Evanston Dimensions | Ask the Historians

I just read your article on the Evanston Inn/Hotel that was published in the RoundTable and I was curious if you had any information on the old Pembridge Hotel that was located at 1406 Chicago Ave. … I have just learned [it] was formerly Pembridge House, a Northwestern University dormitory for women during WWII, and I’m trying to learn about the history of the building.

An Evanston RoundTable reader

Thank you for your question. Digging into the history of the building at 1406 Chicago Ave. turned out to be an absorbing experience. The building, located between Lake Street and Greenwood Avenue, just one block south of Raymond Park, has an interesting history, and it was fun to look into the records that tell not only the story of that specific building, but also the surrounding area. 

Pembridge Hotel

If you stand on the east side of Chicago Avenue and look up at the building at 1406, you can just make out the faded “Pembridge” inscribed at the top of the building. This so-called ghost sign reveals something of the building’s history, which begins in 1928 when the six-story structure was constructed.

The building’s owner, Frederick W. Lang, was also an architect. Lang designed the hotel and hired Nils Persson Severin to construct it.[1] Both Lang and Severin were Evanston residents, living at 1317 Oak Ave. and 1125 Davis St., respectively.[2]

The 81-room hotel that rose at 1406 Chicago Ave. was designed as a “bachelor hotel,” a men’s-only residence that catered to white-collar professionals and offered bachelor residents “convenience” and “comfort” – not to mention “single blessedness,” as the Evanston News-Index put it. Nearly all the hotel rooms had connecting baths, while downstairs a lounge provided residents with “a restful atmosphere” whose “homelike features” included a wood-burning fireplace and radio.[3]

Soon after it opened in the summer of 1928, the Pembridge Hotel won the City of Evanston’s award for architectural merit.[4]

The construction of the Pembridge Hotel occurred during a new era of apartment house and hotel construction in Evanston. Throughout the 1920s, the city experienced a post-World War I building boom; the period saw more construction than any other era up to that point. Along with land prices, numerous apartment houses and hotels were going up around the city. In just a few short years, in addition to the Pembridge Hotel, Evanston would see construction of the Orrington Hotel (1923-1924), the Georgian Hotel (1927) and the Homestead Hotel (1928).

The 1920s construction of hotels and other large buildings meant that a page was turning on the story of an older, more residential Evanston. Indeed, all along Chicago Avenue – where the Pembridge Hotel would rise in 1928 – single-family homes once dotted the thoroughfare. And before those were built, a women’s college once stood on the site.

Predecessors

On the current site of 1406 Chicago Ave. and the surrounding land between Chicago and Sherman avenues, and Lake and Greenwood streets, once stood the North-Western Female College (not affiliated with Northwestern University). Dedicated in 1856, the building stood for less than a year before it was destroyed by fire. A new building was constructed on the same site in 1857. That too would be destroyed, razed to make way for residential housing in the growing city of Evanston.

By 1892, Evanston had become a city and was undergoing a population boom. In 1894, several homes were constructed along the west side of the block of Chicago Avenue between Lake and Greenwood, including one at 1406 Chicago. There are no known existing images of that house, but there are images of surrounding homes that once lined the avenue.

Before the Pembridge hotel was constructed, ownership of the house at 1406 Chicago Ave. changed hands several times. Its final owner was Hugh Prior Wetherbee (1867- 1941), an accountant for the Interstate Commerce Commission. In 1925, Wetherbee, who lived in the house with his wife, Grace, and son, Ambrose, applied for a building permit to construct a garage on the lot. Two years later, they sold the house and moved to 925 Hinman Ave. In December 1927, the new owner, Frederick W. Lang, applied for a permit to demolish the house; plans for the construction of a new “fireproof hotel” on the site were soon underway.[5]

Another former neighbor to the Pembridge was the Church of All Souls,[*] constructed in 1903. The 100-seat chapel, which stood across the street from the Pembridge, was dedicated in June 1904. The church was designed by architect Marion Mahony Griffin (1871-1961), who was also a member of the church.

Griffin, born in Chicago, was the second woman to earn an architecture degree from MIT and the first woman licensed to practice architecture in Illinois.[6] Before starting her own practice with her husband, Walter Burley Griffin (also an architect), she worked in the studios of architects Frank Lloyd Wright and Dwight Heald Perkins.[7] She grew up in nearby Winnetka and later lived in Rogers Park.

