Mount Prospect's postwar mayor faced financial challenges

Maurice Beach (M.B.) "Pen" Pendleton was Mount Prospect's fourth mayor, serving two terms from 1945 to 1953 during a pivotal fiscal time for the village.

Although he entered office during the postwar boom, finances were dire. Judgements over $45,000 from special assessment bond holders, operating expenses up to six months in arrears, and $14,000 in tax anticipation warrants halted the village's growth. Bonds previously issued to purchase a fire truck defaulted, giving the village a negative credit rating.

Pendleton's administration kept a promise to "run the affairs of the village in a conservative and businesslike way." Within months, finances were redeemed without court action or burdening taxpayers. Voluntary foreclosures were initiated, returning nearly a thousand lots back to the tax rolls. A balance was achieved in the road and bridge fund. Building ordinances were strengthened. Growth followed.

With voter approval and a gift property deed from Commissioner William Busse and the fire department, a new municipal office building and garage were built, as was a library. Police and fire equipment was purchased, and two new wells were dug. The Lions Club purchased 16 acres for a Memorial Park and deeded it to the village. Railroad crossing gates were installed on Main and Emerson, at a cost split with Northwestern railroad.

Mount Prospect became a modern, progressive community.

Pendelton's contributions went beyond village politics. He published trade journals from 1929 to 1952 on Chicago's Printer's Row, and produced the Mount Prospect Review, later bought by Paddock Publications, publisher of the Daily Herald. There Pendleton met his second wife, then Hester Kline, who covered Mount Prospect. The couple lived at 411 S. I-Oka and had two sons, David and Thomas.

Pendleton was a charter member of South Church, a founding organizer for Northwest Community Hospital, co-founder of the village's first Cub and Boy Scout troops, and a Lions Club member.

In 1956, Pendleton left Mount Prospect, his home of 25 years. He died in 1991 at age 89 in McHenry, with his final resting place in Scio, New York, the site of his boyhood home.