Robert Douglas Horticultural Heritage

Georgia D. Clarke's slide taken in Waukegan, circa 1910, titled, "Sherwin Wright-Edge of the Wild-Aurea-Flavescens." 

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For years, I have marveled at a group of 32 glass lantern slides in the Museum's collection. They are beautiful slides of trees, landscapes and flower gardens, hand-colored in spectacular tints, and attributed to G.D. Clarke.

When I looked at the slides last week, wanting to share them as springtime inspiration in this blog, I recalled that G.D. Clarke had not been researched. There are a number of individuals in our records who need to be researched to further our understanding of their lives and items they donated, and writing this post gives me a chance to do that. So, I set to work with my research, and was surprised by an interesting discovery.

Georgia D. Clarke (1871-1952), circa 1945. Waukegan News Sun.

 

Our donor records note the donor of the slides as Mrs. Elam Lewis Clarke. Since the slides were made circa 1910, I looked in early Waukegan city directories, and found listed Elam L. Clarke (lawyer) and his wife, Georgia D, living at 740 N. Sheridan Road, Waukegan. This answered my initial question—"G.D. Clarke" was Georgia D. Clarke (1871 - 1952). Elam Clarke, by the way, was the son of Lt. Colonel Isaac Clarke (1824-1863), hero of the 96th Illinois Regiment.

Through census records, I was able to ascertain that Georgia's maiden name was Douglas. She was the granddaughter of nationally known nurseryman, Robert Douglas of Waukegan. Some of the subject matter of her slides were pine trees planted by her grandfather, Robert Douglas.

Georgia Douglas Clarke photographed these White Pines on the Dead River in Zion, IL, circa 1910 (above). The pines were planted by her grandfather, Robert Douglas, in what is today the Illinois Beach State Park. 

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English immigrant, Robert Douglas (1813-1897), started his nursery business in Waukegan in 1848. Within thirty years, Douglas became the largest grower of pines and spruces in the United States. About 1849, Douglas began the Lake County Fair as an arbor and floral exhibit at the courthouse in Waukegan. This project turned into the Lake County Agricultural Society and then into the Lake County Fair Association, which held the first county fair in 1852.

R. Douglas & Sons stationary, circa 1889. Dunn Museum 2013.18. 

Douglas bought sapling pines from Europe and planted them in the sandy soil north of Waukegan along Lake Michigan in today's Illinois State Beach Park. The land was cheap, and Douglas thought the soil would be good for growing. He planted 200,000 seedlings, white and Scotch pine, some of which were reportedly sourced from the Black Forest of Baden-Wurttemberg in Germany. Their descendants can still be seen near the lakeshore at the state park.

"Dunes of Lake County" by G.D. Clarke, circa 1910. Dunn Museum 93.32.369

In 1888, Douglas, and famous landscape architect, Jens Jensen, began preservation efforts to create a regional park in the area of today's Illinois State Beach Park. With industry encroaching from the south, sand mining devastating the dunes, and parts of the surrounding countryside succumbing to farm pasture and homes, it looked like the unique beauty and habitat of the area would be lost. In the 1910s, Douglas's granddaughter, Georgia, documented the site's beauty in her lantern slides. Legislative efforts to save the area finally began in the 1920s. 

"Prickly Pear Cactus" by G.D. Clarke, circa 1910. Photo taken in what is today the Illinois Beach State Park. 

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Douglas's extensive mail-order business brought him national recognition. In 1896, the Biltmore Estate in North Carolina (home to George Vanderbilt) purchased a large quantity of Douglas's evergreen stock.

"Peony Field" at 703 N. Sheridan Road, Waukegan, by G.D. Clarke, circa 1910. 

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The beautiful peony garden above was located down the bluff on Sheridan Road at Grand Avenue. The view is looking south with a potting shed in the background at left and a gas storage tank at right. As early as 1861, this area was designated on plat maps as "Greenhouses," and Grand Avenue did not run east of Sheridan Road until well into the 20th Century.

In the city directory, Georgia Clarke is listed as living across the street from this garden at 740 N. Sheridan Road, but her obituary states that she lived at 703 N. Sheridan Road, the address of this beautiful garden. According to her obituary, Georgia was "known throughout northern Ilinois as a garden expert... Her specialties were iris and peonies and the peony beds at the former family residence at 703 N. Sheridan Rd. were known far and wide."

Another view of the garden at 703 N. Sheridan Road, Waukegan. This G.D. Clarke slide is titled, "Hibiscus Mallow." 

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During World War I, Georgia sold flowers from her garden to benefit Victory Memorial Hospital and the Red Cross.

