UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS LIBRARY ATURBANA-CHAMPAIGN ILL, HIST. SURVEY Digitized by the Internet Archive in 2012 with funding from University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign http://archive.org/details/chicagosgreatcenOOsmit Courtesy of Chicago Historical Society William B. Ogden, Chicago's First Mayor From Painting by G. P. A. Healy CHICAGO'S GREAT CENTURY 19 3 3 18 3 3 by Henry Justin Smith Published for A Century of Progress 1933 Consolidated Publishers, Inc Chicago 977.3/ CONTENTS CHAPTER PAGE I Young Men Start a Town 1 II The Town Prospers 7 III Chicago Becomes a City 16 IV What "Made News" Then 22 V Water or Rail? 29 VI The City Rises From the Mud 37 VII "Long John" and His Domain 47 VIII The "Boys of '61" 54 IX From a War to a Calamity 61 X The Invincible City Recovers 71 XI Aspects of the Eighties 82 XII The Skyline Begins to Change 93 XIII Hail Columbus ! 102 XIV And Afterward 114 XV Joys of the Waning Decade 125 XVI Dawn of a Speed Era 135 XVII Birth of City — Planning 144 XVIII The War Years 152 XIX Post-War Toils and Troubles 160 XX The Skyline Changes Again 167 XXI The Deeds of a Century 175 XXII 1933 184 LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS William B. Ogden, Chicago's First Mayor Frontispiece Mark Beaubien's Sauganash Tavern, 1833 2 South Water Street in 1834 2 Home of William Jones, Father of Fernando Jones 16 Chicago's First Shipment of Grain, 1839 16 John ("Long John") Wentworth 24 Chicago From the Southwest, 1845 28 Nomination of Lincoln in the Wigwam, 1860 54 Nomination of Grant in the Crosby Opera House, 1868.. 64 Fugitives Crossing River, Great Fire of 1871 68 State and Madison Streets in 1880 82 Dearborn Street, Looking North Toward Washington Street, 1888 98 "Water Gate" at the World's Fair, 1893 102 "Chicago Day" at the World's Fair, 1893 112 Wacker Drive, Seen Between Towers, 1928 172 Brilliant Chicago Skyline at Night, 1930 178 Michigan Avenue From Art Institute Terrace, 1933 184 A Century of Progress International Exposition, 1933... 192 FOREWORD The present volume is a brief but vivid history of Chicago from the time of its incorporation as a town to the present day. It is authorized by A Century of Progress, 1933, as befitting the occasion when the progress of humanity during one hundred years is celebrated and the anniversary of the birth of Chicago is brought to world-wide attention. In order to make this history accessible to, and easily read by, large numbers of people, its length has been deliberately limited. A complete picture of many events is thus rendered difficult, if not im- possible. The author, however, has skilfully designed a narrative which presents the chief events of the city's dramatic career, and which includes interesting portrayal of many citizens who are famed in its history. To inspire new interest in a story which in many ways surpasses in drama that which could be told of any other city; to help celebrate a notable anni- versary; to increase the civic patriotism of Chicagoans — such is the aim of this book. ^0&Ztsl4*&/' CHAPTER I Young Men Start a Town 1 IN the summer of 1833 the hamlet of Chicago, which had lived casually under Fort Dearborn's walls, advanced to the dignity of an incorporated town. It was already "on the map." In 1830, after the federal gov- ernment granted land for the Illinois and Michigan canal, James Thompson had surveyed and laid out the "town of Chicago/' Again, when Cook County was created in 1831, Chicago was made the county seat and was given a postoffice. By 1833 it had reached the quota of 150 inhabitants, required for incorporation, and its area was sufficient. Thus the step could be taken quite legally, and the only trouble was a certain indifference on the part of many of the residents, who preferred wolf-hunting and tavern-lounging to anything as serious as organizing a town. However, there had come to this rude collection of cabins a number of men and women with solid, sober ideas, men who intended to grasp opportunity, women who desired to raise children in a civilized place. And these men, informally abetted by the women — who of course had no votes — determined to organize under the Illinois statutes. About the first of August, 1833, there was held in the most likely rendezvous in town a gathering for the expression of senti- ment. The meeting-place was Mark Beaubien's Sauganash Tavern. And why not? It was the building that most attracted village meetings ; not to speak of drinking parties and dances. Its frame addition, dominating the log-built original section, was bragged about by Mark if not by everybody. Foreign visitors found it crude; but they were considered prejudiced. Its second floor dance hall, when adorned by autumn leaves and garlands, was a gay place for dancers, with Mark's fiddle going and his shout resounding: "Balance all!" "Cross over!" and the "lobby" was good enough for a meeting of pioneers bent on creating a town. There were thirteen of them, and they were nearly all youthful. Even Col. R. J. Hamilton, though circuit court clerk for Cook 1 CHICAGO S GREAT CENTURY County, was only thirty- four, while John S. C. Hogan, the post- master, was twenty-eight. T. J. V. Owen, Indian agent and sturdy pioneer, was thirty-two. Mark Beaubien, the "genial host," was thirty-three. Several of those assembled were even younger, like J. T. Temple and George W. Dole. And there sat among them, though not voting, a youth of only twenty-one, a budding lawyer named John D. Caton, afterwards to be for a quarter-century a judge of the Illinois Supreme court. The group of eager, young, but very responsible men found a contrast in an "oldster," Russell E. Heacock, a lawyer at some times and a carpenter at others. He was fifty-four years old. In the presiding officer's chair sat Col. Jean Baptiste Beaubien, middle-aged trader and land-owner. Col. Beaubien was not too well versed in parliamentary matters, so young Mr. Caton sat by and, according to his own half-humorous account, prompted the chair- man. Everything was finally discussed in due form, and a vote was taken as to whether an election of town trustees should be held. All but Mr. Heacock voted "aye." He, pursuing some principle or other, voted "no." On August 10 the election of town trustees took place. There was a "rush to the polls," but only twenty-eight men were qualified to vote, and nearly half of them were also candidates. The winners were : T. J. V. Owen; George W. Dole, storekeeper and packer; Madore B. Beaubien, son of Jean; John Miller, tanner; and E. S. Kimberly, physician. Owen was named president and Isaac Harmon clerk at an organization meeting August 12. On the books of the Illinois state capital at Vandalia it was recorded that the rude village lying where a three-legged river ran into Lake Michigan was no longer a mere frontier post or a "spot on a county map." Chicago was a town. 2 Eighteen thirty-three had been, and continued to be, an exciting year. Black Hawk and his warriors, not so many months before, had been repulsed by an ill-disciplined army, and the memory of that great Indian alarm had not died out. Then, during early 1833, countless messages had passed back and forth between west and east. Illinois was a wonderful country; that was the word 2 i 3 III 1 3 Mark Beaubien's Sauganash Tavern, 1833 Courtesy of Chicago Historical Society South Water Street in 1834 YOUNG MEN START A TOWN that young fellows — many of whom had discovered the fact through soldiering — wrote home with enthusiasm. There was a great deal of packing up and saying goodbye in eastern towns and on farmsteads in the lovely New England valleys. The western movement became a passion. It was noised through the nation that Chicago was being made a harbor! It was advertised that northern Illinois was a land of plenty. And northern Illinois was safe. Before the summer of 1833 it was fully determined that the Indians who still clung to possessions near Lake Michigan were going to take what they could get and move out. They would stage one theatrical farewell, and then, as fast as they could be transported, they would cross the Mississippi forever. Thus there would be no more of massacre and alarm-by-night in northern Illinois. Furthermore, titles to land would be unencumbered. Such was the promise. And there was another lure to Chicago, which greatly impressed men seeking their fortunes: The water-course which anyone could trace on a map, the trail leading via the Erie Canal, the Great Lakes, the Chicago river, and the portage to the Des Plaines, was to be supplemented by the "mighty" canal, leading to the Illinois river and thence to the Mississippi. Boats could pass, in the footsteps of the discoverers, from Eastern America to New Orleans. And the immense and luscious resources of the Central West could be freighted northeast and east, to lade fleets on the Great Lakes and pour riches into the laps of the enterprising. All this was perfectly clear to many people. The predictions of Joliet and others, a century and a half earlier, seemed certain to be fulfilled in a short time. Hence, everything being favorable, Chicago, the town, received during the summer of 1833, a fine lot of young and ambitious eastern Americans, to mingle with pred- ecessors of the same sort, and with the descendants of French traders, and with people of Canadian-Indian origin. There was a frenzy of getting housed, and of seeking means to add to scanty hoards of money. During that '33 summer more than one hundred and fifty houses, it is said, were built. Charles Fenno Hoffman, New York writer who visited the place early in 1834, testified that "the population was quintupled last summer, and ... the influx of strangers far exceeds the means of accom- CHICAGO S GREAT CENTURY modation ; while scarcely a house in the place, however comfortable looking outside, contains more than two or three finished rooms." There was a surplus of home-seekers and a shortage of building workmen. Young married couples, used to farming or to living under the comfortable routine of eastern cities, had to pitch in and build their own little homes. They labored with feverish haste and without the best of materials. Primitive saw-mills up the river supplied lumber, which often went into the houses perfectly green, then dried out and shrank, leaving crevices in the walls through which whistled the winds of winter. Some desperate builders went into the woods themselves, chopped down trees and drove them into the ground for scantlings. But the great majority of the "immigrants" were youthful and plucky. And on all sides there was activity, energy, progress. It was becoming clear that there were fortunes to be made in this boom town. Men arrived every day to "keep store" with all the merchandise such a community might need. Philo Carpenter, the druggist, was prospering. The produce and meat men, George Dole and Gurdon Hubbard — the latter a mighty woodsman who had turned to business — were doing well. P. F. W. Peck was already a well-known merchant, and near him, on South Water street, Eli Williams put up a store whose frame was cut with a broad-ax from North Side timber. A brickmaker, a watchmaker, a blacksmith, a ship-builder, arrived. Silas B. Cobb, 21 -year-old Vermonter, landed from a ship whose captain held him prisoner until he had paid his last dollar. Cobb set up a harness shop and auctioned his wares to eager crowds, both Indians and whites. But there were also people concerned about the "things of the mind." Eliza Chappel, New York girl of Mayflower descent, came down from Mackinac, where she had taught school, and began to give instruction to twenty Chicago children in "a little log house just outside the military reservation." Three churches were established between May and October, a Catholic, a Presby- terian and a Baptist, the ministers in charge being, respectively, Father St. Cyr, Rev. Jeremiah Porter, and Rev. Allan B. Freeman. These pioneer preachers were welcomed by the devout with almost 4 YOUNG MEN START A TOWN tearful joy. But the frontier town was viewed with some horror by the new-coming clergy. After a prayer meeting in the fort, the first Sunday of his coming, the Rev. Jeremiah walked through the village, and, as he wrote : "The first dreadful spectacle that met my eye was a group of Indians sitting on the ground before a miserable French dram- house, playing cards, and as many trifling white men standing around to witness the game." St. Mary's Catholic church, its attendance swelled by the French citizenry, began in May, the first mass being celebrated in a 12- foot log cabin owned by Mark Beaubien, and the first child bap- tized being George, the son of Mark. In October the church dedicated a frame meeting-place whose lumber was brought across the lake in a scow. Indian women helped clean the structure, which was unplastered, but had a steeple bell about the size of those used on locomotives of fifty years ago. As for the Presby- terian and Baptist congregations, they met at first in a two-story structure called the Temple building. Its fine name was mislead- ing. It was called the Temple only because it had been erected through the efforts of John Temple, contractor for the U. S. mails. The Presbyterian church boasted twenty-six members at the out- set; the Baptist fourteen. Both soon occupied meeting-houses of their own. So did the Methodists, who had got their start as early as 1831 through the efforts of Rev. S. R. Beggs, and had held their quarterly conference in 1832. Not only did the churches, in such an infant community, play a leading part socially, but religion was a stern and moving force among the pioneers. Many brought to Chicago their "New Eng- land consciences" ; others, amid the privations of the time, were sustained by a faith as much religious as commercial. Still, the ministers had no monopoly of professions in primitive Chicago. In 1833 it had six lawyers, several of whom ranked as justices of the peace, and eight physicians. Before the end of the year there were two druggists. And, by way of confirming the fact that Chicago really was a town, the autumn brought with it a newspaper, The Chicago Democrat, a weekly. Its founder, 25-year-old John Calhoun, came from New York state by schooner and stage-coach, his printing-press preceding him. His difficulties 5 CHICAGO S GREAT CENTURY were not confined to his cramped and gusty "offices," for it is recorded that the eager editor was unable to print President Jackson's annual message until a month after its delivery. Yet subscribers and advertisers both gave the baby newspaper their support. And, to show further the awakening of education in the town, one of Calhoun's first advertisements was of the Chicago English and Classical Academy, which resounding name the organ- izer gave to his private school for boys. It is possible, however, that such enterprises did not feel com- fortable until the treaty which banished the Indians was finally signed. That most spectacular event of 1833 took place in Sep- tember, beginning with a grand council of the Chippewa, Ottawa and Pottawatomie chiefs. They were met by three commissioners of the United States government in a council which, fortunately, was witnessed by the observant English traveler and writer, Charles J. Latrobe. His vivid description of the debate is a classic in Chicago annals. "The glorious light of the setting sun, stream- ing in under the low roof of the council-house, fell full on the countenances of the former (the whites) as they faced the west, while the pale light of the east hardly lightened up the dark and painted lineaments of the poor Indians. My heart bled for them in their desolation and decline." On the 26th the treaty was signed, seventy-six Indian chiefs appending their marks, and one his name, to a document which dispossessed them, in return for nominal payments, of lands later valued at hundreds of millions. The white man was triumphant. His new town on Lake Mich- igan was organized, governed, churched and taught. It had a new ferry and a new jail. It could fine an offender $5 if his live- stock strayed abroad or if he should cross a bridge (when the town got one) driving faster than a walk. Ships, stages, ox-carts, and saddle-horses were bringing newcomers week by week. At this time, New York had a population of nearly 200,000. Philadelphia, too, was already historic and well-populated. Boston was "cultured." New Orleans and St. Louis were important cities. Surely none of them recognized a competitor in tiny Chicago. 6 CHAPTER II The Town Prospers 1 THE historian, Andreas, presents, in a manner unusually vivid for him, this picture of Chicago in the early '30s : "The village was built along the south side of Water Street and westerly toward the settlement at the forks. There were scattered shanties over the prairie south, and a few rough, unpainted build- ings had been improvised on the North Side between the old Kinzie house and what is now Clark Street. All together it would, in the light of 1883 (when Andreas wrote), have presented a most woe-begone appearance, even as a frontier town of the lowest class. It did not show a single steeple nor a chimney four feet above any roof. A flagstaff at the fort, some fifty feet high, flaunted, in pleasant weather and on holidays, a weather-beaten flag, as an emblem of civilization, patriotic pride, national domain, or anything else that might stir hearts of the denizens of the town. The buildings of the fort were low posted, and none of them exceeding two low stories in height. "Approaching the village by land from the south, one would see, on emerging from the oak woods, near Twenty-third Street, a good stretch of level grass, the lake on the right, woods along the borders of the main river, and, lying on the back-ground of the green woods, only a thin cloud of smoke from the shanty chimneys, a line of almost indefinable structures, and the flag over the fort, if perchance it was flying. A brown path, where the grass had been trodden out, led to the fort, and another, better trodden and wider, led across the prairie towards the forks where the Sauganash Hotel then flourished. " 2 To this unattractive place people kept on coming by the score, by the hundred. They arrived from ships that had made long and stormy voyages around the Great Lakes. They sometimes disem- barked at Detroit, and pursued the trails leading through Michigan 7 CHICAGO S GREAT CENTURY City around the curve of the lake, across the Calumet River by a quaking ferry, then up the glistening sands to the village of their hopes. Not a few drove all the way from New York state, Penn- sylvania, or the South. Their covered wagons stood in rows, on the vacant land, with camp-fires glowing against a star-lit sky, and little poke-bonneted wives frying bacon. If these young hopefuls, many of them from noted families of the East, some of them Yale, Harvard, or Dartmouth graduates, had money to "put up" at a tavern, there were four or five avail- able — but not too comfortable. All were crammed with guests, and half-breeds or evil-looking whites hung about the doors. "In the tavern at which we stayed," wrote Charles Butler in a memoir, "the partitions were chiefly upright studs, with sheets attached to them. The house was crowded with people — emigrants and trav- elers. Many of them could only find a sleeping-place on the floor, which was crowded with weary men at night." John D. Caton told of sleeping fourteen in a room — in seven beds. Of the food served there is divers testimony, but there were no chefs from Delmonico's. And the coffee! It probably was of the kind that led an early traveler in central Illinois to exclaim, at a tavern table : "If you call this coffee, give me tea. If it's tea, give me coffee!"* In the event that arriving couples or families decided on build- ing at once, they faced those difficulties of scarce lumber and scarcer help. Many of them slapped together their shacks in a few days. They put up roofs, but could not make walls fully weather- tight. Little wives, some in their 'teens, started housekeeping with only such furniture as they could bring as baggage. The "folks at home" helped them with presents; boxes full of simple luxuries, now and then a silk dress. Needless to say, there was no sewerage or running water in the town. There were fire-places, but also risk of burning down the houses. In winter the thermometer went below zero, sometimes twenty below, but in these ice-box houses the wives carried on, looking after all the needs of their husbands and children, making their own clothes, curing illnesses, and becoming mothers while listening to savage winds tearing at the shaky clap-boards. If ♦"Chicago's Highways, Old and New, from Indian Trail to Motor Road' by Milo M. Quaife. 8 THE TOWN PROSPERS these women went out at night, there was pitch-darkness. They found their way through swamps by lantern-light. And then, day- times, there were often sights hardly fit for women, such as dog- fights — a lot of those ! — and Indian boys torturing birds, and pap- pooses with scurvy, carried on the backs of dirty Indian mothers. For the red men and women were not all gone until the late '30s. Their farewell took the form of a savage festival, with war dances and drunken uproar, that left a burning memory with many a sen- sitive spectator. Delicate women of the East, accompanying their husbands or their fathers, faced every hardship with a smile. As in any fron- tier place, there was rather a dearth of single women; and each wagon load of femininity that drew up at a tavern door was closely scrutinized. An example was that of the Warren girls, who drove from New York state, often taking turns at the reins, with their father giving encouragement. As they arrived at their hotel they were noticed by several young men, one of them Silas Cobb, wear- ing an apron and with rolled-up sleeves. As he himself told it : "There were several young women in the party, two of them twin sisters whom I thought particularly attractive, so much so that I remarked to my friend, after they had departed, that when I was prosperous enough so that my pantaloons and brogans could be made to meet I was going to look up these twin sisters and marry one of them or die in trying." Mr. Cobb did marry one, and Jerome Beecher married the other. The old-timer, E. O. Gale, has recorded that the twins looked so exactly alike that "Cobb thought that he married Maria and Beecher always believed that he himself married Mary, but they only knew what the girls told them." Then, there was the Aiken family, which migrated to Chicago by team in 1835. The party was a large one, including as it did most of the church choir of Hannibal, N. Y. They sang hymns as they drove along roads hub-deep in mud, and through swamp land. Mrs. Aiken was the one who usually piloted her family to safety. To make matters no better, in one of the rear seats reclined a girl with tuberculosis. This family group, as the story is told by a descendant, Brayton Saltonstall, managed the 800-mile trip and on reaching Chicago 9 CHICAGO S GREAT CENTURY crossed the river to the "west side." There was a tavern at Lake Street sometimes called Rat Castle, with good reason. After a time, the Aikens took over the tavern, but could not at first rout the rats, one of which spoiled a gown belonging to mater familias. The wolves howled outside, and the hotel was rechristened Wolf Tavern. Later the family found a home on Jefferson Street. Children were born, without the aid of maternity hospitals. A daughter was married at the age of sixteen ; but she was quite mature, says the chronicler, who adds : "It seems that the intense life of the pioneer tends that way." The surroundings were none too good : Ditches filled with water in spring, and "covered with green scum in sum- mer." The housewives used rainwater dipped from cisterns or purchased from "watermen" at a shilling a barrel. In the kitchens were sheet-iron stoves burning wood or charcoal ; in the living- rooms, tallow candles for lighting. No window screens. Ice in the water pitchers for the morning ablutions. Black darkness in the streets and fields by night. Sometimes, the shouts of drunken men near by. Yes, life was hard for the women even more than for the men, yet with their youth and their ambitions they enjoyed many a novel thrill. Besides, it seems that, being half-starved for refined pleasures, such as they had known, they set to work to create new ones. The years 1833 to 1837 and beyond were distinguished by enter- prises ranging from music to a medical college, and from debating societies to theaters. Education went ahead. Eliza Chappel's school was succeeded by a regular "system" authorized by the legislature; by a building of its own, built by John S. Wright in a burst of generosity ; and Ruth Leavenworth took the place of Miss Chappel — who married Rev. Jeremiah Porter — teaching pupils for whom the town charged $2 per quarter, except when parents could not pay ; then the children went to school free. The medical college was none other than Rush, incorporated in 1837 on petition of Dr. Daniel Brainerd and Dr. Josiah Goodhue. It was the first medical college west of Ohio. Not until 1844, 10 THE TOWN PROSPERS however, was its building, a brick and stone structure costing $3,500, erected on the north side and lectures begun; not until 1847 was "laughing gas" tried out, and chloroform was not used until 1848. In 1834 the good Jean Beaubien brought to Chicago a piano, and a year later there was a Chicago Harmonic Society, which staged an elaborate vocal and instrumental concert in the Presbyterian church. Compositions by Mozart, Weber, and others, were per- formed. So was the "Dead March in Saul." But also given was a piece called "Away with Melancholy." The theater was soon to follow — but preceded by the circus. "The Grand Equestrian Arena" was the first to arrive, occupying a small tent and stabling the horses in a convenient barn. Chicago youth reveled in the exhibitions, as it had in the performances (two years earlier) of "Monsieur Chaubert, the Fire King," who ate melted lead and coals of fire! Literature native to Chicago had to wait until the '40s, but there was an artist named Samuel Brooks as early as 1833. Also be- longing to that decade was the Chicago Lyceum, which held meet- ings and profound discussions, and which had a library of three hundred volumes. The hospitable Presbyterian church was some- times its meeting-place; sometimes the Saloon Building, the most pretentious public hall of the period. An immense amount of elo- quence was poured out for the Lyceum, it might be by Dr. Wil- liam B. Egan, noted after-dinner speaker, or Rev. I. T. Hinton, who had become the Baptist pastor ; he of whom it was written that "Such was his reputation as a scholar and orator that rarely did he find a room large enough to contain his audiences." The newspapers — for there were now more than one — faithfully recorded all this progress, in competition with that relic of antiquity, the town crier. New editors had come upon the scene, and new printing-presses. Robert Fergus "set up" as printer and publisher in 1839; Stephen Gale as stationer in 1835. The second newspaper to appear, following Calhoun's Democrat, was the Chicago Amer- ican, which came out on Saturday mornings. There was also a weekly, heralded as a "liberty paper," the Chicago Commercial Advertiser. It lived only one year. Not so with The Democrat, which in 1836 passed from Calhoun's failing hands into the pow- 11 CHICAGO S GREAT CENTURY erful ones of a 21-year-old giant who had lately tramped into Chi- cago after a journey from New Hampshire by various modes of transportation. This was "Long John" Wentworth, destined not only to be an editor, but mayor, congressman and mighty civic figure. He acquired in a relatively short time all the stock of The Democrat for about $2,800, and built it up, by tremendous exer- tions, until in 1840 he was able to make it a daily newspaper. The town, during those middle '30s when so many things hap- pened, was making material and political progress. It apparently had no police, not even a constable, until 1835, though it had already, in 1834, a law prohibiting sale of liquor by "tippling shops" or groceries on the Sabbath. Fire protection came earlier than police. The town had scarcely been incorporated when an ordinance was passed against passing an unguarded stove-pipe through roofs or sides of buildings; a Mrs. Hopkins was fined for disobeying the ordinance. In 1834 there was a dangerous fire, put out by citizens who "repaired to the scene of conflagration with a promptitude worthy of commendation." This blaze brought about agitation and, a year later, William B. Ogden was made agent to buy a couple of engines — a big order for a little town. At about the same time, citizens like P. F. W. Peck, Silas Cobb and Joseph Meeker signed up as members of the "Pioneer" hook and ladder company, and there was formed also (though no engine had yet arrived) the "Fire Kings." They had not only a name, but a motto: "Pro bono publico," which suggested, in a way, the fact that there was no departmental payroll. Fires were unfortunate, but they were interesting social occa- sions, with refreshments afterward. And the dances given by the heroic volunteers were among the brightest events of the year. Fire protection, however, was the more a problem because there was still no water system. Bucket brigades, both for putting out fires or for boiling eggs — that was the life. The river was still a country stream with more ferries than bridges. There was a rickety log span across the south branch at Lake Street, and a ludicrous draw-bridge at Dearborn, which pes- 12 THE TOWN PROSPERS tered travelers exceedingly. It was literally chopped to pieces by irate citizens in 1836. But the river was on the way to its destiny. The sand-bar across its present mouth was a stubborn barrier, over which the brothers Huguenin had to haul with an ox-team a yacht in which they had sailed from Oswego, N. Y. In 1834 the schooner Illinois, property of Oliver Newberry and George W. Dole, got through a narrow channel and sailed as far as the forks, saluted by cheering crowds. But most vessels halted outside the harbor, meantime doing their best to supply the town with necessaries, including some of the mail. For several important months of the year navigation was closed, and Chicago was virtually cut off from the East. This often led to actual hardships, such as a threatened famine in flour, one winter. Chicago had only twenty or thirty barrels all told, but there was more on a Newberry and Dole ship outside the harbor. Offers to buy at $15 a barrel were made to Mr. Dole, but he stoutly replied : "I'll sell for actual necessity, and for not more than $8.50 a barrel." It would have been well had a similar integrity and poise been shown in another field, that of the sale of land. A mania of real estate speculation began as far back as 1833, when the school section bounded by State, Madison, Halsted and Twelfth streets — a prospectively immense fortune in land — was sold for as little as $38,865. While speculation on these lots was at work, canal lots were also on the market, and, to add to the real estate craze, the government opened in 1835 a land office which brought hordes of adventurers, as well as legitimate buyers, into the market. Through those middle thirties Chicago and the surrounding region were insane with barter of patches of "vacant." Prices went up by tens of dollars, by fifties, by hundreds. Merchants forsook their customers to trade in sandy areas whose values sky- rocketed day by day; lawyers and doctors sought riches through frantic deals which, amid the general insanity, seemed normal enough. The streets were filled with shrieking land-gamblers. Before the government land office, throngs trampled the unpaved 13 CHICAGO S GREAT CENTURY street into a swamp of clay ; the store keeper in that building spread sand over the mud to make a footing for the boots of the crowd. An auctioneer named Garrett had a place on Dearborn Street that was thronged, week in and week out. It was printed that during ten months of 1835 he sold "$1,800,000 of property," not all of it in Chicago. A good deal of the land that changed hands at that time was in middlewestern "towns" which existed mainly on dubious maps. It may have been Garrett's human advertise- ment which the sharp eye of Harriet Martineau saw one day : "A negro, dressed up in scarlet, bearing a scarlet flag and riding a white horse with housings of scarlet, announced the times of sale." To cash transactions were added flocks of promissory notes, and trades as little backed by possession as modern stock purchases on margins. A smart young fellow like John S. Wright could be rich for a day — and was. Wright, who was barely of voting age, got an uncle of his to sell for $15,000 a lot that had cost $3,500 a year before, and collected $100 commission. Keeping on, Wright sold in New York eighty acres for which he had paid $4,000, and reaped $10,000. By 1836 this strippling had amassed — on paper — a fortune of over $200,000. In a year or two it was gone. There were countless other examples, some ludicrous enough. One young newcomer was offered a complete tavern, lot and all, for $500; he might have sold it for $5,000 in a few days. The land on which later the Tremont House was built "could have been bought for a barrel of whisky" in 1833, but by 1836 it was deemed worth $5,000. Gurdon Hubbard made $80,000, it is recorded, on an investment of $66.33 for two "canal lots." Meantime, during the frenzy which brought customers for 400,000 acres to the government land offices, and which made osten- sibly rich men out of youngsters who could scarcely grow a beard, a number of far-sighted men began building fortunes in Chicago. One was H. O. Stone, at first a lumber worker, then a real estate dealer. Another was W. L. Newberry, who traded carefully and held to what he made; a third, William B. Ogden, who, on behalf of associates, bought a dismal-looking tract for $100,000, held an auction, and reaped mightily during the boom years. He estab- lished in 1836 the firm of Ogden, Sheldon & Co. A year later came Elijah Peacock, who found customers for jewelry — which is 14 THE TOWN PROSPERS not as surprising as it seems — and Augustus Burley established a good business in china and glassware. So grew the town, in cheerful mood. In 1836 joy reached a frenzy, when financial clouds were dispelled from the face of that symbol of prosperity, the Illinois and Michigan Canal. The legis- lature voted to back up bonds for the work, and it could start. Three mighty cheers! And so high was the feeling that Chica- goans, in a mass meeting, ordered twelve guns fired in honor of each legislator who voted Chicago's way, and they asked the news- papers to print the names of these friends in capital letters. The opponents? They got only italics. On July 4 came the first "shovel day," when happy crowds hur- ried to the new town of Canalport on steamers or by team ; saw Col. William B. Archer turn the first earth in the presence of the other canal commissioners, Gurdon Hubbard and William F. Thornton ; and listened to eloquent speeches by Mr. Hubbard, Col. R. J. Ham- ilton, Dr. W. B. Egan, and others. A true sensation was caused by one speaker, Judge Theophilus Smith. As the incident was related by the veteran Fernando Jones fifty-six years later, at another canal ceremony, Judge Smith mounted a barrel and shouted : "In twenty years you will see 20,000 people in Chicago ; in fifty years 50,000." An Irishman in the crowd called out : "Aye, aye, judge, we won't be here, so we can't see how big a lie you are telling." This only aroused the judge, who cried : "Yes, fellow citizens, in a hundred years from this time you will see a city of 100,000." Mr. Jones relates: "That was too much for the boys. They took him off of the barrel and threw water in his face. 