Gill Park

Gill Park honors Lake View resident Joseph L. Gill (1886--1972), a Chicago Park District Commissioner, and local Democratic party leader. Gill served as 46th Ward Democratic Committeeman for more than 60 years. He was chairman of the Democratic County Central Committee from 1950 to 1953, and is said to have engineered Richard J. Daley's first nomination for mayor in 1955. Gill served the public in various capacities, including as controller of the Forest Preserve District beginning in 1919, as Illinois state representative from 1926 to 1930, and as clerk of the Municipal Court for most of the subsequent three decades. In 1960, Mayor Daley appointed Gill to the Chicago Park District Board of Commissioners. Gill was serving as park district vice president at the time of his death in 1972. Two years before, the park district had decided to establish a recreational facility on West Sheridan Road in the densely-populated Lake View neighborhood. By 1972, the site had been acquired with the help of funding from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, and plans had been developed for a multi-story fieldhouse with a swimming pool, a gymnasium, and an assembly hall. Neighbors refer to the impressive structure as the "highrise fieldhouse." The park district installed a new soft surface playground at Gill Park in 1991.