The house that burned down Monday in the North Valley wasn’t any ordinary house, a reader tells me:
517 Green street was torched early [Monday] morning by some cowardly arsonists. Everyone should know that this wasn’t just any random abandoned house. It was believed by many to have been the oldest standing house in Peoria, dating back to 1837 and challenged in that claim only by the Flanigan house on Glen Oak. It has been passed down generation to generation through the same Peoria family since the late 1800s. It was left un-attended last year (temporarily) because the owner had some medical issues to deal with and has been staying with family out of state. In the time since he left, it has been raided by hooligans and bums, squatting there and wreaking havoc with no regard to the age and historic value of the structure. In recent months, with the help of the owner’s family, Councilman Weaver, the Peoria Historic Society, Northside Housing Services and some local preservationists, I’ve been working on getting it preserved and turned into a public museum for everyone in Peoria to enjoy. I guess that wasn’t meant to be. I just wanted you to know that there was more to the story of this house than the PJStar knew to report today.
The house will likely be demolished because it now poses a safety hazard, according to published reports.
Yes, this was a very sad event for Peoria and its’ history.
This is one example of crime that is not in the spotlight, Arson…
It is on Google street view still…
I thought the mineral springs house was the oldest?
Mineral Springs is the oldest natural landmark, but the mineral springs building, while very old (1840s,) was not older than this house. This house was an old farm house long before St. Mary’s was built behind it and even before this neighborhood was annexed by Peoria is the mid 1800s. It’s hard to imagine…I guess it’s not that hard to imagine anymore considering the growing number of empty lots that are starting to make the north valley look more like a developing subdivision than the most densely populated neighborhood in Peoria, as it once was
Well that sucks.
Well that explains a lot about the house. It definitely looked like something from 1837.
This is just another example of the historic preservation powers that be in Peoria dropping the ball. Unfortunately, this was a very big ball of lead. Good on CJ trying to pull together a little action, the crime is that institutions like the Peoria Hist Society should have been on this long ago. Where was Lakeview!?! Aren’t they supposed to be the new, self-styled guardians of Peoria’s past!?!
Lets see if we can make a list of the ‘history’ [architecture, historical places, artifacts, etc] the supposed caretakers of Peoria’s past have lost…mostly due to downright negligence!
One more reason why this museum is a sham.
Carefull Bob, these people here like old crap. 🙂
One thing about crap… it kinda feels good to have at first, kinda nice when it’s new, starts to stink right away, but after awhile, the stink goes away.
Drove by yesterday and it has been demolished!
While I agree that this is a shame that the house was destroyed by an arsonist, I am bit unclear on why this is the historical society’s fault? Whoever torched may have done it anyway.
Of what historical value is a house that was in as bad a shape as this one was? Just because it was the oldest in the city, doesn’t make it valuable, does it? Certainly, no one would have chose to refurbish it. Sentimentality can be take too far–in my opinion.
Sharon I agree. The house while old was in severe neglect. It would have been nice to fix up but money and the neighborhood, well, that wouldn’t have been a good investment. It’s like that rotted out apartment building on Hamilton Blvd. the church wanted to tear down. Still, many people think it’s nice to preserve these old buildings but not every old building has to be preserved.
Never once heard anyone associated with St Mary’s complain about the crackheads, prostitutes and drug dealers in the neighborhood. Oh, isn’t the OSF master plan to scrape the the ground of the Near Northside and put up what they want.
Really quite diabolical if you think about it – set up programs that appeal to those in poverty, programs that will maintain them in that state in that area, causing the working and investing class to leave, and then buy up their property as they leave. And along the way you can stick the city with the cost of demoing those properties who were arsoned by people to whom you probably supped at your soup kitchen.
Sharon & Emtronics, the process had been started to get it refurbished and restored, then turned into a public space when this all happened. It was a plan designed to enhance northside tourism and please St. Mary’s who’d been complaining about it.
Also, I must say that I live up the street from the apartments on Hamilton. They weren’t rotten, they were in better shape than my house. Removing them has severely hurt the neighborhood. The empty lot looks very bad. The folks at Trinity Luthern did not have respect for the homeowners who must live with the consequensces of their destruction.
Are you sh*tting me? That empty lot is being used. The entire property looks better than it ever did. And if your property looked worse that that run-down, debilitated building, I feel sorry for you.
Billy: Again, you are right. Trinity’s property looks terrific and has upgraded the neighborhood more than any other project in 40 years.
