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| Today, the InterContinental Chicago, just north of Tribune Tower began life as the Medinah Athletic Club (JWB Photo) |
On this date back
in 1927 the Mayor of Chicago, William Hale “Big Bill” Thompson, turned up the
first shovel full of dirt at the site of what would become the Medinah Athletic
Club’s 42-story headquarters. A little
over 18 months later the $8,000,000 masterpiece, today the home of the Hotel
InterContinental, would be complete.
They built ‘em fast back in those days.
Unfortunately, the
days of skyscraper glory that were the 1920’s were just about over when the
building opened. The architect, Walter
W. Ahlschlager, was a big name. As the
Medinah Athletic Club was being built, the Beacon Theatre and Hotel on
Manhattan’s Upper West Side, where the Allman Brothers have plugged in for over
200 shows, was being finished as well as Mr. Ahlschlager’s 5,920 seat Roxy
Theatre, now gone. The designer’s 49-story Carew Tower in Cincinnati, still the
second-tallest building in that city, would follow Chicago’s tower.
Built toward the
end of Chicago’s frenzied love affair with the Art-Deco style the Medinah
Athletic Club fronts Michigan Avenue with an eclectic design style that draws
its share of attention. If Tribune
Tower, just to the south, seems a little disconcerting with its Art Deco shaft
and Gothic top knot of flying buttresses, then Medinah is a screaming wild
child, a mash-up of decorative styles from Turkey, Persia, France, Egypt,
Italy, the Nordic countries and Assyria with just enough Art Deco thrown in to
make it a 1920’s building.
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| "Consecration" on the west wall . . . a wild take on the Art Deco fascination with all things Egyptian (JWB Photo) |
At the eighth floor
there are those unmistakable relief carvings, each of the three friezes
depicting a different scene. There is Wisdom on the north wall, Consecration of the west, and Contribution to the south [The History of the Medinah Athletic Club
and the Intercontinental Chicago, InterContinental Chicago].
Most noteworthy is
that wacky gold Moorish dome at the top of the building. Referencing the eastern mysteries of the Ancient
Order of Nobles of the Mystic Shrine, the dome, so the story goes, was
originally designed for use as a dirigible dock until 35 people perished in the
Hindenburg disaster at Lakehurst, New Jersey, and the plan was abandoned. But, of course, the great German airship’s
demise in 1937 occurred eight years after
the Medinah Athletic Club opened, and no record of any dirigible making an
attempt to dock at the building exists.
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| Would any rational being step out of a dirigible onto a slender parapet 45 stories high in the middle of a major city? I would have made the decision to stay on board. Note the "mooring mast," by the way . . . (Photo from The History of the Medinah Athletic Club and the Intercontinental Chicago) |
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| Medinah would not be the first time a chimney was made to look like something else . . . this is the chimney at KAM Isaiah Israel in Hyde Park designed by Alfred Alschuler and completed in 1924 (JWB Photo) |
More likely is this
explanation . . .
Perhaps architect
Ahlschlager’s most idiosyncratic addition to the building’s exterior occurs at
the top. The Moorish=style dome and
nearby chimney disguised as a minaret.
The 40-foot-wide dome was constructed of concrete and then gilded. A spiral staircase leads from the
forty-second floor up and into the dome’s center where there is a glass
cupola. The dome is punctuated by eight
openings form which all of Chicago could be viewed. This was never open to the public but as an
observatory it must have been sensational.
The original “minaret,” adjacent to the dome, was truncated years ago,
the top half removed probably due to age and subsequent weakening; unfortunately
it now appears more like a chimney – the magic has gone. [The
American Skyscraper, 1950-1940: A Celebration of Height. Joseph J. Korom.]
There were many
other lavish touches within the tower. A
miniature golf course on the twenty-third floor, complete with water hazards
and a babbling brook. A shooting range,
a billiards hall, running track, gym, archery range, bowling alley, a two-story
boxing arena – all these and more filled the pleasure palace. The fourteenth-floor pool was an aquatic
extravaganza with exquisite tile and a fountain of Neptune. The Grand Ballroom contained a six-ton
Baccarat crystal chandelier, the largest on the continent at the time.
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| The Medinah Athletic Club on a still developing Michigan Avenue (Google Image) |
All of this, plus
440 guest rooms, for the club’s 3,500 members.
Occupancy on opening day in 1929 was just over 30 percent, and by 1934
the Shriners had lost their masterpiece in the financial meltdown of the
Depression. Since then the strange tower
with its surprising ornament, its idiosyncratic setbacks, and its “mooring
mast” and gold dome has led an equally eccentric life, serving in a range of
roles from apartment building to the site of a Kon Tiki Ports restaurant. It has been, at various times, a Radisson
Hotel, a Sheraton Hotel, and since 1990 the InterContinental Chicago.
Back in the heady
days of 1929 one of the advertising blurbs for the club read:
Look me up at the Medinah
Club. It is no wonder that men and women
of discrimination, not in Chicago alone, but throughout the country, and even
abroad, say these words with a pardonable touch of pride. For Medinah is the finest and richest
expression of modern city club luxury and fine social life. Here is found every convenience, every
necessity one could look for in a club, hotel, or even a home. [Chicago’s North
Michigan Avenue: Planning and Development, 1900-1930. John W. Stamper.]
The glory. And the fall.
And the glory once more. A
continuing theme in a city in which that cycle plays out again and again and
again.
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5 comments:
I really enjoyed reading about this. It is one of the most curious sights as you walk up N. Michigan Ave.
And now I know the rest of the story. Quite a history and quite a place!
really well researched and written piece Jim. about the airships. did you know that one crashed in the Loop in 1919? it fell on the building that preceded the Continental Bank Building
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