Crime Scene and Trauma Cleanup in Momence, IL

Momence is a small city in Kankakee County in northeastern Illinois, set on the banks of the Kankakee River about 50 miles south of Chicago.

The town grew at a shallow limestone ford in the river known as the Lower Crossing, a longtime Potawatomi crossing point on the Hubbard Trail between Vincennes and Chicago.

Momence is generally believed to be named for Isadore Moness, a man of French and Potawatomi descent associated with the area in the early 1800s.

The town was first platted by Dr. Hiram Todd in 1846.

The 2020 census counted 3,117 people and 1,182 households in Momence, which is part of the Kankakee-Bradley metropolitan area.

In July 1893, a crew funded by the neighboring state of Indiana cut a shallow channel through the limestone ledge just east of Momence, beginning the drainage of the Grand Kankakee Marsh, then the nation's largest inland wetland.

In the 1890s Momence celebrated its hay trade with a Hay Palace, a festival building constructed out of baled hay.

The sandy soil around Momence proved ideal for growing gladiolus flowers, and the city has celebrated with an annual Gladiolus Festival since 1938.

The 1938 festival program boasted that eastern Kankakee County was the largest gladiolus field center in the world.

Momence's 30-acre Island Park sits in the Kankakee River on Mill Street and is maintained by the Momence Park District.