As the blocks surrounding the new Pembridge Hotel began to take on a newer, more modern shape, the doors of the new hotel opened. It was advertised as being “ideally located” near Lake Michigan, Evanston’s shopping district and transportation. The hotel appealed to long-term guests and rented accommodations by the month as well as by the night. It had a kitchen and dining room that was open not only to guests but also to the general public.

Northwestern students made use of the dining room, often hosting club dinners and events at the Pembridge. The university’s Philosophy Discussion Club, which met frequently at the All Souls Church across the street, hosted regular dinners at the Pembridge preceding their meetings.[8]

According to U.S. census records, the Pembridge was segregated, as were nearly all of Evanston’s hotels for many decades. Only white residents lived at 1406 Chicago. In the 1920s and into the 1930s, the residents were all white males, mostly in their 20s and 30s. Among them were salesmen, clerks and lawyers. Herbert S. Potter was the hotel’s first manager. There was at least one Black employee hired to work at the Pembridge: In 1929, Perry Wilson, a Black Evanston resident, was employed to work maintenance at the hotel.

The hotel soon ran into financial difficulty following the 1929 stock market crash. The Great Depression spelled difficulty around the globe. “Thrifty rates” were available at this “economical” hotel, the ads now noted. And the Pembridge made a pointed appeal to Northwestern students, graduates and parents with ads regularly appearing in the Daily Northwestern.

A bestselling author: Daughter and Wife of Pembridge managers

For a few years in the 1930s, the hotel’s managing director was Evanston resident Claude Arthur Ward (1880-1971).[9] Ward, his wife Marion (1882-1974), and two daughters, Mary Jane and Charlotte, moved to Evanston in 1915 and lived in an apartment house at 1610 Oak St., which no longer exists.

After graduating from Evanston Township High School in 1923, the Wards’ eldest daughter, Mary Jane, attended Northwestern for two years and then studied art at the Lyceum of Arts Conservatory.[10] It turns out that her connection to the hotel adds an interesting layer to the building’s history.

In 1928, Mary Jane Ward married Edward Quayle. Quayle also attended Northwestern. An aspiring playwright, Quayle worked as a statistician for a cement company. Living in Evanston in the 1930s, the young couple struggled to make ends meet. Soon, Quayle took over his father-in-law’s job as manager of the Pembridge.

Meanwhile, Ward took on various jobs, from selling dresses to writing mail-order advertising. Later she was hired as a writer for the Evanston News-Index.[11] She was also working on a number of novels. In 1939 Ward and Quayle moved to New York City, where Quayle managed a hotel.[12] Mary Jane Ward continued to write.

Her work paid off. Ward would go on to become a bestselling author with the publication of her 1946 semiautobiographical novel, The Snake Pit (later made into a film starring Oliva de Haviland). The novel was largely based on Ward’s own experience being treated at a New York State psychiatric hospital in 1941. Ward was variously diagnosed with schizophrenia and bipolar disorder and suffered throughout her life from bouts of illness; she would seek treatment in hospitals several times.

The Snake Pit joined the pantheon of books and movies that shifted the narrative concerning critical social issues. Ward’s book confronted the stigmatization of people living with mental illnesses. Ward would spend much of her career dedicated to educating the public about mental illness. In 1946, Ward and Quayle returned to Illinois from New York and bought a dairy farm in Elgin. They later moved back to Evanston.[13]

The Pembridge in the Great Depression

As the Depression wore on, the Pembridge faced financial difficulty and underwent several cost-cutting changes. In order to increase revenue, the hotel opened its doors to female residents in 1937.[14] The hotel that once appealed to “bachelors” now broadened its pitch and advertised to both “business men and women” (emphasis added).

One of those women was Dorothy Donahue, a Northwestern student. Donahue was present the night of May 26, 1937, when the hotel was robbed. Quayle was on duty that night when a “man, dark haired and handsome with a white handkerchief over his face” robbed the hotel’s office safe of $350.

Afterward, Donahue told a reporter: “The bandit evidently was a man of some education. He cursed profusely and then apologized.” Donahue recounted that she had been wearing a diamond ring her father had given her as a graduation present. She stealthily put the ring in her mouth to hide it and nearly swallowed it while the robber tied her up.[15] The robber made his escape with the case he’d stolen, as well as the hotel guests’ jewelry from the hotel safe.

In late 1938, the hotel underwent foreclosure after it “failed to prove sufficiently profitable” and the State Bank of Evanston assumed trusteeship. The real estate firm Quinlan and Tyson took over management.[16] 

The hotel was still full to capacity; now its residents – both men and women – ranged in age from 16 to 82. The hotel had become more of a “residential hotel” (an apartment house) with residents staying on, sometimes for years. But because of the hotel’s economic struggle, cost-cutting measures continued: By the early 1940s the dining room and kitchen were permanently closed.

