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31-425: The first poem serves as an introduction: "The Hill" Where are Elmer, Herman, Bert, Tom and Charley, The weak of will, the strong of arm, the clown, the boozer, the fighter? All, all are sleeping on the hill. One passed in a fever, One was burned in a mine, One was killed in a brawl, One died in a jail, One fell from a bridge toiling for children and wife— All, all are sleeping, sleeping, sleeping on

62-497: A Petersburg cemetery, and a tour of graveyards in both towns, especially Oak Hill Cemetery in Lewistown, reveals most of the surnames that Masters applied to his characters. After growing up and leaving Lewistown for Chicago, Masters met and befriended William Marion Reedy , the owner, publisher and editor of the St. Louis-based literary magazine Reedy's Mirror . By the time Masters wrote

93-441: A household in the city was $ 34,688, and the median income for a family was $ 42,500. Males had a median income of $ 32,292 versus $ 22,396 for females. The per capita income for the city was $ 18,718. About 13.8% of families and 16.0% of the population were below the poverty line , including 26.6% of those under age 18 and 6.9% of those age 65 or over. Petersburg is served by WCIA, WICS, WAND, WSEC, WRSP television stations. Petersburg

124-455: A memorial statue of Masters and offers a self-guided walking tour of the graves that inspired the poems. In 2015, the town celebrated the 100th anniversary of the anthology's publication with tours, exhibitions, and theatrical performances. Today Spoon River Anthology often is assigned in high school and college literature classes and as a source of monologues for theatrical auditions. It is also often used in second-year characterization work in

155-490: A picture of life in their town that is shorn of façades. The interplay of various villagers—such as a bright and successful man crediting his parents for all he's accomplished, and an old woman weeping because he is secretly her illegitimate child—forms a gripping, if not pretty, whole. Many of the characters who make appearances in Spoon River Anthology were based on people that Masters knew or heard of in

186-431: A planned community organized by real estate speculators Peter Lukins (for whom the town is named) and George Warburton. Abraham Lincoln worked as the surveyor who first mapped, measured and help to divide lots on the land. Petersburg quickly grew, due to an advantageous placement on the river, becoming the county seat in the 1830s and eventually drawing off the population of New Salem, which was abandoned in 1840. Many of

217-476: A stark contrast to the flat plains around it. The trees are mostly deciduous maples and oaks, and New Salem State Park is home to a sizable stand of old-growth forest . Petersburg was damaged by an earthquake originating in the New Madrid Fault on July 18, 1909. The earthquake was felt over most of central Illinois, but Petersburg suffered the most widespread damage. The portions of Petersburg located below

248-454: A steady (if small) industry, and the town caters to Lincoln enthusiasts as a gateway to New Salem and in housing some relics of Lincoln's early life in Illinois. There are also a growing number of bed and breakfast inns, many of which are located in restored Victorian homes. Recent developments have also turned the town into a bedroom community for the state capital of Springfield, Illinois , which

279-556: Is 23 miles (37 km) to the southeast. Petersburg is located in central Menard County and Illinois Route 97 passes through the city on Sixth Street, leading northwest 25 miles (40 km) to Havana and southeast 23 miles (37 km) to Springfield , the state capital. Illinois Route 123 enters Petersburg from the south with IL 97 but leaves to the east on East Sangamon Street. IL 123 leads east and south 11 miles (18 km) to Athens , and southwest 14 miles (23 km) to Illinois Route 125 near Pleasant Plains . According to

310-503: The Greek Anthology , a collection of classical period epigrams , to which Spoon River Anthology is stylistically similar. Spoon River Anthology originally was published in serial form in Reedy's Mirror from May 29, 1914, until January 5, 1915. The poems were attributed initially to the pseudonym Webster Ford. William Marion Reedy , owner, publisher and editor of the magazine revealed

