Old Buildings, New Views
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H VoL. 35y d N0. 1 e PublishedPa by ther Hydek Park H istoricalH Society istoWINTErr 2013y 2013 R te WIN Permit No. 85 No. Permit T Chicago, IL Chicago, oor V r 37 6 60 IL Chicago, AID P HS U.S. Postage U.S. 5529 S. Lake Park Avenue Park Lake S. 5529 ANDE V HP Org. Non-Profit Society Historical Park yde H ANCES Fr S o T o H P Tecumseh, Shawnee Indian leader, Del Prado entrance hall ceiling This Newsletter is published by the Hyde Park Historical Society, a old Buildings, Hyde Park Historical Society not-for-profit organization founded CoLLECTINg AND PrESErVINg HyDE PArk’S History in 1975 to record, preserve, and New Views Time for you to join up or renew? promote public interest in the history Fill out the form below and return it to: of Hyde Park. Its headquarters, must have walked by this building a hundred “I times but never once looked in,“ remarked The Hyde Park Historical Society located in an 1893 restored cable car Mindy Schwartz. Such were the sentiments of many 5529 S. Lake Park Avenue • Chicago, IL 60637 station at 5529 S. Lake Park Avenue, of the more than fifty history and architecture buffs touring landmark hotels on Hyde Park’s east side in ✁ houses local exhibits. It is open to late September. Mindy was eying Grecian sculptures Enclosed is my new renewal membership the public on Saturdays and Sundays of faces, pillars, and wall decorations propped against Bob Dalby examines a wall feature in the East Park Tower Hotel in the Hyde Park Historical Society. from 2 until 4pm. the wall in the spacious business quarters of MAC Property Management in the ten-story, Geogian-style Hyde Park Boulevard overlooking Harold Washington Student $15 Sponsor $50 Web site: hydeparkhistory.org East Park Tower hotel apartment on the northwest Park, was built in 1922. Tour participants entered Member $35 Benefactor $100 Telephone: HY3-1893 corner of 53rd Street and Hyde Park Boulevard. through the office complex, then were ushered into Name President: Ruth Knack MAC Property Management, currently engaged the main lobby where they were impressed by the Editor: Frances S. Vandervoort in converting these buildings into rental apartments beauty of a recently uncovered skylight, now softly Address Membership Coordinator: and condominiums, sponsored the tour of East Park illuminated by hidden fluorescent lighting. Claude Weil Tower Hotel and three other classic Hyde Park Hotels. The tour, led by Peter Cassel of MAC Property Zip Designer: Nickie Sage East Park Tower, a red brick and terra cotta building Management and MAC associates David Gwinn and situated on the northwest corner of 53rd Street andr Lindsey Phillips, began at the “porte-corchére”, ➤ 2 r2 r7 ➤ 1 literally the “carriage porch” of Windermere House on East 56th Street. Peter filled us in on Memorable Architecture UPCOMING EVENTS local history, beginning with Paul Cornell’s vision of Hyde Park as a suburb of single-family dwellings, Tour Saturday, December 15, 2-4 pm Holiday all reachable from the city by the Illinois Central party at Headquarters. Bring your favorite Railroad. The Age of the Skyscraper began in Chicago The weekend of October 13-14 saw visitors from holiday refreshment and stories to tell in the 1880s with the construction of large steel- all over Chicago thrill to parquet floors, leaded glass, about local history. frame buildings characterized by masonry cladding and oak-paneled entrance halls, all seen during Saturday, January 19, 2013, 1-3 pm Tour of and hydraulic elevators. Hyde Park’s hotels, though openhousechicago, sponsored by the Chicago St. Thomas the Apostle’s Church. Meet at not skyscrapers in the technical sense, benefited from Architecture Foundataion. On Saturday architecture Kimbark Avenue entrance. these structural advancements. buffs braved threats of heavy rain to cross thresholds Early Hyde Park hotels were built to accommodate into homes owned by some of the city’s most Saturday, February 23, 2013 Annual dinner visitors to the World Columbian Exposition of 1893. important figures of the 19th and early 20th centuries. at Quad Club. Featured speaker will be Tim The first Del Prado Hotel, built on the north side 480 guests were welcomed by Rev. Ljubo Krasic of Samuelson, Chicago’s Cultural Historian. of the Midway between Dorchester and Blackstone Croatian Ethnic Institute, now housed in the Ryerson Avenues on 59th Street, was one of these, as was the Skylight in lobby of East Park Tower Hotel Mansion at 4851 South Drexel Boulevard. This original Windermere Hotel, built at the northwest handsome building, designed by architects Treat and corner of 56th Street and Cornell Avenue at the site residential apartment building in the 1970s when the Foltz, was built in 1887. Also, several