As the hotel struggled financially through the Depression, potential buyers were sought. The Evanston real estate firm Hokanson and Jenks ran advertisements in the Chicago Tribune announcing the sale of a “high grade hotel” in an undisclosed residential suburb. According to correspondence housed in the Evanston History Center archives, at least three offers were made, but none were in an amount the bank found acceptable. (The asking price was $110,000-$120,000).[17] It was not until 1943 that a new owner would be found.

A dormitory for the duration

With the entrance of the United States into World War II, Northwestern found itself with an extreme shortage of student housing. Because of a wartime rationing of gasoline that made commuting to campus difficult, in 1943 more students than ever had applied to live on campus. All of the men’s dormitories on the north campus had been turned over to a college training program for the U.S. Navy. Meanwhile, the university also saw an increase in enrollment of female students. Facing wartime restrictions on non-war related construction, university officials surveyed the existing housing stock in Evanston to find more student housing.[18]

In August 1943, Northwestern announced that it had purchased the Pembridge for $120,000.[19] Northwestern’s business manager explained that the university planned to use the hotel as a women’s dormitory “for the duration of the war.”[20]

The building underwent a quick overhaul: Its 72 bedrooms, dining room and kitchen were remodeled and refurnished in order to make the building “more adaptable to dormitory purposes.”[21] In fall 1943, the new dormitory, called Pembridge House, opened to 144 women students.[22]

Segregation would persist at 1406 Chicago Ave. Indeed, for decades Northwestern barred Black students and visitors from living in any of its housing facilities. It was not until 1947 that Northwestern opened an integrated women’s dormitory.[23]  

The women who moved into Pembridge House in the fall of 1943 had company: Three men who had been living at the Pembridge Hotel when it was sold to Northwestern declined to move out. After a brief legal skirmish, they were allowed to remain temporarily. After all, the housing shortage impacted everyone, not just students.

“Most of the coeds have accepted the situation with good grace,” one newspaper reported.[24] One of the hotel residents who refused to move had been living at the Pembridge Hotel since he graduated from Northwestern in 1930. The only problem with living in a women’s dormitory, he told a reporter, was the curfew: All residents had to observe lights out by 10 p.m.[25]

The new dormitory did not entirely solve the problem of limited campus housing. As the 19453 fall quarter approached, an estimated 200 students were still unable to enroll because of “inadequate” housing.[26] The university scrambled to find more off-campus housing for the students.

Along with the local newspaper, The Evanston Review, Northwestern launched an appeal to Evanston residents to rent rooms in their homes. About 6,000 male Evanston residents were now in the service and it was hoped that “there may be Evanston families with a spare room available who might be willing to take a student or two,” said Alice Schwiebert, Director of Women’s Dormitories. [27]

Throughout the war, Pembridge House residents took part in campus-wide war-related programs, hosting, for example, an “entertaining open house” for servicemen and also staging an original musical comedy based on “dormitory life,” called The Pembridge Phollies. The production premiered at the Highland Park U.S.O. in December 1944.[28]

The overriding theme of these events was to keep up “morale.” For many Pembridge residents, that was made more difficult because their own husbands were in the service. Indeed, during World War II, a large number of Northwestern students were not only female, they were also married; their husbands were in training, in combat, and in service around the globe. Now, a shift was underway in what was considered the “average” college student. “Faculty eyebrows are no longer raised in horror at the thought of married students in the undergraduate schools,” the Chicago Tribune reported in 1944.[29]

With the end of the war and another postwar building boom about to get underway, Northwestern would see enrollment skyrocket with the passage of the G.I. Bill. Numerous new dormitories were planned, but Northwestern continued to use the Pembridge House as a dormitory for a decade. “Despite the long walk to 8:30 classes Pembridge still retains its popularity,” the Daily Northwestern reported in 1953, “for there are several girls in the dormitory who have returned to spend their third and senior year there.”[30]

In 1954, the university announced plans to convert the Pembridge House into graduate student housing. But those plans were scrapped and the Pembridge was sold. Its final year in service as a dormitory was 1959-1960. (In the following two years, Northwestern constructed two new women’s dormitories.) 

Apparently the success of a hotel-to-dormitory conversion was in the minds of Northwestern officials when they purchased the Oak Crest Hotel at 1570 Oak Ave. in summer 1960 and announced plans to convert the 1929 hotel into housing for married graduate students.[31] 

A new era for the Pembridge

In the summer of 1960, the new owner of the former Pembridge House applied for a permit to convert the building into a nursing home. Dr. Kenneth Grubb was appointed medical director of the facility, which was advertised as providing “spacious” rooms, “selective” diets and 24-hour care “under supervision of registered nurses.” The cost: $11 per day.

