The Weekly Croissant: Cairo, IL

plus ring pops and a bathroom for besties

Aug 20, 2023

A few days ago, Steve and I drove through Cairo, IL en route to a show in St. Louis. Cairo is perhaps the most lonesome town I’ve ever seen… almost completely abandoned, but with signs of a thriving past; a fancy (abandoned) legal buildings and a beautiful old (abandoned) theater. I tried to check out Cairo real estate on Zillow and found exactly three properties for sale. I think most of these buildings have just been left to rot.

Steve told me he had stopped in Cairo once before with a band when they all had to pee. They saw the city signs and were sure that they’d be able to find a bathroom. Turns out, there are no businesses whatsoever in Cairo, and the band ended up pulling over at an empty lot to pee collectively in the dark. A woman poked her head out of the window from the derelict building across the road.

Hey! she yelled at them, I see what yer doing! I’ve already called the cops!

They giggled, shrugged, and left. Steve pointed out the building where the woman had lived, the entire roof now had caved in.

However, Steve’s illegal peeing karma followed him right back to Cairo. We saw very few humans (none) on our way through the town and yet, about a mile or so down the road, we were pulled over by a cop for “speeding”.

Sir, do you know how fast you were going?

Maybe 53?

It’s 45 speed limit here sir, it doesn’t get to 50 until up there where that tree is.

Jason Isbell’s Speed Trap Town immediately started playing in my head.

We humbly accepted our forced donation to Cairo, IL’s only fundraising scheme, and continued on our way, with a significant dent in our gig pay for the day (and Steve’s pride).

Growing up in Illinois, I was familiar with Cairo, so named because of its geographic location resembling the Egyptian capital, on a low-lying delta where the Mississippi and Ohio rivers meet.

My brother went to Southern Illinois University, whose mascot is the Salukis, the royal dogs of Egypt, which we always used to make fun of, because they are not very fierce-looking dogs.

The nickname for this area, “Little Egypt”, always made me imagine golden Sphinx statues and Cleopatra as a kid. In reality, Cairo is the kind of place you can’t drive through without wanting to write a song about it, but in a very different way. It’s a pure American horror show, broken dreams and dried-up industry. Here are few songs that capture the feeling of the place, both historic and present.

As I write this, I am thinking about the way that abandoned and broken places can be inspirational for artists. Detroit has become a pivotal epicenter for art after being considered a ghost town for years, and I just read in the New York Times about another creative commune which sprouted from an abandoned industrial site in Finland.

There’s something incredibly rich, though often dark, about these places that make us reach deep into ourselves; unused space, crumbling splendor, and the cycles of communal death and rebirth on display.

As an added bonus, if you visit Cairo, you can have the pleasure of stopping at the nearest gas station (several miles out of town) and visiting this incredibly unique #bestiesbathroom: