F.B. Eye on Chicago

On July 26 of this year the Federal Bureau of Investigation will celebrate its century anniversary. (The Chicago office didn't officially open until August 21, 1920 and was headed by Special Agent James P. Rooney.)And, to celebrate, they are updating their website and including historical documents of interest.

The "Electronic Reading Room" includes many documents related to Chicago's history. In March, I included a link to the Internal Revenue Service's recently released documents pertaining to Al Capone, and they really were interesting. (See the post: Al Capone and the IRS Investigation)But, the F.B.I. site has 2,397 related to Capone and 107 pages on the St. Valentine's Day Massacre.

Gangsters are not the only Chicagoans represented. There are also documents related to Jane Addams and Richard Wright, to name just two.

If you have some spare surfing time, check it out.

Goin' to Graceland

TOMB of a millionaire,
A multi-millionaire, ladies and gentlemen,
Place of the dead where they spend every year
The usury of twenty-five thousand dollars
For upkeep and flowers
To keep fresh the memory of the dead.
The merchant prince gone to dust
Commanded in his written will
Over the signed name of his last testament
Twenty-five thousand dollars be set aside
For roses, lilacs, hydrangeas, tulips,
For perfume and color, sweetness of remembrance
Around his last long home.

(A hundred cash girls want nickels to go to the movies to-night.
In the back stalls of a hundred saloons, women are at tables
Drinking with men or waiting for men jingling loose silver dollars in their pockets.
In a hundred furnished rooms is a girl who sells silk or dress goods or leather stuff for six dollars a week wages
And when she pulls on her stockings in the morning she is reckless about God and the newspapers and the police, the talk of her home town or the name people call her.)

"Graceland" by Carl Sandburg (Chicago Poems, 1916)
Photo: The mausoleum of Potter Palmer and Bertha Honoré Palmer,(Wikipedia,©Jeremy Atherton, 2006)


I've always wanted to live in Chicago. Specifically, I've wanted to live in one of the condominiums at 330 S. Michigan Ave. (I believe they are in the McCormick building designed by Holabird and Roche and completed in 1910.) Since I have rather limited means, this is not going to be an option. So, being reluctant to give up my dream of spending my final days in Chicago, I began to think about Graceland Cemetery. We are all going to "shuffle off this mortal coil" at some point so if I can't spend my days in Chicago now, other than to visit, why not later! Lots cheaper than a condo, and couldn't ask for better company: the Palmers, Marshall Field, Louis Sullivan, Carter Harrison, etc., etc.

George Pullman is there, too, but no one will talk to him.

From the Graceland website:

If you decide to sit and rest at the Pullman exedra (which means it has seats) you might well use the time to ponder what’s between you and George Pullman, the famous inventor of the sleeping car and the infamous landlord of his workers.

Solon Beman, who built Pullman’s feudally run town, designed the stately Corinthian column. But what’s underground is more interesting: Pullman’s coffin, covered in tarpaper and asphalt, is sunk in a concrete block the size of a room. On top of the block lie railroad ties and even more concrete. Why so secure? The family feared that Pullman’s angry workers, whose wages were cut while their rents remained the same, would resort to skullduggery at the gravesite.

Honestly, I'm not being macabre. I'm intrigued and excited about the possibility. Just a thought, so I've added a new set of links on Graceland Cemetery in the left column. Can't say I'm dying to get there real soon...

Chicago History Caught in the Web

Wright On...Everything

The Harry Ransom Center at the University of Texas at Austin presents The Mike Wallace Interview of Frank Lloyd Wright. Conducted in two parts in 1957, Wright gives his opinions on a wide variety of topics including religion, art, Louis Sullivan, and the "common man."

Wish You Were Here

Chicago History in Postcards has hundreds of cards organized by category, including the White City. The card (above) depicting the "Fire Show" is a sample.

Summer Learning Op

The 2008 Summer Seminars at the Newberry Library will begin on June 3rd, but registration is open now and recommended. Topics include genealogy, Plato and Pullman cars.

Gamer in the White City


1893: A World's Fair Mystery is a text computer game (Win95/98/Me/2000/XP/Mac) produced by The Illuminated Lantern. To be honest, I have no idea if it is any good, but it sounds really interesting. If anyone has played this game, let me know. I might want to give it a try.

