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William Henry Cairnduff
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Cairnduff's Addition A Plus for Edgewater
John Lewis Cochran is credited with being Edgewater's founder. It is a title well deserved, for it was he who gave it its name, named several important east-west streets, platted and subdivided more land, sold more lots, built more homes and did it much longer than any other person.
And yet he was not alone. There was another developer in that very formative period in Edgewater's history who deserves our attention. His name is William Henry Cairnduff.
In the spring of 1888, he subdivided approximately 38 acres of land bounded by what is today Broadway, Ridge, Glenwood and the alley north of Ardmore. He called his new subdivision "Cairnduff's Addition to Edgewater;" today we call it Magnolia Glen. The summer was spent in creating the infrastructure: grading the streets, installing water and sewer mains, putting in sidewalks and planting trees.
Promotion began in July. By reviewing the real estate advertisements in each Sunday Chicago Tribune, we are able to obtain a good picture, not only of the enticements Mr. Cairnduff offered prospects, but of the progress at various points of time.
By naming his subdivision as an addition to Edgewater and promoting it as part of Edgewater, he cleverly piggy-backed on Cochran's previous and concurrent promotional efforts.
Like Cochran, he spent heavily on advertisements and, like Cochran, he was a good wordsmith. He did some of the same things Cochran did in his ads: he stressed the quality of the improvements, the lakeside location and the convenient transportation. Like Cochran, he had an agent near the depot who would show prospects the lots and homes. He also offered free transportation on the steam trains to and from Edgewater.
Cairnduff stressed that all lots were within easy walking distance of the depot (on Bryn Mawr) and he did something that Cochran never did - he claimed that lots in his development were on the highest ground in Edgewater.
He offered lots on easy terms and loaned money to build homes on them. He offered ready-built homes and he offered to build homes to suit. With all lots came perfect title, warranty deed and certified abstract.
Mr. Cairnduff envisioned that Evanston Avenue (now Broadway) would be a boulevard - an extension of Sheridan Road. And he advertised it as such, charging more for the residential lots which faced the lake than for the other lots. (Note: The present Sheridan Road had not yet been built.)
Ridge Avenue he envisioned as a business street and priced lots bordering on it accordingly.
During the years 1888, 1889 and 1890, he advertised heavily. While Cochran often kept his classified ads the same for various periods of time, Cairnduff offered much more variety, sometimes changing them weekly. Like Cochran, he would occasionally run large display ads, which would often show a sketch of a house already built.
Progress came relatively quickly for Cairnduff, and, if we can believe a later ad, was beyond his initial expectations. By the end of 1888 - about six months after he offered lots for sale - he had sold 100 of his approximately 225 lots.
A March 30, 1889 ad indicated that 11 houses were under construction, to be available by May 1. An April 28, 1889 ad proclaimed that four out of eight houses had been sold before completion. About a year later, in a March 2, 1890 ad, he boasted that over 200 lots had been sold and that 30 homes had been built (both by him and lot purchasers), of which 27 had been sold and 25 already owner occupied.
On May 18 of the same year, he announced that a $10,000 business block on Ridge Avenue was nearing completion on a lot that he had sold. A week later he added that the building would house a family grocer, market and provisions store that would be "one of the most attractive stores of its kind in Chicago." The building stood on the corner of Ridge and Broadway where the Golden Waffle restaurant is now. In that same ad, he also claimed that "one half the population of Edgewater own homes and reside on lots sold by us."
Why did Cairnduff do so well so soon? One reason might be that he offered homes (and lots) at a lower cost than Cochran initially did. In fact, in a display ad in the March 31, 1889 issue of the Chicago Tribune, he made the claim: "The only low-cost houses in Edgewater are in 'Cairnduff's Addition'."
He offered 6-, 8- and 10-room houses from $2,750 to $5,500, where Cochran offered houses from $4,000 to $12,250, with most of the houses in the middle to higher ranges. Later, Cochran offered more moderately priced houses in what is now Lakewood-Balmoral, but he didn't do it during this early period. Perhaps the fact that he had his own construction company, whereas Cochran did not, gave him a competitive edge.
One of the things he did, for which we are grateful as researchers of Edgewater's history, is that he published the display ad, shown here. It includes a map of his development that shows the houses built as of May 11, 1890, the date of publication. A number of the houses have been identified by current address. And a few of them will be featured on the EHS fall house tour.
Thank you, W.H. Cairnduff, for being so considerate! Your ad and addition were wonderful pluses for Edgewater.

