July 27, 1890 – With all of the news today focusing on the
effects of global warming and rising seas, it is interesting to look back on a
feature in the Chicago Daily Tribune 127
years ago, an article that dealt with the changing nature of the city’s
shoreline and how the forces of erosion and addition affected the Chicago River
over the years. Originally the “little
block-house fort” at Fort Dearborn on what is now the southwest corner of
Michigan Avenue and Wacker Drive stood where the Chicago River bent “more than
90° and finally emptied into the lake at or south of Madison Street.” [Chicago
Daily Tribune, July 27, 1890] The sharp bend to the south was formed because
the mouth of the river was blocked by a sandbar that prevented all but barges
and flat-bottomed boats from entering. In 1835 the United States government cut
a channel through the sandbar on a line with the channel to the west, building
piers on the north and south sides of the new channel at the same time. The pier on the north side drastically
changed the natural flow of sand along the lake shore that resulted from the
erosion of lakeside bluffs on the north shore.
As a result, the shore between the new mouth of the river and the area
around today’s Chicago Avenue expanded so that by 1872 a new shoreline that
extended 1,500 feet into the lake had accumulated just north of the river
gradually diminishing to about 500 feet at Chicago Avenue. In the preceding years the Illinois Central
Railroad and various private property owners had been busy filling in the lake
for freight yards opposite the ends of South Water, Lake and Randolph
Streets. In 1871 this process was
increased as “debris from hundreds of acres of burnt buildings had to be
disposed of, and in addition a place of deposit had to be found for hundreds of
thousands of cubic yards of earth dug from the cellars of the new buildings
which were being built.” With the
article the paper prints a map, showing the difference in the shoreline over three-and-a-half miles between 1839 and
1890. Between Indiana Avenue and
Randolph street, the shoreline had been extended nearly a half-mile into the
lake.. The newly created land between
North Avenue and the river had increased by 180 acres. The amount of ground added to the city
between Monroe Street and today’s Congress Avenue was about 32 acres. Awaiting adjudication was the issue of entitlement
to this newly made land. It would be
years of court cases, suits and counter-suits before the issue would be
resolved. Still pertinent today is the
conclusion of the article, “Lake Michigan is the one grand topographical
feature of the city, distinguishing it from other cities, tempering its
climate, and causing the health-giving breezes which remove atmospheric
impurities … We need the water more than we need the land … The filling of the
lake for park purposes may be a necessity of the present public exigency, but
not a foot more should be allowed to be converted to private or corporate
uses.”
July 27, 1919: Sparks from the smoke stack of the lake freighter Senator start a fire that destroys the coal sheds of the Peoples Gaslight and Coke Company on the east side of the north branch of the Chicago River at Hobbie Street. The freighter had run aground as it moved past Goose Island, and the tug Racine was assisting it. The sparks from the ships set the roof of the coal sheds on fire, which then spread to two buildings at 1145 Larabee Street, prompting a 4-11 alarm, another day at work on the North Branch. The Senator didn't catch a whole lot of breaks. On October 31, 1929 she was rammed amidships by the steamer Marquette and went to the bottom, taking seven crew members and a load of 241 brand new Nash Ramblers with her.
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