Holiday Housewalk to showcase Weller Creek area in Mount Prospect

The Mount Prospect Historical Society will present a longtime favorite — the 37th annual Holiday Housewalk — from 3:30 to 9 p.m. on Friday, Dec. 5. This year it will explore an area of town never before touched by previous house walks: the area along Weller Creek on the east side of Elmhurst Road (Route 83).

While this area of Mount Prospect features many homes built on traditional 1950s and 1960s subdivision streets, it also features an interesting tucked-away corner of homes north and south of Weller Creek, connected by a picturesque footbridge, which will be lit with white holiday lights on the night of the walk.

The William and Elizabeth Murphy ranch home, built in 1954 by Elmer Gleich, a well-known local builder at the time, is one of those. Today it is owned by Bill and Anne Barrett, the home’s third owners. They moved there in 2013 and have spent the past 12 years doing one renovation after another, most recently transforming a screened porch into a lovely family room, punctuated by an outstanding stone fireplace. It overlooks the scenic wooded area surrounding Weller Creek and one of footbridges constructed by the Weller Creek Drainage District in 1925 to let farmers access their fields on both sides of the deep creek.

Originally, the home featured three bedrooms, 1½ baths, a living/dining room separated by a strange fireplace that stuck out between the two parts of the room, a tiny family room, a kitchen, a full basement and a two-car garage.

That is what it was like when William and Elizabeth Murphy purchased it from Gleich. He had built a 20-acre subdivision he named “Ellendale,” after his wife, Ellen. Gleich did a lot of home building in Mount Prospect during the 1950s before moving on to Palatine and Inverness.

He made quite a name for himself in Palatine, calling himself in one ad: “the wizard of quality home building, the man who transforms open land into prestige addresses overnight … the genius who has given much more than any other builder in the Northwest suburban area.”

The original owners had three boys and one girl. William was a former Marine who worked night security at the First National Bank of Chicago. Elizabeth was a security supervisor at Continental Bank downtown. The couple also owned Foremost Liquors at Austin and Irving Park Road for about 10 years. Elizabeth sold the home in 2007, five years after William’s death.

“We moved here from Rolling Meadows and chose this house because of the little turnaround near the creek,” recalled Anne Barrett. “We figured that the kids would like it for safe, isolated play.”

But the house was initially less than ideal. It had been largely neglected for years and certainly hadn’t had any updates.

So, the Barretts rolled up their sleeves and got to work — doing much of it themselves. They fully combined the living room and dining room, having a contractor remove the odd fireplace, making the space much more usable. When removing the fireplace, the contractor discovered the builder had taken scores of leftover bricks from homes around the neighborhood and dumped them under this fireplace. The Barretts removed them, only saving the ones that matched their house, for any future needs. Bill also built lovely bookcases along the living room wall.

They also removed the enclosed stairs to the roomy basement and built new open stairs at a right angle to the original stairs. This allowed them to expand the kitchen and add a bar area. They also updated the kitchen cabinet fronts and changed the floor from tile to wood.

Another part of the original family room space was used to add a vanity and a walk-in closet to the newly created primary suite.

In the basement they added a fourth bedroom and bath and lots of family “fun” accoutrements like a workout space, pingpong table room, play area and television viewing area.

The Barretts also bumped out the two-car garage, allowing them space to build a powder room, built-in desk and laundry room/mud room behind the garage. They used those bricks found beneath the fireplace to face the front of the bumped-out garage.

The front of the home also got a face lift when they removed a large stone oval area and low wall in front of the front door that former owners presumably used as a mini patio. The Barretts replaced it with a covered front porch and landscaping.

Most recently, they added the vaulted ceilinged family room with stone fireplace on the other side of the garage.

“I know a contractor personally and he and I have done much of the work together, with help from my two sons,” Bill explained.

“We have really liked figuring it all out ourselves,” added Anne.

Six homes on tour

In total, the interiors of six private homes, built between 1954 and 1977, will be featured on the tour this year.

In addition to the Barretts’ home, the featured homes are: 310 E. Hiawatha Trail, owned by Brian and Devon Wojciechowski; 400 E. Berkshire Lane, owned by Tom and Stacy Dubinski; 700 S. Emerson St., owned by Jason and Lisa Royal; 1 W. Orchard Place, owned by Mark and Katie Szarmek; and 3 W. Orchard Place, owned by Keith and Amy Saddler.

All will be exciting to tour in their own ways, whether because of the lovely decorating, Mid-Century Modern touches or renovation work that has been done, according to JP Karlov, housewalk co-chairperson.

As usual, this walking tour will be accented by beautifully lit luminarias.

The tour will begin in a tent at Lonnquist Boulevard and Main Street where last-minute tickets will be sold, refreshments will be offered and watercolors of the featured houses will be displayed. Museum store items and tickets for a raffle will also be sold there. The “will call” table for tour tickets ordered online at www.mtphist.org will also be located in the tent.

Non-refundable tickets will be sold for $30 each through Dec. 4 at the Mount Prospect Village Hall, 50 S. Emerson St.; River Trails’ Weiss Center, 1500 E. Euclid Ave.; the Central Community Center, 1000 W. Central Road; Millie’s Hallmark, 1024 S. Elmhurst Road; and the Dietrich Friedrichs House museum, 101 S. Maple St.

Last-minute decision-makers may also purchase tickets on the day of the walk, beginning at 3 p.m. at the headquarters tent, but the cost will be $35 per person at that time.

Phone the Society at (847) 392-9006 for more information or log onto www.mtphist.org.