A very nice example of the Pure Oil English Cottage gas station,
in Evanston, Illinois (at 516 Dempster) will be demolished.
There was a Save the Cottage effort with the idea of moving it
around the corner, but the Chicago Sun-Times of Sept. 23 reports that
this fell through.  The man who owns the station and an adjacent
strip mall plans to demolish so that he can add two stores
to the mall.  $60,000 was raised to save the cottage, including
some from Henry Dawes, former president of Pure Oil.  (I don't know
whether he was related to the Charles Dawes who was Coolidge's V.P.
and whose house is now the Evanston Historical Society.)

Here's the part that bothers me the most.  "The Evanston visitor's
bureau decided that it did not have the resources" to take over
the building, at the news site, as a visitor's center.
"'It would be something we would consider down the road, maybe in
two years.'"  (quotes from Sun-Times, quoting the bureau's
exec.dir.)  Two little and two late.

Martin C. Tangora
Vice President, Landmarks Preservation Council of Illinois