Celebrating Good Memories

Meadowbrook Manor will have two good reasons to celebrate this weekend. 

The family-owned skilled nursing and rehabilitation facility, 339 S. 9th Ave., is having it fourth annual community block party from 2 p.m. to 5 p.m. tomorrow.

As part of the celebration, they will commemorate the centennial of the Meadowbrook Manor building which was the original location of the Illinois Masonic Orphans Home.

Beverley Domaleczny, the facility’s admissions director, said Meadowbrook Manor moved into its current site in 2005. With 197 beds and 125 residents, the building has been a staple in the LaGrange community for more than 40 years.

The community block party started four years ago, Domaleczny said, as a way “to celebrate being a part of a very vibrant and active community. We’re very proud of our involvement with the community as we give back to many our residents and family members from the LaGrange area.”

The event—an ice cream social—will have attractions such as a live deejay, inflatable structures for children, face painting and balloon art provided by the West Suburban Clown Club. Visitors will also have a chance to win a commemorative ceramic and cloth angel figurine as part of a raffle. Raffle proceeds will go toward resident programming, Domaleczny said.

Besides the festivities, visitors can attend guided tours of the facility’s building which will mark its 100th anniversary this year. Dedicated in 1911, the building was the home of the Illinois Masonic Orphans Home, Domaleczny said. In the early 1960s, it was sold and then converted into a skilled nursing and rehabilitation center called Colonial Manor. The home, a campus with  residential cottages, moved to next door to what is now Meadowbrook.

The home was a place where former residents such as 79-year-old Georgetta Rediehs felt comfortable and safe. The Burr Ridge resident will be on hand to answer questions during the tours.

She explained that when her when her mother died, her father needed help in caring for her and her brothers Edward and Gordon. The children’s father was a Mason and belonged to a local lodge. Members recommended the home to him and he sent the children there. While he visited her and her brothers, Georgetta stayed at the home during her pre-teen and teenage years from 1942 to 1950.

“That’s what the home was for,” she said. “It was for people who needed help raising their children. A lot of the kids there didn’t have either parent (in their lives). Some of us had one parent. I was fortunate to have my dad.”

Georgetta Rediehs remembered how the home provided the basics which included healthcare, education at LaGrange public schools, participation at a local Congregational church and activities. Everyone had a chore to do.

“Being older and looking back, I think they did a great job,” she said. “When I went to the home, there were about 250 kids. They took care of everybody. If you needed special care, they would line up an appointment with a doctor and you would see that doctor in town.”

The staff also helped some of their residents, like Rediehs, find work or go to college once they reached adulthood. She held a summer job and briefly attended Northern Illinois University on a scholarship. As a young adult, she married her high school sweetheart.

“There’s just so many fond memories of being in the home,” she said. “It’s not like growing up in a normal family home. I would liken it more to being in the Army. It was very regimented. Of course, with having that many people you tend to have everything regulated in such a way that you knew where all these kids were all the time.”

For more information, call Meadowbrook Manor at 708-354-4660.