31st Annual Garfield Farm
Museum Awards:
One Room School House to Governor’s Mansion
Award
recipients:
- Diana
Rauner, restoration of the Governor’s Mansion in
Springfield
- The
Skyline Council, Preservation of Whitney One-Room School
Houe, Campton Township
- Fox
Mill Masters Homeowners Association, Restoration of
Granquist Farm dairy barn
- Gibbons,
historian, author, and restorer of 1839 Miller house in
Geneva
CAMPTON
HILLS, IL: On Saturday, April 13 at 8 pm following dinner,
Garfield Farm Museum (GFM) will recognize four historic
preservation endeavors at the 31st Annual Garfield Farm
Museum Awards Ceremony at the historic Dunham Woods Riding
Club in Wayne, IL.
The
2019 award winners range from an author, a home owners
association, and a young professionals’ organization to the
former First Lady of Illinois. Each effort is an excellent
example of initiative that is the hallmark quality of many
of the past award recipients. As Illinois celebrates its
200th year of statehood, preserving its heritage is a
particular focus for the 2019 awards.
Its
is common agreement that much needs to be done to get
Illinois' "house" in order but few realize the very symbol
of our state’s First Family’s Home by 2014 had fallen into
an incredible state of disrepair with holes in the roof and
flooding in the basement. The Governor’s Mansion was
built in 1855, expanded, and rehabilitated through the years
as the “People’s House”. It is one of only three
continuously occupied state governor homes in the country. A
second floor apartment serves as the state family’s private
quarters, the rest of the home provides for state functions
and is a historic house museum. Diana Rauner, as
First Lady served as chair of the Illinois Governor’s
Mansion Association from 2015-2018. She was the driving
force to raise $15 million of private funding to
re-establish the dignity of the state’s First Home. This
feat is an inspiration to all to not wait for someone else
to take up a cause and thus Mrs. Rauner is being awarded a
Garfield Farm Museum Historic Preservation Award.
Where
the next generation of historic preservationists will arise
is a concern when one of the oldest one room schoolhouses in
the state is facing deterioration. When Skyline Council
member Erica Ruggerio worked on a historic preservation
study for the village of Campton Hills, IL, she persuaded
fellow Council members to embrace it as a project. The
Skyline Council is a group of young professionals
interested in historic preservation and architecture that is
a branch of Landmarks Illinois, a nonprofit historic
preservation advocacy group. The Art Gustafson family have
been willing donate the building since the 1980s for
preservation. Thanks to the Skyline Council working with
Campton Township, this 1852 Greek Revival frame schoolhouse
is planned for a move to the township’s open space, Gray
Willows Farm. This initiative by the next generation of
preservationists inspires all who value America’s heritage
and the Council will receive a GFM Historic Preservation
Award.
The
passing of responsibility from one generation, one group to
the next is a major challenge in historic preservation
today. When Kane County was the first county in Illinois to
establish a historic preservation commission in the late
1980s, the county approved the Fox Mill development in
Campton Township provided two of the three historic
farmsteads be preserved. One, the now landmarked first
settler John Beatty farmstead, has been privately restored
by 1999 GFM award winners David and Penny Newkirk. Less
certain was the future of the Verner Granquist farmstead
buildings that make up Fox Mill’s Community Center. Credit
goes to the Fox Mill Masters Homeowners Association
that has engaged Trillium Dell Timberworks to restore this
early 20th century dairy barn, a landmark on the
neighborhood’s landscape. As barns disappear from the
American scene, here amongst 670 plus families, a reminder
of the importance of our agriculture and its heritage will
be re-enforced in young minds of today and the future. The
Association is being given a Historic Preservation Award.
It
was exceptional when a historian and author was able in a
couple of years to compile a two volume illustrated history
of Campton Township. Adam Gibbons topped himself
when he followed it up with a 490 page history of Campton’s
Wasco, Illinois at the behest of the late George Bergland,
third generation descendant of Wasco’s founders. Yet this
Geneva, IL resident and past president of Preservation
Partners, could not sit on the sidelines as one of Geneva’s
oldest homes, the 1839 Hendrick Miller house faced
demolition. A Garfield Farm Museum Historic Preservation
Award is most appropriate for his initiative and financial
effort, as he and his wife Heidi have moved the home onto a
lot for rehabilitation. For a former New Yorker to so
thoroughly adopt his new home state teaches us long term
residents to better appreciate and discover our own
backyards. Though the future of historic preservation is of
great concern, it is rewarding to find four such individuals
and groups ready to embrace what needs to be done.
The
former Oak Lawn Farm, one of the world’s largest draft horse
breeding facilities in the world in the late 1800s, survives
in part as the Dunham Woods Riding Club that consists of 40
acres, several historic barns, and the late 1830s Solomon
Dunham farmhouse converted to a clubhouse. The late
Miss Jane Dunham was a very generous supporter of Garfield
Farm. Its historic farm setting is the perfect venue for
museum’s awards evening. Following a 6 pm reception and 6:45
pm buffet dinner, the 8 pm Awards Ceremony will
start with recognition of the Class of 2018 donors to
The 1840s Society. Following the Awards, a review of the
$750,000 2018 projects at the museum will be given.
For
museum members it is $50 a person, guests $55 and to help
sponsor the evening a donation of $50 or more will include
listing in the evening’s program. To receive an invitation
by mail or e-mail please respond to info@garfieldfarm.org
or call 630 584-8485.
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