Showing posts with label Midway Airport. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Midway Airport. Show all posts

Saturday, January 18, 2020

January 18, 1945 -- Midway Airport Gets New Terminal Building


January 18, 1945 -- Agreement is reached between Chicago and airline officials in a plan to build a new terminal building at the city airport, today's Midway International Airport. Scaled way back from what once was proposed as an elaborate $1,750,000 terminal, the new proposal calls for a building about 1,400 feet long, costing $470,000. The airlines agree to bear the cost of the new building, along with loading areas, taxiways, and parking places, getting the city to repay the investment by remitting the cost of landing fees over a period of ten years. The city architect, Paul Gerhardt, Jr., will design the building. Each of the eight airlines using the airport agree to rent space at $2 a foot, and a share of the cost of construction will be assessed each air line based on the ratio of its scheduled flights.

January 18, 1951 – Virgil E. Gunlock, the Chicago Commissioner of Subways and Super-highways, announces that Herlihy Mid-Continental Construction is the lowest of five bidders on the project to extend Wacker Drive between Madison and Washington Streets.  The company submits a bid of $1,076,493 for the work.  This will be the third of eight blocks in the 12.5 million dollar project to construct the two-level extension of Wacker Drive from Lake Street to its connection with the Congress Expressway to the south, which is itself in the final stages of construction.  The Market Street stub of the elevated line, pictured above, ran south along the route of Wacker Drive, formerly Market Street, and had to be removed in order for the project to be completed.


January 18, 1954 – The Vice-President of the Columbia Broadcasting System, H. Leslie Atlass, announces that the network has purchased the Chicago Arena at 630 McClurg Court for $1,500,000 and plans to convert it into a “television city.” [Chicago Daily Tribune, January 19, 1954] Four studios will occupy 50,000 of the 87,000 square feet in the facility. The remainder of the space will be used for scenery and maintenance shops, storage areas and facilities for film processing.  WBBM-TV will then vacate its current studios at the State-Lake building at 190 North State Street and the Garrick Theater at 64 West Randolph Street within the year.  The Chicago Arena, designed by architect A. N. Rebori, was used for ice reviews, tennis matches and other sporting events. It was finished in 1924 at a cost of $800,000 and was originally called the Chicago Riding Club.  The building achieved a historic milestone on September 26, 1960 when John F. Kennedy and Richard M. Nixon met in the first televised presidential debate in history.  The building was demolished in 2009, and in December of that year the Rehabilitation Institute of Chicago bought the site.  On March 25, 2017 the Institute opened the new building, the $550 million Shirley Ryan AbilityLab on the site, serving patients who need extended care and rehabilitation services after they leave traditional hospitals.  The Chicago Arena is pictured in the black and white photo above.  The new AbilityLab is shown on the site in the photo below that.
chicagosuntimes.com
January 18, 1972 – A heavy cordon of police is stationed around two water filtration plants after two young men are arrested and charged with plotting to poison the city’s water supply with typhoid bacteria.  Charged with conspiracy to commit murder are Allen C. Schwander, 19, and Steven Para, 18. Both men are arrested in an apartment on Fairfield Avenue in Evanston.  States Attorney Edward V. Hanrahan says, “Investigation disclosed that an organization called ‘RISE’, of which Schwander and Pera were organizers, had allegedly planned poisoning water supplies and spreading deadly diseases in Illinois and elsewhere. Members of ‘RISE’ were allegedly to be inoculated and immunized enabling them to survive … and to form the basis of a new master race.” [Chicago Tribune, January 19, 1972]  Deputy Police Superintendent James Rochford reassures the public, saying, “There is no evidence at this time that these people [the two arrested] have the ability or capability to carry out the act.”  Mayor Richard J. Daley underscores Rochford’s declaration.  “The city’s water is safe and all necessary steps to protect the water in the future will be taken,” Daley says.  Bond is set at $250,000 for each man.
Posted by Chicago Old and New at 2:30 AM 0 comments
Labels: , ,

