A river runs through it

Gary Marx and Daniel Overturf – Book signing for "A River Through Illinois." 5 to 7 p.m. Saturday, Barnes and Noble bookstore, 1300 E. Main St., Carbondale.

It may have just been an excuse for two old friends to collaborate, but the result is a chronicle of one of the state's most historic waterways.

Gary Marx and Daniel Overturf have known each other for almost 20 years. They spent the last ten photographing and interviewing people along the 330-mile Illinois Waterway, from Chicago to Grafton, for "A River Through Illinois," a book that blends more than 100 color photographs with a narrative containing history, personal stories and literary impressions.

For 23 years, Marx worked as a columnist and news editor at The Southern Illinoisan and now works for The Kansas City Star. He grew up in Schiller Park, a Cook County suburb of Chicago, with a great respect for the Des Plaines River, one of the primary sources of the Illinois River.

Originally from Peoria, Overturf is an associate professor and former chair of the department of cinema and photography at Southern Illinois University Carbondale and has worked as a photographer and teacher in New Mexico, Kansas, Nevada and Alberta, Canada.

The two use their personal connections with the waterway and their experience in media to take readers from the urban landscape of Chicago to the state's most rural areas. They head to places most people have never been with the stories of fishermen, scientists, engineers, hunters, riverboat pilots, deckhands, farming families, bar owners, shop keepers, government workers, regular Joes, men, women, young and old.

Flipside caught up with Marx and Overturf in separate interviews to discuss the book before their signing this weekend in Carbondale.

How did you get the idea for "A River Through Illinois?"

Marx: We'd been looking for a project that would pair Dan's photographs and my writing for some time, so at its base, there was a desire to collaborate. We'd explored a couple of other subjects before hitting on this idea, which immediately appealed to both of us. Dan grew up in Peoria, and he returned from a visit there, as I recall, really jazzed about some photos he'd taken and about the prospects of an Illinois River project of some sort. It developed from there.

Overturf: The thing about it is - this is kind of an old story that you hear from a lot of people - a lot of time you don't really know as much about your home until you go back and take a closer look. Having been gone for so long, not only was I learning about the Illinois River, because it was right there, it always had been as I was growing up.

I was not a teenage 'river rat' out on the boats all the time fishing or waterskiing. When I was growing up, the river was only beginning to get noticed as an environmental issue. The Illinois River had been neglected during my youth and only started to get turned around back then.

Which came first, the pictures or the text? Or the pictures or the idea?

Marx: Both. We worked together and separately on this project. We spent about four days together with a crew on a towboat and we took quite a few road trips together, but often we'd work independently. For instance, I'd meet someone on a weekend guerrilla run to a town or landmark, and Dan would follow up and arrange a portrait of that person. Alternately, he'd meet someone and tip me off to a possible story. Sometimes he'd come back with an outstanding photograph with no human subject, and I write to the image.

Overturf: We kind of got together on the genesis of the idea. That's about the only 'single mind' we had on this. We quite quickly came together on the project as a whole.

My very first photographs in starting to consider this were probably done in 1998, which has been about 10 years. At that time it wasn't a book; it wasn't a project. Gary wasn't there, I was just kind of putting some things together in snapshot form. Snapshots for photographers are more like taking notes. So, I just took a lot of notes and we kind of used that to discuss where we might go on this.

Why do you think this waterway is significant?

Marx: The waterway is significant in a navigational sense because it links the Great Lakes to the Mississippi River. Product - whether it's coal, chemical, corn or what have you - moves more efficiently, with less of an environmental impact, by barge than it does by rail or truck. The linkage to the Great Lakes makes it possible to ship product to and from the Eastern Seaboard without having to go to the Gulf of Mexico and around Florida. Besides the Mississippi and the Ohio, the Illinois is the most important inland waterway in North America.

The waterway is significant for wildlife, too. Migratory birds need the wide expanses of water and the backwater lakes and wetlands that abound in some areas of the river (and used to be more plentiful.) The waterway used to be a great fishery, too, but less so today, due to sedimentation and channelization. And invasive species, which is a huge problem now.

The waterway also provides lots of jobs, and it is a vessel, so to speak, for our heritage. Lots of history was made and continues to be made in the thin strip on the map.