'Arrah,' said the leader to the judge, 'if we hadn't stopped you you'd have made it a million.' " 15 CHAPTER III Chicago Becomes a City 1 MORE suddenly than it developed, the "land boom" collapsed. President Jackson's financial policy led to the closing of western banks, brought the blizzard of promissory notes to judg- ment, and stripped most of the land speculators of their profits. Gloom settled over the town of Chicago. Pieces of paper called scrip appeared in business, and not merely did contractors use it, but barbers and storekeepers gave customers tickets "good for a shave" and "good for a loaf of bread." Nine out of ten citizens were deep in debt. The future of Chicago looked dark, as it has done fully twenty times. And it was in this mournful year, 1837, that the leaders of the town decided to apply for a city charter. Many of these leaders had come to the front since 1833. John Caton, fledgling lawyer at first, had become an able counsellor. Cool-headed men like Newberry and Ogden had gained respect. It was due largely to such influence that the charter application avoided one peril — unlimited municipal indebtedness. The debt limit was set at $100,000. In other respects the formation of the city proceeded with an ambition which some people thought passed reasonable bounds. Six wards were sketched out over territory much of which showed no habitation. A board of aldermen, a board of education, and six assessors, were provided for, amid the jeers of a few who thought Chicago already "governed to death." There was a High Constable, and several "lower" constables — and little crime. But the civic enthusiasts were looking to a far future. Some of them, though they laughed at a higher figure, again predicted a population of 50,000 ! 2 On March 4, 1837, the legislature granted the charter, and the first city election was set for May 20. When candidates for mayor were "brought out," the informal debates in tavern rooms 16 ^ Home of William Jones, Father of Fernando Jones Courtesy of Chicago Historical Society Chicago's First Shipment of Grain, 1839 CHICAGO BECOMES A CITY and second-floor offices finally concentrated on two men. One was Col. John H. Kinzie, oldest living son of the John Kinzie who settled in Chicago in 1804, befriended the Indians and became a sutler for Fort Dearborn. John junior had enjoyed a variety of experience in the wild northwest; had been agent among the Winnebagoes and secretary to Gov. Cass of Michigan ; and, among other things, had acquired the title of colonel. His ancestry and personality together made him a man of mark in Chicago. Yet, with all his prestige, when he ran for mayor he was not quite thirty-four years old. His opponent was not yet thirty-two. This was William B. Ogden, of wholly different lineage and experience from that of Kinzie. He had passed his early years in Delaware County, New York, taking up in his 'teens the business of his dead father ; and when not yet thirty had been a New York state senator. His debut in Chicago has been described. That within two years, 1835-37, he became a leader among such men as John Caton, John Wentworth, Isaac N. Arnold, Philo Carpenter, J. Young Scammon, and Gurdon Hubbard is enough to show the character of this astonishing New Yorker. He was not merely able, but handsome. Mr. Arnold, who was the first city clerk, once made an enthusiastic word-picture of his friend, writing phrases such as these: "His forehead was broad and square; his mouth firm and determined ; his eyes large and dark gray ; his nose large, hair brown ; his complexion ruddy ; his voice clear, musical and sympa- thetic; his figure a little above the medium height; and he united great muscular power with almost perfect symmetry of form." The two candidates were good friends, and, incidentally, both members of St. James Episcopal Church (established in 1834). When the election came on, the division of votes seems to have been not so much a question of personal popularity as one of pure partisanship. Kinzie was a Whig ; Ogden a Democrat. So the voters of six wards splashed through mud to the polling- places, and "voted straight," Whig or Democrat. What seem like odd results, considering friendships, are found in the records. Thus, in the First ward, Madore Beaubien, of the oldest Chicago element, walked up to the table in the Eagle hotel (in what is now the "loop") and shouted his vote for Ogden. J. Young Scammon 17 CHICAGO S GREAT CENTURY and Levi Boone, though admirers of the New Yorker, cast ballots for Kinzie. So did Gurdon Hubbard, W. L. Newberry, Grant Goodrich and Buckner Morris (who was to be the second mayor) in the Sixth ward — the present Gold Coast. In the Fourth ward, on the "northwest side," James Laframboise, whose name meant nothing if not a link with the early Chicago of Canadian traders, voted for Ogden. And so it went. But the poll lists of that day emphasize another thing : the pre- dominance of American names; names suggesting New England and, back of that, England itself; Arnold, Wright, Saltonstall, Talcott, Harmon, Smith, Forsythe. In an extreme minority were those of French descent, who had dominated the elections of ten or twelve years before. And but one name suggesting pure Indian is found: Star Foot. Properly enough, he voted for Kinzie. Ogden won by a vote of 469 to 237 for his opponent. It is worth noting that the south side cast just twice as many votes as the north, and that on the west side only 97 ballots were cast altogether. The city of that day, although it had greatly progressed since 1833, still had no building higher than two stories; nor any tall spire. There was, apparently, not a single cellar. There were still no gas, no sewers, no water system more modern than the painful process of hauling from the lake in carts. Although the Chicago Hydraulic company had been organized in 1836, it did not begin to work until years later. There was nothing resembling street paving. The streets passed from mud to dust, in the season, and reverted to mud. "Sidewalks" were merely more mud. Even women wore boots. Yet, with every appearance of zest, the population kept on growing. The first census, taken two months after Mr. Ogden's triumphant election, showed 4,066 souls, a gain of over 3,000 since '33. True, only 2,645 were adults, and there were nearly one fourth as many children under five years old as there were people over twenty-one. (The births in those crazy wooden houses must have come rapidly.) It is worth noting, also, that to 18 CHICAGO BECOMES A CITY the 4,066 actual residents the census added 104 "sailors belonging to vessels owned here" ; a naive way of padding the figures. All except 77 of the dwellers in this transformed Indian trading-post were white. The others are described in one place as "people of color," and in another as "blacks." This population over which Mayor Ogden and six aldermen took municipal rule was of great variety, in ancestry and character. The range was from the stiffest Puritans to the free-drinking, free-loving remnants of the frontier; and from squatters densely ignorant to people who could write Latin or Parisian French. At public gatherings assembled a strange mixture of race and cos- tume. The hotel dances, from which the most conservative church folk stayed away, were whirligigs of style, in which sober black coats rubbed elbows with hunting-shirts, and flowing skirts mocked at garb borrowed from the Indians. Mayor Ogden had a spacious house — built about the time of his election — on a square of ground on the "near north side" — where he became a grand host. From this verandahed dwelling, with its beautiful shade trees, the descent in scale was to wretched cabins among swamps, occupied by fami- lies who lived in terrible squalor. Indeed, since the bursting of the land bubble, the city was poor, save for a few of the prosperous. It was municipally poor. Its governmental frame work, so excellent on paper, what with a city council, a clerk and treasurer, constables, a municipal court (short-lived), street commissioners and a health board, a militia organization, schools and school inspectors, was bare-boned because the municipal pocket was all but empty. The city began its func- tions with less than $2,000 in the hands of the treasurer (Hiram Pearsons). Thus, being nearly broke, its leaders thought of bor- rowing, and the aldermen resolved to obtain $25,000. But they received a blow in the face. Application to the Chicago branch of the State Bank of Illinois brought a polite letter from the cashier that the proposal had been presented to the directors, "and, I regret to have to state, declined." The system of borrowing on tax warrants does not seem to have existed. What was to be done? There remained, it appeared, only the 19 CHICAGO S GREAT CENTURY expedient of issuing scrip- — and in scrip the new-born city paid its bills. Through this dismal period Mayor Ogden stood up like the man he was, facing the future and advising faith. Around him rose the moans of men lately "rich" and now at their wits' end. Houses were almost literally papered with over-due notes. There was danger of fire, and need of more fire apparatus. This need was demonstrated two years later, when flames ruined eighteen build- ings on Lake Street, including the first Tremont House, the property of Ira and James Couch. Through the hot summer of 1837 the mayor preached patience and courage. And in the autumn came the historic mass-meeting when discouraged citizens urged a moratorium on debts. Ogden confronted them, pleaded with them not to "proclaim their own dishonor"; reminded them — according to the faithful account of J. Y. Scammon — "that many a fortress had saved itself by the courage of its inmates and their determination to conceal its weakened condition"; and cried, in the words so often quoted, "Above all, do not tarnish the honor of our infant city." These words, spoken by one who had suffered heavy losses of his own, saved Chicago from repudiation of debts. But the city that grew so rapidly during the boom was halted in its progress. Mere scores, not hundreds, of people now were adopting it for a home. Much of the land so wildly bartered stood in the name of non-residents. Neither they nor the resident owners would, or could, pay more than a part of the taxes due, trifling as they were compared with the values that had been established on some of the lots. The taxes levied were less than $1 per lot ; a few were taxed as high as $10. But the delinquencies were widespread. It was hardly a "tax strike." Most of those folk with "New England consciences" would have paid had they been able ; but plain bread and butter was hard to find. Yet the nucleus of what was to become one of the most embat- tled, and one of the pluckiest, cities in the world was not defeated. The canal was still going forward, rod by rod. It furnished one of the few means of employment, in that time of depression. The ships were coming in, and some were going out, burdened with 20 CHICAGO BECOMES A CITY cargoes representing Chicago's first exports. And religion upheld the faith of many. At the height of the "bad times" came the organization of the "Chicago and Vicinity Bible Society." Bibles had a boom, even though real estate was "flat." The newspapers were undaunted too. The Chicago American vociferated, in 1839, "Hard times or easy times, blue devils or whatnot — say what you will, feel what you will — Chicago is a wonderful city." It was a situation more smoothly expressed by Joseph N. Balestier, one of the most talented of the early residents. He wrote in 1840: "The year 1837 will ever be remembered as the era of protested notes; it was the harvest of the notary and the lawyer — the year of wrath for the mercantile, producing, and laboring interests. Misery inscribed its name on many a face but lately radiant with high hopes; despair was stamped on many a countenance which was wont to be 'wreathed in smiles.' Broken fortunes, blasted hopes, aye, and blighted characters : these were the legitimate off- spring of those pestilent times. The land resounded with the groans of ruined men, and the sobs of defrauded women, who had entrusted all to greedy speculators. Political events, which had hitherto favored these wild chimeras, now conspired to hasten and aggravate the impending downfall. It was a scene of woe and desolation. Temporary relief came in the shape of Michigan money — but like all empty expedients, it, in the end, aggravated the disease it pretended to cure — it seemed a sovereign panacea, but it proved a quack specific. "Let us turn from this sickening spectacle of disaster and ruin. Mad as her citizens had been, Chicago was Chicago still. Artificial enterprises had failed, but nature was still the same. There stood Chicago 'in her pride of place* — unmoved and immovable. Though mourning and desolate, she could still sustain an active population. Need I add that SHE HAS DONE IT?" 21 CHAPTER IV What "Made News" Then 1 IN a wooden fire-trap in the heart of town, "a den of a place," looking like "a dismantled grist-mill," a company of ten actors performed on an October evening in 1838 the play by Bulwer- Lytton entitled "The Lady of Lyons." Footlights made of tallow- dips illumined fitfully the rough scenery. On the even ruder chairs and benches, or in two curtained boxes, sat an audience composed of gentlemen in high-collared dress coats — if they had any — ladies in shovel bonnets and shawls and plain citizens in linsey-woolsey. In the gallery — for there was one — rioted a lot of mischievous and hooting boys. After the five acts of "The Lady of Lyons" came to a tragic close and Claude Melnotte's fate was settled, a lad ten years old came before the curtain, a gaudy affair exhibiting a medallion of Shakespeare. The boy sang the "comic song of Lord Lovel and Lady Nancy." This was "Master J. Jefferson," according to the play-bills. It was, in fact, the debut in this future metropolis of a coming great actor. And the "infant city," choked with debt and overspread by melancholy, was reacting against its troubles by cheering the opening of the theater called The Rialto. In the year before, the manager of the new playhouse had experi- mented in Chicago, putting on popular pieces in what was left of the Sauganash Tavern, abandoned not only by Mark Beaubien but by his successors. A populace half -famished for amusement so encouraged the impresarios, Isherwood and McKenzie, that they made bold to return in 1838 and transform John Bates' abandoned auction-room into The Rialto. The licensing cost money, but that was not the only difficulty. Thoughtful citizens, including J. Y. Scammon, Alanson Follansbee, E. S. Kingsbury and Attorney Giles Spring, memorialized the city council, protesting that the theater was a bad fire risk, and that insurance rates on the cluster of wooden buildings around it would rise. But there was still another complaint, a moral one. This came from a member of 22 WHAT MADE NEWS THEN the committee of three appointed to decide the question. Two of the members, H. L. Rucker and Eli Williams, voted for the theater, but the third opposed it. He was Grant Goodrich, devout Metho- dist and later one of the founders of Northwestern university. He declared that a permanent theater was a menace to moral welfare ; and that "the tendencies of the performances of modern theaters were grossly demoralizing, destructive of principle," and "nurseries of crime." But in this early argument over "morals versus art" amusement won, in a community that badly needed it. Now, had it not been for The Rialto and the venturesomeness of the Jefferson family, young Joe might never have seen Chicago, and its annals would have lacked one of the most sprightly pictures of the city of that day. The family had come around the lakes by steamer from Buffalo. Writes Jefferson in his autobiography : "Day by day passes, till one night a light is espied in the distance, then another, and then many more dance and reflect themselves in the water. At sunrise we are all on deck looking at the haven of our destination, and there in the morning light, on the shores of Lake Michigan, stands the little town of Chicago, containing 2000 inhabitants.* "Off we go ashore and walk through the busy little town, busy even then, people hurrying to and fro, frame buildings going up, board sidewalks going down, new hotels, new churches, new theaters, everything new. Saw and hammer — saw! saw! bang! bang ! — look out for the drays ! — bright and muddy streets, gaudy colored calicos, blue and red flannels and striped ticking hanging outside the dry-goods stores, bar-rooms, real-estate offices, attor- neys-at-law — oceans of them !" Although Jefferson's details are not quite accurate, the city, as he implies, is undaunted, active. It is moving forward on several fronts, and ready to go on all. Despite the warnings that building a city cannot be an unmixed success, and despite the absence of *An under-estimate, of course. 23 CHICAGO S GREAT CENTURY some things belonging to a richer civilization, there is excitement here. There is variety. Let us glance at a few of the events that "made headlines." In the spring of 1839 the city is swept by a religious "revival," in which both Presbyterians and Baptists show great zeal. The preaching is tempestuous; the converts are many. In particular, the Rev. Isaac Hinton pours forth his eloquence and so warms his hearers that they are able to endure immersion in the chill and murky Avaters of the river. Hinton has won further note by prophecies that the world will come to an end in 1873 ; and by a series of sermons on the devil and his works. "He had the devil down the side and up the middle of every dance; in the ladies' curls and the gentlemen's whiskers," writes John Wentworth. "When the people came out of church they would ask each other 'what is your devil ?' " Congruously or not, there comes in the same week with the revival the first issue of the city's first (indeed the state's first) daily newspaper, The American. It is printed on the third floor of a building at Clark and South Water Streets. A year later its editor is fined $100 for contempt of court. By 1842, though not for that reason, it is dead. But in the meantime, John Wentworth's Democrat has become a daily. In the fall of 1839 the hotels and coffee-houses are buzzing with talk of the clash between Wentworth and Capt. David Hunter, pioneer and at one time commandant of Fort Dearborn. The stalwart editor of The Democrat has published an attack on "per- sons who have been filching money unjustly in the shape of Indian claims." Capt. Hunter, considering that this is an assault upon himself, marches into the barren little office of The Democrat. He lays down two pistols on the tables, and shouts that Wentworth must fight. But the six-foot editor — twenty-four years old now — stoutly refuses to go into battle. A correction in the paper will be enough. It is made. And afterwards the fiery captain reveals that the pistols were not loaded ! 24 Courtesy of Chicago Historical Society John ("Long John") Wentworth WHAT MADE NEWS THEN Less amusing, but more significant of urban growth, are such events as the publication of the first law book, the beginning of engraving by the famous S. D. Childs, the establishment of free public schools, the beginnings of brass foundry work and of the brewing of beer. This last is prophetic of a great Chicago industry. Equally prophetic, but of a mighty source of internal strife, comes a dramatic incident of 1839. A "strange, famished, terrified negro" has appeared on a farm in LaSalle County, armed with a knife and a gun. What to do about this man, clearly a runaway slave, is a problem to the farmer and his friends. After a night hidden in a barn he is taken to Ottawa, thence on farmers' wagons to Plain- field and Lyons; and at length, guided by various people, he is placed with Dr. C. V. Dyer. The good doctor, who was post physician in Fort Dearborn, has become an ardent abolitionist, and now speedily sends the poor fugitive on to safety in Canada. This is apparently the first time a Chicago home has been made a station on the Underground Railway. As years follow, there will be many others. In 1839, also, a large part of the populace is boiling with anger and sympathy because the preemption claim of good old Col. Jean Beaubien has been turned down, both by the United States Supreme Court and by the House of Representatives. The colonel claimed an important part of the Fort Dearborn reservation ; land that would be worth millions. Not only is his long fight fruitless, but a cold-blooded lawyer has outbid him for the very lot the pioneer lives on ; hence an indignation meeting is held, with resolu- tions calling the lawyer by bad names and declaring him ungener- ous to an old-timer. But the protest fails, and the coloners house at South Water Street and Michigan Avenue, with the graves of his children hard by, is "sold from him in his old age/' 6 Still another stirring event : On the afternoon of July 10, 1840, the populace is streaming toward a spot near the lake shore, about three miles south of the courthouse square. Sixty militiamen, com- 25 CHICAGO S GREAT CENTURY manded by Cols. Beaubien and Seth Johnson, are on hand to keep order, assisted by two hundred armed citizens on horseback. A gallows has been put up. A nervous sheriff is in charge of the condemned man, John Stone, a woodchopper. The latter has been found guilty of the murder of Mrs. Lucretia Thompson. Circum- stantial evidence, such as a piece of his shirt found near the death scene, convicted him. Indicted in May, he is a doomed man in July ; for justice runs swiftly in 1840. He protests his innocence, in fact says others committed the crime, but, when asked whether he knows them, replies, "If I did I would swing before their blood should be upon me." Then the Episcopal service is read, the cap adjusted, the trem- bling sheriff sends John Stone to death. Such is the first execu- tion for murder in the young city of Chicago, destined to see within ninety years an appalling number of murders, and nothing like the convictions commensurate with the crimes. A different page is turned. A society is formed that will have far-reaching results in building, instead of destroying, the com- munity. Fourteen men are made officers and directors of the Young Men's Association of Chicago. They first meet, in early January, 1841, in the hardware store of Seth Otis. Mark Skinner, one of the ablest of the city's numerous lawyers, draws up a sub- scription paper which, within a couple of weeks, has nearly one hundred and fifty signers, who have paid $2 fee in advance. The enterprise is attacked by low-brow citizens as "an aristocratic and exclusive affair," but it goes ahead. W. L. Newberry is president, and Skinner vice-president. A reading-room, with newspapers and periodicals, is set up at Lake and Clark Streets, over the bar- bershop of John Johnson, colored. Soon Newberry gives the insti- tution its first books. To these are added, after a few years, the library of the Chicago Lyceum. Famous lecturers are brought to town. And later, when the society becomes the Chicago Library Association, it ranks as the forerunner, though not the actual ancestor, of the Chicago Public Library. Does it seem surprising that men so active in other fields should turn their minds to "culture"? No more so than that the city 26 WHAT MADE NEWS THEN government, when one year old, should vote for a park. A park, in a region still largely wilderness ! Well, Chicago had to have it. A single square, at the southwest corner of Michigan Avenue and Washington Street, was set aside, named Dearborn Park, and dedicated "forever" to recreation. The year: 1838. 8 Always with many unexpected turns and alluring side views, the main stream of the city's life flowed on. The population jumped from 4,470 in 1840 to 29,963 in 1850. Many new people; many new ideas, and needs. More newspapers, that was one demand. The Chicago Express, a daily afternoon paper, started up, ran shakily until 1844 with "Henry Clay for President" at its masthead, then sank. Its suc- cessor was The Chicago Daily Journal, also completely Whig. Clay was beaten by Polk, but The Journal kept on, with Richard L. Wilson as editor. It kept on even after Wilson was hurt when a cannon he was helping to fire, in celebration of the victory of Buena Vista, went off too soon. The paper prospered. It even boasted Chicago's first dramatic critic, B. F. Taylor. More courts was another need. The municipal court had ceased. In 1845 came the Cook County Circuit Court, with Hugh T. Dickey as its first judge. The docket soon was over- full. There were now many ambitious law students, as well as lawyers, so the first law school was opened in 1847 by John J. Brown, who was "merciless in vituperation" but "an ornament to the bar," said foe and friend. More public schools ? A good many, also the first decent school building, on low land opposite McVicker's Theater; a two-story brick which shocked by its cost ($7,500) ; known as "Ira Milti- more's Folly." But it justified itself. More doctors? Rush College graduated a hundred new ones within six years. The Chicago Medical Society came in 1850. More police and firemen? Many more. Bridges? The Dearborn Street freak was gone. The north side clamored for a new one, so that the "Hoosiers," busy prairie- wagon merchants, might get across. There was a row between north and south sides ; a city council deadlock. Ogden and New- 27 CHICAGO S GREAT CENTURY berry, good historians say, turned the tide by presenting to the Catholic church the land at Superior and North State Streets. The deadlock ended. The Gark Street bridge was built under Ogden's supervision. One at Wells Street, largely financed by Newberry, followed. Alas ! These and others were destroyed in 1849, when the Desplaines River overflowed, the Chicago River was flooded, and a mass of ships was hurled downstream. Other things : Brewing, tanning, packing, and flour-milling are growing apace. "Over the river," Philetus Gates sets up an iron works, soon to loom very big. Joseph T. Ryerson founds a com- pany that will be notable in the steel industry. A boat with pro- peller is launched from a north side ship yard. The first Chicago- owned bank is being run by George Smith, thorough Scotchman whose nephew, "Silent" Smith, will inherit something like $50,000,000. Wonderful '40s ! They are plunging forward toward two public enterprises of first magnitude: one, the completion of the Illinois and Michigan Canal ; the other, the operation of railroads. Modern Chicago is at hand. 28 CHAPTER V Water or Rail? 1 IN some ways, the canal had a more troublous birth than the railroads. The difficulties, both in financing and in engineering, that were met and surmounted, form a record that would fill pages if not books. The story at its briefest relates how the canal enterprise, begun with flying banners in 1836, had run up a bill of over $1,250,000 by 1839. Even sturdy supporters like Gurdon Hub- bard, William B. Archer and William Gooding, the chief engineer, saw the point, especially since the state, after launching its magnifi- cent "internal improvement act," had gone broke in the 1837 panic. Canal "scrip" met an immediate need ; then a complicated piece of bond financing came to nothing, and in 1843 work on the canal — which by then had cost $5,000,000 — was stopped. Andreas com- ments : "The old lesson containing as its moral the powerlessness of premature enterprise was being taught to the young state by that stern master, experience." At this point there came to the front again our friends William B. Ogden and Isaac Arnold, together with the able attorney Justin Butterfield and others; also an important New Yorker, Arthur Bronson. Arnold stirred up the Chicagoans in a great speech in Mechanics Hall. Bronson worked upon eastern capitalists. Soon the plan was formed, then matured, for a new state loan, sub- scribed partly in New York and Boston, partly in London and Paris. After this financing was achieved, there came an engineering argument. A program had grown up with many advocates — chief among them Russell Heacock, whom we first met as an opponent of the town incorporation — called the "shallow cut" plan. In a way, its name tells its aim. However, it was deficient in the respect that it did not provide for making the Chicago River turn back its current, "run uphill," and force the waters over the "divide" at Summit. Now came to being, through brainy Ira 29 CHICAGO S GREAT CENTURY Miltimore (the same who built "Miltimore's Folly"), the idea of a pumping system — that which forms the principle of the great Sanitary canal. Miltimore was a good engineer, and his idea, fortunately, prevailed. There was money, and through 1844-47 the work went on, hindered though it was by unexpected trouble in digging the cut, and by terrible outbreaks of disease. It was on the 10th of April, 1848, that the canal was deemed ready to be opened from Lockport to the Chicago Harbor. The ship "General Frye," on that red-letter day, was sent of! from Lockport with wild cheers, and towed over the Summit level, whence it entered the Chicago River. At that entrance it was greeted by Mayor Wood worth and a delegation, in tall hats. As the "General Frye" went on, citizens standing on the muddy riverbanks and on the bridges gave it a noisy welcome. Yet this was not the formal opening, which took place April 16, with still more ceremony. Finally, on April 24, a real freighter, the "Gen- eral Thornton," journeyed from La Salle to Chicago, laden with a cargo all the way from New Orleans, and passed on to Buffalo. For some years the new waterway so prospered, and such a "land boom" developed, that not only Chicago, but the whole state felt the stimulus. It is essential to mention, as a sort of footnote, that the canal "saved Chicago from being in Wisconsin." Under an ancient ordinance the southern line of that state might have been drawn east and west from the lowermost tip of Lake Michigan, and at one time Wisconsin sought to "bribe" politically the leaders of Chicago to submit to such a demarkation. But it was argued that it would be awkward to operate a canal under two state governments, and Chicago remained in Illinois — to become both its pride and, in political campaigns, a target of its criticism. A second footnote: According to John Wentworth, Chicago never had mosquitoes until the canal was dug. 2 By this time prosperity had come again; come, ostensibly, to stay. The caravans kept toiling in from the East. Steamers, some of them dubbed "floating palaces" by flowery writers of the period, were bringing more people. There were nearly 17,000 30 WATER OR RAIL.' inhabitants by 1847, and they were only forerunners of thousands who would arrive each year. The plank roads which entered Chicago like the spokes of half a huge cart-wheel, were thronged, in season, by carters bound for Chicago, and if the planks some- times sank into swamp, those stout carters merely cursed and floundered on. The great plains were emptying their riches into the city which commanded lake navigation. Wheat by the millions of bushels, flour by the tens of thousands of barrels, beef and pork, wool, buffalo robes, deerskins — 28,259 pounds of these in 1847 — were loaded upon outbound vessels. The imports to Chicago, now a government port of entry, had passed $2,000,000, but the exports had passed that. The board of trade was being formed. And men were shouting, with readier confidence than ten years before : "Chicago will be the greatest city in the West! It will have 150,000 people! It will surpass Galena and St. Louis." This last prediction made some people shake their heads. It was too much. In 1847, on the eve of railroads, a gathering truly tremendous, considering the time and place, "put Chicago on the map" more emphatically than ever. In a huge tent erected in the courthouse square were gathered delegates and visitors to the river and harbor convention. It had been called partly to protest against veto of river and harbor legislation by President Polk, and in part to stimulate the improvement of waterways throughout the Cen- tral West. There were leading men from the West, East and South — Horace Greeley, Thurlow Weed, and others. One dele- gate was a tall, gaunt Illinoisan who attracted little notice — Abraham Lincoln. Within a dozen years or less his fame would be nation wide. It is said the attendance, or at least the number of strangers in town, during the three-day sessions, reached 20,000. Whether this figure be exact or not, the convention was the first of anything like the size to be held in Chicago; it was attended by military parades and turn-outs of the fire companies. With the eloquent resolutions forwarded to Congress there went out through the nation enthusiastic stories of the vigor of the young city, "which in ten years will be larger than Albany," wrote Thurlow Weed. 31 CHICAGO S GREAT CENTURY But Chicago, which needed $12,000 for its harbor, did not get it then. 3 Almost immediately came the proof that there was a thing newer and more startling than the development of waterways : The rail- road. The first one, the Galena & Chicago Union, had been chartered January 16, 1836, with the Illinois Central following two days later. But who thought anything of those charters ? True, short lines of railroad were running "back East," and it was under- stood that the cars stayed on the tracks most of the time. But in and around Chicago the canal was the big thing ; also, plank roads and stage lines did very well. Thus, no one seriously pushed the railroad idea through the hard times of the late '30s and early '40s. Pilings driven along Madison Street for the Galena-Chicago Union remained there neglected. Nor did the railroad project — though revived in 1846 at a convention in Rockford — really come to life until the incomparable pair, Ogden and Scammon, gave it vitality. There was a "railroad king" in Boston named William F. Weld. To him went Ogden and Scammon, who with others had acquired the lifeless charter. Quite in the royal manner, Mr. Weld said, in substance, "Gentlemen, go home, raise what money you can, expend it upon your road, and when the road breaks down, as it probably will, come and give it to us." Mr. Weld did not know the men to whom he was talking. As they returned home they said to each other: "The Galena shall not break down. We shall sell stock and raise the money." Then followed a campaign that stretched over a long, hard period. No one in Chicago could at first be found with more than $5,000 to invest. An opportunity arose to buy from the Rochester & Canandaigua Railroad a supply of "strap rail" — a primitive rail that was little more than a thin strip of iron on a wooden base — two cars and two engines. Contracts were made for ties, without money to pay for them. Most of the directors began to lose heart. At one time Mr. Scammon went to George Smith, the Scotch banker, and asked him for a loan of $20,000. Smith, who in after years made millions in South American schemes, at first declined. 