The search for a great nearby holiday destination: And the winner is–Springfield, Illinois

By Sally Tippett Rains

During the Government shut-down with the uncertainty about air travel, we decided to do an article about destinations in driving distance from St. Louis to take for a holiday get-away. We chose  a group of towns in Missouri and Illinois and contacted their convention and visitors bureaus to find out what they had to offer for the holidays– in our case, Christmas.  The towns included: Mt. Vernon, Illinois; Springfield, Illinois; Arnold, Missouri (which would include Kimmswick); Cape Girardeau, Missouri;  Champaign-Urbana, Illinois; Galena, Illinois; Marion, Illinois; and St. Charles, Missouri.

After compiling the information, we took a look at each town and decided we would take a trip to one. The winner was: Springfield, Illinois.

Springfield is an easy drive from St. Louis, basically on Interstate 55. The Google Maps show it as 97 miles and it took just under two hours to get there.

Upon arriving to town we headed to the Lincoln Home Historic Site to get tickets for the tour. The tickets are free but you have to go to the facility to reserve your tickets the day of the tour. There was a beautiful Christmas tree in the lobby of the Lincoln Home Historic Site Visitor’s Center which is run by the National Parks. The tree is at the top of the page. We enjoy collecting ornaments from places we have been so we got one in their gift shop.

We got the tickets for our tour and there was time for lunch so we headed to a much suggested and unique place: Charlie Parker’s Diner.

The name might sound familiar for two different reasons. One is there was a jazz musician named Charlie Parker but the restaurant is not named after him. The story is the original owner was trying to think of a good name and came up with Charlie Parker. It’s not named after anyone, it’s just a catchy name. The other reason you might have heard of it is the famous chef,  Guy Fieri featured it on his Diners, Drive-Ins, and Dives television show. He came there and ate in the little restaurant built inside a genuine Quonset hut.

Charlie Parker’s is famous for it’s large pancakes which the waitress told us was the size of the many 33 LP records hanging all over the walls. The decor was music with photos of Elvis Presley and the many albums covering the walls.

The photo, left is one we found  that was taken of our aunt, Pat Sleade,  when she ate with her grandaughter Lindsay Sleade who provided us with the photo.  took her to Charlie Parker’s That pretty much says it all. The waitress was’t kidding, the pancakes were huge.

The whole decor of Charlie Parker’s was a lot of fun and it was dressed up festively for the season with a big Christmas tree. You can see the Elvis photo in the photo of Pat with the pancake as well as the tree in the larger photo.

After a delicious lunch, which was breakfast– they serve breakfast all day– we headed back for our tour.

This trip had gotten off to a great start so far with all of the holiday decorations we were seeing along the way.

The tour of the Abraham Lincoln House was one we won’t forget. Being fans of historic houses, we have been to many and the guide often says, “these furnishings are exact replicas” or “this is the type of furniture they would have had” but we were surprised at how many of the Lincolns’ things are actually in the house.

The Lincolns bought a one story house which they renovated to two stories and added bedrooms. They had planned to return home after his presidency. This photo shows what it looks like today and the home the Lincolns spent most of their Springfield life in after he re-modeled it.

After his assassination, Robert Lincoln, the only son who eventually survived as all of Abraham and Mary Todd Lincoln’s children besides him died at a young age, sold the house. While the Lincolns were in Washington, D.C., some of the neighbors kept some of their belongings so once it was decided to turn it into a place where people could take tours, there were still items including chairs, a bed, and a large stove that were actually used by the Lincolns.

The photo, below,  shows one of the parlors.

The tour was free and well worth the time. While the Lincoln house was decorated for Christmas, there were not brightly lighted Christmas trees and anything resembling the lights we have today. In fact, the guide told us there was no evidence that the Lincolns even had a tree, so there was none there as the National Parks Department seeks to keep completely true to the history. The simple decorations of red berries, red bows and even a stocking hung on the mantel.

The flowers on either side of the mantel appeared to be Paperwhites, a type of daffodil known for its cluster of white flowers, which grows easily indoors and blooms in the winter. They added some red details and berries to make these flowers look festive for the holidays.

Saturday we headed to White Oaks Shopping Mall to see their Wintree Wonderland display. It was billed as a: Festive Forest of more than 45 beautifully decorated Christmas trees from designers, schools and scouts.

