Sunday, August 27, 2017

August 27, 1872 -- Montgomery Ward's First Catalog Published



August 27, 1872 – Montgomery Ward begins the first mail-order company by creating a catalog to reach rural consumers.  The catalog is one page and consists of a simple list of 163 items with ordering instructions.  After coming to Chicago in 1865, Word worked in wholesale operations for several firms and “In tedious rounds of train trips to southern communities, hiring rigs at the local stables, driving out to the crossroads stores and listening to the complaints of the back-country proprietors and their rural customers, he conceived a new merchandising technique: direct mail sales to country people.” [http://www.lib.niu.edu] With a stake of $1,600 Ward and two partners worked from a small shipping office on North Clark Street. A year later both partners abandoned the project, but Ward hung on, and in the next ten years or so saw the growth of the catalog to 240 pages, offering 10,000 items for sale.


August 27, 1978 – At a time when it appears that Chicago’s Loop elevated system is doomed, architect Harry Weese writes a guest editorial for the Chicago Tribune in which he asks that the system be spared.  He begins by calling the elevated system “a landmark of structural and artistic integrity and of historical significance.”  [Chicago Tribune, August 27, 1978]  “Like the old Auditorium Theater,” Weese asserts, “which languished for 25 dark years before being recalled of its former splendor, a redeemed “L” would be a proud symbol of an age when Chicago led the world in its technological revolution.  It is part of the city’s legacy, as much as its museums and park systems and architectural landmarks . . . Putting people underground enhances neither their psyches nor their safety.”

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