32 WATER OR RAIL: "Why, if you have the money?" demanded Scammon. "I dinna wish to lose it," replied Smith. Upon this, Scammon invoked the name of his friend Ogden; and in another ten minutes the loan was arranged, the deal being kept secret. Quarrels and accusations of self-interest against the two de- termined promoters arose. These, however, were not so bitter as the antagonism of many of the country folk when the solicitors of stock subscriptions went "on the road." In small towns men complained that rapid transportation would ruin them. A tavern- keeper at Marengo denounced railroads as "undemocratic and aristocratic." He howled for plank roads, "upon which everybody can travel." However, the two promoters journeyed in buggies all the way from Chicago to Galena, making speeches and even visiting homes. The farmers "came through" with subscriptions, "even though," Mr. Scammon wrote, "they had to borrow the first installment of $2.50 on a share and get trusted till after harvest." The miners around Galena also dug into their pockets willingly. During these gruelling journeys, after riding and talking all day, Mr. Ogden would sit up until late with his correspondence, yet he seldom showed fatigue; "was always cheerful and pleasant," wrote his companion. Also, his courage was unshakable; Later in his career, on a similar mission, he faced a meeting in Wisconsin when his life was imperiled ; but he won his audience by coolness and fearlessness. And as to his integrity, it is told that late in life, when he was not so well off, he was offered $25,000 a year as receiver for a railroad. He declared $10,000 was enough, and — unlike many a receiver in our day — refused to take more. The railroad itself was a poor little thing at first. It clung to the level land; grades could not be afforded. "It was a single straight line, hardly more," Mr. Scammon wrote. "Station houses, sidings, turn-outs and turn-tables had to be, for the most part, deferred to the future." The strap-rails were jeered at by visiting engineers. Eastern lines, though still in their infancy, had T-rails, able to hold up fairly heavy trains. And as for the construction 33 CHICAGO S GREAT CENTURY work, though there were no mountains to climb, there were swamps to cope with, for the country near Chicago was, in some seasons, half under water. Fred A. Nash, who surveyed the route, wrote: "Much of the time we waded, waist deep," and four-foot stakes had to be used because of tall grass. Similar obstacles beset the engineers who laid down the crude wood-and-iron rails, first as far as the Des Plaines River, later to Elgin. But finally, in the fullness of time — and a bit over — the enter- prise that had cost so much in labor, argument, and financial worry, that had been almost ostracized by the Chicago city council, that was not at first allowed even to cross the north branch of the river, became a fact, and a "good newspaper story." The news for a long time had been mainly of the Mexican War, and the aftermath of war was swallowing space; yet on October 25, 1848, The Democrat admitted to its columns an item saying that "the locomotive, with the tender and ten cars, took its first start, and run out a distance of five miles upon the road. A number of gentlemen rode upon the cars." This engine was the "Pioneer," which had just been brought to town on the freighter Buffalo. In November the little locomo- tive, with its four wheels, and its comical funnel, drew a train bearing about one hundred passengers as far as the Des Plaines, and on the return trip a load of wheat was dumped into one of the cars from a farmer's wagon, in what might be called in those days a half -humorous "publicity move." Anyway, it was the first grain transported to Chicago by rail, and the "Pioneer" lived to tell the tale. Less than twenty years had passed since finishing touches were given to Stephenson's "Rocket," in England. In the first months of 1848 another marvel, closely linked with railroad success, had reached Chicago — the telegraph. The initial message came from Milwaukee. After it flashed through, smart bachelors and ladies used the telegraph to exchange flowery mes- sages ; an early instance of "Don't write ; telegraph." Soon there was connection with Detroit. The latter city wired to Chicago and three other towns : "We hail you by lightning as fair sisters." The answer was equally courteous: 34 WATER OR RAIL f "May we be joined by bonds as holy as those which unite maidens to the object of their love, but unlike that love may our course always run smoothly." Trains, drawn by puny wood-burning locomotives, had been creeping westward for several years before a line came into Chicago from the East or South. During 1852, however, three railroads managed to stretch as far as the city on Lake Michigan, and its future as a railroad center was assured. The Chicago, Rock Island & Pacific was already virtually in the city, and its "depot" on the south side prairie found, early in 1852, a competitor when trains began to run into the Michigan Southern station — the very first to come from the East. It was only a year and a half before the two roads combined in a single station costing $60,000 and considered for long a mark of the grandeur of Chicago. In May of 1852 came the Illinois Central — accompanied by the Michigan Central — to its temporary station on the lake shore just south of Twelfth Street. The arrival of "I. C." trains was the culmination of a long and determined effort begun in 1836, aban- doned when the great Illinois "internal improvement" bubble burst a little later, and revived in the late '40s by a few indomitable souls, of whom Judge Sidney Breese, John Stephen Wright, and United States Senator Stephen A. Douglas proved among the most persistent and eloquent. Breese worked in the Illinois legis- lature, Wright deluged Congress with petitions, and the super- popular Douglas worked in Washington. The "Little Giant" had become a resident of Chicago, and was passionately its partisan. Through years of activity, too complex to describe in this narra- tive, the great project moved along, becoming a certainty when the Illinois Central received its generous grant of right-of-way in return for paying to the state seven per cent of its annual gross earnings. Douglas won his battle, or else the road — originally meant to run from Cairo to Galena — might never have reached Chicago. As it was, the "I. C." came in, a welcome contributor to the funds of a none-too-rich city and welcome, too, in that it 35 CHICAGO S GREAT CENTURY agreed to fortify the lake shore, which was crumbling, against the lake waves. Roswell B. Mason, afterwards mayor of Chicago, built the line, assisted by T. B. Blackstone, later the Chicago and Alton's president. Mason and his staff ran it over the great plains of central Illinois — "we traveled forty miles without seeing a house of any kind," he once wrote — and brought trains triumph- antly into the lake-side station on May 21. Chicago crowds cheered this accomplishment. The city was in generous mood. The road was given a strip of shore three hun- dred feet wide, reaching to Randolph Street. Soon its trains, bal- ancing on a strip of track trestled above the lake, entered a station near the river. And it was some years before Chicago realized that this welcome addition to its railroads had captured a water-front. The Chicago of the '50s was not thinking about the future of the lake-front, but about the success of the railroads. To the destiny that shaped them had come a mighty ally, an invention scarcely yet understood : The McCormick Harvesting Machine. In the year when the "Galena Railroad" was opened, Cyrus H. McCormick was building a plant north of the river, and William B. Ogden, in the same month of his railway trial trip, contracted to help the Virginia inventor with funds. In another year Ogden was out of the enterprise, and the powerful, reserved, dark-eyed McCormick was pushing it himself. By 1850, helped by his brothers Robert and Leander, he was employing 120 men and turning out 1,600 machines a year. There was a commotion in the farming districts. A revolution in agriculture was beginning. As the fields gave up their grain in a crescendo of quantity and speed, as the steam trains drew creaking car loads toward the growing city on the lake, a new foundation of prosperity, both for city and railroads, was driven deep. 36 CHAPTER VI The City Rises From the Mud 1 ' I 'HERE were Chicagoans in those days who pronounced their ■■» city a "metropolis" ; but the word would not do. To make a metropolis it takes more than railroad stations. In 1848 Chicago acquired a new citizen, who speedily became a civic patriot. But he was patriotic with his eyes open. He saw what would be, but he also saw what was. This was William Bross, a New Jersey man trying new fortunes at the age of thirty-five. At first he thought Chicago needed a book-shop, but this proved to be premature. Bross gave it up and joined with J. Ambrose Wight, editor of John S. Wright's Prairie Farmer, in another venture — The Prairie Herald. Afterwards Bross combined with John L. Scripps to publish The Democratic Press. This was finally merged with The Tribune, which had begun in 1847 "in an old wooden shanty" at Lake and Market Streets. The amazing city which Mr. Bross observed in the '60s from the eminence of joint editorship of The Tribune with Scripps and Joseph Medill had amazed him no less when he first saw it. But he knew it to be uncouth and, in spots, even hideous. "Slab city/' he did not hesitate to call it — wooden slabs, not marble — streets lined with unadorned frame structures ; here and there one of brick ; two stone "aristocratic mansions" on Michigan Avenue near Lake, standing alone. There were dingy hovels, and stretches of sand, and scrub trees. Streets were still of virgin earth, and "the side- walks, where such luxuries were indulged in, lay in most cases upon the rich prairie soil, for the string pieces of scantling, to which the planks were originally spiked, would soon sink down into the mud after a rain." So would the surface of streets. Teams stuck in the mud. On the mired wagons jokers would put signs, "No bottom here," or "Shortest Road to China." This was annoying, but it was not the worst of the story. The river, that pleasant country stream of olden time, had become a slow 37 CHICAGO S GREAT CENTURY pestilence. The offal of slaughter-houses, and other refuse, was dumped into it. Swamps near the city, even sloughs within the limits, bred disease. There were no sewers. The "metropolis" into which were coming new hordes of people, many of them now from across the Atlantic and some darkly ignorant, became the prey of epidemics which taught a dreadful lesson. Smallpox, appearing every year in the early '40s, became more common as the city grew; the county hospital (opened in 1847) was too small, and there had even been resort to "boarding" sick people in private homes. The smallpox epidemic of 1848 caused new terror. It led to free vaccination of the poor by such well known physicians as Dr. Daniel Brainerd and Dr. L. D. Boone. Scarlet fever, pneumonia and tuberculosis all were prevalent. Many a letter to some eastern home told how r some housewife had "pined away," "gone into a decline," or, more specifically, died of "gal- loping consumption." Ill-ventilated cottages did the work. And in 1849 cholera came up the Mississippi, attacked the Chicago popula- tion, and so raged that during one month 931 sufferers, mainly of the "immigrant class," died. It was clear that a city now containing close to 30,000 people and with much to boast of, could not go on with wretched drainage, mud streets, and a bad water supply. So all these things were attacked by men whose lack of modern science was balanced by their ingenuity. How "dry out" the center of the city? It was nearly ten feet above lake level at State and Madison Streets, but toward the west it sloped gently until at Market and Madison it was less than six feet above lake level. A similar slope ran northward to the river. One early idea was to plank the main streets in the hope that surplus water and sewage would run blithely down the gutters into the river. But alas ! The streets themselves became sloughs. "Our first effort at paving, or one of the first," wrote Bross in his memoirs, "was to dig down Lake Street to nearly or quite a level with the lake, and then plank it . . . The experiment was a disastrous failure, for the stench at once became intolerable." Yet the planking of streets went on for nearly two years, and cost 38 THE CITY RISES FROM THE MUD $31,000. Gas lit a part of these streets for the first time in 1850, but illumined a sorry picture of sinking "pavement" and oozing slime. Five years more, and a new, more sensible, but even more expensive plan was brought forward. This was "to fill to a level of ten feet above ordinary on the streets adjacent to the river, raising them with an inclination sufficient to protect the sewers and to give cellars of seven and one-half to eight feet in height." (Report of Engineer Clarke.) But whence was this enormous amount of filling to come? Qarke had his answer: "It has been found that the surplus earth of the south division has been sufficient not only to raise the grade of the streets, but to fill up the whole of the lake basin between the railroad and Michigan Avenue." This gigantic effort was undertaken, and, in the course of twenty or thirty years, completed. Yet as late as 1856 it was still an occasion of doubt, and of protest. Citizens tried to prevent it by injunction, but were over-ruled by Judge Caton. The year follow- ing, The Tribune asked : "What effect is this new grade going to have on buildings already erected?" The same article suggested that the Tremont House, for example, could be "entered from the street through the second-story windows by building two or three short steps upon the proposed sidewalks." But this device never became necessary. The Tremont House itself was raised. That brick structure was lifted by jack-screws and hoisted eight feet. The proprietors, Ira and James Couch, footed the bill — about $45,000, it is asserted — and narrators insist that not a pane of glass was shattered. Afterwards, noting this success, building owners sought out contractors to "give them a lift." A half -block of Lake Street buildings was raised. "It took 5,000 screws and 500 men to accomplish it," asserted a witness. One of the most successful of the contractors was George M. Pullman, new in Chicago but already noted for jack-screw suc- cessses in New York State. His renown as developer of the sleep- ing-car later quite eclipsed that early fame. 3 Having thus launched Chicago on its raising of grade and build- ings, a long process that left uneven sidewalk levels for another quarter-century (with bevies of rats camping underneath) we 39 CHICAGO S GREAT CENTURY return to the early '50s to see what else Chicago did to "pull itself out of the swamp." That it needed this was freely blazoned in the newspapers : The Gem of the Prairie, The Journal, and others. In "populous local- ities," said one paper, "there are noisome quagmires ... at which the very swine turn up their noses in supreme disgust." (This editor may have forgotten that hogs were barred some years before from running in the streets ; or maybe the hogs broke the law.) In more outlying districts there were large tracts deemed worthless, beyond remedy. A commission worked at this problem, spent $100,000, and reclaimed a lot of land. But the city still needed real sewers, and to meet this mighty task there was a man of skill, E. S. Chesbrough. He visited Europe, and at length rec- ommended a system of intercepting sewers. By 1856 six miles were built. And then, the only trouble was that the river might become all the worse. Nearly half a century was to pass before this last menace was wholly removed. The effort to give the city decent drinking-water, beginning with the abortive Chicago Hydraulic company, was renewed more than once during the '40s and '50s. Engineering work at first hailed as excellent became antique with discouraging speed. The growing city outstripped whatever was done for it. Yet the crib system, so elaborately used today, was one of those early inventions, mainly due to Ira Miltimore. For a time enough fresh water was drawn from the lake, through piping between the cribs and reservoirs, but within five years the water had become alarmingly bad. "Little fishes were pumped into the reservoirs and thus distributed over the city," one reads. Soon the whole populace became aroused, and in 1851 a board of commissioners tackled the problem. It produced within a few weeks a new hydraulic company and a plan which was the ancestor of the Chicago Avenue waterworks. It provided for bigger and better pumping and for a "non-condensing engine of about 170 horse power," to elevate water into these reservoirs in different sections of the city. For this work an estimate of construction cost was made exceeding $335,000. The sum looked enough to "do" for all time. The work it did proved adequate just about fifteen years! 40 THE CITY RISES FROM THE MUD By 1854, crib, piping and engine-house were working, and the dignified engine-house — with a tower that unfortunately leaned from the perpendicular, like that of Pisa — stood on the lake front. The city which admired it was forced, however, for some months to do without water fifteen hours of the twenty- four and got none on Sundays except in case of fire. This was remedied, and barring accidents, one of which, oddly enough, was caused by swarms of insects clogging a strainer, the water supply was delivered — to 7,053 buildings by 1857 — more or less efficiently for a good while. What the city had come to be after a year of railroads, is shown not only by population figures, which in 1853 recorded a jump from 38,734 to 60,662, but also, and much better, by the testimony of photographs and drawings. These reveal streets no longer lined solely by two-story make-shifts of wood, but by brick structures looming even four stories high among the older buildings. They show church spires, numerous and varied. They show factories with belching smoke, grain elevators, train-sheds. They show a river and harbor closely packed with shipping, so that the masts and funnels rose as thick (according to the pictures) as in London River. It was a city overwhelmed, as it has been almost ever since, by incoming thousands who no longer had a common ancestry or tongue. Immigration into the United States as a whole, from 1841 to 1850, was more than three times that from 1831 to 1840; and there was no more alluring destination than Chicago for those alien travelers who disembarked, after exhausting voyages, at the Atlantic ports. They arrived, breathless, sometimes half-famished, often penniless, in the Lake Michigan city which now could be termed, even conservatively, the leading city of the Mississippi Valley. In the streets these nationals, ignorant perhaps, yet sturdier and saner than many who came in after years, made a scene constantly more picturesque. They were pitiful, too, seeking houses, crowding small hotels, driving busy railroad men frantic, later pushing out into new "settlements" where they perched, only to migrate again, back to city wards. Some aliens found pioneers of their kind ahead of them. Jews 41 CHICAGO S GREAT CENTURY who had left Germany in the '30s began to flock to Cook County as early as 1843, thanks to the efforts of a Jewish Colonization Society, whose adherents settled in the Shaumberg district. They attracted others of the race who found Chicago homes. Irish had come much earlier. They were strong in Chicago, and able to send up an appeal for the freedom of Erin in 1842 ; the next year St. Patrick's Day was celebrated with a glittering turnout of the Chicago Band and the Montgomery Guards. The Germans, in about the same period, became eloquent as a group, in a protest over refusal to appoint a German street com- missioner. That nationality also had the first foreign-language newspaper to be published in Chicago, the Volksfreund. As for Scandinavians, they were not lacking. The first Swede, Olaf S. Lange, had arrived in 1838, and colonies had come one by one. A "Swedish town" existed on the North Side before 1850. There were also growing groups of Norwegians and Danes. Bohemians settled early, over on the West Side. Before the middle '50s half, or more than half, of the population was foreign-born. It would be a good many years, however, before these people from the north of Europe would rub elbows with those from the Balkans or the Italian peninsula. 5 It is saying nothing against the influence of the alien to note that by the middle '50s Chicago had become extremely wicked. Its notoriety as a "center of crime" spread beyond the borders of the United States. We now see the peaceful picture of a village once under the sway of a "New England conscience" invaded by a more modern confusion, by battle, and by outbreaks of vice. As Lloyd Lewis wrote in "Chicago ; the History of Its Reputation" : "Idle men walked the streets, or came and went riding the rail- road bumpers. Wages for those lucky enough to find work were fifty cents a day . . . Burglaries, street holdups, safe-blowing, were almost a nightly matter . . . The police were denounced viciously : 'The city is at the mercy of the criminal classes,' shrieked The Tribune." Near the railroad stations and along parts of the river-bank "dens of iniquity" — and the term is none too strong — clustered more thickly and with more open parade of their lure. Young farm 42 THE CITY RISES FROM THE MUD hands, driving into town over the long highways, were robbed, and worse. Pickpockets seized the Saturday night "rolls" of Chicagoans and visitors alike. Some of those caught worked out sentences on the streets, dragging ball and chain. In the general turbulence religious prejudice played a part, beauti- fully entangled with such grave issues as "Know-nothing-ism," abolition of slavery, and temperance. The first of these smote Chicago, already a "melting-pot," with a violence that made the cauldron spill over. Fully as explosive was the question of slave states, which led to the famous mobbing of Stephen A. Douglas when, in the face of letters threatening him with death, he faced a stormy crowd in front of North Market Hall in 1854 to explain his Kansas- Nebraska bill. The fiery little senator, whom Lincoln once termed, referring to his stature, "the least man I ever saw," con- fronted the shouting and snarling mob defiantly, and finally — as the result of a speech by William Bross, it is said — met with showers of missiles. One historian is careful to point out that there were no rotten eggs ; "rotten apples were the worst things used." Then, in the spring of 1855, Dr. L. D. Boone, pioneer physician, took office as mayor. He was rated a Know-nothing of the most complete type. Scarcely had he been in office when he sought to curb the saloon by increasing the license fees. Then he invoked the dead-letter Sunday closing law, and precipitated Chicago's first fatal street riot. Preceded by numerous arrests and demonstrations before the justice courts, this disturbance came to a head on the North Side. A mob was formed, bristling with arms. The mayor ordered it dispersed. But the angry citizens marched down Clark Street to the bridge, which stood open, and demanded that the bridge-tender close the draw, permitting them to cross. He refused. Later, after police had been massed on the south bank, the bridge span was closed, and the crowd rushed across, only to meet a fusillade from the police. The entire city force now numbered nearly 100, and was commanded by Chief Cyrus Bradley. There was general shooting. A German citizen fell dead. Several on both sides were wounded. And shortly the riot died out, leaving, however, increased bitterness behind. Nothing was settled. Chicago continued to drink on Sundays as well as other days. 43 CHICAGO S GREAT CENTURY This was not surprising, since two years before a city-wide vote on local prohibition had resulted in its defeat, two to one. As for slavery, the temper of Chicago had been shown as early as 1850, when the city council voted overwhelmingly in denunciation of the fugitive slave law. The spectacle of open gambling and flaunted prostitution in the '50s, abetted, as some thought, by the "depravity" of stage plays, spurred on the church groups and "reformers" to mightier efforts. Now, twenty years after the chartering of the city, there were nearly fifty churches. To the early organizations of the Catholics, Baptists, Presbyterians, Swedenborgians (encouraged as early as the '30s by J. Y. Scammon) had been added pioneer groups of nearly every denomination, major or minor. The growth of the German and Scandinavian elements was demonstrated by Lutheran churches in many parts of the city. St. Paul's German Evangelical church, which quickly became important and always has been, sprang up in 1846. Its little frame meeting- house on Indiana Street was soon outgrown. The First Norwegian Evangelical Lutheran, organized in 1848, had the good fortune to buy for $800 a building whose timbers had been scattered by a storm; to rebuild cost $1,000 of money collected from many hard- working people. A Christian church, organized in 1850, had as pastor Charles B. Egan, brother of the popular orator, Dr. W. B. Egan. There was a quarrel in the church, and secessions ; but it is worth noting that H. H. Honore, father of Mrs. Potter Palmer and leading Chi- cagoan for many years, refused to secede. Even more illustrative of the variety of faith in Chicago of the '50s is the fact that there was a Society of Spiritualists listening to lectures on the third floor of a Clark Street building. In 1849 had arrived a "rapping medium," Mrs. Julia Lusk, of Milwaukee. The raps, Andreas records, "were very loud and distinct, resembling the fall to and roll across the floor of a heavy croquet ball." Ira B. Eddy is said to have been Mrs. Lusk's first convert. He rejoiced to hear, remarks the historian, decided negative raps when he asked the question, "Is there a personal devil ?" 44 THE CITY RISES FROM THE MUD The Universalist church was strong enough by 1853 to put up a really impressive building at Wabash Avenue and Van Buren Street. The Unitarians had flourished, having as early as 1844 a steeple bell loud enough to be heard far and wide, and to be used even as a fire alarm. The Congregationalists organized in 1852 and 1853 respectively two churches destined to be famous and long- lived: Plymouth and New England. The "old First" had been running since 1851, when Philo Carpenter (organizer of the city's first Sunday-school) led a revolt from the Third Presbyterian church. As for the Episcopalians, the pioneers, St. James and Trinity, had as colleagues Grace Church — later noted for the pastorate of Rev. Clinton Locke — the Church of the Atonement, and others. Of course, in the same period, Methodists, Baptists, Presby- terians and Catholics had added greatly to membership rolls and buildings. The First Methodist, born in 1831, occupied in the '50s a $12,000 structure at Clark and Washington Streets, where the society has been ever since through many phases of architectural change; and the First Presbyterian was putting up a building of Athens marble in Wabash Avenue near Congress Street. But the most eye-compelling meeting-house of all was the Second Presbyterian, at Michigan Avenue and Washington Street. The pastor was that vigorous being, Rev. Robert W. Patterson. This church was built of a porous limestone from some of whose pores a tar-like constituent oozed in hot weather. The building came to be known as "the spotted church."* William Bross, himself a devout deacon, humorously quoted a friend as saying the name was really derived from "speckled morality." The spires of these and many other houses of religion rose in the heart of the city, or near by. They looked down gravely upon a thronged and bustling assemblage of life ; and their earnest members viewed with dismay the size of that human swarm. "Revivals" were frequent. They were, usually, deeply fervent revivals, in which young boys "wrestled all night with the devil," and girls, "cleansed of wickedness," marched in white frocks to the altars. *Some of the stone was used in the building of the present Presby- terian church of Lake Forest. 45 CHICAGO S GREAT CENTURY 7 Meantime the frowns which church folk bent upon the drama had failed to discourage it. Isherwood and Mackenzie's venture had expired, but by 1847 John B. Rice had come to establish the first Chicago stock company and to build a theater that taxed newspaper adjectives. The boxes especially were praised as "resembling a boudoir." Here the comedian Dan Marble performed, and Mrs. Hunt accomplished the feat of impersonating four sisters in a single drama. In Rice's theater, too, appeared James E. Murdock as Hamlet, Edwin Forrest as Othello, and James H. McVicker, who was soon to build a theater of his own and live long in Chicago theatrical history. Junius Brutus Booth played "Richard III" and Shylock in 1848, when his son, the assassin of Lincoln, was still a boy. Competing, in a way, with this theater were various circuses, minstrels, and Mooney's museum. The latter was noteworthy because its manager was none other than David Kenniston, sur- vivor both of the Boston tea party and the Fort Dearborn massacre. He was himself the best exhibit, since he could proudly advertise, in 1848, that he was 112 years old ! Kenniston's grave still remains in Lincoln Park. But none of these attractions attained the spectacular publicity that fate gave to Rice's on a July night in 1850. The opera "La Sonnambula" was being performed. A cry of "Fire !" arose. Mr. Rice shouted to the audience, "Do you think I would permit a fire in my theater ?" Yet within a few minutes the flames, which started in a nearby stable, spread to the theater, which was destroyed. The humor of the occasion was furnished by a man "who had been dining out," and who sat applauding during the alarm of fire, even amid smoke, shouting "Bravo ! Best imitation of fire I ever saw !" Mr. Rice rebuilt his theater, and it flourished for many years, justifying the lines of a "poet" whose effusion was delivered that opening night of 1847 : "Where the domed city rises o'er the plain There holds the drama a distinguished reign, Where waved the prairie, now behold the town, See Art and Industry adventure crown." 46 CHAPTER VII "Long John" and His Domain 1 THAT high-flown phrase, "the domed city," was prophetic rather than descriptive. No dome rose over Chicago's roofs until 1853, when the new Cook County courthouse, whose "splendor" dazzled many a visitor, supplanted the story-and-a-half structure that had served since 1835. The new courthouse, jail and municipal building signalized an era which led with unchecked growth and prosperity to 1857. Then Chicago fell again into a depression. But by that time Art and Industry had, in fact, "crowned adventure," and at last, for its time and background, Chicago was a metropolis. It had nearly all things to make life rich and pleasant, so far as westerners knew those things. It was served also by contributions from Europe due not only to the arrival of fine people born over the sea, but to the travels of some Chicagoans who could now enjoy leisure. Trips abroad were easier now, and a good many people were rich. In the homes of men like Ogden, Newberry and Arnold were paintings, gorgeous mirrors, damasks and other treasures from Europe that even a collector of today would prize. The painter G. P. A. Healy found it worth his while to accept Mr. Ogden's invitation to come to this once "raw" town and paint the great men. He painted also the daughters of W. L. Newberry, and many others. One of the business leaders sneered at Healy as "Frenchified" ; but this critic was in a minority. Most well-to-do Chicagoans were reaching out for art, many for literature. There was a poet near, if not in, Chicago — William Asbury Kenyon ; also at least one novelist, Mrs. Juliette Kinzie, author of "Waubun." But European literature was more widely read, and when it came to travels abroad, it is told that a humorous game, in those days of simple games, was to entertain in "the parlor" people who had known two Atlantic voyages, in the dining-room those who had taken but one — and to "freeze out" on the porch people who had no hope of ever going abroad. 