Building the Dream

Chicago's Architecture: From the First Fur-Trading Post to the Development of the Skyscraper is an extensive website from Peoria's Bradley University. The site is designed as a "Virtual Cruise" and addresses the question,

How did Chicago become the birthplace of American architecture? The balloon-frame house, the iron-and-steel framed building, and the skyscraper were all born there. A list of some of the city's architects reads like a roll call of genius: William LeBaron Jenney, Louis Sullivan, Dankmar Adler, Daniel H. Burnham. But there is much more to be attributed to this development than mere technical inventions and innovations or a number of outstanding architects. This new and very U.S. American vision of architecture marks a critical period: the phase toward the end of the 19th century when a predominantly rural nation became urban, when the cities' populations boomed, and when the Big Chicago Fire of 1871 opened immense possibilities for reconstruction.

Observing Yerkes

The Yerkes Observatory is a facility of the Department of Astronomy and Astrophysics of the University of Chicago. It was established in 1897 on Geneva Lake in Williams Bay, Wisconsin and named for the controversial Chicago businessman, Charles T. Yerkes. The origin of this strange pairing is explained in Timeline History of Yerkes Observatory. While the history, beginning in 1892, is unfinished, this is a site to watch.

Recommended reading:
Robber Baron: The Life of Charles Tyson Yerkes by John Franch.
"The Scoundrel and the Scientist" by Pamela Hodgson (originally appeared in Chicago History magazine in the Fall-Winter 1990-1991 issue.)

Remembering...

on April 25, 1886 workers in Chicago began demonstrations demanding the eight-hour day. On May 4th the issue would come to a bloody head in Haymarket Square. See the links in the left column for more information.

Have a great weekend!

Past Grads Meet on New CPS Alumni Site

"Chicago Public Schools launches the new Web site, CPSalumni, to connect an estimated three million people, who have attended or worked in Chicago Public Schools, with separate home pages for every school in CPS history. CPS is the first large urban public school district to organize its alumni in this way.

The goal of CPSalumni.org is to build relationships with alumni and their former schools and classmates, engage alumni in supporting their schools, share information about alumni groups and activities, encourage the sharing of stories and photos about school experiences, and archive public education in Chicago."

The official launch of the site will be today at the Bateman Elementary School.

So, what does this have to do with Chicago history, you might ask? Glad you did...

Elliot Ness
Amelia Earhart
Nelson Algren
Edgar Rice Burroughs

Any of those names sound familiar? Of course they do, and they are all alumni of the Chicago Public School System. For more information, see the Honor Roll on the site.

What attracted me about the new site is that 1)every school that has existed in the CPS system will have a page and 2)they want to create a "living history and archive of public education in Chicago - rich stories, famous people, etc." These goals provide a fantastic opportunity to connect the past and present by including the history of each school and paying particular attention to early Chicagoans who attended the school and made a distinctive mark on the city; the school's genealogy, if you will. It might even make an interesting project for current students, engaging them in the process and learning a little Chicago history along the way.

The purpose of the CPS Alumni site is to connect those who have graduated from a CPS school and, perhaps, encourage involvement with today's students. Great idea. The CPS gets a bad rap pretty much everyday and can use all the help they can get.

For more information on the development of the Chicago Public Schools see the article in the Encyclopedia of Chicago, Schools and Education.

A Visit to the Union Stock Yards

Was there no better way to enjoy a Sunday family outing at the turn of the 20th century than by visiting the Union Stock Yards to watch a pig be brutally slaughtered by overworked, underpaid immigrants? Guess not.

I found this wonderful 1903 Swift and Company souvenir and just had to share. The booklet begins with some facts and figures regarding the Swift operation and then provides a station by station overview:

The hogs "are allowed to rest" after their long journey...



Note the happy little child in her Sunday best...



The entire 18 page 1903 Swift & Company Visitors Reference Book can be seen at the Duke University Libraries Digital Collection: Emergence of Advertising in America 1850-1920.

Carter H. Harrison (Sr.)