Tuesday, August 27, 2019

August 27, 1945 -- Charles de Gaulle Welcomed

Chicago Tribune Photo
August 27, 1945 – The city welcomes General Charles de Gaulle, the president of the French provisional government at a banquet at the Blackstone Hotel.  After he is greeted by Mayor Edward Kelly and Illinois Governor Green, the general says, “It is said that often nations hide their aims from each other.  But the French nation does not hide hers.  She wants to attain a degree of activity enabling her to play a role much more important than before in the economy and exchanges of the world.”  [Chicago Daily Tribune, August 28, 1945].  He continues, saying that he has an “unshakable faith in the future” and concluding, “Let me say that the welcome of Chicago has greatly contributed to the faith.  Viva Chicago! Viva America!  Viva France!”  General de Gaulle is greeted at the Chicago airport, today’s Midway International Airport, by several thousand people when his plane arrives around 8:00 p.m. Streets are packed with people near the Blackstone Hotel as a car whisks the French leader to the banquet in the Crystal room of the hotel.  On the following day General de Gaulle attends mass in Holy Name Cathedral, visits two war plants, and is honored in a parade from the Blackstone Hotel to the La Salle Street entrance of City Hall where he speaks at a public reception before he leaves for Ottawa, Canada.   Chicago Mayor Edward Kelly and General de Gaulle share a ride to the Blackstone Hotel in the above photo.


August 27, 1930 –The Lindbergh beacon begins official service at 9:00 p.m.  Ceremonies on the roof of the Palmolive building precede the lighting of the mighty beacon which is illuminated when the President touches a button at the White House.  The beacons namesake, Charles Lindbergh, is not at the ceremony, declining an invitation to attend so that he could avoid reporters and cameramen.  An hour before the beacon is illuminated, a dinner is served on a terrace below.  In attendance are Rear Admiral Moffett of the Navy’s air forces; Major General Frank Parker, the Sixth Corps area commander; Sir George Hubert Wilkins, a noted explorer; and Captain Fritz Loose of Germany, in town for a series of air races.  Charles S. Pearce, president of the Colgate-Palmolive Peat Company, welcomes the guests and presents Merrill C. Meigs, the chairman of the civic committee in charge of the dedication.  City Attorney William D. Saltiel accepts the light on behalf of the city.  The beacon consists of two beams – one, a rotating two-billion candle power lamp, 603 feet above the street, and the other, a fixed eleven-hundred million candle power light that points directly to the municipal airport. The Chicago Daily Tribune reports, “For a few seconds the big light was held stationary, pointed to the southwest, then it began a leisurely turn, touching the loop skyscrapers as it went. The new Merchandise Mart, already blazing with lights, was given added brilliance by the beam; the Mather tower loomed out of the darkness as the shaft brought it into view, and a degree or two further east the beam gilded the flag staff of the Tribune tower and illuminated the mosque-like dome of the Medinah Athletic Club.” [Chicago Daily Tribune, August 27, 1930]. The beacon will need some fine tuning, apparently. People on top of a six-story building in Michigan City, 35 miles from the city, report they cannot see the light. A pilot flying the United States mail from Omaha says he was about 100 miles away from the airport when the beacon was illuminated, but he did not see it until he was directly over the municipal airport on the southwest side of the city.  Further tests will be conducted to determine the most advantageous angle for the great beam.  For more on the Lindbergh light, please turn to this entry in Connecting the Windy City.


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.”
Posted by Chicago Old and New at 2:30 AM 0 comments
Labels: , , ,

Tuesday, August 20, 2019

August 20, 1938 -- Douglas Corrigan, the "Wrong Way" Flyer, Mobbed by Chicagoans

historynet.com
August 20, 1938 – Police estimate that a half-million people line the ten-mile route from the Chicago Airport, today’s Midway International Airport, at Sixty-Third and Cicero Avenue to the Chicago City Hall, every one of them straining to get a glimpse of Douglas Corrigan, the young aviator who, weeks earlier, had completed a solo flight from New York to Dublin, Ireland. “I like it,” Corrigan says modestly. “But I don’t understand it.  I’ve been getting the same thing everywhere. It’s surely strange.”  [Chicago Daily Tribune, August 21, 1938].  The crowd begins to gather at the airport two hours before Corrigan’s expected touch-down at 11:00 a.m.  The pilot arrives exactly on time as 50,000 spectators line Cicero Avenue outside the airport.  He is met in front of an American Airlines hangar by Chicago Mayor Edward Kelly, who welcomes him, saying, ”Son, we’re really glad to see you. I’m Mayor Kelly.  You’re the kind of folks we like to see.”   Corrigan responds, “Two months ago I didn’t expect ever to be in a situation like this.  I’m in your hands and whatever you say goes.”  With that the entourage is off to City Hall, where the aviator answers a few questions from reporters after spending a few moments with the mayor in his private office.  Then it is off to the Blackstone Hotel for a luncheon, followed by a tour of the city’s parks and a stop at the Edward Hines Hospital in Maywood where Corrigan is cheered by veterans.  A dinner in his honor is held at the Chicago Athletic Association where Corrigan is asked about the most money he has ever made in a year.  “Oh, about a thousand dollars,” he answers.  “Do you have any ambition to make any more,” another questioner asks.  “What’s the use,” answers Corrigan, who is rumored to have received offers from major movie sutdios as well as from airline companies.  “The government’ll take it all away anyhow, and, so far as I can see, it deesn’t put the taxes it collects to any good purpose.  I don’t want any more money.”  Corrigan caught the attention of an American public, starved for some good news in the throes of a world-wide depression.  In a plane he had virtually constructed himself, and with a fuel tank that he knew was leaking gasoline when he took off, he made the trip from Floyd Bennett Field in Brooklyn, New York to Baldonnel Aerodrome in County Dublin after a 28-hour, 13-minute flight with provisions consisting of two chocolate bars, two boxes of fig bars, and a quart of water.   The plane had no radio, and the compass he used was 20-years-old.


