ELMWOOD PARK HISTORY
CENTERED IN CONTI CIRCLE

History | Postwar Years
Civic Construction | Modern Amenities

It wasn't unusual that the grand French fountain in the middle of the circle occasionally spouted bubbles.  More than 65 years later, John Litrenta, Sr. is one of those who will confess to contributing to that phenomenon as a boy.  "We used to steal soap from home and throw it in the fountain," said Litrenta, a village resident since 1922 and village Electrical Department superintendent and Public Works director for more than 30 years.  "It went down into the pipes and came up out of the fountain as foam.  The police usually stopped us -- we were stupid enough to stand there and watch it and get caught."

Amid what was once the largest single-home development ever undertaken by a single real-estate firm, the park now name Conti Circle was a haven.  The Community park in Elmwood Park's Westwood development was an open, grassy 5 acres.   Sidewalks led the way through dozens of trees surrounding a centerpiece French fountain.  In 1927, pioneer developer John Mills dedicated those 5 acres to the village to stay that way.  They did for nearly 50 years.  But Conti Circle now has become ground zero for development to provide bigger, better services for Elmwood Park residents.  Library officials want to renovate or somehow expand the public library built there in 1975.  Across the circle, the 22-year-old Civic Center is undergoing renovation and additions.  In between the library and the Civic Center, the stage is set for construction of a family aquatic center to open in early 1997.   There's irony in the wake of Conti Circle's development: Only in the past year has the landlocked village found sites to begin filling what a 1994 study called "the glaring void and excessive demand for park and recreational open space within the village of Elmwood Park."  Village President Peter Silvestri said his administration -- under which the decision was made last year to build the aquatic center -- is making the most of the hand it's been dealt.  "The library and the recreation center never should have been build there in the first place," Silvestri said, adding that he opposed the construction as a student in 1974, under then-Village President Elmer Conti.   "The old circle was beautiful, and the reality is that three village presidents before me decided to build over it."  Opinion differs on how to best use the circle as the village recreation area it was originally intended to be."   Many parents look forward to taking their children to swimming pools next to the Civic Center, where a number of recreational programs already take place.  Business leaders also like the addition: "I feel it's a necessary improvement to perpetuate the village's recreational opportunities and family atmosphere as we know it," said Al Biancalana, a longtime Elmwood Park businessman and coordinator of the village's Fourth of July and Taste of Elmwood Park festivities.  The events, traditionally held on the circle, moved to the new Central Park in 1996.  But, like any plan, the aquatic center has its opponents.  "They're going to wreck it by building a pool there," mused Edwin Emmerling, and Elmwood Park Historical Society founder and longtime archivist of local history.

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The History

The man behind Westwood and Conti Circle set up shop in 1887 in a storefront at North and Monticello avenues, in Chicago's Austin neighborhood.  The real-estate company John Mills established there was to become Illinois' biggest home-building business, largely due to a idea Mills brought back from his winter home in Beverly Hills, Calif.   In California, Mills saw a building project called Westwood.  With streets named Sunset Drive and Oak Leaf Circle, the development was laid out in a spoke-wheel pattern.  Thus inspired, in 1926, Mills bought 245 acres in northwest Elmwood Park -- once owned by River Grove's Elmwood Cemetery -- from Paul Stensland, president of Milwaukee Avenue State Bank in Chicago.  Mills & Sons' record-breaking $25 million Westwood project included more than 1,600 brick bungalows and 146 business lots surrounding a village circle.  With homes selling for about $8,900 each -- near Village Hall, a shopping district and the Chicago Milwaukee St. Paul and Pacific Railroad across the street -- Westwood took off.  That was in the heady days before the Great Depression that later shuttered Westwood State Bank.  In the center of it all was a French fountain Mills dedicated to his wife, Lottie.  Surrounding the fountain was a 5-acre community park Mills dedicated to the village's homeowners, with the stipulation it had to be used solely for recreation.

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The Postwar Years

Alan Bennett, a longtime Elmwood Park trustee, recalls moving to Elmwood Park in 1948.    "None of the apartment buildings that dot the circle were there," he said.  "It was open prairie -- I used to catch snakes there."   "The circle was an open park designed for passive recreation," said Bennett, who, like many Elmwood Parkers, spent childhood days playing baseball on the circle.  Around Westwood and the circle, Elmwood Park was changing -- and growing -- with the times.  So much so that the Elmwood Park Public Library in 1950 opened a branch at the old Elm School grounds to serve residents south of Grand Avenue.  The library, established in 1935 and operating from a storefront at 7705 Westwood Drive since 1939, was later to become a player in the makeover of Conti Circle.  In 1962, the library announced plans to enlarge and remodel its basement and front, with an addition to help nearly double its size.  In 1968, five year after the renovations, a survey by the library science department at Rosary College in River Forest showed that a third of Elmwood Park's residents used the library frequently -- and that the facility was too small.  "All the library boards had always wanted the library to be on the circle," said Gudrun "Goodie" Hommersand, a Library Board member from 1954 to 1993.    "They felt that it was a choice spot."  But, because the circle was dedicated as a park, a library there wasn't going to happen.  Yet.   Meanwhile, the village struggled to keep up the circle and its centerpiece fountain, which had become a late-night hangout for teenagers and a target for vandals.  In 1963, the Elmwood Park Women's Club had wrapped up to 2-1/2-year campaign raising more than $2,000 for restoration for the damaged fountain.   "The kids kept wrecking it," Bennett said.  "I lived across the street when we were first married, and it became a nighttime hangout for kids.  It was a hangout to drink beer."  "We continued to have problems with teenagers throwing beer cans by our apartment building," he said, adding that his family bought a house and moved away from the circle in 1971.

