Illinois

Illinois
State
Country	United States
Before statehood	Illinois Territory
Admitted to the Union	December 3, 1818 (21st)
Capital	Springfield
Largest city	Chicago
Largest metro and urban areas	Chicago metropolitan area
Government
• Governor	Pat Quinn (D)
• Lieutenant Governor	Sheila Simon (D)
Legislature	General Assembly
• Upper house	Senate
• Lower house	House of Representatives
U.S. senators	Dick Durbin (D) Mark Kirk (R)
U.S. House delegation	11 Republicans, 8 Democrats (list)
Population
• Total	12,910,409 (2,009 est.)
• Density	223.4/sq mi (86.27/km2)
• Median household income	$54,124
• Income rank	17
Language
• Official language	English
• Spoken language	English (80.8%) Spanish (10.9%) Polish (1.6%) Other (6.7%)
Latitude	36° 58′ N to 42° 30′ N
Longitude	87° 30′ W to 91° 31′ W

Symbols

Illinois (/ˌɪlˈnɔɪ/ IL-i-NOY) is the fifth-most populous state of the United States of America, and is often noted for being a microcosm of the entire country. It is the most populous state in the Midwest region; however with 65% of its residents concentrated in the Chicago metropolitan area, most of the state has either a rural or a small town character. With Chicago in the northeast, small industrial cities and great agricultural productivity in central and northern Illinois, and natural resources like coal, timber, and petroleum in the south, Illinois has a broad economic base. Illinois is an important transportation hub; the Port of Chicago connects the Great Lakes to the Mississippi River via the Illinois River. As the "most average state", Illinois has long had a reputation as a bellwether both in social and cultural terms and politics.

In the 1810s settlers began arriving from Kentucky; in 1818 Illinois achieved statehood. The state filled up from south to north. Chicago was founded in the 1830s on the banks of the Chicago River, one of the few natural harbors on southern Lake Michigan. Railroads and John Deere's invention of the self-scouring steel plow turned Illinois' rich prairie into some of the world's most productive and valuable farmlands, attracting immigrant farmers from Germany and Sweden. By 1900, the growth of industrial jobs in the northern cities and coal mining in the central and southern areas attracted immigrants from Eastern and Southern Europe. Illinois was an important manufacturing center during both world wars. The Great Migration of African Americans from the rural South to Chicago, established a large community that created the city's famous jazz and blues cultures.

Three U.S. Presidents have been elected while living in Illinois—Abraham Lincoln, Ulysses S. Grant, and Barack Obama. However, the only President actually born and raised in Illinois was Ronald Reagan. Today, Illinois honors Lincoln with its official state slogan, Land of Lincoln, which is displayed on its license plates.

Name

See also: List of Illinois counties and List of Illinois county name etymologies

"Illinois" is the modern spelling for the early French missionaries and explorers' name for the Illinois people, a name that was spelled in many different ways in the early records.

The name "Illinois" has traditionally been said to mean "man" or "men" in the Miami-Illinois language, with the original iliniwek transformed via French into Illinois. However, this etymology is not supported by the Illinois language itself, in which the word for 'man' is ireniwa and plural 'man' is ireniwaki. The name Illiniwek has also been said to mean "tribe of superior men", though this is nothing more than a folk etymology. In fact the name "Illinois" derives from the Miami-Illinois verb irenwe·wa "he speaks the regular way". This was then taken into the Ojibwe language, perhaps in the Ottawa dialect, and modified into ilinwe· (pluralized as ilinwe·k). These forms were then borrowed into French, where the /we/ ending acquired the spelling -ois. The current form, Illinois, began to appear in the early 1670s. The Illinois's name for themselves, as attested in all three of the French missionary-period dictionaries of Illinois, was Inoka, of unknown meaning and unrelated to the other terms.

History

Main article: History of Illinois

Pre-European

Copper plates found at Pre-Columbian burial sites in Illinois.

Native Americans lived along the waterways of the Illinois area for thousands of years before the arrival of Europeans. The Koster Site has been excavated and demonstrated 7,000 years of continuous habitation. Cahokia, the largest regional chiefdom and urban center of the Pre-Columbian Mississippian culture, was located near present-day Collinsville, Illinois. They built more than 100 mounds and a woodhenge in a planned design expressing the culture's cosmology. The civilization vanished in the 15th century for unknown reasons, but historians and archeologists have speculated that the people depleted the area of resources. Many of the tribes engaged in constant warfare. At one site in the central Illinois River valley, one-third of all adults died as a result of violent injuries.

The next major power in the region was the Illinois Confederation or Illini, a political alliance among several tribes. There were about 25,000 Illinois Indians in 1700, but systematic attacks and warfare by the Iroquois reduced their numbers by 90%. Gradually, members of the Potawatomi, Miami, Sauk, and other tribes came in from the east and north. In the American Revolution, the Illinois and Potawatomi supported the American colonists' cause.

European exploration

Illinois in 1718, approximate modern state area highlighted, from [Carte de la Louisiane et du cours du Mississipi] Error: {{Lang}}: text has italic markup (help) by Guillaume de L'Isle.

French explorers Jacques Marquette and Louis Jolliet explored the Illinois River in 1673. In 1680, other French explorers constructed a fort at the site of present day Peoria, and in 1682, a fort atop Starved Rock in today's Starved Rock State Park. As a result of this French exploration, Illinois was part of the French empire until 1763, when it passed to the British. The small French settlements continued; a few British soldiers were posted in Illinois, but there were no British or American settlers. In 1778, George Rogers Clark claimed the Illinois Country for Virginia. The area was ceded by Virginia to the new United States in 1783 and became part of the Northwest Territory.

19th century

See also: History of Chicago and History of Nauvoo, Illinois

Historical population

Census	Pop.	Note	%±
1800	2,458		—
1810	12,282		399.7%
1820	55,211		349.5%
1830	157,445		185.2%
1840	476,183		202.4%
1850	851,470		78.8%
1860	1,711,951		101.1%
1870	2,539,891		48.4%
1880	3,077,871		21.2%
1890	3,826,352		24.3%
1900	4,821,550		26.0%
1910	5,638,591		16.9%
1920	6,485,280		15.0%
1930	7,630,654		17.7%
1940	7,897,241		3.5%
1950	8,712,176		10.3%
1960	10,081,158		15.7%
1970	11,113,976		10.2%
1980	11,426,518		2.8%
1990	11,430,602		0.0%
2000	12,419,293		8.6%
2010	12,830,632		3.3%
Source: 1910-2010

The Illinois-Wabash Company was an early claimant to much of Illinois. The Illinois Territory was created on February 3, 1809, with its capital at Kaskaskia.

