Farmers traded at stagecoach trail communities such as Hainesville, often exchanging dairy products and eggs for what they could not craft on the farm.

In the 1890s, when officials of the Chicago, Milwaukee & St. Paul Railroad extended a branch line from their Milwaukee–Chicago main line at Libertyville Junction (later Rondout) to Janesville, Wisconsin, western Lake County farmers gained easy access to Chicago.

Landowners near Hainesville such as Amarias M. White knew that a railroad station would increase property values.

He also drew up a town plat to show railroad officials that profitable traffic would come through his station site.

White's promise came true in 1901 when the Armour Company decided to harvest ice from Round Lake for their refrigerator car operations.

They erected a massive ice storage building holding over 100,000 tons for shipment in spring and summer months.

Soon after, those farmers who wished to disconnect were allowed to do so—an act which prevented present-day residents of the village from having any public access to their namesake lake.

A fire in 1917 destroyed the Armour operation in the village, although a dormitory housing winter ice cutters survived.

The praise showered on the Round Lake environment by them helped bring a slow trickle of nonagricultural residential growth to the village.

With post–World War II expansion into the suburbs, Round Lake's Armour-era reputation as a rural refuge acted as a magnet for development.

[10] The Round Lake station provides Metra commuter rail service along the Milwaukee District North Line.