This commemorative issue of The Preservation Foundation Newsletter is designed to provide a useful reference for Lake Foresters interested in learning more about historic areas of the City and in supporting efforts to preserve Lake Forest’s visual character.
“Celebrate Historic Places – Our Past for Our Future.” By making a commitment to restore these buildings, their owners are helping to preserve some of the physical treasures that represent our legacy for the future.
The Station Renovation project is nearly complete, and by Thanksgiving the Lake Forest North Western Station should be a shining tribute to the kind of results that can be achieved when citizens, businesses, and government work together toward a worthwhile civic goal.
One hundred and twenty-five years ago, a Chicago business man, D. R. Holt, built an Italianate home on a high spot in a dense woodland that was to become Lake Forest.
The development of Mayflower Park was made possible by the granting of a special use permit by the City, applicable to residential development of educational institution buildings and exempting it from the City’s Historic Preservation Ordinance.
It has been brought to the attention of our Board of Directors that North Hall, Smith Hall and the Chapel of Mayflower Park (formerly Ferry Hall Academy) are being allowed to seriously deteriorate.
As President of the Lake Forest Foundation for Historic Preservation, I have often wondered whether my personal views concerning preservation coincide with the views of the community at large.
Thanks to the contributions of individuals, community groups, and businesses, work by concerned individuals and station tenants, and the continuing support and cooperation of the City of Lake Forest, the following major portions of the Station Renovation have been completed (or pledged) in the past year.
Many of the Foundation’s activities this year were focused on Jhe renovation of the North Western Station.
“The historic preservation movement has scored a major victory with the passage of new tax incentives for the rehabilitation of historic buildings,” according to Michael L. Ainslie, president of the National Trust for Historic Preservation.