During the discussions leading up to Illinois' admission to the Union, the proposed northern boundary of the state was moved twice. The original provisions of the Northwest Ordinance had specified a boundary that would have been tangent to the southern tip of Lake Michigan. Such a boundary would have actually left Illinois with no shoreline on Lake Michigan at all. However, as Indiana had successfully been granted a 10-mile northern extension of its boundary to provide it with a usable lakefront, the original bill for Illinois statehood, submitted to Congress on January 23, 1818, stipulated a northern border at the same latitude as Indiana's which is defined as 10 miles (16 km) north of the southernmost extremity of Lake Michigan. But the Illinois delegate, Nathaniel Pope, wanted more. Pope lobbied to have the boundary moved further north, and the final bill passed by Congress included an amendment to shift the border to 42° 30' north, which is approximately 51 miles (82 km) north of the Indiana northern border. This shift added 8,500 square miles (22,000 km²) to the state, including the lead mining region near Galena. More importantly, it added nearly 50 miles of Lake Michigan shoreline and the Chicago River. Pope and others envisioned a canal which would connect the Chicago and Illinois rivers, and thusly, connect the Great Lakes to the Mississippi.

In 1818, Illinois became the 21st U.S. state. The capital remained at Kaskaskia, headquartered in a small building rented by the state. In 1819, Vandalia became the capital, and in the next 18 years, three separate buildings were built to serve successively as the capitol building. In 1837, the state legislators representing Sangamon County, under the leadership of state representative Abraham Lincoln, succeeded in having the capital moved to Springfield, where a fifth capitol building was constructed. A sixth capitol building was erected in 1867, which continues to serve as the Illinois capitol today.

Though ostensibly a "free state", Illinois had slavery. The French owned black slaves as late as the 1820s. Slavery was nominally banned by the Northwest Ordnance, but that was not enforced. When Illinois became a sovereign state in 1818, the Ordnance no longer applied, and there were about 900 slaves there. As the southern part of the state, known as "Egypt", was largely settled by migrants from the South, the section was hostile to free blacks and allowed settlers to bring slaves with them for labor. Most citizens were opposed to allowing blacks as permanent residents, and efforts to make slavery official failed in 1822. Nevertheless, some slaves were brought in seasonally or as house servants. The Illinois Constitution of 1848 was written with a provision for exclusionary laws to be passed. In 1853, John A. Logan helped pass a law to prohibit all African Americans, including freedmen, from settling in the state.

In 1832, the Black Hawk War was fought in Illinois and current day Wisconsin between the United States and the Sauk, Fox and Kickapoo Indian tribes. The Indians withdrew to Iowa; when they attempted to return, they were defeated by U.S. militia and forced back to Iowa.

The winter of 1830–1831 is called the "Winter of the Deep Snow"; a sudden, deep snowfall blanketed the state, making travel impossible for the rest of the winter, and many travelers perished. Several severe winters followed, including the "Winter of the Sudden Freeze". On December 20, 1836, a fast-moving cold front passed through, freezing puddles in minutes and killing many travelers who could not reach shelter. The adverse weather resulted in crop failures in the northern part of the state. The southern part of the state shipped food north and this may have contributed to its name: "Little Egypt", after the Biblical story of Joseph in Egypt supplying grain to his brothers.

By 1839, the Mormon utopian city of Nauvoo, located on the Mississippi River, was created, settled, and flourished. In 1844, the Mormon leader Joseph Smith was murdered in the Carthage jail. After close to six years of rapid development, the Mormon city of Nauvoo, which rivaled Chicago as Illinois' largest city, saw a rapid decline after the Mormons left Illinois in 1846 for the West in a mass exodus.

Chicago gained prominence as a Great Lakes port and then as an Illinois and Michigan Canal port after 1848, and as a rail hub soon afterward. By 1857, Chicago was Illinois' largest city. With the tremendous growth of mines and factories in the state in the 19th century, Illinois played an important role in the formation of labor unions in the United States. The Pullman Strike and Haymarket Riot in particular greatly influenced the development of the American labor movement. From Sunday, October 8, 1871, until Tuesday, October 10, 1871, the Great Chicago Fire burned in downtown Chicago, destroying 4 square miles (10 km²).

In 1847, after lobbying by Dorothea L. Dix, Illinois became one of the first states to establish a system of state-supported treatment of mental illness and disabilities, replacing local almshouses.

Civil War

Main article: Illinois in the Civil War

During the American Civil War, over 250,000 Illinois men served in the Union Army, a figure surpassed by only New York, Pennsylvania, and Ohio. Beginning with President Abraham Lincoln's first call for troops and continuing throughout the war, Illinois mustered 150 infantry regiments, which were numbered from the 7th to the 156th regiments. Seventeen cavalry regiments were also gathered, as well as two light artillery regiments.

Twentieth century

In the 20th century, Illinois emerged as one of the most important states in the union, with a population of nearly 5 million bolstered by continued immigration from southern and eastern Europe, and by African-Americans from Mississippi, Louisiana, and Arkansas. By the end of the century, the population had reached 12.4 million. The Century of Progress World's Fair was held at Chicago in 1933. Oil strikes in Marion County and Crawford County lead to a boom in 1937, and, by 1939, Illinois ranked fourth in U.S. oil production.

No state has had a more prominent role than Illinois in the emergence of the nuclear age. As part of the Manhattan Project, the first sustained nuclear chain reaction took place at the University of Chicago in 1942. In 1957, Argonne National Laboratory, near Chicago, activated the first experimental nuclear power generating system in the United States. By 1960, the first privately financed nuclear plant in United States, Dresden 1, was dedicated near Morris. In 1967, Fermilab, a national nuclear research facility near Batavia, opened a particle accelerator which was the world largest for over forty years. And, with eleven plants currently operating, Illinois leads all states in the amount of electricity generated from nuclear power.

