The First Beverly Art Center
By Carol Flynn
The Ridge Historical Society (RHS) will be open tomorrow, Sunday, December 11, from 1 p.m. to 4:00 p.m. The address is 10621 S. Seeley Avenue, and admission is free.
The current exhibit, Hetherington Design Dynasty, will only be on display for a few more weeks, through January 7. RHS is open on Sundays and Tuesdays from 1:00 to 4:00 p.m., or by appointment. Note, however, that Christmas and New Year’s Day fall on Sundays this year and RHS will be closed both days. This means there are only two Sundays left to view the exhibit – tomorrow and December 18.
The exhibit has a new feature added for the holidays – the Christmas cards that Mildred Lyon Hetherington designed and sent to family and friends.
The Hetheringtons were a three-generation family of architects – John Todd, his son Murray, and Murray’s son Jack – who lived in Beverly and designed close to one hundred homes and buildings in the area, including the Graver-Driscoll House, RHS Headquarters.
Mildred Lyon was a local artist who met Murray Hetherington when they were both students at the Art Institute of Chicago. They married and had two children, son Jack the architect, and a daughter Mary who died young.
Mildred was known for her portraits and her illustrations of children’s publications. As many artists do, she created her own Christmas cards.
In 1969, Mildred’s card featured the new Beverly Art Center (BAC), which had just opened that September on the 2100 block of West 111th Street, on the campus of the Morgan Park Academy (MPA).
This was a significant event for the Hetherington family because the building was designed by Jack Hetherington, who had attended MPA. Although BAC moved from that building when the new BAC at 111th Street and Western Avenue was built, MPA continues to use the building
The original BAC building features a modern design with a portico that floats atop slender concrete columns, nicely depicted by Mildred in her Christmas card.
However, this past summer, architects and historians, as well as Hetherington family members, were dismayed to observe that MPA was encasing the lower sections of the concrete columns in brick, destroying the original façade.
While it is understood that this was done to preserve the columns from further deterioration, the alterations are incompatible with the original design. Not only is the building affected, but the visual cohesiveness of the Ridge Historic District is impacted by this type of alteration to a historic building. The Ridge Historic District is part of the National Register for Historic Places. The RHS Historic Buildings Committee has been in contact with MPA.
RHS can help owners of local historic buildings in need of preservation “facelifts” to understand landmark considerations, and to research the building’s history and design to assist with restoration efforts.