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Naperville
Thursday, March 28, 2024

The History Detective – Building History

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I recently interviewed Steve, Nancy and Eric Shiffler about their century-old construction business located in Naperville. Shiffler Builders, Inc., formerly (1907-1963) Charles Shiffler Sons, is located in the Kirchgasser Building on the corner of North Avenue and Center Street between the DuPage Children’s Museum and the train station. They shared with me several old ledgers and a photo album of the many projects and clients they have had over the years.

The pages read like a Who’s Who of Naperville families, businesses, and churches. The Shifflers have worked in town, on farms, residential and commercial jobs for more than 100 years.

The Shiffler family, like so many early Naperville families, came from Pennsylvania in 1856. Henry Shiffler, Sr. bought land north of town in Section 2, roughly the area of the Cantera movie complex which his son Henry, Jr. farmed until his death in 1903. Henry Jr.’s widow Mary Ann (nee Erb) and only son Charles and his family moved to Naperville later that same year. Charles married Emma Sollenberger in 1890 and had six children. To support his large family, Charles started his own construction business in 1907.

I met Eric Shiffler several years ago at the Masonic Lodge cornerstone opening (see “Cornerstone Contents Conclave” Nov. 16, 2015, Positively Naperville) and recently at Menards during one of my shifts. Eric is a seventh-generation Napervillian and a fifth-generation carpenter with Shiffler Builders. His father, Steve, who started full-time with the company around 1980, and mother Nancy gave me a short tour of the many artifacts, tools and blueprints that decorate the walls and cases of their offices.

Eric’s grandfather and Korean War veteran Ken Shiffler joined the company in 1955 and Eric’s great-grandfather, Paul, joined the firm in 1912. Over the years, Paul took numerous color slides of clients, homes and businesses which Steve made into prints. What a great photo journey through old Naperville.

Although Shiffler Builders is primarily a full-service residential contractor, they have developed a few small sub-divisions like picturesque Oak Hills (1943) on the east side of town and Green Acres (1949) on the west side of town. In 1954, just west of Green Acres, the Shifflers built Lawn Meadow with its own water company.

Among the Shiffler treasures is a piece of lumber marked “Shiffler Apartments” from the building they built directly north of their office, and a piece of a servant’s speaking tube found in the walls of a home in the Historic District.

Shiffler Builders is building history in Naperville, one board at a time!

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Bryan Ogg
Bryan Ogg
Bryan Ogg is a local historian and curator of local legend, stories and lore.

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