[4] The Potawatomi inhabited Lake County before the United States Federal Government forced them out in 1836 as part of Indian Removal of tribes to areas west of the Mississippi River.

[5] As Lake Forest was first developed in 1857, the planners laid roads that would provide limited access to the city in an effort to prevent outside traffic and isolate the tranquil settlement from neighboring areas.

These neighborhoods include estates and homes designed by distinguished architects such as Howard Van Doren Shaw, David Adler, Frank Lloyd Wright, Arthur Heun, Jerome Cerny, Henry Ives Cobb, and modernist George Fred Keck, among others.

Landscape architects Frederick Law Olmsted and Jens Jensen also designed projects in Lake Forest.

Market Square, designed by Howard Van Doren Shaw, was completed in 1916 as a commercial center for Lake Forest.

Lake Forest had an African-American community from very early on in its history, drawn to employment opportunities on the estates and educational institutions in the late 19th century.

A prominent early Lake Forest businessman was Samuel Dent, an escaped slave and Union veteran who ran a livery stable.

[7] Another black entrepreneur was Julian Matthews, who ran a bakery, restaurant, and ice cream parlor with his wife Octavia.

Members of this African-American community established the African Methodist Episcopal Church as of 1866, and it stood at what is now the corner of Maplewood and Washington Road.

[8] By the 1980s, increased housing prices had encouraged some older black residents to sell their properties lucratively, but others stayed in the community.

[7] Lake Forest also had a small community of Jews, typified by wealthy socialites such as Albert Lasker and David Adler.

In their view, the city was overrun with immigrants from southern and eastern Europe who had dangerous socialist ideas and indulged in excessive alcoholic consumption.

[5] Beginning in the 1950s, Lake Forest's population increased dramatically due to an aggressive program of real estate development and annexation of surrounding areas.

The neighborhood now known as "West Lake Forest" was started as an unincorporated community known as Everett, with many Irish farm workers, who were served by Saint Patrick's Catholic Church.

Novelist Arthur Meeker Jr., who grew up in West Lake Forest in the early 1900s, considered moving back to his childhood community, but upon visiting in the 1950s "to my dismay I found this region wasn’t really rural anymore.

[11] In 1988, the community expanded further westward, annexing 682 acres of land surrounding Lake Forest Academy and Conway Farms Golf Club, despite negative reactions from residents.

In the next 38 years, the group managed to acquire more than 700 acres (2.8 km2) within the city limits, which now form six nature preserves with 12 miles (19 km) of walking trails open to the public.

In 1992, Lake Forest gained national attention when it attempted to ban the sale of offensive music to anyone under the age of 18.

[15] City council members used existing ordinances against obscenity—defined in the codes as "morbid interest in nudity, sex or excretion"—to buttress their campaign.

[citation needed] The actor Mr. T angered town residents by cutting down more than 100 oak trees on his estate, in what is now referred to as the "Lake Forest Chain Saw Massacre.

[32] Lake Forest is noted in the Chicago area for its history of polo, once being the westernmost establishment of the sport in the United States.

Dubbed the World Series of Polo by the press, each match drew thousands of spectators to Lake Forest from Chicago and across the country.