Macomb is a city in and the county chair of McDonough County, Illinois, United States. It is situated in western Illinois, southwest of Galesburg. The city is just about 75 miles (121 km) southwest of Peoria and 77 miles (124 km) south of the Quad Cities. A special census held in 2014 placed the city’s population at 21,516. Macomb is the home of Western Illinois University.

First settled in 1829 upon a site tentatively named Washington, the town was officially founded in 1830 as the county chair of McDonough County and unchangeable the proclaim Macomb after General Alexander Macomb, a general in the War of 1812. War veterans were supreme land grants in the Macomb area, which was ration of the “Military Tract” set aside by Congress. In 1855 the Northern Cross Railroad, a predecessor to the Chicago, Burlington and Quincy Railroad, was build up through Macomb, leading to a rise in the town’s population. In 1899 the Western Illinois State Normal School, later Western Illinois University, was founded in Macomb. Representative Lawrence Sherman was instrumental in locating the college in Macomb. In 1903 the Macomb and Western Illinois Railway was built from Macomb to genial Industry and Littleton by local financier Charles V. Chandler, though this railroad was deserted in 1930. In 1918, construction on Illinois Route 3 was begun as a confess financed highway from Cairo to Rock Island through Macomb; in the late 1920s U.S. Route 67 was Elongated along this route to Dubuque, Iowa.

Macomb has been visited by several US Presidents beyond the years. Ulysses S. Grant, Andrew Johnson, Rutherford B. Hayes, William McKinley and Theodore Roosevelt have everything made brusque addresses in Macomb. On two occasions, Abraham Lincoln and Barack Obama addressed large audiences prior to their election as president. Obama was actually stumping for the U.S. Senate at the time, meaning a president or presidential nominee has not visited Macomb in 109 years and counting.

The WIU campus and its Hanson Field Stadium were home to the St. Louis Rams’ football summer training camp from 1996 to 2004. In 2005, the Rams settled to upset summer training to their own facilities in St. Louis, Missouri, ending the nine-year relationship.