August 20, 1936 – Before a crowd of more than 10,000 people, Mayor Edward Kelly and other city officials dedicate the new Ashland Avenue bridge over the north branch of the Chicago River at Elston and Clybourn Avenues.  The bridge is worth the $1,713,000 it costs to build it because it is the final link in the widening and extension of Ashland Avenue from Ninety-Fifth street to Devon avenue, a project that began in 1922.  A parade of cars begins at Sixty-Ninth Street and moves along Ashland to Milwaukee Avenue where it is joined by a series of floats that depict the development of the city’s traffic from horse cars to streetcars and buses.  Kelly says, “All of the city will benefit by this great improvement.  It required much planning and is a concrete expression of the ‘I WILL’ spirit of Chicago.  It is a credit to the community, a mark of achievement.” [Chicago Daily Tribune, August 21, 1936]


August 20, 1899 – The Chicago Daily Tribune reports on a controversy surrounding United States government buildings at the upcoming Paris exposition.  The man in charge of settling the kerfuffle is Chicagoan Ferdinand W. Peck, who must somehow come to a decision regarding the huge issue of whether the letter “V” or “U” will be used on American buildings at the exposition.  Those who argue against substituting the “V” in words that normally would use “U” say that the substitution “is an unwarranted bowing of the knee to the French, an effort unduly to honor words already borrowed from them and a pledge that the United State by and by will make their entire language its own.” [Chicago Daily Tribune, August 20, 1899] Peck is the one man most responsible for seeing the great Auditorium Theater built a decade earlier, and that building on Congress Street and Michigan Avenue uses “V” in place of “U” in its nameplate.  One of the architects of the Auditorium, Louis Sullivan, says, “The letter “V’ has always been considered more artistic than the letter “U” … the letter is ugly, totally too heavy in the lower portion, and made of no artistic lines.  The “V” is copied from the old Roman and may be found in practically every inscription designed by an artist or an architect.”  In Rome the Latin language of antiquity had no “U,” so one could speculate that the use of the “V” in neo-classical design enhances the effect of the design style.  One could also ask a stone carver which letter he or she would prefer to carve and be fairly accurate in predicting the response. 


August 20, 1980 – Things become heated at the Dirksen Federal Courthouse on Dearborn Street as Judge Marvin Aspen sends 14 sweaty jurors downstairs to the offices of the General Services Administration to complain about conditions in the “sweltering courtroom.”  “Maybe they’ll listen to you,” the judge says.  “They certainly ought to, because you’re paying their salary.”  The Chicago Tribune reports that the assistant building engineer, Michael O’Connell, tells the jurors, “Don’t expect it any lower than 80,” as he explains President Carter’s energy guidelines, which call for the cooling of public buildings to no less than 80 degrees.  The real problem, though, seems to be with the engineering of the building.  According to the Tribune, “In recent years, some Dirksen Building courtrooms have been so hot or so cold that a number of judges have said they cannot conduct business and have threatened to cite the GSA for contempt of court for obstruction of justice.”  [Chicago Tribune, August 20, 1980]    


Posted by Chicago Old and New at 2:30 AM 0 comments
Labels: , ,

Friday, August 9, 2019

August 9, 1945 -- Studebaker Engine Plant Up for Sale

chicagotribune
August 9, 1945 – The federal government’s Reconstruction Finance Corporation announces that the huge aircraft engine plant operated by the Studebaker Corporation at 5555 Archer Avenue has been put up for sale.  The main building contains 782,988 square feet and sits on a 50-acre site just west of Midway Airport.  Every B-17 Flying Fortress produced after January, 1944 came equipped with Studebaker-built R-1820 engines.  Engine components were fabricated and manufactured in the Chicago area plant and shipped to South Bend, Indiana for final assembly at a 1,500,000 square foot plant that sat on 318 acres.  During World War II Studebaker built 63,789 engines, each composed of nearly 8,000 finished parts.  The above photo shows another engine coming off the assembly line at the Studebaker plant.


