A county Crime Stoppers group is offering a reward of up to $2,500 to apprehend whoever defaced a Route 66 mural in Springfield, Illinois, with graffiti.
The mural on the railroad viaduct on Ninth Street, just north of Converse Street, was vandalized between the week of Jan. 10 and Jan. 27, causing hundreds of dollars in damage.
Anyone who knows who vandalized the mural should leave an anonymous tip to Crime Stoppers at (217) 788-8427. Informants also can submit a tip on Cashfortips.US or using the P3 app on any mobile device.
According to WAND-TV, the Springfield Art Association, with the help of 10 high school students, in July completed the mural featuring landmarks on Route 66:
Education Director Erin Svendsen said this was an effort to bring some color to the underpass on North Peoria Road.
“We have different things specifically from the north side in the mural,” Svendsen said. “We have Shea’s Auto Museum that’s closed. We were trying to give tribute to that. The state fair with the Lincoln statue, which is another Route 66 landmark.” […}
Since its completion, Svendsen said the mural received an overwhelming positive response from the community.
“Online, we had something like 80,000 people had viewed the mural. We had the Route 66 magazine wanting to make it their cover,” Svendsen said. “It was really amazing, just being on the street, seeing how many people were honking and driving by, yelling out their windows … thank you so much! We love this! North side really needed it!”
Svendsen said the damage will be painted over, but they’ll have to wait a while to do it because the paint won’t stick well when weather conditions are lower than 55 degrees.
Here’s a photo of the students working on the mural last summer:
(Image of the Route 66 mural on Ninth Street in Springfield, Illinois, via the Facebook page of the Springfield Art Commission)