Home » Illinois » Wheaton

James W. Loewen (1942-2021)

We mourn the loss of our friend and colleague and remain committed to the work he began.

Wheaton

Illinois

Basic Information

Type of Place
Suburb
Metro Area
W. Chicago
Politics c. 1860?
Unions, Organized Labor?

Sundown Town Status

Sundown Town in the Past?
Possible
Was there an ordinance?
Sign?
Year of Greatest Interest
Still Sundown?
Surely Not

Census Information

The available census data from 1860 to the present
Total White Black Asian Native Hispanic Other BHshld
1860
1870
1880
1890
1900
1910
1920
1930
1940
1950
1960
1970 31138 591
1980
1990 51464 47847 1304
2000
2010
2020

Method of Exclusion

Main Ethnic Group(s)

Group(s) Excluded

Comments

In DuPage County. Possible entire county was sundown.

According to information in Arna Bontemp’s and JAck Conroy’s book “They Seek a City”:
Citizens took out ads in 1964 supporting the rights of blacks to rent or own housing in Wheaton. Racists struck back with an allegedly fraudulent questionaire under the allegedlly forged letterhead of the “United Citizens’ Committee for Freedom of Residence,’ a real organization, and asked questions like:

‘Do you think that more attractive grandchildren would result if:
___Your son married a Negro girl?
___Your daughter married a Negro boy

Would you feel prejudice against a Negro who raped your:
___Wife?
___Daughter?
___Both?’