Edgebrook Park

As automobiles became increasingly affordable to Chicago's middle-class residents in the late 1920s, the northwest side's Forest Glen quickly developed as a commuter neighborhood. In 1939, the Board of Education built the new Edgebrook Elementary School to meet the educational needs of the booming community. Thirty years later, the Chicago Park District began leasing property surrounding the school. For more than a decade, the park district and the Board of Education jointly operated the school and adjacent ball fields and playground. The park district withdrew from the site in 1983. Only seven years later, however, joint operations were reinstituted after community residents approached the park district about developing school-based recreational programming for children, teenagers, and adults. The following year, the Board of Education transferred a five-acre section of the school property to the park district but retained additional acreage for possible future library construction.