Special thanks to Beverly Millard at the Waukegan Historical Society for additional information on Georgia D. Clarke and Elam L. Clarke.

Let's All Go to the Fair

The Lake County Fair opened this week in its new digs on Route 137 in rural Grayslake. The move has been controversial. However, the Fair has had many homes in its' 157-year history, including Waukegan, Libertyville, Antioch, Gurnee, Wauconda, and of course, Grayslake.

The Fair got its start as the Lake County Agricultural Society in the 1840s, by local nurseryman and horticulturalist Robert Douglas, who held arbor and floral exhibits at the county courthouse in Waukegan.

In 1852, the first county fair was held at the McKay race track in Waukegan. The fair's purpose was to encourage "better farming and livestock raising by holding annual exhibitions of all sorts of farm produce: fruit, vegetables, dairy products, items of home manufacture, poultry and livestock."

This artful arrangement exemplified what the fair association promoted--beautifully grown produce. This display was made by Fremont Township farmers and Prussian immigrants, Christian and Catherine Thomas, and exhibited at the fair, circa 1880. At the center of the apples and grapes are the Thomas's portraits, who were rightfully proud of the fruit of their labor. 

Tom Thumb (1838-1883) in 1863. Encyclopædia Britannica online.

The fair also featured entertainers and horse harness races. In 1855, General Tom Thumb appeared at the Lake County Fair in Waukegan.

Horse harness racing at the Waukegan Fair, McKay's racetrack, circa 1878. Dunn Museum Collection

The McKay race track was located west of the County buidling on the north side of Washington Street. This image shows a harness race at the track, probably during the Waukegan Days Fair, circa 1880. The courthouse can be seen in the center distance.

Having the fair on the east side of the county was probably a burden for farmers and visitors. In 1854 it was moved to French's Farm in Libertyville, a more central location, but went back to Waukegan from 1855 to 1857. Farmers then convinced the county board to lease 10 acres in Libertyville for the fair's use. It was held at the Lake County Farm (Winchester House) location from 1858 to 1881.

In 1882, the fair moved to Appley Avenue (now Lake Minear) in Libertyville. This location was popular and used until 1925.

Shown at left are the Libertyville fairgrounds which included a racetrack, circa 1910.

In 1928, the fair was reborn in Antioch, where it remained through 1947. In 1948-49, it was again held in Libertyville at Memorial Field; 1950 in Gurnee; 1951-55 in Wauconda; and had its longest run in one location from 1956 to 2008 in Grayslake at Routes 45 & 120.

The Grayslake location was the former property of one of the fair's founders, John Gage (1802-1890). Gage's farm was often praised as being a "model for eastern and western farmers."

This photo shows the Fine Arts Department building at the Grayslake fairgrounds, 1968. Each year, local artists are encouraged to enter paintings and photographs to be judged for fair ribbons.

With the exception of four years, the fair has been held each year from 1852 to 2009. In 1861 and 1864 it was not held due to the Civil War. The fair board stated: "the times are too troublesome for holding of airs successfully on account of the volunteerings of so many of our labouring men for the war, and on account of the general depression all over the land, our people have no heart for such shows." And in 1926 and 1927 there was no fair, for unknown reasons.

Bud Slusser with his "team of pigs" at the Lake County Fair in 1968. Dunn Museum Collections.

There's something for everyone at the fair!

Diana Dretske ddretske@lcfpd.org 

Fair time...

It's high summer and for a lot of communities that means the beginning of fair season. The Lake County Fair is going on this week, July 22-27, and is celebrating its 156th anniversary.

The county's fair was begun by local nurseryman, Robert Douglas, who held arbor and floral exhibits at the county courthouse in Waukegan during summers in the late 1840s. His project turned into the Lake County Agricultural Society which in turn became the Lake County Fair Association. The first county fair was held in Waukegan in 1852.

And what would a fair be without a fair queen? The first modern pageant was staged by P.T. Barnum in 1854. The first bathing beauty pageant took place as part of a summer festival to promote business in Rehoboth Beach, Delaware, in 1880 with inventor, Thomas Edison, as a judge, and the prize a bridal trousseau.

The Chicago World’s Fair of 1933-34, chose Miss Lillian Anderson (see photo) of Racine, Wisconsin, and later of Libertyville, to be the fair’s queen. Anderson paraded with her court of fifty attendants into the fair on opening day. The attendants wore white and cream dresses with broad-brimmed hats of red. The Chicago Daily News described the scene: “Queen Lillian herself occupied a red throne under a feathery red canopy and smiled prettily at the reviewing stand with a perfectly executed "eyes right."