Then & Now: Railroad Station - Mokena

The manner in which Americans moved around their world changed drastically during the last half of the 19th century. Before the 1850s, the only practical way to travel and trade across long distances was along the nation’s many natural waterways.

As a result, patterns of settlement were focused along the nation’s coastal areas and the rivers. A few dirt roads connected major towns or cities, but travel on them was difficult, unpredictable and time-consuming.

By 1900, locomotives traveled along thousands of miles of rails that crisscrossed America. Large ships moved passengers and freight across oceans; smaller boats navigated the nation’s rivers, lakes and canals. Even bicycles, carriages and wagons rolled passengers over thousands of miles of local roads. In time, many new villages, towns and cities sprouted up along these new routes.

One of the fastest-growing of these new cities was Chicago. By the end of the 19th century, Chicago had become an economic powerhouse with nearly 1.7 million residents. Located at the intersection of river, lake and railroad routes, Chicago’s industrial, manufacturing and commercial life depended on the boats and trains traveling into and out of the region. In time, Chicago became the most important railroad center in North America.

In the first decade of the 20th century, the average American had come to depend on products from far distant places. Fruit from California, furniture and meat from Chicago, clothes from New York, or more unique items from the mail order catalogs of Sears, Roebuck and Company and Montgomery Ward all crisscrossed the country with a speed and ease unheard of just a few decades before. Both firms sold nearly everything imaginable and guaranteed delivery to at least the nearest railroad station.

As such, railroad station buildings, or depots, were often the center of activity and communications for small towns in America. In the years before the automobile, the railroad depot was the only means to the outside world for most people. Not only could you use the building to board your train to faraway places, but it also was where the goods you purchased were delivered. The station was also a gathering place to receive and send off loved ones, most particularly military servicemen who departed to train for service.

Looking southeast from the railroad station in Mokena, the Then photograph, circa 1905, shows typical commuters strolling along the platform toward the station. Notice the parcels and packages in the foreground, which probably arrived by train that day.

The Mokena Street railroad crossing can be seen to the left in the photograph, and slightly out of view is the grain and coal dealership of W.H. Bechstein. Visible to the right is the general store of John A. Hatch.

The Now photograph shows a similar view from the Mokena Street crossing today. Notice that the former Hatch store still stands along Mokena Street today.