Nothing stays the same forever, not even historic towns. Sometimes they get better. Galena has. And Galena was good to start with.
Galena is one of the few places in the Midwest, probably in the country, where the 19th and 20th Centuries grappled–and the 19th won.
Unlike other towns that may be just as old, Galena has kept its heart intact. Eighty-five percent of it is on the National Register of Historic Places. It is so well-preserved that cars and electric lights seem out of place.
The first time I drove into town, more than 15 years ago, its age was a delightful shock. Last fall, when my sister Jane and I drove in at dusk, the illusion was still perfect: Galena is the 19th Century.
Even now, as you approach Galena, there are no clues to what`s ahead. Then the highway dips down, curves and becomes a city street and suddenly a hundred years drop away.
With a population of 3,900, Galena is not much more than a village. It is an old river town, full of red-brick cottages and terrace-like streets that climb steep hills above the water. The houses get bigger as the streets rise, until they reach Prospect Street, where a row of red-brick mansions perches above the town like a tiara. Main Street parallels the river for nearly a mile, solidly walled on both sides with three- to five-story commercial buildings from the middle of the last century.
Some of Galena`s other streets are as steep as staircases. Some really are staircases. And some of the oldest streets are accessible only by four-wheel-drive. (Until you get used to that, you have to be careful late at night so you don`t drive onto one of those streets when you make a downhill turn.)
Galena`s name comes from the lead ore found in this corner of northwest Illinois. In the early 1800s, that ore drew miners to the banks of the Fever River, a Mississippi tributary, and the town that grew up there soon became a mecca for steamboats and commerce as well.
In its heyday in the 1850s, Galena boasted more than 15,000 people and was bigger than Chicago. It was so prosperous that townspeople became concerned with the town`s image and changed the name of the Fever River to the Galena River in 1853.
Abraham Lincoln spoke in Galena once, at the fancy DeSoto House hotel on Main Street. And the town is still proud of having produced nine Civil War generals, the most famous being Ulysses S. Grant.
When the war broke out, Grant, an Army veteran, was clerking at his father`s leathergoods store in the Coatsworth Building on Main Street. He immediately re-enlisted.
When he returned as the victorious commander of the Union armies, the citizens of Galena threw him the best party the town ever had. Banners over Main Street hailed the conquering hero, and the town gave Grant and his family a gift that has kept Galena on the map ever since: A new, completely furnished house–red brick, of course.
The Grants lived in it only sporadically. In fact, Grant spent only 20 months and 27 days in Galena in his life, according to local historians. The house was rented out when the Grants left Galena for the White House in 1868, and eventually it passed to the state of Illinois with about 90 percent of its original furnishings. (Located on Bouthillier Street, on the east side of town, the Grant Home is now open free to the public daily except Thanksgiving, Christmas and New Year`s.)
Galena`s glory days didn`t last. New railroad lines pulled shipping away from the steamboats, and the town lost the battle to keep the silty riverbed dredged out. A depression in the 1890s all but finished it: Galena ceased to bloom and began to die.
For most of the 20th Century, the little town dozed on its riverbanks and nursed its memories. There wasn`t enough money to tear down the old buildings. While that was painful for the townspeople, that`s what saved Galena–that, and a planning commission devoted to keeping things the way they used to be.
When other small towns were bulldozing their old storefronts in the name of urban renewal, Galena hung on to what it had, even though not all citizens thought that was a good idea.
One who did was Frank Einsweiler, a Galena native now in his 13th year as mayor. Before that, he headed the town`s planning commission for 25 years.
Einsweiler, nearly 80–but ”I never think of age”–is a veteran of many save-Galena battles. In the late 1940s, he fought to build a dike and flood gates to protect downtown from the unpredictable river`s ravages. And in 1969, he and other preservationists succeeded in getting Galena listed as a historic district on the National Register.
I began visiting Galena not long after that, but at first the changes weren`t very noticeable. Some of them weren`t even for the best.
There were always a few restored houses you could tour, and a couple of guest houses to stay in. Antiques shops on Main Street changed hands every now and then, and sometimes a new eating place would open, usually a coffee shop or corner tavern.
The old DeSoto House, a cold, shabby barn of a place when I first stayed there 15 years ago, eventually closed. The last time I was in Galena, about three years ago, the hotel was so structurally unsound that the sidewalk out front was off limits to pedestrians: Too dangerous, the city signs said.
I didn`t mind. I wasn`t going to Galena to enjoy the food or the hotels. I was going for the atmosphere.
