The Hutchins building, on the Waukegan campus of Shimer College, was a large two-story house located at 420 N. Sheridan Road, north of the Admissions building and south of Armstrong House.
Hutchins is known among Waukegan architectural historians as the John M. Strong Residence, after its first owner. It was originally built around 1846 in the Greek Revival style, and was remodeled and expanded in the Italianate style later in the 19th century.
Acquired by Shimer in the early 1990s, Hutchins was named for Robert Maynard Hutchins. Hutchins was the only classroom building on the Waukegan campus apart from 438. Because it contained only a single classroom, that room became known as the Hutchins classroom, a name that has persisted into the Chicago period.
The Hutchins classroom was used principally for natural sciences classes. The walled-in porch area on the north side of the building housed the school's laboratory equipment. Other rooms on the first floor housed faculty and staff offices. The glassed-in porch on the east side of the building, facing Sheridan Road, was used as a smoking lounge until indoor smoking was banned on campus in the late 1990s.
The second floor was initially used for student housing. During the mid- to late 1990s it housed the campus computer lab, which was later moved to Armstrong.
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- by Waukegan Historical Preservation Commission:
- After the residence was acquired by Shimer College, the house received a particularly fine and historically accurate paint scheme on the exterior, which serves to highlight and enhance the elaborate detailing of the building.
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