ELKHART -- Descendants of John Dean Gillett are spending a final few months in the nearly 150-year-old home atop Elkhart Hill that still bears his name.

The 33-room mansion and 785 surrounding acres are scheduled to be sold at auction in August. A Chicago company that specializes in high-end real estate has been brought in to sell the mansion, secondary homes, barns, farmland and wooded acres as a single property or in 10 separate tracts. As for minimum bids or asking prices, there are none. Private bidders could pay as much as $150,000 up front just to join the auction, depending on the number of tracts sought.

Gillett House is not the typical piece of central Illinois real estate. At 10,000 square feet, the home includes seven bedrooms, five full baths, a library, a powder room, a spacious kitchen, tennis court, a water tower-turned-art studio and wrap-around, screened-in porch. Nearby Drake House, also included in the auction, has three bedrooms, 2 1/2 baths and a swimming pool.

Elkhart Hill, about 20 miles north of Springfield, provides a panoramic view of central Illinois prairie. The nearly 800-foot hill is said to be the highest point between Chicago and St. Louis.

“You don’t see this in the Midwest very often. You see it on the East Coast, or they exist way out in mountain country where oil barons lived,” said Michael Fine, principal and managing partner with Fine & Company LLC, the firm hired to conduct the auction.

It’s the history of Old Gillett Farm -- and what is to become of the landmark -- that is the focus of coffee-shop talk in adjoining Elkhart. While not regularly open to the public, the farm figures prominently in local history, including the heyday of Elkhart as a cattle-shipping point to the world on the Chicago & Alton Railroad. The mansion at one point was the heart of a nearly 20,000-acre livestock operation.

“I would hope that somebody would feel the value and the history, and be careful with what has gone before,” said Gillette Ransom, herself a descendant of John Dean Gillett. Her first name was handed down through the family with an extra ‘e.’

Ransom is co-founder of the Elkhart Historical Society and owns Country Bumpkin antiques and collectibles in the small Elkhart business district. Ransom recalled frequent visits to Gillett House as a child and especially remembers the view from Elkhart Hill.

“You can see Springfield. You can see the Hilton (now Wyndham City Centre) clearly,” Ransom said.

Old Gillett Farm contributes to Elkhart as a key tourism draw, said Chris Wibben, interim director of Destination Logan County tourism bureau. Elkhart also is on a section of historic Route 66. “The home is just so interesting,” said Wibben. She noted that the bureau is working with Elkhart on additional tourism-historic programs, included a fall festival.

A vineyard, bed and breakfast, historic site, conservancy district, and a horse and cattle ranch, are among the ideas floated in local discussions, according to Ransom. Whatever the future, she’d like to see Old Gillett Farm preserved. “I’d love to see the property stay together rather than break it up into 10 little pieces,” Ransom said. “I hope that whoever buys it loves it as much as we do.”

John Dean Gillett and his wife, Lemira Parke Gillett, built the original home in 1870, according to a local history. The couple reconstructed the mansion in 1873 after a fire heavily damaged the first home. Gillett House history reads like a “Who’s Who” of politics, business and entertainment. Gillett and Abraham Lincoln were longtime friends. Gillett’s oldest daughter, Emma, married Richard J. Oglesby, a Civil War hero and three-term governor of Illinois. Among 20th century visitors were Earnest Hemingway and Cary Grant. Adlai Stevenson wrote speeches for his 1952 and 1956 presidential campaigns on the screened porch. Gillett was dubbed “Cattle King of the World” by the London Gazette in the 1870s for the 2,000 cattle exported each year to Europe. He is credited with developing the Shorthorn breed of cattle. John Dean Gillett died in 1888, and pieces of his holdings have been sold off through the decades. But Gillett House and the core of the farm have remained in the family.

Grown children and retirement plans were behind the decision to sell, according to Fine. Current family owners were not available for comment, though co-owner Lisa Pasquesi released a statement that the auction establishes a “time-certain date of sale.” Pasquesi is the great-great-great-granddaughter of John Dean Gillett.

Fine and Company has conducted high-end auctions across the country during 30 years in the business. A 20,000-square-foot mansion near Mahomet sold for $4.3 million at auction last year. The owner turned to an auction after initially offering the property through a traditional listing at $10 million. Owners of properties priced well above the surrounding real estate market often prefer auctions, according to Fine, as the quickest way to reach a limited group of buyers with the interest and financial means to spend millions. Buyers in other regions of the country have ranged from nature conservancy districts to real estate investment companies. But Fine said buyers often have personal roots in the area. “It’s someone who’s from the area. ‘I left. I grew up and made my fortune, and now I’d like to come back,’” Fine said.

Sale tracts range from 107 acres anchored by the Gillett mansion, carriage house, water tower and upper barns to 8.7 acres that includes a farmhouse, barn, sheds and grain storage. The Drake House is part of a 9-acre tract. Five tracts include tillable farmland, while a tract of a little over 47 acres is marketed as suitable for home sites. Sealed bids are due Aug. 1 for tracts including the Gillett mansion and possibly some furnishings; Drake House; and the potential home-development sites. Remaining tracts will be sold at a live auction scheduled for Aug. 10 at the President Abraham Lincoln Hotel in Springfield. Fine said bids typically are received in the 24 hours before the deadline. “It’s possible someone would come in early and make an offer to buy it, but most sell at the auction,” Fine said. --

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