BLOOMINGTON — A resurgence of coronavirus cases has prompted the state to deploy rapid response teams of Illinois National Guard members and extra doses of vaccine to McLean and surrounding counties.
Health departments in McLean and Peoria counties will have additional doses of vaccine shipped directly to them, according to Gov. J.B. Pritzker's office, and the process won't deviate far from the norm: Appointments will still need to be made via each health department.
In neighboring Tazewell and Woodford counties, as well as in Fulton, teams will travel the counties administering the single-dose Johnson & Johnson vaccine.
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"Our rapid response vaccination teams will help counties mitigate early signs of a possible resurgence of COVID-19 cases as we continue to get vaccine to all eligible residents as quickly as possible,” Pritzker said in a statement.
The Tazewell County Health Department said it already has a clinic planned for Friday at Veterans Memorial Ice Rink. The appointment-only clinic will run from 9:00 a.m.-6:00 p.m., and is open to those who live or work in the tri-county region.
The governor's announcement cited an increased test positivity rate and an uptick in COVID-related hospitalizations as the reason for the deployment.
The state has been monitoring 11 regions in the state for signs of the virus' resurgence, establishing metrics that each regions has to meet or maintain in order to stay open under Phase 4.
Walgreens is changing the way it schedules second coronavirus vaccine doses after getting complaints from customers.Walgreens was scheduling Pfizer shots four weeks apart. The recommended time frame is three weeks.The company says it was doing that in order to make scheduling quicker and easier. The process actually ended up leaving people confused. The CDC has said it's alright to space doses up to six weeks apart if necessary.
Region 2, the 20-county region that includes McLean, isn't meeting two of those metrics: The area has a 6.2% test positivity rate and 78% of intensive care unit beds are reported as in-use, leaving only 22% capacity.
IDPH data shows that as of Monday, 179 people were reported as COVID patients. Statewide, around 1,600 people were reported as hospitalized because of the virus Monday night. Of those patients, 357 were in the ICU.
Locally, area hospitals are feeling the consequences of McLean County's increasing coronavirus case load.
Data from the McLean County Health Department on Tuesday showed 42 residents are hospitalized either in or outside of the county and 39 people are hospitalized at either OSF St. Joseph or Carle BroMenn.
Local hospitals reported that 96% of all intensive care unit beds are in-use and 95% of all total beds are filled.
Another 44 cases of COVID-19 were confirmed in the past, according to MCHD.
Including the 487 people isolating at home, that brings the county's total of active cases to 529.
The test positivity rate has jumped as well: As of Monday, the seven-day average is 5.4%, up from Sunday's 4.9%.
No additional deaths were reported.
Vaccine update
More than 78,740 doses of vaccine have been administered in McLean County to-date. Around 27,400 people have received both shots, meaning around 15.8% of the overall population is fully-vaccinated.
The county continues to trail its neighbors, according to data from IDPH, as well as the state rate of 19% of the population having received both shots.
While McLean County will not move to universal vaccine eligibility before Monday, health department officials said appointments for those 16-years and older would open Thursday at 11 a.m.
15 urban legends of McLean County
15 urban legends of McLean County
Ange Milner
Williams Hall was once home to ISU's library, and the building is supposedly haunted by the school's first librarian, Angeline Vernon "Ange" Milner.
She was decidedly not the inspiration for the opening scene in the 1982 blockbuster motion picture comedy “Ghostbusters.”
Coal mine tunnels
There are no coal mine tunnels under downtown Bloomington. The tunnels of the McLean County Coal Co., operating from 1867 to the late 1920s, generally run west of Morris Ave. between Washington and Market streets on the city’s west side.
There was a steam tunnel built in 1903 that went from the McLean County Courthouse (now the Museum) to the middle of Center Street, where it met up with a network of other steam tunnels.
These were not intended for people to walk in, other than the workers that maintained them.
Cook Hall
Cook Hall on the ISU quad, popularly known as “The Castle,” is one of five “Altgeld’s castles” at Illinois universities—University of Illinois, Southern Illinois Carbondale, Eastern Illinois, and Northern Illinois are the other four.
They were constructed in the Gothic Revival style and said to be built at the “initiative or inspiration” of German-born Illinois Governor John Peter Altgeld. That much is true.
What is not true is the story that all five castles are designed to be “fitted” or pieced together to create, if only on paper, a much larger castle.
Duncan Manor
Towanda Meadows, also known as Duncan Manor, is located on a hill south of Towanda and visible from Interstate 55.
The home was said to be a stop on the Underground Railroad, even though it was erected in the mid-1870s.
Other oft-told (and incorrect) stories about this home include the existence of a secret treasure room under a second-floor bedroom. This “room” is actually a cistern for the main floor bathtub.
Federal prison
There was never an Old Federal Prison on Market Street, let alone anywhere else in Bloomington, as erroneously stated in several ghost sighting websites.
Perhaps there was some confusion with the old McLean County Jail, no longer standing, which was located a block south of Market St. at the corner of Madison and Monroe streets.
Pictured is the county’s fourth jail, which was in use in the late 1800s. It opened in 1857 and was replaced in 1882 by the one many longtime residents remember, which was located one block to the southwest. Both jails are no longer standing.
First brick pavement in the U.S.
Center Street on the west side of the Courthouse Square was not the site for the first brick pavement in the United States, contrary to the historic marker at the corner of Center and Washington streets.
The “Bloomington System” for street paving was well known, but the City of Bloomington can make no claim of being “first.”
Pictured is a 1867 bird’s eye view of downtown Bloomington.
Lake Bloomington tower
Many area residents mistakenly assume that the steel tower standing alone at the southwest end of Lake Bloomington is an abandoned fire watch platform erected by the U.S. Forest Service or some government agency.
