Just as each building on a street has a history, every street in a town has a history. These stories are often quite interesting and occasionally misinterpreted. An example of a common misinterpretation is Rand Road. The road was named for Socrates Rand, one of the earliest settlers to this area. However, the road wasn't named after him for one of the noteworthy things that he did, such as working to bring the railroad through the area or opening the first lumber mill in 1854. For that matter it wasn't named for him because he was one of the founding settlers to the area. The road was named for him simply because it crossed his property when it was laid in 1836.

A street can get named in a many different ways. Many streets are named by the first individual who developed a plot of land. The Village can also choose to name a street as an honor to an individual. Some street names are chosen to honor a group rather than an individual. South of Northwest Highway there are a series of unusually named streets, such as Hi Lusi and Wapella. The Camp Fire Girls in Mt. Prospect chose these uncommon street names. The names were chosen to honor American Indians as the first residents in the area. The Camp Fire Girls were interested in both the study of this culture and work to improve the community.

Of course, a street can have more than one name or have it's name changed, sometimes the reason a name is changed is the most interesting part of a streets history. The streets in downtown, one of the oldest areas of Mt. Prospect, have interesting names and interesting changes. All on streets in this area have distinctive histories, while many of them have had more than one name over the years. Central Road was once called Carpenter Road, while Evergreen was originally named Eggleston Avenue. Ezra Carpenter Eggleston laid out these roads in 1874 when he drew up the first plat map of Mt. Prospect. These humbly chosen names were changed in 1905 when Eggleston's development was taken over by William Busse. This became the "Busse and Willie's ReSubdivision in Mt. Prospect" and is responsible for the current names in the downtown area. With this "ReSubdivision" many of Eggleston's names were changed. Busse Avenue, had been Park Avenue according to Eggleston while Emerson was formerly Broadway.

The original development and the later "ReSubdivision" was on land that had been purchased from Owen Rooney. Most of the land directly west of the original triangle developed by Eggleston was at one time owned by Owen Rooney, one of Mt. Prospects earliest residents. The early development only took up about half of the Rooney farm. In 1923, George Busse purchased the remainder of Owen Rooney's farms and then moved to Mt. Prospect. School Street, Lincoln Avenue, Central, and Mt. Prospect Road bordered the farm he purchased. East of School Street (which was originally called North Street), there are six streets with very interesting names: Owen, William, Louis, Edward, George, and Albert. These are unusual because they are first names not family names, as one would expect. Owen Street most likely refers to Owen Rooney, as the street runs through part of the land that was originally his farm. However, the rest of these streets also run through what was his farm. Therefore, the questions are; who do these names refer to and how did these names come about? To answer the first of these questions, the streets are all named for members of the Busse family, a very influential early family. Each of these streets intersects with Busse Avenue, which makes it possible to stand on the Albert Busse corner or the Louis Busse corner etc. The more interesting question is; how did these names come about?

There are a couple of possible answers to this question. The first recreational park in Mt. Prospect was made on land donated in 1918 by William, Louis C., Edward, George, Louis F., William Jr., and Albert Busse. It is possible that the village named the streets after these Busse' in gratitude for this donation. The second possibility has to do with where these streets run. In the same year George Busse purchased the remainder of Owen Rooney's farms he and his brothers, Edward and Louis Busse founded the Mt. Prospect Development Association, which was the organization that subdivided the farm and drew up the plat maps. Later, at the urging of his brothers, William, Edward, Louis and nephew Albert, George Busse founded Busse Real Estate, which sold the property in this subdivision. It seems possible that these streets were named for those that helped in the subdivision. There may not be a clear answer to how the streets got there name, but it is clear that each street has an interesting history of it's own.