Biohazard Cleanup Near Brookside Subdivision Pontiac, IL

Pontiac is a city in central Illinois and the county seat of Livingston County, with a population of 11,150 at the 2020 census.

Pontiac was established on July 27, 1837, by Henry Weed and brothers Lucius and Seth M. Young specifically to serve as the seat of the newly formed Livingston County.

The city is named for Chief Pontiac, the Ottawa leader famous for Pontiac's Rebellion in the 1760s.

Census Bureau figures count about 4,457 households in Pontiac, averaging roughly 2.15 people per household — a figure lowered by the large institutional population at its prison.

Pontiac boomed with two transportation landmarks: the Chicago and Alton Railroad in 1854 and the arrival of Route 66 in 1926.

Downtown Pontiac is anchored by the Livingston County Courthouse, completed in 1875 and listed on the National Register of Historic Places — its architect, J.C. Cochrane, also designed the Iowa State Capitol.

Pontiac is one of the premier stops on Illinois' Route 66 corridor and hosts the Route 66 Association of Illinois Hall of Fame and Museum inside its old city fire station.

Artist Bob Waldmire's Volkswagen van — the real-life inspiration for Fillmore in the Pixar film Cars — is on display at Pontiac's Route 66 museum.

Pontiac packs in museums for a city its size: the Pontiac-Oakland Automobile Museum, the Livingston County War Museum, the Museum of the Gilding Arts — the only gilding museum in the United States — and the International Walldog Mural and Sign Art Museum.

More than 20 large murals, many painted when the Walldogs gathered in Pontiac in 2009, decorate downtown buildings with scenes from the city's history.