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Top Attractions in Peoria

George L. Luthy Memorial Botanical Garden

George L. Luthy Memorial Botanical Garden, usually just Luthy Botanical Garden, is a 4.5 acres botanical garden and conservatory located in Glen Oak Park, near the corner of Prospect Avenue and Gift Avenue in Peoria, Illinois, USA. The garden was established in 1951. It now contains more than 300 genera, with an emphasis on roses, perennials, annuals, hosta, hemerocallis, and herbs. Specific gardens include an all-season garden, herb garden, perennial garden, rose garden, viburnum collection, wildlife garden, and woodland garden. The conservatory is 2,500 square feet and features tropical plants, orchids, and seasonal displays. The garden is named after George Littlewood Luthy, who was president of Peorias Commercial National Bank and of the Peoria Park District, which owns the garden. It is open daily. Garden admission is free; a fee is charged for the conservatory.

John C. Flanagan House Museum

The Judge John C. Flanagan Residence is a house in Peoria, Illinois, United States. The home was constructed for Judge John C. Flanagan, a Philadelphia native, in 1837. The house was either part of an original 620-acre tract purchased by Flanagans father from local Native American tribes or part of a 20-acre tract purchased by Flanagan when he came to Peoria in 1831. It is believed that Abraham Lincoln was once a guest in the home during the Lincoln-Douglas debates from 1854 to 1860. The building was added to the National Register of Historic Places on September 5, 1975. The house is now operated by the Peoria Historical Society as the John C. Flanagan House Museum, a 19th-century period historic house museum. The house also serves as the headquarters for the Peoria Chapter of the Daughters of the American Revolution.

Pettengill-Morron House

The Pettengill-Morron House, or Morron House, is a house located in the American city of Peoria, Illinois. The 1868 mansion was originally built for Moses Pettengill, a hardware store owner who came to Peoria from New Hampshire in 1833. When Pettengill arrived in Peoria there were 150 people, 30 log cabins and three frame houses. The original house on the site, an 1862 construction, was destroyed by fire in 1865. The current building was constructed in 1868 in the Second Empire style, and a colonial revival porch and porte-cochere were added in 1900. Its original address was 464 Moss Avenue before Peorias address renumbering in the 1950s. The last resident was Miss Jean Morron, who lived there from 1953 until she died in 1966; the Peoria Historical Society acquired the house in 1967. The house was listed on the U.S. National Register of Historic Places on April 2, 1976. The home is also listed as a contributing member to the West Bluff Historic District, which was added to the National Register in December 1976. The Peoria Historical Society operates this house and the Judge Flanagan Residence as historic house museums.

Scottish Rite Cathedral

The Scottish Rite Cathedral in Peoria, Illinois is a church-style building that houses the Scottish Rite Bodies of the Valley of Peoria. The building is at 400 NE Perry Avenue, at the corner with Spalding Avenue. The cathedral is listed as a contributing property to Peoria's North Side Historic District. The Scottish Rite Bodies of the Valley of Peoria was established in Yates City, Illinois on 25 February 1867, and moved to Peoria in 1869. The body had 3 meeting locations in Peoria before the Scottish Rite Cathedral. The cornerstone for the Scottish Rite Cathedral was laid on 7 May 1924. The cathedral design features flying buttresses and symbolic stained glass windows. The cathedral has an auditorium with a stage and a 1,000 person capacity. The body has approximately 2,100 members.

Peace and Harvest

Peace and Harvest are two 8-foot tall limestone statues in downtown Peoria, Illinois, USA. The male and female figures represent peace and harvest respectively. The statues were sculpted by Chicagoan Mary Andersen Clark as part of the Works Progress Administrations Federal Art Project, and were added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1988. The statues, created in 1938 and 1939, were dedicated on September 3, 1939 in front of the Peoria Municipal Tuberculosis Sanitarium, just north of the current Forest Park Nature Center, and stood at the site until the sanitarium closed in 1975. They then moved to Peoria Courthouse Plaza from 1975 to 1988, then were stored in a Peoria firehouse until 1992, causing them to briefly lose their National Register status. In June 1992, the statues were placed at their current site at in front of the Becker Building at the corner of Jefferson and Main Streets.