Overturf: You have to ask some hard questions - is this project going to really matter, is there some unique significance to this topic - when you start thinking about devoting so much time and energy to this topic.

It's a pretty important stretch of river. As a river that is that important, it's really the only one that's contained within one state. The Ohio, Mississippi, and for that matter, Missouri and other rivers, quite a few of them traverse different states and form the boundaries for different states. The Illinois River doesn't do that. It simply kind of cuts down through the heart in this kind of reverse seven shape from Lake Michigan down to the Mississippi. It's all Illinois all day.

How did you go about gathering the information?

Marx: We knew we wanted to touch certain bases, so I read a lot, attended conferences and simply arranged interviews with key people. Most of the focus, though, was on people who actually are on or at the water's edge. My favorite thing to do was to make what I called guerrilla runs, blind visits to places, and let serendipity rule the day. I'd introduce myself to people, tell them what I was up to and let them tell their story.

Overturf: Photographing in a documentary style for me has always been a blend of research and curiosity. Curiosity usually initiates the research, but I never set out to fulfill a preconception. My idea about how to make these photographs is to go, explore and respond. Certainly from any type of initial foray into an area, the cards just fall into place. You meet somebody who explains to you why this area has been this important in history and so on.

Your subject leads you. You do objective research, you try to ask as many different people the same question in a lot of cases, maybe photograph places at different times of year from different people's points of view, but you find that without a preconceived notion � you actually go out and respond and absorb all done under a rather respectful methodology, that you're trying to understand what you're photographing.

Why did you decide to use the personal narratives to shape the story?

Overturf: One of the most interesting aspects of working on this book is how absolutely knowledgeable and expert certain people are for very specific stretches of the river. The overall is just too long. You can maybe talk to someone from the corps of engineers or somebody else who has some official status, but in a lot of cases, they'll also be rather local or regional.

When you meet somebody in Havana, they may have no idea what it's like to be along the same river in Morris, and all they are is just downstream, a ways, but still downstream on the same river.

Marx: Stories are vital. They connect us as a people. We learn from them. And we all have a story, sometimes more than one. The world didn't need a dry recitation about "The Importance of the Illinois Waterway." Dan and I wanted to introduce readers to interesting individuals, little people with personal stories. Characters. Through that method, I think we've told a larger story. In some ways - and I know this might seem like a cliché - but this book is a mosaic, a montage, little bits making a larger image. And I think that image turned out to be a particular place at a particular time. I think it's important to say this: We did not produce any so-called definitive story about the Illinois Waterway.

And, to tell the truth, we could've gone on forever and not told the full story. That's because the subject is a moving target, and it's so diverse. Dan and I have said this more than once: The river changes all the time; it's a living thing. And many of the subjects I've written about and the images he photographed have already passed. I look at the photos in the book today, and I see friends I made along the way who are no longer alive.

Were there any stories or places that struck you more than others?

Marx: The river's different around every bend and switchback, and I loved the whole thing, even the industrial stretches near Chicago. But there was one spot that I've tucked into my memory bank, and I visit it occasionally still. It's in the lower region, between Florence and Pearl, off a remote road close to the water, where the river is unbounded by levees.

One time, I sat there for about an hour listening to the clicking of insects and watching the evening birds flit across the fields. It was wild and peaceful. And then I heard the approach, the unmistakable thrum and throb of a towboat. It was pushing barges upstream. It took a long time to approach, growing louder as it came. Through the trees, I could see it pass, and then the sound gradually faded. And when it was gone, the birds still flew, the insects still buzzed, and there was a rhythm to the whole scene. It was all a part of the natural landscape, even the towboat.

Overturf: I don't think I ever felt unwelcome anywhere. There are some very good folks in Bath, which is just south of Havana, who really kind of took us under their wing and taught us a lot about that area. They're a good example of people I met all along the river.

Gary and I were taking an interest in their stories, taking an interest in their lives and trying to approach it from a very respectful point of view, out of a sincere curiosity.

I think the entire book tends to maintain that spirit. We're not trying to sugarcoat the environmental or any other issues that exist on the river.

Certainly a lot of the modern world impinges on the natural beauty of any waterway in the United States, or anywhere, for that matter. On the other hand, the people we met there were some of the most genuine people I ever had a chance to work with.

brent.stewart@thesouthern.com / 351-5074