Batavia Institute | |
Location | Batavia, Kane County, Illinois, United States |
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Coordinates | 41°50′40.49″N88°18′58.6″W / 41.8445806°N 88.316278°W |
Built | 1853 |
Architect | Town, Elijah Shumway |
Architectural style | Greek Revival |
NRHP reference No. | 76000712 [1] |
Added to NRHP | August 13, 1976 |
The Batavia Institute (currently recognized name) also known as Bellevue Place Sanitarium is a Registered Historic Place in Batavia, Illinois, US.
Batavia Institute, a private academy, was chartered on 12 February 1853 by 13 men, including Rev. Stephen Peet, the Congregational minister, Elijah Shumway Town, Joel McKee, John Van Nortwick, Dennison K. Town, who settled in Batavia in 1839 as its first physician, and Isaac G. Wilson. [2]
The original building, which still stands in Batavia at 333 South Jefferson Street, at Union Avenue, was constructed in 1853–1854 of locally quarried limestone at a cost of $20,000. The architect Elijah Shumway Town designed the building in a Greek Revival style. [3]
Bids were opened by the State Board of Education in Peoria on 7 May 1857. The first proposition on the agenda was from Batavia, which offered a subscription of $15,000, with the land and building belonging to the Batavia Institute, valued at $30,000, making $45,000 in all. Washington, in Tazewell County, Bloomington, and Peoria submitted proposals, as well. [4] [5]
In 1875, following the death of Abraham Lincoln, the 16th President of the United States, ten years later, Mary Todd Lincoln was committed to Bellevue Place Sanitarium, formerly known as the Batavia Institute. A Chicago court deemed that Mrs. Lincoln behaved "irrationally" and ordered her to be place in a mental hospital. [6] Mrs. Lincoln stayed for less than four months at the Bellevue Place prior to being released to her sister, Elizabeth where she assumed her care in Springfield.
In the 1960s, the building was converted to a residential facility for unwed mothers named the 'Fox Hill Home', which operated until the 1970s. In the mid 80s, the building was once again named Bellevue Place and converted into apartments which are lived in as of today. The building is not publicly accessible. [7]
The building was listed in the National Register of Historic Places on 13 August 1976. [3]
Batavia is a city mainly in Kane County and partly in DuPage County in the U.S. state of Illinois. Located in the Chicago metropolitan area, it was founded in 1833 and is the oldest city in Kane County. Per the 2020 census, the population was 26,098.
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Dean Richmond (1804–1866) was Batavia, New York's railroad magnate, director of the Utica and Buffalo Railroad Company, First Vice President of the New York Central Railroad, and from 1864 to 1866, president of the New York Central. He was born in the town of Barnard, Vermont, on March 31, 1804, and was a son of Hathaway and Rachel Dean Richmond. His father moved the family to Syracuse, New York, where he was engaged in the early salt industry. His father died when Dean was only fourteen years of age.
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