47 CHICAGO S GREAT CENTURY Life in some of those "mansions" was cheerful, lavish, and taste- ful. The great houses, broad-sided and roomy, stood, like their counterparts in the South, amid extensive "grounds," not a few of them covering an entire square. Their style was apt to be of man- sard pattern, with a corridor running between two large sets of rooms, and pillared verandahs in front. The "grounds" contained beautiful shade trees and rich adornments of flowering shrubs, blooming gardens, and, usually, vegetable plantations equally beau- tiful. Such were the properties of men like Ogden, Newberry, Arnold, Ezra B. McCagg, J. Y. Scammon, Lambert Tree, and many others. Nor did the north side alone present pictures of that sort. Mich- igan Avenue had its "mansions" and gardens ; so did Wabash ; and the West Side, as far west as Reuben Street (later Ashland Avenue) boasted many an imposing estate. Besides, it had the only high school (1856). On Michigan, between Jackson and 12th Streets, stood Terrace Row, that haughty line of tall "palaces" built of limestone, though reported to be of marble. The Row over- looked a lake front darkened by locomotive smoke, but adorned by a thin strip of park, and saved to beauty anyway by the iridescent sweep of lake waters. The city, even "downtown," had an abundance of trees. To look down upon it from the courthouse dome was to see bursts of green among the roofs. A farther view would show those areas of shade- tree and flower where the North Side wealthy lived, and also fine natural groves toward the south. Chicago now enjoyed unques- tioned the sobriquet embodied in its motto : "The Garden City."* Its favored streets were showy with the equipages and costumes of the day. The contrasts and varieties of life were startling. Carl Sandburg, wielding powerful brush in "Abraham Lincoln; the Prairie Years," writes that Chicago in this period was "the depot, *The city seal that includes this motto was first designed by Col. T. J. V. Owen in 1837. Several times revised, it was finally established for all time in 1907 as a seal with a shield, symbolizing the national spirit of the city ; an Indian, meaning the discoverer ; a ship, emblematic of the approach of the civilization of the white race; a sheaf of wheat, "activity and plenty"; and a nude child in a shell, symbolic of the pearl. The motto "Urbs in Horto" is freely translated "Garden City." 48 LONG JOHN AND HIS DOMAIN crossroads, and point of exchange, of buying and selling, for thousand-mile prairies. Pianos and parlor organs, carpets and rugs, brooches and wigs, diamonds and jewelry were on sale . . . Coronets of pearl arched in the hair of girls whose fathers twenty years before had gone out with the whole town to kill a prowling black bear . . . Women in balloonish hoop skirts walked the streets lightly and gracefully with the wind . . . Along the plank pavements drove teams and wagons, horses and buggies, glossy steeds hitched to phaetons and barouches." But also : "Hackmen at the railroad depots and at street corners barked at strangers 'Hack, sir, hack, sir.' They knew the town and would drive farmers to respectable quarters or to saloons, gambling- rooms, haunts of folly and sin." For even as it was prosperous, Chicago was increasingly vile. It was the great midwestern rendezvous of stockmen, sailormen, young fellows in town for a spree. Along its docks or near its terminals new dens had grown up, to be daintily ignored by those "cultured" and churchly people in the great houses. There were more than fifty churches, but nearly twice as many ballrooms and who knows how many brothels? Saloons and gambling-houses multiplied. Hence a police force with a really great detective on its roster — Allan Pinkerton. (He established his secret service bureau in 1851.) Hence an army of lawyers. And men swinging from the gallows, out on the southwestern prairie, visible to quiet people pruning their lilac-bushes. To rule this many-sided, swarming, rebellious city of 90,000 came in 1857 that stalwart, vehement and experienced pioneer, now forty-two years old, "Long John" Wentworth. He was topping a career as editor and congressman by being mayor. What a man! His height, six feet six; his weight, about 300 pounds. The feet that carried him were fourteen inches long by six wide ; for such are the measurements of a Wentworth slipper exhibited by the Chicago Historical Society. But the mayor was not "all hands and feet," as the saying is ; he had a mind running under full steam. Not a thing escaped his attention, whether it was recasting the board of education, adding to the city's 280 street 49 CHICAGO S GREAT CENTURY lights, or pursuing evil-doers. But it was the last named who gave him the most to do. During the previous administration, that of Mayor Thomas Dyer, unemployment and other things had made crime increase. The election won by "Long John" brought out violence never seen before at Chicago polls. One man was killed in the 7th ward, and there were heads broken elsewhere. It was clear that the city needed something resembling a dictatorship, and Wentworth was the very man for it. Ripping off his coat, figuratively and perhaps liter- ally, he made himself chief of police ex-officio, giving out all appointments and putting on the men leather badges which he designed. In the month following his accession, he ordered the spectacular raid upon "The Sands" concerning which many a legend is still told. "The Sands," a district of immoral hovels on the near North Side bordering the lake, not far from the McCormick factory and what had been the city's finest hotel, the Lake House, had flaunted its vice long enough. According to one story — never proved, though not denied by His Honor — Wentworth caused a dog fight to be advertised on that day of retribution, and the able-bodied dwellers in "The Sands" rushed to the sport. Immediately the police, led by Wentworth in person, selected a number of the noisome shanties, applied hooks and chains to them, and tore them down. A frantic crowd hooted inmates and police impartially. Later in the day six brothels that had escaped the raid were burned down, possibly by inmates seeking to discredit the mayor. He cared little for counter- plots, and rejoiced in enemies. As his years of office advanced, The Tribune, at first a friend, turned on him. Joseph Medill, who had come to Chicago in 1853, was co-editor with Dr. Charles H. Ray, and a battler then, as ever. The Tribune was filled with accounts of burglaries and holdups, of prowlers in the dark, of people afraid to walk abroad lest they be shot either by criminals or panicky police. Wentworth produced statistics showing robberies not as bad as painted; The Tribune shouted "False!" The mayor, through the columns of his own Democrat, answered his rival with stinging epithet. "Long John" was undismayed, and more vigorous day by day. He worked off some of his physical energy by putting his own big hands on 50 LONG JOHN AND HIS DOMAIN offenders. Once, it is related, he pulled a cheating saloonkeeper clear across the frothy bar and put irons on him. So it went, with raids on gambling houses, Haroun al Raschid exploits by the mayor, vandalism at fires, and charges of police cor- ruption, while the city strove against the financial woes of 1857, and in fine homes on the then "Gold Coast" people danced and per- formed charades. They were dancing in the face of a threatened tempest much worse than that of local crime. The Civil War was coming on. Incidents foreshadowing it, or at least illustrating the tension about slavery, were frequent. One such, producing a riot which it took Wentworth and Allan Pinkerton together to quell, occurred when a Kentuckian named Thompson appeared at a hotel with a negro boy. A rumor that the Kentuckian was taking a slave back to his master produced an angry mob, and threats to burn the hotel. But it was not a kidnaping after all, and this chance for a Chicago tragedy passed. More excitement came when Douglas spoke from the Tremont House balcony amid pre-Civil-war frenzy. He had been received with a salute of 150 guns and a fluttering of handkerchiefs, from women on porches. While he spoke, attacking Lincoln for "advo- cating a war of sections" and criticizing the latter's "House Divided" speech, the crowd of Chicagoans seethed below the bal- cony, fist fights took place, hack drivers were pulled from their seats. The "underground railroad" was running as smoothly as the Illinois Central, sending slaves to safety. Allan Pinkerton was one of its managers. His craftiness saved many a slave under the very eyes of officials watching for a chance to seize the escaping man. "It was not an uncommon thing," says one narrator, "to see Mr. Pinkerton's house, which was on Adams Street, besieged by prayer- ful negroes, seeking his aid on behalf of some trembling and hunted fugitive." 4 But despite the various struggles and quarrels, the whole country boiling with the preludes of the Civil War, even with "crime rampant and mad dogs as well," Chicago progress did not stop. In 1859 the first wood-block pavement was laid on Clark Street. In the same year came the welcome spectacle of horse-cars — Chicago's 51 CHICAGO S GREAT CENTURY first — running on West Madison Street and on State Street as far south as 12th Street, then to the city limits. William Bross drove the first spike for this car track. Between the crude stores that then faced the street the little ''bob-tailed" cars crept along, each hauled by a single horse. They were viewed with glee by many people, but evoked protests from others, owners of houses who hated to see State become a business street ! But fate would have its way. This was the beginning of an immense network of traction ; a new chap- ter as well for State Street, which within ten years was to despoil Lake Street as a "retail center." In 1859 Potter Palmer had his establishment on Lake Street. So did Cooley, Farwell & Co., in which firm the Farwell was John V., powerful and philanthropic citizen. In this establishment, in 1856, there was a 22-year-old clerk who was paid a salary of $400, and slept in the store. Sometimes he worked eighteen hours a day. But by 1861 he was a partner ; inevit- ably, it might be said, for his name was Marshall Field. As for John Wentworth, he was not able to bestow a mayoral blessing on State Street's first horse-car, for he was not mayor. He gave way to John C. Haines in 1858; but in the spring of 1860 he returned to office. His police had been re-organized, and because Haines was a speculator in copper stock, these police became known as "coppers" — origin of a long-lived bit of slang. Moreover, they had acquired natty blue uniforms and brass stars. "Long John" stripped these off and restored the leather badges. Next, taking offense because the legislature had appointed a board of police, he summoned the whole force to his office in the middle of the night, and, with the announcement that he would rather "fire" them him- self than let the board do it, he discharged them all. For some hours Chicago was without police protection. A little later, he seized an opportunity to participate in the new era of State Street. At the north end, just south of the river, there was a market-place, where merchants had erected awnings and swinging signs, and where they piled bargain displays on the side- walks. One night Wentworth's sturdy "coppers" seized upon every sign, awning and display-box and piled them in front of South 52 LONG JOHN AND HIS DOMAIN Market Hall. The merchants were furious. Some of the news- papers denounced the mayor. But the mayor only grinned. This was one of his last conspicuous acts as chief executive, but it was not his most famous one. That, after all, was, in 1860, his success in persuading Albert Edward, the Prince of Wales, to visit Chicago. The mayor quieted fears of the Canadian authorities, then entertaining the prince, that "foreigners" might insult His Highness. Edward came, saw everything, and was astonished; astonished most of all, perhaps, by the stature of his host, "Long John," and by the introduction he received to a crowd that col- lected under the balcony of the Richmond House to see him. According to an old-timer named Charles Harpel, as quoted by Miss Mabel Mcllvaine, Wentworth presented His Highness with a wave of the hand, and the remark : "Boys, this is the Prince of Wales. He has come here to see the city and I'm going to show him around. . . . Prince, these are the boys !" Endless stories were told of "Long John," of his wit, his exploits, his 5,000-acre farm at Summit; little about his policies. On his behalf it was claimed that in each of his terms he wiped out the city's floating debt. It was his pride that he brought to Chicago the first steam fire-engine, appropriately dubbed "Long John." Two other fire-engines, added to the equipment during his term, were christened "Liberty" and "Economy"; these two principles he had loudly preached, in and out of season. And on the verge of the Civil War tempest, he relinquished not only the mayor's chair, but also his successful Democrat, whose subscription lists, job work and good will he sold to The Tribune. Before then, the title Democrat had become a misnomer. Amid the shattering of party unities, and determined to support Lincoln in opposition to the extension of slavery, Wentworth was bound, no matter what it cost, to turn Republican. And so he did. The rising Lincoln met Wentworth one day, and the latter said : "You need somebody to run you." Lincoln, laughing, replied : "Only events can make a president." 53 CHAPTER VIII The "Boys of '61" 1 EVENTS were soon to come; days of parades, huzzas, flag- waving, emotional heights and depths. On the riverside space at Lake and Market Streets, from which the ruins of Mark Beaubien's Sauganash Hotel had been carted away, there went up a low board structure, hideous but roomy, with silly towers. On it were painted the words "Republican Wigwam." During May, 1860, girls scissored bunting and muslin ; young men climbed ladders and festooned the hall. The Republican legions came trooping to the chief city of Illinois, in delegations many of which favored the New Yorker, William H. Seward, but which in the end would vote for a citizen of Illinois, "Abe" Lincoln. Followers of the Springfield man stormed the city and the convention. Norman B. Judd had obtained from the railroads low rates for Lincoln shouters. Amid the frenzy of the convention, Judd nominated his friend in a single sentence. Medill and Ray, the Tribune editors, Lincoln boosters for years back, sat watching the roll-calls go his way. One, two, three, then four roll-calls, and Lincoln was the winner, while in New York a dazed Seward saw the crash of his life ambition. In the convention hall, men danced, hugged each other, wept, smashed each other's tall hats, or their own. The hotels and theaters were places of turmoil. Cannon boomed in court- house square. To the Chicagoans of that tempestuous 1860 it must have seemed like days, rather than months, before Lincoln had defeated Douglas for the presidency by a half million popular votes, and before the war became a certainty. The month following seizure of the Charleston arsenal by the Confederates, Chicagoans trooped to Bryan Hall for a "loyalty meeting." While people in the streets shouted for the army and navy, the assemblage adopted a resolution for compromise and against dissolution of the Union, 54 Nomination of Abraham Lincoln in Wigwam, 1860 By Artist of the Period THE "BOYS OF '61" saying: "There should be an exhaustion of peaceful measures before the sword shall be drawn." Furious over this turn of affairs, radical unionists called an- other meeting within the week. George Manierre presided. John Wentworth and Grant Goodrich were among the speakers. Roars greeted the passage of a resolution demanding stern action. Through a winter and early spring Chicago boiled with verbal conflict, as well as action. Scattered regiments were being reor- ganized, including bodies of Germans, Hungarians and Bohemians, though no war existed. But on April 12 came the bombard- ment of Fort Sumter. In the sunlight of an unusually mild spring day, with flags floating from steeples and masts in a balmy breeze, the citizens rushed to the Tremont House to offer to Gov. Richard Yates their militia companies. This was followed by a "grand rally" at Metropolitan Hall, with an overflow meeting in Randolph Street. Judd presided; Owen Lovejoy made the chief address. Well-known citizens like Isaac Arnold and Julian S. Rumsey — ex-president of the board of trade and mayor-elect — followed. Jules and Frank Lumbard, beginning their career as Civil War vocalists, sang a new song, dashed off by George F. Root : "The first gun is fired; May God protect the right." The next day came the governor's call for troops. And a week after the firing on Sumter, a few hundred Chicago soldiers, under Brig.-Gen. Swift, and including members of the Chicago Zouaves, the Chicago light infantry, and light artillery, the Lincoln Rifles and the Turner Union Cadets left Chicago for Cairo. They were poorly armed; the battery had only slugs for ammunition; but they departed, it is told, "in good spirits." The riflemen were Slavs and the cadets Germans. Even while they were facing their first duties, Swedes back in Chicago were organizing companies. The Irish, too, with customary ardor, were forming the nucleus of Mulligan's brigade in response to the call : "For the honor of the old land, rally! Rally, for the defense of the new." 55 CHICAGO S GREAT CENTURY Thus the "disloyalty of the foreigner" was disproved. "Know- nothingism" drew its last breath. And within two months a great opponent of that doctrine, a battler for religious freedom, Stephen A. Douglas, would be brought home to Chicago to die. His body would lie permanently in the South Side Douglas Park, honored by the first monument the city erected. The war was in the South, and Chicago, far remote from it, went its way as a city. It enlarged its boundaries and improved its streets, laying macadam or gravel on many. It built a new iron bridge at Rush Street. The river mouth was dredged to a channel fourteen feet deep, and there was no longer a troublesome sandbar. B. P. Hutchinson ("Old Hutch") was making a fortune as a packer; P. D. Armour was busy between Milwaukee and Chicago in the operations which he crowned with his great coup in pork at the close of the war. Potter Palmer, on Lake Street, was invent- ing new merchandising schemes. Paul Cornell was developing his acres on the far south side into the town of Hyde Park (incor- porated in 1861). R. R. Donnelley was becoming a Chicago publisher. A. N. Kel- logg was making "patent insides" for newspapers. John R. Walsh was running his Western News Company. Dwight L. Moody was carrying on his school in North Market Hall. The University of Chicago was teaching students in its yellow- stone building on the property given it by Senator Douglas, and in 1863 it bought a telescope and put up an observatory. A free evening school was opened by the city. The medical faculty of "Lind University" became the Chicago Medical College. The city's first woman physician, Dr. Mary Harris Thompson, arrived in 1863. Hans Balatka's Philharmonic Society gave concerts steadily, presenting Beethoven, Mozart and Schumann. Crosby's Opera House, the $600,000 venture of Uranus H. Crosby, was being built, to the astonishment of those who saw its glories, and to the financial embarrassment of its promoter. 56 THE "BOYS OF '61" In a curious circular "Wigwam" on the lake front Gen. McClel- lan was nominated the democratic candidate for president in 1864, while flags fluttered and marching clubs filled the avenue. A convention in 1863, also on the lake front, demanded enlarge- ment of canals. It spoke up for the old "I. and M.," which had been damaged by railroad prosperity, and in the same breath it urged a railroad to the Pacific coast. John Wilkes Booth played Richard III at McVickers in 1862, and, in response to the appeals of a "fair petitioner," permitted her to sell hundreds of his autographs at 25 cents each. Woods' Museum, with its curiosities and its ample stage, was opened in 1863. New amusements, new hotels, new foundries, new car lines, new suburbs — Chicago marched on, more slowly than before the war, yet persistently and with its normal rainbow hopes ever in the sky. However, during the four years 1861-65 the great conflict furnished most of the really spectacular events, the terrors, and the tears. During the first weeks of the war Chicago had enlisted thirty-eight companies; by the end of it the city of 170,000 had furnished 20,000 men, more than ten per cent, to the armies that gained the victory. And to the volunteers who went whooping away in the rude railroad trains of the time, were added some who were drafted. The possible fate of all these men, the rumors and announce- ments of battles, the lists of dead and wounded streaming in, all kept the war like a thundercloud over Chicago. The city, in no danger of hearing cannon, could only pay, in men and dollars. And it could set up strong sympathy and support "behind the lines." The need of bringing order out of chaos led to the forming, early in the war, of the Union Defense Committee, the central body for all effort — such as raising funds, equipping troops and aiding soldiers' families. The names of the members of this committee make up a list interesting as a partial roster of Chicago leaders of the period. They were: 57 CHICAGO'S GREAT CENTURY John M. Wilson J. C. Dore Grant Goodrich H. D. Colvin Van H. Higgins John Van Arnam Thomas Drummond George Schneider George Manierre Eliphalet Wood Thomas B. Bryan Russell M. Hough Augustus H. Burley P. S. Yoe E. C. Larned C. G. Wicker J. H. Bowen Col. Joseph H. Tucker Among these are found five judges, several merchants, a banker, and a number of attorneys. They were men of will and courage. Several had seen Chicago in its earliest days, and now, middle-aged, were experienced in problems. The women, meantime, entered at the outset into a passion for making cotton bandages and scraping lint from cotton. Social leaders and obscure housewives toiled alike in sewing-circles, in groups making underclothes and socks for the troops. Others were signing up as nurses or as hospital matrons. Soon the county organized its Sanitary Commission and the Chicago branch was formed under the spur of a terrible report brought from the front by Dr. Robert Collyer. Energetic women were brought into service jointly with the men to ensure a steady flow of sanitary supplies, of medicines and of helpers, toward the depots near the battle lines. One effort in particular, seemingly incited by Attorney Mark Skinner, had its dramatic value. To offset the scourge of scurvy, corps of solicitors went among the farms of the Northwest, splash- ing through the spring mud and collecting, from "door to door/' supplies of green vegetables to be sent to Grant's army. Quan- tities of horseradish were dug; "pickling bees," to make sauer- kraut, became the business of aid societies. Finally the salutary stuff rolled down the Illinois Central and went floating along the Mississippi in lots of a hundred barrels a day. The two sanitary fairs, held in 1863 and 1865, were still talked of, years after the war. They included bazaars for sale of "fancy and useful articles," and received lavish contributions from the country of vegetables, fruit, cider. The first fair was opened by 58 THE "BOYS OF '61" a pageant to which drum beats summoned the crowds. Lake County sent in a hundred wagons crammed with good things. Relics were exhibited, including the original draft of the Emanci- pation Proclamation. It was given by the President himself with a friendly letter. But no message from him could be read at the second fair, for before it opened, in May, 1865, Lincoln lay dead at the hands of the actor who had been applauded in Chicago three years before. This fair, however, lasted three weeks and brought in $240,000, no small part of it from the sale of photographs of "Old Abe," the renowned eagle mascot of the 8th Wisconsin Regiment. 4 One spectacle that kept the war ever before the eyes of the engrossed city was Camp Douglas, originally a Federal military camp, then a prison for Confederate soldiers. It occupied about sixty acres of the "Douglas property," and was bounded, roughly, by 31st and 33rd Streets, Forest and Cottage Grove Avenues. Behind its tall stockade, five city blocks from east to west and two from north to south, were jammed wretched prisoners in numbers varying from 8,000 after the Battle of Fort Donelson to 13,000 late in 1863. Disease and death entered early in the career of the swarming camp; pneumonia and camp fever killed six a day in one winter, and they were buried in the north side cemetery which later became part of Lincoln Park. During 1864 more than 1,000 died of various ills, smallpox included. As the "Yankees" did at Andersonville, many of the Camp Douglas unfortunates tried to dig their way out, and a number succeeded in crawling through the tunnels made under the stockades. Chicago lived in fear of these escaped "rebels"; but Chicago pitied Camp Douglas too. Collections for the prisoners were taken up in the churches, and medicines were furnished by the wagonload, through a relief committee. But the rumors of wholesale mutiny and the stories of plots kept the city nervous. One bona fide conspiracy, engineered in Canada, called for an uprising and a liberation of the imprisoned men. It was dis- covered and a number of citizens were arrested; among them Judge Buckner H. Morris, who had been the second mayor of the city. He proved his innocence and was acquitted. 59 CHICAGO S GREAT CENTURY Of other war excitements, one concerned the "fire-eating" editor, Wilbur F. Storey, and his Chicago Times. The paper was at war with The Tribune and with other established things. Whether it was Copperhead or not, Gen. Ambrose E. Burnside — he of the epoch-making whiskers — thought it was, and on June 2, 1863, he issued an edict suspending The Times. Storey, who loved a fuss, got wind of the order, posted spies at Camp Douglas, where the garrison was, and knew almost to a moment when the soldiers would arrive to stop his presses. By the time the squad walked into the office, nearly the whole edition had been printed. Storey met them with a smile. He knew his circulation would gain. Next day Chicago seethed again. A mass meeting was called for court-house square, and thousands appeared. Several speakers strove to calm the crowd, especially Attorney Wirt Dexter, who prevented serious trouble by a promise that the Burnside order would be rescinded. Meantime there was fear that The Tribune office would be attacked. An armed force under Colonel Jennison, of "Bloody Kansas" fame, was said to be mustered ready to protect MedilFs paper. The stage was set for serious trouble, but the crisis passed. And on June 4 Lincoln revoked the order. At length Richmond fell. The boys came home ; to some homes none ever came back. The Lincoln funeral cortege passed between crepe-hung buildings, and his body was viewed in the court- house rotunda by slow-moving, weeping, multitudes. The Copper- head excitement, the suspicions voiced, even of some popular clergymen, faded out. Chicago as a city went on to another new era—with "The Battle Cry of Freedom" and Lumbard's "Old Shady" echoing in its memory. 60 CHAPTER IX From a War to a Calamity 1 FOR four and a half years, from the spring of 1865 to the autumn of 1869, Chicago had a mayor with a history most unusual as a preparation for "ruling" a large city. He was that old-time actor and theatrical producer, John B. Rice. The popu- larity which he won with his playhouse in 1847 had not merely endured, but had grown; and Mr. Rice, undaunted by the set- backs of varying fortune, had gained wealth in real estate. As he neared sixty, after having rebuilt his theater as a business block, the "barnstormer" of the '40s had become a political leader. Running rapidly over the years of Rice's long tenure of office, one sees him endlessly heading parades, speaking at celebrations of new public works, toasting his city in warm adjectives. It was a period of great, though not unbroken, progress. While southern cities lay in ruins, Chicago was swollen with ambition and was well off in money. War contractors were now millionaires, or nearly so. The combination of agricultural wealth, McCormick harvesters, and branching railroads, could not be beaten. Exports of wheat and corn were increasing by nearly a million bushels a year. Moreover, the population, which went up 58,000 during the war, gained more than 100,000 between 1865 and 1869. It required a burst of new enterprise to make the city habitable for such a host of newcomers. What about water, sewers, streets, sidewalks, transportation? The river was foul. The death rate was increasing. Crowds milled about in the centers of industry; bridges deemed adequate a few years before groaned with traffic, and it was a question, often settled by fights, whether ships or teams had the right of way. To meet these various emergencies engineers, builders and city officials racked their brains and sat in committees, seeking new plans or reviving old ones, to make the midland capital safe. One of the schemes originating during the Civil War, and afterwards attacked with fresh energy, was that of river tunnels. 61 CHICAGO S GREAT CENTURY People must somehow get to the north and west sides from "down- town," and the bridges were overcrowded. So, "let us burrow under the river," said Chicago. In 1864 the council was asked for $100,000 to make a tunnel at Washington Street. "Very well, raise $100,000 to match it, by subscription," replied the aldermen. The fund fell flat. However, in 1866 a new and more feasible tunnel plan was launched, went forward for a while, stranded on the reef of poverty, but was resumed in 1867. Two years later, after an expenditure of more than half a million, the big bore had been cut through the clay under the river, and Mayor Rice had another speech to make. He was also on hand to officiate when ground was broken for the LaSalle Street tunnel, although that subterranean avenue to the north side was not finished until the summer of 1871. But the water problem was even more grave than that of "get- ting about." Dr. N. S. Davis, pioneer physician and founder of the American Medical Association, had studied Chicago's health and its perils from bad water, years earlier. And now, with sani- tation breaking down before an enlarged and very careless popula- tion, something epoch-making had to be tackled. Ellis Chesbrough came to the front again, as city engineer. He made tests which proved that at a certain distance from the shore the water of Lake Michigan was as pure as "any in the world." But how get it? Why, through a tunnel, piercing the blue clay which underlay the city, and connecting with a crib two miles out. New pumping works, too ; all to cost a fat sum. But the Chicago that had worried about $200,000 in the '50s now looked cheerfully upon the expen- diture of two or three million. Skipping details, which may be read elsewhere, of the engineer- ing technique, we arrive at a day in December, 1866. The crib launched a year and a half before floats on the lake off Chicago Avenue. The tunnel, with its iron "inlet cylinder" nine feet in diameter, has advanced from the two ends until there is only one more stone to be set in place; in the meantime the walls of the waterworks building at Pine Street (now Michigan Avenue) are rising, and the water tower, of "castellated gothic with battle- mented corners," is sketched on paper. Here come Mayor Rice and a body of bearded officials with 62 FROM A WAR TO A CALAMITY top hats. They climb into little cars, sitting gingerly in the corners, while mules hitched to the cars are spurred into a canter. The weird journey underground continues to a distance of a mile and a half from the beach. Under the lake waves, at the tunnel junction, the official party stiffly disembarks. Mayor Rice, accustomed to staging drama, sets the last stone with a flourish. And while cannon are fired from the crib and from the shore, the mayor launches verbal fireworks, such as: "Hail Chicago, metropolis of the great West; vast in its re- sources, fortunate in her citizens." As those years went by, Chicago was frenzied with building and with physical improvements. A lot more of the wooden block pavement, either the Nicholson kind or of other make, was laid. Sidewalks, four hundred miles more. New bridges across the river; "splendid" ones at Lake and Madison Streets, to help the growing west side. New docks, to accommodate greater fleets of ships — for there had been 10,000 vessel arrivals in 1865, and now there were 13,000 a year. Marine life was in its heyday. Schoon- ers and steamers, laden down to the water-line, crowded the harbor, and there was a great bustling and singing of sailor chanteys ; while also, at least once a year, there was a wreck accom- panied by all the horror and heroism attending epic disasters on larger seas. On land, people scrambled about, mad to be rich, invading new localities, tearing down old buildings or moving them from site to site. As in earlier times, it was common to see a landmark, or a dwelling, creeping on rollers to a new location. The grading was still going on. People hopped up and down from low side- walks to high, and back. More railroads had arrived : The Chicago and Alton, the Burlington and Quincy, the Pittsburgh, Cincinnati and St. Louis, the Pittsburgh and Fort Wayne, the Chicago, Mil- waukee and St. Paul, the Chicago & North Western — heir to the Galena and other lines — all helping to make the "great" canal more obsolete. State Street was in the midst of its revolution. Field, Leiter & Co. — Marshall Field having acquired a partner somewhat less 63 CHICAGO S GREAT CENTURY dynamic than himself, Levi Z. Leiter — moved in 1868 to a "hand- some stone block" at State and Washington Streets. Potter Palmer had acquired a lot of State Street property, one piece in particular, from the mayor, Levi Boone. Palmer was now out of merchan- dizing, and was thinking of real estate, also of putting up a hotel at State and Quincy. Sam Carson and John T. Pirie had adopted State Street. So had the Mandel brothers. The Fair was soon to arrive. The avenue had now taken on definitely its character of shopping and business street, what with long rows of stone- front buildings, some as high as six stories ; and a lot at Monroe Street sold for as much as $2,000 a front foot. Chicago's "big stores" were famous, the world over. But others besides business men were ambitious. The Historical Society, in 1868, was proud of its one-story brick home, con- taining 100,000 books and other items. The Academy of Sciences had a new building too. Rush Medical College, with 286 students in 1869-70, occupied a structure considered very fine, at Dearborn and Indiana Streets ; Mercy Hospital completed its large building on the south side; Alexian Brothers Hospital, on the north side, had another, containing what some people considered the two most beautiful statues in Chicago. The Academy of Design had a place on Adams Street, between State and Dearborn; a "birthplace of Chicago Art," celebrating the long and difficult labors of Leonard Volk and others, with G. P. A. Healy encouraging them, to keep art interest alive in careless Chicago. Music had no definite home other than Crosby's Opera House, in which people could hear concerts, or buy pianos from W. W. Kimball and Julius Bauer ; and also stop for dinner in the restaurant kept by Kinsley. But music was a foremost interest. Dr. Florenz Ziegfeld had a flourishing musical college, in which George F. Root, composer of war songs, was an associate. And this thirty-year-old city, which embraced so many interests, from roulette to prayer-books, and from bargain-counters to old masters, went in for athletic sport "in a big way." It had German Turner gymnasiums, curling and gun clubs, cricketers, regattas, horse races. Its race-courses dated from 1844, and it now boasted Dexter Park, the Chicago Driving Club, and the course at Brigh- ton. But, more remarkable, Chicago had seen baseball games since 64 pq w o U 2 'X C FROM A WAR TO A CALAMITY 1856, at least. In 1869 there was formed a professional baseball organization headed by none other than Potter Palmer, and with vice-presidents including General Sheridan and George M. Pull- man ! A year later the Chicago White Stockings (not yet headed by A. G. Spalding) went on tour, and beat New Orleans by the decisive score of 57 to ! They improved on this by defeating a Memphis team 157 to 1. On their return — and it was only just — they were greeted by 100,000 people, it is said, and were given a banquet at the Briggs House. . . . Yet it does seem as though part of their success must have been due to poor pitching by opponents. Oh, it was a great city, a fast-stepping city, which the eloquent Mayor Rice turned over to his successor, Roswell B. Mason, in 1869. It had not only developed its business districts, factories, schools, churches within the restricted area of its youth, but had formed plans to stretch out into wider regions of Cook County. In 1869-70 it was fast acquiring suburbs, south, north and west. The sub- division era had arrived. Samuel Eberly Gross was putting up hundreds of houses. "Own your own home !" cried he. Carpen- ters were throwing together dwellings, out on the prairies, with as much zeal as the pioneers of the '30s, and with not much more idea of beauty. And there were civic leaders who dreamed of parks, greater and more luscious parks. Those little things, Dearborn Park, Union Park, Washington Square, were not nearly enough. While the city boasted of 200,000 people, these park promoters planned for the millions to come — and were called crazy for their pains. Despite ridicule and quarrels, however, such men as Paul Cornell, John W. Wilson, Ezra McCagg, John B. Turner, Henry Greene- baum, C. C. P. Holden, went forging ahead. Most of them had helped form the city's bulwark during the Civil War, on the Union Defense committee or otherwise. They were not used to quitting. So in the 1869 period they went to the legislature, which authorized the parks — Washington, Lincoln, and the west parks — and work began on what were then tracts of vacant land. 65 CHICAGO S GREAT CENTURY With all the pushing into new home-site-territory, and all the haste about it, builders were happy, but they were making a fatal mistake. How terrible it would prove no one could foretell ; 1871 would reveal it. Frame construction was the folly of the day. Other buildings, such as some of those iron and stone structures downtown, were badly constructed too. But with whole squares covered with wood, the city had become largely a "house of cards." And it fell. Not that there had been a lack of warning. Disastrous fires had been part of Chicago's lot since the beginning. During the years just preceding 1871, there had been a series of "conflagra- tions," from the destruction of the S. C. Griggs publishing house in 1868 to the burning of the Drake Block, seven-story building at Wabash Avenue and Washington Street, in 1870. John V. Farwell lost heavily in this fire, as he had two years before in the blaze that devoured Farwell Hall, the home of the ten-year- old Y. M. C. A. Although the historians rather dodge the fact, it would seem that the fire department was not in the best of shape, considering the tremendous hazard. Some of its equipment would not work. And as it turned out, seventeen steam-engines, twenty-three hose carts, and other things in proportion, were by no means enough, even though there were many efficient men on the force. There was one in particular, Denis Swenie, then foreman of Engine Company No. 14, who later would be the greatest of all Chicago's fire marshals. The men as a whole, the horses, too, it may be said, were capable and fearless. But there must have been a reason for the terrible losses that occurred during the months just pre- ceding the "Great Fire." As for flimsy construction, The Tribune, like a prophet of evil, had something to say just a month before the catastrophe. The editor wrote about "walls a hundred feet or more in height, of a single brick's thickness" ; about cornices that "come rattling down into the street in a high wind" ; about marble fronts that were "thin veneer"; about "the dispensation of sheet-iron, of pine planks" ; about "a sham and a cheat, a snare and a lie." "Whether it is that sudden prosperity has debauched us, this is not the spirit that distinguished the Chicago of a few years 66 FROM A WAR TO A CALAMITY ago. . . . But where is that spirit now? Has it all run to sham and shingles?" During the first week of October, 1871, this sort of anxiety- turned into a definite apprehension. There had been for some time a serious drought, all over the prairies. In Chicago, during a week, small fires broke out by the dozen, and apparent arson added to them. Toward the end of the week beginning October 2 a hot, dry wind came up from the south. It bore on its wings the signal of Chicago's destruction. While it roared, the evening of that October 7, flames started in a Canal Street planing-mill and spread rapidly. Then the wind sharply veered to the southwest. Weary firemen battled in vain. Within twenty minutes the flames had fired an area between Jackson and Adams Streets, Clinton Street and the river, and swept on far along the river before it was brought under control. Enormous crowds watched this spec- tacle of flame and smoke, thronging the bridges. It was the greatest fire they had ever seen. But they would know a greater within twenty-four hours. At about 9 o'clock on that Sunday evening, October 8, one William Brown and his sister were sitting in his office on the third floor of the courthouse. He was the night operator of the fire- alarm telegraph service. Glancing toward the southwest, where the blaze of the night before still smoldered, Brown saw a light. He took it for a remnant of the fire that was expiring. But pres- ently he saw it again, larger and redder. No signal had come from the watchman in the tower above. Was he asleep? The glare in the southwest increased; it was a "bad one." At last the call came down from the watchman. The time wa9 9:32. To all appearances, twenty minutes or a half hour had been lost. The blaze had started in the barn behind the cottage of Patrick and Catherine O'Leary, on De Koven Street, a muddy little street between Halsted and Clinton Streets, near 12th. The O'Learys kept a cow in that barn. They burned kerosene in the house. From these two facts, after investigators began to poke about and gossips to get busy, arose later a story that Mrs. O'Leary had taken a lamp to the barn, had started to milk the cow, and the cow 67 CHICAGO S GREAT CENTURY had kicked over the lamp. This tale spread through the world in a short time, and became so firmly established that it is still told as a fact. Yet the affidavits made by the O'Learys a week or two after the fire seem perfectly reasonable. They swore that Mrs. O'Leary milked her cows at 4 :30 p. m. and 5 a. m. regu- larly ; the natural time. She put the horse in the barn at 7 o'clock that Sunday evening, and that was all. She lit no lamp in house or barn. As for Patrick, he swore that milking cows or feeding horses were not his job. Whatever the origin of the fire, it proceeded briskly from the O'Leary barn to adjoining shacks, and then, fanned by that dry southwest wind, roared on northeastward. Nearly everything east of Jefferson Street began to go. There were great showers of sparks. A mass of fire lit on a German Catholic Church, and it was almost instantly in flames. Within an hour that part of the west side was a caldron. Little home-owners, German and Scandinavian laborers, rushed from their houses, abandoning all. Lumber yards, planing mills, railroad shops were enveloped and destroyed in a twinkling. The flames "moved forward in several columns, and, like a well-whipped but unconquerable foe, the fire department slowly retreated." Denis Swenie's company was forced to abandon its engine. Meantime, the O'Leary cottage itself had escaped. As the night deepened, it was seen that cataracts of sparks were threatening the "south division," the business district. Could that ocean of flame leap the river? Soon it did so. The Parmelee stable at Jackson and Franklin Streets caught, and the wind blew this new combustible into flame. "Conley's Patch," a region of vile shanties, in the neighborhood of Adams and Market Streets, was swept. On the fire galloped, northeastward and eastward. By 1 :30 a. m. the courthouse cupola was on fire, and in another half-hour its famous bell went clanging down, amid the holocaust of the courthouse itself. At almost the same time, the State Street bridge began to burn. The fire was preparing to cross the main branch of the river. It made this leap also. Iill's giant brewery building ignited, and went like excelsior. At 3:20 occurred an incredible disaster. Men began to shout: "The waterworks are on fire !" 68 En O W < W I* Q J5 H G W .C W ° £ >> O C/2 P S 3 2 O U w > a FROM A WAR TO A CALAMITY It was true. Ellis Chesbrough's great work for the salvation of Chicago was a target. And if there had not been panic before, there was panic now. The whole downtown district north of Congress Street was due for obliteration. Down went the new Grand Pacific Hotel — on which the roof had just been placed — and the postofnce building, and the handsome Rock Island station, and the Chamber of Com- merce, and everything else in LaSalle Street and the other streets. Into flames went $1,034,200 currency in the U. S. treasury build- ings. Down went the Sherman House, The Tremont, Hooley's Theater, the Crosby Opera House, in which Grant had been nominated in 1868. Down went the $200,000 building of The Tribune, which had not warned in vain. Down went Field & Leiter's store, while Marshall Field desperately threw wet blankets over the threatened stock. Down went the Palmer House, just built. Alas for the Academy of Design, and Dr. Ziegfeld's Col- lege! Farewell to haughty Terrace Row. Goodnight to Peter Schuttler's wagon factory, the Gates iron works; goodnight to a lot of tall ships and faithful bridges. Goodnight to the trees in little Dearborn Park, the first and best-loved. The fire had crossed to the north side. It danced and roared from one factory to another, from house to house, swallowing the McCormick plant and McCormick's mansion. It jumped the luscious squares of trees and gardens, falling joyously upon the mansard roofs of these great houses — Newberry's, McCagg's, Arnold's. At Pine Street it encountered the stone water-tower and received a set-back; that same water-tower still stands. And it could devour only a part of St. James Episcopal Church, and only part of the New England Congregational. But the Historical Society and Academy of Science buildings were ruined. Just north of Washington Square the flames threatened the big roomy wooden house of Mahlon Ogden, brother of William. A corps of rescuers went to work, aided by the open space to the south — and when all was over, this dwelling was the only one on the "near north side" that stood. The beautiful homesteads, filled with treasures, were gone. On the Arnold lawn there remained, smoke-blackened, a sun- 69 CHICAGO S GREAT CENTURY dial with the inscription, in Latin, "I number none but serene hours." 5 Such, and unspeakably more besides, was the ruin spread in the "city of sham and shingles" between Oct. 8 and 10, 1871. On the night of the 9th, in a small west side church, Mayor Mason, sur- rounded by officials, wrote with a lead pencil on a scrap of paper Chicago's message to the world. It said : "With the help of God, order and peace and private property shall be preserved." And it said: "The faith and credit of the city of Chicago is hereby pledged for the necessary expenses for the relief of the suffering." These words reached the world at once by telegraph. And the world responded with help to a city which, in some places, prior to that day, was quite unknown. 70 CHAPTER X The Invincible City Recovers 1 IF one could imagine present-day Chicago with its loop district a mass of ruins, its "Gold Coast" turned into rubble, most of its chief buildings destroyed, its transportation stopped, nearly half its population homeless, militia on guard against ghouls and rob- bers — if one could imagine all that, he would understand the plight of Chicago in October, 1871. Only a few hundred were dead; otherwise, an earthquake could have done no worse. What was the "lesson" of it all ? The cries of certain moralists that the city, wicked and reckless, had been scourged for its sins, fell unheeded upon the ears of Chicago leaders who were dealing with the emergency. They were banding to set up a new Chicago on the ashes of the old. They were sending thanks to the cities, like New York, Indianapolis, St. Louis, which were hurrying relief on special trains. But they were even busier laying foundations, set- ting up new institutions, and passing from one to another the challenge, voiced by Joseph Medill in the Tribune, "Chicago shall rise again." Mr. Medill was elected mayor, the month following the fire. By that time, thanks to amazing toil and courage, thousands of tem- porary buildings stood on devastated patches among derricks used to haul away the wreckage, and a few permanent structures had been started. Business men had wasted no time on self pity. Within a few days after the fire the lake front, east of Michigan Avenue, was crowded with small emergency buildings into which merchants and others moved what was left of their property. The hardware men, Hibbard and Spencer (later Hibbard, Spen- cer, Bartlett & Co.) were among those who selected the lake front for the time being. Others "set up shop" on or near their old loca- tions ; still others found a toe-hold where they could. Firms like D. B. Fisk & Co., millinery, Edson Keith & Co., dry goods, were hard at it again before the ruins of their store had fairly cooled. Keith resumed business in his Prairie Avenue stable, and sold 71 CHICAGO S GREAT CENTURY $60,000 worth of goods there, it is said. Doggett, Bassett & Hills, shoe dealers, reopened the second day after the disaster. Two young men, Charles Waters and Alexander Moody, started a pie factory, and sold 1 ,000 pies a day. J. V. Farwell, victim of earlier fires, moved, undaunted, from Lake Street to Franklin. Henry Horner, wholesale grocer, burned out in South Water Street, crossed the river, temporarily, to West Randolph Street. Albert A. and Otho Sprague bravely rebuilt their business. A. H. Blackall, coffee dealer, had nothing left after the fire except the money in his pocket ; but immediately he sent East for new stock, and went ahead. So did Christian Jevne, who sold many delicacies and whose name makes old-timers' mouths water even now. Field and Leiter purchased outright the car barns of the City Railway Company at State and 20th Streets and within a fortnight had an "immense bazaar" running in the place. . . . The spirit of such men was the spirit of nearly all. Of the banks, nineteen national and nine state or private insti- tutions, all but one were gone. They had been doing an $800,000,000 business; now the financial situation was chaos. Yet, forty-eight hours after being "burned out," the bankers were meeting under the chairmanship of W. F. Coolbaugh ; that same day, twelve found temporary quarters ; on Friday all the banks announced that they would pay 15 per cent to depositors; within four more days they resumed payment unconditionally. No less courage was exhibited by the Chamber of Commerce and the Board of Trade, and also by real estate men, such as Lyman Baird and W. D. Kerfoot, who, with loans or otherwise, helped property owners back to their feet. It was Kerfoot who put up the sign on his wooden temporary office : "All gone but wife, children and energy." A feat of great moment was performed by John G. Shortall, pioneer abstract man, who saved (by lugging them away in a small truck) the invaluable records of land title, gathered during the years under the system of E. A. Rucker. This rescue work prevented confusion among property owners from being worse confounded. The daily papers, badly needed and run by gritty men, set up little "plants" where they could, and got out their sheets full of calamitous news but spurring the citizens to courage. The Tribune, Journal and Post were among the first. But the veteran battler, Storey of 72 THE INVINCIBLE CITY RECOVERS the Times, was growing weary and despondent. Some of his men found him sitting on his front steps at home. Said he : "The Times and Chicago are gone, forever." They argued with him, heartened him. Soon he was back in the melee. Pages more might be written about the dramatic reaction of Chicago against its disaster. But the real upward movement came some years later, after another financial panic, that of 1873, and another great fire, in 1874. This second conflagration swept part of the business district again, destroying buildings and erasing the work done by many who had rebuilt. Chicago met both panic and fire with coolness and reenforcement of will. In 73 bankers like Lyman J. Gage and George Schneider stoutly voted against clearing house certificates. In '74 the authorities prevented a second destruction of the business district. Besides, there now underlay the city's routine life such a foundation of wealth that growth could not be held back. After '73, the whole tide of national activity swelled upward. Resolution and ambition pointed toward the triumphant twentieth century, and Chicago, even then the Great Central Market, was at the focus of opportunity. Hence became evident such a mighty wonder as steel ; steel rolled into rails, ingots, nails. Capt. Eber Ward had built, as early as 1857, his rolling mills on the north branch of the river. He had produced, in 1865, a Bessemer steel rail, only nine years after the first an- nouncement of the process. By 1872 he had a Bessemer plant on the north side, and within ten years would be built at South Chicago the first units of the mighty steel works in that region. The Union Steel company was also rolling rails at its plant on the southwest side. The glare of these factories on the northern and southern sky heralded a great age. Hardly less symptomatic was such an enterprise as that of "Crane Brothers'* — Richard and Charles — the former of whom started his Chicago career with a brass foundry in the lumber yard of his uncle, Martin A. Ryerson. By 1860 the Cranes had an iron foundry ; then an iron pipe mill. And in 1871 they started building freight and passenger elevators, run by steam. Nine years later they were using 73 CHICAGO S GREAT CENTURY an hydraulic process.* As new and taller buildings rose in what people never tired of calling "Chicago, The Phoenix," elevators replaced tedious stairways in office structures — and foreshadowed the skyscraper. None of these early efforts, however, were more clearly of a new epoch, and none attained greater fame, than the development of the "palace" sleeping car. It is doubtful in whose brain the basic idea first sprang to life. Zenas Cobb, who came to Chicago in 1845, is recorded by some as having first thought of putting beds (or bunks) in railroad cars. But assuredly George M. Pullman was thinking of the same thing before he began raising Chicago buildings in the middle '50s. Anyhow, no one but Pullman was the creator of the sleeping-car as we now know it. After he had experimented with "No. 9," one of two cars which he obtained from the Alton railway for the pur- pose, and after "No. 9," with its crude upper berths, wood stoves and candle-light, had made a few trips in 1859 and afterward, Mr. Pullman's genius had its real flowering. The Civil War halted its course, but the war was scarcely on its last legs when Pullman undertook car-building on a scale as amazing as though someone in the '60s had planned a new courthouse of solid onyx. Taking the bulk of his capital — all of it, some assert — to the amount of $20,000, this man of thirty-three produced the "Pioneer," accidentally or purposely named after Chicago's first locomotive. It had really practicable upper berths, but also it had handsome wood fittings, fine upholstery, even plate glass ! The skeptics sneered. Railroad men held aloof, and pointed out that the new car was too wide for existing platforms and too high to go under bridges. Gov- ernor Matteson, head of the Chicago and Alton, and John W. Brooks, a big man in the Michigan Central, were two railroaders who had more faith. Eventually, not only did platforms and bridges have to be changed, but the epoch of through service was speeded up, for the traveling public sank with a sigh of relief into the berths that robbed night journeys of their horrors. They learned to take off even their shoes, an operation which had to be enforced upon the *According to some accounts, the hydraulic elevator was conceived in 1870 by C. W. Baldwin and was first demonstrated in the store of Burley & Co. 74 THE INVINCIBLE CITY RECOVERS first travelers in old "No. 9." As all the world knows, the "Pioneer" carried the funeral party when Lincoln's body was brought West, and it was at Grant's service when he made a processional visit to his old Galena home. The Pullman Palace Car Company was organized in 1867, and in 1899 it absorbed its chief rival, the Wagner Company. The "palace car" had been steadily improved, and from among the Pullman group of brainy men had emerged H. H. Sessions as "father" of the covered vestibule. Furthermore, in the '80s Mr. Pullman estab- lished his "model town" on the flat land at Chicago's southern tip, where in a passion of landlordism he rented houses to his workmen, built a hotel and theater, and performed the functions of a separate city government, even down to collecting for water and gas facilities. The courts eventually ruled that all this was in conflict with public authority, and Pullman was swallowed by Chicago. The "Drama of the Hog," ever spectacular in the eyes of the world, had its prologue in pioneer days, with Archibald Clybourn, Gurdon Hubbard, and Newberry and Dole — not to speak of nu- merous hogs — as actors. The first act, to continue the metaphor, came in 1848, when the Bull's Head stockyards were opened at Madison Street and Ogden Avenue; the second in 1855 or 1856, with John B. Sherman's "big" venture — yards for 30,000 hogs and 5,000 cattle — at 29th Street and Cottage Grove Avenue. The great third act saw the curtain rise upon the Union Stock- yards on Halsted Street, in 1865, when railroads and citizens united to buy a large acreage from John Wentworth, prince of all the territory. Then, before the third act had really begun to run its course, there stepped upon the stage three stars — Philip D. Armour, Gustavus F. Swift and Nelson Morris. Armour's great civil war coup, followed by shrewd speculation, had made him rich. Forty-three years old when he moved to Chi- cago, where he already had a packing house, he was a mogul of both "the yards" and the board of trade. His well-established busi- ness, his terrific industry — for he thought nothing of working from 7 a. m. until twilight — and his acumen, made him an apparently unbeatable antagonist in this arena of packing; yet in 1857, the 75 CHICAGO S GREAT CENTURY same year when Armour became a Chicagoan, 36-year-old Gustavus Swift turned up as a rival. Not strictly so at first, for during two years Swift was only a cattle buyer. But in 1877 he became a packer. And with him arrived the "dressed beef" industry. Mr. Swift had an associate named Herbert Barnes, who went East to prepare the minds of purchasers for an innovation studied by the packer some years before — the refrigerator car. Mr. Barnes had no fun, the "trade" being either skeptical or hostile to the new idea. The railroads would have none of it. But in Chicago Swift fixed up a refrigerator car, helped hang the carcasses inside it, sealed it, and sent it off to Mr. Barnes. The latter opened it with a long face. But there hung the beef, fresh and wholesome. It was the beginning. Swift went on building the cars, risking what fortune he had, and at length the railroads saw the point. Within five years the refrigerator car was an experiment no longer. Morris, unlike Armour and Swift, was a German who had been an "immigrant boy." Coming to Chicago at fifteen he had worked his way up from the bottom in the old Sherman yards ; but he had established himself in the new Packingtown before Armour and Swift arrived. He, the Libbys and others, were the rivals of the two giants. Among them all, they built a "city within the city," with its own railways, water, and police which was to be the scene of epic battles, and which was both a pride and a stench in the view of excessively delicate Chicagoans. These more delicate ones, seeing how the processions of curious visitors hurried to see animals slaughtered, tried to show them institutions of intellect and art. Such enterprises, like industry, flourished as the revived city reached out for all the good things of life. The theaters were alive again. Visitors could be taken, at least in the middle 70s, to The Globe, on the West Side, acquired by Col. Wood of museum fame two weeks after the fire. He opened there with "Who's Who ?" and a writer commented that no better piece could be found, for who knew who was who in those chaotic days. More classic productions could be seen at Hooley's, re-estab- lished in 1872; and, a little later, at the Columbia, where Robson 76 THE INVINCIBLE CITY RECOVERS and Crane brought out "Twelfth Night." The Columbia belonged to Jack Haverly, who had a minstrel house as well. Dandy and gambler, Haverly lived to no great age. There was opera for the visitors; truly grand opera. Since Crosby's was gone, the performances were usually at the new McVicker's. There "Aida" was given in 1874 as a novelty, with Christine Nilsson; and there Albani sang for Chicago its first "Lohengrin." Col. Mapleson's Italian company gave gala per- formances at Hooley's in 1879; and in 1883 he brought Patti to Chicago. Besides opera, there was choral music, for the Apollo Club had been organized, in a church that escaped the fire, shortly after that disaster. And there was the Beethoven Society, run by the noted musician Carl Wolfssohn, he who astounded everybody by a series of piano recitals that included the entire list of Beethoven sonatas ! The visitors could be shown a new Historical Society building, and a new Academy of Sciences ; but when it came to the Public Library, they were shown a water-tank. It was a reservoir which escaped the fire, and around which a temporary city hall was set up, the whole forming what was called The Rookery. In the city hall Mayor Medill and his successor presided. In the tank was the book collection. But the library, thanks to vigorous support, did not stay there long. There might have been no library at all but for the help of Thomas Hughes and others in England, just after the fire. On every side, as the city gathered way in its new progress, sprang up societies, social, political, or artistic. The Chicago Club, organized in 1869, found a home after the fire. N. K. Fairbank made a record by being a ten-year president, reelected from 1875 to 1885 without a break. The Union League came in 1879, lacking a clubhouse, but soon to have one ; and the Iroquois, democratic, fol- lowed a year later. The Calumet (now no longer existing) was formed in 1878 for distinguished South-siders ; presently it had a club-house and a fine art collection. The Standard, for Jewish citizens, was earlier, being established in 1867 at 13th and Michigan, whither the fire did not reach. The Fortnightly, organization of women, was established in 1873, and the Chicago Woman's Club in 1876. The Chicago Literary Club, with its weekly programs for the good of the soul, was born in 1875. 77 CHICAGO S GREAT CENTURY Not until the '80s, when Charles L. Hutchinson became its devoted president, could the Art Institute exhibit a building of its own. But it began its unbroken career under its present name in 1879, taking over the collection of the Academy of Design ; and it speedily became one of the city's unquestionable ornaments. Where the Art Institute finally came to stand, there rose in 1873 the huge reddish body of the Exposition building, with its beflagged towers. It grew out of an ambitious project, headed at the outset by Potter Palmer, to exhibit the industries and art of the Middle West. Its contents were an astonishing miscellany, comprising steam engines, merchandise exhibits, an aquarium, flowers, confections, and heaven knows what else. No boy of that era can ever forget it ; none can ever forget looking down on the band-stand, while the great fountain splashed beyond. Some may recall better the vast ropes of taffy, pulled by machinery. And there may be a few who remember one breath-taking moment when an elevator fell the length of its shaft, containing six passengers. But behold! They stepped out, unhurt and smiling. It was a demonstration of the Ellithorpe compressed air safety device, and the invention worked. In fact, said an optimistic newspaper : "It seems as if the deadly elevator had been robbed of its terrors." Those were happy days along the lake front and in the clubs, but, as ever, there was "another side." Whether or not it was still true, as Dr. Robert Collyer had said in 1871, that "the only recognized aristocracy of the city is a set of ignorant and recently enriched social swells and snobs," other points he made were applicable in the later '70s. He delivered this speech from a dismantled pillar of Unity church, the Sunday following the fire. Cried he, after denouncing wooden buildings within the city limits : "We have given full sway to drinking, gambling and licen- tious houses, and have, by our moral laxity, invited to the city and harbored in it, a criminal population almost equal to that of London." The criminals were very active after the fire, despite the activity of the police force under Mayor Medill. A new army of crooks and gamblers had arrived, to fatten on the disaster. Even more distress- 78 THE INVINCIBLE CITY RECOVERS ing, a good many people who lost their all became despairing, threw away respectability and joined the law breaking class. With the '73 depression came unemployment and bitterness, the latter by no means allayed by such controversies as that over Mayor Medill's order closing the saloons on Sunday. Reform was again arrayed against liberalism, just as anarchy was beginning to be arrayed against capital. There was a "bread riot" on LaSalle Street which merely pointed to worse disorder later. Through four years the police fought against the deeds of idlers, thieves, and disturbers, and many officers who escaped shooting reported for work with black eyes. Finally arrived, in July, 1877, the news of a great railroad strike in the East. The trouble spread to Chicago almost at once, and found support in the city where Alfred Parsons had come forth as socialist candidate for alderman. Mayor Heath extended the right of peacable assembly to one monster out-door gathering in Market Street. And the next day brought shifting mobs at many points ; strikes in different trades ; police shootings and snarling crowds. Within a day or two the city bristled with arms. Business was paralyzed, and citizens wailed, "The commune is about to rise." The militia were out. Factories were burned. One throng of hoodlums marched down the "Black Road" leading to the new McCormick harvester plant and surrounded it, but was driven off. There fol- lowed a night of desultory fighting, and then a real battle at the C. B. and Q. roundhouse on 16th Street, in which stones did almost as much damage as bullets. Several men got fatal wounds. A street car crossing the viaduct on Halsted Street was virtually torn to pieces "by a pack of howling young devils," some in their 'teens. Arrival of regular troops and plucky work by police at length restored order to Chicago, but the riots had given the city a terrific scare — so great that the Citizens Association presented to the munic- ipality an excellent Gatling gun. Once during the excitement busi- ness men pleaded with an infant newspaper, The Daily News, to stop the lurid "extras" with which the owners, Victor F. Lawson and Melville E. Stone, were bombarding the city. But The Daily News kept on, leaping from 6,000 to 90.000 circulation and gaining its first prestige. Another result of the disorder was even more far-reaching. The 79 Chicago's great century appearance of those "howling young devils" amid the mobs deeply shocked certain citizens, notably Frederick F. Elmendorf and Andrew Paxton. Looking for the cause, they discovered that thousands of young boys were becoming drunkards. In the fall of riotous y 77 there was formed the Citizens League of Chicago for the Suppression of the Sale of Liquor to Minors. So great success was attained in the suppression that other states took up the movement, and thus arrived finally a National Law and Order League, headed by Charles C. Bonney, Chicagoan. 