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Wheels of Time Museum celebrating 30 years and still growing

Did you know there is an electric car at the Wheels O' Time Museum just north of Peoria? It's not a Chevy Volt, either. Nor is it a prototype of something in production now to battle high gas prices.

This electric car is called the Detroit Electric and it was built in 1931. It didn't have a steering wheel; rather, it was steered with a tiller and the driver sat in the back seat.

"That's where the term 'back-seat driver' came from," said Bobbie Rice, director of marketing for the museum, which is entering its 30th season this year. It's slated to open May 2.

The museum started in 1983 as a place for people to see old cars and tractors and rail cars and such. It has evolved into much more as patrons can see — and often touch — in the 24,000 square feet of exhibit space in three buildings on Illinois Route 40, two miles north of Illinois Route 6, in Dunlap.

Patronage grows each year, Rice said, and it has become one of the region's top tourist attractions. In 2011 Wheels O' Time was visited by residents of 45 states and 22 different countries, the latter by people who were touring the United States and wanted to see part of Americana.

Items on exhibit include all types of autos, train engines and cars, fire trucks, clocks, musical machines and instruments, toys, tools and a variety of other things that are meant to highlight items that are or at one time were manufactured in the Peoria area. Other items were made elsewhere but owned by Peorians.

That would include the Detroit Electric. It truly was an all-electric car that was the favorite of the wife of a state senator from Peoria who lived on Moss Avenue. "She liked to take the car from her house to the stores downtown to shop. Trouble was, when she came home there sometimes wasn't enough charge for her to get back up the hill so she had to leave it there until it got charged up again," said Gary Bragg, president of the Wheels O' Time Museum's board of directors.

Bragg was one of the founders of the museum, along with John H. Parks. The two were collectors of old autos, mostly Packards, and they needed a place to store them. Together they bought a five-acre tract of land just north of Peoria and, after inviting other hobbyists to join them, built the first building in 1979.

A few years later Bragg and Parks decided to open the doors of their collection to the public and call it a museum. Expansion of the facilities and items on display soon followed and now the museum is preparing to break ground on yet another building on the site.

But while most of those items have wheels, not everything on display is wheeled. Still, said Rice, "almost everything has wheel-like parts or are made with something that does."

She said many people still are skeptical there are enough items displayed to be interesting. "They don't realize what all we have beyond cars and trains. We try to appeal to everybody and to all ages," she said, citing many of the interactive displays.

Bragg said he often hears patrons refer to the museum as the best-kept secret in Peoria. "Once people see what we have they usually come back, often with kids or other family members. The younger people like to see things they can also put their hands on. We have plenty of those things here," he said.

The museum is open May through October, Wednesday through Sunday from noon to 5 p.m. Admission, which makes up most of the funding for the museum to meet expenses, is $6.50 for adults, $3.50 for children 3 through 11 and free for children under 3. There are also group rates available.

This year, for the first time, Wheels O' Time is offering one-year memberships. A single membership is $25 for unlimited admission for one adult; a dual admission for two adults is $40 and a family membership for two adults and up to three children under 12.

Also, there is a Benefactor membership for a contribution of $100 to $499 and includes unlimited admission for two adults, 10 passes to the museum, the benefactors name engraved on a donor plaque and a lapel pin. For $500 or more for a Patron membership there are the same benefits except 20 passes to the museum.

Rice said Wheels O' Time is a member of the Blue Star program sponsored by the National Endowment for the Arts. That's the program that gives free admission to members of the U.S. armed forces and their families. "It's our third year and we are proud to be part of that," Rice said.

The need always exists for more volunteers to help with various aspects of the museum, including acting as hosts and cleaning and repairing artifacts.
"We are pretty much self-supporting, which is important to us. But that's also why we rely heavily on volunteers," Bragg said.

Some of the more notable items currently on display at the museum are:

•the last Duryea automobile ever built, one of only a few left anywhere in the world

• a 1916 Glide that was built in Peoria Heights

• a limousine originally owned by Hugh Hefner before D. James Jumer bought it and used it at Jumer's Hotel

• the 1937 A12 Cord designed by Gordon Buehrig, a Bradley University engineering graduate from Mason City

• a 1962 Chrysler station wagon Sen. Everett Dirkson drove throughout the state while running for re-election that year, then loaned to his son-in-law Howard Baker on his first campaign for U.S. Senator from Tennessee

• the last Holt Caterpillar tractor before the company changed its name to Caterpillar Tractor Co.

• the two Pullman train cars that sat for decades at Junction City as part of Vonachen's Old Place restaurant, which Pete Vonachen donated to the museum when the restaurant was closed and the building razed

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