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Cantigny Park  Robert R. McCormick Estate & Museum The Robert R. McCormick Museum is a historic house museum that depicts the country home of a family that made the Chicago Tribune the “World’s Greatest Newspaper.” Joseph Medill (1823-1899), who became the owner of the Chicago Tribune newspaper in 1874 built this house in 1896 for his daughter and son-in-law, respectively, Katherine Medill McCormick (1853-1932) and Robert Sanderson McCormick (1849-1919). Medill’s grandson, Robert Rutherford McCormick (1880-1955) took possession of the house in 1920. Robert McCormick lived in the house until his death in 1955.
As editors and publishers of the Chicago Tribune, Joseph Medill and Robert Rutherford McCormick used the newspaper as a forum for advocating their own political points of views. On a national scale, Joseph Medill was instrumental in helping to establish the Republican National Party and in securing Abraham Lincoln’s election to the Presidency of the United States. On a local scale, Medill was instrumental in helping Chicago recover from the devastating fire of 1871.
Robert Rutherford McCormick became President of the Chicago Tribune in 1911. He served as the publisher and editor-in-chief of the Chicago Tribune from 1925 to 1955. McCormick’s pro-Republican editorials strongly supported the First Amendment rights to Freedom of Speech and Freedom of the Press. Before he took over the newspaper, however, Robert McCormick served as an Alderman on Chicago’s City Council and as President of the Sanitary Commission. Before he reached the age of 25, McCormick was also a practicing attorney and a published author. When McCormick was 35, he married Amy Irwin Adams (1872-1939). She died in 1939, and McCormick re-married in 1944.
Colonel Robert R. McCormick continued to live in the mansion until his death in 1955. McCormick’s second wife, Maryland Mathison Hooper McCormick (1897-1985), could have lived in the mansion for as long as she liked, but she chose to leave for Washington, D.C. In 1959, the mansion became a museum. The Cantigny Foundation, which is a branch of the Robert R. McCormick Tribune Foundation, maintains the mansion as a historic house museum. The mansion has 35 rooms, 12 fireplaces, 13 bathrooms and 4 staircases.
The Robert R. McCormick Museum reflects the public and private sides of Medill and McCormick, their families and guests who enjoyed this country home in Wheaton, Illinois. Priceless family heirlooms, Chinese and European works of art, and over 400 year-old antiques grace the 27 rooms that are on display for the public.
From 2002-2005, mansion staff members are restoring the interior of the mansion to reflect the way it looked from 1937 to 1955. Part of this restoration plan includes creating reproductions of original window and upholstery coverings, re-painting many of the wall colors and re-arranging some of the furnishings. Most of the original curtains and floor coverings are gone, but some of the original wallpaper and furnishings exist in the house.
1896-1899
Joseph Medill hired architect Charles A. Coolidge to design a Beaux-Arts style home with a white clapboard exterior and an imposing classical portico for the front facade. The Beaux-Arts style of architecture is characterized by symmetry and classical design. The term Beaux-Arts comes from an architectural school in France, called the Ecole Des Beaux Arts. Many American architects, including those in the Coolidge firm, studied at this school in France.
Medill’s house cost $15,000 to build in 1896. Coolidge’s other important designs in Chicago include the Art Institute of Chicago and the former Chicago Public Library, which is now the Chicago Cultural Center. Medill called his country retreat Red Oaks Farm as a tribute to the 300 year-old oak trees that still grow on the estate.
Joseph Medill may have used the central room on the second floor as his bedroom. Katherine Medill McCormick, Robert Sanderson McCormick and other family members may have used the other bedrooms on the second floor. Robert Rutherford McCormick and his older brother Medill used the end rooms in the attic as their bedrooms. The Victorian-era kitchen and the servants’ quarters were located in the basement.
During this era, the house was heated with coal burned on grates inside the fireplaces. Lighting consisted of candles, oil and kerosene lamps. Summer heat was vented through a ceiling window in the attic, and the second floor rooms had louvered doors to allow breezes to waft through and to afford privacy for those inside the bedrooms. Because of these conditions, the house was only occupied during the summer and fall seasons.
Up until the 1935 expansion, this Medill-era home measured 72 feet 8 inches across from east to west and 35 feet 6 inches wide from north to south.
1899-1920 When Joseph Medill died in 1899, his daughter and son-in-law, Katherine Medill McCormick and Robert Sanderson McCormick, occasionally used the house as their country retreat. Katherine and Robert Sanderson McCormick may have used the central room on the second floor as their bedroom. Guests and other family members occupied other second floor bedrooms. Servants’ rooms were in the basement.
The house was electrified in 1909, so the wall scones and lamps used electric bulbs. The house was still heated with coal, but instead of using grates in the fireplaces, the McCormicks installed two coal stokers in the basement. On the east wall of the interior of the west porch, one can see the small door through which the coal was dumped into the basement.
1920-1935
In 1920, Katherine’s son and daughter-in-law, Robert Rutherford McCormick and Amy de Houlle Irwin Adams McCormick (1872-1939) began to use the house as their country retreat. Robert Rutherford McCormick took over the second floor central room as his bedroom, and his wife Amy used the series of room on the east end of the second floor as her bedroom suite. The two bedrooms on the west side of the second floor became guest rooms. Servants’ quarters remained in the basement.