In truth, the tower served as a platform for a U.S. Civil Aeronautics Authority (later Administration) rotating beacon to assist passing aircraft with navigation.
The CAA installed the beacon in October 1939. It was maintained until circa 1950 and removed and taken to the Bloomington Municipal Airport (now the Central Illinois Regional Airport) in 1951.
One year later, the City of Bloomington assumed ownership of the tower. Due to the costs involved in removing or relocating the tower, a decision was made to leave it as is.
Lincoln and Douglas debate
Abraham Lincoln and Stephen A. Douglas likely never debated or delivered speeches in the Dimmitt’s Grove neighborhood east of downtown Bloomington, despite the “Lincoln Oak” plaque indicating such.
The plaque is found along East Jackson Street behind the Vrooman Mansion at 701 East Taylor Street. In 1914, Carl Vrooman and Adlai Stevenson invited Vachel Lindsay, poet laureate of Illinois, to speak at the dedication of a plaque attached to a white oak tree behind the Scott-Vrooman residence.
Legend has it that Vrooman and Stevenson, both staunch Democrats, may have made up the Lincoln and Douglas story and placed the plaque, a memorial to Lincoln, a Republican, on the oak tree in Vrooman’s backyard in order to grab attention from Republicans in an election year.
In 1966, a 32-square foot section of ground behind the Scott-Vrooman house was deeded to the City of Bloomington.
The oak tree, known as the “Lincoln Oak,” died in 1976 and a copy of the original plaque is mounted near a replacement tree. Several affidavits from 1921 held in the McLean County Museum of History Archives indicate that there is no truth behind the “Lincoln Oak” story.
Among the affiants who attest that no Lincoln nor Douglas speeches were ever delivered in Dimmitt’s Grove were W.B. Carlock, W. W. Workman (who personally knew both Lincoln and Douglas), and James M. Fordice.
Lincoln Funeral Train
Bloomington was the final stop of the Abraham Lincoln Funeral Train, which traveled between April 21 and May 3 in 1865, before it arrived in Springfield.
The catafalque car carrying Lincoln’s body was built at the Military Railroad System shops in Alexandria, Virginia, and not at the Chicago & Alton (C&A) Shops in Bloomington, as a stubborn local legend goes.
Oblong man marries Normal woman
Local residents often talk about a supposed Pantagraph marriage announcement that read “Oblong Man Marries Normal Woman.”
The McLean County Museum of History has extensively researched the “Oblong Man Marries Normal Woman” story, but has not located the actual headline. There is a good chance that the headline never ran in The Pantagraph.
However, the couple in question does exist—their marriage license ran in February 1971, as the story goes, and they reached out to our newsroom in 2011.
Better yet, in 2012, another Oblong man and Normal woman announced their marriage, in a case of history (or legend) repeating itself.
Paul F. Beich Co.
The Paul F. Beich Co. and Beich chemist Justin J. Alikonis had no role in the development of Tang, the fruit-flavored drink formulated by General Foods Corporation and food scientist William A. Mitchell in 1957 and first marketed in powdered form in 1959.
A non-McLean County urban legend holds that Tang was developed for U.S. space flight. The confusion rests with the fact that sales of Tang were poor until NASA used it on John Glenn’s Mercury flight and subsequent Gemini missions.
Back in Bloomington, Beich and Alikonis were involved in developing candy for NASA, but not Tang. During the Oct. 3, 1962, Mercury spaceflight, astronaut Wally Schirra snacked on bite-sized nutrition bars coated with Alikonis’ patented glaze, and a Beich fudge bar was used by NASA during the Gemini program of the mid-1960s.
Pictured is a February 1999 photo of David Beich giving a tour of the Paul F. Beich candy factory.
Pullman sleeping car
In the spring and summer of 1859, George Pullman and carpenter Leonard Seibert of the St. Louis, Alton and Chicago Railroad Shops on Bloomington’s west side converted two StLA&C day coaches (No. 9 and No. 19) into Pullman sleeping car prototypes. That much is true.
What is not true are claims that these were the very first sleepers. The first sleeping car patent dates to several years earlier, and by 1859 non-Pullman sleepers were already running on several railroads.
There are also urban legends surrounding an 1865 Pullman prototype known as “Pioneer.” Contrary to oft-repeated stories, this sleeper was not built at the Chicago & Alton Shops in Bloomington. It was built in Chicago. Nor was it ever part of the Abraham Lincoln funeral train in 1865. Nor did its supposed extra width and height require railroads to cut back depot platforms and raise bridges.
Tornadoes
Bloomington-Normal is not less susceptible to tornadoes due to topographic or geologic quirks, such as the location of glacial moraines, the Mackinaw River, or some other spurious explanation.
While Bloomington-Normal has enjoyed relatively few close encounters with tornadoes, that fact can be explained by statistical chance and nothing more.
This photo, taken atop the Bloomington moraine, shows LeRoy four miles to the south.
Veterans Parkway and Illinois 9
There are also several legends surrounding the Veterans Parkway and Illinois 9/Empire Street interchange.
The most common story is that engineer was insane, or that the complexity of the project drove him to insanity.
Some area residents are also convinced that this interchange is the most complex in the entire world, or at least, the United States.
Also, many area residents have heard that Greek interns from the University of Illinois designed the interchange.
Watterson Towers
There are several legends surrounding Watterson Towers, an Illinois State University residence hall complex.
A common rumor claims that one or both of the towers are slowly sinking. Students have also heard that the architect became insane during or shortly after construction, completed in 1970.
Other legends claim that the architect committed suicide by jumping off the towers, or that the architect is buried under the towers. All are patently false.
