 |
| (JWB, 2008) |
March 8, 1876
A regular meeting
of the Board of Trustees of the Town of Lakeview was held at which a petition
for opening Lill Avenue “through Block 16, from Sheffield to Lincoln Avenue”
was tabled. (It must still be on the table. Lill still ends at Sheffield.) Also at the meeting S. B. Chase was granted permission to
lay a two-inch wrought iron pipe at his own expense on Belmont Avenue “for the
use of water at his house and other residents on the said street, who cannot
procure the same on account of objections being filed against the assessment by
Mr. Young, owning property on the south side of said avenue.” (I’m guessing Mr. Young spent most of
his time avoiding the stink eyes that his thirsty neighbors cast toward him.)
Also on this date
came the report of a huge fire at 105 and 107 South Water street, midway
between LaSalle and Clark streets.
First noticed by two detectives on their way home, a second alarm was
sounded as the flames quickly engulfed the four-story building. Two men had to be rescued from the
second floor as 11 streams of water were directed at the inferno. No. 165 was occupied by E. C. Reichwald
& Co., William Little & Sons, and Bartholomew & Fordham. No. 165 was occupied by Wayne & Low
and McClay & Tucker. Poor
Bartholomew & Fordham . . . no insurance and losses close to $4,000.
March 8, 1893
A health inspector
was dispatched to the area around Belden and Webster after numerous complaints
about the filthy condition of the alleys in that area. City ordinances stipulated that garbage
should be removed at least once a week, but the contractor, according to the
area’s residents, “has not removed any for more than two weeks and generally
lets intervals of two to three weeks pass between his visits. In addition it is said that the men who
do the work pile their wagons so full that they leave a line of refuse along
the streets as they are driven away.”
Ex-Alderman William Eisfeldt was the contractor responsible for removing
garbage in the district.
 |
| (JWB, 2010) |
And not far away .
. . T. C. McNary, a student at the McCormick Theological Seminary, had an
encounter with a coyote in Lincoln Park and found himself “laid up with three
serious wounds in his left ankle as a result of contact with the coyote’s
teeth.” It seems that the
theological students drank nothing but water from the Lincoln Park spring and
Mr. McNary and a friend were at the spring with their water jugs for a week’s
supply. As they returned they
passed the coyote den where one of the critters jumped over the wall and
attached itself to Mr. McNary’s ankle.
“The young man belabored the coyote with his water jug . . .” when his
friend came to his aid, throwing his coat over the animals head as a crowd
“sprang on the enraged animal and after a desperate struggle the coyote was
thrown back into the den.” The physician who attended Mr. McNary did not
believe that hydrophobia (the word used for rabies at the time) would set in.
And in New York . .
. Representatives of the 12 National League baseball teams met at the Fifth
Avenue Hotel. James A. Hart represented Chicago. B-I-G events, afoot!
The Committee on Rules recommended “removal of the pitcher from his
present position to the center of the infield, abolishing the pitcher’s box,
and substituting therefore a boundary plate covering a twelve-inch space, to
which the pitcher will be confined; abolition of the flat bat; a lucid
definition of a balk; a rule governing official scorers which provides that a
player who makes a sacrifice hit which advances a base runner shall not be
charged with a time at bat.” Six
clubs opposed placing the pitcher in the center of the diamond: Boston, Cleveland, Pittsburg, Chicago,
St. Louis and Louisville. Chicago
actually wanted no pitcher at all, but wanted the batter to hit the ball off a
tee. (That’s not true. I made that up. Sorry.)
March 8, 1911
“Lambasted with
arguments that dated from Moses to McCulloch, petted and palavered by pretty
women, plastered with sizzling attire, puffed up with pride, and then pushed
into a tank of ice water, the Illinois legislators, at the windup of the
Chicago-Springfield suffrage junket today, had the harrowing experience of
their lives.” So began the Tribune article of the push for a woman’s right to
vote in Springfield. No sooner
were the legislators seated “then Mrs. Catharine Waugh McCulloch and Miss Jane
Addams, with the help of representatives from forty women’s organizations of
Chicago and the state, dragged howitzers, mortars, canister, and shrapnel guns
into position and for two hours shelled the legislature in a fashion never known
before.”
