Taking a page from his grandfather’s book, Howard Schock and his wife have funded a pavilion in Lions Park, land for which Frederick “Fred” Schock donated to the Dundee Township Park District in 1955.
Howard Schock said his family has owned businesses in East Dundee for the last six decades, including his own, Schock’s Towing, which closed with his recent retirement. When he started thinking about something he could do for the village, it made sense to not only build on his grandfather’s legacy but to add to a place that has meant so much to him, he said.
He spent every summer of his youth at the Edmund Haeger Memorial Pool, which is one of the amenities at the park at 570 Penny Road, he said. That it was his grandfather who made the park possible held special significance for him.
“(He) was always doing things for the community to make it better,” Schock said. “My grandfather was a very giving man.”
Frederick Schock was born in Germany and immigrated to the U.S. in 1923, selling his bicycle to pay for the ship ticket, urged on by his sister, Frida Scholl, who suggested he join her in America, Howard Schock said.
Scholl was already a business owner, having opened both a liquor store and restaurant, now the Village Squire, on Washington Street in West Dundee. Fred Schock was a baker by trade and opened a small business in the basement of an Elgin home when he arrived here, Schock said.
As Fred Schock’s business grew, he was able to open a bakery in East Dundee and later built a restaurant on Route 72, the former Manor Restaurant, now Briana’s Pancake House Restaurant. The restaurant started as a hamburger stand for his son, Norm, Schock’s uncle, the four original walls of which remain as part of the restaurant.
Norm Schock ultimately wasn’t interested in being a restaurateur and went on to become a builder, Schock said.
Howard Schock’s parents, Howard and Helen, operated a Citgo gas station and opened Schock’s Towing, which they operated with their sons. Schock was the last family member to run it before he retired.
At Lions Park, there’s a stone acknowledging the family’s role in donating the land. The park district was created in 1958, the same year the pool opened. It would remain in use until the early 1980s.
“People just sometimes take it for granted there’s a park there,” Howard Schock said. “They don’t think about how it got there.”
But it was when his financial advisor asked him what he wanted his legacy to his hometown to be, that he started thinking about his family, he said.
“I didn’t know. It weighed on me. It weighed on me a lot,” he said.
When he and his wife settled on the idea for a pavilion, he knew “it was a way for me to give back to the village for all the patronage people have given my family over six-plus decades,” Schock said.
Built over four days in June, the amenity has two picnic tables inside. Another two picnic tables were placed near the playground.
Since then, he’s seen many people using the pavilion and tables, he said. It’s “heartwarming” to see families out there, he said.
“The donation given to the Dundee Township Park District by the Schock family is very generous and provides a shelter at this park that will be used by many families,” said Dave Peterson, Dundee Township Park District’s executive director. “The shelter with tables and chairs can be used by many different users of the park and fits in nicely with the other park amenities.”
A ribbon-cutting ceremony for the pavilion will be held at 3 p.m. Sept. 29, Peterson said.
Gloria Casas is a freelance reporter for The Courier-News.
