Emma Durant Lane House

The widowed Emma Durant Lane built this Queen Anne-style house for $2,000. Emma Lane and her elderly parents, Bryant and Jerusha Durant, moved here when the house was completed in 1898. Mrs. Lane was a teacher in St. Charles during this time. She was born and raised in what today is known as the Durant-Peterson House.

After her parents died, Mrs. Lane took in boarders. In 1902, she sold the house to Dr. and Mrs. Hawkins, two of her boarders, for $2,800. The Lane House was sold in 1907 to Otto T. Frellsen for $3,200. Frellsen owned and operated the White Front Hotel for many years.

The house stayed in the Frellsen family until 1984 when Steve and Mary Ann Smunt bought it. Over the years, the original characteristics of the Queen Anne style had all but disappeared. The whole house had been covered with plain white asbestos siding, and the decorative window surrounds and wood turnings on the exterior remained hidden under many layers of white paint. Soon after the Smunts moved in, they took on the task of renovating the house. Today, the Lane House stands restored to its original glory.

Sources

■ Badger, David Alan. St. Charles of Illinois. Havana: David Alan Badger, 1985.

■ Durant, William. Durant Genealogy. Baltimore: Alexander G. Rose, 1966-68.

■ "Family Delves Behind Walls for House's Story." Kane County Chronicle 14 July 1993: B: 1.

■ Lane, Emma Durant. Diaries and Memoirs of Emma (Durant) Lane, 1852-1922. Baltimore: Rose, 1978.

■ St. Charles Heritage Center. "Landmark History of the Emma Durant Lane House." 4 September 1992.

■ Tolva, Monica. "Bringing History Home." Karn County Chronicle 14 July 1993: B: 1.