I live within two blocks of Trinity. I see it every day. Tearing that dilapidated building down was the best thing that could have happened to it. The preservation Nazis just wanted it to stay they there in hopes someone with money would come along and fix it up. Woulda coulda shoulda.
Billy, you should probably mention the part where Trinity allowed it to become dilapidated. It should have never been allowed to get to that state in the first place. The best thing that could have happened to it would have been to force Trinity to keep up on basic maintenance of the building.
Of course. FORCE. The battle cry of the those who know better how people should spend their money. Congratulations for towing the party line.
I know someone who owns an historic building where he has his business. He wishes he had never bought the building. It’s probably his for life–hard to find buyers. I know that many regard these old buildings as sacred. However, I do have to ask how many of those same people own one of these historic buildings or plan to purchase one. Yes, I think the city fathers probably should have had the foresight to know which buildings in Peoria should have been salvaged for the sake of preservation. Many of the truly historic were torn down long ago. I am really sorry but I can’t imagine who would ever have bought this particular house (the oldest in Peoria)and for what purpose? What is going to happen to the building on Knoxville that has been owned and occupied by Family House. That’s an albatross–who would ever buy it?
Funny coming from the guy who thinks taxpayers should be forced to pay for muni-wifi and universal health care. But I guess it’s only OK to force people to do something if it’s something you want. And I didn’t realize expecting property owners to maintain their property was such an unreasonable request.
They bought the property with the INTENT to tear is down to make room for the expansion. It was the preservation Nazis who came along and told them “no.” And the Internet is infrastructure. We pay for it anyway. Sorry.
Yes they were blocked from tearing it down. Why should that preclude them from maintaining their property for 11 years?
OK I’d like to hear your take on how we are currently being forced to pay for internet anyway?
Because for 11 years it was their intent to tear it down. Why should they have to pay to maintain the building? Duh.
Billy, where is your concern for lost valuation on multiple neighboring properties and the community? Trinity’s actions and inaction have at worse caused substantial losses in valuation on the part of neighboring property owners and at best stifled appreciation to its fullest potential. You seem more concerned about preserving some vague right of a property owner to do whatever they want even if it would incur substantial losses on neighboring owners.
Mahkno: I am a neighboring property owner and the Roanoke Apt building devalued all property around here for many years before it was torn down. It was a disaster long before the church bought it for the land.
Forget it Anon. He’s a preservationist. These people believe having a rotting building is better for property values than a nice new church-run facility.
I have no opinion about this other than to say: Old rotting buildings often harbor black mold, rats, crack head squatters, and other malicious debris. This reminds me of how farmers often let old barns just rot away, return to nature. An old barn is a somewhat different situation. I guess because great grandpa built it, the farmer imputes nostalgic value to it, and refrains from tearing it down. Look out for the yellow jackets and devil’s darning needles…!
Speaking of old buildings and preservation, anybody seen the downtown public library since it’s been remodeled? Butt ugly.
If the property owner had maintained the building it obviously wouldn’t have become a rotting building. I guess I’d rather be considered a preservationist rather than someone like Billy who apparently prefers having houses and buildings go into disrepair around them in the name of property rights.
Since we now have a new argument that the building was dilapidated before Trinity bought it. That still doesn’t make it OK that the previous owner didn’t maintain it. The city should have been on them about it. Trinity made a bad investment and almost got screwed on it. But at no point should the building been left to rot. The property owner whoever it was should have been required to maintain it.
We’ve sung this song before.
There are many houses in disrepair in this city. And everyone of them were once occupied by people who wanted to move away from the city to its outskirts and suburbs. In a hurry to get away, many of the people couldn’t wait to find a buyer that might want to be a homeowner. Instead they sold to landlords who own rental property all over the city–sometimes they become slumlandlords. That’s just the way it is. This oldest house in the city was a symbol for the preservationists of what should have happened but didn’t. Saving a few houses or buildings for historic purposes isn’t going to change the fact that houses all over the city are being vacated by their owners and sold as rental property–and they will continue to deteriorate. It sounds as though this oldest house would not have been purchased and/or preserved by anybody. The church evidently bought it with the intention of building something usable for the church. The city might be able to declare buildings as historic but that doesn’t guarantee their sale or preservation.
What incentives are offered to entice people to buy and preserve old buildings?
Incentives? none
As I mentioned before, Sharon, the process had already been started to restore the Green st house in such a way that it would have pleased everyone concerned. There was no need for a buyer, it was already owned. It’s an irrelevant argument at this point now, since it’s gone.
