Town file
Eldorado, Illinois
Eldorado, Illinois (Saline County, Illinois) is the town in one episode of Small Town Murder, the comedy true-crime podcast: episode 19, "Two Deaths, One Unexpected Murderer" (24 May 2017). El Dorado, in Saline County in southeastern Illinois, is a town of about 4,000 people in the region known as Little Egypt, roughly two hours from St. Louis.
- Town
- Eldorado
- County
- Saline County
- State
- Illinois
- Country
- USA
- Episodes
- 19
- Approximate location
- 37.812, -88.442
Episode 19 / 24 May 2017 / 61 min / full
Two Deaths, One Unexpected Murderer
"We're going to El Dorado, Illinois... it's in southeastern Illinois... It's in Saline County." about 0:04:24
The case: Murder of Mark Dale (April 1977); Murder of Sean Dale (December 1984). Read the case file.
The figures, as told in 2017
- Population
- 4,064
- Median age
- 36.4
- Median home value
- $44,400
- Two-bedroom rent
- $635
- Cost of living
- 73
- Religious
- 62%
- Property crime
- ▲ a little bit higher than average
- Violent crime
- ▼ about a third lower than average
History, in brief
- Population began to swell beyond scattered farms around 1900 and peaked at 8,000 people in 1925, the most the town has ever had. about 0:05:47
- The name is spelt Eldorado, one word, and comes from the two founders Judge Samuel Elder and Joseph Reed; it was Elder-Rido, and a railroad sign printer painted 'Eldorado' on the train depot, which everyone accepted. about 0:06:14
- The town was once little more than a maze of railroad tracks with the town centre in the middle of them; the tracks have since been replaced by bike trails. about 0:07:03
- In September 1963, five months before the Beatles' first appearance on the Ed Sullivan Show, George Harrison and his brother visited their sister in a nearby town and George performed at the VFW Hall with the local town band. about 0:07:29
- Until about the mid-1960s El Dorado was a sundown town, with an ordinance telling black people to be out of town before sundown. about 0:08:09
Nearest Small Town Murder towns
- Tiline, Kentucky45 miles
- Cynthiana, Indiana48 miles
- Paducah, Kentucky52 miles
- Madisonville, Kentucky61 miles
- Benton, Kentucky67 miles
- Cape Girardeau, Missouri70 miles
Everything here is as told in the episode, on the date it went out; figures and places may have changed since. Endings are covered: open an episode and use the spoiler switch to read them.