August 9, 1964 –Naval reservists participate in the second day of training in Lake Michigan aboard the 312-foot USS. Rauner.  Six ships of the “Corn Belt Fleet” and aircraft from the Glenview Naval Air Station join in the exercises as reservists practice anti-submarine maneuvers off Chicago.  After the exercises are concluded, the submarine is tied up east of the Michigan Avenue bridge for public viewing.  The USS Rauner, Hull Number SS-476, was a diesel-powered attack submarine launched on October 14, 1944. Her first war patrol was off Honshu, Japan where she sank an enemy minesweeper.  By the time the Rauner made it to her second patrol, Japan had declared defeat.  The Rauner entered Tokyo Bay, and with ten other United States submarines, represented the submarine service at the signing of the peace treaty. The summer of 1964 was the only time she worked in coordination with the Great Lakes Naval Training Center although after service in the Atlantic and Mediterranean she was towed to Great Lakes after decommissioning at the Boston Naval Shipyard on January 15, 1969. There she served as a Naval Reserve Training vessel until she was stricken from the Navy list on December 15, 1971.


August 9, 1937 – The rarest of real estate deals occurs when two of the city’s skyscrapers are swapped with no brokers involved in the transaction and with no commission fees paid.  The Marshall Field estate trades the 19-story Times building at 211 West Wacker Drive for the sixteen-story Central Life Insurance Company building at the southwest corner of North Michigan Avenue and East Superior Street.  A representative of the Field estate says that through the acquisition of the Central Life building it now owns the entire block bounded by Michigan, Huron, Rush and Superior.  Through the swap the insurance company will be able to consolidate all of its operations, scattered in various leased spaces in the area, in the Wacker Drive building.  The property on Wacker Drive, shown above, a Holabird and Root design, is still making money.  Saks Fifth Avenue now occupies the corner of Superior and Michigan where the Central Life building used to stand.


August 9, 1972:  A traffic study is released that concludes “Traffic conditions in the Near North Michigan Avenue area will be ‘nearly intolerable’ if the city constructs a bridge over the Chicago River at Columbus Drive.”  The report, prepared for the Greater North Michigan Avenue Association by R. W. Booker and Associates, partially validates a report issued earlier in the week by the Chicago Chapter of the American Institute of Architects.  The report observes that the city has not planned well in proposing a bridge that will connect Fairbanks Court north of the river with Columbus Drive and the developing Illinois Center property to the south.  Taking a special hit is the massive traffic jam that is anticipated during the lengthy reconstruction of the dogleg on Lake Shore Drive north of Randolph Street.  The report makes six recommendations to relieve problems in the River North area if the bridge is built.  They include:  (1) employing rapid transit or people mover systems in the area; (2) widening Fairbanks Court and making it one way south, in the area north of Ontario Street; (3) better enforcement of peak traffic rules and parking regulations in the area; (4) eliminating on-street parking in the area and creating new off-street parking areas; (5) making Ontario and Ohio Streets one way between Fairbanks and Lake Shore Drive and developing grade separation of these two streets with Lake Shore Drive; and (6) making thoro (sic) studies of alternate methods of handling traffic during the reconstruction of Lake Shore Drive, including staged construction to permit continued, limited use of the Drive.  [Chicago Tribune, August 10, 1972]  The bridge was finished in 1982 for a cost of $33,000,000, bringing almost instantaneous development of the area north of the river and east of Columbus Drive.
Posted by Chicago Old and New at 2:30 AM 1 comments
Labels: , ,

