Fogelberg's '˜old lover' recalls youthful romance in Peoria

PEORIA, Ill. (AP) – To Jill Greulich, it seems almost unimaginable that Dan Fogelberg would have turned 70 earlier this year. She thinks back to their youthful romance, wistfully memorialized in song years later, thanks to a chance encounter at a Peoria quick mart on Christmas Eve. During and after their days at Woodruff High School, she was a hand-holding eyewitness as Fogelberg would plop down along the Illinois River to strum his guitar and muse big dreams. Steeped in those recollections, she can hardly envision a septuagenarian Fogelberg. Indeed, amid a long career as a respected artist, Fogelberg – who died at age 56 in December 2007 – always carried a certain boyish charm. Even as the decades and albums rolled by, many of his followers (especially in his hometown of Peoria) continued to harbor a mind’s-eye view of him as a long-haired, wide-eyed young man looking to strike it big. ‘œI certainly remember him much younger,’� Greulich told the Journal Star. Many fans feel the same way, perhaps a result of his strong sense of privacy. He kept interviews to a minimum, focusing only on his music. Record buyers could listen and witness him grow as an artist. But as far as his personal life, he never shared – or, thus, changed – much publicly. ‘œI really don’t find myself that fascinating, to be honest with you,’� he said in a 1985 radio interview. ‘�… It just isn’t that fascinating to tell people who I am. I think I’ve done that musically, to a point. And also it’s obvious I want to preserve my privacy.’� So, when he would visit kin in Peoria, he would keep a low profile. ‘œI’m deeply honored that the people in Peoria are excited that we’re coming in to play,’� he told this paper in 1995. ‘œI just don’t want everyone making too big of a deal of this. Just come to the show and listen to what I can do. That’s what it’s really about.’� In that way, as far as a public persona, he always stayed the same, almost stuck (or at least, slowed) in time. Locally, that phenomenon was reinforced by the nostalgia underpinning two of his biggest hits, ‘œSame Old Lang Syne’� and ‘œLeader of the Band.’� Those songs, both of which hit No. 9 on the Billboard Hot 100 Chart, are deeply steeped in Peoria inspiration. Outsiders and non-fans wouldn’t have any clues as to the characters and settings of those songs. But Peoria knows ‘” and savors ‘” those connections, especially ‘œSame Old Lang Syne,’� each December. Jill Greulich understands the power of the past. During her Woodruff days, she was Jill Anderson, courted by a teen Fogelberg already scribbling his fledgling song lyrics. After their 1969 graduation, they went their separate ways to college ‘” he to study art and theater at the University of Illinois in Urbana, she to Western Illinois University to major in elementary education ‘” but continued an on-again, off-again relationship. Greulich recalls that they often would grab a spot along Grandview Drive, just her and Fogelberg and his guitar, and watch the Illinois River roll by. ‘œWe spent so much time there, Dan playing or just talking,’� she says. ‘œWe could talk for hours.’� Over time, he’d share snippets of melodies and lyrics, many of which ended up on his 1972 debut album, ‘œHome Free.’� One song seemingly leaped from their visits to Grandview Drive: ‘œThe River,’� which starts, ‘œI was born by a river, rolling past a town. …’� ‘œHe was so proud of this,’� Greulich says. They’d seek out other nature scenes, often jumping into a car and wandering out of town. ‘œ(We’d go) driving back-country roads and loving the new visions we learned,’� Greulich says.