Chicago became an ocean port with the opening of the Saint Lawrence Seaway in 1959. The seaway and the Illinois Waterway connected Chicago to both the Mississippi River and the Atlantic Ocean. In 1960, Ray Kroc opened the first McDonald's franchise in Des Plaines (which still exists today as a museum, with a working McDonald's across the street).

The state's fourth constitution was adopted in 1970, replacing the 1870 document. The first Farm Aid concert was held in Champaign to benefit American farmers, in 1985. The worst upper Mississippi River flood of the century, the Great Flood of 1993, inundated many towns and thousands of acres of farmland.

Geography

Main article: Geography of Illinois

Illinois, showing major cities and roads

Boundaries

Illinois' eastern border with Indiana consists of a north-south line at 87° 31′ 30″ west longitude, from Lake Michigan to the Wabash River, above Post Vincennes. The Wabash River continues as the eastern/southeastern border with Indiana, until the Wabash enters the Ohio River. This marks the beginning of Illinois' southern border with Kentucky, which runs along the northern shoreline of the Ohio River. Its western border with Missouri and Iowa is the Mississippi River. Its northern border with Wisconsin is fixed at 42° 30' north latitude. The northeastern border of Illinois actually lies within Lake Michigan, within which Illinois shares a water boundary with the state of Michigan.

Topography

Though Illinois lies entirely in the Interior Plains, it does have some variation in its elevation. In extreme northwestern Illinois, the Driftless Area, a region of unglaciated and therefore higher and more rugged topography, occupies a small part of the state. Charles Mound, located in this region, has the state's highest elevation above sea level at 1,235 feet (376 m). The highest structure in Illinois is Willis Tower with a roof elevation of approximately 2,034 feet (620 m) above sea level. [Chicago elevation (580 ft) + tower height (1454 ft) = 2034.] The floodplain on the Mississippi River from Alton to the Kaskaskia River is known as the American Bottom.

Divisions

Illinois has three major geographical divisions. The first is Northern Illinois, dominated by the Chicago metropolitan area, including the city of Chicago, its suburbs, and the adjoining exurban area into which the metropolis is expanding. As defined by the federal government, the Chicago metro area includes a few counties in Indiana and Wisconsin and stretches across much of northeastern Illinois. It is a cosmopolitan city, densely populated, industrialized, and settled by a wide variety of ethnic groups. The city of Rockford, the fourth largest metropolitan area and the state's third largest city sits along Interstates 39 and 90 some 75 miles (121 km) northwest of Chicago. The Quad Cities, located at the western extreme of the area, had a population in 2009 of 379,066. Arguably, this population makes it the third largest metropolitan area in Illinois. However, since its area spans two states (two of the Quad Cities lie in Iowa), the claim is debatable .

Southward and westward, the second major division is Central Illinois, an area of mostly prairie. Known as the Heart of Illinois, it is characterized by small towns and mid-sized cities. The western section (west of the Illinois River) was originally part of the Military Tract of 1812 and forms the distinctive western bulge of the state. Agriculture, particularly corn and soybeans, as well as educational institutions and manufacturing centers, figure prominently. Cities include Peoria, the third largest metropolitan area in Illinois at 370,000; Springfield, the state capital; Quincy; Decatur; Bloomington-Normal; and Champaign-Urbana.

The third division is Southern Illinois, comprising the area south of U.S. Route 50, and including Little Egypt, near the juncture of the Mississippi River and Ohio River. Southern Illinois is the site of the ancient city of Cahokia, as well as the site of the first state capital, at Kaskaskia which today is separated from the rest of the state by the Mississippi River. This region can be distinguished from the other two by its warmer climate, different variety of crops (including some cotton farming in the past), more rugged topography (due to the area remaining unglaciated during the Illinoian Stage, unlike most of the rest of the state), as well as small-scale oil deposits and coal mining. The Illinois suburbs of St. Louis comprise the second most populous metropolitan area in Illinois with nearly 600,000 inhabitants, and are known collectively as the Metro-East. The only other significant concentration of population in Southern Illinois is an area roughly centered on Carbondale, a four-county area that is home to around 210,000 residents. A portion of southeastern Illinois is part of the extended Evansville, Indiana Metro Area, commonly referred to as the Tri-State with Indiana and Kentucky. Seven Illinois counties are in the area.

In addition to these three, largely latitudinally defined divisions, all of the region outside of the Chicago Metropolitan area is often called "downstate" Illinois. This term is flexible, but is generally meant to mean everything outside the Chicago-area. Thus, some cities in Northern Illinois, such as Rockford – which is actually north of Chicago – and De Kalb, which is west of Chicago, are considered to be "downstate".

Climate

Main article: Climate of Illinois

Because its nearly 400 miles (644 km) distance from its northernmost and southernmost extremes, as well as its mid-continental situation, Illinois has a widely varying climate. Most of Illinois has a humid continental climate (Köppen climate classification Dfa), with hot, humid summers and cold winters. The southernmost part of the state, from about Carbondale southward, borders on a humid subtropical climate (Koppen Cfa), with more moderate winters. Average yearly precipitation for Illinois varies from just over 48 inches (1,219 mm) at the southern tip to around 35 inches (889 mm) in the northern portion of the state. Normal annual snowfall exceeds 38 inches (965 mm) in the Chicago area, while the southern portion of the state normally receives less than 14 inches (356 mm). The all time high temperature was 117 °F (47 °C), recorded on July 14, 1954, at East St. Louis, Illinois, while the all time low temperature was −36 °F (−38 °C), recorded on January 5, 1999, at Congerville, Illinois.

Illinois averages around 51 days of thunderstorm activity a year, which ranks somewhat above average in the number of thunderstorm days for the United States. Illinois is vulnerable to tornadoes with an average of 35 occurring annually, which puts much of the state at around five tornadoes per 10,000 square miles (30,000 km²) annually. The deadliest tornadoes on record in the nation have occurred largely in Illinois. The Tri-State Tornado of 1925 killed 695 people in three states, 613 of whom lived in Illinois. Though this figure can be attributed to the historically higher population of Illinois compared to neighboring states (past to present) as well as modern developments in storm tracking, death tolls due to tornadoes have dramatically declined.

