Whilst driving around the state of Illinois, I visited Metropolis way down in the southern  most part of the state. I found a handful of Sears Homes, and I also found Superman.

I sent my brother an email and shared the photo I took of Superman (see below). My brother wrote back and said, “Smallville, Illinois? Ask to see Superman’s birth certificate. And while you’re there, ask about Obama’s too. More probable that we’ll see Superman’s first.”

Superman stands proud and tall in Metropolis

On Wednesday, February 17th, I left for Illinois. Today, Wednesday (March 1oth) I returned home. I spent most of these three weeks, traveling throughout the state of Illinois, from Chicago to Cairo to Champaign, photographing and documenting the Sears Homes among us. To read more about Sears Homes, click here.

In a few months, I’ll be finishing up this new book titled, The Sears Homes of Illinois.

Traipsing around Illinois was a lot of fun, but also a lot of intense effort. I started each day around 5:00 am, and mapped out a detailed plan of where I’d travel and what I’d do. Then I’d hit the road between 6:00 am and 8:00 am and stay gone until 4:00 pm or beyond. In my three weeks in Illinois, I put 2,500 miles on my little rental car. That doesn’t include my travels around Chicago, where Rebecca Hunter was kind enough to drive me around.

When I’d enter a city, I’d take a look at my Garmin and find the railroad tracks and find the cementery and find the streets marked “McKinley” and “Elm” and “Pershing” and “Third Street.” You can usually find Sears Homes on streets thus named. And then I’d drive through these areas, looking for Sears Homes. When I found a Sears Home, I’d make a note of the address and then I’d use my reference books to find how the house originally appeared in the old catalogs. Then I’d take a photo of the house from the same angle that it appeared in the 1910s or 1920s catalog.

In those three weeks, I took 1,500 photos of 200+ houses. That’s a lot of photos.

And then I returned home. I’ve never been so glad to get on an airplane in my life!

Here are a few of my favorite photos:

Nice Sears Corona in Central Illinois

Sears Ashmore in Central Illinois

Model #196 in Southwestern Illinois

A nice Westly in Metropolis, Illinois (Home of Superman!)

Sears Hollywood in Southern Illinois

Sears Edgemere in Central Illinois

Sears Puritan in Southern Illinois, near the mill in Cairo

Sears Modern Home #163 in Taylorville, Illinois.

Whilst in Taylorville, Illinois last week, I found something I’d never seen before:  A Sears Modern Home Model #163. I talked with my dear friend Rebecca Hunter and learned that she’d never seen one either. In other words, this is a very rare model. And there it sits in Taylorville, a victim of insensitive remodeling.

This once-grand house has now been converted into a multi-family dwelling, which is especially sad.

As I’ve driven around the Illinois countryside, I’ve found that too many Sears Homes are in deplorable shape and are being treated like yesterday’s garbage. Hopefully, my new book on Sears Homes will do a little something to stem this onerous problem.

The first time I saw downtown Cairo, I stopped my car in the middle of the street and stared in disbelief. The entire business district, which comprised several blocks of brick streets in beautiful condition, was empty - deserted and devoid of all movement. Had it not been for a piece of trash blowing down the middle of the street, the scene could have been a still-frame.

The stillness, the quiet, the absence of any sign of life was fascinating, yet also left me wondering if the next sound I heard would be the theme from The Twilight Zone with a voice-over by Rod Serling.

Looking at the stunning late-1800s commercial architecture - most of which was in original condition and all of which had been abandoned - my intuitive sense told me that folks had left this place in a hurry. And as I began researching the area, I learned my hunch was on mark.

In the mid-1960s, racial unrest and riots were a sad part of the American landscape, but in Cairo, things went especially badly. African-Americans, weary of Jim Crow laws and disparate treatment, threatened to boycott businesses that employed only whites. White business owners responded by closing their stores. Large numbers of families - white and black - left the area and never returned. The population plummeted. Today, downtown Cairo is a ghost town - an incredible time capsule - frozen in the 1960s. The city that once boasted of 14,000 citizens now has about 3000 people living within its borders.

I’ve returned to Cairo several times since that first visit and each time, I make a point to drive through that incredible downtown area. I park my car and stare. I stare at the old buildings which are in fair to decent condition and still look much like they did when built 100+ years ago. I look at the store fronts whose doorways have not been darkened by a customer in many years. I study the two movie theatres that look much like they did when built in the 1920s and 30s. I take in the long view and look at the streetscapes, devoid of movement or activity.

Just behind those fantastic old commercial buildings lies a seawall and the Ohio River. I do believe that the city could build a fantastic tourism industry off this downtown area alone. I’ve never seen a sight like it.

Apparently, word is getting out, because on my last visit, I saw two tourists taking a plethora of photos of this eerie but fascinating downtown. However, if you decide to visit - come prepared. Cairo has no public bathrooms, no fast-food joints and no public water fountains. About 15 minutes away, just across the Ohio River, is Wickliffe, Kentucky - site of the nearest public restroom. The nearest Burger Doodle is 30 miles southwest in Cape Girardeau.

One thing Cairo does have is plenty of vacant lots, such as 1501 Commercial Avenue. This corner lot is a few blocks from the downtown area and according to the 1922 Sears Modern Homes catalog, it was the site of a beautiful “Elsmore” (Honor-Bilt home).  The testimonial on page 111 of the catalog reads, “Built by R. P. Fitzjearl, 1501 Commercial Avenue, Cairo, IL. He says, ‘Already-cut lumber saves one-third of time. Plans as simple as reading a book.’”

