Toxic hogweed reported in state
As an infestation of towering, noxious weeds slowly weaves westward from Ohio and Pennsylvania, officials in Illinois figured it could be years before the outbreak touches state soil. No more....
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From bad to worse in Cairo, Ill.
This troubled riverfront town has been ailing for years, plagued by poverty, citizen flight, decay and racial strife. Now its government is paralyzed, with four council members rebelling against the...
State digs deep to revive mines
Mounds from a once-grand industry jut out from the low-lying cornfields in what old-timers call "bony piles." They are the remnants of 64 coal mines that thrived in 1890 in...
Cemetery at center of O’Hare battlefield
Planes thunder overhead, sometimes less than a minute apart. Trucks pull in and out of the FedEx shipping terminal, a stone's throw from St. Johannes Cemetery. About a mile away,...
Katrina survivors endure long wait to retrieve dead
It is a cruel and almost insufferable indignity for those who already have suffered so much. Thousands of frustrated Hurricane Katrina victims who lost their homes, possessions and livelihoods have...
Experts seek how monster storms changed
The two hurricanes that roared into the Gulf of Mexico in the last month were identical in nearly every way. Born in the same region near Haiti, the storms called...
Bush margin safe in Florida
The battle for Florida was expected to pick up where it left off four years ago: an achingly tight race that would defy conclusion on Election Day. But unlike four...
Former Bush aide has governor on ropes
In the quirky landscape of Indiana politics, an accidental incumbent governor is battling for his political life against a Washington insider whose campaign emphasizes he's a comeback Hoosier. In the...
Getting out the grannies
This is the time of year when "snowbirds"--as Northern migrants have long been called here--flock to South Florida. But this year far more than snowbirds are roosting in the Sunshine...
Legion of young voters force to be unsure of
Nothing so far seems to have persuaded Jordan Reilly to vote on Election Day. Not the MTV spots or the Rock the Vote concerts or Comedy Central. Not the daily...