Listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 2016.
“The Robert and Elizabeth Muirhead House is a historic house located at 42W814 Rohrson Road northeast of Plato Center, Illinois. Built in 1951-53, the house was designed by Frank Lloyd Wright in his Usonian style.”
Wikipedia article Robert and Elizabeth Muirhead House, CC BY-SA 4.0.
One of 86 National Register listings published here for Kane County · listed in 2016 · category: Building.
Sources: the Wikipedia article · the National Register database, National Park Service
This property stands in Plato Township. History of Kane County, Ill., published 1908 gives that township a chapter of its own.
The chapter covers the township.
Machine-read from a century-old scan, so expect the errors a machine makes: misspelled names, dropped words, stray characters.
Read the whole chapter on Plato Township - 109 words on its settlement, mills, schools and churches.
Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal wildfire occurrence database lists 6 fires within 5 miles of Robert and Elizabeth Muirhead House between 2003 and 2013, burning about 108 acres in total. None started naturally. None was recorded as arson. Distance is straight-line from the map coordinates, so a fire counted here may appear on a neighbouring settlement's page as well.
| Reported cause | Fires |
|---|---|
| Recreation and ceremony | 3 |
| Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 2 |
| Debris and open burning | 1 |
The most recent of them, most recent first, with the day each was reported and the service that recorded it.
| Date | Cause | Size | Reported by | Name on the report |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 5 April 2013 | Debris and open burning | under an acre | Illinois Division of Forestry Resources | 2013-292 |
| 28 April 2003 | Recreation and ceremony | under an acre | Illinois State Fire Marshal's Office | not named |
| 2 April 2003 | Recreation and ceremony | 2.0 acres | Illinois State Fire Marshal's Office | not named |
| 15 April 2003 | Missing data/not specified/undetermined | under an acre | Illinois State Fire Marshal's Office | not named |
| 14 April 2003 | Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 30 acres | Illinois State Fire Marshal's Office | not named |
| 26 March 2003 | Recreation and ceremony | 75 acres | Illinois State Fire Marshal's Office | not named |
Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The National Weather Service names Plato Center, the town this property stands in, in 9 storm reports between 1996 and 2025: 6 thunderstorm wind, 1 hail, 1 flood, 1 tornado. No death or injury is recorded in these reports. Each account below is quoted exactly as the forecast office filed it, from the NOAA Storm Events Database, and each date opens the federal record of that event.
| When | Event | Place named | Harm | What the report says |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| March 2025 | Thunderstorm Wind | Plato Center | - | A concrete outbuilding lost its roof along CR-22 east of North Plato. Trees were also damaged in the area. |
| March 2025 | Thunderstorm Wind | Plato Center | - | Kane County EMA reported fence damage along Muirhead Rd near Plato Center. |
| August 2025 | Thunderstorm Wind | Plato Center | - | A tree was down and blocking Lenz Rd near Muirhead Rd south of Plato Center. |
| July 2023 | Tornado (EF1) | Plato Center | - | This tornado started in a farm field east of Kendall Road and continued eastward through Elgin. Damage along the path of the tornado consisted of snapped trees and tree limbs, especially between Bowes Bend Drive and Randall Road. Damage to roofs, siding, and walls of homes, a garage, and a farm building was also noted near Bowes Bend Drive and Longcommon Parkway. The roof of a church was also damaged near Nesler Road. The storm crossed into Cook County on the southwest side of Bluff Spring Fen. The tornado appeared to lift near the intersection of Gifford Road and Lake Street. |
| September 2022 | Thunderstorm Wind | Plato Center | - | A photo shared on social media showed trees and power lines blown down blocking a road in downtown. Other tree limbs were blown down. |
| May 2011 | Flood | Plato Center | - | Four inches of water was reported on Route 47, approximately a quarter mile north of Plato Center. |
| August 2025 | Thunderstorm Wind | Plato Center | - | no account filed |
| May 2004 | Hail | Plato Center | - | no account filed |
| June 1996 | Thunderstorm Wind | Plato Center | - | no account filed |
No historic map-sheet match is published for this property yet. That does not mean no map exists. This record needs a coordinate-quality review before it can be joined to a sheet boundary. Browse the county's mapped places while that work is pending.
Other National Register properties close enough to walk or drive between, ordered by distance from this one. Both positions come from the same geocoding pass that matched these properties to their map sheets.
| Photograph | Property | Distance | Listed |
|---|---|---|---|
 | Memorial Washington Reformed Presbyterian Church | 3.6 miles | 1980 |
 | St. Mary's Church of Gilberts | 6.2 miles | 1992 |
 | Teeple Barn | 6.6 miles | 1979 |
 | Camptown Town Hall | 7.3 miles | 1980 |
 | Larkin Home for Children | 7.3 miles | 2018 |
| National Archives record | The nomination case file for reference 15000965 in Record Group 79. |
| Wikipedia article | Community-written account of this property, licensed CC BY-SA. |
| Kane County | All 86 listed properties in this county. |
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