History of the Big Woods School

With the end of the Black Hawk War in 1832, the federal government opened northern Illinois to settlers. Among the first to arrive were James and Anna Brown, who came that same year and received 160 acres through the Federal Land Acquisition Act. At that time, some Potawatomi Indians still lived in the Big Woods area, but they soon moved west.

As more settlers arrived, the community saw the need for a local school. Around 1840, a wood-frame schoolhouse was built on five acres of land donated by James and Anna Brown. In 1850, this land was officially dedicated for use as both a church and a burying ground.

The Big Woods Cemetery and the Big Woods Congregational Church were established on this land. Although they occupy separate properties, both trace their roots to the early Big Woods settlement. The church, originally known as the Big Woods Congregational Church, still stands nearby and since 2016 operates under the name St. Athanasius The Great, a Romanian Orthodox Church.

The wooden school served local children until 1917, when a new brick schoolhouse was constructed on land that had once been part of the Browns’ original farm.

The new building, completed and opened in 1918, was designed in the Craftsman style, featuring a raised first floor and full basement. It was built by the Schiffler Brothers of Naperville, Illinois, and has retained its original red brick exterior for more than a century.

During construction in 1917, the school board members left their mark by writing their names and the date – November 10, 1917 – in the wet cement of a slab near the chimney in the attic. Those names are:

• John Warne, President (son of the original settler John Warne)
• W. W. Daw, Clerk
• Sam Swenson
• Chas. Schiffler
• G. H. Beidelman

A small brick entryway and rear door were added in later years, and the Foundation hopes to restore these areas to their original appearance during future restoration work.

While the windows and asbestos were removed by a previous owner in anticipation of demolition, exact replicas of the original windows have since been installed. Aside from these few changes, the building remains much as it did in 1918.

The school’s first floor contained one large classroom, along with a small entryway, teacher’s office, and stairs to the basement. Two small bathrooms were tucked into the north and south corners. The north windows were set high to allow blackboards underneath – those original blackboards are still in place today. Large east-facing windows filled the room with light, while the south wall, without windows, was lined entirely with blackboards.

Downstairs, a large, bright basement with windows on three sides served as a winter recess area for the children. Beneath the entry and office were two smaller rooms: a furnace room and a coal storage room. The school was likely heated by a coal furnace, though none of the original equipment remains.

When the school opened in 1918, children from nearby farms attended classes here. One former student recalled traveling from the small community of Eola, south of Big Woods, where her family lived in a railroad car because Eola was a railroad hub. She remembered being amazed at the indoor plumbing in the school – a rare feature in the 1940s.

Many Big Woods students later remained in the area to work their family farms until the 1960s, when the federal government purchased much of the farmland to establish Fermilab. Several former students – from both the original wooden school and the later brick building – are now buried in the Big Woods Cemetery beside the school.

The Big Woods School stands today at 3033 N. Eola Road, near Butterfield Road (Illinois Route 56), within the City of Aurora, Illinois. The property was annexed into Aurora in 2007.  The Big Woods Cemetery remains unincorporated while the church was annexed into Aurora in 2002.

Across Eola Road to the west lies a small remnant of the original Big Woods Forest, now preserved by the DuPage County Forest Preserve District – the last visible trace of the vast forest that once gave the area its name.

Through the efforts of the Big Woods School Foundation, the building was placed on both the Illinois Register of Historic Places and the National Register of Historic Places in April 2016. On November 14, 2019, the City of Aurora officially designated it as a Historic Landmark.

In 2022, the Foundation completed important roof repairs to preserve the school’s original red tile roof. These efforts mark just one part of the Foundation’s ongoing mission to restore and maintain the building, ensuring that the Big Woods School continues to stand as a living link to the area’s pioneer past and early education history.