Monday, November 26, 2018

November 26, 1978 -- Bilandic Unveils Five-Year Plan

google.com
google.com
November 26, 1978 –Before the Big Snow that would end his career moves in, Mayor Michael Bilandic unveils a $7.4-billion public works plan that over a period of five years “promises to change the face of much of Chicago by the early 1980’s.” [Chicago Tribune, November 27, 1978]  Nearly $1.1 billion will fund projects in the heart of downtown.  The biggest of those projects, one that never made it off the wish list, is the Franklin Street subway project that, as it is proposed, will run beneath Franklin Street in the Loop. $173.8 million will go toward roads and infrastructure improvements associated with the development of Illinois Center.  Columbus Drive will be extended to the north from Monroe Street at a cost of $44.7 million, and a Columbus Drive bridge across the river will be built for $20.2 million.  Also in the works is the straightening of the “S-Curve” on Lake Shore Drive, relocating and reconstructing Lake Shore Drive from Wacker Drive south to Twenty-Third Street, extending Roosevelt Road and Eighteenth Street from Michigan Avenue to Lake Shore Drive, completing the rehabilitation of Navy Pier, and the construction of a new State of Illinois office building at the site of the old Sherman House Hotel.  Away from downtown, the biggest project is the Crosstown Expressway, expected to cost in excess of a billion dollars, following a path along South Cicero Avenue from the Eisenhower Expressway to Midway Airport and from the airport on a southeasterly path along an undetermined route to join Route 57. Upgrading terminals and construction of a new terminal at O’Hare Airport will take up another billion dollars.   All in all, the plan totals close to 30 major projects, and with the exception of the Franklin Street subway (which most probably would have brought the end of the Loop elevated structure) and the Crosstown Expressway project, it is amazing to see how much of the plan actually was brought to completion.   Although the reconstruction of Lake Shore Drive as it passes the museum campus did not occur for nearly two decades, it was one of the items listed on the ambitious five-year plan Bilandic revealed.  The comparison of the two photos shows what a dramatic difference just this one project made.


November 26, 1877 – The City Council takes up a special ordinance authorizing the leasing of lake front property to the “Chicago Base-Ball Club” [Chicago Daily Tribune, November 17, 1877] for a fee of $1,000 a year.  There is a spirited exchange.  One alderman asserted that “if the city hadn’t the right to sell the ground, it hasn’t the right to lease it.”  An opposing alderman said that “there was nothing whatever in the proposition that would be detrimental to the city, and that there was no good reason why it should not be accepted.”  After various amendments are offered and rejected, the ordinance is approved.  Thus, at a cost of a thousand bucks the team that would eventually become the Chicago Cubs is given permission to play “base-ball” on the northeast corner of Randolph Street and Michigan Avenue where Wrigley Square and the Millennium peristyle stand today.  After playing four years at a park on Twenty-Third Street, the team would move in 1878 to the new lakefront park.  In 1877 the team finished second-to-last in the National League with a record of 26-33. The move bumped them up one notch and four games as the team finished fourth out of six teams with a record of 30-30.


November 26, 1963 – The first steel column for the new Equitable Life Assurance Society of the United States building at 401 North Michigan Avenue is put in place at 10:00 a.m.  Workers for United States Steel place the 19-ton, 35-foot long column in position on the north side of the site that sits between Tribune Tower to the north and the Chicago River on the south.  The tower, designed by Skidmore, Owings and Merrill, will be located on the site where Jean Baptiste Point du Sable, built his home in the early 1780’s, a site that is a National Historic Landmark.  The Chicago Tribune sold the land to Equitable on the condition that the new building could not be taller than Tribune Tower.  Today 401 North Michigan has been joined by a new neighbor to the south as the new Apple store is receiving its first holiday visitors. Its older neighbor, Tribune Tower, is currently under renovation as it moves into a new life as a residential building.
Posted by Chicago Old and New at 2:30 AM 0 comments
Labels: , , , , , , ,

Saturday, September 15, 2018

September 15, 1976 -- Mondale Attacks Ford in Midway Speech

wsj.com
September 15, 1976 –Democratic Vice-Presidential candidate Walter Mondale, speaking to reporters at Midway Airport, says that President Gerald Ford’s record “belies and puts a falsehood to everything he says he’s now for.” [Chicago Tribune, September 16, 1976] Using notes that he had jotted down during his flight to Chicago, Mondale attacks Ford on four fronts.  In the area of health care, Mondale says that the President has made no proposal for a health-care program affordable for most Americans.  In education he asserts that the federal oversight of education under Ford “is the worst in 40 years.” Mondale finds that “The record is absolutely miserable,” showing that 2.5 million Americans have lost their jobs since Ford took office. He also finds that the Ford administration is responsible for high interest rates that make affordable housing so difficult to find.  “Their record couldn’t be worse on all of their objectives,” the Democratic candidate states.  “I think it’s clear that on the issues he has raised, he has a miserable performance record. And if trust must be earned, he doesn’t deserve the trust of the American people.” The election went down to the wire, but the Carter-Mondale ticket pulled out a narrow victory.  If 3,687 votes had been switched in Hawaii and 5,559 votes in Ohio had been switched from Carter to Ford, the incumbent would have been victorious.


