Biohazard and Pathogen Disinfection in Vienna, IL

Vienna — pronounced "vy-AN-ə" by locals — is a small city and the county seat of Johnson County in the "Little Egypt" region of far southern Illinois.

Vienna began as a Native American trading post in the early 1800s and was platted in 1818, the same year Illinois became a state.

Despite its name, Vienna was not named after the capital of Austria.

Vienna has served as the Johnson County seat for close to 200 years; its first post office opened in 1821, and the town was incorporated as a village in 1837 and then as a city in 1893.

In the 1830s, tens of thousands of Native Americans on the forced migration known as the Trail of Tears passed through Vienna on their way to Oklahoma, and a commemorative totem and flags marking the route's halfway point stand in Vienna's Trail of Tears City Park.

The Johnson County Courthouse in Vienna was built in 1868 for a little over $80,000 and is one of the oldest active courthouses in Illinois.

Both the Johnson County Courthouse and the Vienna Public Library are listed on the National Register of Historic Places.

The Vienna Correctional Center, a minimum-security state prison that opened in November 1965 with an operational capacity of 1,963 inmates, is one of the area's major institutions.

Vienna hosts the headquarters and a trailhead of the Tunnel Hill State Trail, a rail trail running from Eldorado to Karnak, and U.S. Bicycle Route 76 crosses the trail in town.

Parts of Johnson County lie within the Shawnee National Forest, and the Garden of the Gods Wilderness is a short distance east of Vienna, while the Heron Pond-Little Black Slough Nature Preserve, a National Natural Landmark, is nearby.