I strolled down one of the most serene streets in Chicago the
other day – Hawthorne Place in East Lakeview. In the days before Lake Shore Drive the street ended at the
lake, and as you walk past the wooded, over-sized lots, you can imagine what it
must have been like to escape the city for the country lifestyle of Lake View
township back at the end of the nineteenth century.
 |
| 546 Hawthorne Place (JWB, 2011) |
Right across from the Chicago City Day School on the far
east end of Hawthorne stands the John McConnell house at 546 West
Hawthorne. For a tour of the
McConnell house, courtesy of Open House Chicago, click here.
For me the interesting thing about these beautiful homes is
the story of the folks who lived in them.
And Mr. McConnell’s story is a particularly interesting one, a story
that actually begins with his father’s attempt to sink roots in the muck of
early Chicago.
 |
| The east side of the John McConnell house (JWB, 2011) |
John McConnell was born on December 8, 1847 to an Irish
father, Edward, and a Scottish mother, Charlotte (McGlashan). Edward left Ireland in 1821, sailing to
Montreal where he spent the winter, moving on to Rochester, New York where he
worked as a clerk in a lumberyard.
Finally, in 1830 Edward left New York “with several equally inclined
partners in an open Macinaw boat with Chicago as their destination.” [Curey,
Josiah Seymour. Chicago, Its
History and Its Builders, A Century of Marvelous Growth, Volume 4. The S. J. Clarke Publishing Company, Chicago: 1912.]
The boat was wrecked off Long Point on Lake Erie, and Edward
and his partners walked back to Buffalo, where he spent the winter, sailing for
Chicago once again in the spring of 1831.
When he got to the swamp that was Chicago, virtually all of its
residents were suffering with fever.
Old Man McConnell, high-tailed it to Springfield, where he started a
wholesale grocery business and made the acquaintance of a country lawyer,
Abraham Lincoln, who represented him in several land cases.
Edward enlisted to fight in the Black Hawk wars and got to
the field “just about the time peace was declared.” [Curry]
Finally, in late 1837 he invested everything he had in Chicago land,
losing most of it in the panic of 1838.
Timing apparently wasn’t one of Edward’s strengths.
He hung in there, though, marrying in 1848 and building the
first brick house in the city at the corner of Clark and Madison. He also bought farm property at 22nd
Street and Halsted. Buying and
selling land gave him a comfortable lifestyle, and he and Charlotte raised four
sons.
 |
| John McConnell's lakeside place in the country (JWB, 2011) |
John, the third son, grew up on the Halsted property and
attended the original University of Chicago. He tried his hand at picture-framing until 1884 when
he began buying and subdividing property in the township of Lake View. It must have been a lucrative business;
from 1870 to 1887 the township grew from 2,000 to 45,000 and became a part of Chicago
in 1889.
John was elected as a Lake View supervisor and president of
the Board of Trustees the same year he began dealing in real estate within the
township. Just a guess – the
position probably didn’t hurt the business. When Lake View township became a part of Chicago, John
became a city alderman.
In 1885 Mr. McConnell built his home at 546 Hawthorne Place,
just steps away from Lake Michigan.
He was a member of the Chicago Real Estate Board, the Chicago Athletic
Association, the Chicago Yacht Club and the Edgewater Golf Club. [Curry] In short,
he was doin’ alright.
 |
| Take away the cars and Hawthorne Place looks much like it must have looked back in 1885 when John McConnell built his home (JWB, 2011) |
And that’s another Chicago story from the middle of the
nineteenth century. The son of an
Irishman who came to the country with nothing ends up in the big brick house on
the lake.
The house is still there, and it is just as impressive as it
must have been back there in 1885 . . . if you ignore the traffic whizzing by
on Lake Shore Drive.
Posts
