.
The 1980’s Superheroes of West Union, Illinois. Shown right after The Gong Show and Manimal. Thursday nights at 9 Eastern, 7 Mountain. Only on NBC.
I’m with bjcpdx on the google thing. I thoroughly enjoy looking at these and going on line to see what’s there now. Good show. Thanks for posting.
Sadly, 2309 W. Glen, Peoria IL has no cars parked out front any more (at least, not in the google street view image). There was a educational resource store here un until a year or two ago. I go past here a few times a month…
These pictures remind me of why GM cars never interested me that much – they were absolutely EVERYWHERE in the midwest. If GMs market share was around 45% in the late 70s/early 80s, then it must have been closer to 60-65% in the farm belt.