2921 Salena

Single Family Gut Rehab

Benton Park Neighborhood

HISTORY: The South Side Consumer Dairy, the original farmhouse at 2921 Salena was built as a single-family home in 1884. What we refer to as "The Dairy", next door at 2919 Salena [shown at left], was a storefront/warehouse building constructed in 1904. A two-story carriage house was eventually built behind the farmhouse in 1920.

Henry Funk, a tailor who had his shop on south Fourth Street, lived in the farmhouse at 2921 Salena from 1884 until 1904 when it was sold to William C. and Louisa Grimm.

After acquiring the farmhouse the Grimms built the storefront at 2919 and proceeded to run their business, Grimm Brothers Window Glass, there until 1925.

The property continued its history of home and business when, in 1926, it became the Theodore Hediger Dairy. In 1931 Mr. Hediger changed the name to the South Side Dairy and later to the South Side Consumer Dairy Company. By 1939 the dairy was listed at both 2919 and 2921. In 1944 the Hediger family sold the dairy to the Beatrice Creamery Company which later became Beatrice Foods. Two years later Anthony Goellner had bought the dairy but kept it a very short time and in 1947, he sold it to William T. and Esther Corrigan. They named it Northland Dairy and it operated for the next 21 years. In 1963 the Home Juice Company was also listed at this address, but by 1965 only Northland Dairy remained. Four years later it had become Gaymont Dairy Specialties Company. The last business to be listed here was a diet beverage company, H & R Distributor and that was in 1980.

The properties were vacant from 1981 and the Benton Park Housing Corporation worked for many years with Alderman Ken Ortmann to find a way to acquire the property for redevelopment. Eventually the Land Reutilization Authority acquired the property and Millennium was selected by the Benton Park Housing Corporation as the developer.

As development began on the project, it was found that some of the original historical details had been altered or changed completely. The brick had been painted; glass block had been installed where windows once were; white glazed brick had been applied over the exterior façade; the courtyard was roofed in; heavy machinery was located in many parts of the buildings; and the first floor of the carriage house had been converted to a massive walk-in cooler.

Fortunately though, Millennium has found that the original room dimensions had remained intact; The Dairy's historic storefront had been covered over with siding and was completely salvagable; and much of the original decorative brick work on the farmhouse remained.