6 We turn a page. The great fire is a memory. So are the riots which "threatened the economic system." The city is again confident, happy in its very hubbub, proud of its hard-won reputation the world over as a "phoenix." It is putting up 1,200 buildings a year, mostly solid ones of iron and stone. (Here and there, in these 1930s, one can still find some of the post-fire structures, with dates cut in stone : "1876" ; "1878.") But the city's finances, in 1879, have been deplorable ; bills are paid in scrip ; even to school teachers the city is in arrears. Strangely like a foretaste of today is the newspaper paragraph: "The 'school marnis' of Chicago have at last been paid a portion of their hard-earned and long-expected wages. There are still two months due these patient doves in the nursery of humanity." There is a new mayor ; that is one reason things are going bet- ter. He is Carter Henry Harrison, scion of a very old Virginia- Kentucky family. A Democrat, he has ended nearly twenty years of Republican municipal rule. He makes himself eternally solid with the police by getting them paid in gold. He reads a lecture to the city council, urging economy. And he says — again it sounds like a prevision of our own time — that real estate is under a heavy load of taxation; the city must economize. "I recognize but one science in finance ; that is, to collect the revenues and live within them." In November, 1879, he is welcoming a glittering assemblage of generals and "notables" ; Sherman, Sheridan, Grant, Logan, Mark Twain, "Bob" Ingersoll. It is an army reunion, in the grand par- lors of the Palmer House. 80 THE INVINCIBLE CITY RECOVERS Harrison boosts his city, ever loyally American, despite its for- eign-born. (Half the population, no less.) And Sherman replies, speaking of the "meteor-like city . . . ready and willing — for a consideration — to feed the world." "I believe," says the great general, "that Chicago would under- take to build a railroad to the moon, if the man in the moon would hold down a ladder long enough for its mayor to get there." Under the persiflage is the sincere tribute of a Titan to the invincible Chicago of "after the fire." 81 CHAPTER XI Aspects of the Eighties 1 r I 'O travelers who visited Chicago in the '80s after a lapse of *■ years it presented a startlingly new scene. All about, smoke belched from recently planted forests of chimneys. At night, flames glowed in hundreds of mills and foundries. Huge manufac- turies, mostly established since the fire, clanged or screeched all day, and at dusk emitted armies of workmen. The stockyards was a citadel of furious activity. "Downtown," those streets so lately divested of every wall and spire were lined with solid fronts of stone, iron or brick. The era of wood had gone, banished by stern laws. So had much of the Garden City, with its tree-lined avenues. In factory property there was invested, by 1880, more than sixty million dollars. Finished products of raw materials freighted from the rich states nearby poured in and out of plants manned by armies growing toward 100,000. Great iron and copper mines lately opened in the north furnished fresh stores of ore, which steamed down the lakes on freighters that humbled the lumber fleets of the '50s and '60s. Expanding railroads spent lavishly for steel. The mills roared night and day. All this effort poured into the pockets of workmen wages by the tens of millions; yet discontent was growing, not merely in Chi- cago, but nation-wide. Hours of work were exhausting and bosses tyrannical. Moreover, the old friendly system, in which a labor- ers' committee could agree with the actual head of a business, had given way, in the complexity of affairs, to negotiation with man- agers and underlings of big corporations. For this and other reasons labor drew together, in more and more powerful organiza- tions, one of them the Knights of Labor. The movement for an eight-hour day grew. Red anarchists, pupils of Johann Most, attached themselves to this movement. An explosion was inev- itable, and in 1886 it came. 82 State and Madison Streets in 1880 ASPECTS OF THE EIGHTIES 2 Prior to that shock to Chicago's self-esteem, however, we observe a city which had its share of the delights of life, and seemed unconscious of its danger. In its physical arrangement and aspect, it was perhaps no more beautiful than the city of the '60s, but it was infinitely bigger and in some respects nobler. The centers of attractiveness had shifted. Michigan and Wabash Avenues, north of Congress, were no longer lined with gracious house-fronts and gardens; the lake front lay under the windows of business houses or hotels. Mansions of the social elect were clustering in that south side area dominated by Prairie and Calumet Avenues and lower Michigan Avenue. To this region were moving from the west side many old families which had lived there before the fire or just after it. Meanwhile, on the north side, there was being formed a new "fashionable district" established mainly by Potter Palmer and celebrated for the huge brownstone house which he himself erected in 1885. In these castles life was on a scale making that in the old north side homesteads look almost rustic. Houses of granite, with plate glass windows, were common. Many had heavy porte-cocheres, iron fences, towered stables. Within were rooms walnut-panelled, decorated with traces of the Gothic style or the French, crowded with weighty furniture, tall vases, silk portieres, lambrequins, mantels of marble. There were massive chandeliers and enormous stairways. Colored glass windows were thrust in for extra effect. High ceilings and long, narrow "halls" prevailed. The wealthy kept sleek horses, and rode in stately fashion in barouches, victorias, or other vehicles, behind tophatted coachmen, not to speak of footmen (in extreme cases.) The fashion jarred on some men of democratic mind. Thus, Armour preferred to drive his own buggy to the stockyards; Marshall Field would permit himself to be driven until close to his place of business, then he would get out and walk. These "moguls," together with Pullman, Norman B. Ream, the Keith brothers, and various bankers or merchants, lived close together within an area of a few blocks, and put up castles more emblematic of Chicago's vast prosperity, perhaps, than expressive of "millionaire tastes." Michigan Avenue below Twelfth Street 83 CHICAGO S GREAT CENTURY acquired Charles T. Yerkes, Ferdinand Peck, James H. McVicker, H. H. Honore, various packers and brewers — strangely assorted in some ways, but at least lavish in domestic display. "Up north/' where much of the landscape was still like sandy desert, or else land from which the fire had erased the homesteads, the Palmer palace dazzled any stranger who got a glimpse within. It was notably under French influence, including paintings eagerly col- lected by Mrs. Palmer. The Japanese room, the Moorish music room, the grand stair-case, all showed to great effect when levees were held there ; and many such occasions there were. On other avenues, less "exclusive" but handsome enough, lived prosperous folk who could afford a style denied to their fore- fathers. These streets, like Grand Boulevard on the south side, Washington Boulevard on the west, and Fullerton Avenue on the north, had the advantage that they were thoroughfares to the great parks. The latter had come into their first glory. As much money, possibly, as would have built the whole of Chicago in 1840 was poured into the parks between 1871 and the middle '80s. Wash- ington Park had its lakes, its drives, its meadows, while on the edge of it grew up in 1883 the race-track which, with its American Derby, wholly outshone the ancient driving clubs. Douglas, Gar- field and Humboldt parks, with connecting boulevards, were well developed. Lincoln Park, with its shore buttressed against the frolicking lake, already had its splendid elms and its traditions. In the middle '80s it began to sprout statues, and before 1890 it acquired the St. Gaudens Lincoln, while the Grant monument, erected by popular subscription, was under construction. Suburbs like Hyde Park, Lake View, Austin, Oak Park, Ravens- wood, Rogers Park, were filling with people, rich or not, encour- aged to commuting because comic steam "dummies" had given place to suburban trains which ran not too well, yet wisely. The suburbs strove against annexation; but in 1889 the city gathered in at a swoop nearly 126 square miles of suburban territory, including Hyde Park, Lake View and the towns of Lake and Jefferson. 84 ASPECTS OF THE EIGHTIES In 1880 the city boasted 503,185 inhabitants. In 1890, after ten years of mighty forward leaps, it passed the million mark by 99,850. The story returns to the time before Chicago became second only to New York in population, but when it was, nevertheless, "architecturally one of the most beautiful cities." Such it was in the eyes of Mayor Carter Harrison, who added, "Its streets are lined with business houses and residences vieing in splendor with the palaces of princes and nobles in other lands." Hyperbole, indeed, but Chicago liked it. Straight through the years from 1879 to 1887, four terms, it kept "our Carter" in the mayor's chair. He was hotly opposed by some of the newspapers, but the masses believed in him. Out of goodness of heart as well as political strategy, he would stoop from his horse to greet a child, he would dip into his pocket, he would walk a block to chide a merchant who had cheated a stammering "foreigner." His reign was direct and rather autocratic ; a kind of recrudescence of the John Went worth method, although the city Harrison man- aged was far vaster and more complex. Personal liberty was a point in his creed. The saloons flourished. So did gambling houses and houses of ill fame, for that matter. There was a lot of talk about the alleged influence exerted by such a character as "Mike" McDonald, whose name we first find in Chicago annals attached to the call for Mulligan's Civil War brigade. He was gambler, promoter and capitalist in turn and a supporter of Harrison, who, however, put him in his place when Mike tried to act the boss. There was a constant wagging of gen- teel tongues to the effect that Harrison was countenancing a Gamorrah; yet the calm judgment of so acute a student of civics as Prof. Charles E. Merriam is expressed as follows in his book "Chicago" : "(Mayor Harrison) maintained Chicago at a level above that of other cities. There were party bosses, but no great boss could spring up. There were minor peculations, and there were gamblers and prostitutes, not pursued if they kept to the rear, but there was no room for a thoroughly organized system of political corruption of the type that had become familiar in American cities." 85 CHICAGO S GREAT CENTURY While churches and reform agencies found much to criticize, most of the folk from Europe adored Harrison ; and the pleasure- lovers, the men-about-town, and the country people in for a good time, found the city uproariously hospitable. Those were the Good Old Days of long bars, beer with "high collars," stiff cocktails, and varied wines. It was the period of chophouses, of restaurants where politicians, social luminaries, police characters and cowboys could fraternize, and of gaming rooms that offered faro and roulette without question. To decent but convivial places, like Billy Boyle's chophouse, Rector's (with its goldfish aquarium as an ornament), Burcky and Milan's, the Boston Oyster House (lobster a specialty) flocked people to eat and stare. They might expect to see, though more likely at Chapin and Gore's, such a sport patron as Malachi Hogan, such a night-hawk as "Billy" Pinkerton (son of the great Allan), such a theater man as Will J. Davis ; and possibly — just passing through — such an international hero as the prize-fighter, John L. Sullivan. On Dearborn Street there was a saloon, kept at first by Joseph Mackin, then by a man whose wit flowed over and later filled a book. This saloonkeeper's real name was James McGarry ; the book was "Mr. Dooley." Hotel life was in much the same half -European, half-frontier spirit as the life of the chophouses. There was a new Sherman, a new Tremont, and a new Briggs House. The Grand Pacific, destroyed before it opened in '71, was rebuilt after a grander pattern with which its service harmonized, especially when John B. Drake took control. One of his ideas was to give dances called "assemblies," when Johnny Hand, then in his prime, conducted the orchestra with flashing baton. Another idea — first time in Chicago, it is said — was to put flowers on the dining- tables. Other inno- vations, and possibly greater grandeur, were to be seen at the Palmer House, which had risen "entirely fireproof" just after the '71 disaster. It was of decidedly French pattern and had large, luxurious rooms, a dining-room whose pillars and suave colored waiters awed rustic visitors, and, of course, the barber shop whose floor was studded with real silver dollars. All the larger hotels, including the Leland, The Clifton, and the Matteson, followed the American plan except the rather "ritzy" Richelieu on Michigan 86 ASPECTS OF THE EIGHTIES Avenue. There "Cardinal" Bemis astonished the city by serving everything a la carte and with an artistic care for detail worthy of a Parisian host. No less good taste characterized Kinsley's, which after several moves settled down on Adams Street and had a long and admired career. In such a place might be seen a gourmand like Architect W. L. B. Jenney, or lawyers such as Emory Storrs and Leonard Swett. There were in those days no skyscraping limestone walls making a solid parapet along Michigan avenue. Where the hotels stood, with architectural effects more like summer resort property than like hostelries of today, there was a near view of the lake, obstructed by the Exposition building, "Battery D," and the rail- road. Between tracks and avenue was a parkway and a lagoon on which rode pleasure craft. Along the avenue, innocent of concrete, swept the parades of fiery horses, shining landaus or buggies, hansom cabs innumerable. In them rode gentlemen with fine beards and ladies in "picture hats" and stiff collars. Other ladies, haughtily strolling the side- walks, displayed the bustles and trailing skirts of the period ; and some achieved that elegant silhouette called the "Grecian bend." In 1880 came to town the great actress and keen observer, Sarah Bernhardt. It is said that she was snubbed by certain strait-laced dames, but in her memoirs there is no rancor. She writes of "the vitality of the city in which men pass each other without ever stopping, with knitted brows, with one thought in mind : the 'end to attain/ They move on and on, never turning for a cry or prudent warning. They have no time to be prudent; the 'end to attain' awaits them." The women, writes Bernhardt, hasten along also, "bent on pleas- ure." (Some of them, she might have learned, were really follow- ers of Frances Willard bent on wiping out the saloon, or adherents of Belva Lockwood anxious to obtain the ballot.) The stockyards — "A dreadful and magnificent sight," Bernhardt found it. She played "Phedre" the evening after her inspection, with that bloody memory of The Yards haunting her. But she left the city "fond of its people, of its lake as big as an inland sea." 87 CHICAGO S GREAT CENTURY If part of Chicago snubbed her, the rest went to her play, bragged, "I saw Bernhardt," and considered itself civilized for so doing. Civilization? Chicago of the '80s surely had it. Europe boasted its Paris opera, its Albert Hall, its Covent Garden ; but Chicago had Central Music Hall, from 1879 to 1889 a musical and cultural center superior to anything the west had known. England had its Ascot, but Chicago displayed the Derby at Washington Park, accompanied by the jingle of harness on stage- coach horses, and the display of more "Grecian bends." Berlin had its opera house, but Chicago had its occasional but no less splendid seasons, when the Abbey Company or Metropolitan sent its best. In 1884 it hailed young Walter Damrosch, heading the company of his father, just dead, and presenting not only "Tannhaueser" and "Lohengrin," but "Die Walkure." Chicago honored Theodore Thomas, playing in the Exposition Building his summer nights series to audiences happily seated at tables. New York had its Times, Tribune, Herald, Post. Chicago had its own Tribune and Times ; its Herald and Post ; its Inter Ocean, Journal and Daily News, evening and morning — newspapers as enterprising as New York's and certainly as "civilized." New York had nothing like as many national conventions as Chicago, where in 1880 Garfield was nominated, and in 1884 the nominees, Blaine and Cleveland, of both parties, were selected amid wild enthusiasm. England had its cricketers at Lord's ; but Chicago, in those more leisurely days, had a cricket club of its own with 150 members playing in Lincoln Park. And England had no baseball league, nor any White Stockings club with an Adrian Anson, an Al Dalrymple, and a John Clarkson, as Chicago had. Add to these luminaries the star bicyclists, members of a club of more than eighty wheelers, the Chicago Yacht club, the Farragut boat club, and still only a small part of the city's athletic activity is described. In the great '80s, be it noted, Chicago boasted the "wingshot 88 ASPECTS OF THE EIGHTIES champion of the world," Capt. A. H. Bogardus. He once killed 500 pigeons in eight hours and forty-eight minutes. Contrasted with all this was that element of civilization expressed in the churches. By 1880 the Vatican had raised Chicago to be an Archdiocesan see, with the renowned Patrick A. Feehan as Archbishop. The Episcopalians had a new St. James Church, and a new church of the Ascension, risen since the fire. Bishop Samuel Fallows was at the height of his career in the Reformed Church. The Baptists, Methodists, Presbyterians, Congregationalists occu- pied new edifices. Moody had built his Chicago Avenue church. Jenkin Lloyd Jones had established All Souls. And David Swing and H. W. Thomas, both of them become independent of denomina- tions by the route of heresy trials, were drawing big audiences, in Central Music Hall and the Chicago Opera House, respectively. Northwestern University, which opened its doors in 1855, was carrying on in Evanston and was happy over paying a $200,000 debt, thanks to Dr. John Evans, William Deering, and others. The University of Chicago, on the other hand, was slowly dying in its south side building, and by 1888 would be wholly dead — only to be resurrected in 1892. So the city that Carter Harrison loved and "boosted" was, on all sides, a growing wonder, an arena of countless, varied activities. And it became, as the century grew old, a proving-ground for the mechanical inventions just coming into their own. The 850 pas- senger or freight trains that entered Chicago daily on twenty lines in 1883 were now universally equipped with the Westinghouse air brake, that invention less than twenty years old. In the switch yards rose a mesh of block signals and other ingenious devices. Moreover, before 1886, there were in use in Harrison's Chicago some 5,000 telephones. The strange instrument still daunted many people, nor did it work very well. But it was advertised through the fact that Elisha Gray, Chicagoan, had, as he claimed, really invented it. He patented in the 70s what he called "the art of transmitting vocal sounds telegraphically," and tried in a newspaper office, in 1876, his instrument. Later he fought the Alexander Bell patents in the courts. But Bell prevailed. 89 CHICAGO S GREAT CENTURY In 1876 a rude phonograph was put on exhibition in a store. It was voted "primitive and disappointing," and was not heard of again for many years. On State Street, on January 28, 1882, a strange train of cars, pulled by two which had "grips" reaching into a conduit where ran a cable, set off southward to the sound of cheers. They ran from Madison Street to Twentieth in thirty-one minutes. This terrific speed was celebrated in speeches by Mayor Harrison, and by white- haired citizens such as Judge John Caton and William Bross. Within a few years there were other cable lines, and the patronage — despite the noise and discomfort — had increased by millions per year. Electric cars had to await another decade, but as for electric light, Chicago had it in the '80s. The Western Edison Light Co., including John M. Clark and John Crerar, was the "father." Wil- loughby, Hill and Co., Potter Palmer and John B. Drake were among the first users. By '86 the chief hotels and theaters were thus illumined, and some of the streets. And on the new Board of Trade Building, when this dazzling structure went up at the foot of La Salle Street, there was for a time a tiara of 200 electric lamps of 2000 candle-power. It was devised by that same Elmer Sperry who made the Lindbergh beacon that now sweeps the horizon with its deliberate rays. 8 It was the costly new Board of Trade Building that became the target of an anarchist demonstration which formed a curtain-raiser for the great tragedy the following year. The structure was opened late in April with a banquet described as "Lucullan." That evening the anarchist followers were sum- moned to Market and Randolph Streets, intending to move en masse to the "Grand Temple of Usury, Gambling and Cut-Throat- ism," as the circulars described it. An outdoor meeting was held, addressed by Albert Parsons and Samuel Fielden. Under a red flag and a black, the latter symbolizing starvation, the speakers declared Board of Trade memberships cost $5,000 each, while 2,500,000 persons were out of work. "Last summer," shouted Fielden, "one of these Board of Trade 90 ASPECTS OF THE EIGHTIES thieves went on the board and came off in twenty-four hours with $1 ,000,000. Where did he get it ?" "Stole it from us !" shrieked the crowd. "Destroy from the earth every unproductive member of society!" urged Fielden. "Buy a colt revolver, a Winchester rifle and ten pounds of dyna- mite," shouted Parsons. "We'll make it ourselves," the mob answered. The march began, watched by police and by part of the Pinker- ton force, now ruled by "Billy." The parade wound its way through streets adjacent to the Board of Trade, headed by a band and by women carrying flags. Within the building the banqueters were toasting the glories of Chicago. Platoons of police out in the streets were busy fighting off the mobs, which eventually were forced to take another route, and the banquet ended on a high note of triumph. But it was clear that Chicago was in for trouble. Through a summer of street-car strikes and a winter of discon- tent the anarchist activity grew. The eight-hour day was the aim of good labor men ; destruction of government was that of the anarchists. In the spring Red leaders came to the fore when strikes occurred at the McCormick plant. Again the "Black Road" roared with battle. August Spies harangued from the top of a freight-car. Men fell, shot or stoned. Then, on the evening of May 4, 1886, a mass meeting was called for Haymarket Square, the ancient mart at Desplaines and Randolph Streets. Circulars headed "Revenge" had been printed on rough paper and distributed secretly; Spies wrote the docu- ment, but claimed the word "Revenge" was added by an officious compositor. When the demonstraters gathered they moved to a point in Desplaines Street north of Randolph at the mouth of "Crane's Alley." Meanwhile police were assembling at Desplaines street station under command of Inspector Bonfield, who foresaw trouble. So did Chief Ebersold, who had told Mayor Harrison of his anxiety. The mayor ordered the meeting watched. In fact, he watched part of it himself, then, convinced it would be peaceable, went home. From a truck in the middle of Desplaines street the anarchist leaders addressed the throng. At about 10 o'clock Samuel Fielden 91 CHICAGO S GREAT CENTURY was speaking, urging his followers, according to the police report, to "throttle the law." At this point the small police army marched up the street. The excitable Bonfield had decided on attack. At his command Capt. Ward shouted to the assembly to disperse "immediately and peaceably/' In a moment, as Bonfield later told it, "I heard a hissing sound behind me, followed by a tremendous explosion." Also, "a volley of pistol shots from the sidewalks and streets in front of us." Whole rows of police were flattened to the ground. Many sprawled there, wounded or dying. Those who could do so sprang up and charged the mob. "In a few minutes the anarchists were fleeing in all directions." Who threw the bomb ? This was never proved. It was a mes- sage from that volcano of discontent and passion which underlay the smooth, animated surface of Chicago in the "elegant '80s." Eight of the anarchist leaders were brought to trial. One, Louis Lingg, killed himself with a dynamite cartridge. Four, Parsons. Spies, Engel and Fischer, went to the gallows; three, Schwab, Fielden, and Neebe, to the penitentiary. Sixty-seven policemen had been wounded, and seven died. And the bloody night of May 4 fell into the stream of Chicago history, which rolled on, too strong and broad to be checked. 92 CHAPTER XII The Skyline Begins to Change THERE were at this time a few of the pioneers who clung to life, with hair snow white and vision dimming. Strange indeed must have been their thoughts as they looked back to the village of fifty years before, then forward to the big city, with its marvels and its sins. William B. Ogden, "father of railways," had died in 1877; the great fire was too much for him. But Cyrus McCor- mick lived until 1884, Gurdon Hubbard until 1886, John Went- worth until 1888, William Bross and J. Y. Scammon two years longer, and John D. Caton until 1895. We have final glimpses of these aged grandees, nodding at public ceremonies, or, as in the case of the great woodsman Hubbard ("The Fast Walker"), playing croquet with a bevy of grandchildren. Whether the old men were the more astounded by the violence of Chicago or by its new horizons one cannot say. Perhaps they viewed uprisings stoically, but they must have looked with head- shakings as well as pride upon the city's efforts to build toward the sky. The generation of the '80s thrilled over height and bigness. Also, the urge of the times enforced architecture of a new kind. From farms where labor was being saved by McCormick's machines and other devices young people rushed to the cities to work. Growth of all sorts of manufactures and business in general set up a demand for office space. Such pressure brought Chicago to an architectural revolution. The new troop of architects who were to banish the era of John M. Van Osdel and W. W. Boyington included Daniel Burn- ham and John Root, William Holabird, William Le Baron Jenney, Dankmar Adler and Louis Sullivan. Such men had no fear of tradition, not even of departing from the influence of the great H. H. Richardson, whose art contributed to Chicago's splendor in the same period. The younger architects were as bold and inventive 93 CHICAGO S GREAT CENTURY as he. When they could not find methods ready-made they made some. One of the first startlers was the Montauk Block. It rose to ten stories, while onlookers craned their necks. Moreover, it had a singular foundation. Instead of resting on cumbersome and numerous pedestals of stone, it "floated" on a raft of concrete and iron beams — the conception of young, redheaded John Root. The blue clay underlying Chicago mud upheld the Montauk and its raft despite the skepticism of observers. This pioneer skyscraper was on Monroe Street, a location not conspicuous enough for some who caught the building fever. The Studebakers selected Michigan Avenue for their building, which was a factory and show-room de luxe, having tall marble pillars, a grandiose entrance and a court. It stands today, as the Fine Arts building. In 1884 George M. Pullman erected at Adams Street that nine-story structure which still serves as headquarters of the palace car company. Innovations ! The Pullman building, de- signed by S. S. Beman, had not only offices but also apartment suites and a top-floor restaurant, likewise a marble staircase beau- tifully shaped by Irving Pond. Its elevators were as handsome as Pullman drawing rooms, though pulled by ropes — as they still are. Towers of medieval pattern rose from the roof, dominating a Michigan Avenue that had never before seen a really tall building. All through the central district, in those 1880s, went up struc- tures of varied design and degrees of luxury. Promoters hurled into them millions of money and scores of new decorative schemes. The W. C. T. U. put up on LaSalle Street its Temple, which absorbed a large fund and an immense quantity of different kinds of material, from pressed brick to terra cotta. It had a court adorned with towers echoing those of a French chateau ; it had also turrets from the center of which sprang a fleche of bronze, this being surmounted by a figure of a praying woman. On La Salle, a block away, rose the Rookery, on the site of the temporary city hall of a previous decade. This was an attempt to make an ideal office building, even for posterity, and it almost if not quite succeeded. Eastward on Adams Street went up a lesser but more bizarre "skyscraper," the O wings Building, whose owner wanted 94 THE SKYLINE BEGINS TO CHANGE it odd and got what he wanted. Then, ambition knowing no bounds, Burnham and Root were hired to erect a veritable giant, the Monadnock. This amazing mass of masonry, eighteen stories tall, stretched the length of a block; though half of it was called the Kearsage for fear people might not find their way by means of a single directory. It brought groups of visiting architects to admire its simple lines as well as its mighty proportions. While such castles in the air were taking form, much more attention was being paid to them by the laity than to what William Jenney was doing in LaSalle Street next to the Rookery. That gentleman was, in fact, playing an epoch-making role in Chicago business architecture. He was introducing into the Home Insur- ance Building, during 1884-5, the first steel beams ever rolled for such a purpose. They were not many, nor did they at once revolutionize the practice of architects; but they carried on the pioneering spirit, and brought to the architect great posthumous fame. The crowds peering up at this structure were interested in its height — ten stories at first, then two more — but hardly at all in its construction ; doubtless many of them thought the Studebaker Building more stunning. Within three years came William Holabird to build another LaSalle Street castle of offices, the twelve-story Tacoma, and to make a distinct advance in the use of steel framework, and stone "curtains." The modern skycraper was launched. It was soon to know numerous improvements, more complete skeletons, and cais- son foundations instead of "spread" or "floating" ones — but the main principle belongs to the '80s. At that time, as it cannot be too often reasserted, not a single building of all-skeleton construc- tion existed anywhere in the world except in Chicago. 