Historic Elgin House Tour offers rare chance to see inside city's oldest homes

The Historic Elgin House Tour is celebrating its 40th year of letting people peek inside some of the city's oldest homes.

This year's tour will take place Sept. 10-11 and feature six homes, of which four are on the same short street.

Matt Martin, who serves as event chair, also owns one of the four homes on Rugby Place featured on the tour.

"It's a rare thing that we get four sets of homeowners so close to decide on that," said Martin, adding that all four got together in the spring and decided to participate.

Martin and his wife purchased their house in December. He said it's a "restoration in progress."

How does it feel to know a thousand people are about to tour your home, knowing there's still plenty of work to be done?

"My wife is in a mild panic, which is understandable, but it's a productive panic," Martin said. "I do look at my house a little differently now because I'm trying to look at it through the lens of people on the tour and what they're going to think."

The event serves as a fundraiser for the Gifford Park Association, with money collected going to local preservation projects. Martin said the tour usually clears about $10,000 annually and averages about 1,200 attendees.

The homes on this year's tour are:

• 108 N. Channing St. - built in 1883 for Charles Sandberg in the Gable-Ell style with some Italianate features.

• 327 Dupage St. - built in 1871 for John Spire in the Second Empire style, the home is listed as a contributing structure to the Elgin Historic District.

• 15 Rugby Place - built circa 1890 for William Kerber in the Colonial Revival style.

• 16 Rugby Place - built in 1905 for Charles W. and Alice Mabel Glover, also in the Colonial Revival style.

• 24 Rugby Place - built in 1890 for Victor and Margaret Kasser in the Second Empire Italianate style, the home was deconverted from a five-apartment dwelling back to single-family home in 2001.

• 27 Rugby Place - built in 1890 for William Kerber, the house was designed in the Italianate style, though it appears now as Colonial Revival.

Martin said looking at a house from the outside isn't the same as walking through it.

"They all have quirks and surprises and they'll throw you for a loop here and there," he said. "That's why you want to go through them to see how they feel. Some feel way bigger than they look, and some have some just weird, funky features to them that make them really unique and memorable."

Tickets are $10-$20 and are available at historicelginhousetour.com/ and at the Elgin History Museum.