For the Potawatomi,the term Midewindenoted healing.Today it signifies thehealing effects ofrestoration at theMidewin NationalTallgrass Prairie.

Hiking ThroStory By Jeanne Townsend HandyPhotos By Adele Hodde

T here is a piece of landlocated 40 miles southwestof downtown Chicago thatretains remnants of Ameri-can history like pages

ripped from a textbook. These pageshint at a story that tells of native peo-ples and European settlers, war effortsand contamination of land and water inthe name of national security, healingand restoration, new visions and shift-ing values. This land’s most recent

names and intentions seem to collide instartling contradiction as the JolietArmy Ammunition Plant, the site of theworld’s largest TNT factory, continuesits transformation into the MidewinNational Tallgrass Prairie.

Midewin (mih-DAY-win) is thenation’s first nationally designated tall-

grass preserve, and it is no small parceltucked into an out-of-the-way corner.It encompasses 18,094 acres, 7,200 ofwhich are now open to the public,and choosing a starting point forexploration from the 22 miles of trailscan be daunting. The site map identi-fies trail names that jar perception and

Untouched and

isolated for more

than 60 years,

buffer areas

around the

ammunition

plant retain their

natural character.

2 / OutdoorIllinois October 2009

ugh Historypull in disparate directions. Whichway to go? To the Explosives RoadTrailhead or the Twin Oaks Trail? TheBunker Field Trail or the Prairie CreekWoods Trail? The wartime and peace-ful purposes of this site are equallyintriguing, yet it is difficult not to bedrawn first to the vestiges of the mili-

tary-related activities that have takenplace there.

Gearing up for entry into World WarII, the United States government deter-mined that the heartland was the per-fect site for a chemical works/bombassembly plant, lying beyond the reachof the Luftwaffe and the Imperial Japan-

ese Air Force. In July 1940, the govern-ment purchased 150 Joliet-area farmsand within 14 months was turning outblocks of TNT. The landscape wasquickly and dramatically altered by1,000 buildings, 200 miles of roads, 166miles of railroad tracks, and 329 earth-covered concrete bunkers used for thestorage of ammunition and explosives.

Settling on the Bunker Field Trail tobegin exploration, I made my waydown paths now lined with nativeplants that teemed with butterflies.Knowledge of the urgent and secretivenature of what had taken place here

The frames of the ammunition

plant warehouses—slated for

dismantling as the restoration

proceeds—recall Midewin’s former

wartime mission.

Sod-covered

storage bunkers,

or “igloos,”

remind visitors

of the wartime

significance

of Midewin.

October 2009 OutdoorIllinois / 3

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and

y.)

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made me feel as though I were violatingnational security, and this eerie feelingstrengthened upon spotting the silhou-ettes of the storage bunkers, or “igloos,”that appeared to rise organically fromthe earth. Covered with grass to keepthem hidden from aerial view, thesebunkers are a centerpiece of one of themany guided tours offered at Midewin.

As I drew near the skeletal shells ofwarehouses now filled with vegetationand rising starkly skyward, it becameeasy to imagine the tumult of activityperformed by the former employees—10,425 of whom worked at the ammu-nition plant during peak production.These employees would load more than926,000,000 bombs, shells, mines, deto-nators, fuses and boosters, and set anational record for the production ofmore than one billion pounds of TNT.Production was maintained until theend of the war when the arsenal wasplaced on standby. Reactivation cameduring the Korean War, from 1952 to1957, and again during the VietnamWar. By the late 1970s, most operationsat the Joliet Army Ammunitions Planthad finally ceased. But not before atoxic legacy had been left behind.

Intermittently, from the early 1940suntil the 1970s, toxic byproducts from

ized, documented, and fought for byproponents from the Department ofNatural Resources and through grass-roots efforts. On March 10, 1997, theArmy transferred the first 15,080 acresof arsenal holdings to the U.S. ForestService, and a new life for this landbegan. The Indian name “Midewin” waschosen with the permission of thePotawatomi people, a tribe known tohave occupied the area from the late1600s through the early 1800s. Midewinwas the name for the Potawatomi’s“Grand Healing Society”—and it is aname representing the desire for thehealing effects of restoration.

Leaving behind the Bunker FieldTrail and a history that for so long gov-erned this landscape, I journeyed

Midewin BurnhamLegacy Project

The Burnham Plan Centennial

commemorating Daniel Burnham’s

1909 Plan of Chicago is providing

Chicago professionals with the oppor-

tunity to design a Green Legacy Project

at Midewin. The innovative Legacy Pro-

ject plans will incorporate cutting-edge

Green technology in the creation of

two open-air Prairie Learning Centers

at Midewin.

4 / OutdoorIllinois October 2009

Each fall, school groups and visi-

tors assist in the seed production

gardens, harvesting seeds for use

in the horticultural program.

