Homes for sale in
Riverdale.

The Village of Riverdale was incorporated in 1893, taking its name from its position on the Little Calumet River. The earliest settlement in the area traces to 1835, when David Perriam established a small community to operate a toll bridge across the Little Calumet. In 1904 the English former glucose manufacturer Charles Pope purchased property on the south bank of the river, where a beet sugar factory with access to the Illinois Central tracks opened in 1905. That sugar enterprise changed hands over the following decades and was eventually replaced in 1947 by the Chromium Mining and Smelting Corporation, reflecting the village's steady shift toward heavy industry.

Riverdale became a center of Chicago-area steelmaking when Acme Steel opened a new plant in the village in 1918, drawn by the Calumet region's rail network, Great Lakes ore transport, and nearby coal and limestone. By the end of the 1950s the company had completed its move from Chicago to Riverdale, and the plant operated for decades under successor owners including Interlake and Cleveland-Cliffs. Today the 137-acre Whistler Woods forest preserve preserves a natural stretch of the Little Calumet River within the village and anchors the south end of the Major Taylor Trail.