Town file
Villa Park, Illinois
Villa Park, Illinois (DuPage County, Illinois) is the town in one episode of Small Town Murder, the comedy true-crime podcast: episode 80, "Sex, Lies & Duct Tape" (9 August 2018). Rebecca Klein, known as Becky, was thirty-two years old in March 2007.
- Town
- Villa Park
- County
- DuPage County
- State
- Illinois
- Country
- USA
- Episodes
- 80
- Approximate location
- 41.886, -87.978
Episode 80 / 9 August 2018 / 160 min / full
Sex, Lies & Duct Tape
"Villa Park, Illinois, which is, like we said, northeastern Illinois... It's in Dupage County." about 0:08:46
The case: Murder of Becky Klein (March 15, 2007). Read the case file.
The figures, as told in 2018
- Population
- 21,969
- Median age
- 36.4
- Median household income
- $70,000
- Median home value
- $241,000
- Cost of living
- 113
- Religious
- 72%
- Property crime
- ▼ slightly below average
- Violent crime
- ▼ about 10% below average
History, in brief
- Villa Park was open prairie crossed by Native American trails running to and from the lake. about 0:10:13
- By the mid-1800s about 15 white families lived in the area, mostly German settlers looking for farmland. about 0:10:42
- The settlement was first named Ardmore, after the Ardmore subdivision, and was renamed Villa Park in 1917. about 0:15:23
- The Wander Company of Bern, Switzerland, opened its only American plant, making Ovalteen, in Villa Park in 1917. about 0:14:51
- The Ovalteen factory drove the town's growth and created demand for workers' housing and transport. about 0:12:33
- The population boomed in the 1920s, helped by the Aurora, Elgin and Chicago railroad. about 0:16:11
- In the 1920s buyers of property were offered 20 apple trees or 200 baby chicks. about 0:16:41
- A five-cent newspaper began in the 1920s. about 0:17:25
- The women's club used a little red wagon as a library until the town got a library. about 0:17:30
- In the 1930s many banks closed, but the Villa Park Trust and Savings Bank survived. about 0:17:40
- The population rose from 8,000 during the Second World War to 25,000 in 1965, its peak. about 0:18:08
- The Ovalteen chocolate factory closed in 1988; it had been listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1986 and was later converted into loft apartments. about 0:18:36
- The town's motto is 'the garden village'. about 0:09:03
- Villa Park covers 4.76 square miles, about 25 minutes from downtown Chicago, an hour and a half from Milwaukee and four and a half hours from Detroit. about 0:08:57
The reviews read out
3 stars
"The residents are wonderful, caring, helpful and hard working, but the village is mismanaged and its employees are short sighted, manipulative and a drain on the community's potential."about 0:19:33
3 stars
"The police officers are nice but do not seem to help much; they are always around but never there when you really need them."about 0:19:54
3 stars
"The area is close to major highways and has good public schools and a diverse population, but crime seems to be staying constant."about 0:20:24
Nearest Small Town Murder towns
- Bloomingdale, Illinois7.3 miles
- Elk Grove Village, Illinois8.3 miles
- Oak Park, Illinois9.7 miles
- Streamwood, Illinois14 miles
- Arlington Heights, Illinois15 miles
- Chicago, Illinois15 miles
Everything here is as told in the episode, on the date it went out; figures and places may have changed since. Endings are covered: open an episode and use the spoiler switch to read them.