Pingree Grove clerk's magnet collection shows where she's been

Marjorie Morton's elaborate magnet collection tells the story of where she and some of her closest family members and friends have been.

Morton, Pingree Grove's utility clerk since 2006, boasts about 800 magnets in her entire collection.

The South Elgin resident keeps 51 of those magnets on display in her office at work - 34 on a bulletin board and 17 on a filing cabinet.

Most come from people who think about her while they're sightseeing.

"Once people know you collect magnets, they bring you some when they go on vacation," she said.

Morton bought just two of the magnets now at village hall - one from the Virgin Islands and two more from Kenya.

The bulk of her collection comes from a globe-trotting sister who works in Kenya with the US Department of Homeland Security and has traveled to 58 countries.

That sister, named Linda Dougherty, furnishes Morton with between five and six magnets every Christmas.

Doughtery has given Morton magnets from such far-flung places as Shanghai, Egypt and Peru.

Morton's magnet obsession began in 1978, when she and three of her four children were driving back and forth to visit relatives in New Jersey and Pennsylvania.

They began collecting state-shaped magnets on that trip and putting them on a magnetic board of the United States - it was Morton's way of teaching her children about the states' placement in the union.

Years later, someone gave Morton a magnet from Iowa that didn't look like the state and she's been hooked on collecting unique ones ever since.

For example, instead of magnets that look like the country of Kenya, Morton has the "big five" group of animals found there: a lion, a rhinoceros, a leopard, elephant and Cape buffalo.

"It's an economical thing to collect and it's a lot of fun and thank you to everybody who's ever given me one," she said.

Morton loves traveling and has been on a cruise through Eastern Europe and also visited her sister in Kenya last year.

The magnets she picks up and displays at the village frequently become talking points for people waiting in line to pay their water bill.

"I think the people that stop are just interested that she's been out of the country," said Village Clerk Michelle Figuerola, whose office is across the hall from Morton's.

Morton's collection spans the entire world, but if there's any place she could get a magnet from, it would be South Africa.

"I have several of the other countries in Africa, but not that one," she said. "Hopefully, my sister will get it for me eventually."