September 15, 1966 – Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. reveals a plan to target downtown stores in Chicago in an effort to create jobs for African Americans in the city.  Speaking to a rally of 500 in the Greater Mount Hope Baptist Church at 6034 Princeton Avenue, Dr. King says, “I’m going to march straight up Michigan avenue and straight up State street and organize every store in the city.”  [Chicago Tribune, September 16, 1966] The next day, he reveals, pickets will demonstrate in front of the Saks Fifth Avenue store on Michigan Avenue.  In his address Dr. King also criticizes Senator Everett Dirksen for his opposition to the civil rights bill.


September 15, 1961 – Three carpenters fall 43 stories to their deaths as a scaffold on which they are being lifted separates from the hoisting hook inside the core of the east tower of Marina City, under construction north of the river on State Street.  Mike Einsele, a worker inside the core, says, ‘We were raising forms inside the core and I was about five feet above them.  They were standing on the scaffolding, and I guess a cable slipped.  I heard a loud noise and I turned around to look.  The bodies bounced crazily, hitting one obstruction after another, until they hit the bottom.  I heard the thuds when they hit and I got sick.  I got out of there then.”  [Chicago Tribune, September 16, 1961]  Another worker, Will Bridges, who was working ten stories below the scaffold and who had just stepped out of the way to get a drink of water, says “Everyone inside the core heard them fall.”  Speculation about the cause suggests that the heavy forms on the scaffold that were being hoisted for the next phase of concrete work jammed against the wall of the core and twisted the hoisting hook enough so that the scaffold fell away.
Posted by Chicago Old and New at 2:30 AM 0 comments
Labels: , ,

Wednesday, September 5, 2018

September 5, 1982 -- Midway Airport Rapid Transit Route Chosen


September 5, 1982 --The Chicago Tribune reports that Chicago transit officials have selected the Forty-Ninth Street corridor as the route that a 9.1-mile rapid transit line will use to move people from the Loop to Midway Airport.  According to the plan, the route could be in operation by the end of the 1980’s with costs kept to a minimum through the use of railroad rights of way for much of the distance.  It is expected that the federal government will provide 80 percent of the funding for the $453 million project.  The hope is that 18,000 to 35,000 residents of the Southwest Side will use the line, relieving the area’s population of the burden of depending on bus service in the only section of the city without rapid transit service.  Nine stations will be built along the new line, including a stop at Midway along Cicero Avenue, at Pulaski Road and Fifty-First Street, Kedzie Avenue and Forty-Ninth Street, California avenue at Forty-Ninth, Western at Archer, Ashland Avenue just north of the Stevenson and Halsted Street at Archer.  The line will connect with the Loop elevated with a proposed connection between the Ryan line (today’s Red Line) and the State Street subway to get Ryan line trains off the Loop elevated structure.  Before any of this can happen, though, the Urban Mass Transportation Administration must approve an environmental impact statement.  This is another one of the projects that took decades to bring to completion.  A high-speed subway line between the Loop and Sixty-Third Street was first proposed in the 1940’s.  In 1987 the project finally kicked off, and the new line was opened on October 31, 1993.



September 5, 1880 – A Chicago Daily Tribune editorial issues praise for an expanding lakefront “as a beautiful breathing-spot for the people” [Chicago Daily Tribune, September 5, 1880] after which it issues a warning.  The paper first observes, “The debris from the great fires of ’71-‘74 furnished the material to fill up the basin between the Illinois Central Railway and the old breakwater, and, after various vicissitudes, the space has been leveled off, with walks and grass plots it affords an inviting retreat on sultry evenings for all classes, the working people especially finding there much needed rest and recreation.  It is hoped in the not distant future that stately maples and elms will replace the starveling poles that now disgrace it, and make it one of the most beautiful, as it is the most inviting, resort that can be found in any city in the country.”  Disrupting the process of beautification, though, is a proposal to make the area a parade ground for the military. “No one will accuse THE TRIBUNE of opposing anything that can contribute to the comfort and efficiency of our military organizations,” the editorial ends, “but the use of the park for this purposes is entirely unnecessary … by common consent base-ball has usurped a part of this north end of the park (the organization that eventually would become the Chicago Cubs began its life, playing in an area that is now occupied by the peristyle on the southeast corner of Randolph Street and Michigan Avenue) … A strong remonstrance has been prepared, and it is hoped the Council will adopt it.  Let the park be kept forever for the people.  They need it, and it is their right that they should have it.”  The photo above shows the park, looking south, about ten years after the editorial appeared.