Grandview Drive

Grandview Drive is a two and a half mile scenic road with adjacent park areas through Peoria and Peoria Heights, Illinois. Major portions of the road give a view of the Illinois River and its valley as well as clear views of the some of the most prestigious and historic homes in the area. Houses along Grandview Drive are among the best known in the city; the residential area on the west of Grandview Drive, opposite the river, was added to the National Register of Historic Places as an historic district in 1996. A large amount of land on the valley side of Grandview Drive is owned by the Peoria Park District and is undeveloped except for park benches. The districts legal name, "Pleasure Driveway and Park District of Peoria", is a reflection of Grandview Drives original prominence in the Peoria park system. Of particular note, the drive is said to have been one of the first "linear parks" of its time. President Theodore Roosevelt is said to have proclaimed it the "Worlds Most Beautiful Drive" during a 1910 visit. Grandview Drive was the original location of WMBD; although the WMBD callsign was assigned in FCC sequence, the callsign is associated with Roosevelts comment.

Lincoln Branch Peoria Public Library

The Lincoln Branch Peoria Public Library is a Carnegie library located at 1312 West Lincoln Avenue in Peoria, Illinois. Built in 1910, the building served as the first dedicated library building on Peoria's South Side. The South Side branch library opened in 1903 in a building called the Neighborhood House; however, it had outgrown its space in the building by 1909. The city petitioned the Carnegie Foundation for funding for a new library; the Foundation provided a $20,000 grant for the building, and the city passed a $2,000 annual tax to cover the library's maintenance. Peoria architecture firm Hotchkiss & Harris supplied a Classical Revival design for the building, and construction began in 1910 and was completed the following year. The library became popular with neighborhood residents, setting city records for daily circulation; it also held special collections serving the city's Lebanese and German immigrant communities. The library was added to the National Register of Historic Places on May 28, 2014.

Springdale Cemetery

Springdale Cemetery is a historic, non-sectarian, active cemetery in the United States city of Peoria, Illinois. It was chartered in 1855, received its first interment in 1857. Almost 78,000 individuals are buried at the cemetery. It contains a public mausoleum and 15 private mausoleums. The property was acquired in 1854, and the first interment took place in April 1857. The Cemetery is an active, non-sectarian burial ground, and the property contains 15 private mausoleums. The historic gatehouse, constructed in 1901, was razed in 2010. The public mausoleum, which was designed by the Chicago architectural firm of Lovell & Lovell, was completed in 1929 and has been expanded twice. The cemetery once grew to over 360 acres but has since retracted to its present size of 223 acres. The property includes six and a half miles of winding driveways. The cemetery is the final resting place for nearly 78,000 individuals from the Peoria area. The property is not fully developed, and as a result, the Cemetery can accommodate another 50,000 burials. The Cemetery permits traditional burial in the ground, entombment in the mausoleum, inurnment of cremated remains in crypts and in burial lots, and a scattering garden. The Cemetery is actively planning for green burial.

Peoria Riverfront Museum

The Peoria Riverfront Museum is a public museum of science and culture located in downtown Peoria, Illinois. Containing a planetarium, a giant screen theater, exhibits, collections, educational classes, and public outreach, the museum opened in October 2012. A specialty resource of the museum is the "Illinois River Encounter," a family-oriented gallery that attempts to be the definitive aquarium of the Illinois River, which flows adjacent to the museum. Adjacent displays describe the ecology, social history, and engineering of the working river. The Peoria Riverfront Museum serves as a replacement for the former Lakeview Museum of Arts and Sciences, which was located in a different location in Peoria and closed in September 2012. The Museum building and grounds are owned by Peoria County and leased to the museum by public-private partnership agreement. Key to the agreement was the enactment by local voters of a supplemental sales tax. An admission fee is charged.

