Suburbs that are obscure or little-known (Chicago, Waukegan: food, housing, rating)

[Chicagoland60426]

Originally Posted by fusillirob1983

I think a lot of the towns named in the last 24-48 hours are extremely well known by anyone in the SW burbs.

I'd say an obscure suburb in the region is Orland Hills. A village barely one square mile smacked in the middle of the two regional giant commercial hubs (Tinley and Orland), so you might not recognize it driving through 159th St. Plus, it partially shares the same name as Orland Park. It's like a suburb of a suburb.

[pvande55]

Originally Posted by Chicagoland60426

I'd say an obscure suburb in the region is Orland Hills. A village barely one square mile smacked in the middle of the two regional giant commercial hubs (Tinley and Orland), so you might not recognize it driving through 159th St. Plus, it partially shares the same name as Orland Park. It's like a suburb of a suburb.

It was originally incorporated as Westhaven. It changed its name by referendum for better recognition.

[Chicagoland60426]

Originally Posted by pvande55

It was originally incorporated as Westhaven. It changed its name by referendum for better recognition.

I just looked up Orland Hills'(Westhaven) history and it shows that the name change happened in 1986- 25 years old around that time. In contrast, Orland Park was incorporated in 1892; however, it didn't really begin to take off until the 1950s or 1960s. Same for Tinley Park, to an lesser degree. I suppose this prompted Westhaven to change to Orland Hills.

And go figure, they are even aware of their obscurity. Their motto is "The Best Kept Secret In The Southwest", according to the village's website.

[fusillirob1983]

Yeah, I would imagine Orland Hills is lesser known to many outside the SW burbs. It's probably an ideal place to live if you work somewhere in the south suburbs or accessible by I-355, and want your kids in a pretty good school district, and maybe a small discount from Orland Park or Tinley Park home prices.

[Pseudonym18123]

Spring Grove...a nice with McMansions that I have never even heard of. Apparently, it goes to Richmond-Burton HS(never heard of those places either). Funny how so many nice places in Chicagoland go under the radar because of their distance from the city.

[Curly Q. Bobalink]

Originally Posted by ToriaT

Lyons. I don't think many people know about it. Its south of Riverside, IL

Ahhhh, Lyons, IL. Home to the famous "Michael's Magic Touch" of my mis-spent youth. Lots of "Rub" joints used to be present on Ogden Avenue, much (ahem, "alleged") mob activity purported to be there, similar to another suburb south of O'Hare (Stone Park?) My favorite (Lyons?) dive bar used to be "Bobby and Clyde's", further west on Ogden, along with the frequently-visited Otto Brothers Honda / Suzuki - the Ottos were Good Guys. Wasn't the "leaning tower" landmark located there or near there?

[MillennialUrbanist]

Originally Posted by Curly Q. Bobalink

Ahhhh, Lyons, IL. Home to the famous "Michael's Magic Touch" of my mis-spent youth. Lots of "Rub" joints used to be present on Ogden Avenue, much (ahem, "alleged") mob activity purported to be there, similar to another suburb south of O'Hare (Stone Park?) My favorite (Lyons?) dive bar used to be "Bobby and Clyde's", further west on Ogden, along with the frequently-visited Otto Brothers Honda / Suzuki - the Ottos were Good Guys. Wasn't the "leaning tower" landmark located there or near there?

I'm not familiar with these facts; I basically know Lyons as Riverside's red-headed stepchild, like North Riverside. In other words, a rough around the edges, modern-looking, working-class suburb that follows the Chicago street grid. Which is a contrast to Riverside being upscale, quaint, and wholesome, and specifically refusing to follow the grid. (Long before lack of a standard grid became the norm in suburbia and even some new subdivisions in the city proper.)

[Curly Q. Bobalink]

Originally Posted by guidoLaMoto

Lisle-- you drive thru it on the way from Downers to Naperville. Its Four Lakes complex was the VD capital of the world in the 70s
Burbank- just south of Midway AP and Clearing District
Bridgeview- 2nd largest ArabAmerican pop in US
Summit- frequent haunt of Babe Ruth when the Yankees were in town; Not much else has happened there since then; usually hyphenated with Argo, which is basically the Corn Products Research Institute & the Argo CornStarch plant
Willow Springs IL, aka SpeedTrap IL or to locals, "The Town That Time Forgot"; home to The Grove, voted annually as the best biker bar in Chicago; patrons still smoke at the bar; even the cops are afraid to go there. I remember the first time I went there. I thought I had stepped onto a pirate ship. Also home to Resurrection Mary, world famous ghost.
And how about Highwood, tucked in between Highland Pk & Lake Forest, once called "The Toughest Town in the US" by Calvin Coolidge. When Fort Sheridan was open, the town consisted of one small grocery store, one gas station, one church (St James) and about 50 saloons (real easy to sell charity drawing tickets as a kid).

