Oak Park in Illinois

Wednesday, 28 November 2018 - 11:00 am (CET/MEZ) Berlin | Author/Destination:
Category/Kategorie: General, Architecture
Reading Time:  15 minutes

Lake Street © Dennisyerger84/cc-by-sa-4.0

Lake Street © Dennisyerger84/cc-by-sa-4.0

Oak Park is a village adjacent to the West Side of Chicago. It is the 29th largest municipality in Illinois. The village has a population of 52,000. Oak Park was settled beginning in the 1830s, with rapid growth later in the 19th century and early 20th century. It incorporated in 1902, breaking off from Cicero. Development was spurred by railroads and street cars connecting the village to jobs in Chicago. Architect Frank Lloyd Wright and his wife settled here in 1889. Population peaked at 66,015 in 1940. Smaller families led to falling population in the same number of homes and apartments. In the 1960s, Oak Park faced the challenge of racial integration, devising many strategies to integrate rather than re-segregate the village. Oak Park includes three historic districts for the historic homes: Ridgeland, Frank Lloyd Wright and Seward Gunderson, reflecting the focus on historic preservation.

Oak Park is located immediately west of the city of Chicago. The boundary between the two municipalities is Austin Boulevard on the east side of Oak Park and North Avenue/Illinois Route 64 on the village’s north side. Oak Park borders Cicero along its southern border, Roosevelt Road/Illinois Route 38, from Austin to Lombard; and Berwyn from Lombard to Harlem Avenue. Harlem/Illinois Route 43 serves as its western border, where between Roosevelt and South Boulevard, it borders Forest Park and between North Boulevard and North Avenue to the west it borders River Forest. The entire village of Oak Park lies on the shore of ancient Lake Chicago, which covered most of the city of Chicago during the last Ice Age, and was the forerunner to today’s Lake Michigan. Ridgeland Avenue in eastern Oak Park marks the shoreline of the lake, and was once an actual ridge. As with the geographical setup of the Chicago River, which connects to the present day Lake Michigan just north of the city’s Loop, the ancient Des Plaines river once emptied into glacial Lake Chicago, making prehistoric Oak Park a “Plains river Delta” system. One of North America’s four continental divides runs through Oak Park. This divide, a slight rise running north-south through the village, separates the Saint Lawrence River watershed from the Mississippi River watershed, and is marked by one plaque on Lake Street at Forest Avenue and another in the northwest corner of Taylor Park.

Oak Park has an active arts community, resulting in part from its favorable location adjacent to Chicago (seven miles west of the “Loop”). It is home to numerous theater, music, dance, and fine arts professionals. The arts district on Harrison, bounded by Austin Avenue to the east and Ridgeland Avenue to the west, features boutique galleries, shops and restaurants. Oak Park is home to several professional dance and theatre companies, including Circle Theatre, Oak Park Festival Theatre, and Momenta. Oak Park, with neighboring River Forest, also plays host to the Symphony of Oak Park and River Forest, which celebrated its 75th anniversary in 2009. Oak Park is also home to WPNA, broadcasting from the former Oak Park Arms Hotel at 1490 AM since 1951. Run by the Polish National Alliance, the station’s programming serves the diverse linguistic and cultural communities in the Chicago metropolitan area (in the late-1960s WPNA had the only “underground” disc jockey in Chicago, Scorpio). There is also the Oak Park Art League (OPAL), a nonprofit visual arts center founded after World War I (renamed in 1970), which provides classes, workshops, lectures, demonstrations, and exhibitions. Since 1921, OPAL has been providing opportunities for arts engagement and cultural enrichment. Over 4,500 artists participate in OPAL’s events each year. Oak Park has been home to numerous festivals and holiday observances. The July 4 celebration featuring fireworks draws thousands to the Oak Park-River Forest High School football stadium. A Day in Our Village, held in June, allows local groups to set up tables to seek members.

