View Hyde Park Hotels Presentation
Total Page:16
File Type:pdf, Size:1020Kb
THE GRAND HOTELS OF HYDE PARK Patricia Morse Hyde Park Historical Society Presented: 18 July 2021 Map of American Indian trails and villages of Chicago, and of Cook, DuPage and Will counties in 1804. Map by Albert F. Scharf, 1900- 1901. Photograph: Chicago History Museum; watercolor from The Dream City in Ashes--p. 6 (arcadiasystems.org) HYDE PARK BEGINS • 1833 Nathan Watson buys land • 1853 Hyde Park Railroad Station opens • 1861 Hyde Park incorporates Paul Cornell Watson’s Tavern from Hansen, Paul Cornell from HPHS HYDE PARK HOUSE 1858-1879 Gurdon P. Randall, architect Approximately, the corner of 53rd and Hyde Park Blvd Wood Frame 80 Units, 200 People Photo: HPHS Archives HYDE PARK HOTEL 1888-1962 • • • • Photo: CHUCKMAN'S PHOTOS ON WORDPRESS: CHICAGO NOSTALGIA AND MEMORABILIA THE COLUMBIAN EXPOSITION OF 1893 SOUTHSIDE TRANSFORMED Beatrice Hotel 1891-1959 SW Corner 57th & Dorchester Southside Transformed • Over 1500 Hotels and Lodging Houses on the Southside • Multiple small frame structures or empty lots became single buildings with single owners • Commercial streets became lined with tall buildings • Stores on the bottom, living spaces above • Built fast and furious for the Fair • Targeted by Urban Renewal 1950s University of Chicago Photographic Archive Catherine Van Valkenburg Waite Holland Hotel 1891-1938 NW Corner Lake & 53rd Street 400 Rooms Photo: Woman of the Century/Catherine Van V. Waite - Wikisource WHAT MAKES A GRAND HOTEL Services Public Spaces • Daily maid service • Ballrooms • Laundry service • dances, fundraisers, weddings, civic • Bellhop/Assistance organization meetings, community • Concierge/Front Desk gatherings, political rallies • Security/Doorman • Elegant Dining • Meal plans • Smoking Rooms for business meetings • Parlors for receiving guests Luxury • Entertainment facilities • Marble staircases • Billiards • Elaborate décor • Bowling • Fine furnishings • Putting Greens • All the comforts of a wealthy home • Concert Rooms • Cutting edge technology • Movie theaters • Exclusivity (high rent) Apartment Hotels rented short-term or long-term, with a range of rooms and suites. They offered services and did not require leases. Windermere Hotel 1891-1959 https://chuckmanchicagonostalgia.wordpress.com/ Raymond and Whitcomb Grand Hotel 1891-1929 1414 East 59th “Street 9,000 square foot dining room seating over 500 Bird's eye view of the World's Columbian Exposition, 350 rooms in 1, 2, 3 room suites Chicago, 1893. | Library of Congress (loc.gov); http://chuckmancollectionvolume11.blogspot.com/ CHICAGO BEACH HOTEL 1891-1924 Thomas Starrett Engineer NE Corner 51st & Cornell 450 rooms, 175 with private baths http://chuckmancollectionvolume8.blogspot.com/; https://chuckmancollectionvolume4.blogspot.com/ AFTER THE FAIR 1895-1917 Jackson Park –Olmsted Sons Redesign • Lawn Tennis • Athletic track and field • Equestrian Trails • Rose Garden, Annual Beds, Lakefront Promenades • Baseball Diamonds • Beach Bathing • Boating • Yacht Harbor digitalcollections.nypl.org; CHUCKMAN'S PHOTOS ON WORDPRESS: • After 1905, Golf CHICAGO NOSTALGIA AND MEMORABILIA; HipPostcard HOTEL DEL PRADO (THE RENAMED RAYMOND & WHITCOMB GRAND) The past is a foreign country (tumblr.com); University of Chicago Photographic Archives DOMESTICITY 1905 STYLE Elegant domestic life • Porcelain bathtubs, • Built-in buffets and bookcases, • Servants’ rooms, • Steam heat, • Electric lights, • Telephones, Chicago History Museum Image Archive The Staff who Provided the Services, Pre-World War I • Unionized • Well-Paid Hotels provided 1000s of Jobs Chicago History Museum Image Archive Arthur Burrage Farwell Hyde Park Protective Association Chicago Law and Order League “BLIND PIGS” AND GAMBLING Wikimedia; Chicago Tribune CHICAGO BEACH HOTEL CHUCKMAN'S PHOTOS ON WORDPRESS: CHICAGO NOSTALGIA AND MEMORABILIA Chicago’s Residential Hotel Center “Caldrons of social Here living is worthwhile. and cultural evil” • Fast train to office, stores, theaters Women have • Recreation in Jackson Park dangerous leisure. • Events at the University • Cooler by the lake Women had access to unfettered urban “Enjoy living in a way that will free you diversity and its from the tedious, worrisome duties distractions. that go with keeping house” Women didn’t need families. They could live on their own and have careers. University of Chicago sociologist, Norman S. Hayner Hyde Park Building Boom, 1917-1930 By 1930, 100 hotels in Hyde Park • Fire-proofing • Steel-frame construction • Concrete floors • Brick & terra cotta • 12 to 17 stories • Class Differences • Smaller Rooms Below • Kitchenettes • Breakfast nooks • Murphy beds • Massive Suites Above CHUCKMAN'S PHOTOS ON WORDPRESS: CHICAGO NOSTALGIA AND MEMORABILIA Sisson Hotel 1917 Sherry Hotel 1927 