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Civic Construction

In 1971, more than 27,000 people called Elmwood Park home.  Parents began calling on Elmwood Park officials to provide more recreational opportunities for their children.   And President Nixon had started federal revenue-sharing programs providing per-capita grants to municipalities for capital projects -- like new civic centers and libraries.  In 1973, what had long been known as Broadway and later Elmwood Parkway was renamed Conti parkway.  Meanwhile, village officials decided to replace the green space at the circle with a much-needed recreation center.  Then-Trustee Don Storino made the trip to Arizona to visit Mills' last surviving heirs, to assure them the center would be in keeping with Mills' intent to maintain the circle for recreational use.  The family agreed to lift the restrictive covenant on the circle.  Although voters rejected a referendum to raise taxes for the Civic Center's construction, federal revenue-sharing funds were available.  Plans moved forward for the center's construction.  "After the Civic Center was (approved) in the circle, we asked to get the other end of the library," Hommersand said.  "We had to get permission from the Mills family; we felt very confident because they had always felt good about the library."  In February 1974, the Library Board accepted the village's plan for a 14,700-square-foot library on the circle.  Although state law forbade municipalities from approving library construction on park-designated land without holding a referendum, the Library in Parks Act allowed Elmwood Park as a home-rule community to waive the restriction.  Hommersand and Library Director Al Korbel said that, to their knowledge, the Elmwood Park library was the only library build in a park under that legislation.  To make way for the improvements, the fountain, long ago dedicated to Lottie Mills, had to go. The village planned to "junk it," Litrenta said. While the fountain was being dismantled, a private contractor offered to buy it. He took it borne for $50.  The Elmwood Park Civic Center opened Its doors on Dec.15, 1974; the new Elmwood Park library, on Oct. 6,1975.

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Modern Amenities

Eleven years later, Elmwood Park's population has declined. The need for recreation and library services hasn't. Of the village's 23,000-plus residents, nearly 84 percent live in family households, according to 1990 census figures. Given that 39 percent of Elmwood Parkers are between the ages of 19 and 44 the ages at which many people start families - the village's young population is expected to grow.  Already, school and village officials say, the 1990s have seen a surge in the number of young children enrolling in Elmwood Park schools and participating in village recreation programs. According to Elmwood Park School District 401, enrollment has increased at a clip of about 140 students a year in the last five years - although total enrollment falls about 1,000 students short of the district's record of 3,500 students in the 1970s.  And so, construction began on the family aquatic center at Conti Circle; two pools covering 5,000 square feet of surface area, plus green space and other amenities between the Civic Center and library.   Bennett was the Village Board's sole "no" vote on locating the aquatic center on the circle. "I was not against the concept of a pool, but the location of the pool," Bennett said, adding he feared burdening residents with "a fourth major government facility in that area."  Parking and traffic congestion are chief among Bennett's concerns.  Additional spaces will open up once the Police Department moves to its new headquarters on Fullerton Avenue. Eighty-five percent of parents who bring their kids to municipal pools drop off their kids and don't stay, according to the aquatic center's architect. And the center's plans call for a drop-off and pickup area.  "It requires a 'wait and see' attitude," Bennett said. "Parking (at the circle) does tend to become tighter on weekends and weeknights. It (the aquatic center) will probably create additional parking pressures."  Echoed Hommersand: "I don't know how that will make out for the library. But it's a done deal."  After the face of Conti Circle is irrevocably altered, the village will continue its quest for green space elsewhere.  Elmwood Park historically has lacked the recreation facilities typical to other municipalities: It has no village baseball fields, softball fields, volleyball courts, golf-course holes, picnic shelters or tables, swimming pools or hiking path.Some of that is now changed. In early 1996, the village razed a three-story house to expand Kathie Torpe Park at 76th and Fullerton avenues to nearly double the size of the one-fifth acre playlot. The site was intended for use the Elmwood Park Library until the library was built on Conti Parkway.  On the 2400 block of North 75th Avenue, the village in 1995 also bought and razed six houses for the new Central Park. Completed in June 1996, the park includes many amenities for residents to enjoy.  The park projects will help boost the village's park acreage, which compares dismally with standards established by the National Recreation and Bark Association. The association recommends 10 acres of parkland per 1,000 population; until the park expansions are complete, Elmwood Park has only 0.08 acres per 1,000 residents.  The park expansions will more than make up for the now-underutilized green space on Conti Circle that will become home to the aquatic center, Silvestri said.  "Well, T can't make use of it, even though there are a lot of younger people who can," Litrenta said, *referring to the changes in store for Conti Circle. "I think it should have remained as a park. That was a beautiful fountain. We should have put up a fight for it, but we didn't.  Echoing Litrenta, Silvestri said, "It's too late now to lament the use of the circle. Those who are complaining are complaining 20 years too late."

by Kim McCullough
--Community Guide