Sauganash was a real person, and the Sauganash neighborhood was named in his honor. Potawatomi Chief Billy Caldwell spent a good part of his life maintaining peace between Native Americans and European settlers by negotiating treaties between the groups. Since Caldwell was of mixed Irish and Native American ancestry, Native Americans referred to him as Sauganash ('the Englishman'). For his work, the U.S. government gave Caldwell a large plot of land, upon which the Chicago neighborhoods Sauganash, Forest Glen, Edgebrook and South Edgebrook now sit.

In 1835, Caldwell, U.S. government officials and Native American tribal leaders met in the shade of an elm tree at what is now the intersection of Rogers, Kilbourn, and Caldwell avenues to sign a treaty ceding the property to the United States in exchange for land further west in Iowa. The Old Treaty Elm eventually died in 1933, and in 1937 a commemorative bronze plaque was placed a few feet west of where the tree once stood. Today, the marker still reminds residents and passersby of Sauganash’s Native American heritage.

In 1912, developers Koester and Zander purchased a portion of the land and named it for Sauganash. The first Sauganash home was constructed in 1924. Over the next four years building escalated and about 100 more homes and a couple churches sprouted up in the area. The Sauganash Community Church was finalized in 1925, and Queen of All Saints church was dedicated a few years later in 1929. Soon more churches and houses were built, and in the following decades Sauganash’s almost-suburban location attracted a variety of well-to-do Chicago workers, like judges, politicians, policemen, and firefighters. In a short time Sauganash came to be known as a stable community—a great place to raise a family in a peaceful, sylvan setting.

In recent years, the neighborhood has been revitalized with exclusive single-family home developments on former large industrial sites, keeping this sought-after neighborhood a mostly residential one.
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