341-469: The Meisner technique of actor training. Spoon River Anthology is credited as an initial inspiration for the "audio log" storytelling device in video games as it first appeared in the game System Shock , a narrative technique that became a standard trope of narrative games. Petersburg, Illinois Petersburg is a city in and the county seat of Menard County , Illinois , United States , on

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372-529: The U.S. Census Bureau , Petersburg has a total area of 1.56 square miles (4.04 km ), all land. The bulk of Petersburg lies on the bluffs overlooking the Sangamon River , though a portion of it, including the downtown/courthouse square area, is technically on the floodplain of the river. The Sangamon flows north, then west to the Illinois River at Beardstown . The town itself is moderately forested,

403-419: The "exhaustion of body" that befell him while writing, which eventually manifested in pneumonia and a year-long bout of illness as the work was being prepared for publication. He claims that the Lewistown residents who strove to identify the poems' characters with real people did so only "with poor success". More recently, Lewistown celebrated its relationship to Masters's poetry. The Oak Hill Cemetery features

434-503: The Lewistown library board, voted for the ban. (Masters claimed "My mother disliked [the anthology]; my father adored it".) Despite this, the anthology remained widely read in Lewistown; local historian Kelvin Sampson notes that "Every family in Lewistown probably had a sheet of paper or a notebook hidden away with their copy of the Anthology, saying who was who in town". Masters capitalized on

465-460: The bluffs and part of the floodplain overlooking the Sangamon River . It is part of the Springfield, Illinois Metropolitan Statistical Area . The population was 2,258 at the 2020 census , nearly unchanged from 2010. Petersburg is located approximately 2 miles (3 km) north of New Salem , the original location where Abraham Lincoln first settled, as he started his career. The town began as

496-511: The bluffs suffered major flood damage during the intense flood season of 1993. The city and Menard County have since undertaken a campaign to buy and eliminate the low-income housing located in the most flood-prone areas, creating a small series of parks near the Sangamon River. Shortly after 12:30pm on December 31, 2010 , an estimated 40 homes were damaged by a tornado, with 22 of the homes listed as uninhabitable by local officials. The tornado

527-541: The city was 97.78% White , 1.09% African American , 0.39% Native American , 0.22% Asian , 0.35% from other races , and 0.17% from two or more races. Hispanic or Latino of any race were 0.78% of the population. There were 997 households, out of which 31.6% had children under the age of 18 living with them, 44.8% were married couples living together, 13.7% had a female householder with no husband present, and 38.6% were non-families. 35.7% of all households were made up of individuals, and 18.0% had someone living alone who

558-485: The hill. Where are Ella, Kate, Mag, Lizzie and Edith, The tender heart, the simple soul, the loud, the proud, the happy one?— All, all are sleeping on the hill. One died in shameful child-birth, One of a thwarted love, One at the hands of a brute in a brothel, One of a broken pride, in the search for heart's desire; One after life in far-away London and Paris Was brought to her little space by Ella and Kate and Mag— All, all are sleeping, sleeping, sleeping on

589-472: The hill. Where are Uncle Isaac and Aunt Emily, And old Towny Kincaid and Sevigne Houghton, And Major Walker who had talked With venerable men of the revolution?— All, all are sleeping on the hill. They brought them dead sons from the war, And daughters whom life had crushed, And their children fatherless, crying— All, all are sleeping, sleeping, sleeping on the hill. Where is Old Fiddler Jones Who played with life all his ninety years, Braving

620-412: The lush Victorian-era homes built by early wealthy inhabitants still stand on the bluffs of Petersburg. The town itself takes great pride in these structures, which has even preserved some of the original cobblestone streets to complement the classical architecture. Petersburg began as a trade center for agriculture in the region and a shipping point, where a railhead met a point in the Sangamon River that

651-536: The old home valley where the writer came from. Such a writer and book are realized here." The book sold 80,000 copies over four years, making it an international bestseller by the standards of the day. Meanwhile, those who lived in the Spoon River region objected to their portrayal in the anthology, particularly as so many of the poems' characters were based on real people. The book was banned from Lewistown schools and libraries until 1974. Even Masters's mother, who sat on