Frank Lloyd Wright spent the first 20 years of his 70-year career in Oak Park, building numerous homes in the community, including his own and Walter Gale House. He lived and worked in the area between 1889 and 1909. One can find Wright’s earliest work here, like the Winslow House in neighboring River Forest, Illinois. There are also examples of the first prairie-style houses in Oak Park. He also designed Unity Temple, a Unitarian-Universalist church, which was built between 1905 and 1908. There were several well-known architects and artists that worked in Wright’s Oak Park Studio, including Richard Bock, William Eugene Drummond, Marion Mahony Griffin, and Walter Burley Griffin. Many buildings in Oak Park were built by other Prairie School architects such as George W. Maher, John Van Bergen, and E.E. Roberts. Oak Park’s housing stock reflects the decades of its rapid growth while it was part of the town of Cicero and since 1902 when it became a village. Historic preservation has been a priority since an ordinance passed in 1972 and since revised. There are 2,400 historic sites in Oak Park, the majority of which are homes built in the Queen Anne, Prairie School and Craftsman styles of architecture. The Village of Oak Park displays these online on an interactive website. Three historic districts recognize the variety of styles often standing next door to each other. The three districts are Frank Lloyd Wright, Ridgeland-Oak Park, and Seward Gunderson, outlined on a map from the Village. A fourth district is under consideration as of 2015, of 176 homes built by Thomas Henry Hulbert. The Art Deco style main post office on Lake Street was designed by White and Weber in 1933. It is part of the Ridgeland-Oak Park Historic District.

Arthur B. Heurtley House, designed by Frank Lloyd Wright © IvoShandor/cc-by-2.5 Edward R. Hills House, designed by Frank Lloyd Wright © IvoShandor/cc-by-2.5 Francis J. Woolley House, designed by Frank Lloyd Wright © IvoShandor/cc-by-2.5 Frank W. Thomas House, designed by Frank Lloyd Wright © IvoShandor/cc-by-2.5 Lake Street © Aude/cc-by-sa-2.5 Lake Street © Dennisyerger84/cc-by-sa-4.0 Peter A. Beachy House, designed by Frank Lloyd Wright © IvoShandor/cc-by-2.5 Thomas H. Gale House, designed by Frank Lloyd Wright © IvoShandor/cc-by-2.5
<
>
Arthur B. Heurtley House, designed by Frank Lloyd Wright © IvoShandor/cc-by-2.5
In 1835, Joseph Kettlestrings, an immigrant from England, purchased 172 acres (70 ha) of land just west of Chicago for a farm and their home. Once their children were born, they moved to Chicago for the schools in 1843, and moved back again in 1855 to build a more substantial home a bit east on their quarter section of land. More farmers and settlers had entered the area. Their land was called by several names locally, including Oak Ridge. When the first post office was set up, it could not use the name Oak Ridge as another post office was using that name in Illinois, so the post office chose Oak Park, and that name became the name for the settlement as it grew, and for the town when it incorporated in 1902. By 1850, the Galena and Chicago Union Railroad (after that, the Chicago & Northwestern and now Union Pacific) was constructed as far as Elgin, Illinois, and passed through the settlement area. In the 1850s the land on which Oak Park sits was part of the new Chicago suburb, the town of Cicero. The population of the area boomed during the 1870s, with Chicago residents resettling in Cicero following the Great Chicago Fire of 1871 and the expansion of railroads and street cars to the area. “In 1872, when Oak Park received its own railroad depot on the Chicago and Northwestern Railway, its rapid emergence as a residential suburb of Chicago began. In 1877, the railroad was running thirty-nine trains daily between Oak Park and Chicago; in the subsequent year, more railroads and street car lines, with increased service, came to link Oak Park and Chicago. As Chicago grew from a regional center to a national metropolis Oak Park expanded – from 500 residents in 1872 to 1,812 in 1890, to 9,353 in 1900, to 20,911 in 1910, to 39,585 in 1920. Oak Park thus emerged as a leading Chicago suburb.” A review of Oak Park’s history by Wiss, Janny, Elstner Associates in 2006 further explains the importance of railroads and street cars in the development of Oak Park:

