Lincoln Highway mural comes to Maple Park

The Illinois Lincoln Highway Coalition has completed the next in a series of interpretive murals, stretching along the 179-mile Illinois byway corridor in more than two dozen communities, with a mural at the Maple Park Village Hall, 302 Willow St.

The mural, put up Tuesday, is a tribute to early roadside filling stations along Lincoln Highway, with a detailed painting of a local service station by Jay Allen, owner of ShawCraft Signs in Machesney Park, and his employee, Joe Marshall.

Maple Park was home to three gas stations in the early days of the Lincoln Highway, offering motorists not just fuel, but their every auto need. All the elements of a bygone era are evident in the image: gasoline pumps, advertisements for tires and restrooms, completed with a “ready to serve” uniformed attendant.

The ILHC received a National Scenic Byway Grant from the Federal Highway Administration and an Illinois Department of Commerce and Economic Opportunity, Office of Tourism, Attraction Development grant to pay for the $10,000 artwork, according to Sue Vos, chairwoman of the ILHC and President/CEO of Aurora Area Convention and Visitor Bureau.

She said each mural is a hand painted and that it “will be the largest work of public art in the country.”

For more information, go to drivelincolnhighway.com.