by Barbara Benson

This is the third and final installment of the story about the evolution of the lake at Lake Barrington Shores from a muddy depression in the early 1920s, unknown on any plat maps, and its metamorphosis to become Indian Lake and now Lake Barrington.  Much of the detail was provided in 1985 to the late Andre F. Rhoads, by Charles Davlin and Leroy Miller.  They were descendants of the area’s pioneer settlers with long and good memories.  My interest in retelling this story was generated by a newspaper article from 1946, which indicated that the proposed new North Barrington School, was to be named Indian Lake School.  My primary resource has been an article that appeared in a Barrington Area Historical Society newsletter in 1985.  That article was researched and written by the late Andre F.(Dusty) Rhoads.  He and his wife Lucy were residents of LBS.

 

The previous installment ended with the lake’s development and beautification by the property owner from the mid-1920s until 1946, G.C. Criswell of the Criswell Candy Company.   Charlie Davlin stocked the lake with bass, and Leroy Miller remembered at his 1985 meeting with Dusty Rhoads, that he had spent 2 years hauling rocks from a quarry in Fox River Grove, driving a six-wheeler and dumping the rocks at low points around the lake.  Charlie Davlin would set the rocks with his bulldozer. Eventually, the entire lake was ringed with rocks to prevent the shoreline from erosion.  It was partly due to their efforts, that residents of LBS using canoes, rowboats and sailboats, were forbidden to beach them along the lakeshore, for fear of displacing the protective ring of stones.

 

In 1946, the estate was sold to Robert Bartlett.  According to Leroy Miller, Mr. Bartlett changed the name from Indian Lake to Lake Barrington, because  “there were 700 Indian Lakes in the United States and he didn’t want to be the owner of just another one.”  But, Davlin had his own ideas about the name change.  By then, the name “Barrington” had gained a lot of appeal because many wealthy Chicagoans had built estates in the Barrington countryside, and perhaps the name reflected a certain “snob appeal.” Besides the Lake Barrington property, Bartlett acquired several large tracts in Cuba Township, many of which, in the 5-acre zoning area, remained undeveloped until recent years.  But, it became time to sell the estate, and in 1972 it was purchased by the J.S. James Company, and Amoco Realty, a division of Standard Oil of Indiana.  After long review by the Lake Barrington Village Board, and some local landowners’ protests, the development of Lake Barrington Shores was approved and construction of the first units began in 1973.   The lake, and many of the old trees provided the development a “settled "ambience, and extensive, well cared for landscaping, as well as the golf course, give LBS a distinctiveness lacking in other condominium developments. And it really all began with the imagination and “tinkering” of two old-timers, Charlie Davlin and Leroy Miller, whose grandparents, in the mid-19th century, had settled the open prairie, punctuated by beautiful stands of oak trees.  But that is a story for another time, about Cuba Township’s heritage!

 

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ANNUAL TOWN MEETING

April 14, 2009

Cuba Township office

28000 W. Cuba Road

Barrington, IL  60010

7 pm

Cuba Township will hold its 159th  Annual Town Meeting

originally implemented to give citizens a uniform place and time to gather, this state mandated meeting provides an opportunity for any registered voter of the Township to speak.

 

March 1, 2009 is the deadline by which Cuba Township voters may propose agenda items to the Annual Town

Meeting.  Proposals must be written, signed by at least 15 registered township

voters and delivered to the Cuba Township Clerk, Priscilla H. Rose

 

Please join us– questions can be directed to the Township office at (847) 381-1924