groups of visitors of Bret Harte School and a parking lot. The first Del University of Chicago acquired the building and its visited the Society’s headquarters. Prado Hotel, razed more than 100 years ago, was on name was changed its name to Windermere House. Correction land that later became the site of International House. MAC Property Management acquired the building in Windermere West, as the old hotel was known, was 2005 is now renovating some classic elements of this In the article, Sunday Afternoon in Pullman…” the torn down in the 1950s. classic building, including plans to revive the French Science Fair Projects? name of Eliot Ness is misspelled. Eliot is spelled with The Windermere Hotel, built in 1922, became a and Italian Renaissance lobby. A new sign inspired one, not two “ells.” Hyde Park History regrets the error. by the original Windermere Hotel sign will be placed HPHS member Bert Benade provided Hyde Park in a conspicuous location at the front (south) of the History with a list of research papers from the Technical building. Society of The Armour Institute of Technology From Windermere House, tour guests walked to the (founded in 1890), which merged with the Lewis Answer to Mystery Quiz Shoreland Hotel in the 5400 block of South Shore Institute (founded in 1895) in 1940 to become the Drive. This distinctive Spanish Revival building now Illinois Institute of Technology. Some of these topics This is 61st Street just east of Dorchester Avenue and is inaccessible because of the extensive reconstruction might be appropriate for high school students today immediately north of the Andrew Carnegie Elementary going on within its high walls. Built in 1925-26, the for science fair projects. Others seem remarkably School, seen in the background. In the early 1880s, the Shoreland abutted Lake Michigan so closely that primitive, but as Benjamin Franklin once asked, Illinois Central Railroad built a spur from their main waves sometimes cast spray on the hotel’s front walls “What good is a newborn baby?” line to accommodate visitors to the Washington Park and windows. The completion of Promontory Point Race Track between Cottage Grove Avenue and South on the lakeshore in the mid-1930s put an end to The Pneumatic Caisson Park Avenue, now Dr. Martin Luther King Memorial onslaughts from the waves. Peter Cassel described The Fur Seal Drive. The curve on 61st Street indicates the path of the spur from its origin near 60th Street. In the early how the building’s 1000 rooms are being reconfigured Automatic Railroad Signals into one, two, and three-bedroom apartments. All 1890s, Mayor Hempstead Washburne sought to ban interior structures have been removed except columns Express Telephone System all racetracks in Chicago because of corruption and and floors. David Guinn described the demolition Manufacture of Chewing Gum gambling. The track closed from 1894 until 1898, as “green;” city standards require that ground water Study of the Telephone Sound in the Japanese Language when it reopened. It remained open until 1905, when the State of Illinois banned gambling and all horse not be contaminated and that all removed material— The Life of Watt between 19 and 24 million tons—must be hauled racing. In 1926, a second Washington Park Race Track The Subject of Phrenology T away to be recycled. Guinn described how the opened in south suburban Homewood. Hyde Parkers know this street as the site of the Saturday morning oor building is secured by large timber pilings extending Determination of Base Line in Triangulation V r 60 feet below surface. Notables who have lived in Manufacture of Pianos farmer’s market. Just beyond the wall on the left, at 6100 South Blackstone Avenue, are the Experimental ANDE or been feted in this hotel include aviatrix Amelia V Earhart, Jimmy Hoffa, Al Capone, Bill Veeck, and Manufacture of Pipe Organs Station and Chicago Bicycle Works. Elvis Presley. Manufacture of Pneumatic Tires ANCES Fr The third stop, East Park Tower Hotel, described Development of Trolley Systems S o T previously, was relatively unfamiliar to most members o Manufacture of a Dollar Bill H P of the group. From this building, the group crossed View of Del Prado Hotel to the “new” Del Prado Hotel on the corner southeast Petroleum Industry Winterr 2 0 1 3 Winterr 2 0 1 3 r6 r3 corner of 53rd Street and Hyde Park Boulevard. This they finished on the back steps leading up to what is now The Third Star hotel, almost identical to the Hampton House to the Museum of Science and Industry (where I worked the east, is the oldest of the four hotels visited. Built when in college), which is where he proposed to her. People can’t seem to get enough information about in 1918 as the Cooper Carlton Hotel by Sherman So you see how much this tour would mean to me.