City	Jan	Feb	Mar	Apr	May	Jun	Jul	Aug	Sep	Oct	Nov	Dec
Cairo	41/25	47/29	57/39	69/50	77/58	86/67	90/71	88/69	81/61	71/49	57/39	46/30
Chicago	30/16	36/21	47/30	59/40	71/51	81/61	85/65	83/65	75/57	64/45	48/34	36/22
Edwardsville	36/19	42/24	52/34	64/45	75/55	84/64	89/69	86/66	79/58	68/46	53/35	41/25
Moline	30/12	36/18	48/29	62/39	73/50	83/60	86/64	84/62	76/53	64/42	48/30	34/18
Peoria	31/14	37/20	49/30	62/40	73/51	82/60	86/65	84/63	77/54	64/42	49/31	36/20
Rockford	27/11	33/16	46/27	59/37	71/48	80/58	83/63	81/61	74/52	62/40	46/29	32/17
Springfield	33/17	39/22	51/32	63/42	74/53	83/62	86/66	84/64	78/55	67/44	51/34	38/23

Demographics

Illinois Population Density Map

In the 2010 Census, Illinois was found to have a population of 12,830,632, representing a slightly lower increase than had been anticipated in estimates from two years earlier.

Specific demographic data from the 2010 Census is not subject to release until March of 2011, but as of the 2007 estimates from the U.S. Census Bureau, there were 1,768,518 foreign-born inhabitants of the state or 13.8% of the population, with 48.4% from Latin America, 24.6% from Asia, 22.8% from Europe, 2.9% from Africa, 1.2% from Northern America and 0.2% from Oceania. Of the foreign-born population, 43.7% were naturalized U.S. citizens and 56.3% were not U.S. citizens. Additionally, the racial distributions were as follows: 65.0% White American, 15.0% African American, 14.9% Latino American, 4.3% Asian American, 0.3% American Indian and Alaska Natives, and 0.1% Native Hawaiians and Pacific Islander American. In 2007, 6.9% of Illinois' population was reported as being under age 5, 24.9% under age 18 and 12.1% were age 65 and over. Females made up approximately 50.7% of the population.

According to the 2007 estimates, 21.1% of the population had German ancestry, 13.3% had Irish ancestry, 7.9% had Polish ancestry, 6.7% had English ancestry, 6.4% had Italian ancestry, 4.6% listed themselves as American, 2.4% had Swedish ancestry, 2.2% had French ancestry, other than Basque, 1.6% had Dutch ancestry, 1.4% had Norwegian ancestry and 1.3% had Scottish ancestry. Also, 21.8% of the population age 5 years and over reported speaking a language other than English, with 12.8% of the population speaking Spanish, 5.6% speaking other Indo-European languages, 2.5% speaking Asian and Austronesian languages, and 0.8% speaking other languages.

Chicago, along the shores of Lake Michigan, is the nation's third largest city. In 2000, 23.3% of Illinois' population lived in the city of Chicago, 43.3% in Cook County and 65.6% in the counties of the Chicago metropolitan area: Will, DuPage, Kane, Lake and McHenry counties, as well as Cook County. The remaining population lives in the smaller cities and rural areas that dot the state's plains. As of 2000, the state's center of population was at 41.278216°N 88.380238°W / 41.278216; -88.380238, located in Grundy County, northeast of the village of Mazon.

Leading population centers
Rank	City	Population	County	Chicago Springfield (State Capital)
1	Chicago	2,853,114	Cook, DuPage
2	Aurora	171,782	DuPage Kane Will
3	Rockford	157,272	Winnebago
4	Joliet	146,125	Will
5	Naperville	143,117	DuPage, Will
6	Springfield	117,352	Sangamon
7	Peoria	114,114	Peoria
8	Elgin	106,330	Cook, Kane
based on 2008 U.S. Census Bureau estimates

Urban areas

See also: List of cities in Illinois and List of towns and villages in Illinois

Chicago is the largest city in the state and the third most populous city in the United States, with its 2008 estimated population of 2,853,114. The U.S. Census Bureau currently lists seven other cities with populations of over 100,000 within Illinois. Based upon the Census Bureau's official 2008 population estimates, they are: Aurora, a Chicago satellite town which at 171,782, eclipsed Rockford for the title of "Second City" of Illinois in 2006. However, at 157,272, Rockford is not only the number three city, it also remains the largest city in the state not located within the Chicago metropolitan area. Joliet, located southwest of Chicago, is the fourth largest city in the state, with a population of 146,125. It is also one of the fastest growing cities in the U.S. Naperville, a suburb of Chicago, is fifth with 143,117, it shares its western border with the state's second largest city, Aurora, along Illinois Route 59. Springfield, the state capital of Illinois, comes in sixth with 117,352. Peoria, which decades ago was the second largest city in the state, comes in seventh with 114,114. The eighth largest and final city in the 100,000 club is Elgin, a northwest suburb of Chicago with a 2008 estimated population of 106,330.

Other major urban areas include the Illinois portion of Greater St. Louis (often called the Metro-East area), which has a population of almost 700,000 people, the Champaign-Urbana Metropolitan Area, which has a combined population of almost 230,000 people, the Illinois portion of the Quad Cities area with about 215,000 people, and the Bloomington-Normal area with a combined population of over 165,000.

Religion

Catholics and Protestants are the largest religious groups in Illinois. Roman Catholics, who are heavily concentrated in and around Chicago, account for around 30% of the population. Chicago and its suburbs are also home to a large and growing population of Hindus, Jews, Muslims, Baha'is and Sikhs. The largest denominations by number of adherents in 2000 were the Roman Catholic Church with 3,874,933; the United Methodist Church with 365,182; the Southern Baptist Convention with 305,838 and Judaism with 270,000.

Illinois played an important role in the early Latter Day Saint movement, with Nauvoo, Illinois, becoming a gathering place for a period in the 19th century. Nauvoo was the location of the succession crisis, which led to separations between many Latter Day Saint sects. The largest sect, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, also claims the most members in Illinois at 55,460.

