The Top Three Articles of 2024

Once again the holiday season is approaching and with it, the end of another year. It's time to reveal our top three most popular articles in 2024 and what you, the readers, enjoyed most. 

1    Why Are So Many People Wrong About Their "Sears" Houses? -- Why do so many people insist their house (or their neighbor's house or their grandma's house) is from Sears when in reality they don't resemble any of the Sears models? I offer some possible reasons.

2    The Houses That Macy's Sold -- We all know about Sears Roebuck houses. But what about Macy's houses? In 1963, Macy's, along with builder All-State Properties, introduced the Leisurama summer homes. And you need to check these out!

3    Old Tyme Sears Modern Homes Advertising, 1930's and 1940's -- Let's take a fun look back at how Sears Roebuck marketed its houses in the 1930's and 1940's.

We invite you to join us in 2025 and see even more Sears homes in Chicagoland. Happy Holidays!

For the Sears house connection to "A Christmas Story", click here!

A Warm and Charming Sears Conway in Deerfield

859 Osterman Ave., Deerfield. Photo from Realtor site.

Sears Conway.

The Sears Conway was a practical bungalow that sold very well nationally.  This Conway in Deerfield is close to downtown and the train station. 

The house has a dominating gabled porch, and this Conway in Deerfield has had the gable raised. The front door is flanked by two adjacent windows. There were decorative brackets on the exterior. 

Photo from Realtor site.

The Conway had two floor plans. This Conway in Deerfield had the plan with stairs in the rear. There were two bedrooms upstairs originally, and today there are three bedrooms and a bathroom.

Photo from Realtor site.

The living room and dining room were originally separated by a wall, but today that space has been opened up. Photo from Realtor site.

Photo from Realtor site.

Photo from Realtor site.

A pantry closet was removed to grant more space in the kitchen. The door to the right goes to the backyard and the basement stairs. Photo from Realtor site.

Two bedrooms were combined on the first floor to make one big master with a walk-in closet.  Photo from Realtor site.

The first floor bathroom. Photo from Realtor site.

One bedroom upstairs has been converted into a home office. Photo from Realtor site.

There is a bedroom adjacent to the office. Photo from Realtor site.

Another home office can be found tucked in the enlarged front gable. This was originally attic storage. Photo from Realtor site.

This Sears Conway in Deerfield was built in the summer of 1927.

Libertyville Indepedent, June 1927. 

 

Peter Van der Velden and his wife, Lily, were married in 1923 and decided to purchase a Sears house in 1927. Peter was an engineer for the Milwaukee Railroad.

The Van der Veldens moved in 1942 to another house in Deerfield. 

Shadow People Lurk in a Sears Vallonia

Spectral, shadowy beings are the new boogeymen.

Shadow people are dark, humanoid figures that manifest just outside a person's vision. Some people insist they are ghosts or demons. Other people suggest they are hallucinations caused by schizophrenia, dementia, or drug use.

Illustration from psychonautwiki.com.

Author Jason Offutt recounts the story of Lisa Falour on his website: From the Shadows. As a teen, Lisa lived in a Sears Vallonia in South Euclid, Ohio.

4522 Telhurst Road, South Euclid, OH. Capture from Google Streetview.

Sears Vallonia from the 1936 Modern Homes catalog.

As Lisa sat in the kitchen doing her homework, she would regularly see shadowy figures in the adjacent dining room.

As Offutt relates in his story, "The Thing on the Stairs", Lisa said:

“I constantly saw shadow people walking around in the dining room while I sat at the kitchen table,” she said. ”They were normal sized and silent, and though usually out of the corner of my eye, when looked at straight, they would just quietly move on. It wasn’t a trick of the eye.”

If she turned on the dining room light, the shadow people disappeared.

At nights, Lisa would hear footsteps advancing up the stairs. Then, she would feel a presence standing at her bedroom door. 

Art from imgur.com.

Lisa also saw a door in the dining room that wasn't actually there. From "The Thing on the Stairs":

“I repeatedly saw ‘another’ door,” Lisa said. “It may have been at another point in time, as the house was constantly worked on and changed. It was just slightly to one side of the ‘real’ door leading to the bathroom, cupboards, TV room, closet …”

The Vallonia floor plan. Was Lisa seeing the original door to the staircase that had been later moved? 

Lisa was unaware if any other family members saw the shadow people. She moved from the house at age 18, but continued to see the shadow people on later visits.

From "The Thing on the Stairs":

“I never heard a sound from the shadow people, and didn’t feel particularly threatened, but I did feel uneasy and not happy they were there,” she said. “It made me not like the house. All I can say is the house was creepy.”

Lisa's family owned the Vallonia from 1967 to 1975. She claimed that the house had numerous owners before 1967 (presumably because of the hauntings).

I couldn't find any evidence that anyone died in the house.  Lewis Noll, a carpenter, built the house in the mid-1920's.