Historic Glen Ellyn site soon will include veterans memorial
Ron Aubrey pulled an old piece of paper from a vault in the Glen Ellyn Park District offices.
It was an agreement, signed by Roy Spalding, to sell his land across from Glenbard West High School to the park district on one condition: The site would always be used as a park.
The date was 1925.
"I'll be darned," Aubrey thought. "That's why it's still a park."
Aubrey, a former park board member and history buff who was working on an online archives of park district records at the time, decided to do some digging into Spalding and his land.
The story would take several twists and turns, but Aubrey took away one impression - the so-called Spalding Point was fading, and if he didn't do anything about it, "all the history" would be lost too.
"There's a responsibility as to what we're supposed to do with this while we still have it," he said.
Aubrey has been beautifying the park near the corner of Crescent and Park boulevards for several years, thanks in large part to an anonymous $95,000 donation. He's also resurrecting its original use as a memorial for veterans.
In a few weeks, construction should begin on what he's calling the Heroes of Freedom Memorial, a project delayed by Crescent roadwork.
Seating will be on either side of a concrete pentagon. A flag and granite marker - for every branch of the military - will stand over each of the five points of a star in the pentagon. At the center is a large rock with a plaque, installed in 1934 to recognize Civil War vets.
"We wanted to have something small, respectful," Aubrey said. "And maybe the people that will walk by just pause, reflect, thank, pray, honor these people who were here before us that sacrificed themselves for our freedom."
Spalding sounds like the good guy in this tale, the green space advocate. But after poring over records and newspapers, Aubrey discovered that neighbors blamed Spalding, a real estate developer, for a lumber yard near what is now the Metra station. Then a rumor spread that Spalding was looking to put a gas station on the property across from Glenbard West.
"You can imagine what the residents thought about that," he said.
Ten of them banded together and bought a strip of land that would foil any development (there also was talk of a hospital).
"It was literally brilliant," Aubrey said.
Spalding eventually left town and moved to neighboring Lombard, apparently "not to be heard from," Aubrey said, until he decided to sell to the park district.
"I think he finally came around," he said.
The village would go on to observe Memorial Day there. The women's club put in a "soldiers pathway" with crabapple trees. In 1968, four trees were planted for Glenbard West grads killed in Vietnam: Bruce Capel, Thomas B. Duffy Jr., Robert F. Morgan and John Scull Jr.
Aubrey put in markers for the four.
"I wanted to give them honor," he said.
Capel was a center for the Illini, roomed with teammate Dick Butkus on away games and played in the 1964 Rose Bowl, a win.
We all know what happens to Butkus.
He gets drafted by the Bears.
Capel enlists.
A second lieutenant in the Marines, Capel was killed in Vietnam May 12, 1966, only months after deploying. His Glen Ellyn family received 575 sympathy letters, Aubrey said.
"Off the field, everybody loved him, and he was very unpretentious, had a heart of gold," Aubrey said.
On the 50th anniversary of Capel's death next year, Aubrey wants to hold a special ceremony that also would formally open the new memorial at Spalding Point, now owned by Glenbard High School District 87.
And next month, he hopes to launch a website, another archives, this one preserving Capel's letters and mementos and the stories of Glen Ellyn veterans who died in conflicts as far back as the War of 1812.
About $110,000 has been raised from donors for the memorial and the improvements.
"I don't know what it is about this town, but people care, and they just don't talk about it," Aubrey said. "They do something about it. We refer to ourselves as a village of volunteers. It was like that back in the '20s, and it's true today."