Demographics of Illinois (csv)

By race	White	Black	AIAN*	Asian	NHPI*
2000 (total population)	80.71%	15.73%	0.62%	3.84%	0.11%
2000 (Hispanic only)	11.78%	0.35%	0.19%	0.08%	0.04%
2005 (total population)	80.34%	15.63%	0.62%	4.45%	0.11%
2005 (Hispanic only)	13.72%	0.39%	0.20%	0.09%	0.04%
Growth 2000–05 (total population)	2.30%	2.07%	3.74%	19.16%	10.13%
Growth 2000–05 (non-Hispanic only)	-0.68%	1.81%	0.91%	19.36%	10.18%
Growth 2000–05 (Hispanic only)	19.75%	13.28%	10.14%	9.96%	10.06%
* AIAN is American Indian or Alaskan Native; NHPI is Native Hawaiian or Pacific Islander

Economy

Main article: Economy of Illinois

The Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago at the heart of Chicago's financial center

The dollar gross state product for Illinois was estimated to be US$634 billion in 2008. The state's 2008 per capita gross state product was estimated to be US$40,006, and the state's per capita personal income was estimated to be US$41,411 in 2009.

As of March 2010, the state's unemployment rate was 11.5%, and two months later, the rate dropped to 10.8% in May.

Taxes

Illinois' state income tax is calculated by multiplying net income by a flat rate. In 1990, that rate was set at 3%, but in 2010, the General Assembly voted in a temporary increase in the rate to 5%; the new rate went into effect on January 1, 2011, and is scheduled to return to 3% after four years. There are two rates for state sales tax: 6.25% for general merchandise and 1% for qualifying food, drugs and medical appliances. The property tax is the largest single tax in Illinois, and is the major source of tax revenue for local government taxing districts. The property tax is a local— not state— tax, imposed by local government taxing districts, which include counties, townships, municipalities, school districts and special taxation districts. The property tax in Illinois is imposed only on real property.

Agriculture

Illinois' major agricultural outputs are corn, soybeans, hogs, cattle, dairy products, and wheat. In most years, Illinois is either the first or second state for the highest production of soybeans, with a harvest of 427.7 million bushels (11.64 million metric tons) in 2008, after Iowa's production of 444.82 million bushels (12.11 million metric tons). Illinois ranks second in U.S. corn production with more than 1.5 billion bushels produced annually. Illinois also produces wine, and the state is home to two American viticultural areas. Illinois' universities are actively researching alternative agricultural products as alternative crops.

Manufacturing

Illinois is one of the nation's manufacturing leaders, boasting annual value added productivity by manufacturing of over $107 billion in 2006. About three-quarters of the state's manufacturers are located in the Northeastern Opportunity Return Region, with 38 percent of Illinois' approximately 18,900 manufacturing plants located in Cook County. As of 2006, the leading manufacturing industries in Illinois, based upon value-added, were chemical manufacturing ($18.3 billion), machinery manufacturing ($13.4 billion), food manufacturing ($12.9 billion), fabricated metal products ($11.5 billion), transportation equipment ($7.4 billion), plastics and rubber products ($7.0 billion), and computer and electronic products ($6.1 billion).

Services

By the early 2000s, Illinois' economy had moved toward a dependence on high-value-added services, such as financial trading, higher education, law, logistics, and medicine. In some cases, these services clustered around institutions that hearkened back to Illinois' earlier economies. For example, the Chicago Mercantile Exchange, a trading exchange for global derivatives, had begun its life as an agricultural futures market. Other important non-manufacturing industries include publishing, tourism, and energy production and distribution.

Energy

Illinois is a net importer of fuels for energy, despite large coal resources and some minor oil production. Illinois exports electricity, ranking fifth among states in electricity production and seventh in electricity consumption.

Coal

The coal industry of Illinois has its origins in the middle 19th century, when entrepreneurs such as Jacob Loose discovered coal in locations such as Sangamon County. Jacob Bunn contributed to the development of the Illinois coal industry, and was a founder and owner of the Western Coal & Mining Company of Illinois. About 68% of Illinois has coal-bearing strata of the Pennsylvanian geologic period. According to the Illinois State Geological Survey, 211 billion tons of bituminous coal are estimated to lie under the surface, having a total heating value greater than the estimated oil deposits in the Arabian Peninsula. However, this coal has a high sulfur content, which causes acid rain unless special equipment is used to reduce sulfur dioxide emissions. Many Illinois power plants are not equipped to burn high-sulfur coal. In 1999, Illinois produced 40.4 million tons of coal, but only 17 million tons (42%) of Illinois coal was consumed in Illinois. Most of the coal produced in Illinois is exported to other states, while much of the coal burned for power in Illinois (21 million tons in 1998) is mined in the Powder River Basin of Wyoming.

Mattoon was recently chosen as the site for the Department of Energy's FutureGen project, a 275 megawatt experimental zero emission coal-burning power plant which just received a second round of funding from the DOE.

Petroleum

Illinois is a leading refiner of petroleum in the American Midwest, with a combined crude oil distillation capacity of nearly 900,000 barrels per day (140,000 m³/d). However, Illinois has very limited crude oil proved reserves that account for less than 1% of U.S. crude oil proved reserves. Residential heating is 81% natural gas compared to less than 1% heating oil. Illinois is ranked 14th in oil production among states, with a daily output of approximately 28,000 barrels (4,500 m³) in 2005.

Nuclear power

Main article: Nuclear power in the United States

Byron Nuclear Generating Station in Ogle County.

Nuclear power arguably began in Illinois with the Chicago Pile-1, the world's first artificial self-sustaining nuclear chain reaction in the world's first nuclear reactor, built on the University of Chicago campus. There are six operating nuclear power plants in Illinois: Braidwood; Byron; Clinton; Dresden; LaSalle; and Quad Cities. With the exception of the single-unit Clinton plant, each of these facilities has two reactors. Three reactors have been permanently shut down and are in various stages of decommissioning: Dresden-1 and Zion-1 and 2. As of 2008, Illinois was ranked first among the 50 states both in nuclear capacity and nuclear generation. In 2007, 48% of Illinois' electricity was generated using nuclear power.

Wind power

Average annual wind power distribution for Illinois, 50 m (160 ft) height above ground (2009).

