{"nrhp_refnum":"06000680","name":"Lowell Park","other_names":[],"category":"district","location":{"address":"2114 Lowell Park Rd.","address_restricted":false,"city":"Dixon","county":"Lee County","state":"IL","lat":41.88891574150006,"lon":-89.48895612924626,"geom_source":"nps_gis"},"listed_date":"2006-08-08","is_nhl":false,"nhl_designated_date":null,"areas_of_significance":["Entertainment/Recreation","Landscape Architecture"],"significance_levels":["local"],"summary":{"what_it_is":"Lowell Park is a municipal park district of about 200 acres on the Rock River just north of downtown Dixon, Lee County, Illinois, developed from about 1907 onward with stone shelters, a bathhouse, a caretaker's house and winding roads.","why_significant":"The nomination argues the park is an early and unusual Illinois example of preserving a natural area of unusual beauty as a public park, designed in the American Romantic style by Arthur Coleman Comey and O. C. Simonds. Its native limestone structures, many built with WPA labor in the 1930s, are described as exceptional craftsmanship that blends with the landscape.","narrative":"Lowell Park is a 200-acre public park on bluffs and ravines above the Rock River, just north of downtown Dixon, Illinois. Its development began around 1907, with plans by landscape architect Arthur Coleman Comey and later supervision by O. C. Simonds, who directed park work for about two decades. Roads wind down through native forest to a lower terrace of picnic areas and the riverfront. The park holds an unusual collection of buildings for a municipal park, including Woodcote, a Dutch Colonial Revival caretaker's house, a 1922 bathhouse, a well house, and seven shelters of locally quarried limestone, many built by WPA workers in the 1930s. Stone entrance pillars, fireplaces and retaining walls share the same horizontal limestone character. The park was designed in the American Romantic manner, keeping built features subordinate to natural scenery. The nomination notes it was one of the earliest Illinois parks created to preserve a natural area of unusual beauty, and that its craftsmanship and setting define its identity.","period_of_significance":null,"architect_builder":"Arthur Coleman Comey (plans, Woodcote and well house); O. C. Simonds (landscape architect); Simonds & West (WPA shelters); C. Roy West (supervised entrance pillars)","architectural_style":"Late 19th and Early 20th Century American Movements/Craftsman; Dutch Colonial Revival (Woodcote); American Romantic landscape design","criteria":[],"status_note":"Publicly owned park in current use; most built features are in good condition, though Vaile Shelter is deteriorated and Woodcote now has a hotel-type domestic function listed.","vacant_flag":false,"machine_generated":true,"model":"claude-sonnet-5-5","prompt_version":"v1.0-2026-10-29","generated_at":"2026-10-29 02:55:37.49383-05","source_pdf":"https://s3.amazonaws.com/NARAprodstorage/opastorage/live/11/8913/28891311/content/electronic-records/rg-079/NPS_IL/06000680.pdf"},"photo":{"url_800":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/media/06000680/b0d05541d9-800.webp","url_1600":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/media/06000680/b0d05541d9-1600.webp","licence":"CC BY-SA 3.0","author":"Kepper66","credit_html":"<a href=\"https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Lowell_Park_Dixon,_Illinois.JPG\" rel=\"noopener\">Kepper66</a>, <a href=\"https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0\" rel=\"license noopener\">CC BY-SA 3.0</a>, via Wikimedia Commons","source_page":"https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Lowell_Park_Dixon,_Illinois.JPG"},"district":null,"sources":{"nps_snapshot_date":"2026-05-22","nara_catalog":"https://catalog.archives.gov/id/28891311","wikipedia":"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lowell_Park_(Dixon,_Illinois)","wikidata":"https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q48790553"},"indexable":true,"url":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/illinois/lee-county/lowell-park-06000680/"}