September 18, 1925 – Alonzo C. Mather pays $500,000
or $7,692 a square foot for 65 feet of frontage on Wacker Drive, adding this
property, owned by the Chicago Title & Trust Company, to Michigan Avenue
property he already owns east of the Wacker Drive lot. Born in Fairfield, New York in 1848, Mather
came to Chicago in 1875, where he started a wholesale business. At some point he found a way to wealth – by
developing a new kind of railroad stock car that reduced the loss of life stock
while in transit through the provision of feed and water. The Herbert Hugh Riddle design for Mather
Tower at 75 East Wacker Drive provided the headquarters for the Mather Stock
Car Company when it opened in 1929. The
existing piece of property that Mather owned on Michigan Avenue was meant for
another similar tower that would be connected its partner on Wacker Drive by a
ground floor arcade. The economic
catastrophe of the Great Depression ended the plan for the second tower.
Posts
No comments:
Post a Comment