This monolithic statue was erected in honor of Chief Black Hawk (even if it wasn't made to look like him).

This deceivingly ordinary warehouse hides an enormous collection of pop culture treasures.

The city of Rockford, Illinois is symbolically protected by a quartet of fittingly stony sentinels.

This lush 12-acre site was once named the finest Japanese garden in North America.

A historic and oft-filmed prison stands in a Chicago suburb.

The study has wall paneling from a 17th century ship.

Roses and other fascinating flora fill this garden built to commemorate Britain's immortal Bard.

Once at the center of U.S. finance, the historic Trading Room was meticulously recreated piece by piece and rebuilt in the Art Institute.

A century-old network of freight tunnels underneath the city's historic business district.

One-of-a-kind preserved ruins of an abandoned 1880s church in Chicago's Pilsen neighborhood.

A century-old hotspot for jazz, frequented by everyone from Charlie Chaplin to Al Capone.

These abandoned grain silos and tunnels are an urban exploration dream.

A giant bronze coil of feces is both a tribute to doggie defecation and a reminder to pick it up.

A European-style bath house in Chicago.

Built to house a chapter of the Knights Templar, this grandiose building is a relic of Freemasonry in Chicago a century ago.

What was once one of the country's largest confectionary plants is now an abandoned ruin, but is still pretty sweet.

The oldest house in Chicago certainly doesn't look the part and there are some who say it doesn't deserve its title either.

Julia Buccola Petta's body was peculiarly well-preserved when it was exhumed six years after her death.

A onetime gangsters' hideaway where you can dine on steaks, fine wines, and cigars just like they once did.

A hidden grotto on the grounds of the Kane County Government Center.

This cemetery is all that remains of a school for "wayward" girls.

A replica viking ship from the Chicago World's Fair is still in dry dock in an Illinois park.

This overgrown Illinois water park offers a whole new type of adventure.

Burial mounds of prehistoric Native Americans who lived along the DuPage River.