It really was! When I moved back here in the early 80s and the subject came up, someone might go, “Shhhhh, don’t say that too loud, some people here don’t want Macomb to be remembered as some god forsaken hick town.” Seriously. Now we’ve been literally self-branded as “Unforgettable Forgottonia.”
The official name of the movement, “Forgottonia,” for the unofficial seceded state, popped up in an in-depth article Darcie Shinberger wrote, “County Law and Legal Discuss New State Referendum” published June 5 in The Community News Brief A McDonough County Board member invited Loret Newlin, director of “Illinois Separation” to speak to the Board’s Law and Legal Committee about placing a referendum on the November ballot asking voters if they would consider the “possibility of creating a new state and separating from Cook County.” That is this organization’s sole purpose. The committee voted to bring it to the County Board members for a vote.
I have some opinions on that, but my thoughts today are focused on Forgottonia, which County Board Member Clayton Cook, who had invited Ms. Newlin to the meeting, mentioned in his statement for the post-meeting story. In the article, Mr. Cook notes, “We all see the Forgottonia branding in Macomb.
Everyone should also know that it was a movement headquartered in McDonough County … The Separation Referendum is a similar movement, albeit far lower on the scale of severity, it asks the voters if we should talk about forming a new state. Forgottonia was a succession movement from the US.”
Well, the reality is, that it was not.
About 10 years ago, I did some research on Forgottonia. Neal Gamm, who was one of the organizers and the “unofficial, self-appointed governor,” left his papers to the WIU Archives and I reviewed them there (anyone can schedule a time to do that). I was sending information to the writer and director of a play, “Forgottonia: The Musical,” that was going to be performed at a community college in Missouri. This couldn’t be our Forgottonia, I thought, but indeed it was!
Colin Healy, the writer and I began corresponding, and I sent photos and documents, (speeches, press releases, agendas) to him to share with the cast. A group of us attended the production wearing Forgottonia tees in the front row; the cast and musicians were delighted to get more history of Forgottonia.
When Colin was a teen, he had seen an episode of a 2010 History Channel program called, “How the States Got their Shapes,” and in which Neal was interviewed, and Colin tucked it back in his mind as a good idea for a play. This video can be viewed on our Macomb Area Convention and Visitors Bureau. Go to their website, click on the link “about” top right, click on “Historical,” then scroll down until you see a photo labeled “Neal Gamm Governor of Forgottonia” to find detailed information and a video titled, “Forgottonia, IL History Clip.” That is the “State/Shapes” episode.
Below it is an excellent article and interview with Neal written by Nathan Woodside and published in the McDonough County Voice Dec. 24, 2010.
Neal Gamm was a local guy from Table Grove attending WIU as a theater major at the same time I was in college at WIU in 1972, my sophomore year.
At that time, many locals were very concerned that the western Illinois region was being forgotten by our state and federal elected officials in terms of funding for badly-needed infrastructure and resources. Congress did not pass funding for a proposed interstate highway from Chicago to Kansas City, Amtrak services were dropped, local roads and bridges were crumbling, etc.
Neal notes, “People were frustrated, they needed someone to speak out for them and they thought I was it. And in a way I was. At least I got their opinions out there”.
That’s when the ‘scheme,” as Neal referred to it, “was conjured up by himself, and two civic minded friends Jack Horn, son of the local Coca Cola bottler and Frank “Pappy” Horn, a Macomb Chamber of Commerce board member.” They would organize an initiative to form an alliance with 13 other counties in the region that would become “Forgottonia,” and together they would secede from the Union, declare war on the U.S., then surrender and apply for foreign aid reparations.
This was not a formal political movement like Illinois Separation (or New Illinois). This was political theater. And as someone studying theater “he became the front man.” Neal became the voice of Forgottonia and the “governor,” dressed up in a zany costume. The capital was Fandon, a town that is so small it lost its zip code.
Government offices were in various neglected looking buildings; the flag was white, a symbol of surrender. Neal and his “cabinet” started contacting and meeting with local officials in the 14-county area, and sent out press releases. Soon Gamm was leading parades of reporters down the streets of Fandon.
But the local issues were finally being heard, “You can malign, humiliate and scream at your politicians and it won’t bother them a bit, but you laugh at them, and they can’t stand it,” he said.
Then things went sideways. Media outlets from coast-to-coast picked up on Forgottonia. Neal notes, “It was just supposed to be a local kinda deal and it ended up going national. It was weird, because they were covering it fairly straightly.
Some papers, I think, really thought we were serious.”
But, he was not a politician and just couldn’t keep it up.
“I really had to do my homework…I didn’t know diddley about it...I was in over my head,” he told an interviewer.
A year later Forgottonia and its organizers began to fade from the spotlight. But that year Amtrak services were resumed and that’s a big deal.
It’s interesting that history keeps repeating itself, but there have always been divisions in our country.
I wanted to write this to clarify the differences in both movements but, the one being voted on by our County Board is certainly higher on the scale of severity despite the referendum’s innocuous wording that feels much like the one on our last ballot.
In writing, I wanted to set the record straight as Forgottonia was total satire by a group of merry pranksters for a good cause-the good of the people of Forgottonia. The referendum before the board is no joke; it is very real and serious.
On humor, from Neal, “(he) believes another spark of humor in government is sorely needed in a time where extreme partisanship is the rule. I feel like we need it now more than ever. Politics has become obstruction. We’re not getting anything done because they are just trying to keep the other guy from getting anything done.
That’s not the way to do it. I don’t know what the answer is. More and more I think we ought to do Forgottonia again.”
The main road in Fandon (County Road 600 North) was officially dedicated as Gov. Neal Gamm's Forgottonia Veterans Freeway during the 50th anniversary celebration of the Forgottonia movement on September 9, 2023.
Someone else is going to have to pick up that white flag as Neal Gamm, died at the age of 65 on November, 16, 2012 in Ipava. From his obituary, “He was a U.S. Army Veteran of the Vietnam War attaining the rank of Second Lieutenant… worked at various jobs and also was the governor of Forgottonia.”
Quoted material in this essay were taken from: “County Law and Legal Discuss New State Referendum” published in the Community News Brief on June 5, 2026 and article with an interview with Neal written by Nathan Woodside and published in the McDonough County Voice newspaper on 12/24/10.