Judah Frank Hecht Interview *History of Uptown, North Broadway District/W.H. Cairnduff Subdivisions, Document #17Source: Mr Hecht of 6204 Broadway, a real estate man in the district who was employed by W.H. Cairnduff when the latter subdivided his land in 1888. Interviewed in December, 1927.

The land which W.H. Cairnduff subdivided was purchased from the government by Stephen Campbell in 1835. He sold it to Thomas Jenkins who re-sold it to W.P. Lyon in 1835. The land was next bought by a man named Harding who sold it to Thomas Thompson with a mortgage on it which Thompson did not know about. The mortgage was foreclosed by the sheriff of Cook County, a Mr. Chase, and held by him for thirty years. He leased the land for truck gardens. In 1886 the land was sold by Chase to Henry Ives Cobb, the latter holding it two years and renting it out as a farm. Mr. Cairnduff bought the land from Mr. Cobb in 1888. In the same year the land was laid out. Most of it was sold by 1900. The tract was bounded by Rosedale, Ridge, Broadway, and Glendale Avenues. [Editor’s note: the northern boundary was the alley north of Ardmore not Rosedale and it was Glenwood rather than Glendale Ave.]

All the land was restricted against the sale of liquor. The purchaser of the northwest corner of Broadway and Ridge bought the land for a grocery store and so the clause against liquor was left out of his contract. He had no more than secured the land than he sold it to persons who put up a saloon.

Ridge Avenue was the only street laid out when Cairnduff entered the district and so he laid his east and west streets to run parallel to it. These streets are named Early and Victor. By running them in this direction, Mr. Cairnduff thought the residents upon them would be in more direct line with the Chicago, Milwaukee, and St. Paul station. A few houses were built to get the subdivision going, but no stores were put up. The liquor restriction was not put upon the residential section.

The people who bought in this subdivision were of a good class. Most of them came from the north side closer in. They already loved the north side and came further out for more space for their children. One of the first buyers was a man named Williston who later became an alderman. The people who lived on the north side used to be twitted for their poor transportation and slowness. The south side had its Illinois Central and its streets went straight out from the loop. Those who lived on the south side used to banter about the difficulties getting through the north side because of the many irregular streets. While the north side seemed to enjoy the seclusion and privacy of such streets, the south side boasted that they were closer to the city and had thoroughfares that were easily approached and passed through. Still the residents of the northern section did not mind the inconvenience of living out farther, since they were away from the noise and unpleasantness of the factories. Although their little street did not always meet others, it gave residents the feeling of being on private driveways.

When Cairnduff subdivided, there was only a grocery store on Broadway near the subdivision. This had a stairway leading up to it, for the first floor was high. It was near Bryn Mawr and is torn down now. It was on the south side of the street just east of the L. The last owner was named McManus. He had bought it from a man by the name of Childs. [Editor’s note:  He is referring to the Guild Hall built by J.L. Cochran and located at the southwest corner of Bryn Mawr and Winthrop.]

I guess in the early days there was plenty of swampy land around here. I’ve heard the story of a three-year-old child running away from home and getting lost in the swamp east of Ridge. It seems while he was stumbling around he fell in an open ditch and was drowned.

* Judah Frank Hecht was born 15 May 1865 in LaPorte, Indiana, the child of parents born in Hesse and Bavaria, Germany. He died 18 August 1931 and is buried in Rosehill Cemetery. For many years he and his wife Wilhelmina and their three children lived at 5842 North Magnolia. In the early 1920s they moved to 1457 Rascher, where their youngest child, son Raymond C. Hecht, continued to live with his own wife and children into the 1940s.

Cover page: Documents: History of the Uptown Community, Chicago. Prepared for the Chicago Historical Society and the Local Community Research Committee, University of Chicago. Research under the direction of Vivien M. Palmer; staff investigators Marion Lindner and Beatrice Nesbit. These documents contain data just as it was secured form old residents and from existing documents. A final check of the data will appear in the volume of the Social History of Chicago.

Format: Photocopy of a typescript without page numbers in the Chicago History Museum library; volume 2 of a 6-volume set containing documentary information on 20 Chicago community districts/areas.

Publication date: 1925-1930.
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William Henry Cairnduff lived in the house below.

whc house
House in Cairnduff's Addition
This residential building is located within an area of Chicago developed by W.H. Cairnduff in 1880s and 1890s. The area was originally known as Cairnduff's Addition to Edgewater and now this area is called Magnolia Glen and is part of the Edgewater community area. Although the specific history of this building on N. Ridge Avenue would require additional research, its Victorian architectural character suggests it may be one of the early buildings of the subdivision. This building is bounded on both sides by brick-faced residential buildings which, based on their architectural style, appear to have been constructed later.
....15 Jan 2018
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