September 5, 1931 – The general manager of the Union Station Company, O. H. Frick, announces that work will soon begin on a $2,000,000 powerhouse that will supply heat to the new post office building, Union Station, and other railroad property along the river.   The new structure will sit midway between Taylor Street and Roosevelt Road on the west bank of the river.  The new building is necessary because the present Union Station heating plant sits on the site of the new post office, currently under construction.  Graham, Anderson, Probst & White, the same architectural firm that designed Union Station and the new post office, will also design the power house.  The specifications for the new structure are impressive, according to Frick.  He says, “The first unit will have four 1,600 horse power boilers, normal rating, with a maximum rating of 4,000 horse power each.  Its capacity will be 16,000 horse power.  The maximum length of the distributing system will be about one mile and will use both overhead and underground pipe systems, thoroughly insulated to reduce condensation losses.”  The Union Station Company, jointly owned by the Pennsylvania, Burlington, and Milwaukee railroads, projects the cost of the powerhouse at $2,000,000.
Posted by Chicago Old and New at 2:30 AM 1 comments
Labels: , ,

Sunday, September 2, 2018

September 2, 1981 -- Mayor Jane Byrne Unveils $3.3 Billion Improvement Project


September 2, 1981–Mayor Jane Byrne unveils a $3.3 billion, five-year public works plan that, if implemented, will bring major changes to the city.  In the plan’s 142 pages a half-billion dollars are allocated for projects in the Loop and at O‘Hare International Airport with $2 billion allocated to the rest of the city.  Byrne says, “This capital improvements program is indeed ambitious, but in that respect it is typical of Chicago.  It embodies not only the best hopes of Chicago citizens and my administration, but also our shared commitment to a better city in the years ahead.” [Chicago Tribune, September 3, 1981]Perhaps the most ambitious aspect of the plan is the $64.8 million proposal to eliminate the S-curve on Lake Shore Drive.  The plan also includes: the construction of the Columbus Drive bridge; the reconstruction of Lake Shore Drive from the Chicago River north to Huron Street; construction of a central public library in the block bounded by State and  Van Buren Streets, Plymouth Court and Congress Parkway;  and redevelopment of the six-square block area bounded by Washington, LaSalle, and State Streets and Wacker Drive.  Close to a half-billion dollars is allocated for improvements at O-Hare, including renovating and expanding terminals, upgrading parking facilities and the possible construction of a monorail system.  Midway is scheduled to see $50 million in improvements as well.  Elimination of the S-curve where Lake Shore Drive crossed the river, shown above, was one of the major projects outlined in the $3.3 billion plan.    


September 2, 1954 – Ten thousand people watch as the captured German submarine U-505 is hauled across Lake Shore Drive at Fifty-Seventh Street on its way to a permanent place at the Science Museum. The drive is closed to traffic at 7:00 p.m. and opened again at 7:00 a.m. the following day as the submarine is moved on rails for a distance of 300 feet across the highway  Directing the move is Rear Admiral Daniel V. Gallery who commanded the task force that captured the vessel off the coast of West French Africa in 1944, taking control of the first submarine ever commandeered in naval combat.  Workmen of the La Plant-Adair Company, a house moving company from Indianapolis, are in charge of jacking up the submarine and transporting it safely to its final resting place at the museum.  The above photo shows the U-505 sitting on the beach at Jackson Park after being rolled off the floating dry dock preparatory to being hauled across Lake Shore Drive to the Science Museum, today's Museum of Science and Industry.


