Illini State Park

Several reminders of America’s Industrial Age can be seen at Illini State Park. The area is part of an old glacial feature called the Marseilles Moraine. A mine one mile south of the park supplied coal to Marseilles industries until World War II. The Illinois Traction System, an interurban electric transit system that ran from Chicago to Princeton, was one of those industries. Less than a mile north of the park is the historic Illinois-Michigan Canal, completed in 1848 when the section from Marseilles to Morris opened. In the mid-1920s, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers built a barge canal, and visitors can watch as large barges pass and through the Marseilles Locks.

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