"To the roaring frontier city in 1855 there comes a certain Kentuckian with a black slouch hat on his massive head and a ten-year-old Yale diploma behind him in some Lexington attic a gusty youth of thirty, familiar with Paris and Berlin, leaving St. Louis now to have a look at this place called Chicago. The girl whom he has just married is with him, yet even on his honeymoon he falls in love with the city so much in love that all the rest of his life he will call Chicago his 'bride.'

"He walks around the streets, then says, "I think Chicago is destined to be the greatest city on this continent. I have decided to cast my lot with it." And, like a Doge of Venice marrying the Adriatic Sea, Carter H. Harrison the First weds himself to the city whose young figure he can see ripening under its blowsy homespun dress."
(From Chicago: The History of its Reputation by Lloyd Lewis and Henry Justin Smith)

Carter Henry Harrison , five times elected mayor of Chicago, is one of the most beloved figures in Chicago's history, and his dedication and service to the city and Illinois goes without question. Harrison's Congressional biography lists some of his educational and political accomplishments:

HARRISON, Carter Henry, a Representative from Illinois; born near Lexington, Fayette County, Ky., February 15, 1825; educated by private tutors; was graduated from Yale College in 1845; traveled and studied in Europe 1851-1853; was graduated from the law department of Transylvania College, Lexington, Ky., in 1855; was admitted to the bar in 1855 and commenced practice in Chicago, Ill.; also engaged in the real estate business; unsuccessful candidate in 1872 for election to the Forty-third Congress; member of the board of commissioners of Cook County 1874-1876; elected as a Democrat to the Forty-fourth and Forty-fifth Congresses (March 4, 1875-March 3, 1879); was not a candidate for renomination in 1878; mayor of Chicago 1879-1887 and declined a renomination; unsuccessful candidate for Governor of Illinois in 1884; delegate to the Democratic National Conventions in 1880 and 1884; owner and editor of the Chicago Times 1891-1893; again elected mayor of Chicago in 1893."

Harrison was known as the "people's mayor" for good reason. His live and let live attitude toward gambling and vice and his multi-lingual abilities that allowed him to converse with the immigrant communities made him popular with just about everyone. Harrison is best known as the Mayor serving during the Haymarket Riot and the Columbian Exposition and served until his death in Chicago by assassination October 28, 1893. He is interred in Graceland Cemetery, Chicago, Ill. and Harrison Park is named for him.


A new set of links has been added for this beloved Chicago Mayor. Also of interest is the 1892 "guide book," Chicago by Day and Night: The Pleasure Seekers Guide to the Paris of America which provides a glimpse of Chicago at the time and Chicago By Night: What to See and How to Find It.

Baseball and Beer: New Links Added

Nothing says spring in Chicago like beer and baseball. So in honor of the season (and an anticipated win by the Cubs this afternoon) this week’s new links (scroll down the left column) feature the Lager Beer Riot of 1855 and the 1919 World Series Scandal.

The 1919 World series pitted the Chicago White Sox against the Cincinnati Reds and Chicago was the hands down favorite to win. But, Chicago lost the series five games to three, and it wasn’t until about a year later that baseball fans would be shocked with the truth. (1919 was a tough year for Chicago.)


The Lager Beer Riot, April 21, 1855) was Chicago’s first instance of civil disobedience. Stemming from strong anti-immigrant sentiments, who were blamed for the escalating crime rate, Mayor Levi Boone raised liquor license fees and shortened their term from one year to three months. At the same time he enforced a 12-year-old “blue law,” which till then had been ignored, that required saloons to close on Sunday. The move was obviously aimed at the German and Irish population since Sunday was their only day off from work and hoisting a few was an old world tradition.

Have a cold one in honor of those who fought for the right! And, Go Cubs! (OK, Go Sox, too!)

Where Do You Get Your History?: Primary Sources

"Primary sources provide first-hand testimony or direct evidence concerning a topic under investigation. They are created by witnesses or recorders who experienced the events or conditions being documented. Often these sources are created at the time when the events or conditions are occurring, but primary sources can also include autobiographies, memoirs, and oral histories recorded later." --from Primary Sources at Yale

The importance of primary sources in historical research is the central theme of The Pen and Spindle, one of my favorite blogs and authored by Heather Vallance and Cathy Barrett. Their site, newly redesigned for easier navigation, provides a fresh list of links that keeps me busy for days. The April 7th This Week in Research Resources, for example, offered fifteen new sites the majority, of which, were portals to primary sources I have found to be extremely useful.