Renaissance Coliseum

Renaissance Coliseum is a brand new multi-purpose athletic facility at Bradley University in Peoria, Illinois. Renaissance Coliseum was originally intended to be complete in 2009, but construction delays pushed back the opening to the 2010–11 academic year. The official dedication took place on October 15, 2010. Renaissance Coliseum houses athletic offices, practice, training/conditioning facilities, the athletics hall of fame and other features. Adjacent to the arena is a state-of-the-art men’s basketball practice facility. In addition to hosting Bradley Athletics events, the facility will welcome concerts, speakers, commencement, IHSA competitions, and other events local to Central Illinois. After the demolition of Robertson Memorial Field House, the 4,200-seat arena was needed to host sports that dont require the larger Carver Arena. Because of the delays, the Bradley teams moved to Lorene Ramsey Gymnasium at nearby Illinois Central College for the 2009–2010 season. Concerts the arena has hosted over the years include: Weezer, Jason Derulo, Mike Posner, Taking Back Sunday, Girl Talk, The Band Perry, Plain White Ts, and The Frey. In 2012, the Bradley University Mens Basketball team played its first regular season home game on campus since 1982. The team has continued to schedule at least one regular season home game at the arena since then. Bradley played two home games of the CIT postseason tournament at the Coliseum, defeating both the University of Wisconsin-Green Bay and Tulane.

Academy of Our Lady/Spalding Institute

Academy of Our Lady and Spalding Institute were Catholic high schools across the street from each other in downtown Peoria, Illinois. The Academy , a girls' school, traced its lineage back to 1863. The Spalding Institute , the boys' school, was founded in 1899 by the Franciscan Brothers of Mountbellew, Ireland, at the invitation of John Lancaster Spalding, the first Bishop of Peoria. It was one of the communities which left that religious congregation to split off and become part of the Third Order Regular of St. Francis of Penance, based in Rome, Italy. The schools merged into one co-educational school, Academy of Our Lady/Spalding Institute in 1973. AOL/SI was merged with Bergan High School to form Peoria Notre Dame High School in 1988, and the campus was closed at the end of the 1988-1989 school year. Buildings on the campus are contributing properties of the North Side Historic District.

Robertson Memorial Field House

Robertson Memorial Field House was a multi-purpose arena on the Bradley University campus in Peoria, Illinois. The arena, built inside two surplus World War II airplane hangars in 1949 for $400,000 ($4 million in present terms), had a 3-foot (1 meter) raised floor as its sports court and event stage. The Field House was dedicated on December 17, 1949, and named in honor of Alfred J. Robertson, usually known as "Robbie" or "A.J.", who served as Bradley's coach and athletic director for 28 years. When it opened, it had a seating capacity of 8,300, but more aisles and wider seats soon reduced capacity to 7,800. Since a 2004 renovation, its capacity had been 5,000. From 1949 to 1982, it was home to the Bradley University men's basketball team, whose winning record there was 400–100 before they moved to Carver Arena in 1982. From 1982 until 2008, the women's basketball and volleyball teams played their home games at the arena. It hosted the Missouri Valley Conference men's basketball tournament title game in 1980. The 2007–2008 season was the final year of use for Robertson Memorial Field House; it hosted NCAA women's basketball and volleyball. In April 2008, Robertson Memorial Field House was demolished. Bradley's new women's basketball arena, the Renaissance Coliseum, opened in October 2011 on the same plot previous occupied by the Field House.

Rock Island Depot and Freight House

The Rock Island Depot and Freight House is a two-story railroad station and adjacent one-story freight house from the turn of the 20th century. It was constructed in 1899 directly besides the Illinois River in the American city of Peoria, Illinois. The depot and freight house are Peoria's last remaining historic reminders of the importance of the railroad in the city's past. The depot was built by the Chicago, Rock Island and Pacific Railroad as the terminus of a major branch line that delivered significant goods and passengers to Peoria. The 1900 opening of the depot was attended by "throngs of populous;" at its height before the depression of the 1880s, Peoria was a transportation hub, rivaled only by Chicago in the Midwest. The station's clock tower was removed in 1939. The buildings were listed on the U.S. National Register of Historic Places in 1978. After the end of train service, the building became known as River Station, and has been a restaurant, and afterwards a set of restaurants and bars. Currently the building is occupied by Martinis On Water Street, and The Blue Duck Barbecue Tavern. It is adjacent to the Peoria Riverfront Museum.

