Walter Smith Gurnee, Sr.

Mayor of Chicago.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walter_S._Gurnee

Mary Helen Yoe’s mother Catherine Gurnee, (born August 30, 1816), was the daughter of Halstead Gurnee (born June 4, 1776 and died March 15, 1822 Rockland County, New York) and Hannah Coe, (born May 26 1784 and died May 4, 1837) Catherine’s parents were married May 27, 1801 in Kakiat (Haverstraw), Rockland County, New York. The Gurnees were of Scottish Ancestry.

Catherine had 6 brothers and sisters, one of which was Walter Smith Gurnee.

Walter S. Gurnee was a director of the “Hydraulic Company” and Walter was City Treasurer in 1843, he is 3 years older than Catherine. He married Mary M. Coe and had 7 children. Walter, as the story goes, is why there is a place called “Glencoe” in the Chicago area. A ritzy area of Chicago made immortal in the movie Risky Business. In 1873, Walter was a member of the board of directors for the Chicago, Milwaukee and St. Paul Railroad,and when the trains arrived in Gurnee, they named the train station after him. (He had also been President of the railroad in 1854).

Walter S. Gurnee

Walter was born the son of a wealthy tanner in New York in 1813. His father had made a small fortune in the business in New York and sent his son west, with financial backing in hand. He arrived in Chicago in 1836, where he started a tannery business. He also dealt in insurance and real estate, becoming one of the larger landowners in the Chicago area. He is also credited with the founding of Winnetka as well as the land he owned, which would eventually become Highland Park. Gurnee was elected the 11th mayor of Chicago in 1851 and at that time mayoral terms lasted one year, but he was elected again in 1852. Under his administration, the Board of Health was created.

In 1853, Walter bought a 12,000 acre tract from his in-laws called the “Coe Stock Farm”. He built a house known as “The Castle”. It featured landscaped grounds with rare trees and shrubs imported from England, Scotland and China as well as an orchard in which varieties of apples and pears were grown.

Walter S. Gurnee house, 750 Glencoe Dr., Style 1870 Second Empire Certified Historical House March 14, 1996

A later version of “The Castle”

The area where he built his house, is called Glencoe, and it’s said that it was named after Glencoe, Scotland, where Walter Gurnees’ family was from, and inspired by the ravines in this area of Illinois.

Glencoe, Scotland is a spectacularly beautiful place.

a stream in Glencoe

Gurnee attempted to run for mayor of Chicago again in 1860, but “Long” John Wentworth, a former mayor and U.S. Representative, defeated him in a bitter election.

Gurnee (middle) and Wentworth

Walter declared bankruptcy in 1862, went back to New York in 1863 and purchased land in Westchester County, but still maintained his business ties to Chicago. He sold his house to Dr. Alexander Hammond four years later, and it was he who actually “built the town” then, of Glencoe, Illinois.

On July 22, 1887, Walter S. Gurnee (who had been one of the original financial backers of the West Side & Yonkers Patent Ry)incorporated the New York & Long Island Railroad Co. under the New York State General Railroad Act of 1850. The certificate of incorporation (#4599) was filed in Albany eight days later. The N.Y. & L.I. proposed to build a tunnel (power unspecified) from Long Island City (then a separate municipality) to New York City (Manhattan). In 1930, his son Walter S.Gurnee Jr. and wife are listed in the New York Blue Book of Society as living at 116 E. 53, also “Rock Hill,” and Oyster Bay, Long Island.

Walter Gurnee died at age 90 April 17, 1903 and was buried at Sleepy Hollow Cemetary.

He must have had a son, a junior, because in the “NEW YORK SOCIAL BLUE BOOK—1930” in the section (Names & Addresses of Prominent Residents)”- is listed the following: “Gurnee, Mr. & Mrs. Walter S. 116 E. 53., also “Rock Hill,” Oyster Bay, L.I.”