24 THE AUDUBON BULL TDE@isiEs 
THE CORPS OUT-ENGINEERED 
by Bruce Hannon & Julie Cannc 
In the past two years the Midwest 
District of the Army Corps of 
Engineers shipped out a general 
and two colonels to points in 
Okinawa, Korea, and Vietnam. 
The top civilian was “promoted” 
to another area. Why? Many think 
the answer lies with a small 
band of midwestern conservation- 
ists who hounded the Corps 
through its complex technopoliti- 
cal maze and achieved an alterna- 
tive to the midwestern district's 
favorite project, the revised 
Oakley Dam. 
This confrontation was in the 
making years ago when settlers in 
Central Illinois first began plow- 
ing the nation’s richest soil. In 
pre-pioneer days wide belts of trees 
flourished along Illinois rivers. As 
the years passed, the grain fields 
were pushed to the very edge of 
the river banks—except in a 1500- 
acre area along the Sangamon 
River. Here the primeval forest 
endured and a long forgotten ecol- 
ogy continued undisturbed. 
The area is intact today through 
the farsightedness of a nineteenth 
century Horatio Algers and his 
philanthropist son. The _ father, 
Samuel Allerton, built a fortune in 
the livestock market, and as his 
fortune grew he invested in land. 
By 1900 he owned 40,000 acres, 
including the 19,000 acres of land 
in Piatt County, Illinois, that 
willed to his son, Robert. 
Robert Allerton, in addition 
administering the family pro} 
ties, developed a deep interes! 
the fine arts. It was Robert 1 
took the 1500 acres of black-so 
woodlands in the Sangamon Va 
and fashioned one of the n 
beautiful estates in the Mic 
West. In the words of a Univer 
of Illinois publication: Waa 
through the ministry of archit 
ure, sculpture, and landscape 
sign he illustrated how art 
nature may be blended for 
delight and edification of man 
In developing the estate, Ro 
built a 20-room Georgian mans 
created a series of informal 
formal gardens, and sowed 
property with both originals 
copies of some of the world’s fi 
sculpture. In all his plans he | 
sidered the native Illinois li 
scape. His gardens, though s 
are based on foreign inspira 
feature native floral materials. 
most of the 1500 acres, inclu 
the bottom lands that fringe 
rambling Sangamon River, 
covered by a forest that has | 
evolving undisturbed for 2( 
years. | 
In 1946 Robert Allerton don 
the 1500-acre tract, including} 
mansion, to the University of 
nois to be used “as an educati 
and research center, as a i 
and wildlife and plantlife res¢ 
