Dave's Depots -- In the Heat of the Night Edition -- Sparta, Illinois

This edition of Dave’s Depots takes us to Sparta, Illinois. Sparta is a town in Randolph County, Illinois. The depot sits along the old Gulf Mobile and Ohio line south from St. Louis. The line active through Sparta, no longer as a mainline, but as a branch to a coal power plant north of town on the Kaskaskia River. The line north of the power plant to St. Louis is abandoned, and part of the right of way was reused as a new path for Illinois Route 3.

Many of you may recognize the Sparta depot, and the entire town, as the setting for the 1967 film In the Heat of the Night. The movie starred Rod Steiger, Sidney Poitier, and Lee Grant. Sparta became “Sparta, Mississippi” for the movie, and many local buildings were used. The movie is actually a pretty good one, winning four Academy Awards that year. The Sparta depot is featured in several scenes. In the opening, Poitier disembarks the train in Sparta, to await a connection. At the end of the movie, Poitier boards the train again to leave town.

The movie also featured trains of the Missouri Pacific. Early in the movie, an escaped convict is running from the police and the requisite hound dogs, when he crosses the MoPac tracks near the Mississippi River and then attempts to flee to "Arkansas" over the river on a highway bridge. This part was filmed in nearby Chester, Illinois. You can still drive across the bridge today.

Ironically enough, in the movie, Poitier is supposed to be heading back north when he boards the train at the end of the movie. In real life, he’s heading south.

Today, the depot is in good shape, used as a local art gallery.