Mount Emblem Cemetery

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Mount Emblem Cemetery is located at the intersection of Grand Avenue and County Line Road in Elmhurst, Illinois. Despite noise from air traffic to O'Hare International and automobiles on I-294, the peaceful surroundings and carefully-planned landscaping work to help visitors enjoy the tranquility of the 160-acre cemetery. Mount Emblem is perhaps best known as the home of "The Old Dutch Mill" (incorrectly publicized as being built in 1850), a typical Dutch smock windmill that towers above the trees and can be clearly seen from I-294.

1 History
2 Design
3 Current Developments
4 External links

[edit] History

Henry Frederick Fischer began windmill construction in 1865 after acquiring the farmland from his father, Frederick L. Fischer (as an interesting side note, Henry’s brothers-in-law, William Asche and Frederick Graue, bought a sawmill further down Salt Creek that they later replaced with a grist mill, now known as the Graue Mill). The typical Dutch smock windmill was among the first of its kind to be built in Chicagoland. Fischer built the mill with parts from a prefabricated kit imported from Holland that was assembled with the help of two Dutch millwrights and local farmers, including Christian Heidemann, whose own windmill (that was in Addison, Illinois until it burned down in 1958) was based on Fischer’s design. During construction, some alterations were made to the mill’s height and design which probably caused its construction to span three years (most windmills, in spite of being assembled without machinery, typically only took a year and a half to be fully constructed). The mill began grinding in 1867.

Just ten years after opening, Fischer sold the mill and ten acres to Edward Ehlers for $10,000. Fischer moved his family to Oregon where, three years later, he sold another twenty-one acres to Ehlers. Competition from other area mills and a steady decline in wheat farming in Illinois began to hurt Ehlers’ “Addison Mills”.

The widow of Edward Ehlers, Caroline, sold the farm and the windmill to the Mount Emblem Association for $10,000 in 1925. The association planned to convert the land into a cemetery. Although the windmill and farm buildings were scheduled for demolition, the association instead hired Henry and Franklyn Ehlers, Edward’s sons, to preserve the mill as a museum. They rebuilt the sails, installed new shingles and trim on the exterior, painted the mill, and purposely dismantled some of the inner gearing to better show their use. The sails were turned to an ‘X’ formation, which traditionally means the mill is in “a long rest period”. They also turned the cap to the northeast toward the cemetery’s entrance. The barn was the only other structure that survived demolition; it is now the home and headquarters of the cemetery custodian.

[edit] Design

The administration building, along with the cemetery’s entrance gates and bridges, were designed to resemble English architecture of the 1860s, supposedly to “match” the styles used when the windmill was built; however, these copper and stone English structures only contrast with the Dutch woodwork of the mill. Since the windmill’s dedication in June 1936, it plays music on Sundays and holidays from loudspeakers in the third floor windows. It took eleven years for the architects of Simonds, West, & Blair to transform 75 acres (of what is now 160 acres) of flat farmland into a picturesque, tranquil scene with tens of thousands of new trees and shrubs as well as the creation of Lake Emblem. Over the years, the Fischer windmill became an historical local icon and the subject of artists’ paintings. In 1956 Mount Emblem was awarded for its preservation of the mill by the DuPage County Historical Society.

[edit] Current Developments

Recently, the cemetery association hired landscape architects to rebuild the deteriorating shores of the creek and Lake Emblem. New trees have also been planted throughout the land. Over the years, the windmill--with its sails turned to the Northeast--has been the victim of "tail-winding," where the wind blows against the back of the mill, causing great damage to the upper floors of the mill. New, smaller, light-weight aluminum sails have been bolted to the mill's cap, designed to allow the wind to pass through (rather than turn) the mill.