Illinois has seen growing interest in the use of wind power for electrical generation. Most of Illinois was rated in 2009 as "marginal or fair" for wind energy production by the U.S. Department of Energy, with some western sections rated "good" and parts of the south rated "poor". These ratings are for wind turbines with 50-metre (160 ft) hub heights; newer wind turbines are taller, enabling them to reach stronger winds farther from the ground. As a result, more areas of Illinois have become prospective wind farm sites. As of September 2009, Illinois had 1116.06 MW of installed wind power nameplate capacity with another 741.9 MW under construction. Illinois ranked ninth among U.S. states in installed wind power capacity, and sixteenth by potential capacity. Large wind farms in Illinois include Twin Groves, Rail Splitter, EcoGrove, and Mendota Hills.

As of 2007, wind energy represented only 1.7% of Illinois' energy production, and it was estimated that wind power could provide 5-10% of the state's energy needs. Also, the Illinois General Assembly mandated in 2007 that by 2025, 25% of all electricity generated in Illinois is to come from renewable resources.

Biofuels

Illinois is ranked second in corn production among U.S. states, and Illinois corn is used to produce 40% of the ethanol consumed in the United States. The Archer Daniels Midland corporation in Decatur, Illinois is the world's leading producer of ethanol from corn.

University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign is one of the partners in the Energy Biosciences Institute (EBI), a $500 million biofuels research project funded by petroleum giant BP.

Arts and culture

Museums

For a more comprehensive list, see List of museums in Illinois.

Illinois has numerous museums. The state of the art Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum in Springfield is the largest presidential library in the country; numerous museums in the city of Chicago are considered some of the best in the world. These include the John G. Shedd Aquarium, the Field Museum of Natural History, the Art Institute of Chicago and the Museum of Science and Industry.

Music

Main article: Music of Illinois

Illinois is a leader in music education having hosted the Midwest Clinic: An International Band and Orchestra Conference since 1946, as well being home to the Illinois Music Educators Association (IMEA), one of the largest professional music educator's organizations in the country. Each summer since 2004, Southern Illinois University Carbondale has played host to the Southern Illinois Music Festival, which presents dozens of performances throughout the region. Past featured artists include the Eroica Trio and violinist David Kim.

Sports

For a more comprehensive list, see List of professional sports teams in Illinois.

Soldier Field, Chicago

Major league teams

As one of the United States' major metropolises, all major sports leagues have teams headquartered in Chicago.

• Two Major League Baseball teams are located in the state. The Chicago Cubs of the National League play in the second-oldest major league stadium (Wrigley Field) and are widely known for having the longest championship drought in all of major American sport: not winning the World Series since 1908. The Chicago White Sox of the American League won the World Series in 2005, their first since 1917.
• The Chicago Bears football team has won nine total NFL Championships, the last occurring in Super Bowl XX in 1986. The NFL's Arizona Cardinals were the Chicago Cardinals until they left the city in 1961.
• The Chicago Bulls of the NBA is one of the most recognized basketball teams in the world, due largely to the efforts of Michael Jordan, who led the team to six NBA championships in eight seasons in the 1990s.
• The Chicago Blackhawks of the NHL began playing in 1926, as a member of the Original Six and have won four Stanley Cups, most recently in 2010 (after one of the longest Stanley Cup droughts of any NHL team, not having won since 1961).
• The Chicago Fire soccer club is a member of MLS and is one of the league's most successful and best-supported, since its founding in 1997, winning one league and four Lamar Hunt U.S. Open Cups in that timespan.

Minor league teams

Many minor league teams also call Chicago their home. These include

• The Chicago Rush of the Arena Football League, who ArenaBowl XX in 2006.
• The Chicago Wolves is an AHL team.
• The Chicago Sky of the WNBA
• The Chicago Bandits of the NPF, a female softball league; the Bandits won their first title in 2008
• The Chicago Red Stars of the WPS, a female soccer league

Folded sports franchises

The city was formerly home to several other teams that either failed to survive, or that belonged to leagues that folded.

• The Chicago Blitz, United States Football League
• The Chicago Sting, Major Indoor Soccer League
• The Chicago Cougars, World Hockey Association
• The Chicago Rockers, Continental Basketball Association
• The Chicago Skyliners, American Basketball Association
• The Chicago Bruisers, Arena Football League
• The Chicago Power, National Professional Soccer League
• The Chicago Blaze, National Women's Basketball League.

Professional sports teams outside of Chicago

Chicago is not the only place in Illinois where professional sports are played. The Rockford Lightning is one of the oldest CBA teams in the league. The Peoria Chiefs and Kane County Cougars are minor league baseball teams affiliated with MLB. The Schaumburg Flyers, Lake County Fielders, and Joliet JackHammers are members of the Northern League, and the Southern Illinois Miners belong to the Frontier League.

In addition to the Chicago Wolves, the AHL also has two teams in Illinois outside of Chicago: the Rockford IceHogs serves as the AHL affiliate of the Chicago Blackhawks, and the Peoria Rivermen is the AHL affiliate of the St. Louis Blues.

Motor racing

Illinois has a long tradition of motor racing. Oval tracks at the Chicagoland Speedway in Joliet, the Chicago Motor Speedway in Cicero and the Gateway International Raceway in Madison, near St. Louis, have hosted NASCAR, CART and IRL races, whereas the Sports Car Club of America, among other national and regional road racing clubs, have visited the Autobahn Country Club in Joliet, the Blackhawk Farms Raceway in South Beloit and the former Meadowdale International Raceway in Carpentersville. Illinois also has several short tracks and dragstrips. The dragstrip at Gateway International Raceway and the Route 66 Raceway, which sits on the same property as the Chicagoland Speedway, both host NHRA drag races.

Parks and recreation

For a more comprehensive list, see List of protected areas of Illinois.

The Illinois state parks' system began in 1908 with what is now Fort Massac State Park, becoming the first park in a system encompassing over 60 parks and about the same number of recreational and wildlife areas.

Areas under the protection and control of the National Park Service include: the Illinois and Michigan Canal National Heritage Corridor near Lockport; the Lewis and Clark National Historic Trail; the Lincoln Home National Historic Site in Springfield; the Mormon Pioneer National Historic Trail; the Trail of Tears National Historic Trail; and the American Discovery Trail.