“We are not asking
you for suffrage; we demand it,” shouted Mrs. Raymond Robins, pounding the
speaker’s desk.
“We are dreadfully
tired of the soft twaddle of procrastination,” said Mrs. Grace W. Trout,
president of the Chicago Political Equality League.
The “Suffrage
Special” traveled to Springfield from Chicago with 300 suffragettes on
board. At Kankakee a crowd of
1,500 people greeted the special.
Miss Kate O’Connor of Rockford addressed the crowd, “We are going down
to Springfield to stir up the animals.
It is spring now and there’s going to be the almightiest housecleaning
in this state ever you heard of.
They may hand us a bouquet with a string to it, but we’ll get away with
it anyway and when we get things as we want them the state will be so clean you
won’t have any mud on your streets.”
But . . . some
business did get done down there in Springpatch. Representative Benton F. Kleeman of Chicago introduced a
bill in the house providing for the creation of a Chicago harbor in Lake
Calumet. In the bill the Sanitary
District of Chicago was given full power and authority to construct the harbor,
which was to cover not less than 300 acres with a depth of 21 feet.
March 8, 1934
In a Tribune column, columnist Antoinette Donnelly replied to “Indignant,” who
wrote that “a woman head of her department took her aside the other day and
requested that she forget the bright nail polish during her business day. ‘The old cat,’ the young business woman
calls her superior, ‘is jealous.
She said the boss asked her to speak to me. I don’t believe it because he never said anything himself.’”
Ms. Donnelly’s
reply: “In all probability the boss did speak to the woman superior to
intercede, in his behalf, against the flashing nail tip. Some men simply do not like the
stuff. It’s distracting, and when
they’re dictating letters they don’t want distraction . . . Better take the
hint, Indignant. Also, get the
idea out of your head that some one who takes you aside and tells you something
for your own good is an old cat.
It’s not a success-making frame of mind toward a superior, anyway. . .
After all, the boss isn’t interested in being vamped. Not the kind you’re going to get anywhere with in a business
way. There’s a time and place for
everything.”
In Washington, D.
C., freshman congressman from the 16th District Everett Dirksen
demanded legislation “to impose a quota on the importation of foreign
blackstrap molasses to prevent its competition with corn and other grains in
the manufacture of American alcohol and liquor.” Prohibition had ended a year earlier and an agreement
administered by the federal alcohol control board stipulated that American
distillers must use only domestic cereal grain in the production of
alcohol. But the UNBELIEVABLE
shortage of alcohol in the country allowed the use of huge quantities of Cuban
molasses. Dirksen pointed out that
despite the Depression and Prohibition, imports of blackstrap molasses into the
country increased from 31,000,000 gallons in 1909 to 205 million gallons in
1932. Dirksen believed that a
quota on Cuba’s shipments to the United States would regulate the flow of
blackstrap so as to protect the American grain producers’ market. A most propitious beginning to a career
that lasted into the 1960’s.
 |
| (JWB, 2010) |
And in Chicago . .
. speaking at a luncheon of the Chicago Association of Commerce at the Palmer
House Japanese Prince Iyesato Tokugawa “scoffed at the ‘so-called danger of war’ between
his country and the United States.
“We must not forget,” the prince said, “that these close trade relations
between us stand on a basis of the most friendly sentiment, which has always
characterized the intercourse between the two countries since the opening of Japan
in the middle of the last century.
You may take from me an assurance that it is the ardent wish of the
majority of the Japanese people that these happy relations should never be disturbed
and the Pacific ocean should always be true to its name.”
All articles in this blog were found in the archives of The Chicago Tribune.
All articles in this blog were found in the archives of The Chicago Tribune.
Posts
No comments:
Post a Comment