Sweitzer Park

Sweitzer Park actually began as a proposed residential neighborhood as part of the Brookhill Subdivision centered around Hilldale Avenue. The original plat called for a dead-end road to be paved into the area off of Hilldale, very near the current entrance to the park, leading to nine residential lots. Interestingly, Tazewell County still shows the phantom road and non-existent plats on its Geographic Information System overhead maps of the city.

It is unclear whether the dead-end road ever existed. It appears on street maps for the city in the 1950s and 1960s as Webster Street. It is assumed that the main reason this area never became a residential area was the flooding of Farm Creek, which would have affected most, if not all, of the properties built in the park area.

Fred & John Sweitzer donated the land to the City for public use as a park in 1967.  The Sweitzers were instrumental in the development of the Brookhill Subdivision.

The city donated this land to the Park District upon its formation in 1968.

Very early on, it was considered to build a road into the park off of Main Street, but that was quickly discounted for various reasons, including cost, the proximity of the proposed road to the railroad tracks, and the road eating up a significant portion of the park's acreage.

In 1995, Marvin Nieukirk, owner of the home at the southeast corner of Main and Hilldale, donated the back half of his property and a new shelter to the Washington Park District in the name of the Washington Rotary.  He dedicated the shelter to Herman Essig and Louie Nieukirk, both charter members of the Washington Rotary Club.

In spring 2024, a new playground apparatus was added to Sweitzer Park.