MORRIS – As you may have heard, the Community Foundation of Grundy County is moving.

Since I came on staff in 2003, we have rented office space – first in the Baum Building and then at 102 Liberty St. Now that We Care of Grundy County has purchased a building on Route 6, that opens up their condo in the Canalport Community Center and now we are purchasing it – we’ll finally have a permanent home.

We’re excited to be moving into the nonprofit hub that is the Canalport Community Center. Our neighbors will be Grundy Community Volunteer Hospice, Morris Theater Guild, Christian Youth Center and Grundy County Historical Society. CCC was known as the Coleman Hardware Building and we’re hoping to use our remodeling to restore some of the original industrial feel.

According to Wikipedia, “The ‘U’-shaped building has three distinct wings surrounding a gravel courtyard. J. H. Hall constructed the building in 1873, intending to use it as a furniture factory, but his company went bankrupt before he could begin production. The Sherwood School Furniture Company moved into the building soon afterward and made extensive improvements to the structure in 1874. The company added a new foundry building, put an addition on the original building, and built a new smokestack. The Sherwood Company brought economic prosperity to Morris by employing 140 new workers and purchasing resources from other local industries. The building’s location on the Illinois & Michigan Canal helped the company grow, as it used the canal to transport goods and as a water source.

In 1876, the company built a new structure to replace a building lost to a fire; this structure is now the building’s south wing. The company changed its name to the Ohio Butt Company in 1880 and then changed it again to the Coleman Hardware Company in 1887, after president Joseph G. Coleman. During this time, the company changed its production from furniture to cast iron fixtures and other hardware. The company was sold in 1935, and the factory was sold along with it; it has since been used by various industrial companies and is now a community center.

The building was added to the National Register of Historic Places on August 16, 1994.”

If you have any photos, documents, or items from these old businesses, we’d love to have them.

In addition to the historic remodeling, we also are expanding the concept of a “nonprofit hub” by converting the current food pantry space into three small “satellite” offices for agencies who serve Grundy County but are not based here – agencies who need a part-time place to serve clients without the cost of a full-time rental space.

Each office will have a desk, chair, phone, internet access, an area for displaying materials, and access to storage, a small shared conference room, a copy/print room, and the large existing community conference room down the hall. Details of rent and scheduling have yet to be worked out, but we already have had calls from interested agencies and we will brainstorm with them how best to use the space so that it is useful for all.

And to repeat for those who don’t know, there is already an 18-by-27 foot conference room in the CCC that is available for community groups to use. It fits about 30 people. For now, call We Care at 815- 942-6389 to check its availability.

We Care expects to be out by the end of February and we hope to move in around June 1. We’ll have an open house shortly thereafter – we hope you can come.

In the meantime, business continues here as usual. We continue to convene networks, give grants, and serve donors who want to use donor-designed funds to meet their charitable goals.

To talk about any of these services or to ask about the upcoming “satellite” offices, call us at 815-941-0852 or email me at julie@cfgrundycounty.com.