Mettawa was incorporated in 1960 by a group of forward-looking residents who wished to preserve the area’s rural beauty for future generations.

The area was originally settled by Native Americans, http://www.tolatsga.org/pota.html, and Mettawa takes its name from the chief of a former Potawatami Village that was located in the 1830s near the Village’s southwestern border. The Village’s name was proposed by James Getz the first Village Mayor and then president of the Lake County Historical Society.

In 1844, the United States government issued property deeds to settlers who wanted to homestead in this beautiful area. In fact, Bradley Road takes its name from one of these early families. The first homesteaders in this area east of the Des Plaines River found a land filled with wetlands, prairie with beautiful flowers, hickory-oak forests, and a network of Indian trails linking the Villages and Forts, present at that time. For the next hundred years much of the land suitable for growing crops was farmed.

In the early part of the 20th century, some land holdings were assembled into larger country estates and used as summer retreats. Two famous residents and landowners of the area were Adlai E. Stevenson (Governor of Illinois and candidate for U.S. President) and Edward H. Bennett (co-author with Daniel Burnham of the 1909 Plan of Chicago).

By mid-20th century, there were 118 residents living in what is now the Village of Mettawa. Many of these residents kept horses and appreciated the beauty of the landscape, its forests and open fields. They understood that the quality of life here could be threatened by dense residential and/or commercial development, so they decided to take some steps to protect the area.

In 1959 a group of these residents decided to incorporate the Village of Mettawa to help control development and to maintain their increasingly rare rural environment by enacting five-acre zoning. Since 1960 the Village Board  has supported the Lake County Forest Preserve as it acquired many acres of land in the village for forest preserves. Today’s Village borders contain five large preserves: MacArthur woods, the Adlai E. Stevenson Home, Grainger Woods, Daniel Wright and the Old School forest preserves.

Kay and Ted Bennett picnic at Deerpath Farm circa 1965

Since 1994, several businesses have joined with the Village to preserve open lands. All business tax revenues collected by the Village help to support Mettawa by funding open space improvements, trail development and providing tax rebates for the residents. Some of the largest businesses based in Mettawa now include the Hong Kong Shanghai Bank Corporation (HSBC), Computer Discount Warehouse (CDW), the Marriott Residence Inn, and The Hilton Garden Inn, where the Village holds its official meetings and soon to be opened, Costco. Other businesses (in the tollway oasis and in the oasis business park east of the tollway) can be found LISTED under “Business” on the web site.

Today, Mettawa has over 450 residents, but many more people than that see its beauty as they travel through the village by foot, horseback, bicycle or in their cars on Everett Road, Route 60/Townline Road, Riverwoods road/Boulevard, Bradley Road, Old School Rd. and St. Mary’s Road.

True to the founders’ vision, Village residents and businesses remain dedicated to land conservation and preservation of the rural character of the area. The Mettawa Open Lands Association (MOLA) was founded in 1989, and became formally active in 2006. MOLA maintains “Whippoorwill Farm,” A Mettawa Gateway Preserve, which is currently being restored to a native landscape. Since 2006, professional native landscape contractors and MOLA members on volunteer work days are transforming the Farm into a beautiful native landscape of earlier times.

Side-by-side with the contractors at the Farm are DePaul University scientists/students performing “Best Practices” research (using five different methods to establish a prairie on a severely eroded field). Another example of land stewardship is the The Deerpath Farm conservation community which includes 140 acres of permanently protected open space, including wetlands, prairie and woods.

The Mettawa Trail (a path for pedestrians, equestrians and bicyclists) gives many residents direct access to the Des Plaines River Trail and the many acres of forest preserves.

Today, Mettawa’s residents enjoy their rural views, trails and landscape because of a few concerned people wanted to enjoy the land, and found a way to protect  it for future residents and visitors. The history of the Village of Mettawa continues to be protected by many current concerned residents and the Village Board.