Kickapoo Building

The Kickapoo Building is a historic commercial building located at 726 West Main Street in Peoria, Illinois. Built in 1911, the building was originally used as a tied house for the Anheuser-Busch Brewery, which sought to expand its presence in Peoria's large brewing industry. The two-story building has a flatiron shape, a design which took advantage of its triangular lot. Architect Albert Keifer gave the building a Classical Revival design with German Renaissance Revival features. Flatiron buildings were once commonly built in Peoria as a necessity of the city's geography; while downtown Peoria was built on a grid aligned with the Illinois River, its subsequent additions were usually aligned with the cardinal directions, and extensions of streets from the additions into downtown led to the creation of many triangular lots. The Kickapoo Building's lot was created by three of these streets, Main Street and Glendale Avenue from the original downtown and Knoxville from the boundaries of several later additions; while it was not the first building on its triangular lot, it was the first one to take full advantage of the space. Modern commercial development and freeway construction eliminated many of Peoria's diagonal streets downtown, including Knoxville Avenue itself, and took many of its flatiron buildings with it; the Kickapoo Building stands out among the survivors for its decorative commercial storefronts on all three sides. The building was added to the National Register of Historic Places on December 31, 2013.

OSF Saint Francis Medical Center

OSF Saint Francis Medical Center, located in Peoria, Illinois, United States, is a teaching hospital for the University of Illinois College of Medicine at Peoria and part of the OSF Healthcare System. The Center, which is the largest hospital in the Peoria metropolitan area and in central Illinois, is designated by the state of Illinois as the Level I adult and pediatric regional trauma center for a 26-county region in mid-Illinois. OSF Saint Francis owns the Children's Hospital of Illinois (though the Hospital has its own President), the OSF Saint Francis Heart Hospital, the Illinois Neurological Institute, and the OSF Saint Francis Medical Center College of Nursing, which are all located either in or near the Medical Center. The hospital is a clinical training hospital for many medical students, interns, residents, and fellows of the Peoria campus of the University of Illinois College of Medicine. It is the largest Level I trauma center for adults and children between the Chicago and Rockford metropolitan areas and the St. Louis metropolitan area. It is the fourth largest hospital in all of Illinois. The hospital offers adult and pediatric renal transplantation and adult pancreatic transplantation; most of the time, adult, and especially, pediatric, cardiac transplantation cases are referred to tertiary care academic medical transplantation centers in Chicago or St. Louis, though there are facilities and surgeons and physicians available for cardiac transplantation at the Center's Heart Institute and at the Children's Hospital, and they have been performed there repeatedly. The hospital offers advanced burn care, hyperbaric, and debridement and grafting services for both children and adults, and sometimes, if need be, can transfer very severe cases to the certified state burn units in Springfield, Chicago or St. Louis. The Center's new Jump Trading Simulation Institute is used for bioengineering, biochemical research, research on new devices and tissues and grafts, and medical and nursing and bioengineering training. The hospital made national and international headlines in the health care field on April 9, 2013, when a toddler, Hannah Warren, about 3, from South Korea (born to a Canadian father and South Korean mother) who was born without a trachea (a windpipe) received an artificial trachea that incorporated, with the plastic, her own living stem cells (the adult type), in the first bio-engineered transplant on a child in the U.S. and the first bio-engineered trachea transplant in the world. It is the first stem cell procedure of any kind at the Catholic medical center. The major 11-hour surgical procedure was led by Dr. Paolo Macchiarini of Sweden's Karolinska Institute, along with top surgical and medical officials from OSF. However, she died three months later from complications.
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