Memories of Life in Downers Grove

A Lifetime in Downers Grove

I remember Woolworth's 5 and 10 cent store on main street and Selig Sisters across the street with drawers filled with new hats.

On Ogden Avenue you would find Flora's fruit and vegetable stand, the Last Word Restaurant, Joch's meat market and grocery store (they delivered), and Poulin's feed store where mom bought feed for our chickens. On Fairview Avenue was the Prince Castle with ice cream cones and of course a One-In-A-Million malted milk shake.

I remember the old Village Hall and Police Station on Main street sandwiched between the cemetery on the south and St. Joseph's creek on the north. There were two WW I cannons out in front of the hall that were fired to announce the start of the parade on the 4th of July. The parade started downtown and they marched to the memorial park on Maple Avenue. There you would find a carnival and that was where the fireworks were ignited after dark.

During WW II there was a Canteen ice cream parlor on Main Street, a Memorial Honor Roll board by the railroad station listing all of the men from Downers Grove that were serving their country, and I remember working at Curren Chemical Company on south Main street (Lemont Road) where I assembled hand grenades for the war.

I remember Rite-Rite pencil company on Rogers street, mom and dad going to French's Tavern to dance, the huge train wreck at the depot in 1947, and double feature movies and dish night at the Tivoli Theatre (I still have a bown from dish night).

I remember the Downers Grove aviator, Art Chester, who lived on Gierz Street near our home. He would arrive home after a race pulling his plane behind his car, then securing it to a tree on the parkway in front of his home.

Living close to the Polish picnic grove on Fairview Avenue was great fun in the summer months when crowds would come from all over on weekends. The gates to the grove would open for the cars to enter coming down Prairie Avenue. The sound of Polish music being played by the small bands could be heard for blocks around.

Having been born and raised in the village by parents who were also born here in the late 1800s, I have many memories to share.

Grace Clevenger Schramm