Turning Our Attention to the Next 150 Years

Nathan Harter

Sesquicentennials don’t come along every day. Now that the city has celebrated its past and put its heritage into perspective, maybe we should devote an equivalent number of dollars and an equivalent number of hours to figuring out the future. One thing about studying history: you start to recognize that the present is contingent. What does that mean?

The arc of history is not inevitable. Nowhere is it written in the stars whether a city prospers or declines. Sometimes, the most significant events occur by happenstance, the fortune of influences converge on one outcome, whereas other outcomes had been possible. Things are the way they are because of what happened yesterday. If people yesterday had made different choices, things might be very different today.

A pioneer does not stop on our bluff to set up homestead but keeps on trekking westward. An Indian party does not skirt the little outpost but assails it, wiping out all settlers. The diseased traveler turns left rather than right at the fork in the road and brings pestilence. A tornado leaps the next county over and lands instead right on top of our houses. The Union loses the Civil War and all of North America splits into petty, rival territories. Who knows?

The trajectory of any city is unique. New Salem, Illinois, which Abraham Lincoln reached as a young man earnest and wry, has disappeared. Chicago, on the other hand, became the largest city in the American Midwest. Vandalia, Illinois, had been the state capital, but because of a narrow vote in the legislature (thanks in part to Lincoln) the capital moved to Springfield. You ever heard of Vandalia, Illinois?

A young professional, fresh from medical school, decides to set up practice in one town and not the next town over. A huge factory considers locations in three states, and because of a package of incentives wrought by the governor, it picks here. A couple of talented athletes grow up together and get it into their heads to win the state title together. An elementary school teacher with vision and a gift inspires kids to dream bigger dreams than ordinary children do.

Part of what happens to any city is purely accidental, a freak or fluke. What’s interesting, however, is that much of what transpires happens as a result of particular choices made by specifiable people. One thing leads to another, and before you know it, a town vaults past its neighbors and becomes preeminent. Any more, that does not happen because of one decision, all-or-nothing. Instead, it happens because of a series of coordinated decisions made by a cluster of ambitious leaders.

Research in sociology tells us that permanent social change tends to be the product of a visionary cadre of leaders who pledge themselves to a direction and work together over time to move a community toward a particular destiny. So the question today, after looking backwards at the unfolding of this city over one hundred and fifty years, is whether we can look around at our leaders today, find out if they are on the same page, and ask whether they have a vision for tomorrow.

Here and there, a good man might run for public office and take his turn in the seat of power, and God bless him. But what we need is a coherent power cluster, dedicated to reform, and open to infusions of talent from both its youth and newcomers. Does there exist such a cadre? If not, why not? And if so, what are they deciding today that our descendants will see fit to celebrate one hundred and fifty years from now?  

Text Only