Historical Photo Guessing Game: It's The Lake Forest Municipal Services Building

Even with not much to go on from the looks of the photo, people correctly guessed the structure is the old Municipal Services building on Laurel Avenue.

The photograph was taken from the Witness Tree Book, which has been produced during Lake Forest's 150th anniversary. The book is available online at www.lf150.com, the , the , or the 

According to the Witness Tree Book, the Municipal Services Building construction took place in the early 1960s, replacing the old facility at 1170 Western Avenue. The original plan was to finance the $250,000 building from the sale of the city property. However, there were no buyers, and the site of the old facility is now Franklin Park, a small triangle just south of Crystal Point. The building was financed instead with funds on hand from various divisions of the Public Works department.

The building was to be completed in January, 1962. However, the Auburn Construction Co., which had submitted the lowest bid, defaulted in November of 1961, and in January of 1962, work remained at a standstill until another contractor could be found to take over the job.

The Municipal Services Building was vacated in 2009 for a larger facility at Conway.

Thanks for your continued participation with these historical photo postings.

We'll be back with another historical posting on Sunday (Aug. 14).