A one-of-a-kind experience to remember Chicago Bears Hall-of-Famer, Walter Payton.

After three years in the making, the Chicago Bears are reporting today the Lake County [Illinois] Discovery Museum will open October 2nd. In it, visitors will be led through a replica of the locker room door at Soldier Field onto a simulated football field as the show begins.
As many know, Walter Payton died on 11/1/1999 from a liver disease. When he retired, he was the all-time leading rusher in NFL history, having since been replaced by good friend, Emmitt Smith.
Number 34's early childhood in Mississippi through his years as a star running back on the small campus of Jackson State to the will and determination that drove 'The Man called Sweetness' to new heights in the annals of the National Football League will be featured.
The Lake County Discovery Museum, itself, is located on Route 176, west of Fairfield Road near Wauconda, Illinois.
[Side note: as a man who was also once told he would die from liver failure, a strange thing happened to me a week after Walter Payton died. I received a knock at my front door and there was a driver for UPS. After signing for the parcel, I was mystified to see I had been shipped something from Bears headquarters at Halas Hall in Lake Forest. Inside was a Bears' football cap. Seems I had won it in a contest being advertised in the Chicago SUN-TIMES. It was the very first thing I had ever won in my life!]