3 If there was a sensation over the Home Insurance and Tacoma, there was an extravagant one over the venture which Ferdinand W. Peck and associates undertook at Congress Street and Michigan Avenue. At that corner, and running back to Wabash, there was to be a shrine of music as much abreast of Chicago's greatness — even ahead of it, some thought — as the Crosby Opera House was in the '60s. Primarily for grand opera, but with businesslike 95 CHICAGO S GREAT CENTURY additions of a hotel and many floors of offices, the Auditorium building marked an Ultimate in the expiring 19th century. Mr. Peck sketched the idea before the Commercial Club in 1886. Fate placed the designing in the hands of Louis Sullivan, eccentric associate of Daukmar Adler. His sketches took form, during the years up to 1889, in immense walls of granite and stone, sur- mounted by a tower weighing 15,000 tons, and containing the theater, which had excellent accoustics and beautiful murals. The mosaics in the building absorbed 50,000,000 pieces of marble. Fifteen elevators helped prove the bigness of the enterprise. The whole extraordinary mass rested on the "floating" foundations of the period. Louis Sullivan dreamed o' nights that his tower had sunk out of sight. But good engineering, combined with good luck, perhaps, made the great building not only safe but efficient. By 1888, when the national Republican party decided to convene there, the Auditorium had got as high as the fifth story. Its theater was near enough completed so that all the frenzy and crowding of a convention could proceed as usual. It will be recalled that Blaine, defeated in 1884, entered the picture as possible nominee, but even while his followers were staging a "Plumed Knight" parade, he was deciding to withold his name. So Benjamin Harrison was nominated on the eighth ballot, with cheers in which one newspaper writer found a lack of heartiness, and a band that played "a clammy strain that no one recognized." This same newspaper, however, noted that even in the galleries "the faintest tremolo" of the band was distinctly heard, and that "Ferd Peck was the happiest man of all the 10,000. His collar was limp and soppy, but his pride stood out in his face like the horns of a Texas candidate for the stockyards. His Auditorium was a success." It proved itself so again on the night — December 9, 1889 — of the dedication of the theater. Shiny carriages drove to the door, and in the boxes sat white-moustached gentlemen and bejewelled ladies to hear the Apollo Club, under W. L. Tomlins, sing Haydn's "The Heavens Are Telling" and hear a special chorus rencfer a cantata composed for the occasion by Frederick Grant Gleason. Addresses were delivered by President Harrison, Governor Fifer, 96 THE SKYLINE BEGINS TO CHANGE Mayor Cregier, and John S. Runnells. And Patti, Chicago favor- ite for many years, sang "Home, Sweet Home." Mr. Peck had no place on the program; but he did not care. That great night, and the splendid opera seasons which followed, were his com- pensation. In the very same month a meeting was held which launched another vast project, nothing less than "the tallest building in the world." It was a Masonic Temple, bringing to realization some- thing that Norman T. Gassette had suggested, though less ambi- tiously, in 1873. Gil W. Bernard and Dr. J. B. McFatrich were among those who got behind the idea. An association was formed, and the site at State and Randolph streets was purchased. Finally, after a few years, there the building stood, twenty stories high, squatting on its "floating foundation," and with a superstructure of steel. It was the most ambitious design of John Root, who gave it such splendors as tiers of recessed bay windows and a granite entrance arch forty-two feet tall. Elevators very speedy (for that day) had been developed. The building had fourteen of them for passenger service. Hanging to the grill-work, people were rushed breathless to the top — a round trip every three minutes — where they surveyed Chicago from a height loftier than any so far achieved except by balloons. Yet the great wonder, according to the guide-book author of that year, John J. Flinn, "is that every floor from the pavement to the eleventh floor inclusive is fitted up for shops." And Mr. Flinn promises that "on the roof there are to be hanging gardens, covered with glass roof and walls that are to rival the abode of the gods. It is given out that there may be refreshments up there, but everything that inebriates will be remorselessly banished." Mr. Flinn was, in that respect, a true prophet. But his prescience could not tell him that in less than forty years the Masonic Temple, become the Capitol Building, would be almost dwarfed by mightier piles of stones; nor that the Auditorium, which exhausted all superlatives, would be deserted by its opera. Like the designs of the millionaire builders, the eyes of thousands who looked down from the Auditorium Tower or the Masonic 97 CHICAGO S GREAT CENTURY Temple turned usually toward the lake. When they swung the other way, they could descry areas of dusty roofs and little streets where dwelt immense hordes of people who were not so happy. "Over there" lived the accumulations of folk who struggled against the combined problems of race trouble, labor discontent, religious prejudices and bad housing. "Over there" the weekly income was small or nonexistent, families lived in hovels at the mercy of careless landlords, children swarmed the sidewalks or toiled until haggard in ill-lighted shops. Racial lines were con- tinually shifting. The great ensemble scene of immigration now began to include costumes, languages and customs new and disturb- ing to the older elements. The Germans, Irish and Scandinavians were still the most numerous, but the Poles were "coming up" like the Bohemians, and there were first symptoms of the migration from Southern Europe. Among those who disembarked from day coaches were occasional barbarous-looking beings who spoke a tongue that scarcely anyone understood. Also, the negro popula- tion was growing into the thousands. Smart politicians knew how to profit by all this. But, while they were making the most of human misery, others were trying to apply remedies. There was a focal point down along South Halsted Street, not far from where the great fire started. That region was a Babel, a clutter of floundering and persecuted nation- alities, a hive of children. In it stood a gracious old homstead that had belonged to Charles J. Hull. Two young women, Jane Addams and Ellen Gates Starr, went to live there, soon gathering about them students and self-sacrificing workers such as Mrs. Florence Kelley, Mrs. Alzina Stevens and Mrs. Lucy Flower. The "foreigners" viewed with surprise these missionaries who seemed concerned about their woes. The city as a whole was indifferent. Hull House found no mention in booster literature of the period. Now all the taxi-drivers know it. The Hull House group went vigorously into every fight for political reform, and even more earnestly into movements to relieve the lot of sweat-shop workers or to protect children from being used as slaves. They saw in this sort of oppression, as well as in the forming of "boy gangs," the seeds of a hoodlumism that one day might threaten the city. : -. -' r' Copyright, Interstate Photo Company Dearborn Street Looking North Toward Washington Street, 1888 THE SKYLINE BEGINS TO CHANGE But it was not yet time for a "Paddy the Bear" or a "Forty-two gang" in that district. The really vicious slums, with their "gin mills" and rows of brothels, were closer to the rising glories of what is now the Loop. They clustered along the west bank of the river and made a "no-man's land" of the region south of the Board of Trade and along South Clark and South State Streets. There vice and thieving flourished almost unchecked. At election times the inmates were herded to the polls; between campaigns they were let alone, except for blackmail. The city hall sounded the busy signal when reformers spoke up. Segregation of vice was still the social theory. And the underworld throve, only occasionally invaded by a religionist such as Col. George R. Clarke, who founded a mission in a building that had sheltered a low resort called the Pacific Garden. At this time, according to the veracious John J. Flinn, "the entire district from Van Buren Street south to Twenty-second, and from the railroad tracks to and including the east line of State Street, was in the hands of thugs, thieves, murderers and prosti- tutes." But almost contiguous to the lower end of this area ran the fashionable parts of Michigan Avenue and Prairie Avenue where the great houses stood, and a hotel or two which forty years later became headquarters for Capone hoodlums. Other once respectable buildings turned into hang-outs of gunmen more mur- derous than Chicago at its nineteenth century worst could imagine, even in nightmare. From the boiling stew of infamy before 1890 came murders and riots, seductions and holdups. But besides those due to criminal insanity or mere caveman love of fighting — with clubs or bricks rather than revolvers, as a rule — an occasional first-rank crime originated in political or race friction. The murder of Dr. Edward Cronin, for example, the great melodrama of 1889 and following years, sprang from a battle of factions over so remote an issue as the freedom of Ireland. The doctor's body was found in a catch- basin, which imprisoned also secrets of a plot which was never unravelled to its last skein. Carter Harrison was not then in office to help hunt down the murderers. After four terms, called "the reign of hell and Har- rison" by opposition newspapers, he let go of the helm. Chicago 99 CHICAGO S GREAT CENTURY tried out John A. Roche, De Witt Cregier and Hempstead Wash- burne successively. But none of these found an antidote for the virus of crime. 5 One may look upon 1889 as a typical year in its display of the bizarre contrasts which mark Chicago, or any great city. Eighteen- eighty-nine, with its Auditorium, its Hull House opening, its Cronin murder ! In a year like that there would be sixty homicides, and nearly 100 persons would be killed at railroad grade crossings. There would be a dozen suicides by minors! There would be children dying of want, although a Foundlings Home had been running for thirty years. But, while vicious or despairing people made work for the coroner, the more fortunate would be shaping ideals into concrete forms. In 1889 the Newberry Library, gift of W. L. Newberry, had not only emerged victorious from a contest over his will, but was planning to build on the Mahlon Ogden property. It was buying rare books, too. In 1889 John D. Rockefeller made his conditional gift to the Baptists of $600,000 "to found a college," and the new University of Chicago was duly founded. In the same year, the Chicago Theological Seminary laid the corner-stone of a new building. In 1889, people were properly excited over clearing the lake front of unsightly buildings. "The Lake Front for the people!" was the significant cry. In this protest the dear old Exposition Building, whose "healthy though smoke-begrimed red," it was writ- ten, "is gradually fading into a sickly yellow," became a target. So did the Illinois Central and its terminal station. The phrase "all hog railroad" was soon to be coined as a term of reproach. The W. C. T. U. was holding huge conventions. Frances Willard, once of Northwestern University, had founded the tem- perance society and made it nationally strong. Responding to a different sort of aspiration, the Illinois legis- lature, in 1889, authorized the Sanitary District of Chicago. This represented not culture, but stark necessity. The early efforts to solve the problem of a huge, shiftless city and its health had been 100 THE SKYLINE BEGINS TO CHANGE found wanting. That the drinking water was foul was proved not only by the taste but by the fact that nearly 2000 persons were dying each year from typhoid fever. In 1880 the Citizens Asso- ciation had sent up a cry for action ; by 1886 the city council had been forced to act. Within three years the drainage commission — Rudolph Hering, Samuel G. Artingstall and Benizette Williams — had turned in a report. Three more, and there would be a "shovel day," the third since Chicago was a town, breaking ground for a new and mightier sanitary canal that would turn the current of the river "uphill" more forcibly than the old ditch, and, surely, surely, would ensure the completion of that ship channel to the Mississippi. "What we do," said Engineer Lyman Cooley in his address, "is but the beginning. . . . Machines will vanish in rust, the proud- est monuments of man will sink to rubbish heaps, while this (the canal) goes on as nature's self, an added feature to Mother Earth as though it had always been." What else in 1889? Well, His Honor Mayor Cregier picks up his pen and signs the appointment of 250 citizens to obtain for Chicago, and bring to victory, a project still very vague but based upon the coming 400th anniversary of the discovery of America. The celebration has been discussed since 1885, at least. It has taken its time. Now the leaders of Chicago must doff their coats and contend with New York, Washington and St. Louis for the honor (and profit) of being host to the world. There is a battle of petitions, delegations, and other "pressure." Newspapers in all the cities roar at each other. In New York, Editor Dana of The Sun, irked by the boasts of Chicago, invents the term "Windy City." At length Congress votes. Chicago wins ! 101 CHAPTER XIII Hail Columbus! 1 AND so, six thousand citizens, organized to the last vice-chair- l man, took up the heavy task. Armies of salesmen went to work. Millions were raised by selling stock, bonds, and Columbian half dollars. Chicago pledged $10,000,000 when it found New York would go that high to get the Fair. Then Daniel H. Burn- ham, with his board of architects, his landscapers, sculptors, and painters, put up the buildings. And the exposition was formally opened in the spring of 1893, a year later than it should have been to conform with the anniversary it celebrated. It was the World's Columbian Exposition. It was not the "Chicago World's Fair." But in the mind of the average man, Eugene Field was right when he wrote "Columbian Exposition! It is the World's Fair,' in spite of sesquipedalian wise-acres." There it stood, a city of buildings mammoth in size, attended by state structures, concessions, a Midway, and a fringe of this and that. On the sands or clay of half -developed Jackson Park there had gone up, within two years, this array of classic forms in a pushing, frontier town caring little that Greece ever existed. Within view of the smoke of the stockyards, and not far north of the fuming steel works, appeared suddenly, as it seemed, fragile children of a past architectural age, dressed all in white. And in them practically all the nations set up samples of the handsomest or most original things their civilization had produced. There was incongruity about some of this, but there was unques- tionable beauty. Temporary, even fleeting, was the show which the world brought to Chicago. But, while it lasted, as President H. N. Higinbotham said in his report, "unlike the vision of St. John, it did really have a material existence." The exposition was under construction for more than two years. It enlisted New York architects such as Richard W. Hunt, McKim, 102 Water Gate" at the World's Fair, 1893 HAIL COLUMBUS ! Mead and White, and George B. Post ; a Boston firm, Peabody and Stearns; one from Kansas City, Van Brunt and Howe; three Chicagoans, Henry Ives Cobb, S. S. Beman and Louis Sullivan. Over this group reigned urbanely as director of works Mr. Burn- ham, whose partner, John Root, died just before ground was broken. Ernest R. Graham became assistant director. Mr. Burnham worked harder than anybody. He was abroad at daybreak, driving about among the skeletons of buildings, holding staff conferences as early as 7 a. m. Others labored to their utmost. The troops of mechanics and craftsmen faced, for the most part undaunted, not only gruelling toil but peril. Those vast buildings called for the labors of a Hercules; nor had engineering science made the advance it shows today. And then, there were the winters! Storm, cold, slush! Once an avalanche of snow descended from the roof of the Manufactures Building upon a lower level and ruined practically an acre of glass. It had been seen from the outset that '92 would arrive too speedily. So the act of congress was made to provide for the opening on May 1, 1893, and for a dedication ceremony on Oct. 21, 1892, which was figured, under the present calendar, as the anni- versary of the day when Columbus stepped ashore on a small West Indies island. When dedication day came, the grounds were in crude shape; the Manufactures Building, scene of the ceremony, was hardly finished. But so great was the interest, so thoroughly had the Fair been advertised by salesmanship and by inter-city quarrels, that the speakers faced a crowd that was as enormous as it was uncomfortable. "Silver-tongued" orators drew people in the '90s, and this occasion was honored by two of the most famous, Henry Watterson and Chauncey Depew, who, despite their power, were not easy to hear in a building covering thirty-one acres. There were other lures of the period, such as the Thomas Orchestra and a huge chorus. Harriet Monroe read parts of her "Columbian Ode." Mr. Higinbotham, who had become president after Lyman J. Gage resigned the burden and George F. Baker found his health inadequate, held the gavel, while Vice-President Morton, Mayor Washburne, Mrs. Potter Palmer, head of the board of lady man- agers, and Thomas W. Palmer — not a relative, but head of the 103 CHICAGO S GREAT CENTURY National Commission — played leading parts, as did George R. Davis, the director-general. Mrs. Palmer, the city's social leader, drew special attention as she spoke of the Woman's Building, and described how machinery had relieved women from drudgery. "Women as a sex have been liberated," said she. "They now have time to think, to be educated, to plan and pursue careers of their own choosing. . . . Even more important than the discov- ery of Columbus is the fact that the general government has just discovered women." At which there must have been applause from any women of the pioneer era who, in old age, were listening to Mrs. Palmer's words. After fireworks in the evening the throng found its way out through the sketchy beginnings of Frederick Olmstead's landscap- ing, paused to marvel at the great ghosts of unfinished buildings all about — and went home to wait until spring. Before that season arrived, there were symptoms throughout the country, not omitting Chicago, of the "panic of 1893." The epi- demic of crumbling values and shaky banks swept westward in time to become a dark portent for the success of the Fair. The very men who most adorned the Exposition board were most preoccu- pied by "troubles downtown." This, however, did not daunt those who were racing to the opening day as much as did the difficulties of construction, the transportation problems, and delay in arrival of exhibits. There was shaking of heads even among plucky trustees ; some of the newspapers became skeptical. Workmen struck, and a settlement on a "closed shop" basis had to be made. But to every query, "Will you make it in time ?" Mr. Burnham answered, "Yes." And to every urge to set back the date of opening Mr. Higinbotham and his board replied, "No." The rail- roads were spurred to effort; the Illinois Central tracks were raised; the South Side Elevated ("Alley L"), Chicago's first, and the street-car lines were given impetus. The Fair must be opened on May 1. And opened it was. 3 Those who flocked to the long-awaited spectacle were rewarded. If the writer may be permitted a quotation from a previous work: 104 HAIL COLUMBUS ! "They saw an Administration building with an exquisite dome higher than that of the Capitol at Washington, and in front of this the MacMonnies fountain, with its graceful rowing maidens — acclaimed by St. Gaudens and others as the masterpiece of master- pieces. They saw other fountains, one on each side of the Mac- Monnies, then the lustrous Grand Basin, with its peristyle at the eastern end, and the Liberty statue upraised, but shrouded, waiting to admire itself in the mirror of the basin. There were the vast creamy flanks of Machinery Hall, Agriculture Hall, the Manufac- tures and Mining Buildings; to the northwest, the Wooded Island, the dome of the Arts Palace, and a city of structures in which the classic motive faded out among bold and varied conceptions expressed in State buildings." The White City, now all but complete, simply stunned those who saw it for the first time. It was as though a magician had brought down from some dreamed-of paradise a city of pearl and had laid it gently upon the sands. Who cared whether the Grecian revival was logical, or whether Sullivan's whirling conceptions in the Transportation Building harmonized with milder patterns else- where ? No lay observer, perhaps, realized that in the Arts Palace, Charles B. Atwood had designed the "most beautiful building since the Parthenon." The entire array quickened the pulses, like music. And Chicagoans were justified in forgetting, for the moment, that the buildings were the creation largely of out-of-town architects and that the exposition had to do with an event in national, not local, history. "We did it!" those people felt. And indeed, in the last analysis, it was Chicago that had done it. Between dedication day and "grand opening" there had been a national election and an inauguration. Grover Cleveland was back in the White House. In Chicago, whose mayoralty in the World's Fair year was well worth striving for, Carter Harrison had been returned. Perhaps he risked something in seeking a fifth term, but he rolled up the largest plurality of his career. So it was these two well-known figures who represented nation and city in opening the exposition. Possibly never had either seen such a day. Nor had Chicago. Conspicuous in the procession to 105 CHICAGO S GREAT CENTURY the grounds^ consisting of more than twenty carriages, escorted by bands and soldiers, were not only the officials of the Fair and the governor of Illinois, John P. Altgeld, but real nobility from Spain. (After all, the Fair was concerned with Columbus.) In the carriage beside Mrs. Potter Palmer rode the Duke and Duchess of Veragua, with their son and daughter and a brother of the duke — belonging to the line of Isabella's admiral. Proceeding along that "sideshow" street, The Midway, the celeb- rities managed to get themselves seated in proper ranking order on a platform in front of the Administration Building, overlooking the beautiful court of honor. Before them was massed a crowd estimated at several hundred thousand, but looking like a million toadstools — for it was raining, and umbrellas were up. Presently they were furled ; the sun glistened upon the white facades. But order was impossible. There was a madness to see and hear; and the stronger of that multitude simply pushed aside the weaker. "Husbands lifted their wives up shoulder high, so they could breathe. Crying children were held aloft. Women with torn clothes climbed to the press-stand and tried to clamber over the railing ; reporters dragged to safety some who were fainting.' ' Upon such a scene the dignified lords and ladies of Spain must have looked with amazement. President Cleveland's aplomb, how- ever,, was not upset. Introduced by Director General Davis, the president stepped forward and in calm tones made his carefully and ponderously worded address. Then he laid a chubby finger on an electric key, which stood on the table before him. Pressing it, he started revolving the wheels of the engine which was the heart of the Fair's power. A whirr began in all the buildings. At the same moment the fountains sprang to life. Flags rushed to the top of masts, and salvos were fired in the harbor. And the white walls of the immense temples of agriculture, machinery, transportation, all echoed back deafening cheers. Not only did the buildings overawe beholders, but their con- tents baffled efforts to see more than a small part, even upon repeated visits. Never before had there been such a concentration of the artistic or useful products of earth and men, to win rosettes 106 HAIL COLUMBUS ! and medals. There had been great displays in Paris in 1889 and in Philadelphia in 1876, but the nations had not spent so liberally ; and besides, at Chicago appeared manifestations of that inventive skill which made so triumphant the latter part of the nineteenth century. Even without going inside the buildings, spectators could watch some of those discoveries or improvements in operation. The intramural railroad which encircled the grounds gave them a fore- taste of elevated roads, electrically driven by a "third rail," that would soon seem commonplace. And as people looked down into the White City they saw its whiteness dazzlingly emphasized by electric lighting very powerful for the period. Incandescent light- ing, done by the Westinghouse Company, and arc lamps furnished by the companies just united in the General Electric Co., blazed simply "everywhere." From each corner of the Manufactures building shot the rays of a searchlight that could be seen, it was said, eighty-five miles away. The light was thrown from a fifty- foot mirror with a surface intensity of 194,000,000 candle power. Such figures astounded even many experts, who were equally impressed when they were told that in the power plant the Westinghouse Company had twelve 10,000 light alternating current dynamos, requiring about 1000 horsepower apiece, and the largest switchboard yet constructed. The companies which had formed the General Electric Company installed Edison lights on the intra- mural railway, in the sample battleship that formed an exhibit, and built two electric fountains in the grand basin. On a "Tower of Light" in the Electricity Building shone a thousand vari-colored Edison lamps, and the Western Electric Company produced a current that lighted different series of lamps, one at a time. This company also demonstrated long distance telephony. People heard concerts from New York ! Two pioneers of Chicago's public utilities were concerned in the wonders of '93 : B. E. Sunny and Samuel Insull. Mr. Sunny, who had been superintendent of the Chicago Telephone Company as early as 1879, was president of the intramural railway. Mr. Insull headed the Chicago Edison Company. Here was to be seen, in 1893, says the World's Fair official his- tory, "the largest and most complete central station for lighting ever 107 erected in the United States. " Indeed, it was three times as power- ful as the installation in all the rest of Chicago. There were 127,000 electric lights in the grounds, and the main basin was encircled by 1650 incandescent lamps. A writer of the period burst into rhapso- dies about the "superb enchantments of that greatest laboratory of science. . . . An omnipotent agency answers the behests of the wizards of the volt and ampere." Yet in so short a time, as great cities grew, even this marvel dwindled ! As for engines, the supremacy of 1893 over 1876 was illustrated in the fact that the Corliss Engine, a great feature of the Philadel- phia Centennial — later of Pullman's model town — was surpassed in horsepower sixteen times by the Allis engine that "drove" Chicago's Fair. In Machinery hall spectators gazed upon wierd monsters of the tandem-compound, or triple-expansion, or duplex, type; tur- bines, oil engines, machines which "miraculously" made their own gas from gasoline and whose explosions were created by an electric spark ! There was a hundred-foot-wide tank of water that was used only to demonstrate how scores of pumps could suck up the water and return it in jets or streams. There were water wheels. There were hydraulic presses. Locomotives of new and "giant" build (a decapod weighing 195,000 pounds!) were shown. There were refrigerating machines and fire extinguishers and fire engines. There was a traction truck, to use at fires, spelling eventually the disappearance of the fire horse. There were lathes, forges, ham- mers, saws. There were printing-presses of the latest pattern. There were mailers, and there were cash registers, adding machines,* type-writers, and sewing-machines. There were bicycles galore, including a "safety"; no wonder, since the '80s had seen 4,000,000 bicyle riders in the United States. And in contrast with devices used in pleasure or commerce was one to be devoted to "pure science" ; the great Yerkes telescope, gift of Charles T. Yerkes, the traction baron. It had as yet no lenses, but before many years it would be searching celestial worlds. "Edison's kinetescope" was on display, described as a "specially *Dorr E. Felt, of Chicago, had perfected the comptometer six years before the Fair. 108 HAIL COLUMBUS ! constructed camera and phonograph working in perfect unison. The camera produces forty-six pictures a second. By thus rapidly photographing figures in action upon a sensitive film and adapting the phonograph to catch any sounds emanating from them, both sound and motion are reproduced." (Within a few years two Chicagoans, George K. Spoor and A. H. Ahmet, were making primitive "movies" and uttering rosy predictions which few people wholly believed.) Amid all the revolving, hissing and clanking in the World's Fair buildings a man of far-seeing mind might have looked for two inventions that have since become ordinary — but he would have looked in vain. The automobile ? There were on exhibit no "steam or electric carriages for use on common roads," to quote the official history, though "a Daimler road carriage driven by petroleum made occasional trips around the grounds," and it is casually remarked that "an electric carriage also made its appearance." Aviation? It "had not even reached the stage of successful experimentation. It exists only in theory," wrote the historian of '93. But the science of shooting at people existed in fact. It had developed to such a point that the Krupp Company required a whole building for itself to exhibit the great guns. The champion among these exhibits was a coast-defense gun with a weight of some one hundred and twenty-two tons. It fired a projectile weighing 2200 pounds, with a striking energy of 18,600 metric tons. It could "pierce the heaviest armor of ships." A special truck had been required to bring this monster to Chicago, where it sat proudly among 12-inch naval guns, coast-defense weapons, quick-firing artillery, armor plate exhibits, and a lot else. They were all dwarfs beside the "naval Goliath" with its forty-six foot barrel length. Ancestor of "Big Bertha" ? 6 When it came to the "arts of peace," such a feast was spread that many people gorged themselves and did not recover for weeks afterward. Having merely remarked that in such exhibits the work of ancient peoples lay at one end of the scale, and that of inventive moderns at the other, one must refer the reader, for a real survey, to the volume on "exhibits" in the official history. It is a tome of 109 CHICAGO S GREAT CENTURY 520 pages, in which one reads between the lines the eager compe- tition for prizes. Turning over these pages, one's eye falls upon casual items, such as : Pavilions made of corn, rye, wheat, grass, with rosettes and garlands interwoven. An Illinois farm-home landscape, with houses, meadows, and woods, made from one hundred and twenty-five kinds of cereals and grasses. Nine-foot timothy grass; oats from a reclaimed tidal marsh; 400 specimens of Colorado wheat; California banners showing a 40,000,000 bushel wheat crop in 1892, and barley 15,000,000 bushels. Agriculture displays from Mexico, Canada, South America, Algeria, Russia, South Africa, The Himalayas, Bessarabia. Dozens of prepared cereals, patent foods, bakery novelties, some of them pioneers in the field. Cured meats from the Chicago stockyards. A huge statue of Columbus and heroic copies of the Venus of Milo, carved out of chocolate. The largest cheese ever seen, ten tons in weight, sent by Canada. Cigarettes from America ; cocoons from Japan. Live-stock shows ; horse shows ; poultry shows ; dog shows. Forest growths ; California sequoias ; a Michigan logging camp, all complete. Twelve hundred wine exhibits from Spain; The French wines, from Medoc to champagne ; German wines out of 270 vineyards. A mounted armoured knight from California, made all of prunes. Rose plantations, with a trellis covered with the Pride of Wash- ington and Baltimore Belles. The greenhouse, 18,000 orchids; rhododendrons and azaleas, chrysanthemums of all tints ; gladioli, lilies ; an "old New York Garden." The "Columbus egg," turned on end and made to spin by rotary current — magic to the "natives." French tapestries ; the Gobelins, including "The Godchild of the Fairies," valued at $119,000; gold quartz from fifteen counties in California, silver statue of Justice from Montana ; amethysts from 110 hail columbus! Minnesota ; garnets from Utah ; a diamond-washing plant, running just as in Cape Colony ; masses of copper from Michigan. Limoges China; Sevres china, Lambeth pottery; Berlin porce- lain; ebony from Saxony; Holland delft; a life-size statue of Leonidas, from Belgium ; a century vase, made of 2,000 ounces of silver; the largest yellow diamond in the U. S., sent by Tiffany; gold and silver caskets, shields, vases, from England, France, Denmark, Russia. Clocks self-winding ; a master clock ; clocks with chimes ; French watches, Swiss watches ; a clock showing the hour, minute, second, day of week and month, phases of the moon ; automaton pianos. Model tenements ; peptonized foods ; domestic science, and how a family could live on $500 a year. Platinum, iridium, osmium, rhodium, and others; a nugget of platinum weighing 158 ounces! Russian cabinets with bright-colored birds on a background of lapis lazuli from the imperial quarries at Peterhof, "from which (1893) the czar takes $275,000 worth of articles annually." In the Fine Arts Palace, 10,040 exhibits, half of them oil paint- ings, the others water colors, etchings, drawings, etc. George Inness, Frank Millet, W. M. Chase, John S. Sargent; Verestcha- gin ; Millais, Orchardson, Maddox Brown ; Delacroix, Meissonier, Ingres, Degas, Manet — to mention a handful only. In the Midway, the Irish village, the German village, old Vienna, the Moorish palace with its "chamber of horrors," villages Algerian and Tunisian, Chinese and Japanese ; an Egyptian Tem- ple ; South Sea Islanders and native Dahomey houses ; the world's Congress of Beauty; "Little Egypt." The Ferris wheel ! two hundred and fifty feet in diameter, with an axle said to be the largest piece of steel ever forged ; thirty-six passenger cars. To picture the overpowering effect of such things, and thousands more, would have taken a greater poet even than the Whitman who wrote, for the Centennial of '76 : "Here shall you trace in flowing operation, In every state of practical, busy movement, the rills of civilization. * * * Learning, the sciences, shall all be here, None shall be slighted, none but shall here be honored, helped, exalted." Ill CHICAGO S GREAT CENTURY 7 But the opening weeks of the Columbian fair were somewhat dismal. The first day, with its crowds, was followed by days when Columbian guards and wheel chair boys had little to do. The financial collapse had become serious. There was an argument, also an injunction suit, over Sunday closing; settled in favor of opening. The month of May brought only 1,050,037 paid admis- sions, with nearly half as many "deadheads." In June and July, however, after the schools and colleges closed and the fame of the fair had spread, there were a million and a half more; in August three and a half million paid; in September 4,659,871; and in the great month of October, 6,818,884. The earlier and "dull" months brought heavy thought about the expenditures, which were declared by an examining committee to be nothing less than "wasteful." A halt was called. Yet the final accounting showed that the $26,000,000 of expenditures by the Columbian Exposition board were exceeded by the receipts, and the stock- holders reaped 10 cents on the dollar. The multitude recked naught of the expense. It was happy. Vast programs of music and oratory, mighty "congresses," were staged, the latter dealing with religion, with the progress of women, with social welfare, with ethnology. A new thrill per week! . . . The caravels, the Viking ship, "special days" devoted to nationalities, societies, anniversaries. And royalty ! The memory of the Varaguas was dimmed when there arrived in the midst of a city still largely provincial, still given to sneering at pomp, the Infanta Eulalia, come officially to represent the little king Alfonso (her nephew) and the queen regent. She stormed the East, with smiles for Washington officials and New York millionaires. Soon she arrived in a Chicago rail- road station, where a big official committee awaited her, including aldermen blushingly hatless. Carter Harrison, sporting a silk hat for the first time in his life, said the newspapers, stepped forward and kissed the hand of the blond princess ! There followed, on her part, visits official and unofficial to the exposition. She trod a carpet strewn with pansies into the Spanish Building, entering the door (for luck right foot foremost) and royally declared the exhibit open. She attended formal receptions, 112 «:« -, HAIL COLUMBUS ! dinners, and a breakfast at the mayor's home. She visited the Midway incognito, escorted by Spanish Consul Hobart Chatfield- Taylor. The newspapers headlined, "Princess Smokes a Ciga- rette/' And she left a bad taste in the mouths of the social leaders by turning up her nose at a reception given at the home of Mrs. Potter Palmer, in the hotel of whose husband the Infanta was staying. An "innkeeper," so Spanish royalty considered him. "She was constrained at last," wrote Mrs. William J. Calhoun in "Chi- cago Yesterdays," "to put in an appearance at the reception, but she arrived an hour late and she departed outrageously early, mak- ing no response meanwhile to the greetings of the guests as they were presented." The city really breathed easier after she was gone. It turned to other events, of which the most terrible was the fatal "Cold Storage warehouse fire," and the most astounding "Chicago Day," anniversary of the fire of '71. An all-day, all-evening pageantry was carried out, celebrating incidents in Chicago history and much beside. More than 700,000 people swarmed the grounds, drove police to despair, bruised each other in the crush or lost their children. And then the Fair drew rapidly to a close, to a triumphant cele- bration into the midst of which crashed a tragedy : The assassina- tion of "our Carter," fifth-term mayor. He had been raised to orifice and thrust into the front seat during a summer of grandeur, only to die. 113 CHAPTER XIV And Afterward — 1 "XJINETY-THREE" was a peak. It was more—a Great *■ ^ Divide, up one side of which toiled Chicago during the nineteenth century 4 On the other side lay the twentieth. Now, definitely, the pioneer city and the "Garden City" were to be left behind, while even the more modern Chicago which sprang up after '71, would soon seem antique. The World's Fair vanished. Its glories, even the majority of its frescoes and sculptured inscrip- tions, were dissipated, and the huge buildings still standing long- after the closing day went up in a cyclone of flame. But during the six months when the Exposition flourished before peoples' eyes, it roused Chicago to an exalted idea of what a city could be like. It stirred other American communities as well. "The World's Fair," D. H. Burnham wrote, "was the beginning, in our day and country, of the orderly arrangement of extensive public grounds and buildings." Chicago in the '90s felt a new stimulus in its blood. Loyalty to it was redoubled. . Citizens trained to unified action by work on the Fair, felt "we can do anything," and many a city monu- ment (together with the vast Chicago Plan of a latter period) was the result. But this golden age, if one may call it that, was accompanied by various distresses, by explosions which made peo- ple wring their hands at the same time that they congratulated each other. The exposition had brought to Chicago great hordes of strangers. People with titles and medals were a very small part of them. Besides workmen who found temporary but well-paid jobs there were any number of small merchants, peddlers of trinkets, not to speak of "con men," pickpockets, and panderers. For all of these unstable elements the "bottom dropped out of things." The show was over. And winter came on. 114 • AND AFTERWARD Having added to its normal amount of poverty that extra popu- lation of floaters, the city had to turn from rejoicings to grief. The World's Fair has been blamed for this, but without much reason. The situation was simply 1857 and 1873 over again; but the city now had more than a million population, instead of 100,000 or 200,000. And it had gained this size without paying due atten- tion to what was happening to its poor, and without checking its crime. Hence, even while magnificent new buildings were rising, there was famine in the by-streets, men were sleeping in corridors of the city hall, and bread-lines half a block long crept toward every door of relief. Now were all these venerable and big-hearted institutions, such as the Foundlings Home, the Home for the Friendless, the Old Peoples Home, the Newsboys Refuge, the Relief and Aid Society, besieged beyond their power to help. Despite all effort, people died of cold and hunger. Children grasped at crusts, and men warmed themselves on patches of sidewalks that had a bit of heat coming from below. It is at such times that people turn upon society with a perma- nent snarl. A winter passed, fraught with distress in all the big cities, and in the spring Jacob Coxey's "army" began moving upon the National capital. That straggling march of unemployed, forerun- ner of "hunger parades" such as are seen even in our own times, attained Washington. On the very day when "Gen." Coxey and "Lieut.