Historic Glen Ellyn house headed for demolition

A 19th-century farmhouse of historical significance in Glen Ellyn could meet the wrecking ball to make way for a new family home.

Stewards of Glen Ellyn's heritage hope to intervene in the eleventh hour and arrange a meeting with the new owners of the deep, wooded lot where the house has stood for 170 years.

"We're going to do our very best," said Lee Marks, the chairman of the village's historic preservation commission.

But the homebuilders hired by those owners have applied for a village demolition permit and could pick it up once two procedural steps are satisfied. Barring their voluntary cooperation and a last-ditch effort to save it, the white house could be torn down at 426 Hill Ave.

Members of the historic preservation commission met Thursday night to try to find a way to stave off the loss of what they say is one of the village's last few homes from the 1840s.

If they do secure a meeting with the couple, preservationists would be sure to tell the story of the home's original owner, William J. Johnson. Research provided by the Glen Ellyn Historical Society shows Johnson worked for 20 years as DuPage County's treasurer and may have been the first.

Johnson also must have been a prominent land owner, considering he purchased about $18,900 worth of property, starting in 1843, according to county records compiled by history buff and Glen Ellyn resident Elizabeth Scheet. That's a significant sum for the era, she told the preservation commission.

Johnson owned 120 acres around the site of the farmhouse, an area that extends from just west of present-day Kenilworth Avenue to just west of Park Boulevard, Scheet said.

During the meeting, historic preservation commissioners identified the new property owners as Lori and Dan Niforatos. They could not be reached for comment Thursday. Neighbors say the Glen Ellyn couple purchased the home from the family of a woman who grew up in the house and died about a year and half ago.

Before the property changed hands, Marks said he toured the home with John Schreiber, a fellow commissioner and a contractor who has restored historic buildings. Marks said the home appeared to be "structurally sound."

"There is nothing to recommend the house for demolition," Schreiber said.

Commissioners expressed frustration that village officials had not told them ahead of time the owners had applied for a demolition permit. But the home is not one of the 38 landmarked properties within Glen Ellyn.

"We need to find a way that this commission and the village can be more proactive then reactive when this kind of stuff happens," Commissioner Kelli Christiansen said.

Marks said he recently found out about the impending demolition from a neighbor and reached out to the new owners last week.

"I think this whole thing was a surprise when I called them," Marks said.

Once the contractor identifies a date for the demolition, the builders will be required to send a notice to surrounding property owners seven to 10 business days before the first of three possible consecutive dates to begin demolition, village planners say.

The contractor can get the demolition permit in hand after the notice has been sent and the village receives proof that the utilities on the site have been disconnected.

But the contractor may choose to pull at the same time both the demolition permit and a building permit that has not yet been issued.

Marks said doesn't want to put the owners "between a rock and a hard place." But he also is dismayed that Glen Ellyn could lose what he considers an important piece of its history.

"It's very sad," he said.