As suburban residential development continued in the 1880s and 1890s, streetcars and elevated trains supplemented the original main line steam railroads to connect Oak Park commuters to jobs in downtown Chicago. One of the first streetcar lines was the Chicago, Harlem, & Batavia “dummy” line, which ran approximately along the present-day route of the Eisenhower Expressway. The “dummy” trains used a miniature steam locomotive with a false cladding designed to conceal most of the moving parts and avoid startling horses. This line first began operation in 1881, but did not provide direct commuter service to downtown Chicago until June 1888. A more extensive streetcar network throughout Oak Park was opened in 1890. In the future village of Oak Park, this system ran east-west on Madison Street and Lake Street, with a north-south connection on Harlem Avenue. Streetcar service was discontinued in 1947, to be replaced by buses. The Lake Street Elevated Railroad (today’s CTA Green Line) was extended into Oak Park in 1899–1901, although the trains ran at ground level until the 1960s. The Metropolitan West Side Elevated Railroad (today’s CTA Blue Line) was extended into Oak Park in 1905, providing local service over tracks originally placed by the Chicago Aurora & Elgin electric interurban train. The “Met” line moved onto new tracks along the Congress (Eisenhower) Expressway in 1958.

The Village of Oak Park was formally established in 1902, disengaging from Cicero following a referendum. According to the local historical society, “The period 1892–1950 saw the construction of almost all of the housing stock in Oak Park, and most of the village’s current buildings.” The village population grew quickly, and “by 1930, the village had a population of 64,000, even larger than the current population”, while cherishing a reputation as the “World’s Largest Village.” Chicago grew rapidly in the 19th century, recording 4,470 residing in the 1840 Census in the place so recently a fur trading post, reaching 1,099,850 in 1890, and then 1,698,575 in 1900, passing Philadelphia to the number two spot in the US, and in that year, the fifth largest in the world. Chicago was well located on the shores of Lake Michigan for transport; after the fire of 1871, Chicago rebuilt its center and exploded with new ideas; Oak Park grew along with its neighbor to the east, having location and railroad and street car connections in its favor. After World War II, “Oak Park was affected by larger developmental trends in the Chicago Metropolitan area. The construction of the Eisenhower Expressway cut through the southern portion of the Village in the mid 1950s. Starting in the 1960s and 1970s, Oak Park has made a conscious effort to accommodate changing demographics and social pressures while maintaining the suburban character that has long made the Village a desirable residential location. Beginning in the 1960s, Oak Park faced the issue of racial integration with effective programs to maintain the character and stability of the Village, while encouraging integration on racial basis. This was perhaps the greatest challenge to Oak Park, which some judge it has met with success. Population fell from the peak level, primarily from smaller average household size, including a rise in one-person households. Oak Park has a history of alcohol prohibition. When the village was incorporated, no alcohol was allowed to be sold within its village limits. This law was relaxed in 1973, when restaurants and hotels were allowed to serve alcohol with meals, and was further loosened in 2002, when select grocery stores received governmental permission to sell packaged liquor. Now alcohol, such as beer and wine, is easily accessible.

In 1889, Frank Lloyd Wright and his wife settled in Oak Park. He built many homes and the Unity Temple, his own church, in the village, before he left in 1911 to settle in Wisconsin. Oak Park attracts architecture buffs and others to view the many Frank Lloyd Wright designed homes found in the village, alongside homes reflecting other architectural styles. The largest collection of Wright-designed residential properties in the world is in Oak Park. A distinct focus on historic preservation of important architectural styles began in the 1970s and continues, with many buildings marked as historically significant, and so far, three historic districts defined. Other attractions include Ernest Hemingway‘s birthplace home and his boyhood home, the Ernest Hemingway Museum, the three Oak Park homes of writer and Tarzan creator Edgar Rice Burroughs, Wright’s Unity Temple, Pleasant Home, and the Oak Park-River Forest Historical Society. Oak Park and River Forest High School is a comprehensive college preparatory school, with a long list of alumni who have made major or notable contributions to their fields of endeavor. Among these are Nobel Prize-winning author Ernest Hemingway, football Hall-of-Famer George Trafton, McDonald’s founder Ray Kroc, city planner Walter Burley Griffin, comedian Kathy Griffin, basketball player Iman Shumpert, and the voice of iconic cartoon character Homer Simpson, Dan Castellaneta.