Interpretive exhibits within the

Midewin Welcome Center provide

information on the cultural and

natural history of the area.

the manufacture of bombs, artilleryshells and high explosives had foundtheir way into the soil and groundwater.How then, despite the massive cleanupthat has taken place, could thoughtshave turned so improbably from TNTproduction to flora and fauna? Whatcould have sparked such an incongru-ent vision for the future of this land?The answer may lie partly in the ammu-nition plant’s need for seclusion.

For both safety and security reasons,this plant and 77 others like it in thenation required the isolation offered bysurrounding buffer lands. At Joliet, thefactories were so enormous, thousandsof acres of open land were necessary toinsulate the ammunition plant—acresthat included fields, pastures, prairieremnants, woods, wetlands andstreams—acres that the public wouldnot see or touch for nearly 60 years.

Eventually, the site’s potential asmuch-needed wildlife habitat was real-

October 2009 OutdoorIllinois / 5

toward Midewin’s present. I drove pastthe South Patrol Road Restoration Pro-ject, which is the site of the preserve’smost enduring restoration efforts.According to Marta Witt of the USDAForest Service, at the time of the landtransfer only 3 percent of native vegeta-tion remained in little corners of farmfields and along railroad grades.

“Very, very little,” she stated, butquickly added that even before therestoration began, these acres had beenthe last refuge for many species.Midewin already provides a haven fornumerous plants and animals in desper-ate need of habitat, including twospecies on the federal endangeredspecies list, 20 species listed by theState of Illinois as watch list, threat-ened, or endangered, and 26 speciesrecognized by the U.S. Forest Service asRegional Forester Sensitive Species.

Arriving at the Prairie Creek WoodsTrail, I found an entryway constructedof intertwining branches that beckonedhikers onto the path beyond. Whenprairie dominated the landscape of Illi-nois, early visitors often likened it to avast, rippling ocean, and the metaphor

seemed fitting. The lush grasses centralto the Prairie Creek Woods Trail undu-lated in the breeze, moving me along toits edge and into the seclusion of theadjacent Prairie Creek Woods. Statelycitizens of this original woodlandproudly proclaimed their longevity andtheir identity with signs tied to theirtrunks—burr oak, shagbark hickory,black ash—and suggested what couldonce again be.

When I asked Marta Witt if what Ihad read was true—that it would take50 to 100 years to complete the restora-tion—she responded emphatically,“Oh, at least.”

A final stop at one of the native seedproduction gardens along River Roadacted as a reminder of the size and

complexity of the largest prairierestoration east of the Mississippi River.Midewin also is a center for research, aplace to attempt to piece together anecosystem so rare—only 0.01 percentof Illinois’ original 21 million acres ofprairie remain—that no one knowsexactly how these pieces collaborate asa system. “So much of what happens atMidewin will be an ongoing experi-ment, learning by trial and error how togradually regain our natural heritage inIllinois,” states one Midewin source.

As the prairie is restored and themosaic of habitats regains health anddiversity, the Midewin National Tall-grass Prairie of the future will offer notonly refuge for wildlife but also ever-expanding opportunities for recreationand education—and for continued jour-neys through history. Whether taking atour that introduces you to the “Ghostsof the Ammunition Plant” or setting offon bicycle or foot in independentexploration, at Midewin it is possible totravel through time, to hike throughhistory, moving from the past to thepresent and toward a future that recallsour prairie legacy.

Springfield writer Jeanne TownsendHandy holds an M.A. in EnvironmentalStudies and has been accepted into theSociety of Environmental Journalists.

Tom Handy is a Web specialist forthe Southern Illinois University School ofMedicine. He spends his free time as afreelance photographer and musician.

At a glanceMidewin National Tallgrass Prairie, 30239 S. State Route 53,Wilmington, IL 60481Telephone: (815) 423-6370Web site: www.fs.fed.us/mntpDirections to the Welcome Center: From I-55: Take exit 241 at Wilmington and atthe top of the ramp turn left or east. Travel 3.5 miles on New River Road, turning left(north) on State Route 53 and proceeding 1 mile to the site.From I-80: Take exit 132, State Route 53 and Chicago Street, and turn right, or south, atthe end of the ramp. Travel south on State Route 53 approximately 15 miles to the site.From I-57: Take exit 327 at Peotone and turn left, or west, from the northbound ramp;turn right or west from the southbound ramp. Travel approximately 15 miles on theWilmington-Peotone Road to State Route 53, turning right (north) and traveling approxi-mately 1.5 miles to the site.Permitted Activities: A stop at the Welcome Center or visit to the Web site isadvised for details on the following activities.

Tours and lectures are offered year-round on a variety of topics.The Midewin trail system includes trails designated for walkers, bicyclists, horse-

back riders and cross-country skiers.Opportunities abound at Midewin for wildlife watching, with early morning and

dusk the best times to view wild turkeys, white-tailed deer, grassland birds and coyotes.Midewin is open for spring turkey and fall deer hunting. Check the Web site calen-

dar for details. Current hunting season information also is posted at trailheads.A number of rustic (tables and portable toilets) picnic areas are available.

Evidence of the scale of the native

plant restoration program is

evident within one of Midewin’s

many shade houses.