Ridge Historical Society
Teacher Appreciation Week – May 3-9, 2021
By Carol Flynn
We wouldn’t forget Teacher Appreciation Week! Teachers, education, and the quality of the local schools have always been important in the Ridge communities since they were founded. We will pick up where we left off some time ago in profiling people for whom schools are named in the Ridge communities.
Some outstanding teachers have been affiliated with the Ridge, and one of them was Kate Starr Kellogg (1854 – 1925). Kate was a progressive educator who explored new teaching techniques, introduced parent-teacher associations, and supported teachers’ unions. She was named a Chicago district superintendent in 1909. She was a contemporary to other educators from the area – Bessie Sutherland, Alice Barnard, and even John Vanderpoel. John Shoop, who also has a school on the Ridge named for him, was superintendent of Chicago public schools for part of Kate’s career.
Kate was born in New York to John Leonard Kellogg and Harriet Bencham Scott Kellogg. The family moved to Chicago when Kate was a young child.
John Kellogg was a prominent homeopathic physician, and a professor of obstetrics at Hahnemann Medical College.
In addition to his practice, Dr. Kellogg was also involved in charity work. In 1862, it was reported in the newspapers that he was the physician for the Home for the Friendless. The purpose of this home was to give shelter and aid to destitute women and children. The clientele was primarily children – homeless, orphaned, given up by or taken away by the courts from parents who could not care for them – and “worthy women” and children who through desertion or death had no husbands/fathers to provide for them. Dr. Kellogg treated the children for illnesses such as diphtheria, measles, and cholera. He also improved the sanitation of the home.
Dr. Kellogg was involved in local politics. He was elected president pf the Greenback Club in Evergreen Park in 1876. The Greenbacks were a political party – also known as the Independent Party or the Greenback Labor Party. They were in favor of financial reform, and worked to form an alliance of organized labor and farmers to topple the control of the industrial and banking empires. They later regrouped as the Progressive Party. He was also involved in Chicago school and education activities.
Dr. Kellogg bought a seventy-acre farm in Evergreen Park which became the family’s anchor for decades. It was referred to as his ”summer residence” although it appears it was a working farm. It bordered on 95th Street and California Avenue, the present site of Little Company of Mary Hospital. It is shown on an 1890 map although the family was living there for years prior to that.
Kate was the second of six daughters.
The oldest was Mary, who appears to have lived at the Evergreen Park location for most of her life. No occupation was listed for Mary on the U.S. Censuses so we don’t know that much about her.
The third daughter was Gertrude, and the same situation exists – we don’t have much information on her, she lived at the Evergreen Park house all her adult life.
The fourth daughter was Harriet, or Hattie. She worked as a teacher until she married businessman Clark Harold Foster from Englewood, Chicago, and they moved to New York.
Alice DeWolf Kellogg Tyler was the fifth daughter, and she became a well-known artist. Alice studied at the Academy of Fine Arts, which became the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. She began teaching there in 1887. She also studied in England and Paris, and her letters from that time are included in the Smithsonian Institution Archives of American Art. Alice’s artwork was exhibited at the 1893 World’s Fair, the Columbian Exposition in Chicago.
Some of her paintings were of family members and the farm in Evergreen Park. She also did a portrait of famous social worker and reformer Jane Addams, and her work is permanently exhibited at the Jane Addams Hull-House Museum.
Alice married Orno J. Tyler, a bookkeeper. Alice suffered from chronic renal disease, which took her life in 1900 at the age of 37.
The youngest daughter was Mabel, who is also listed as an artist. She married Charles Dyer Rich, but he died at the age of 31, leaving her a young widow with a son. She moved back home.
It appears that through the years, all of the family members lived on the Evergreen Park property. This included extended family – Orno Tyler lived with the family after Alice died.
The Kellogg family is buried at Mount Greenwood Cemetery, but the graves are not marked.
Next post: Kate Starr Kellogg’s career in education.