Government

See also: Government of Illinois

Like all 50 states, Illinois has three branches of government: executive, legislative and judicial. Legislative functions are granted to the Illinois General Assembly, composed of the 118-member Illinois House of Representatives and the 59-member Illinois Senate. The executive branch is led by the Governor of Illinois, but four other executive officials are separately elected by the people. The judiciary is composed of the Supreme Court of Illinois and the lower appellate and circuit courts.

Politics

See also: Political party strength in Illinois

The dome on the Illinois State Capitol in Springfield is taller than the dome on the United States Capitol.

Party balance

Historically, Illinois was long a major swing state, with near-parity existing between the Republican and the Democratic parties. However, in recent elections, the Democratic Party has slowly gained ground, and Illinois has come to be seen as more of a "blue" state. Chicago and most of Cook County votes have long been strongly Democratic. In addition, Democratic voters have moved to the traditionally Republican "collar counties" (the suburbs surrounding Chicago's Cook County, Illinois), which are becoming increasingly diverse. Republicans continue to prevail in rural northern and central Illinois; Republican support is strong in southern Illinois outside of the East St. Louis metropolitan area. Illinois has voted for Democratic presidential candidates in the last five elections. Barack Obama easily won the state's 21 electoral votes in 2008, by a margin of 25 percentage points with 61.9% of the vote. And though the Republicans' electoral performance in the 2010 mid-year elections marked some improvement, the trend in Illinois politics for the long term appears to be more blue than red.

History of corruption

Politics in the state, particularly those of the Chicago machine, have been famous for highly visible corruption cases, as well as for crusading reformers, such as governors Adlai Stevenson (D) and James R. Thompson (R). In 2006, former Governor George Ryan (R) was convicted of racketeering and bribery. In 2008, then-Governor Rod Blagojevich (D) was served a criminal complaint on corruption charges, stemming from allegations that he conspired to sell the vacated Senate seat left by President Barack Obama (D) to the highest bidder. In the late 20th century, Congressman Dan Rostenkowski (D) was imprisoned for mail fraud; former governor and federal judge Otto Kerner, Jr. (D) was imprisoned for bribery; and State Auditor of Public Accounts (Comptroller) Orville Hodge (R) was imprisoned for embezzlement. In 1912, William Lorimer, the GOP boss of Chicago, was expelled from the U.S. Senate for bribery and in 1921, Governor Len Small (R) was found to have defrauded the state of a million dollars.

US Presidents from Illinois

Three presidents have claimed Illinois as their political base: Lincoln, Grant, and Obama. Lincoln was born in Kentucky, but moved to Illinois at the age of 21; he served in the General Assembly and represented the 7th congressional district in the US House of Representatives before his election as President. Ulysses S. Grant was born in Ohio and had a military career that precluded settling down, but on the eve of the Civil War, and approaching middle age, Grant moved to Illinois and thus claimed it as his home when running for President. Barrack Obama was born and raised in Hawaii (other than a four year period of his childhood spent in Indonesia) and made Illinois his home and base after completing law school.

Only one person elected President of the United States was actually born in Illinois. Ronald Reagan was born in Tampico, raised in Dixon and educated at Eureka College. Reagan moved to Los Angeles as a young adult and later became Governor of California before being elected President.

Though never elected president, Illinois Governor Adlai Stevenson, who was born and raised in central Illinois, was the Democratic nominee for president in 1952 and 1956.

Black senators

Since the adoption of the United States Constitution in 1789, only six African-Americans have served as members of the United States Senate, and half of them represented Illinois: Carol Moseley-Braun, Barack Obama, and Roland Burris (2009–2010), who was appointed to replace Obama after his election to the presidency.

Law enforcement

For a more comprehensive list, see List of law enforcement agencies in Illinois.

In 2000, Illinois was ranked 4th in the U.S. in the number of full-time sworn officers with 321 per 100,000 persons, behind Louisiana (415), New York (384), and New Jersey (345). In this ranking, only New York had a higher total population than Illinois. Illinois is also near the top of most law enforcement numbers lists, such as number of agencies per state, number of agencies with special jurisdictions, and number of local police agencies. Even taking into account that Illinois is the fifth most populous state, many of the ratios are higher than more populated states. There is much overlap in jurisdiction amongst the different law enforcement agencies.

At the state level, there are at least eleven law enforcement agencies. At the county level, there are sheriffs, forest preserve police and other specialized police forces. At the local level, most cities and many villages have municipal police forces, park district police forces, and even local specialized police forces. Many colleges also have their own campus police that are often sworn police officers.

Education

Illinois State Board of Education

Main article: Illinois State Board of Education

The Illinois State Board of Education or ISBE, is autonomous of the governor and the state legislature, and administers public education in the state. Local municipalities and their respective school districts operate individual public schools but the ISBE audits performance of public schools with the Illinois School Report Card. The ISBE also makes recommendations to state leaders concerning education spending and policies.

Primary and secondary schools

See also: List of school districts in Illinois and List of high schools in Illinois

Education is compulsory from kindergarten through the twelfth grade in Illinois, commonly but not exclusively divided into three tiers of primary and secondary education: elementary school, middle school or junior high school and high school. District territories are often complex in structure. Many areas in the state are actually located in two school districts—one for high school, the other for elementary and middle schools. And such districts do not necessarily share boundaries. A given high school may have several elementary districts that feed into it, yet some of those feeder districts may themselves feed into multiple high school districts.

Colleges and universities

For a more comprehensive list, see List of colleges and universities in Illinois.

Using the criterion established by the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching, there are eleven "National Universities" in the state. As of 19 August 2010, five of these rank in the "first tier" (that is, the top quartile) among the top 500 National Universities in the United States, as determined by the U.S. News & World Report rankings: the University of Chicago (8), Northwestern University (12), the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (39), Illinois Institute of Technology (106), and Loyola University Chicago (119).

Illinois also has more than 20 additional accredited four-year universities, both public and private, and dozens of small liberal arts colleges across the state. Additionally, Illinois supports 49 public community colleges in the Illinois Community College System.

Infrastructure

Transportation

See also: List of airports in Illinois, List of Illinois Routes, List of Illinois railroads, and Category:Illinois waterways

File:Illinois 2002 series passenger plate sample 000 0000.gif

The current Illinois passenger license plate, introduced in 2001.

Because of its central location and its proximity to the Rust Belt and Grain Belt, Illinois is a national crossroads for air, auto, rail and truck traffic.