Hampton House 1979 Henry L. Newhouse & Felix M. Bernham, architects 352 rooms in 84 fully-furnished apartments, of 2-6 rooms each COOPER-CARLETON HOTEL 1918 DEL PRADO HOTEL 1929-present Henry L. Newhouse & Felix M. Bernham, architects Chuckman postcards; University of Chicago Photographic Archives; WINDERMERE EAST Rapp and Rapp, architects 1922-Present 1924: 450 guest rooms Present: 228 apartments Vilma Banky Wikimedia; University of Chicago Photographic Archives; https://chuckmanchicagonostalgia.wordpress.com/ CHICAGO BEACH HOTEL 1921 George C. Nimmons architect 600 hotel rooms Hotels of Hyde Park THE HOTELS LOSE THE BEACH 1925 Looking South from 39th Street , Leif Erickson Drive, May 1930, just opened “the most wonderful water playground of the world” Vintage Lake Shore Drive -- Chicago Tribune; Encyclopedia of Chicago • Single-room units $240 a month ($3650 a month in 2021 dollars) • 9 room suites $1,075 a month ($15,600 a month in 2021 dollars) • Modern exercise equipment delivered to guests in their rooms • Dancing lessons, including tap • Bowling alley (enough lanes for tournaments) • 18 hole indoor putting golf course, full- time golf instructor, in the basement THE SHORELAND • Barber shop 1926-PRESENT • Beauty salon • Convenience shop ARCHITECT: MEYER FRIDSTEIN • Terrace café, Castilian Grill, Louis XVI Room of Gottschalk & Co. • Full-time upholstery workers in the attic to service the $2 million worth of furniture in 1926: 1000 Rooms the building. 1965: 750 apartments Present: 350 apartments LUXURY Chicago History Museum Images; MAC Properties; Application for National Historic Landmark Status 1930’S STYLE Application for landmark status PICCADILLY HOTEL 1927-Present Theater: 1927-1972 SE Corner 51st Street & Blackstone Rapp and Rapp 350 Rooms 1940’S Chuckman; Chicago History Museum Images; 1950’S Guests of the Shoreland Milton Friedman, Bill Veeck, Jimmy Hoffa, Marie Wilson Doris Irwin of American Air Lines Mrs. Luis Aparicio at home in the Picadilly during the Sox run for the pennant 1959 Duke Ellington performed at the Piccadilly, 1961 (photo from 1970) Charles W. Cushman Photograph Collection; Completeist: The Jack Benny Show 1952-53 Season; Chicago History Museum Images; Wikimedia’ Smithsonian Magazine; Chicago Tribune URBAN RENEWAL 1952-1970 Problem—White Flight & Crime & Urban Decay • Population Density • Poverty • Crime Solution—Create a Middle-Class Residential Suburb in the City • Remove commercial streets • Create a few shopping centers • Decrease density Hotels • Tear down old hotels, especially World’s Fair era buildings like the Beatrice and the Hyde Park Hotel • Decrease the number of units in surviving buildings • Turn hotels into leased apartments • Loss of 1000s of hotel jobs “Black and white united against the poor” Mike Nichols and Elaine May University of Chicago Photographic Archives URBAN RENEWAL 3 ERAS OF LAKE PARK 1950s 1890s 1961 1960’S • Rooms Combined into Apartments • 25% of rooms for short-term guests in the Shoreland, Windermere, Del Prado • Still important public community spaces, still convenient to downtown Lost Marketing Points • Air conditioning, pools, not lake breezes and beaches • Nike missile base in deteriorated Jackson Park • Air traffic moves to O’Hare • Hyde Park unsafe and boring--jazz clubs gone • Breakdown of civic & commercial life • Changing tastes—Counterculture and space age New Marketing Point • Seniors • Don’t have changing tastes Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters convention at Del Prado • Want services Hotel, 1965 Chicago History Museum Images 1970’S DORMS AND APARTMENTS Some of the Hotels Once Owned by the University • Broadview • Blackstone • Carlson • Shelbyrne • Shoreland • Piccadilly (tore down theater 1972) • Windermere (bought 1973, sold 1979) University of Chicago Photographic Archives 50 TH ON THE LAKE 1958-present 4900 S. Lake Shore Drive 300 Units SHORE DRIVE MOTEL 1956 -1988 NW Corner 56th & South Shore Drive 2000’S Hyde Park Apartment Hotels Thematic District, National Register of Historic Places, 1986 • Shoreland • Del Prado • Windermere • East End • Mayfair • Flamingo • Poinsetta HYATT PLACE CHICAGO, SOUTH/ SOPHY UNIVERSITY MEDICAL CENTER 2013 2018 • Top 20 New Hotels, Travel + Leisure • Rated Number 3 of all Chicago hotels, Trip Advisor • Well rated Mesler Restaurant • Local artists in the décor just like the Windermere of old THE STUDY 2021 WHERE ARE THEY NOW Torn Down • Hyde Park House, 1879 (burned) • Hyde Park Hotel, 1962 • Beatrice Hotel, 1959 • Holland Hotel, 1938 • First Chicago Beach Hotel, 1925 • Second Chicago Beach Hotel, 1970 • Windermere (West), 1959 • Shore Motel, 1980??? Condos • Hotel Sisson/Hotel Sherry/Hampton House Rehabbed as Rental Apartments • Del Prado • Shoreland • Windermere (East) Hyde Park Hotels Referenced in the National Historic