REALITY RESCUES WESTCHESTER’S GOLDEN DREAM

From the

Chicago Sunday Tribune

JANUARY 23, 1949

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REALITY RESCUES WESTCHESTER’S GOLDEN DREAM

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(Continued from page 1)

George F. Nixon, realtor and head of the syndicate which spawned the infant community as a satellite of the mighty Insull empire, emphasized the trend toward individual home ownership and easy mortgage payments as being chief reasons for the recent rapid growth.

Buy Village For 5 Million

Nixon is engaged in a five year building program in Westchester which will total 1,000 units upon completion.

Nixon’s group purchased Westchester in 1925 for five million dollars.  Planning experts were hired to lay out the community and building plans totaling more than 100 million dollars plus civic improvements to run into millions more were announced.

The proposed village lay like a piece of pie in the angle of prairie from Chicago by the Aurora & Elgin running to Wheaton and the Burlington running beyond LaGrange.

To this veld the Insull interests which had recently added the Aurora & Elgin to its empire proposed to bring an influx of city dwellers thru the means of improved transportation.

“Income Homes” Early Goal

It was announced that certain Aurora &Elgin service would be discontinued to be supplanted by “L” service.  The “L” would be brought to Westchester, first thru an extension to Roosevelt rd.

“I was taken by complete surprise,” Nixon recalled recently, “when the planning experts said that the [public wanted to buy sites for apartments instead of single family residences, ‘income homes’ they wanted, for it was unthinkable in those days to put money into something which brought so return.

“Nonetheless we set aside areas for single family residences, erected a model home in a downtown department store, and ran daily full page newspaper advertisements.  We sold 200 apartment or business sites for every single family residence lot and those we did sell barely covered the cost of the advertising.”

15,000 Saplings Planted

Well over half of the community was allocated to apartment or business use and less than 40 per cent to single family residences.  The restrictions were made binding by deed clauses which ran until 1970.

The planners went ahead and laid out the community.  Streets and sidewalks were paved, sewers and streetlights installed, and 15,000 elm saplings planted to insure that Westchester would be an oasis on the fringe of a mighty metropolis.  The “L” was extended and ran 180 trains daily between Westchester and the loop.  Two schools were erected and the community named one after Nixon.

Construction totaled 121 single family dwellings, 21 two-flats, and three three-flats.

Then – The Crash

But the remaining property owners couldn’t be bothered to build.  The returns were too small and the risks too great.  Financing was done mostly by five year first mortgages and three year second mortgages.

“Practically every one knew at least one person who had lost property under that system,” Nixon said.  “Fifteen, 20 and 25 year mortgages with payments like rent were unheard of in those days.”

Then the bubble burst.

Building halted.  So did tax special assessment, and mortgage payments.  The delinquencies ran into millions.  Then came foreclosures and Westchester began to wither.

Only the elm trees continued to grow.

The dream appeared to be a mirage.

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Last Modified:  03/25/2006