Since it was the week before Christmas we chose to go to the mall right when it opened to avoid the crowds and that was a great choice.

The tree display was in an empty store near where Santa was. Each tree was lit and they were all different. It was really fun to walk the aisles of the Christmas tree festival and look at each one.

Visitors had the opportunity to vote on their favorite.

After that we headed to the Farmer’s Market at Union Station, but from our GPS and information on the phone it was closed, so we thought we’d find some place to hang around while waiting for the tour of the Governor’s Mansion. We saw a book store so we headed in. Who should walk in but Abe Lincoln himself! And he was with his lovely wife, Mary.

It’s not often you run into the Lincolns at a bookstore so we had to get a shot of Rob with him.

We asked if they knew a restaurant we could go to and they both suggested the Sixth Street Cafe so we walked the short distance there.

It was a great little diner in the heart of the Lincoln exhibits in downtown Springfield and we got the traditional Patty Melt and chicken salad. As luck would have it, Abe and Mary were also hungry ad they came in. We ended up having a great conversation with them.

Some characters stay “in character” and it’s hard to have a conversation but they stepped out of their Lincoln persona to chat but were a wealth of information. It was so interesting.

It turns out the man portraying Lincoln is Fritz Klein, an actor famous for doing this.  Klein has portrayed Lincoln in 43 states and has been in many documentaries and movies, including include Lincoln’s Last Day, Lost River: Lincoln’s Secret Weapon, Lincoln: American Mastermind, and Lincoln’s Last Night. Here is the link to his IMDb page to see all he has done portraying Lincoln: CLICK HERE.

He was very modest but the woman who portrayed Mary told us about him. She is an actor named Pam Brown (LivingMaryLincoln.com) , also a successful Lincoln re-enactor who does shows all over.  Both Klein and Brown were dressed in costume from the time we saw them before noon until after the service.

They would walk around and people asked for their photos.They brought so much joy to people visiting the Lincoln sites and we were surprised how much stamina they had to be so friendly to everyone they saw all day.

Next on our schedule was “Cocoa at the Old Capital” so we headed the short distance. It was just like a Hallmark Movie– building a cocoa stop on our trip. Once we got to the Old State Capitol, who did we run into again, but  Klein– or should we say, Abraham Lincoln, as well as Santa Claus and the people handing out the hot chocolate for $3 a cup.

The Old State Capitol is just what the name implies, located at 1 Old State Capitol Plaza Springfield, Illinois 62701, it is open to the public with tours offered Tuesday through Saturday. It is closed on Sundays and Mondays.

It was in this building that Lincoln spoke the immortal words: “A house divided against itself cannot stand…”

He said it in a speech in the turbulent days preceding the Civil War. Also in the building complex, Abraham Lincoln tried several hundred cases in the Supreme Court, borrowed books from the state library, and read and swapped stories with other lawyers and politicians in the law library. On May 3 & 4, 1865, Mr. Lincoln’s body lay in state in Representatives Hall as a crowd estimated at 75,000 filed past to pay their last respects. As with the other Lincoln sites it was decked up for the holidays.

A little later in the afternoon, we took a tour the Governor’s Mansion. It was a special “Holiday Tour” and was free of charge but you had to sign up for tickets ahead of time. The tour guide explained that it would only be twenty minutes as opposed to the hour-long tour you would get any other time of the year, but this was to see the holiday decorations.

The house, now occupied by the Pritzkers was decorated outside as well as inside.

As the guide explained the decorating process is similar to the one for the White House.  The First Lady oversees it and it is set up both for the family to enjoy and for the many guests. If you decide to take a Springfield holiday trip next year be sure you look up when it is open for tours as it is a limited time and tickets must be arranged ahead of time. You also must show identification when checking in and will go through a metal detector for security reasons.

The home is located at 410 E Jackson St, Springfield, IL 62701

We were able to take a photo by the tree in the lobby as you walk in but they would not allow us to take any other pictures. That was a shame because it turns out  Governor J. B. Pritzker is a big sports fan and he had a large all-sports tree in his office. We got to see it and it was covered with Illinois sports team ornaments.

We included this photo, the only one they let visitors take,  so you could see the grand staircase leading to the second floor and just over Rob’s shoulder is Gov. Pritzker’s office; you can see his desk.