When I drive through Cairo, I look at all those empty lots and try not to think about how many Sears homes have been torn down in the intervening years. Several? Dozens? Or worse?

Thus far, I’ve identified about 30 Sears homes in Cairo. Many are in poor condition and a few more may be torn down before the city awakens to its architecture treasures. The addresses of these Sears homes are at the Cairo Public Library on Washington Street and make for a fun driving tour.

The older I get, the more I yearn to know something of our family history. My timing for all this  has turned out to be rather poor. My mother and her siblings passed on years ago. My father is still around, but his long-term memory is not. We recently looked at an old picture album together and I remembered more than he did about relatives I’d never met. After I was born in 1959, I became extremely ill and required a three-week hospitalization. My elderly father had no memory of any of this.

After my Aunt Engie passed away a few years ago, I went through an old shoe box I found buried in her closet and found several photographs from the 1920s and 30s. Sadly, there was no information scribbled on the back of the black and white snapshots. Now I can only make educated guesses as to who these people were.

During the years my children were growing up, I faithfully maintained photo albums, replete with names and dates and places. These many years later, those photo albums are the source of much joy. My oldest daughter Crystal told me recently, “If the house catches fire, and you can only save one thing, save the photo albums first! Everything else can be replaced!”

But what to do with all these early 20th Century photos that I found stuffed in a shoe box? These were my ancestors - I think. These were people my mother and her sister loved - I think.

Back in the day, photographs required an investment of time, effort and money. Photos were reserved for important days and special events. Who were these people? And what were the stories? All I know is that these pictures were taken in Rockford, Illinois (early 20s) and then sometime in 1925 or 1926, my grandfather (Edward Brown) moved his children to Alameda, California.

I wish I knew more.

The only person I recognize in this photo is my late mother (center on bottom row).

This is a photo of my mother (youngest girl) with her sister (Engie) and older brother Harry.

This is probably a picture of my maternal grandmother with her first son, Harry. It was probably taken in early 1910s.

Mom (the younger girl) and Aunt Engie with unknown person, perhaps a nanny?

Unknown person at unknown house in unknown place (house is late 1910s or early 20s)

I believe this is my Uncle Harry with his father (my maternal grandfather).

There’s a wonderful book titled, “The Good Old Days, They Were Awful!” It’s an interesting book with many stories of how life “back in the day” was not all peaches and cream. I agree with that - to an extent - but there were some bonuses to life back then. However, as far as issues of sanitation, we’re miles ahead of our ancestors who lived in the early 1900s.

Here’s an ad from the American Carpenter and Builder Magazine, from 1912. (Story continues below photos.)

1912 American Carpenter and Builder ad

Close up of the modern toilet

Take a better look at this contraption. In short, the (ahem) “human waste products” were dropped into a steel box directly under your house (aka basement or foundation). After a time, you’d stir the (ahem) contents in this box and add chemicals a couple times a week.  See the handle beside the toilet (on the floor)?  That’s your stirrer. And see the large pipe behind the toilet? In a perfect world, that’s a vent pipe that directs odors out of the living space. In a perfect world.

I suppose for those who were accustomed to donning warm shoes and making the long trek to the outhouse in the backyard, this “chemical toilet” was better. I suppose.  But in the real world, that thing must have stunk to high heaven. And what poor soul was charged with crawling under the house and cleaning out the box twice a year?

I love studying the good old days and I love writing about the good old days. However, when I finally learn how to travel back in time, I think I’ll take my modern plumbing with me.

Part of the fun of traveling to 23 states and giving 200 talks on Sears Homes is seeing all kinds of wacky and wild stuff. One Sunday morning in 2003, as my host was driving me back to the airport (to return home to the Midwest), I saw this Sears Madelia (see second photo below). It was in Zanesville, OH (or a nearby town) and we were actually several blocks beyond this building when I told my host, “Please turn around. I think I saw something.”

He reminded me that we didn’t have much time and I told him I understood and this wouldn’t take but a second. And there - in all its painful glory - was this badly butchered Sears house. It’s actually a Sears Madelia and it was not that popular a model for Sears. (Sears sold 370 designs of kit homes from 1908 - 1940.)

The first picture (first image) is a happy, healthy Madelia in Wood River, Illinois on 9th Street. There are 24 Sears Homes in a row, a remnant from the days of Standard Oil’s purchase of $1 million worth of Sears Homes for their refinery workers. The second picture I’ve titled,

A Madelia trapped in a tavern’s body.

A happy little Sears Madelia in Wood River, IL

And here’s the Madelia trapped in a tavern’s body.

A Madelia trapped in a tavern's body

This next house is a Sears Crescent in Norfolk, Virginia. It’s a happy little Crescent with good self-esteem.

A happy Sears Crescent

And this next picture was taken by Rebecca Hunter, a kit-home expert in Elgin, Illinois.

An unhappy Sears Crescent in Illinois

Here's a Sears Westly, as it appeared in the 1919 Sears catalog

Unhappy Sears House in the Midwest. Too much plastic in one place.

Okay, so it’s from a February 1911 Ladies Home Journal, but still, it sounds so intriguing.

At first glance, I assumed that this fireproof house was 90% asbestos content, but upon reading the full article, I saw that I was wrong. It’s made of poured concrete and has lots of hollow tile, plaster (applied over metal lath), ceramic tile and block. Even the floors are poured concrete. Ater all that concrete is dried, the wooden forms are removed.

Very interesting idea for a house, and it’s nice-looking, too but good luck hanging up any pictures on the walls. Small price to pay for a fireproof house - I suppose.

A picture of the Fireproof House (from 1911 LHJ)