KEWANEE — Inspiring others for the betterment of their community was the shared quality of two women who were honored by the Kewanee Chamber of Commerce Ambasadors Club with its Outstanding Citizen Award at a banquet held Tuesday, July 26, at the Flemish-American Club.

Etta LaFlora was recognized as the 2020 Outstanding Citizen, two years late since the banquet was not held in 2020 due to COVID-19 restrictions on public gatherings.

Dianne Packee is the 2022 honoree with “Esstential Workers” listed as recipients of the 2021 award, again with no banquet due to COVID. “It’s been a long time coming, but we’re finally back,” master of ceremonies Brock Tumbleson said in welcoming a large crowd of family and friends of both women to the meal and award ceremony.

Speaking on behalf of Dianne Packee were former director of the Kewanee Economic Development Corporation, Russell Medley, fellow Rotary Club member Carrie Boelens, and Dierdre Scott, co-chair, with Packee, of the Prairie Chicken Festival for the past eight years.

Medley recalled the night he first met Packee at a community meeting called by a city council member to brainstorm ideas on how to improve Kewanee. Medley said he remembered how quiet she was, but came up with something that had been done in Pontiac, where she had previously lived … Walldogs murals on buildings around the central business district.

At first, Medley said he and others were skeptical, but others liked the idea, especially since the artwork featured subjects from local history. He said Packee went to work organizing multiple committees, made contacts with the Walldogs, arranged for housing and set the project to be done in July of 2013. The result was 200 Walldogs artists from around the world spending four days in Kewanee painting 15 murals.

The night the murals were “unveiled” in a downtown open house, Medley said he was “shocked” at the thousands of people who walked the streets viewing the finished products. Packee was also instrumental in raising $100,000 to cover the cost of the murals, Medley said, which bring tourism dollars into Kewanee on a sustaining basis.

Since then, five more Walldogs murals have been added to the outdoor gallery.

Boelens picked up the next chapter in the mural saga, Quarter Madness, a fundraiser held each March which raises funds for new murals and preservation and maintenance of the current set, as well as funding the Rotary Club of Kewanee’s support of local organizations. Boelens and Packee, both Rotary members, initiated Quarter Madness, something new in Kewanee, which took a few years to catch on. Now, people wait in line for an hour-and-a-half just to get in the door.

"Somehow, no other town can replicate it, only Kewanee,” said Medley, also a former Rotary member.

“It was the right people, the right place and the right time,” said Boelens. She said Packee personifies the Rotary motto “Service above self.”

Scott said it’s the spirit with which she does things, referring to Packee as a “worker bee, full of energy and humor” when she was the driving force behind organizing the Prairie Chicken Chalk Art Festival, a celebration of public art held each July. The event features fun activities with the display of the artwork of local elementary students in the windows of downtown stores and chalk art images created on the concrete pathways of the former Grand Central Fun Center. The proceeds from the festival also go to support the ongoing mural project.

In accepting the award, Packee also recalled the night she got the courage to suggest the idea of painting murals on buildings.

“That night changed my life,” Packee said. “Who’d ever dream of something like this from a little girl who grew up in Fairview Homes."

She said none of it could be accomplished without the involvement of friends and her family, including husband Dennie, “who says I need to learn a new word, ‘No.’” She added “This award is for all of them. I was never alone in anything I did.”

Both LaFlora and Packee were presented with Certificates of Recognition from the Illinois State Senate signed by State Sen. Win Stoller (R-Peoria). There have been 48 recipients of the Outstanding Citizen Award since its inception in 1976.