The longer I write this blog the more I appreciate primary sources available on Chicago's history. The Internet Archive , for example, has become a favorite site for early histories and personal reminiscences published in the late 19th century and early 20th century. You are welcome to view my "Bookmarks" of personal choices for some excellent examples.

Chicago is fortunate to have many noted scholars (Carl Smith and Dominic Pacyga, for example), but I strongly believe that whether an amateur, such as myself, or a published professional historian our greatest wish would be to somehow experience and/or observe events as they happened. Primary sources are the next best thing to a time machine.

A Glimpse of the Past

The streets of Chicago seem crowded today, but take a look at the corner of State and Madison through the eye of the Edison Manufacturing Company in 1897, part of the Video Gallery at Encyclopedia of Chicago. The Library of Congress website features an extensive section on these early Edison Motion Pictures with dozens of early clips.

Chicago Politics is a Laughing Matter...Sometimes

The battle for Grant Park is, once again, being fought. The Chicago Children's Museum wants to move from their current location on Navy Pier to a site that, historically, was to remain "forever open, clear and free." Much of Chicago may well be hoping for some clever writer to pen "The Chicago Carol," where the ghosts of Daniel Burnham and Montgomery Ward visit Mayor Daley and turn him from his evil ways, i.e. supporting the CCM move and throwing alderman rights in the river. But, as First Ward Alderman Hinky Dink Kenna once said, "Chicago ain't no sissy town."

The current power struggle certainly supports Hinky Dink's evaluation and is definitely not funny to many Chicagoans. Visit the Chicago Tribune, the Chicago Sun-Times, the Save Grant Park Organization or Lynn Becker's blog, ArchitectureChicago Plus and you'll see how unfunny the situation is (and why) but that is not to say Chicago politics can't be funny.


Now, as any reader of this blog knows, I don't feature contemporary fiction on this site, even if it concerns Chicago. But, today I make an exception. The novel is Windy City by Scott Simon. Here are my reasons:

1. I'm a big fan of Scott Simon, NPR's Peabody-award-winning correspondent and host of Weekend Edition Saturday.

2. Windy City was reviewed in the Washington Post by my friend Gary Krist, author of The White Cascade: The Great Northern Railway Disaster and America's Deadliest Avalanche and several fictional works such as EXTRAVAGANCE and Chaos Theory.

3. The book is set in Chicago, concerns Chicago politics, and we can all use a good laugh now and again.

Finally...

4. It's my blog, and I can damn well do what I want - even if I am a tad off topic (Ok, make that WAY off topic).

Windy City is the story of the chaos that ensues in City Hall when the mayor is assassinated ( a knee-slapper if ever I heard one!) and begins:

The mayor was found shortly after eleven with his bronze, brooding face lying on the last two slices of a prosciutto and artichoke pizza, his head turned and his wide mouth gaping, as if gulping for a smashed brown bulb of garlic with life's last breath. Blood from his gums had already seeped into the tomatoes, prosciutto, and caramelized onions. His blue oxford-cloth shirt was unbuttoned. His red tie had been slipped out of its knot and trailed forlornly from his collar. His heavy gray slacks were laid across the back of the sofa where he was sitting for his last meal, illumed by the cold glare of the television set. The security guards who had rushed in heard the ice in the mayor's bourbon crackling while it melted (it was that fresh) over the cloaked gallop of their thick shoes against the great carpet. Three men's magazines were fanned across the sofa, each with the kind of cover that, in Indiana, would call for the woman's bosom to be enrobed with a brown paper strip. But the guards' attention was drawn to the bold red letters they saw marching across the mayor's boxer shorts: big daddy.

That's funny! You can read the entire excerpt on the NPR site and even purchase the book, with proceeds going to support NPR. It's a good thing. I can't wait to read it. Yes, I will read select novels now and again. I'm not a total history geek!

Hinky Dink was right, in fact or fiction, no doubt about it.

And, thus ends my commercial plug for the day. Unfortunately, it is now back to Chicago politics as usual...

