Daily Herald opinion: Saving DuPage's Mayslake Hall preserves important piece of suburban past
This editorial is the consensus opinon of the Daily Herald Editorial Board
Nearly 30 years after acquiring the Mayslake Forest Preserve, the DuPage County Forest Preserve District is finally doing a major exterior renovation of the mansion on the Oak Brook property.
One of DuPage's unique outdoor recreational sites, the 89-acre preserve has lakes and ponds, a prairie, a marsh, and woodlands. There's also a chapel and the historic Mayslake Hall.
Mayslake Hall is a Tudor Revival-style mansion with fine architecture, spacious rooms and beautiful views. The former home to coal baron Francis Stuyvesant Peabody has great potential but needs repairs.
Forest preserve President Daniel Hebreard says structural problems have been contributing to water damage and other threats to the home, which Peabody built between 1919 and 1921.
"If we didn't put money into it now, you either end up having to tear it down, or you're going to have a significant loss," Hebreard said.
Repairing the building's outer shell is the right decision. But there was a time when some questioned whether such an investment was worth it.
DuPage voters agreed in 1992 to a $17.5 million tax increase to purchase the Mayslake property. The forest preserve district acquired the land in 1993 and prevented the loss of valuable open space.
Still, previous forest preserve commissioners were reluctant to put tax dollars into the mansion. So while private donations and grants helped pay for restoration projects through the years, none were on the scale of what the district is doing now.
The current project will include brick and limestone masonry restoration. Rotting exterior woodwork and stucco also will be selectively demolished and replaced with new materials.
Some of the renovations will address changes made by the Franciscan Province of the Sacred Heart, which owned Mayslake from 1926 to 1993. Aluminum window frames, for example, will be replaced with more historically accurate materials.
The district received a $750,000 museum capital grant from the Illinois Department of Natural Resources to help pay for the work. But most of the project's roughly $6.4 million price tag comes from a recent bond issue. The forest preserve has the bonding authority to issue debt without voter approval. Officials say the district didn't need to raise property taxes to borrow the money.
Preserving historic locations in the suburbs is a worthwhile goal. The sites and buildings give us a glimpse into the lives of those who came before us - and that helps us understand who we are now and where we're going.
Mayslake Hall has served as a venue for architectural tours, lectures and artistic performances. The district is already planning new exhibits and programs for the mansion's reopening in 2023.
We commend the current forest preserve board for supporting Mayslake Hall and committing resources to ensure it will be here to educate future generations.