Moving to Streator IL (Chicago, Peoria: appointed, 2009, layoffs)

[Schmoo]

Originally Posted by bwilk123

Schmoo, I am not trying to attack you but have you ever been to Streator?

Unfortunately I have, many times. My opinion on Streator is far from the minority in this thread, though you are free to disagree of course.

[lookingforsomething]

I know quite a few people that lived there that moved because of crime issues. I used to work there at a bank, I was an outsider.(I live about 45 minutes north.) The customers were SOOOOO unfriendly to me.......all the time. I traveled all over the place in that position, and this was the only town that treated me that way. I dreaded working there! To me, it's not an appealing town at all. But, to each there own!

[gardener34]

Yeah - I know what you mean. I grew up in a suburb (won't mention which one) that has recently been "tear down central" and is often mentioned in glowing terms on these forums as being a great place to live.

However, growing up there and even now, there were/are all kinds of creepy and weird things going on there that get glossed over or get no press. And yes, the upper middle class have substance abuse problems and mental illness problems too.

Remember: Creeps and crime are everywhere.

[S. Pearce]

I would like to comment as to Streator where I lived 40 years ago, but I also want to be careful not to offend the spirit of a person with whom I was acquainted there, who actually befriended me almost as a father, who told me once that when he and his spouse first moved to Streator, they stayed because they found the people there so friendly.

Such was not quite my experience. My reason to be there was to take a specific job. I attempted to first scrutinize the town and take some measure of it before committing, but it was difficult to do without necessary tools.

I have read with interest the string of comments since I, these many years later, found them fairly accurate for describing my time there. In the ensuring years I have thought about my time in Streator, and that I felt it simply showed me a hypocritical face, and, yes, even then was in "denial," as another writer here wrote. Then it had a history of elected officials or leaders absconding or embezzling funds, or doing things that spoke to presenting two faces. Some of these persons were arrested; some left town. I felt they were set up for their downfall, if such it was, by the community itself. I felt tacitly they were encouraged by the townfolk who chuckled over the idea of cutting a few corners here and there, and perhaps wanted to compromise their own leaders that way, to provide cover for their own doings. When some such wrongdoing came to light, residents didn't seem to cast blame because, it would seem, they were not ready or able to bring the business home, and to face or blame themselves as to it. They just said, "Tsk, tsk, it is so sad what happened to them...they were such a nice family."

Streator then was still known as "The Glass Capitol of the World," "containing" the Owens Illinois plant, and The Anthony Company, and some others. My personal view is that in those years Illinoisians, especially downstate, took on a mantle of self-approbation from their universities' reknown for turning out supposedly respected scientists who were to definitively lead the world forward in science and maybe engineering. Students were considered world lights just to have attended those universities. I felt that air seemed to carry over to these downstate towns. (I had no quarrel with the working class aspect in Streator, in itself, au contraire - these residents are not necessarily being described here, and I think many saw what is described here happening but kept their heads down, and worked on, not messing with it.)

Behind the facade of self-approbation, a good part of Streator, to me, in my experience, rationalized and denied vulgar or common, petty personal behavior and the way persons were treated by others there. Many members of the ministry knew they had such a problem, and struggled with it. They even put together a radio program hosted by a revolving foursome of community religious leaders to bring focus and instruction through teaching of precepts. No, it was no Norman Rockwell town, though such there may be - far from it; and on the other hand there was no real multi-tiered economic class consciousness in the housing there as far as I could see either; it was pretty flat really, no one part of town was much distinguished from the other.

I was fully vested in a work that, in the greater part - that which the public never saw - led me to constantly deal with the politics and culture of Streator, six days a week, and my experience was I found living there to be misery, and I was young! No, I never again had that type of experience.

Another way to say it was in those days corn crops appeared to fill the farm fields along country roads for miles. There was a spot where the interstate from Chicago made a sweeping turn west and as the motorist made the turn at a certain height, at a certain season, one could look below over the fields. Three to four rows back from the border of the corn, the view revealed - no more corn - the field was full of pumpkins! I learned that, in fact, some farmers in the area did eventually cop to the truth that they were raising pumpkins behind the corn. As a relative of mine in Indiana said when I told him that the farmers in the area grew pumpkins (an easier, less risky crop to grow than corn, which evidently requires more demanding skills) said, "They use that rich black topsoil to raise pumpkins?"

My experience as to Streator had to do with its honesty with self, and issues of respecting itself in respecting others. I can say, I found Pontiac in Livingston County more easily assimilatible, but Streator did have a nice little river running through it.

[Drover]

Uh, this thread is almost a year old. I think the guy has has answer by now.

[arpschneider]

Originally Posted by shadow91

I beg to differ with you but there are more than 3 murders since 1999. One a child, one found stuffed in a drain pipe, no arrest, one woman beaten with a baseball bat in her home (I worked with her) found by her son,

The one with the baseball bad was (IIRC) Darlene Hellerman, who was for years the secretary at Holy Trinity Lutheran Church in town. As I understood it, it was because her husband finally got sick and tired of her working there day and night and was more devoted to the church than her own family.

I was involved doing some work for that church many years ago prior to her murder and remember when she would be there until 9 or 10 PM (my helpers and I were living in a camper along-side the church while we were doing our work, so that's how I knew, because we worked late into the evenings ourselves) so I think that particular situation was really a pretty isolated incident.

I would be willing to bet that there were some contributing factors to all of these which aren't going to surface because Streator is such a small town that people's tongues wag. . .

[arpschneider]

Originally Posted by lookingforsomething

The customers were SOOOOO unfriendly to me.......all the time.

Most of the settlers to Streator were Slovaks that worked in the coal mines near town. Being part Slovak myself and having "shirt-tail relatives" from there, I understand the "unfriendliness. Slovaks are by and large just VERY distrusting people and hence, cold to "outsiders". If you think it's bad in Streator, you should try Price County, WI, where my material grandparents were from! There's a HUGE enclave of Slovaks and their offspring there and it's very much the same.

[arpschneider]

Originally Posted by S. Pearce

I found Pontiac in Livingston County more easily assimilatible, but Streator did have a nice little river running through it.

The same Vermilion River runs through Pontiac as well as Streator!

[Lockport101]

I have about 30 friends that goto high school in streator, Should i move there, I live in Oak Lawn, bUT i need to move by my best friends, what do yous think

[tayz366]

Originally Posted by bwilk123

Schmoo, I am not trying to attack you but have you ever been to Streator? By the sound of the post you are either exagerating quite a bit or have never been there. I am not sure of the number of grocery stores in Streator but I know there are atleast four. That may not be as many as a place like Joliet or Chicago however, for a smaller town that is plenty. Also, I live in the area and I have never found 100 acres of farmland around here. Also I could name atleast a dozen resturaunts in this "town with nothing". Also, I am sure that someone could find a job closer that 1 1/2 hours away. Some big companies that Streator has is Owens, Vactor, US Food Service, and Dependable. Along with quite a few small businesses. Also Bloomington is about 50mins away. ISU is there. Then there is Peru and Ottawa. Both are about 30-40 mins from Streator and they have many jobs.

Ummm, I have lived in Streator and I moved my kids far far far away. Yes, it is that bad or it could easiy become that bad. It would never be in my reccomendations for a place to live. I have lived inner city chicago and walked away less unscathed.