Chicago History at the NYPL

Theodore Dreiser?! This is just one of the little treasures that I found on the New York Public Library Digital Gallery. The Digital Gallery provides access to over 600,000 images digitized from primary sources and printed rarities in the collections of The New York Public Library, including illuminated manuscripts, historical maps, vintage posters, rare prints and photographs, illustrated books, printed ephemera, and more. Their policy of "free and open online access" to their digitized images is applauded and appreciated.

.
Here's a stereoscopic view of the Field, Leiter & Co.'s store at State and Washington Streets after the Great Fire in 1871. There are hundreds more of these glimpses into the past.

Get a cup of coffee, type in "Chicago" in the Search box, and sit back an enjoy. You'll be there for awhile.

The Drake and The Disaster

In a Crain’s Chicago Business article yesterday, Shia Kapos reported “Spiffed-up Cape Cod in Upstream Swim.” The Cape Cod Room of the legendary Drake Hotel has, indeed, re-opened, but based on the article there seems only to be guarded enthusiasm and restrained optimism. Well, I, for one, am ecstatic! The last time I visited the restaurant I had the best bread pudding I’ve ever tasted. (Oh, please tell me it is still on the menu!) And high tea in the Palm Court of The Drake is always a joy. Personally, I think that shopping the Magnificent Mile without having tea at The Drake is, well, just not the Chicago way. Yes, I'm "old school..."

So, what does this have to do with Chicago history other than it being a vintage luxury hotel, gangster Frank Nitti had an office in the hotel and Joe DiMaggio and Marilyn Monroe carved their initials in the Cape Cod Room bar?

Tracy Drake and his brother John Drake purchased the property for the hotel in 1916 from the estate of Potter Palmer. Construction began in 1918, and the hotel opened in 1920. The picture above is a postcard printed at its opening. Since that day, the sumptuous hotel has been the stop-over of choice for visiting aristocracy, celebrities, politicians and pretty much anyone who was anybody and the building was registered with the US National Register of Historic Places in 1980.

The architectural firm that designed The Drake was Marshall and Fox: Benjamin Henry Marshall (1874-1940) and Charles Eli Fox (1870-1926). Before the firm was established in 1905, Benjamin Marshall had his own practice beginning in 1902. One of his first projects - here it comes - was the The Iroquois Theater located at 24-28 West Randolph. The theater (now the location of the Oriental Theater) opened on November 23rd, 1903 and burned 37 days later taking hundreds of souls, mostly women and children.


I am delighted that the Cape Cod Room of The Drake Hotel has reopened. It is one of my favorite places in Chicago. But,I could not help but be reminded of the hotel's link to one of Chicago's most tragic disasters. John McCutcheon captured the feeling of loss by a family in the cartoon titled, "His Sunday Dinner After the Iroquois Fire." Note the empty chairs.

I've taken this opportunity to provide a new set of links for the Iroquois Theater Fire at Chicago History Online.

For additional reading:
Tinder Box: The Iroquois Theatre Disaster 1903

Chicago Death Trap: The Iroquois Theatre Fire of 1903

Chicago's Grand Hotels: The Palmer House, The Drake, and The Hilton Chicago (IL)

From Time Magazine, June 19, 1933: Chicago Hotels

Shared Chicago Visions: Henry Blake Fuller and Lorado Taft

Just three days after the start of the Great Chicago Fire on October 8, 1871, Joseph Medill’s editorial in the Chicago Tribune triumphantly proclaimed, “CHICAGO SHALL RISE AGAIN.” (Chicago Days, 39). Putting its grief aside, Chicago rolled up it sleeves and did what it did best – got to work. 22 years later it played host to the world with the Columbian Exhibition of 1893, building, in only two and half years, a gleaming white fantasy city that boasted every new marvel of the Industrial Age and inaugurated a strengthened cultural awareness in its citizens and institutions. The city’s efforts seemed to have paid off because on the morning of October 28, 1917 Chicagoans awoke to the startling declaration in a Chicago Tribune essay by H. L. Mencken, the Baltimore pundit and acclaimed literary critic, that Chicago was “the most civilized city in America.” Culturally, Mencken emphatically stated, Chicago was “alive from snout to tail.” (Heise, pg.37)

