I Make Fun of State Quarters: Illinois

All right, Illinois, do your worst. What have you got? Is it the oh-so-original approach of combining the state motto with the state bird, and maybe adding the state bird if there's room? Is it a vista of Lake Michigan and the phrase, "We have waves, too, when it's not frozen"? Let's see it.

(Source)

Words. Should have brought...a poet.

All right, it's not perfect. There's that awkward phrasing where they say they're the 21st state in the 21st century, but it looks more like "century" has been left over as a Mint typo. There's that weird little dribble at the bottom of the Illinois outline, as if the state is trying to claim a few beachheads in Kentucky.

But still, after scrutinizing quarters whose designs range from Deep South states celebrating Socialist icons to giant birds that will kill us all, it kind of floors you to see a quarter that condenses all of its key identities into an inch-wide piece of currency, and does it right.

What comes to mind when you think of Illinois? Odds are it's Chicago and Abraham Lincoln. The city is one of the most populous in the country, and Lincoln is widely considered one of the best Presidents, if not the best.

Chicago is, of course, represented by the Sears Tower. Yes, I know it's supposed to be the Willis Tower now. But for one thing, it was still the Sears Tower when this quarter debuted. Also, no one wants to call the iconic building by the name slapped onto it by an insurance broker that bought office space for a song during the Great Recession and picked up the naming rights for free. Chicagoans responded with a rousing, "Yeah sure, we'll call it that when the Cubbies win the friggin' World Series," and then kept calling it the Sears Tower anyway.

The Coleman Tower in New York keeps annoying the Willis Tower by demanding to know what it's talking about. (Source)

It's always a little annoying to see companies buy the naming rights for something because they think it will improve their brand. In some cases, it can lead to outright loathing of the company. Around the same time the Willis Group was picking up the naming rights for the Sears Tower, the new stadium for the New York Mets was being renamed from Shea Stadium to Citi Field, after Citigroup. It was subsequently nicknamed "Sorry We Screwed The Entire Economy But Still Got A Bailout" Ballpark.

To be fair, though, the Sears Tower name is an early example of this trend. There's also the fact that the retailer left the building way back in 1988, although it kept the naming rights for awhile. The Willis Group has since sold the skyscraper, but is shelling out $1 million a year for the right to retain the name and have everyone ignore it and call the building the Sears Tower. But a new name could come when the rights expire in 2025.

On to young strapping Abe Lincoln.

Honest Abe was born in Kentucky, but spent the formative years of his legal and political career in Illinois before he was elected President. And besides, Kentucky had probably already ceded any claim on a Lincoln quarter in favor of portraying a famous horsey race.

So this would be the third piece of currency to feature Lincoln, after the penny and the five dollar bill. I could have sworn that the update to the U.S. currency designs included upgrading the handsomeness of the presidents, but the only thing searches on this topic revealed was a disturbing amount of sites ranking the commanders-in-chief by hotness.

That said, the Lincoln on this quarter is pretty damn good looking. Kudos to the design for making him rather muscular, which is historically accurate considering that Lincoln the rail-splitter was incredibly strong. His feat of holding an axe at arm's length between a thumb and forefinger seems mundane until you try it at Home Depot and have to give up before a sales associate can even yell at you. He also wrestled for sport, and responded to a brawl at one political rally by giving an agitator who was about to attack a friend the old heave-ho.

Kudos also for the face not only being recognizable as Lincoln, but also as a Lincoln who is striding toward his future with an expression of complete badassery. He's like some kind of 19th century John McClane.

You know all those lame Chuck Norris jokes that have faded away as Chuck Norris closes in on 80? I think we can safely reassign them to Illinois State Quarter Lincoln. This guy sees the rabble-rousing of a bunch of slave-owning plantation masters in the South, and with a single look he says, "Bring it on."

So we've got two decent state symbols in a row. It's like two bars on the slot machine. Come on, one more and we get the jackpot!

FREAKIN' CHERRY.

All right, fine. This is actually a decent way to encapsulate another aspect of the Illinois identity. Illinois ranks right smack in the middle in the ranking of states by land area, and Chicago is the only city in the state with more than a million people. The rest of the state is crammed full of farms.

According to the Illinois Department of Agriculture, the state is the nation's top producer of pumpkins. It's also a leading producer of corn, pigs, and soybeans, with significant production of wheat and hay and...

You know, let's just cut it off there. Forgive me for not finding the Illinois sorghum crop as interesting as one of the world's tallest skyscrapers and Sexy Abe Lincoln.