Weeping Woman of Seventh Avenue’s Dead End

Legends speak of a ghostly woman who wanders the railroad tracks beyond the Seventh Avenue dead end, searching for her missing children.

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Around the dinner table after a hard day’s work, the residents of Sterling, Illinois have been known to whisper about deaths along the nearby railroad tracks and banks of the Rock River. These deaths have occasionally left behind ghosts, the most famous of which is a weeping woman who wanders the tracks just beyond the Seventh Avenue dead end, searching for her missing children.

The City of Sterling was incorporated in February 1857 and is located across the Rock River from the town of Rock Falls. These twin cities are connected by the First Avenue Bridge. Sterling has long been a center of industry in the area, ever since the Union Pacific Railroad, the oldest railroad network in the United States, came through in 1856. Businesses like Northwestern Steel & Wire, Franz Manufacturing, and National Manufacturing followed at the turn of the century. Consequently, the city was once called the hardware capital of the world.

Over the years, the twin life-sources of Sterling—the railroad and the Rock River—have occasionally become a curse rather than a blessing. Some do not respect the silent power of the river and succumb to its undertow. Others, mainly children, have innocently wandered to their doom while playing on the bluffs along the river.