Roald Tweet
Writer and Narrator of 'Rock Island Lines'Beginning 1995, historian and folklorist Dr. Roald Tweet spun his stories of the Mississippi Valley to a devoted audience on WVIK. Dr. Tweet published three books as well as numerous literary articles and recorded segments of "Rock Island Lines." His inspiration was that "kidney-shaped limestone island plunked down in the middle of the Mississippi River," a logical site for a storyteller like Dr. Tweet.
It was from Rock Island’s rich heritage that Dr. Tweet spun his histories, biographies and "stretchers." Among his favorite topics were railroads and riverboats, which he combined on a CD in celebration of the Grand Excursion in 2004. "Rock Island Lines with Roald Tweet" received awards from the Illinois Historical Society as well as the Towner Award from the Illinois Humanities Council.
Dr. Tweet was professor emeritus, retired from the Augustana College English department, where he was professor and Conrad Bergendoff Chair in the Humanities. A writer and radio personality, Dr. Tweet was also an accomplished woodcarver and whittler.
Dr. Tweet left us in November of 2020, but his legacy lives on. You can hear many of his Rock Island Lines in podcast form here and also in a forthcoming book from WVIK and East Hall Press.
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CommunityThis is Roald Tweet on Rock Island.If the following story is not true, it should be. It involves two Illinois folk heroes, Abraham Lincoln and the…
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CommunityThis is Roald Tweet on Rock Island.If you passed through fourth grade any time before 1947, you, too, memorized Eugene Field's poem, "Little Boy Blue."…
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CommunityThis is Roald Tweet on Rock Island.Safe in the Vatican, Pope Leo the Thirteenth was probably not aware in the spring of 1887 that a stack of lumber in…
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CommunityThis is Roald Tweet on Rock Island.You can't blame the judge, the fourteen lawyers, the prospective jury members, and the audience for all being just a…
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CommunityThis is Roald Tweet on Rock Island.By 1850, fifteen years after their founding, the three small villages around Rock Island were on their way to becoming…
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CommunityThis is Roald Tweet on Rock Island.Remember that Weekly Reader joke: "what does a fifteen-hundred-pound gorilla eat? Answer: "Anything it wants."…
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CommunityThis is Roald Tweet on Rock Island.Of at least one Rock Islander, Benjamin Dann Walsh, it can truly be said that there was some good news and some bad…
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CommunityThis is Roald Tweet on Rock Island.Less than a hundred miles north of this island lies a cornfield made popular by the movie Field of Dreams. It's not…
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CommunityThis is Roald Tweet on Rock Island.Even today, Easterners view the Midwest as far better ground in which to plant corn than culture. They would almost…
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CommunityThis is Roald Tweet on Rock Island.Think of Chicago as our Philistine giant, Goliath, and all the small Illinois villages and towns as so many Davids,…