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Abe Lincoln. Swank martini club. It's easy to admire both, but it's hard to picture them together.
So it goes with Illinois, a state split between the urban and up-to-the-minute delights of Chicago and
"downstate" (meaning not Chicago), a place knee-deep in Lincoln lore and other attractions that recall the Illinois of
the 1800s.
For visitors, the state's dual identity is a blessing. They can experience the museums, shopping, restaurants and nightlife of one of the world's premier cities and then, in a matter of hours, move to the tranquil countryside with its abundance of vintage architecture and historic sites. Taken as a whole, Illinois provides an interesting slice of the Midwest, both rural and urban, serene and sophisticated.
Origins: Cahokia, the urban center of the pre-Columbian Mississippian culture, was located near present-day Collinsville, Illinois. That civilization vanished circa 1400–1500AD for unknown reasons. The next major power in the region was the Illiniwek Confederation or Illini, a political alliance among several tribes. The Illiniwek gave Illinois its name. The Illini suffered in the seventeenth century as Iroquois expansion forced them to compete with several tribes for land. The Illini were replaced by the Potawatomi, Miami, Sauk, and other tribes.
Demographic: As of 2005, Illinois has an estimated population of 12,763,371, which is an increase of 51,355, or 0.4%, from the prior year and an increase of 343,724, or 2.8%, since the year 2000. The top five ancestry groups in Illinois are: German (19.6%), African American (15.1%), Irish (12.2%), Mexican (9.2%), and Polish (7.5%). The 2004 total gross state product for Illinois was US$528 billion, placing it 5th in the nation. The 2003 per capita income was US $32,965. Illinois' agricultural outputs are corn, soybeans, hogs, cattle, dairy products, and wheat. Its industrial outputs are machinery, food processing, electrical equipment, chemical products, publishing, fabricated metal products, transportation equipment, petroleum and coal.
Presidential Politics: Illinois was always a major battleground between the Republican Party and the Democratic Party . Since 1992 it has moved steadily more Democratic at the national and state level. Illinois voted for Democratic presidential candidates in the last four elections. John Kerry easily won the state's 21 electoral votes in 2004 by a margin of 11 percentage points with 54.8% of the vote. Traditionally, the central cities were Democratic, especially Chicago and East Saint Louis. The suburbs of Chicago were historically Republican. However, the "collar" counties of Lake and DuPage, while still mostly Republican, have been trending towards the Democrats. Small cities and towns are Republican strongholds (except for the old coal mining towns). Rural districts in the northern third of the state have historically been Republican; those in the middle third mixed, and those in Little Egypt (the southern third of the state), Democratic.
Source: Wikipedia and Northstar Travel Media LLC