Read more on VisitOakPark.com, OakPark.com, DowntownOakPark.net, Oak Park-River Forest Chamber of Commerce, Wikitravel Oak Park, Wikivoyage Oak Park and Wikipedia Oak Park (Smart Traveler App by U.S. Department of State - Weather report by weather.com - Global Passport Power Rank - Travel Risk Map - Democracy Index - GDP according to IMF, UN, and World Bank - Global Competitiveness Report - Corruption Perceptions Index - Press Freedom Index - World Justice Project - Rule of Law Index - UN Human Development Index - Global Peace Index - Travel & Tourism Competitiveness Index). Photos by Wikimedia Commons. If you have a suggestion, critique, review or comment to this blog entry, we are looking forward to receive your e-mail at comment@wingsch.net. Please name the headline of the blog post to which your e-mail refers to in the subject line.








Recommended posts:

Share this post: (Please note data protection regulations before using buttons)

Portrait: The Astor family

Portrait: The Astor family

[caption id="attachment_162391" align="aligncenter" width="485"] John Jacob Astor by Gilbert Stuart[/caption][responsivevoice_button voice="UK English Female" buttontext="Listen to this Post"]The Astor family is a family known for its prominence in business, society, and politics in the United States and the United Kingdom during the 19th and 20th centuries. The Astor family is of German origin, appearing in North America during the eighteenth century with John Jacob Astor. John Jacob Astor (born Johann Jakob Astor) was the youngest of four sons born to butcher Johann Jacob Astor and M...

[ read more ]

Aberystwyth in Wales

Aberystwyth in Wales

[caption id="attachment_153093" align="aligncenter" width="590"] National Library of Wales © Rhyshuw1/cc-by-sa-3.0[/caption][responsivevoice_button voice="UK English Female" buttontext="Listen to this Post"]Aberystwyth (English: Mouth of the Ystwyth) is a historic market town, administrative centre and holiday resort within Ceredigion, Wales. Often colloquially known as Aber, it is located near the confluence of the rivers Ystwyth and Rheidol. Since the late 19th century, Aberystwyth has also been a major Welsh educational centre, with the establishment of a university college there in 1872. ...

[ read more ]

BIQ, the world's first building with a bioreactor façade

BIQ, the world's first building with a bioreactor façade

[caption id="attachment_153736" align="aligncenter" width="590"] © iba-hamburg.de / Splitterwerk, Graz[/caption][responsivevoice_button voice="UK English Female" buttontext="Listen to this Post"]Natural, efficient and unique: the BIQ is setting new standards as the first building in the world to have a bioreactor façade. Microalgae are cultivated in the glass elements that make up its “bio skin”. These are used to produce energy, and can also control light and provide shade. Inside, an innovative living concept is aimed at ensuring maximum design versatility for everyday life, and gives ...

[ read more ]

The Mall of the Emirates

The Mall of the Emirates

[caption id="attachment_161431" align="aligncenter" width="590"] © flickr.com - Peter Gronemann/cc-by-2.0[/caption][responsivevoice_button voice="UK English Female" buttontext="Listen to this Post"]Mall of the Emirates is a shopping mall in Dubai. Developed and owned by Majid al-Futtaim Properties, it opened in November 2005 and is located at interchange four on Sheikh Zayed road. The multi-level shopping mall currently features more than 630 retail outlets, 7900 parking spaces, over 100 restaurants & Cafes, 80 luxury stores and 250 flagship stores. It has a total gross leasable area of 255,4...

[ read more ]

The Hermitage Museum in Saint Petersburg

The Hermitage Museum in Saint Petersburg

[caption id="attachment_25947" align="aligncenter" width="590"] Winter Palace at night © Robert Breuer/cc-by-sa-3.0[/caption][responsivevoice_button voice="UK English Female" buttontext="Listen to this Post"]The State Hermitage is a museum of art and culture in Saint Petersburg. One of the largest and oldest museums in the world, it was founded in 1764 by Catherine the Great and has been open to the public since 1852. Its collections, of which only a small part is on permanent display, comprise over three million items, including the largest collection of paintings in the world. Beside the Lo...

