Waterman, IL

Waterman is a DeKalb County village with a name rooted in the old railroad map. It was surveyed and platted in 1872, then named for Daniel B. Waterman, a railroad solicitor from Aurora. The 2020 census counted 1,433 residents. Today, the village is also linked to the DeKalb Ag seed-corn processing plant, which makes agriculture feel like part of the built landscape, not something beyond the town limits. The village's farm-country setting is impossible to miss when you arrive from the highway.

ATTRDavid Wilson from Oak Park, Illinois, USA / CC BY 2.0

Lion's Club Park has its own story. A local resident built the Waterman and Western, a one-third-scale train that circled the park for half a mile before a 2021 fire destroyed it. The little railroad is gone, but it says a lot about the place: a village park became a miniature rail line, and a local hobby turned into something everybody knew. Waterman is a small farming community with a grain-and-seed economy and a surprisingly memorable park legend.