September 2, 1914 – Federal officials begin an investigation to determine the cause of a fire that rips through the passenger ship City of Chicago, which lies beached at the life saving station at the entrance to the Chicago River.  The one big question about the wreck is how a fire could have gained such force if all members of the crew were on duty.  The boat sits with its hull resting on the bottom of the lake in about twelve feet of water with a load of Michigan grapes, cantaloupes and peaches still aboard.  The official report of the Coast Guard describes the event, “When within 5 miles of the end of her run in the early morning of September 1, 1914, the 1,439-ton passenger steamer City of Chicago, bound from St. Joseph, Mich., to Chicago, with 94 passengers, a crew of 56, and a full cargo of fruit, was discovered by her master to be on fire amidships.  To avoid panic no alarm was sounded, and the presence of the fire was kept secret on board until the master was able to lay his vessel, head-on, upon the breakwater protecting Chicago Harbor.  As the steamer rested upon the barrier referred to she lay within a few feet of the old Chicago Coast Guard Station.  The station lookout had observed smoke rising from her before she struck, and keeper and crew lost no time in beginning the work of extinguishing the fire.  The women and children on board were carried down ladders set against the steamer’s side.  With everybody safely landed, the Coast Guard crew devoted their entire attention to subduing the fire, and succeeded, with the help of a fire tug, in putting it out after three hours’ effort.”  The captain of the City of Chicago, Oscar Bjork, says, “There isn’t much to say about it.  You can see where the boat is, and you can bet I didn’t put her there for nothing.  I don’t think it would have been possible to save her anyhow – but I wasn’t figuring on saving her.  It was the passengers I was worried about.”  [Chicago Daily Tribune, September 2, 1914]

Posted by Chicago Old and New at 2:30 AM 0 comments
Labels: , , , , , , , ,

Friday, May 4, 2018

May 4, 1933 -- American Airways Begins Direct Service to New York



May 4, 1933 –At 1:10 p.m. an American Airways twin-engine Cutiss Condor takes off from what is now Chicago’s Midway Airport, inaugurating direct airline service between Chicago and New York City.  The plane lands at the Newark, New Jersey airport at 7:59 p.m. after a flight of five hours and 26 minutes, carrying 15 passengers, a flight attendant, two pilots and 200 pounds of express mail. Stops are made at Detroit and Buffalo.  “This is different from the old planes, when if you stood up in the aisle the pilot gave you a dirty look and began winding up his stabilizer to fix the trim of his ship,” says one passenger as he heads to the rear of the plane to watch the sun set over the Catskill Mountains. 

John Augur Holabird
May 4, 1945 – John Augur Holabird dies at St. Luke’s Hospital on his Fifty-Ninth birthday.  The famed architect’s résumé includes some of the greatest Chicago buildings, including the 333 North Michigan Avenue building, the Board of Trade, the Palmolive building, today’s Chicago Hilton and Towers, formerly the Stevens Hotel, Passavant Hospital, the Chicago Daily News Building, and Patton Gymnasium at Northwestern University.  The son of a pioneer in the design of steel-framed tall buildings, William Holabird, John Holabird’s education was completed at West Point.  Graduating as a Second Lieutenant, he quickly rose in the ranks to the rank of Lieutenant Colonel in the field artillery, commanding the Twelfth Field Artillery, Second Division in the St. Mihiel, Blanc Mont and Meuse-Argonne offensives.  He was awarded the Distinguished Service medal and the Croix de Guerre.  His attention turned to architecture, and he began his study in 1910, graduating in 1913 from the Ecole des Beaux Arts.  Holabird was a Fellow of the American Institute of Architects, a member of the Chicago Plan Commission and of the Commission of Fine Arts and a member of the Chicago, University, Commercial, Tavern, Union League, Glen View Golf and Saddle and Cycle Clubs. [https://www.westpointaog.org/memorials]


May 4, 1992 – University of Chicago trustees announce that the school has selected a site east of Michigan Avenue and north of the river, as home for its downtown Graduate School of Business. “This project reflects the university’s commitment to maintaining a substantial presence downtown, while also providing a state-of-the-art facility in which to train tomorrow’s business leaders,” says Hanna H. Gray, the U. of C. president. [Chicago Tribune, May 5, 1992] Lohan Associates, a Chicago architectural firm, will design the center, and McHugh Construction Company will be the general contractor. If you are on the river sometime, notice what an understated example the Gleacher Center is of contextual design. The tier of windows on the western third of the building’s south face relate beautifully to the Mid-Century Modern style of the 1965 structure at 401 North Michigan, Gleacher’s next door neighbor to the west. The tier of windows on the eastern two-thirds of the building relate equally well to the SOM’s 1989 Post-Modernist Art-Deco throwback NBC tower just to the east. Anyone not looking for it might well miss it, but this is contextual design that shines.
Posted by Chicago Old and New at 2:30 AM 3 comments
Labels: , , ,
Subscribe to: Posts (Atom)