[ read more ]

Aït-Benhaddou in Morocco

Aït-Benhaddou in Morocco

[caption id="attachment_227288" align="aligncenter" width="590"] © ER Bauer/cc-by-2.5[/caption][responsivevoice_button voice="UK English Female" buttontext="Listen to this Post"]Aït Benhaddou is a historic ighrem or ksar (fortified village) along the former caravan route between the Sahara and Marrakesh in Morocco. It is considered a great example of Moroccan earthen clay architecture and has been a UNESCO World Heritage Site since 1987. The site of the ksar has been fortified since the 11th century during the Almoravid period. None of the current buildings are believed to date from ...

[ read more ]

São Miguel Island, the largest island of the Azores

São Miguel Island, the largest island of the Azores

[caption id="attachment_216565" align="aligncenter" width="590"] Fonte de Buraco Belvedere overlooking the village of Maia © José Luís Ávila Silveira/Pedro Noronha e Costa[/caption][responsivevoice_button voice="UK English Female" buttontext="Listen to this Post"]São Miguel Island, nicknamed "The Green Island" (Ilha Verde), is the largest and most populous island in the Portuguese archipelago of the Azores. The island covers 760 km² (290 sq mi) and has around 140,000 inhabitants, with 45,000 people residing in Ponta Delgada, the archipelago's largest city. The ancient laurisilva forest h...

[ read more ]

Belleville in Paris

Belleville in Paris

[caption id="attachment_185590" align="aligncenter" width="590"] Street art by Ben Vautier in Belleville © Cadaverexquisito/cc-by-sa-3.0[/caption][responsivevoice_button voice="UK English Female" buttontext="Listen to this Post"]Belleville is a neighbourhood of Paris, parts of which lie in four different arrondissements. The major portion of Belleville straddles the borderline between the 20th arrondissement and the 19th along its main street, the Rue de Belleville. The remainder lies in the 10th and 11th arrondissements. It was once the independent commune (municipality) of Belleville which ...

[ read more ]

Portrait: Friedrich von Schiller, poet, philosopher, physician, historian, and playwright

Portrait: Friedrich von Schiller, poet, philosopher, physician, historian, and playwright

[caption id="attachment_219212" align="aligncenter" width="432"] Friedrich Schiller by Ludovike Simanowiz (1793 or 1794)[/caption][responsivevoice_button voice="UK English Female" buttontext="Listen to this Post"]Johann Christoph Friedrich (von) Schiller was a German poet, philosopher, physician, historian, and playwright. During the last seventeen years of his life (1788–1805), Schiller developed a productive, if complicated, friendship with the already famous and influential Johann Wolfgang von Goethe. They frequently discussed issues concerning aesthetics, and Schiller encouraged Goethe t...

[ read more ]

The World Trade Organization (WTO)

The World Trade Organization (WTO)

[caption id="attachment_169437" align="aligncenter" width="590"] © Imalipusram[/caption][responsivevoice_button voice="UK English Female" buttontext="Listen to this Post"]The World Trade Organization (WTO) is an intergovernmental organization that regulates international trade. The WTO officially commenced on 1 January 1995 under the Marrakesh Agreement, signed by 123 nations on 15 April 1994, replacing the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT), which commenced in 1948. It is the largest international economic organization in the world. The WTO deals with regulation of trade in goods,...

[ read more ]

Return to TopReturn to Top
Cap-aux-Meules Island - L'Étang-du-Nord Lighthouse © Renaudp10/cc-by-sa-3.0
Magdalen Islands in Quebec

The Magdalen Islands are a small archipelago in the Gulf of Saint Lawrence with a land area of 205.53 square...

Nurly Tau business center in Almaty from the City Hall Park © flickr.com - Alexandru Panoiu/cc-by-2.0
Theme Week Kazakhstan – Almaty

Almaty ("City of Apples/Apple Trees"), formerly known as Alma-Ata and Verny, is the largest city in Kazakhstan, with a population...

Baikonur Cosmodrome Museum © flickr.com - Ninara/cc-by-2.0
Theme Week Kazakhstan – Baikonur

Baikonur, formerly known as Leninsk (see Tyuratam), is a city of republic significance on the Northern bank of the Syr...

Schließen