History of the Neighborhood

Dimmitt’s Grove is one of Bloomington’s oldest neighborhoods. It had scattered residents in the 1830s, but was quickly populated when the railroads came in the mid-1850s. By 1900, some of the early houses had been replaced with more modern homes, as the neighborhood was developed. The name Dimmitt’s Grove came in 1987 when the neighborhood organization was founded.

The earliest houses here were probably log houses that belonged to farmers. Among them were William Dimmett (whose family used the spelling Dimmitt by the twentieth century) and William Evans. Their homes would now be on Taylor and Grove Streets.

The old Dimmett house may be part of the structure that is now at 611 E. Taylor. The Illinois Central Railroad came to Bloomington in the spring of 1853, bringing building materials and entrepreneurs to town. By 1860, Grove to Washington, the streets with higher elevation in the neighborhood, were illing in. Thee was a lumberyard, owned by George Bruner on the south side of Grove St. in the 500 block, along with Conover Female Academy. Several 1850s houses still stand in their original form on Grove St. Among them are 418, 506, 510 and 603. Some were later enlarged, including 707 E. Grove. The Barber brothers, who owned a nearby mill, built 709 E. Taylor and 407 S. Clinton, a Gothic Revival. In the 1870s, some of the larger houses were added to the neighborhood. Eliel Barber, who lived at 709 E. Taylor, built a 17-room Italianate home next door at 701 E. Taylor, which received an 18-room Richardson Romanesque addition and remodeling in 1900.

Other large 1870s Italianates are at 401, 407 and 421 E. Grove. 407 was updated in the early twentieth century with stucco and roomy porches. 507 E. Front was one of many impressive Italianates on Front St. By 1900, large Queen Anne-style houses with plumbing and central heating had replaced some of the simpler houses along the desirable lots on Grove St. Architect George Miller added 409, 604 and 701. A George Miller from E. Washington Street moved to 402 E. Grove in November of 2004. Other impressive Queen Annes from the 1880s are at 612, 702, and 706 E. Grove. At the turn of the century, architect Arthur Pillsbury designed 702 E. Front and the Chalet-style beauty at 607 E. Front. In the nineteenth century, lots illed in oward the southern edge of the neighborhood as the city added sewers.

Along Oakland, then known as Clay St., was a slough that provided drainage for industry including foundries and a pork packing plant on its south side. When the city built sewers, the slough went underground and the streets near it illed with houses. The city’s irst public school, the ourth Ward School, which originally illed to square blocks and stood at Taylor and Evans Streets, was razed c. 1910 and those lots illed, some with houses built with the recycled bricks from the school. The three similar stucco houses on Taylor St. (known today as the sherbet houses, 509-513 E. Taylor) and three similar Foursquares, 403-7 S. Evans, were part of this development. Older houses like 512 E. Taylor 605 E Grove St. were updated to join the mission style houses of the 1910s. Arthur Pillsbury added 611 E. Washington, 503 E. Olive, 503 E. Grove, an addition at 609-11 E. Grove, and 701 E. Taylor, and at least one of the 3 new houses in the 400 block of Evans.

In the 1850s, Abraham Lincoln visited friends in the neighborhood, including attorney Kersey Fell, whose house at 707 E. Grove was a social gathering place. He also worked and visited with Reuben Benjamin at 510 E. Grove. Ezra Prince, who later lived at 418 E. Grove, drove Lincoln to Peoria when he was riding the circuit here. Judge Lawrence Weldon lived at 407 E. Grove and hosted President Ulysses S. Grant there.

The railroad building boom brought entrepreneur John Routt, who built 510 E. Grove and the original house at 512 E. Taylor. He would later leave Bloomington and ind success as the Gvernor of Colorado. George Bruner, a miller, built a lumber yard in the neighborhood, and later built a grand house for himself at 612 E. Grove (This house was replaced in the 1880s by Judge Sain Welty.) Bruner’s daughters married a miller and a merchant and built homes at 701 and 604 E. Grove (and an earlier one now at 403 S. Evans, which once faced Grove St.) Matthew Scott, owner of land and coal mines, bought 701 E. Taylor in 1869. His wife Julia was the sister of Adlai Stevenson, U.S. Vice President under Grover Cleveland. Matthew and Julia’s daughter Julia later married Carl Vrooman, who served as Assistant Secretary of Agriculture under Woodrow Wilson. The Vrooman mansion served the community as a hospital during the Great Influenza epidemic of 1918. Illinois’ 18th governor, John M. Hamilton, lived at 502 S. Clayton before he served the state from 18831885. Marie Litta, who became an internationally known opera singer, lived at 512 E. Taylor.

A city park at Gridley and Jackson, just across the neighborhood boundary, is named for her. Delmar Darrah, who lived at 702 E. Front, was the originator of Bloomington’s Passion Play. Author Harold Sinclair, who wrote The Horse Soldiers (1956) and American Years (1938), lived at 709 E. Taylor. The Mowrer brothers, Paul Scott and Edgar Ansel, both winners of Pulitzer Prizes, lived at 418 E. Grove. Today, 400-700 E. Grove St. is a National Historic District, and scattered houses in the neighborhood are zoned S4 and watched over by Bloomington’s Historic Preservation Commission. The historic character of our neighborhood attracts many walkers enjoying the sights. 402 E. Grove won “This Old House’s” Most Curb Appeal award in 2012. Every ve years, the neighborhood hosts “Day in Historic Dimmitt’s Grove,” which attracts many visitors to see the houses and gardens, go on historic walking tours and enjoy music and attractions at the Vrooman Mansion grounds.

Marie Litta Source: McLean County Museum of History

Neighborhood History provided by Terri Clemens