The stockyard metaphor was appropriate. Chicago at the turn of the century was a tough city of urban squalor; stink from the stockyards, exploited workers, unchecked poverty, amorality and massive government corruption. It was urbanization with its most disastrous results, and much of the literature of the period addressed the “clash of aesthetic forms and ideal with the modern urban industrial environment. (Smith, 2) and the “uncertain status of art and the artist in the modern city.” (Smith, xi)

But people flocked to Chicago from the farmlands and the east seeking a new life and a way to make money. Some were extraordinarily successful; many others, particularly those of the immigrant population, ended up living in the back of the yards. But once the charred timbers had been hauled away the bawdy lady on the lake turned its thoughts to the aesthetic, and the Columbian Exposition of 1893 ultimately inaugurated a strengthened cultural awareness that, to two major figures of the artistic community, had played second fiddle to simply making money: Chicago-born writer Henry Blake Fuller and sculptor and educator Lorado Taft.

Chicago’s “cultural awakening “ had actually begun before the city decided to enter the competition for the Exposition, but even so, it was going to be a hard sell to Congress. “Kenny Williams, in her book, “In the City of Men,” reports that the opposition to Chicago was based in the opponents’ belief that “Chicago was not the city to invite the scrutiny of the world.” It was an issue of “dignity.” One senator pointed out that if he had to vote between Chicago and Hades as the site, he would be strictly neutral.” (Heise, Chicagoization, p. 11)

Chicago shrugged and a citizens committee, consisting of the city’s aristocracy including Marshall Field, George Pullman, and Potter Palmer, was formed in the summer of 1889 to secure the World’s Fair. It was a bold move, but the group was determined. “The men who have helped build Chicago want this fair and…they intend to get it.” (Miller, 379)

When the dust settled, Chicago won defeating its eastern rival New York. But it wasn’t just the fair that was important to the city.

“The fair is easily the most widely written about event in Chicago history, but the preparations for it were far more important for the city’s future than the fair itself. These preparations spawned or broadened the work of a host of new civic organizations and institutions that were part of what Henry Fuller called ‘the Upward Movement in Chicago,’ an elite-inspired effort at civic regeneration that continued well beyond the closing of the exposition.” (Miller, 378)

An offshoot of the fair preparations was the increasing number of cultural groups and organizations established, bringing together like-minded artists, writers, and social reformers. One such organization was called “The Little Room,” the Chicago version of European café society, and both Taft and Fuller were members, along with Jane Addams, George Ade, and Hamlin Garland, to name a few. Fuller was particularly fond of it, and for many years Taft and Fuller were considered to be the acknowledged leaders. (Pilkington p. 114)

Because of their shared interests and the concentric circles of friends, Fuller and Taft met, probably a year or so before the fair, and “in Lorado Taft, Fuller found a congenial companion whose artistic theories parallel his own. (Pilkington, Jr., 115)” The two men could not have been more different in personality, however they also had much in common. The were both prolific writers and critics, believed strongly in education, were influenced by European art and culture and “staunchly advocated the classical style in art.” (Pilkington p 115) Ironically, Taft was even studying sculpture in Paris about the same time Fuller made his first European pilgrimage. Taft and Fuller also agreed on the need for parks and public sculpture in the city in order to inspire and elevate its citizens. “Sculpture, Taft insisted and Fuller agreed, should be pictorial but also symbolic.” (Pilkington p 116) The Columbian Exposition proved beneficial to both men.

While Fuller, a life-long bachelor who lived alone, frequently changed his residence, mixed easily with Chicago’s elite and looked forward to the fellowship of The Little Room, he was basically disgusted with the city. Writer Hamlin Garland described him in his journal as a “wraith in pantaloons…[and] coldly sarcastic in his judgments of people…[Fuller] “carried himself with fastidious grace, a small alert gentleman who resented the mental and physical bad smells and raucous noises of his native town.” (Miller, 411)

When the Fair opened, Chicago native Henry Fuller was riding a wave of literary success from the publication of two European historical romances based on his travels in France and Italy: The Chevallier of Pensieri-Vani, in 1890 and the subsequent, but less popular, The Chatelaine of La Trinite in 1892. In 1893, however, Fuller’s writing took a new course and the first of his Chicago novels was published.

