When Grandpa started Glenwood in 1970, he wasn’t thinking of your typical trailer park. He was thinking of his trips to Florida each year when he and Grandma would load up their little trailer and take 2 weeks to drive to Briny Breezes mobile home community, where they would winter. If they were lucky, they would make 100 miles in one day. Grandpa wasn’t in a hurry.
In Briny, they would relax with their friends in a beautiful 55 and above mobile home community right on the beach. They loved being in a friendly neighborhood with people their age. So Grandpa thought, why can’t I do this in my home town? He didn’t have a beach, but he did own 120 acres of beautiful land in a country setting. Being a civil engineer, he began drawing up plans for a new kind of mobile home community.
He didn’t want mobile homes jammed up next to each other. He figured people want a little elbow room, maybe a garden. So he built quarter acre lots. Or about. Bigger than any nearby residential neighborhoods. Underground utilities for a cleaner look. Big areas of green space, lots of trees.
He took his time. He built 4 lots a year, max. He carefully supervised the landscaping of each lot to make sure water flowed away from each home. No sewer or water line was backfilled until he carefully checked it out. He loved building something beautiful, working outside, having his own business. He was so glad to be out of Shell Oil Company, cranking out complex drafting drawings in the days before computers.
People lined up to get in. He had a waiting list. They paid rent, but not property taxes. They got a home at half the price of one in neighboring subdivisions, with rent that was lower than their neighbor’s residential property tax.
But after 43 lots, age began to catch up with Grandpa. Amazingly, he had begun Glenwood when he was 74. He and Grandma passed away and left it to my sister, Sabrina Schubert, and me. We wanted to continue the great model he had begun. So in 1995 I began building 20 more lots. To improve the quality of homes in Glenwood, we began setting up our own new homes and selling them. I love working with my chain saw, so tree trimming and planting accelerated. Each year the community kept improving and people were attracted from surrounding areas: Bethalto, Wood River, Granite City, Jerseyville, Florissant, St. Louis. Now, with our web site, maybe from even further away. Perhaps from your neighborhood.