McCormick began construction of a swimming pool, just outside the east portico, in August of 1919. The pool cost $3,500 to construct. A telephone was added to the home in 1928. The McCormicks used the Illinois Bell Company to provide them with their telephone service.
1935-1955 In the early 1930s, McCormick hired architect Willis Irvin to expand and re-model his grandfather’s home into a stately mansion that would be reminiscent of the McCormick’s 18th century plantation home in Virginia. Colonel McCormick changed the name of the estate from Red Oaks Farms to Cantigny Farm to commemorate the small French village he helped to free from German occupation during World War One.
By 1938, Willis Irvin completed the additions of an east and a west wing, which flanked Coolidge’s central section of the house. The west wall of the dining room represents where the Coolidge-design ends and the Irwin expansion begins. The east wall of the drawing room represents where the Coolidge-design ends and the Irwin expansion begins. Steel pocket fire doors in the basement as well as on the first floor mark the line between the Coolidge design and the Irwin expansion.
The new dimensions of the expanded house measured 195 feet, 6 inches across from east to west and 35 feet, 6 inches wide from north to south. The east wing measured 60 feet from north to south, and the west wing measured 63 feet from north to south.
In 1936, the McCormicks changed their heating system from the coal stokers to an oil burner in the basement. The oil burners heated hot water that circulated through radiators throughout the home. Some standing radiators are still visible on the second floor, but many of the other rooms have radiators built into the walls just below the window sills. Air conditioning was added to the home in the in 1938.
Interior of 1935 West Wing
The basement level of the west wing became a modern kitchen wing with a servants’ sitting room, servants’ dining room and a servants’ porch. The first floor of the west wing became the private bedroom areas for the McCormicks. Despite the fact that Irwin built a bedroom suite for Amy on the first floor of the west wing, Amy McCormick decided to keep her bedroom on the second floor. When Robert McCormick remarried in 1944, the second Mrs. McCormick (Maryland) used rooms on the first floor of the west wing as her bedroom suite. The third floor of the west wing became the new bedrooms and bathrooms for the servants.
1935-1955 Central Section: Second Floor Until her death in 1939, the first Mrs. McCormick continued to use the east rooms on the second floor as her bedroom suite. From 1940 to1944, all of the bedrooms on the second floor became guest bedrooms. From 1944 to 1955, the second Mrs. McCormick’s daughters used the bedrooms on the west end as their own bedrooms, and the middle and east rooms continued to function as guest bedrooms.
Interior of 1937
East Wing
The basement level of the Irwin expanded east wing became a private movie theatre. The first and second floor of the east wing became a two-story library with a hidden bar. McCormick called his library Freedom Hall.
Exterior of Irwin's Design
When the wings were finished, Medill’s white clapboard house was covered with red Georgian brick. McCormick then had the bricks and the whole exterior painted white to more closely resemble the White House in Washington, D.C. When McCormick stepped back, however, he decided that he did not like the white color. So he had the house sand-blasted to remove the white paint. The resulting color of the exterior brick is now a mixture of red and white: pink.
Exterior of East Wing
To adorn the exterior of Freedom Hall, McCormick had the names of Washington, Jefferson, Clark and Mason carved into limestone blocks near the cornice line. McCormick felt that these men had a profound impact on the development of the United States and the freedoms he held most dear to his heart: freedom of speech and freedom of the press. George Washington was the first president of the United States. Thomas Jefferson drafted the Declaration of Independence. George Rogers Clark was the Revolutionary War hero that freed this area of Illinois from British occupation. (Please keep in mind that George Rogers Clarke spelled his name with an “e,” even though McCormick did not.) George Mason drafted the Virginia Bill of Rights, which became the model for the United States Constitution.
Interior Flooring Materials Most of the floors in the mansion are made of oak. An exception to this is the floor in the library or Freedom Hall, which is made of veneered teak. Most of the floors on the second floor are made of pine. Also the floors in the west wing stairwell, dish pantry, kitchen and food pantry are made of rubber tile. The floors of the west wing bathrooms are made of ceramic tile.
Interior Ceiling Materials
The ceilings in the west wing stairwell and kitchen wing are made of acoustic tiles that absorb excessive noise. The rest of the ceilings in the mansion are made of plaster.
Interior Wall Materials
At the cornice line (at the top of the wall, where the wall meets the ceiling) there is plaster molding. Most of the walls above the chair rail are made of plaster that is covered with flat paint, canvas or wallpaper. Other sections of the walls, such as the wainscoting below the chair rail are made of pine. The walls in the library are made of Brazilian butternut.
Interior Door and Window Materials
All of the doors and windows in the mansion are made of white pine. 
Stars & Bars Plantation: The Oval Designed Windows on Side 1 were incorporated into our house as a result of our visit to Cantigny Park in 2004. It is one of my favoriate Plantation Estates in the US. It is beautiful and very close to downtown Chicago. In one of our etched windows is the Statue of Liberty and in the other glass pane is etched the American Flag and Bald Eagle. The oval windows were added to remember this great plantation house. |
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