Pioneer Information
Born in Givrins, Switzerland, Dubuis studied for two years at the Polytechnic Institute at Winterthur, Switzerland (now the Polytechnic Institute of Switzerland), and subsequently spent four years as an architect’s apprentice. He immigrated to the United States in 1869, settling in Chicago. The following year he was hired by Chicago’s West Park Commission as a draftsman. By 1880 he replaced William Le Baron Jenney as the commission’s architect and engineer, overseeing the development of parks and boulevards, including Douglas (now Douglass) Park and Garfield Park. In addition to his role with the commission, Dubuis served as the landscape engineer for a redesigned plan of Lincoln Park in Grand Rapids, Michigan (1889), and contributed to the landscape design of the Illinois Building at the World’s Columbian Exposition (1893).
After leaving the West Park Commission in 1893 Dubuis worked as an engineer for the city’s Lincoln Park District. Two years later he relocated to Peoria, Illinois, to serve as the Engineer and Superintendent of Parks. One of his first projects was the design of the 117-acre Glen Oak Park, where he established picturesque drives, a pavilion, tennis courts, and athletic fields. He subsequently laid out pavilions and paths at Laura Bradley Park and South (now Trewyn) Park. His most significant work in Peoria was the design of the 180-acre linear Grand View Park in 1902. With its 2.5-mile long pleasure drive that includes scenic overlooks and preserved old growth trees, the site was declared the “world’s most beautiful drive” by President Thedore Roosevelt upon his visit to Peoria in 1910. A resident of Peoria until his death at the age of 57, Dubuis is buried in the city’s Springdale Cemetery. His contributions to Peoria’s cultural landscape are commemorated in a plaque in Grand View Park and the park’s listing in the National Register of Historic Places in 1996.