That same year, 1960, the “old” block of Chicago Avenue would fade further into the historical distance. In the years since the Pembridge Hotel had been built, a series of apartment houses had replaced the houses along the west side of the block, including a 1928 cooperative apartment building at 1430 Chicago Ave., constructed by Evanston’s ubiquitous developer, Victor Carlson.

In 1960, the Church of All Souls, across the street from the Pembridge, was put on the market. After securing property on Ridge Avenue for a new and larger facility, the Unitarian Church of Evanston sold the church to the First Presbyterian Church. In the summer of 1960, the Church of All Souls was demolished to make way for the parking lot that exists today, just south of the First Presbyterian church.  

By 1970, the First Presbyterian Church (built in 1895), at the corner of Chicago Avenue and Lake Street and designed by Daniel Burnham, would be the only structure on the block remaining from the earlier era.

In the 1970s and 1980s, the facility at 1406 Chicago Ave. would cease being called a nursing home; it was variously described as a “health care center” and later a facility for “long term care.” A total of 145 beds were available in the facility. 

In 1982 the Pembridge House facility filed a $1 million federal lawsuit against the City of Evanston charging city officials with creating difficulties for the operation of the facility, allegedly stemming from an effort to “banish … persons with [mental] handicaps from Pembridge house and Evanston by attempting to close the home.”[32] The suit was dismissed by a U.S. District Court judge.[33]

In 1993, a new corporate owner opened a new facility: Greenwood Care, an intermediate care facility “for the chronically mentally ill.” The for-profit facility, licensed by the state of Illinois, is classified as a specialized mental health rehabilitation facility. Greenwood Care continues to operate the facility today.[34]

Postscript

It is an ironic fact that the building at 1406 Chicago Ave., which now has a nearly century-long history, serves today as housing for individuals living with mental illness.

Mary Jane Ward, whose own family members once managed the Pembridge Hotel, spent much of her life after the 1946 publication of The Snake Pit working to educate the American public about mental illness and specifically about the condition of facilities in which patients are treated, especially state institutions. She visited hundreds of facilities, gave hundreds of speeches and worked in the mental health community to raise awareness and provide relief and support to those living with mental illness.

One of her goals was to erase the stigma of mental illness and advocate for patients. “When I came back from the hospital,” Ward said of her first treatment at a psychiatric hospital, “my friends avoided the subject of my illness, although I had no hesitancy about discussing it until I saw that it would be easier for them if I didn’t. In the hospital, mental illness is regarded as simply an illness. The public’s wary attitude toward ‘breakdowns’ must be overcome.”[35]

Especially in the aftermath of World War II, when so many who suffered through the war were in need of help, the field of psychology began to be transformed. Ward’s novel went a long way in changing public attitudes about mental illness.

The Evanston History Center is happy to partner with the Evanston RoundTable to share the insights that our expansive collection of Evanston history provides. Public records, newspapers, letters, maps, photographs and artifacts all carry messages from the past to inform our lives today. The differences and changes can be compelling, disconcerting, educational, but always fascinating and often downright funny.

Since history looks at the past but also influences the future, and today will be history tomorrow, we have titled this column “Dimensions.”  We are living in a historic time, and you can help us tell future generations what it was like. We are located in the National Historic Landmark Charles Gates Dawes House at 225 Greenwood St.. Please visit our website to learn more about how you can participate and contribute to the collection.

What are you curious about in Evanston history? Let us know what you’ve wondered about! Send your queries to info@evanstonhistorycenter.org.

Thank you,
Eden Juron Pearlman, Executive Director

[*] Now the Unitarian Church of Evanston.

[1] “Local Hotel Notes,” Daily National Hotel Reporter, Dec. 24, 1927.

[2] “Nils P. Severin, Ex-Contractor Dies in Chicago,” Chicago Tribune, March 27, 1945. In 1888, Nils P. Severin (1861-1945) immigrated to Chicago from Sweden. He ran a large and successful contracting firm, N.P. Severin Co., until he retired in 1931. Among his firm’s projects were a 1927 renovation of some floors in the White House in Washington; the construction of a courthouse in Honolulu; a government building in Juneau, Alaska; and the Arlington Memorial Bridge across the Potomac River. Among his Evanston projects were the First Presbyterian Church (Daniel Burnham, architect, 1894-1895), Haven Middle School, and the (old) YMCA building, once located at Sherman Avenue and Davis Street.

