SPRINGFIELD, Ill. (AP) — Paul Powell, the southern Illinois political powerhouse who died and left behind $800,000 in cash in the notorious “Shoebox Scandal,” used to say, “The only thing worse than a defeated politician is a broke one.”
For more than half a century, a Powell-established $250,000 trust sustained his legacy, for better or worse. But the account that maintained his birthplace as a museum will soon run dry. The fate of the home in Vienna, a town of 1,300 about 140 miles (230 kilometers) southeast of St. Louis, is uncertain, but it likely will be sold.