I've got some experience with Willow Springs, had an uncle who was a cop there back in the 50's or 60's. They used to go shoot rats for target practice at the town landfill. He told me once that a cow had gotten loose from a truck in the winter, and he and another deputy tracked it onto the ice on the Des Plaines or I&M, where naturally, they shot and butchered it for the meat. They kicked snow over the area (it was night), but when they went past it the next morning, it supposedly "looked like an Indian massacre", LOL. He said that in the 40's and 50's, the cops patrolled the residential area, and "the mob" took care of the bars along Archer Avenue. Supposedly, one of them had a live, adult bear chained up adjacent to the parking lot, like a "pet" - I never found anyone who could substantiate that.

On the north side of the river, in the unincorporated area between the river and what is now the north half of Willow Springs, was Santa Fe Raceway and picnic area. It was a big destination back all the way to the 1930's, I believe, I used to pit for guys who did hobby-stock car racing on the 1/2 mile clay track. It closed back in the early 90's, I believe, I was really sorry to see it go. They must have had to dig down four feet before they ran out of oil and gas in that soil (where they built some expensive houses and townhomes). Interestingly, I have an old Chicago Tribune "Chicagoland" map from the 1970's, I think, that has the area around Santa Fe Raceway listed as "Tiedtville". I worked with one of the Tiedt family back in the 80's, and relatives of his were the owners of the raceway, that's apparently how the place got its name. I doubt it was ever incorporated, though, so it wouldn't qualify for this list.

Something else many folks may not know about Willow Springs, is that after the first atomic pile was tested under the University of Chicago stadium stands, they moved it out just west of Willow Springs, into which is now the "Red Gate" forest preserve, it was the original site of Argonne Labs before it was moved into its current location south of Darien. The Gub'mint simply buried most of the building footprints, and even the carbon pile, I think (Site A), along with another site where animal carcasses and protective gear was buried (Plot M). When radioactive isotopes were found in the groundwater out there in the 1980's (research the group "Broken Arrow, Willow Springs), they had a large company (Halliburton, I think) remediate the area. I remember walking down the same paths out there in the 70's, that the WWII physicists (maybe even Fermi or Teller, who knows) may have walked once, a lot of artifacts (roads, foundations, chain link fencing, etc.) were still there at the time. I'm still waiting to wake up one morning with a third eye in the middle of my forehead.

Spent a lot of time in the 70's at "Fox and Hounds", "Rich Kids" (originally the "Upstairs Lounge", I think), and "Saints and Sinners". Drove the Old Man home one afternoon (too many suds) when I was about fourteen or fifteen from a bar on Archer. Another time I was driving behind a friend as he rolled a hopped-up 1972 Torino just west of town in the woods one night, there's two or three turns out there that sneak up on you real quick when you're pizzed up and WFO. He and the other guys in the car lived, but the car didn't. I went past there some months ago, and there must have been three of those "roadside memorials", which typically mean someone died at a crash site, at or near the same place. Guess that kids are still out there testing the limits.

[Curly Q. Bobalink]

Originally Posted by MillennialUrbanist

I'm not familiar with these facts; I basically know Lyons as Riverside's red-headed stepchild, like North Riverside. In other words, a rough around the edges, modern-looking, working-class suburb that follows the Chicago street grid. Which is a contrast to Riverside being upscale, quaint, and wholesome, and specifically refusing to follow the grid. (Long before lack of a standard grid became the norm in suburbia and even some new subdivisions in the city proper.)

Lyons' reputation for numerous topless bars (and prostitution, let's not split hairs) was well known when I was growing up. The town cleaned up its image starting about thirty years ago by closing many (most?) of the places I accidentally walked into as an impressionable young man. But like Cicero, Stone Park, and others, it still has a reputation for being in tune with "The Chicago Way", LOL:
https://chicago.suntimes.com/columni...t-lyons-cicero

[MillennialUrbanist]

Originally Posted by Curly Q. Bobalink

The town cleaned up its image starting about thirty years ago by closing many (most?) of the places I accidentally walked into as an impressionable young man. But like Cicero, Stone Park, and others, it still has a reputation for being in tune with "The Chicago Way", LOL:

Funny that you mentioned Stone Park. I used to go to this nightclub there, called Energy Thursdays. It was one of the few under-21 nightclubs I knew of. It was OK for its time. The club itself was relatively safe inside, because it attracted college kids from safer, cleaner suburbs far and wide, thanks to the publicity from B96 Radio. Even so, no one dared to walk anywhere past the parking lot. Today, no traces of the club remain, although the building still stands. I'm not sure if another business opened there, or if it's just a boarded-up warehouse now.

The most famous under-21 club was Zero Gravity in Naperville. It was THE mecca of clubbing for college kids and teeny-boppers all over the Chicago area. It closed in 2015; a nursing home stands on its former site. How ironic!