Tag Archives: Academy Hall

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Education a Focus from Winnetka’s Founding: School Financing Needs Led to Village Charter

By Helen Weaver Appeared in the Gazette: Fall/Winter 2018-2019 Winnetka has long been associated with education: as the home of nationally renowned New Trier High School, and the incubator of the Winnetka Plan, progressive educator Carleton Washburne’s experiment in individualized ungraded learning. Less well known is the fact that Winnetka’s founding as an incorporated village […]

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A History of the Winnetka Fire Department

By Helen Weaver, Fall/Winter 2014  Updated 2022 When Winnetka was first incorporated as a village in 1869, fire was a fearsome threat. Early Winnetkans fought fires by joining with their neighbors in bucket brigades, dousing fires with barrels of lake water carried by horse and wagon, or buckets of water drawn from nearby wells and […]

“A” is for Academy Hall

Gazette Article by Trish Early, Summer 1995 In the late 1860s a group of Winnetkans met to discuss the interests of higher education in the community. As a result Academy Hall and an accompanying dormitory were built in 1870. Initially the University of Chicago agreed to lease and maintain the buildings and provide a non-sectarian school […]