Today was another history lesson. The weather was to be nice today, after we had rain during the night, but there was a chance of rain later in the day. We decided to visit the birth place of Ronald Reagan, and then his boyhood home. We had skies filled with cumulus clouds, and we wanted to be near some sort of shelter if a storm was brewing. We started in Tampico, Illinois and a small town of about 790 people. Ronald Reagan was born in an apartment above a business, and our tour guide thought it was a bakery at that time. We walked up a long flight of stairs to reach the apartment, which was very spacious. They had no running water and no electricity during that time period. Then we went to Dixon, Illinois to visit his boyhood home and toured that. We also picked up a few geo-caches in town, and will go back tomorrow to do the bike path and cache on it. We just couldn't chance being on the bike path when a storm might hit. It was a good day to do this, and we enjoyed learning about our 40th president of the United States.
In 1911 Ronald Reagan was born in the upstairs apartment in this building in Tampico, IL. The red door is the entrance to the apartment, after the long flight of stairs to reach the top.
The apartment was nicely furnished and very spacious. It just had two bedrooms, but it was plenty of room, as they only had two boys.
This arch in Dixon is on Galena Street and the building in the background is where the Lincoln-Douglas debate was held. It is across the street from the courthouse in town.
Ronald Reagan's family moved to Dixon, IL when he was nine years old, and lived in this house three years. They always rented wherever they went, and they moved a lot. This is the home that he had the fondest memories. When he and Nancy came back to visit in 1991, he asked when had it shrunk!
This is a family photo of Jack (father), brother Neil, Ron and Nelle (mother) Reagan.
We went to the riverfront park to find a geo-cache and we saw this statue of Abraham Lincoln. It is the only known statue of him in his military uniform. He was a volunteer in the military during the Blackhawk War of 1832.
The eye of the storm! We were returning from a wonderful day in the life of Ronald Reagan, when we met the storm that hit the western part of Illinois, and our campground. It came down in sheets, and was so hard, that we had to stop and wait for it to pass.
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