About Us :

The Village of Wilmette is located approximately 16 miles north of downtown Chicago. Wilmette is a progressive community known for its beautiful lakefront, diverse architecture, tree lined streets, well maintained parks and excellent public and private schools. It is a community committed to its history, preserving its brick streets and old fashioned street lights. The Village extends approximately five miles west from Lake Michigan and is approximately one mile wide. Its municipal neighbors include Evanston and Skokie to the south, Glenview to the west and Kenilworth and Northfield to the north.

History :

Wilmette's recorded history starts in 1674 when Father Marquette's expedition beached their canoes and spent the night on the shores of present day Wilmette.

Wilmette is named for Antoine Ouilmette, a French-Canadian fur trader who settled by the Chicago River in 1790 in Chicago. By 1829, he and his part-Indian wife, Archange, had moved their family to a cabin on the lake shore near the foot of present-day Lake Avenue in Wilmette. In 1829, two square miles of land were granted to Archange and her children under the Treaty of Prairie du Chien.

The area west of Ridge Road was settled by German farmers in the 1840s and was then incorporated as the Village of Gross Point in 1874. Gross Point was dissolved in 1919 and partly annexed to Wilmette in 1924. The remainder of Gross Point was annexed in 1926.

After the railroad was built through in 1854, more people began to settle in the area. In 1869, Alexander McDaniel, John Westerfield, and Henry Dingee, who along with the Gage family, owned the greater part of what is now east Wilmette, joined with two other men to form a real estate syndicate and platted the first subdivision. After the Chicago fire of 1871, the population increased to the 300 people required for incorporation and Wilmette was incorporated on September 19, 1872.

The first Wilmette public school opened in 1871. New Trier Township High School was established in 1899. In 1893-94, Wilmette built its first water distribution system and a sewer system which emptied into the Lake near Forest Avenue. The whole shape of the lakefront changed in 1908-1910, when the Chicago Sanitary District built the North Shore Channel and Wilmette Harbor.The outfall from Wilmette sewers was then diverted from Lake Michigan to the channel in 1914. The landfill created by the construction of the channel was subsequently developed into Wilmette's magnificent Gillson Park.

Wilmette originally purchased water from the City of Evanston, but in 1934 the Village constructed its own water plant and in 1937 started supplying water to the Village of Glenview. Construction of Wilmette's most famous landmark, the Baha'i Temple was started in 1920, but was not completed until 1953.