Photograph as originally submitted to this page in the Historical Marker Database www.HMdb.org. Click on photo to resize in browser. Scroll down to see metadata.

Photographer: Courtesy of the Oak Park Public Library
Taken: July 13, 2023
Caption: William Beye
Additional Description: Ridgeland School (also known as Ontario Street School) was renamed after William Beye. Beye was a German immigrant, a Civil War veteran of the 8th Illinois Cavalry, and a local school board member in Ridgeland, an unincorporated neighborhood that would later merge with two other villages to form Oak Park. Beye was instrumental in the approval of a new modern new school building in Ridgeland; he died of the flu soon after its approval. This photograph of William Beye is part of an archive of photographs commissioned by the Grand Army of the Republic Post 615 (known as the Phil Sheridan Post) in the 1880s and preserved at the Oak Park Public Library.
Submitted: July 22, 2023, by Sean Flynn of Oak Park, Illinois.
Database Locator Identification Number: p738804
File Size: 0.113 Megabytes

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