Editing Bolingbrook, Illinois (section)

==History==
[[Image:Bolingbrook3.jpg|thumb|240px|A typical neighborhood street in Bolingbrook]]
Bolingbrook is a suburb of [[Chicago]] incorporated in 1965. Similar to the neighboring village of [[Woodridge, Illinois|Woodridge]], almost all of the businesses, homes, churches and other buildings in Bolingbrook were built after 1960. The first settlement in what is now Bolingbrook was established in 1831, but the informal farming villages remained unincorporated for over 130 years. The area that is now Bolingbrook is located in the heart of the Gateway Wetlands, which begin in [[Downers Grove, Illinois|Downers Grove]] and end just north of the [[Joliet, Illinois|Joliet]] city limits. The tiny Boardman Cemetery, in what is now the Heritage Creek subdivision, contains the remains of some of these early residents.

Modern Bolingbrook has its roots in the [[Economic history of the United States#Post-World War II prosperity: 1945–1973|housing boom]] of the 1950s. The first subdivision in Bolingbrook, known as Westbury, was immediately west of Route 53. A second subdivision, known as Colonial Village, followed on the far east side of Route 53.<ref>{{cite news|title=History of Bolingbrook|work=Falcon Living}} {{full citation needed|date=December 2023}}</ref>

The village continued to grow steadily for the remainder of the 1960s, reaching a population of 7,000 by 1970. The 1970s were the first period of rapid growth in Bolingbrook, during which its population quintupled to reach over 37,000 by 1980. Much of this growth was as much due to mass annexation as well as raw population growth; the population of Bolingbrook by the 1970 census but with its 1980 land boundary was approximately 25,000, further reflecting the vigorous annexation that took place during the 1970s.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://population.us/il/bolingbrook/ |title=Bolingbrook, IL population |website=population.us |access-date=May 18, 2018}}</ref>

By 1990, Bolingbrook's population had only increased by about 10% from the previous decade, to about 41,000.