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682-447: The poems that became Spoon River Anthology, he had published some poetry with some success; these prior poems, however, were more conventional in style and subject matter. Masters later wrote that it was Reedy, through his criticism and friendship, who encouraged him to write "something more distinctive than what I was doing, somehow, someway, but without telling me how to do it." Masters in particular credited Reedy with introducing him to

713-556: The poems' true authorship in November 1914, after 21 weekly entries. The first bound edition of Spoon River Anthology was published by The Macmillan Company in 1915 with a total of 213 poems. Masters added 33 new poems in the 1916 edition, expanding on new characters with connections to some of the originals. Among these new additions were "Andy the Night-Watch", "Isa Nutter," "Plymouth Rock Joe" and "The Epilogue." Spoon River Anthology

744-491: The sleet with bared breast, Drinking, rioting, thinking neither of wife nor kin, Nor gold, nor love, nor heaven? Lo! he babbles of the fish-frys of long ago, Of the horse-races of long ago at Clary's Grove, Of what Abe Lincoln said One time at Springfield. Each of the following poems is an autobiographical epitaph of a dead citizen, delivered by the dead themselves. Characters include Tom Merritt, Amos Sibley, Carl Hamblin, Fiddler Jones and A.D. Blood. They speak about

775-413: The sorts of things one might expect: Some recite their histories and turning points, others make observations of life from the outside, and petty ones complain of the treatment of their graves, while few tell how they really died. The subject of afterlife receives only the occasional brief mention, and even those seem to be contradictory. Speaking without reason to lie or fear the consequences, they construct

806-429: The success of Spoon River Anthology with the 1924 sequel The New Spoon River , in which Spoon River became a suburb of Chicago and its inhabitants have been urbanized. The second work was less successful and received poorer reviews. In 1933, Masters wrote a retrospective essay on the composition of Spoon River Anthology and the response it received, entitled "The Genesis of Spoon River". He recounts, among other things,

837-479: The two towns in which he grew up: Petersburg and Lewistown, Illinois . Masters sometimes substantially disguised the names of these real-life inspirations, but he sometimes disguised them only barely and, in a few cases, not at all. Most notable is Anne Rutledge , regarded in local legend to be Abraham Lincoln 's early love interest (though there is no actual proof of such a relationship); Masters heard this legend from his grandfather. Rutledge's grave can be found in

868-448: Was 65 years of age or older. The average household size was 2.23 and the average family size was 2.89. In the city the population was spread out, with 24.5% under the age of 18, 8.2% from 18 to 24, 27.4% from 25 to 44, 20.7% from 45 to 64, and 19.2% who were 65 years of age or older. The median age was 38 years. For every 100 females, there were 83.3 males. For every 100 females age 18 and over, there were 79.0 males. The median income for

899-420: Was a critical and commercial success. Ezra Pound 's review of the Spoon River poems begins: "At last! At last America has discovered a poet." Carl Sandburg 's review is similarly glowing: "Once in a while a man comes along who writes a book that has his own heart-beats in it. The people whose faces look out from the pages of the book are the people of life itself, each trait of them as plain or as mysterious as in

930-400: Was both navigable and crossable. In recent decades, the depth of the Sangamon River at Petersburg has become too shallow for navigation, due to silting from local farming and from the diverting of natural runoff into artificial reservoirs such as Lake Petersburg and Lake Springfield. The economy of the area is still derived primarily from agriculture, particularly in corn production. Tourism is

961-401: Was caused by springlike weather during which the temperature was in the 60s across central Illinois. As of the census of 2000, there were 2,299 people, 997 households, and 612 families residing in the city. The population density was 1,705.7 inhabitants per square mile (658.6/km ). There were 1,076 housing units at an average density of 798.3 per square mile (308.2/km ). The racial makeup of

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