Billy, I’m a home owner in RR, not a renter. Tearing down the Roanoke apartments hurt my property value a lot more than it hurt yours. The empty lot is another ugly hole in the neighborhood. I agree with you on a lot of things, but when it comes to the value of historic property to a city, you’re completely wrong. If you don’t believe preservation is important to a city’s identity, go spend a week in Nashville or Cincinnatti or Galena or St. Louis or New Orleans or any of the thousands of other cities who make millions of dollars off tourism from their historic areas.
Mr. lane: I am a renter. But there is NO WAY, NO WAY, your property values were higher with that dilapidated rat trap next door. Uh-uh. I don’t need to a property owner to know that.
Mr. Lane, I did make a comment (off the top of my head) but I know very little about this particular situation. However, I don’t understand what you just said. If no buyer was needed, why was the house sold? When the house was sold, had it been designated as a house of historical significance and did the new buyer understand that the house could not be razed? Also, I agree that St. Louis, etc., have great historic districts (one house doesn’t make a historicl district). Peoria didn’t start soon enough, so so many efforts are just exercises in futility. There aren’t many people who wish to buy property that they would be forced to maintain and could never sell for any other purpose than the historic designation. I am not sure that ownership of a house in the neighborhood should allow a person to dictate what happens to a neighbor’s property. I am all for people who are interested in buying and maintaining buildings of historic significance. However, I’m not much in favor of others declaring someone else’s property as historic–and setting up all these restrictions.
Sharon: Forget it. He’s a preservationist. He will never agree that anything short of some sort of historical preservation dictatorship is needed. In the end, they want to force everybody to preserve old buildings so they can drive by and look at them
Sharon, the house was never sold, it was still owned by the family who passed it down through the last 100+ yrs. There’s a lot to the story, but in a nutshell: the family was going to have it designated as a historic property and preserved with the help of local orginizations, then donated to a local group such as the PHS or the park district. If no one would take it, there was a person who had promised to purchase it and maintain it.
The only comment I’ll make to Billy is that I don’t debate with close-minded people who make blanket assumptions of other people’s views without ever having met the person. (I guess I could also add that I don’t just drive by the building I purchased in a historic district, I also live there and abide by all the rules in the historic district just like every homeowner in the city has to follow the rules of their respective neighborhoods.)
Like I said before Billy, you make sense a lot of times, but on this subject your knowledge and wisdom appears very limited. You DO have to be a homeOWNER to know how a homeOWNER’s property values are effected by their neighbors. A renter can pick up and move any time his lease is up, but I must worry about who’s going to wanna buy a historic home in a historic neighborhood with no historic buildings left standing around it. Stop while you’re behind, Billy. (I guess that was more than one comment, wasn’t it?)
Once again, i am being criticized on an issue related to property values because i am not a home owner. I say again, my status as a non-property owner is irrelevant. YOUR home’s value was not harmed by the church demolishing this building. It wasn’t. Deal.
If you can provide any evidence that it WAS, please do so.
Mr. Lane: You are nuts and crabby. It’s over with the Roanoke. Enough, already. Find something else to gripe about.
The empty lot is not an “ugly hole”.
You’re being criticized because you’re trying to tell me my opinion about my own property values. Again, I respect your opinion on many things Billy, but on this subject you have very little credibility because you don’t own a house in R/R and you don’t acknowledge the potential value (in actual dollars, not just in some vague sense attraction to the past) of historic preservation to a community. You don’t have to worry about the things I have to worry about when it comes to resale value of my house.
I’m not making anymore comments on this because it’s not worth my time to beat a dead horse. Neither of our opinions are going to change any time soon. Here’s a parting thought though: You accused me of being part of a “dictatorship.” What do dictators want more? To control your property or to control your thoughts? It doesn’t help to win someone over to your opinion when you immediately start attacking them and telling them how they should think, Billy.
Mr. Lane: You are the one offering testimony that your property values fell because the apartment building was demolished. Please provide proof or retract.
Billy, don’t be foolish, it doesn’t work that way. There is and never will be a clear delineation like you are thinking. It is pointless to waste the time trying to explain it here.
The only question that matters is this. Would a restored apartment building have been worth more to the area or less than the proposed improvement the church plans to replace it with. I have not seen the church’s plans. I do remember the apartment building. It was, over most of the time of the church’s ownership, restorable and would have been an attractive component to the historic district.
Well, considering that a restored apartment building was never, ever on the horizon for the Roanoke Apartments, we will never know.