Chicago's O'Hare International Airport (ORD) is one of the busiest airports in the world, with 59.3 million domestic passengers annually, along with 11.4 million international passengers in 2008. It is a major hub for United Airlines and American Airlines, and a major airport expansion project is currently underway. Chicago Midway International Airport (MDW) is the secondary airport in the Chicago metropolitan area, a major hub for Southwest Airlines. It served 17.3 million domestic and international passengers in 2008.

Illinois has an extensive passenger and freight rail transportation network. Chicago is a national Amtrak hub and in-state passengers are served by Amtrak's Illinois Service, featuring the Chicago to Carbondale Illini and Saluki, the Chicago to Quincy Carl Sandburg and Illinois Zephyr, and the Chicago to St. Louis Lincoln Service. Currently there is trackwork on the Chicago-St. Louis line to bring the maximum speed up to 110 mph (180 km/h) which would reduce the trip time by an hour and a half. Nearly every North American railway meets at Chicago, making it one of the largest and most active rail hubs in the world. Extensive commuter rail is provided in the city proper and some immediate suburbs by the Chicago Transit Authority's 'L' system. The largest suburban commuter rail system in the United States, operated by Metra, uses existing rail lines to provide direct commuter rail access for hundreds of suburbs to the city and beyond.

Major U.S. Interstate highways crossing the state include: I-24, I-39, I-55, I-57, I-64, I-70, I-72, I-74, I-80, I-88, I-90, and I-94. Its central location is the reason that Illinois carries the distinction of having the most primary (2-digit) Interstates pass through it among the 50 states.

In addition to the state's rail lines, the Mississippi River and Illinois River provide major transportation routes for the state's agricultural interests. Lake Michigan gives Illinois access to the Atlantic Ocean by way of the Saint Lawrence Seaway.

See also

Main articles: Outline of Illinois and Index of Illinois-related articles

Further reading

• Biles, Roger (2005). Illinois: a history of the land and its people. DeKalb: Northern Illinois University Press. ISBN 9780875803494. OCLC 58526330.
• Bridges, Roger D.; Davis, Rodney O. (1984). Illinois: its history & legacy. St. Louis: River City Publishers. ISBN 0933150865. OCLC 11814096.
• Cole, Arthur Charles (1987) [1919]. The era of the Civil War, 1848-1870. Urbana: University of Illinois Press. ISBN 9780252013393. OCLC 14130434.
• Costa, David J. (2007). "Illinois" (PDF). Society for the Study of the Indigenous Languages of the Americas Newsletter. 25 (4): 9–12. ISSN 1046-4476. Retrieved January 28, 2009. {{cite journal}}: Unknown parameter |month= ignored (help)
• Davis, James E. (1998). Frontier Illinois. Bloomington: Indiana University Press. ISBN 0-253-33423-3. OCLC 39182546.
• Gove, Samuel Kimball; Nowlan, James Dunlap (1996). Illinois politics & government: the expanding metropolitan frontier. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press. ISBN 0-8032-7014-3. OCLC 33407256. {{cite book}}: Cite has empty unknown parameter: |coauthors= (help)CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
• Grossman, James R.; Keating, Ann Durkin; Reiff, Janice L. (2005) [2004]. Electronic Encyclopedia of Chicago (Online ed.). Chicago: Chicago Historical Society, Newberry Library. ISBN 0-226-31015-9. OCLC 60342627. Retrieved January 28, 2009. {{cite book}}: Cite has empty unknown parameter: |coauthors= (help)CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
• Hallwas, John E., ed. (1986). Illinois literature: the nineteenth century. Macomb: Illinois Heritage Press. OCLC 14228886.
• Howard, Robert P. (1972). Illinois; a history of the Prairie State. Grand Rapids: W. B. Eerdmans Pub. Co. ISBN 0-8028-7025-2. OCLC 495362.
• Jensen, Richard E. (2001). Illinois: a history. Urbana: University of Illinois Press. ISBN 978-0-252-07021-1. OCLC 46769728.
• Keiser, John H. (1977). Building for the centuries: Illinois, 1865 to 1898. Urbana: University of Illinois Press. ISBN 978-0-252-00617-3. OCLC 2798051.
• Kilduff, Dorrell; Pygman, C. H. (1962). Illinois; History, government, geography. Chicago: Follett. OCLC 5223888.
• Kleppner, Paul (1988). Political atlas of Illinois. DeKalb: Northern Illinois University Press. ISBN 978-0-87580-136-0. OCLC 16755435.
• Merriner, James L. (2004). Grafters and Goo Goos: corruption and reform in Chicago, 1833-2003. Carbondale: Southern Illinois University Press. ISBN 9780809325719. OCLC 52720998.
• Meyer, Douglas K. (2000). Making the heartland quilt: a geographical history of settlement and migration in early-nineteenth-century Illinois. Carbondale: Southern Illinois University Press. ISBN 978-0-585-37905-0. OCLC 48139026.
• Nowlan, James D., Samuel K. Gove and Richard J. Winkel. Illinois Politics: A Citizen's Guide (University of Illinois, 2010).
• Sutton, Robert P. (1976). The Prairie State; a documentary history of Illinois. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans. ISBN 0-8028-1651-7. OCLC 2603998.
• Walton, Clyde C. (1970). An Illinois reader. DeKalb: Northern Illinois University Press. ISBN 978-0-87580-014-1. OCLC 89905.
• Works Progress Administration (1983) [1939]. The WPA guide to Illinois: the Federal Writers' Project guide to 1930s Illinois. New York: Pantheon Books. ISBN 978-0-394-72195-8. OCLC 239788752.

External links

• Official website
• Illinois at Curlie
• Illinois Bureau of Tourism official website
• Illinois: Science In Your Backyard– USGS
• Illinois State Agency Databases– compiled by the Government Documents Round Table (GODORT) of the American Library Association
• Illinois State Energy Profile– DOE, Energy Information Administration
• Illinois: State Fact Sheets– USDA, Economic Research Service
• Illinois State Guide– LOC, Virtual Programs & Services
• Biographies Of Governors of Illinois: 1818 to 1885– compiled by OnlineBiographies.info
• Illinois Highways Page– by Richard Carlson
• Geographic data related to Illinois at OpenStreetMap

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