It shouldn`t have surprised me that a town with so much charm would become a tourist mecca. But I wasn`t prepared for changes–all pleasant–that I saw on my last visit.
Since I`d been there last, Galena`s lodging industry had boomed. The town has sprouted nearly two dozen restored guest houses, may of which offer lavish bed-and-breakfast accommodations. The DeSoto House has undergone a $7.8-million restoration and reopened this spring. And there are now half a dozen pleasant to very good restaurants.
On my first night, I stayed at the Farmers Home Hotel (334 Spring St.), built in 1867 as lodgings for farmers coming to Galena to sell produce.
I arrived shortly before dark on Saturday and explored the hotel before I unpacked. The lobby wasn`t finished, co-owner Tom Kristianson apologized, but most of the rooms were ready–right down to hand-done graining on the woodwork and hand-made quilts on the antique beds. The restaurant serves breakfasts every day, and hopes to serve daily lunches this summer. Rooms are $55 and $65, double occupancy.
The upstairs hotel rooms had been closed for about 80 years, though a descendant of the builders continued to live downstairs. ”When we bought it,” Kristianson said, ”some of the beds were still made.”
I dined that night at one of the new restaurants, Silver Annie`s, on Commerce Street just off Main. It was small–seating only about 40–and comfortably elegant, with Gibson-girl prints on the mellow limestone walls. The evening special was pork chops stuffed with cheese and spinach and side orders of manicotti and fettucini Alfredo. It was a satisfying dinner, and dessert was even better: chocolate mousse cake and a mousse-like pumpkin pie with brandied whipped cream. The bill for two came to $24.
After breakfast the next day, I began exploring the town–make that the town`s antique shops, most of which stay open on Sundays though they may close for a day or two early in the week. Then a detour for lunch at the Market House Tavern (204 Perry St.), a small second-story eatery where the hamburgers come with crab salad. This was followed by a visit to the Grant Home for a lingering look at black walnut furniture and family mementos.
Late in the day I moved to the Aldrich Guest House on the east side of town (900 3d St.). The house, built between 1845 and 1853, has been lovingly restored and filled with antiques. The cost of a pretty room for two with two brass beds was $55, including tax and a full breakfast next morning.
My friend and I relaxed briefly over complimentary wine in the living room, then went to dinner at another small restaurant, the Kingston Inn (300 N. Main St.). The inn is known for quality food and live entertainment. The staff of four sang gentle show tunes and exquisite ballads while we dined on succulent chicken in a caraway-and-cream sauce and beef bourguignon served in a hollowed-out loaf of crusty bread. The bill, with wine, was just under $30. We had promised ourselves we would start home early the next day, but first I wanted to talk to Galena`s feisty mayor, and then we had to try a few more antiques shops, and then we needed a late lunch (wonderful broccoli and cheese soup and puff pastry filled with turkey and mushrooms at the Baker`s Oven on Main Street), so it was well after 3 before we finally turned north. We got home late, but it was worth it. We`d have lingered longer if we could. When I first interviewed Mayor Einsweiler more than a decade ago, he talked about Galena`s needs: more parking space to take the pressure off Main Street, a new bridge on U.S. Hwy. 20 at the entrance to town, a footbridge to connect the main part of town with the residential east bank, and a way of saving the Coatsworth Building, where Grant clerked just before the Civil War. This fall he was still talking about needs, but the first set is history: The Coatsworth, which collapsed at one point in its reconstruction, has been accurately rebuilt, with apartments for the elderly upstairs and retail shops below. A graceful new footbridge is in use, allowing people to park on the east bank of the river and walk over to the Main Street shops. And the new highway bridge boasts traditional limestone piers and historically accurate streetlights.
Parking is still a problem, despite the new DeSoto House parking ramp, which is hidden behind several adjacent–and original–storefronts .
The biggest change, though, may be that the people of Galena are
”beginning to see the importance of historic preservation,” Einsweiler said. ”Their properties are all worth more, and they bring in more income. That talks the loudest: Whenever it affects your pocketbook, that`s the great persuader.”
Now the mayor talks about putting in a marina where visitors with private boats could tie up and stay for a few days. He wants to revive an antique train between Galena and Galena Junction, where the river joins the Mississippi about four miles from town. He wants to dredge the river so it can carry riverboats again–not fake paddlewheelers, though; canal boats, perhaps, because they can navigate under bridges.
If his record is any indicator of future success, he`ll get all those things accomplished, too. And they`ll be authentic: ”I like to think that Galena does things that were Galena,” Einsweiler said. ”I don`t want Galena to become the Dells. I want it to be itself.”
