Reviewing the 2022 Season

As we recently closed the 2022 regular season for Woodlawn Farm, we would like to update you on the status of tours, etc.  The last couple of years have been lean to non-existent.  This year we were able to open for regular tours May 1 and continue to the end of September. We were regularly open on Saturday and Sunday afternoons from 1 to 4 p.m. 

We continue to have visitors, but certainly fewer than we have had in years prior to the pandemic. It has definitely picked up from 2021. We had a few school tours—mostly small groups.  We continue to provide a tour for the Greenfield 8th graders with a continental breakfast, as well as arrangements for a box lunch from Subway, paid for by the parent/teacher organization for their school. We had a group from the Illinois School for the Visually Impaired who combined three classes and sent 12 visually impaired or blind students for a tour. According to their teachers, the students thoroughly enjoyed the tour and would like to come back some time in the future. We had a group of African-American students from Illinois College who came to the farm for the first time from a new orientation program at IC.

We had two successful bus tours this year in the spring and in the fall. We had a record turnout in the spring with a waiting list of 48 people for the fall tour. About half of the fall tour was made up of those waiting list people.  There is never a date that is available for everyone on any list. The fall tour filled three buses with a waiting list of approximately a dozen for next spring.   

Many of the groups and individuals, who tour Woodlawn or take the ½ day bus tour, stay overnight in Jacksonville to access other sites in Jacksonville. There is so much history in our town., and we’re thankful for our visitors this and every year!