Editing Barrington Hills, Illinois (section)

==History==

===Barrington Center Church===
[[Image:BCenterChurch.JPG|thumb|left|Barrington Center Church]]
Barrington Center Church was built in 1853 by the [[Barrington United Methodist Church|Barrington Methodist Episcopal Society]].<ref>[http://www.barringtonumc.com/about/history.html History of the Barrington United Methodist Church] {{webarchive |url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070928084506/http://www.barringtonumc.com/about/history.html |date=September 28, 2007 }} accessed March 30, 2007</ref>  A memorial plaque outside the church lists 91 area residents - one woman and 90 men - who served in the Civil War.<ref name="bal1">{{cite web |url=http://www.barringtonarealibrary.org/local/barrington_area_cemeteries |title=Barrington Area Cemeteries|year=2010|publisher=Barrington Area Library|access-date=March 2, 2010}}</ref> Since the 1980s, the church building has been used by a [[Korean-American]] congregation, the New Friends Wesleyan Church.

In 1860, about 18 immigrant families of [[Czechs|Czech]] ancestry settled along the east side of the Fox River, near the future site of [[Fox River Grove, Illinois|Fox River Grove]]. In 1867, land was purchased at the southwest corner of Church and River - Algonquin roads, and construction was started on [[St. John Nepomucene]] Chapel, named after the patron saint of [[Bohemia]]. Completed in 1873, the chapel was never served by its own priest, and currently services are scheduled only once a year. The chapel and its cemetery are owned by the St. John Nepomucene Catholic Cemetery Association, making it the only privately owned Catholic chapel and cemetery in the [[Roman Catholic Diocese of Rockford|Rockford Diocese]].<ref name="bal1"/><ref>[http://observer.rockforddiocese.org/Archives/November22007/CatholicChurchandCemeteryNowPrivatelyOwned/tabid/785/Default.aspx The Observer] {{webarchive |url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160306073519/http://observer.rockforddiocese.org/Archives/November22007/CatholicChurchandCemeteryNowPrivatelyOwned/tabid/785/Default.aspx |date=March 6, 2016 }} accessed December 6, 2007</ref>

===Railroad and gentleman farms===
Starting about 1900, business executives from Chicago, many of whom were tied to the railroad industry, purchased the rolling farms and subdivided them into large summer estates. One such individual was Spencer C. Otis Sr., who by 1910 is credited with purchasing {{convert|1000|acre|0}} of farmland along what was then Goose Lake Road but is now known as Otis Road and creating Hawthorne Farm. Otis was a "[[gentleman farmer]]" of the era. He worked in Chicago commerce, but his hobby was [[dairy]] farming on his large country estate which was led by his son Spencer Otis Jr. who attended agricultural school in at the University of Illinois in Urbana. At this time the university was experimenting building round barns, of which became an Otis signature, as there were three built on the Hawthorne Farm.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Fitch |first=Victoria R. |title=Hark Back to Barrington: 50 Years with the Fox River Hunt |date=1993 |publisher=Barrington Area Historical Society |location=Barrington, Illinois |pages=1}}</ref> Several of Otis Senior's business associates, including George E. Van Hagen, also built large estates in the area and ran their summer homes as year-round dairy farms.

===Barrington Hills Country Club===
In 1921, the Barrington Hills Country Club, with its eighteen-hole golf course, was established on {{convert|200|acre}} of unfarmable land between [[Lake Cook Road|County Line Road]], Oak Knoll Road, and [[U.S. Route 14|Northwest Highway]]. The land was donated by three of the club's early founders: H. Stillson Hart, who owned the farmstead known as Hart Hills just to the east of the club; George E. Van Hagen of Wakefield Farm, who owned the land just to the west of the club; and J.R. Cardwell, whose Oak Knoll Farm swelled along the winding Oak Knoll Road on the club's northern end. Van Hagen became the club's first president. Noted Chicago architect Robert Work, who was associated with David Adler, designed the first clubhouse, which was opened in 1926 and burned to the ground in 1930. Work designed the second clubhouse as well, which opened in 1931 and still stands.<ref>{{cite book |title= A Club in the Country: The Story of Barrington Hills Country Club| last=Schmitz| first=Patty Dowd| year=2007| publisher=Barrington Hills Country Club| location=Barrington Hills, Ill| oclc=165274776}}</ref>
[[Image:BHills Estate.JPG|right|thumb|The Grigsby Estate is on the [[National Register of Historic Places listings in Lake County, Illinois|National Register of Historic Places in Lake County]].]]