This eight-foot, 1,500-pound statue of former Rosemont Mayor Donald E. Stephens sits on the entrance of what is going to turn into a brand new museum showcasing the historical past of the Northwest suburb.
Courtesy of Village of Rosemont
Preparations are underway to open Rosemont’s new historical past museum — maybe, with a robotic likeness of the late Mayor Donald E. Stephens — in time for the seventieth anniversary of the city’s incorporation on Jan. 20, 2026.
Extra planning conferences are scheduled for later this week and subsequent with village officers and a Chicago-based museum design and building agency tasked with creating the historic shows and interactive reveals that can be positioned simply off the foyer of village corridor at 9501 Know-how Blvd.
It’s the place a larger-than-life bronze statue of the late mayor and city founder was relocated final summer season from the outdated village corridor at 9501 W. Devon Ave.
The proposed Donald E. Stephens Rosemont Historical past Museum will chronicle the city’s improvement from swamps, potholes and rubbish dumps into the enterprise and leisure mecca it’s at present, tied to the expansion of neighboring O’Hare Worldwide Airport.
Telling a lot of that story can be an animatronic likeness of legendary suburban politician and energy dealer himself — if the village can elevate sufficient non-public funds to foot the estimated $100,000 to $200,000 value.
Donald E. Stephens
Stephens’ grandson — present Mayor Brad Stephens’ 12-year-old son Joseph — is anticipated to make the fundraising pitch to native companies and residents in a video; it was his concept for a speaking, transferring depiction of the grandfather he by no means met following a household journey to the Corridor of Presidents at Walt Disney World in Florida.
The present mayor and museum curators not too long ago met with an organization that has developed animatronic robots for Disney.
Static shows — together with a number of the late mayor’s huge assortment of M.I. Hummel collectible figurines — may even have a spot inside the 4,300-square-foot historical past museum. The village closed its Hummel museum at 9513 W. Higgins Highway late final yr and is cataloging the two,500 tiny porcelain items, along with ANRI wooden collectible figurines and Disney collectibles that the previous mayor collected.
Below early design plans, the brand new museum can have room to point out extra Hummels than initially anticipated, Brad Stephens mentioned Monday.
It was a latest go to to Adler Planetarium that impressed upon father and son the worth of getting a wide range of options in a museum. Whereas youngsters flocked to the flashier digital reveals, adults learn the extra conventional shows.
“We’re making an attempt to make it attention-grabbing to younger and outdated,” Stephens mentioned of the brand new museum.
On Monday, the village board authorized the $147,200 buy of a 6-by-12-foot interactive LED monitor that can be positioned within the village corridor foyer within the subsequent 45 days, with plans to combine it into the museum, officers say. Annual upkeep and programming with PanoScape Holdings will value $59,000.
This artist’s rendering reveals the interactive digital board that can be put in at Rosemont village corridor.
Courtesy of Village of Rosemont
The digital contact display will enable the general public to make reservations at Rosemont eating places, buy tickets to occasions, and file Freedom of Info Act requests, for instance. Officers are putting in the massive display at village corridor, however suppose it could even have some software for commerce reveals on the Donald E. Stephens Conference Heart. Comparable digital boards are on faculty campuses and inside casinos in Las Vegas, Brad Stephens mentioned.