Another thing we enjoyed in the Governor’s Mansion were the Menorahs. J. B. Pritzker is Jewish and he has two large menorahs in their formal dining room. His wife, Mary Kathryn, who is called MK is not Jewish by birth, but she supports him in his religion and works for Jewish causes. The tour guide said that the First Lady chose the decorations for the house.

One tree we enjoyed was the Gold Star tree which was decorated with an ornament for each Gold Star Family from Illinois, which included first responders and those in the military. MK also sends a note and  replica of the ornaments to the families.

Springfield has several other house tours including the Dana-Thomas House and the Vachel Lindsay Home that were decorated for the holidays and free to take but reservations are required.

Abe Lincoln told us about a play that was to be performed at 3 p.m. at the Lincoln House Visitor Center and that Mary Todd Lincoln was going to be in. The timing worked out great for us to go right after the tour of the Mansion.

The play featured a different Abe Lincoln, with the same Mary Todd Lincoln we had met earlier;  and an actor who played General Ulysses S. Grant. It was a sweet story about Christmas Eve in 1864. Grant was missing his wife so the Lincolns invited him to spend Christmas Eve with them at the White House. They had much small talk to cover up the fact that they had not heard from General William T. Sherman and it was taking so long they were beginning to worry. At the end of the play, a lone rider showed up out front with a letter from Sherman telling them that on Dec. 21 he and his men took Savannah, Georgia.

It took a few days for the message to get to the White House, and he offered the news to the President as “a Christmas present.” It had arrived on Christmas Eve and the play ended with a rousing happy ending.

We went back to the  Drury Hotel for dinner which was our favorite: meatballs with mashed potatoes and gravy. They always have a wide assortment of food including hot dogs, soup, salad, nachos with cheese and baked potato bar. The dinner was served  from 5:30-7 p.m.

After dinner the thing we had been most looking forward to happened in the church where Abraham Lincoln and his family went: The 1850’s Community Christmas Carol Sing event with participants in costume.

First Presbyterian Church is a congregation of the Presbyterian Church located in downtown Springfield, Illinois. This is the church that President Abraham Lincoln and his family attended while they lived in Springfield, the original building was down the street and then they moved to the current building which is right across the street from the Lincoln home.

The church is wood on the inside with beautiful stain glassed windows and they had electric candles that looked like vintage 19th Century candles throughout the church. The choir was dressed in period carolers clothing and there was a band up in the balcony. The same Abraham Lincoln and Mary Todd Lincoln that we had met earlier were there and participated in the service.

The evening was full of Christmas Carols and in between there were Bible verses about the birth of Christ read.  They had passed out candles and near the end, Abe and Mary walked through the church offering a light from their candles to help everyone light theirs and then everyone held their lighted candles up in a darkened church and sang “Silent Night.”

Lincoln gave the benediction, in which he talked about a “country divided” and said as he thought about families fighting with each other he wondered where he could find the “light” and then he said in a powerful voice, “the light is in here!” and he tapped his hand on the Bible.  It was very moving because you weren’t sure if he was being Lincoln and talking about the Civil War or retreating out of his character and addressing the discord of the current state of the country. Anyway, it was a very moving benediction.

Since we are a baseball website, we could not go to Springfield, Illinois without stopping at the famous Scheels, located at  3801 S MacArthur Blvd, Springfield, IL 62711. A stop on the way out of town on Sunday was the perfect way to end the trip. 

Luckily we had our Christmas shopping finished so we avoided the lines and just enjoyed looking at the holiday decorations– which was really what this trip was about. 

This holiday trip to Springfield, Illinois is a very different trip than one you would take during the summer or any other time of year. There were so many “free” activities offered with a holiday twist.

It may be too late to take a trip to Springfield this holiday season, but it is worth it to check out their VisitSpringfieldIllinois.com next fall so you can see the weekend with the most holiday offerings, which for us was this weekend. There were also a lot of things going on the week after Thanksgiving.

The Drury Hotel was conveniently located so we were able to have our breakfasts and dinners there and get to all of the events  without having to get out onto the highway. It was very easy to get to the destinations, which added to the beauty and peacefulness of this old-fashioned trip.

If you are looking for peace in an old-fashioned holiday– with some excitement– Springfield, Illinois should be on your list for next December.