LEONARD BINDER FAMILY

Leonard Binder and Lena C. Lechler grew up as neighbors in a farm town named Oberachhorn, about 20 miles from Ausbach in Mittelfranken, Bayern, West Germany. Leonard was born January 13, 1816, and died July 6, 1941. He learned the carpenter trade in Germany and served in the German Army under Kaiser Wilhelm for six years before coming to America. Lena was born March 4, 1870, and died November 24, 1946.

They came to the United States aboard an ocean liner as part of a group of 10 friends and neighbors in 1888. They came to the Aurora vicinity to be established with the help of Fred Sorg who had come before them. Leonard worked as a carpenter and Lena as a maid. They were married in 1890 and lived on the Langhurst Farm in Oswego, Illinois, where Lena took in washing. Two children were born there—Fred and Marie.

In 1893, Leonard and Lena rented “The Wood Farm”, which was located ¾ miles west of Route 59 on Route 34 in what is now Naperville, Illinois. The farm was on the south side of what is no Rt. 34. The Metropolitan Life Insurance Building is now directly north of Rt. 34 across from the farmhouse. Four more children were born to them at this location—Lena, Charles, Otto, and Helena. 
In 1914, Leonard purchased 130 acres just east of the Wood Farm on the north side of Route 34 extending almost to Route 59. He added to the small home on the property, and his oldest son, Fred and wife, Daisy, ran the farm.

In 1919, Leonard bought another 106 acres on the south side of Route 34, extending east to Route 59, directly across from the 130 acres. This land was part of the Francis Granger Farms. The family moved to the home at the southwest corner of Routes 34 and 59, and using his carpenter skills, Leonard added on to that home. About that time, Fred’s daughter, Lorene came to live with the Binders and was raised like another daughter. The Binders also sponsored the arrival of Lena’s nephew, Carl Burkhart, from Germany, and he worked for them on the farm.

Lena C. Binder (1870—1946) will be remembered by many as the cook for the Hot Lunch Program at Granger School in the early 1940’s. The Granger School children also received a warm welcome when they went to the Binder home to use their telephone since there were none in the school. 
The Binder’s daughter, Helena Edna, married Leo A. Yackley in 1927, and they moved into the tenant home previously occupied by Fred. When Lena C. Binder (1870) died in 1946, Leo and Helen, bought the Binder family farm and moved there in 1947 with their two daughters—Shirley and Norma. The Yackleys farmed the land until Leo’s death in 1955. Helen continued to live on the farm while renting it to her son-in-law, Neval, until she married Norman E. Harrison in 1960. Helen and Norman farmed it until 1973 when most of the land was sold to developers. Mr. Harrison died in 1982 at the age of 84. Helen kept five acres around her home beside the home of her daughter and son-in-law, Norma and Neval Yeates, and lived there until her death in 1987. 

When the majority of the farm along Route 34 was sold, farms were purchased in Rochelle and Somonauk, Illinois. The Binders great granddaughter and her husband, Candy and Michael Banks, moved onto the latter in 1990. 


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