The first urban novel reflecting the social and economic trends of Chicago was Fuller’s The Cliff-Dwellers published, to the chagrin of the city, the year the Columbian Exposition would introduce Chicago to the world and when it wanted to put its best foot forward. That wasn’t exactly what Fuller had in mind. Fuller’s book was an attack on the city. He had little to say in its favor, and it fully illustrated his disgust of the commercialism that he felt had eroded the ideals of the Exposition.

Fuller applied the term “cliff-dwellers” to the people who lived and worked in the new skyscrapers that had begun being built after the Great Fire. Focusing on the residents of the ficticous Clifton Building (based on the Monadnock Building built in 1891), Fuller describes the businessmen and their families as they grasp for wealth, power and status all within the confines of the building.

Lorado Taft, on the other hand, while recognizing the city’s cultural shortcomings, was already firmly ensconced as an educator and teacher at The University of Chicago and The Art Institute when the Fair opened. In fact, the Fair provided Taft his first major commission, the two sculptural groups flanking the entrance of the Horticulture Building: “The Sleep of the Flowers” and “The Awakening of the Flowers.”

Taft was a tall, bearded sculptor trained at the Ecole Beaux-Arts who frequently dressed in a toga, staunchly believed in the community of artists and thought of himself as an “arts missionary.” He was known for his public speaking abilities and, in addition to The Little Room, was a member of the Chicago Literary Club from 1889 to 1900. Through his lectures and writing Taft created a national concern for the arts. Ten years after the Fair, Taft’s influence on an entire generation of artists was sealed with the publication of his book The History of American Sculpture.


After the Exposition, Taft undertook commissions for many statues, monuments and memorials. His greatest works, however, must include "The Fountain of the Great Lakes" (1913), installed at the Art Institute, and "Fountain of Time" (1922), which is located at the west end of the Midway Plaisance in Chicago.

But, it was his strong belief in an artistic community that kept Fuller by his side. Taft’s complex of studios near the University of Chicago (the Midway Studios) seemed to become the center of the sculpture world. And Fuller no doubt frequented his small studio on the 10th floor of the Fine Arts Building. But, it was the Eagle's Nest artists' colony (in nearby Oregon, Illinois) that may have attracted Fuller the most. This was a place where artists could go to just have a good time. It was also a place that Fuller probably felt the safest. While it was no doubt hinted at in his 1919 novel Bertram Cope’s Year, and spoken of in hushed tones during his lifetime, Fullers homosexuality was probably not common knowledge. The company of bohemians was undoubtedly a safe haven, and may explain why Fuller never left the city he seemed to love to hate.

But, as the historian of the upward movement in Chicago that had begun in the 1880s, Fuller characterized the fair as “a kind of post-graduate course for the men at the head of Chicago’s commercial and mercantile interest; it was the city’s intellectual and social annexation to the world at large,” (Pilkington, Jr., 112) and he carefully listed and acknowledged the city’s cultural progress. Mentioning his friend Lorado Taft twice in the 1897 Atlantic Monthly article, Fuller was also extremely complimentary of the contribution that woman had made to the movement.

Today, Chicago owes a great debt to Lorado Taft and Henry Blake Fuller. Chicago writers and artists are known and respected the world over. The parks and public sculpture that Taft and Fuller encouraged have come to pass, particularly in the new Millennium Park. Literary organizations, some having been established at the turn of the century, continue to encourage new writers of every decade. Taft and Fuller were not the only two men at the time of the Fair that had high cultural hopes for the young city, but it was their shared visions that has made Chicago the city it is today.

PHOTO: "Spirit of Great Lakes Fountain" erected on the south side of the Art Institute with people gathered in front of it (Chicago Daily News, 1913)DN-0061048, Chicago Daily News negatives collection, Chicago Historical Society.

Bibliography:
Garvey, Timothy J. Public Sculptor: Lorado Taft and the Beautification of Chicago. Chicago: University of Illinois Press, 1988

Heise, Kenan. The Chicagoization of America 1893-1917. Chicago: Chicago Historical Bookworks, 1990.

Miller, Donald L. City of the Century: The Epic of Chicago and the Making of America. New York: Simon & Schuster, 1996.

Pilkington, Jr, John. Henry Blake Fuller. New York: Twayne Publishers, Inc, 1970.

Smith, Carl S. Chicago and the American Literary Imagination 1880-1920. Chicago: University of Chicago P, 1984.