Built Where Two Railroads Crossed
Tolono grew up at the 1856 junction of the Illinois Central and the east-west Great Western Railway, ten miles south of Champaign, with early residents largely employed by the rail lines themselves. It incorporated in 1865 as a junction town rather than growing gradually around a natural water source.
Drainage on Unmodified County Prairie
Without a river or historic flood event shaping its site selection, Tolono's basements sit in the same poorly-drained black prairie soil documented across Champaign County -- soil that historically needed clay drain tile just to farm. That baseline drainage challenge, not any unusual local hazard, is the starting point for most Tolono basement water issues.