[3] “Single Blessedness,” Evanston News-Index, Dec. 22, 1927.

[4] “Northwestern Buys Pembridge to Provide Dormitory Space for Women Students,” Evanston Review, Aug. 23, 1943.

[5] Application for Building Permit, Permit No. 17633, Commissioner of Buildings, Evanston, Dec. 30, 1927, Evanston History Center.

[6] Griffin was actually the first woman to be licensed to practice architecture in the world, since Illinois was the first locality to require architects to be licensed. John K. Notz Jr., “Hometown Hall of Famer: Marian Mahony Griffin,” Winnetka Historical Society Gazette, Summer 2004. https://www.winnetkahistory.org/gazette/marion-mahony-griffin/

[7] Margaret Shaklee, “A History of the Unitarian Church of Evanston,” https://ucevanston.org/about-history/; “Marion Mahony Griffin,” https://www.landmarks.org/women_built_type/marion-mahony-griffin/

[8] “Philosophy Group Meets to Hear Stevens Tonight,” Daily Northwestern, Jan. 16, 1930.

[9] According to Evanston City Directories, Claude A. Ward was manager of the Pembridge in 1935- 1937. The Wards later lived at 1030 Dempster St. and then at 725 Emerson St.

[10] Larry Lockridge, Afterword in Mary Jane Ward, The Snake Pit (New York: Random House, 2021): 325.

[11] “NU Alumna’s Novel Selected by Book-of-the-Month Club,” Daily Northwestern, Jan. 22, 1946.

[12] Larry Lockridge, Afterword in Mary Jane Ward, The Snake Pit (New York: Random House, 2021): 326.

[13] “Mary Jane Ward,” Current Biography, 1946, 622.

[14] “Northwestern Buys Pembridge to Provide Dormitory Space for Women Students,” Evanston Review, Aug. 23, 1943.

[15] “Nearly Swallow Ring: Bandit Takes $350,” The Times, May 27, 1937.

[16] “Northwestern Buys Pembridge to Provide Dormitory Space for Women Students,” Evanston Review, Aug. 23, 1943.

[17] “1406 Chicago Avenue,” House files collection. Evanston History Center Archives.

[18] “Seek Evanston Rooms for 200 N.U. Students,” Chicago Tribune, Aug. 15, 1943.

[19] “Northwestern Buys Pembridge Hotel Building,” Chicago Tribune, Aug. 26, 1943.

[20] “University Acquire Hotel for Women’s Dormitory,” Daily Northwestern, Aug. 27, 1943.

[21] “University Acquire Hotel for Women’s Dormitory,” Daily Northwestern, Aug. 27, 1943.

[22] “Pembridge Will House 144 Coeds,” Daily Northwestern, Sept. 23, 1943.

[23] Three years later, an integrated men’s dormitory opened. Both of the women’s and men’s integrated dormitories were located off campus, but they served as the precursors to an eventual integration of all student housing. For more, see Jenny Thompson, The Takeover 1968.

[24] “3 Men Refuse to Quit Rooms in Coed Dorm,” Miami News, Sept. 21, 1943.

[25] “3 Men Refuse to Vacate Hotel Purchased by University for Use as Girls’ Dorm,” Palladium-Item, Sept. 21, 1943.

[26] “Lack Housing Space Again,” Daily Northwestern, Nov. 17, 1943.

[27] “Seek Evanston Rooms for 200 N.U. Students,” Chicago Tribune, Aug. 15, 1943.

[28] “Stage Open House at Scott Sunday,” Daily Northwestern, Oct. 22, 1943; “Pembridge Group to Give Phollies Sunday at USO,” Daily Northwestern, Dec. 1, 1944.

[29] “Again It’s the War.” Chicago Tribune, Jan. 30, 1944.

[30] “Pembridge to House Grads,” Daily Northwestern, Oct. 27, 1953.

[31] Joanne Knoch, “N.U. Takes Unique Step on Housing,” Chicago Tribune, July 3, 1960.

[32] Andy Bagnato, “Nursing Home Files Lawsuit Against Evanston,” Daily Northwestern, May 5, 1982.

[33] Andy Bagnato, “Home’s Suit Dismissed,” Daily Northwestern, Nov. 18, 1982.

[34] “Greenwood Care,” http://greenwoodcare.com/

[35] Mildred Lensing, “Why See a Stigma in a Snake Pit?” Courier-Journal, June 21, 1951.