When former U.S. Rep. George Sangmeister, 71, was a boy, Frankfort was a tiny farm town of about 500 people.
“There was a time when I knew every single person in town, particularly when I had my paper route,” Sangmeister said.
Today, with Frankfort’s population at least 20 times larger, more people know Sangmeister by reputation than he could hope to know personally.
Likewise for the neighboring villages of Mokena and New Lenox, linked together by a stretch of Lincoln Highway (U.S. Highway 30) with populations that exceed Frankfort’s: All three once were small rural communities that transformed during the last 30 years into desirable suburbs that have yet to reach their potential in terms of residential and commercial growth.
Not that there wasn’t growth before, but it was much slower, Sangmeister said. The type of life was different, too, he said.
“Once it was pretty typical around here for most people to be farmers. Dad and Mom would work their farm until they retired around age 50 to 55. Then they would turn the farm over to the kids and move into town, maybe building a house,” Sangmeister said. “It was that way for quite a few years. But in the later part of the 1970s and the early ’80s, it began to change dramatically.”
Spillover suburban growth
Suburban growth fanning out from Chicago had reached Will County. And as new homes were built in Frankfort, Mokena and New Lenox, many were purchased by residents of Chicago and Cook County who were attracted by the villages’ country charm.
“Everyone in some respects likes the small-town community,” Sangmeister said. “Those of us who have been here a while kind of hate to see the old, small town change. But it was inevitable and it has happened and it is still happening.
“Still, it was always amusing to go to the zoning hearings because you would expect the real objections to come from the people that have lived here all their lives, but generally they accepted it more than the newcomers,” Sangmeister said. “The newcomers moved out to what they considered to be a small community and they were most vociferous against any kind of zoning change to allow any further development. But progress moves on–eventually it is going to happen.”
An affordable area
Jim Moustis, 52, is Frankfort Township supervisor and a Will County Board member whose district covers the north halves of Frankfort and New Lenox Townships. He was among an early wave of Cook County residents to relocate to the Lincoln-Way area. His family was one of the first to buy a home in Frankfort Square, an unincorporated community northwest of Lincoln Highway and Harlem Avenue, where he still lives.
“I think we were one of the first 50 families to move in,” he said. “And I can tell you there wasn’t much around.”
At one time there was movement in the Frankfort Square community to incorporate, but the time for that has passed, Moustis said. Over the years the surrounding communities have laid claim to virtually all of the prime potential business property.
“I don’t think there’s enough land mass left for Frankfort Square to incorporate,” he said. “Certainly there is no potential commercial or industrial base left to be part of a new village.”
But Frankfort Square does have one advantage: more affordable housing.
“The villages have been strict with their building codes,” Sangmeister said. “And as a result we have ended up with communities for upper-middle-class people but very little in the way of starter housing.”
Frankfort Square, on the other hand, has diverse housing, including a fair share of condos, Moustis said.
“None of it’s inexpensive anymore, but it’s housing young people can afford, and therefore we have a lot of kids who grow up here and now own their own homes here,” he said.
A pattern to its growth
Both Sangmeister and Moustis feel the Lincoln-Way area has developed in an orderly and logical fashion.
“I think things have progressed fairly well,” Sangmeister said. “As the communities have been expanding, there has been proportional growth in terms of police and fire departments. Major streets have been planned for as well as water and sewer lines. All this is due, of course, to having had such good leadership in these communities. All the way through we have been lucky to have leaders who believe in the planning and hard work it takes to make a community attractive.
“I think one of the keys to the growth here is that we have excellent schools in all three of these communities. For parents who want their children to get a good education, the schools here are a big factor in the decision to move here.”
The Lincoln-Way High Schools receive Sangmeister’s highest praise.
“I dare you to find another school–private or public–in the state of Illinois that’s as nice as those two schools.”
“I suppose there were times when you could say the schools have been pushed to the limits, when the development made it difficult for the schools to catch up,” Moustis said. “But basically people have been very supportive of the school systems and have passed numerous referendums over the years to expand and improve them.”
“Anyway,” Sangmeister said, “what we have is the kind of atmosphere that keeps developers wanting to build.”
Pull toward the city
Although the Lincoln-Way towns used to be commercially oriented toward Joliet, that is no longer the case.
“I would say over the years the pull toward Chicago has increased, particularly when people want to go shopping,” Sangmeister said. “For what you can’t buy locally, people will go to a big shopping center like Lincoln Mall [in Matteson] or Orland Square.”
“Many Lincoln-Way area residents still work in Chicago,” Moustis pointed out. “All you have to do is watch the way the traffic heads in the morning and look at all the cars in the Metra parking lots to realize how many people living here still go to work in Chicago or Cook County.”
Despite the growth, one of the features of life in the Lincoln-Way area that has remained mostly unchanged has been the politics. What was historically a Republican area remains a Republican area, both Sangmeister and Moustis noted.
“My father was the mayor of Frankfort for over 30 years, so I grew up in the political realm,” said Sangmeister, a staunch Democrat. “When those of us who were Democrats out here looked at all these people moving to the area from the city of Chicago where people are Democrats, we thought we were going to have it made. But we soon found out that when people come out here and get into the suburban setting where practically all the offices are controlled by Republicans that they are much more likely to go along with the establishment.”
Goes with the territory
Moustis, a Republican who grew up on Chicago’s South Side, said the trend toward the Republican Party in the Lincoln-Way area has been the effect of people finding they had a choice in politics.
“In Chicago you were either a Democrat or you kept your mouth shut,” Moustis said. “But many people who came here from Chicago always had pretty conservative values.”
Managing growth will be a top priority for all three villages in the future, Sangmeister predicted.
But regional growth may also come to bear on the communities as well, he said, and the need to keep the planning process open is important.
“Take the proposed Peotone airport,” Sangmeister said. If it goes in there will be some obvious benefits, he said, but also some possible drawbacks.
“I think we will get our share of the jobs, both in the construction work that should last from 10 to 15 years and also the permanent jobs that will be generated,” Sangmeister said. “But as far as for Frankfort and New Lenox Townships, I can’t help but wonder what effect the flight patterns may have. How the runways could be located and how low planes may end up flying over this area is something that might get people very upset. It’s just one of the things about the future of the area that we need to be concerned about.”
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Population trends
in thousands
1980
Frankfort 4.4
Mokena 4.6
New Lenox 5.8
1990
Frankfort 7.2
Mokena 10.1
New Lenox 10.6
2000
Frankfort 10.4
Mokena 14.6
New Lenox 17.8
2020 (PROJECTIONS)
Frankfort 35.6* 31.0
Mokena 23.2* 22.9
New Lenox 43.7* 42.9
*Higher number projected if third airport is built.
2000 POPULATION BY RACE
FRANKFORT
White 93.9%
Other 4.8%
Includes:
Asian 2.1%
Black 2.5%
American Indian 0.2%
MOKENA
White 96.9%
Other 1.9%
Includes:
Asian 1.3%
Black 0.5%
American Indian 0.1%
NEW LENOX
White 97.7%
Other 0.8%
Includes:
Asian 0.4%
Black 0.3%
American Indian 0.1%
Note: Percentages do not total 100 because figures unaccounted for are other races or multi-racial.
Sources: U.S. Census Bureau, Illinois Department of Commerce and Community Affairs, and the villages of Frankfort, Mokena and New Lenox
Chicago Tribune
