Daniel Hale Williams / House

Despite prevailing racial discrimination during the early twentieth century, Daniel Hale Williams, an African American, was a leading Chicago. In 1891 he founded Provident Hospital as a training hospital for black nurses and doctors. Three years later U.S. president Grover Cleveland named him surgeon-in-chief of Freedman's Hospital in Washington D.C. An auditorium and atrium at Northwestern University's medical school bear Williams's name.

Dr. Daniel Hale Williams (1858 1931) and his wife Alice (1866 1924), were among Idlewilds earliest residents. Williams's stature a s a leading Chicago physician encouraged other black professionals to spend leisure time here. The Williamses built this cottage, Oakmere, with its laboratory around 1920. When Dr. Dan died at Oakmere in 1931 all activities in Idlewild were canceled for the day. Williams left much of his estate to the NAACP and to hospitals and medical schools.