-Gen." Greene were arrested amid disorder in the Capitol grounds, a Chicago brigadier, "Gen." Randall, set out from Chi- cago. He wore riding costume and bestrode a horse. Behind came a carriage containing a woman adherent and her two little daughters, all dressed in white and waving white silk flags. "Forward, march!" roared the "general." The ragged troop fell in behind and moved toward Michigan Avenue. Crowds lined the streets, applauding or jeering. On the Art Institute steps were massed hundreds, who yelled a greet- ing as banners passed, inscribed : "Right or Justice." "An injury to one is an injury to all." "No charity, but work and fair wages." 115 CHICAGO S GREAT CENTURY On they hobbled over the Indiana line, pressing eastward until the movement collapsed. In the meantime a real threat to Chicago's peace had been gath- ering, and in the summer of 1894 it turned into reality. Out southward lay George M. Pullman's model town, with its factories, its system of landlordism, its social life largely subserv- ient to one man. The depression continued, and the Pullman Company reduced wages, though continuing to collect rents. So, after a lot of conferences, and mostly with regret, some of the workmen struck, and the shops were closed. To the multitude of idle in Chicago and environs there were now added the crafts- men and their families in paternalistic Pullman; and soon there were new "bread-line cases" to win the sympathy of Jane Addams and other social workers. In that year came to Chicago one who had it in him to become a leader in sympathetic citizenship) — Dr. Graham Taylor, the founder of Chicago Commons. He tells in his "Pioneering on Social Frontiers" what happened after the Pullman plant shut down: "A month later the American Railway union held its first an- nual convention in Chicago, having been organized a year pre- viously 'to include railway employes born of white parents in one great brotherhood/ Some of the Pullman employes, hitherto unor- ganized, hastily joined this very general sort of a union. . . . Then this railway union, to support these new members, resorted to the boycott of Pullman cars wherever found in use here and elsewhere." Chicago was thrown suddenly into the chaos of a transportation tieup. Eugene V. Debs headed the A. R. U., and though he spoke against violence he could not prevent it. "From Chicago to San Francisco, the A. R. U. men 'cut out' the Pullmans, the managers discharged the men, then every trade allied with the union quit work." When companies tried to run trains, mobs stoned the cars, or overturned them, and ran howling alongside trains operated with militia aboard the locomotives. Torches were set to box-cars 116 AND AFTERWARD in yards. "The revolution is here," wailed some citizens for the tenth time — and not the last. With the transportation center of the country thus menaced, President Cleveland, setting himself directly against the policy of Gov. Altgeld, proclaimed that the marauders must subside. The governor insisted that the State of Illinois could take care of its own quarrels; nevertheless, the president ordered federal troops to the scene. There were final battles, some of them sanguinary, there was a stern federal court injunction, there was a trial of Debs and others for conspiracy — they were found guilty after a long legal struggle — and at last peace was restored to a city that greatly needed it. Toward this sort of explosion, then, led in the long run the vision of the palace car genius that he could set up a pretty town and run it his own way. With real sadness, in his later years, he looked back upon what seemed mostly a failure of his plan. Dr. Taylor pertinently alludes to a review of the strike by Jane Addams, in which, as he puts it, she "sympathetically compared Mr. Pullman's good intentions and the bitter disappointment he suffered from what seemed to him the ingratitude of the people for whose welfare he had ventured so much with the somewhat similar experience of Shakespeare's King Lear with his daughter Cordelia." Such spectacles as the haggard and homeless of 1893, such wars as the railway strike of 1894, were blows to the self-esteem of the city that had so gorgeously entertained the world; but they were good for the soul. Social agencies already existing were roused to greater zeal, and new ones sprang up. Scholars like Dr. Albion W. Small not only found Chicago a laboratory, but threw them- selves into its problems. And out of the need of "getting together" came the founding of the Civic Federation to stand beside the veteran Citizens Association in work for a better city. Lyman J. Gage headed the Federation, which drew to its banner civic leaders and wealthy people of all types, from Marshall Field to Emil G. Hirsch, and from Jane Addams to Mrs. Potter Palmer. After the assassination of Harrison, known as a believer in a "wide-open town," the city was practically as "wide-open" as before. Not 117 CHICAGO S GREAT CENTURY only that, but it had become a prey of comparatively new political groups. An orgy of franchise-selling, grafting, and "special priv- ilege" went on under the roof of the dusty old city hall, and in offices of some corporations. The name of Charles T. Yerkes, dictator of traction, became synonymous with "grabs"; nor was he alone. Switch-track privileges, alley occupations, charters for public utilities, were seized or bought, right and left. Battling on the one hand for better housing and cleaner morals, the Civic Federation, on the other hand, became bound to reform the munic- ipal government, and rout "grey wolf" aldermen. The Municipal Voters League, first headed by George E. Cole, was the result. And in 1897, so rapidly went the whirligig of politics, the occu- pant of the mayor's chair was a man friendly to the contest against theft of the people's rights, and he was also the heir to the policies of Carter Harrison — for he was Carter Harrison's eldest son and namesake. Let us return to the year of the World's Fair, and see what new edifices of stone and marble adorned the picture. For, after all, these strikes and those boils on the neck of society were transitory. The grander Chicago which began in the '90s endured. We look at two institutions which were direct outgrowths of the Columbian Exposition. The first grew in the minds of some men when they saw what a treasury of things educational, historic or curious was being assembled for the six months' exhibition. Some- thing like a permanent museum should come of it, said these men. One of them was Edward E. Ayer, capitalist and student of early American civilization. He and a group just as potent decided, before the World's Fair was fairly launched, that there should be a museum; and so that it might properly recall the city's most radiant event, they named it Columbian. The interest of Marshall Field, who had subscribed to the largest block of World's Fair stock, was enlisted by Mr. Ayer late in 1893, and the merchant gave $1,000,000. Already it had been decided that the beautiful Art Palace, solidly built so that its valuable contents should not be imperilled, must remain in Jackson Park. Just the place for the new museum! Into its great halls were moved World's Fair 118 AND AFTERWARD exhibits suitable to its purpose, as well as purchasable, and the development of a mighty collection was begun. The other important legacy of the Fair, if one means buildings, was the present home of the Art Institute. It was begun before the Fair and finished, minus later additions, in 1893. The institution, a seedling in the 70s, a plant nursed through the '80s by Charles L. Hutchinson, Martin A. Ryerson and others, was well developed and flourishing when people began to plan the Columbian Exposition. In the charmingly designed building occupied for these last forty years by the Chicago Club, the Art Institute had fine pictures: works by Rembrandt, Van Dyck, Jules Breton, Rubens, Velasquez, and other masters ; and it enjoyed the support of auxiliaries such as the Antiquarian Society, woman's organization dating from 1878. With the World's Fair approaching, it was the time for a Big Move. The exposition trustees, having decided upon Jackson Park as their stamping ground instead of the lake front — which many people favored — were in a mood to recompense downtown Chicago by helping the Institute. So they gave it $200,000. The "old" building was sold to the Chicago Club for $275,000, and Mr. Hutchinson went out among his friends and collected $55,000. In due time the huge oblong building, with its rich cornices, panelings, and galleries, adorned the lake front on the spot where the once prized Interstate Exposition building had stood. "Exquisite! Electric lighted throughout!" guide books raved. Moving both collections and art school was a heavy job for W. M. R. French, then and for many years director, but all was accomplished in time to impress many World's Fair visitors who came to admire the city proper as well as the White City. The Art Institute, thanks to a special legislative concession. became the first and only permanent building on the lake front north of 12th Street. In the way of other structures stood an injunction which went through the testing-tube of the state supreme court more than once. It was the work of A. Montgomery Ward, mail-order pioneer, who for years had insisted that the conditions under which the government ceded the lake front for park purposes be adhered to strictly. Through thick and thin, unhurt by sneers of "watchdog," Mr. Ward waved his injunction every time the shore was threatened. He was really in harmony with those con- 119 CHICAGO S GREAT CENTURY ceptions of an earlier decade, which had come to see the folly of lining so magnificent a shore with commercial and miscellaneous structures. After the World's Fair, with everyone more eager for a beautiful city and more intelligent about it too, the development of the lake front became a real enterprise. It would take a long time, and would need the full organization of the Chicago Plan, fifteen years later, to succeed notably. Meanwhile, if not in the downtown district, at least in two parks bordering the lake, the lovely curving shore was coming into its own. Jackson Park, divested of the Exposition buildings, was being shaped into boulevards, rich landscaping, and bathing-beaches. Lincoln Park, having conquered the problem of fortifying the sandy rim of the lake against heavy waves, was a well-developed beauty spot, with groves enclosing fine statues, and a sweep of water frontage that gave to its new Lake Shore drive extension an outlook as though upon the Mediterranean. There were men of vivid imagination who watched all these things grow, saw what they might become in the twentieth century — and did more than make speeches. Yet, when there was talk of developing a certain section lying not far north of the river, east of Pine Street (now north Michigan Avenue) and south of the Oak Street "bay," people wrinkled their foreheads. On a piece of that sandy tract a grizzled ship-captain with a fixed idea that he owned it was hanging on. He, Capt. George W. Streeter, had clung there like a 'possum on a branch since the '80s ; neither sharpshooters nor writs had dislodged him. A rem- iniscence of rude "squatter" days, he was able to remain a good many years more, until, like other Chicago primitives, he had to surrender to a new kind of epoch. 6 In those '90s the city was changing fast; faster than financial prosperity was returning to the nation. Chicago was in the valley of a reactionary depression, and there was a spectre called bimetal- lism that worried people. However, it was a period when the concrete results of the making of fortunes, and giving part of them, by Titans of an earlier era, were taking form. Now was the time when the Newberry Library took possession of its new building on 120 AND AFTERWARD the "Mahlon Ogden lot," and moved its fine historical, literary and music collection into this imposing home, which it still occupies. It was under the trusteeship of E. W. Blatchford and William H. Bradley. William F. Poole was its librarian. In those years also, the will of John Crerar, grown wealthy as railway supply man during the boom in transportation, gave to the city another library, technical in character, which could not have its own building for a good many years. And the Public Library, whose inheritance was a long tradition instead of immense money legacies (though Hiram Kelly gave it $125,000) got ready to erect a structure on Michigan Avenue that would be permanent and beautiful. It was built on the site of old Dearborn Park, which had seen no building since the Sanitary Fairs of the Civil War, and which was denuded of trees by the flames of 71. The new library in 1892 had got as far as basement and two stories. Chairman Shortall, of the trustees, assured the city of "such true architectural skill and good taste that it shall stand forever as a source of just pride." The promise was kept. But, what with mosaics and marble, what with providing a home for the Grand Army of the Republic — to get over a legislative commitment — it was five years before the great building was complete. By that time both the Historical Society and the Academy of Sciences had new buildings ; the latter given by Mathew Laflin. Business edifices were rising on all sides. The Loop (which was not yet a "loop") had acquired, among others, the Old Colony, Security, Teutonic and Insurance Exchange buildings, the new Marshall Field retail store, the Schlesinger & Mayer (now the Carson Pirie Scott & Co.) building, one of Louis Sullivan's master- pieces, and the Rand, McNally structure, built soon enough to house the World's Fair Commission. The Rand, McNally building had adventurous construction — steel beams encased in hollow tile, and terra cotta. On Michigan Avenue the Chicago Athletic Associ- ation put up its building on that frontage, first of the really modern club buildings. Down the street, the Auditorium got its tall Annex — and so it went. But over these tall roofs, and indeed over the city as a whole, hung a cloud that made many people unhappy, and blackened the white flanks of the new castles. It was a real cloud, mark of the 121 CHICAGO S GREAT CENTURY soft coal smoke of a busy town. This evil had been discerned as early as 1881, when an ordinance was passed against "emission of dense smoke from the smokestack of any boat or locomotive, or from any chimney. " But not much was done during the "elegant eighties. " In the early '90s, on the other hand, there was a Society for the Prevention of Smoke, with Walter L. Fisher its attorney. It did not last long, nor entirely prevent smoke during the World's Fair, but it kept alive a subject of talk and effort which lasted three decades, and was still more or less present even in 1932. Out on the level land of Hyde Park, lonesome except for old suburban homesteads and World's Fair "flats," there was growing in the '90s a group of stone buildings with red-tile roofs which were not so much afflicted by the smoke nuisance. These were the halls of the "new University of Chicago." The Baptist project for which the bounty of John D. Rockefeller flowed had become a university enterprise as phenomenal as Chicago itself. William Rainey Harper, the first president, not only kept the founder inter- ested and open-handed, but he and helpers such as Dr. T. W. Good- speed went among Chicago citizens, strove with them, and won them. Pioneer names like those of Silas B. Cobb, William B. Ogden (whose will was contested for fourteen years), and Jerome Beecher appeared on lists of donors. Marshall Field gave land and a fortune. Charles T. Yerkes completed his gift for the great telescope. Martin A. Ryerson, Sidney A. Kent, and George C. Walker presented funds and their names duly appeared on build- ings. Miss Helen Culver, so long business manager for Charles J. Hull, financed an entire group of biological buildings in memory of Mr. Hull. By 1895 Mr. Rockefeller had given $7,425,000; the Chicagoans, $11,625,000. Such outpouring of money for an American university in so short a time had seldom been seen. But other universities in Chicago were reaping results of the city's 19th century wealth. Lake Forest, to the north, was growing in resources. Northwestern, in Evanston, was advancing rapidly under President Henry Wade Rogers, whose term — 1890 to 1900 — saw the property of the long- lived Methodist institution increase from $2,000,000 to $5,000,000 122 AND AFTERWARD in value. And soon the university would acquire the Tremont House, with its memories of big political caucuses, as its down- town headquarters. It was a good time to obtain money for buildings and endowment from Chicago "princes." The basic wealth of the city had so grown that in 1894 the total tax valuation was $247,422,722, more than seventy-five millions of increase over 1889. Although the 1893 depression continued, country-wide, for four years after the World's Fair, Chicago industries had pulled them- selves together and public works were moving right on. Electric car lines, mere beginnings in the World's Fair period, were rapidly supplanting horse-cars, especially in the southern parts of the city. They were trolley cars. That kind of motive power, in the '90s, was deemed "simple, inexpensive and safe." Some people protested the claim of safety, for they saw wires extended over streets, and often a metal snake fell to the pavement, casting sparks. But the storage battery was considered experimental. The elevated lines, through the later '90s, moved steadily out, like antennae, westward and northward. The "Alley L," with its little locomotives, began to seem obsolete alongside the engineering of the Metropolitan and the Lake Street elevated roads, which promised "fast electric service." They were all electrified and going strong by 1899, in which year the Northwestern "L," on the other hand, was just finishing its array of girders. Downtown, the lines were uniting in a complex sharing of right-of-way on a trestle- work which alarmed some property owners, but greatly interested the general public. Along streets which, thirty years before, had been residence avenues, and which, a little before that, had been considered "out in the prairie," stretched this structure of pillars, tracks and stations — the Union Loop. Put the last word in quota- tion marks, and you have the name of the best-known present-day area of Chicago. 8 And so, through the after-Fair period, the life of the city swung from one extreme to the other — from riot to culture, from luxury to necessity. The handsome libraries, the universities, the busy efforts to provide ways to ride, to speak over wires from office to 123 Chicago's great century office, to turn a switch and have light, to make activity quick, sure and comfortable — these were, in a sense, all part of a coordinate movement which people did not wholly understand, but which they felt was, somehow, "worth what it cost/' 124 CHAPTER XV Joys of the Waning Decade 1 IN those days, many marvels had not yet grown stale. In those days, parades and festivities seemed more exciting than now. The term has been coined: "The Gay Nineties." One might alter it to "The Naive Nineties." Certain groups were sophisti- cated, but the great body of people, and especially those from the hinterland, enjoyed many events and sights which children of today would scorn. It was a real experience, for some, merely to drive about in hansom cabs. Four people could ride thus behind a single horse, for 50 cents the initial mile. If they indulged in two horses, the fare was $1. A trip through the parks could be had for $6 "and up." Within ten years or thereabouts similar sightseers would be thrilling over a new experience, the taxi-cab. The parks were wonderful. Jackson had new bathing beaches, where people sported in decorous costume, and soon came a golf course — first of those in the parks. There were relics of the Fair also ; not only the converted Arts Palace, but the German building, the Japanese house, and a few other reminders, such as — for a time — the lonesome figure of Columbia, where the peristyle had been. Meanwhile, in Washington Park there were play-fields, boating, pony phaetons, floral pieces like the "Gates Ajar" and the cactus globe. In Garfield Park, there was the conservatory and the Chinese pagoda; in Humboldt, the statue of that scientist, Alexander von Humboldt, the rose garden, etc. In Lincoln Park, by night, there was a spectacle more or less the ancestor of the present gorgeous Buckingham fountain: It was an electric affair, gift of Charles T. Yerkes, which performed two nights a week, throwing upon the waters alternate colors. It was not bad fun to listen to the band and watch the spray change its hue. As for fountains, there was a handsome one in front of the twenty-year-old city hall and courthouse — which was beginning to crumble, thanks to scandalous workmanship. There 125 CHICAGO S GREAT CENTURY people could drink at the expense of John B. Drake. He had put up the fountain, with a bronze statue of Columbus, in World's Fair time, when also the Columbus Memorial Building was erected to honor the discoverer and to make some money. And there was the Rosenberg fountain on the lake front — there to this day — given by Joseph Rosenberg, of San Francisco, who had a notion to honor Hebe with a statue, and did so. Near by rose, and re- mained, the statue of Logan, which St. Gaudens designed and which got him into a quarrel with the park board. There was likewise a statue of Columbus on the lake front ; the present writer knoweth not what became of it. But staring at statues could not have been very sensational even then. Crowds flocked, rather, to such things as the cycloramas, standing like hat boxes opposite each other on Wabash Avenue. "The Battle of Gettysburg" was ever the favorite, and it toured the country successfully for years after. But at different times there were offered also "The Great Chicago Fire," "The Cruci- fixion," and "The Battle of Shiloh." All of these seem, in retro- spect, like classic works of art; the G. A. R. men, anyway, quite approved of the Civil War subjects. Lingering Civil War interest also made prosperous the Libby prison show, south of the cycloramas. It was the real Libby prison, transported brick by brick from Richmond as the project of G. E. Wright. The guides would show where Yankee soldiers tunneled out. And, more eye-opening than the letters, portraits and so on in the museum, was the "genuine cabin of Uncle Tom," whose authenticity none of the younger sightseers, at least, doubted for a moment. The dime museum, so old a Chicago institution, held its favor. The Eden Musee, with wax figures both handsome and horrible, was a thrilling thing to enter. And where the cable line began to peter out on the north side, there whirled, for some years, the actual Ferris wheel of the Fair. It was not unique any more, having given birth to little Ferris wheels, some of which are still to be seen as part of minor tent shows. There was a great deal to be amazed at if visitors merely entered the big hotels. The Lexington, in its prime when Grover Cleve- land opened the Fair, remained luxurious for a long time, what 126 JOYS OF THE WANING DECADE with its Renaissance dining-room — with an onyx mantel — and its heroic painting of the Battle of Lexington. In front of the Great Northern, at night, there would be people staring up at its glitter- ing facade of electric lights, just as there would be people banquet- ing sumptuously in the Crystal ball-room. The Palmer House was forever a spectacle ; so were the Grand Pacific and Sherman. And it was a good joke to go up to the desk of the Richelieu and ask for one of those exquisitely decorated suites which cost only $17 a day, though the same thing cost $50 in New York. On State Street, it was a spree to get confectionery or a primitive "soda" at Berry's or at Gunther's, the latter with its furred animals and, upstairs, its museum containing autograph letters, books, portraits whose real value not many customers suspected. Restaurants? Kinsley's, of course, famed for many things, but notably for a "souvenir spoon" banquet held in a hall with ceiling and walls covered with fragrant roses. On the other hand, there was Henrici's, not too "swanky" for anyone. (Kinsley's, by the way, had a "downstairs room" where men could eat hastily with their hats on.) And H. H. Kohlsaat had estab- lished his chain of unique stool-and-counter restaurants. In them one could have a small meal for ten cents, and a "superfluity" (it was advertised) for a quarter. The places from which to view the city were the Auditorium Tower, the old water-tower — occasionally — and the Masonic Tem- ple. Thousands upon thousands of people went to the roof of this Temple. A few score were persuaded by confidence men that they had bought the building. To meet really sober taste, Theodore Thomas offered his orches- tra concerts in the Auditorium, The Art Institute its growing collection, the libraries their new, splendid reading rooms. For a few, who bore the laurels of authorship, there was the Little Room — a clublet meeting in the Fine Arts Building — and the hospitable offices of Stone and Kimball, who were getting out The Chapbook and publishing some books rather in advance of the average taste. Hamlin Garland, W. V. Moody and H. B. Fuller were authors whose names have survived for a generation ; George 127 CHICAGO S GREAT CENTURY Ade and Peter Dunne were other adornments of that literary era, and equally long-lived. There were still others ; a list might seem invidious. A young man named Theodore Dreiser was a tem- porary resident, who was deeply chagrined when he showed a manuscript to Eugene Field and got no praise. Those were years when a good many men and women due to win renown came to Chicago, some of them having been lured by the World's Fair. Bankers like George M. Reynolds and E. D. Hulbert had come to climb the financial ladder. Gen. Charles G. Dawes arrived in the middle '90s. Robert P. Lamont had been of the World's Fair engineering staff; he stayed on, to become a leader in the steel industry, of which John W. Gates was then a dramatic figure. Edith Rockefeller came as the bride of Harold McCormick. The "university group" brought James H. Breasted, T. C. Chamberlin, Alonzo A. Stagg and many besides. There were young men working in laboratories or elsewhere, soon after the Fair, whose discoveries contributed mightily to "pure science" or else led to great practical ends. A. A. Michelson, in his early forties, was adding touches of perfection to the inter- ferometer. A little later, Lee DeForest, young but confident, was working with his comrade, Edwin Smythe, in a hall bedroom full of experimental material, to make radio signals audible ; from that toil came the "three element audion" on which radio reception is based. In contemporary years Almon B. Strowger, influenced to come to Chicago by Joseph Harris, was improving the automatic telephone device which he had exhibited, in an earlier form, at the World's Fair, and which was having a struggle for a foothold in the city. At this time another important innovator, Vincent Bendix, was on the point of a departure from New York which eventually brought him to Chicago and to the development of the self-starter for automobiles. An arrival of the '90s who gave the city an institution no less well known than the World's Fair itself was Richard W. Sears, who came from Minneapolis to join with A. W. Roebuck in the mail-order business. A Chicago clothing manufacturer of about ten years' standing entered the firm, bought a half interest and afterwards became president, launching almost at once into gener- ous philanthropies. This was Julius Rosenwald. 128 JOYS OF THE WANING DECADE 3 The "masses," however, thought little in those days about the coming celebrities. Their gaze was fixed upon current favorites and "good shows" — a street procession, let us say, a convention, a mass meeting. Central Music Hall was popular for such gatherings, whether political, civic, or religious; but after a time the Auditorium was more used. And in due course Libby Prison disappeared, and the Coliseum was built there. In that stone structure, rather ugly but handsomer than the old Wigwam of 1860, was staged the scene, perhaps more dramatic than in any national convention since, when a fiery speech won his first nomination for William Jennings Bryan. The day was the ninth of July, 1896. Chicagoans of high degree, as well as political spectators, filled boxes and balconies, drawn by the battle of tongues. But they were hardly prepared for the climax, when the young Nebraskan strode down the aisle amid cheers and climbed to the platform. As he stood there, "with his aquiline features, pale countenance and the backward sweep of dark hair, he seemed," said a news- paper account, "like an actor in some historic scene." How historic, few realized as he boomed, in his musical voice : "The humblest citizen in all the land when clad in the armor of a righteous cause is stronger than all the hosts of error." On he went, to growing applause, "I come to speak to you in defense of a cause as holy as the cause of liberty." It was free silver he was defending. David B. Hill, on the platform, frowned. The ovation swept along, to a rising tide of wonder and excite- ment, until the well-known conclusion: "If they (the Republicans) dare to come out in the open and defend the gold standard as a good thing we shall fight them to the uttermost. . . . We shall answer their demands for a gold standard by saying to them: You shall not press down upon the brow of labor this crown of thorns. You shall not crucify mankind upon a cross of gold." That night, William E. Curtis wrote for The Chicago Record that Congressman Bryan looked like a real contender against that other silver advocate, Richard P. Bland. Curtis ventured to say that Bryan, "a gentleman" anyway, and one who made the most 129 CHICAGO S GREAT CENTURY of his education, would grace the White House better than Bland. It would be a "poor boy campaign," suggested Curtis. Next afternoon, at 3 :30 o'clock, the Bryan stampede culminated in his nomination on the fifth ballot. The nominee was not visible. But to his wife, sitting in the gallery, women friends rushed, with tears streaming down, and they kissed her. During the months that followed, while McKinley sat on his shaded porch at Canton, Chicago saw plenty of Bryan. He visited it often, while traveling 18,000 miles from state to state. On one occasion his followers started to set up a huge tent on the lake front, but were promptly warned off by Montgomery Ward. Per- haps the "watch-dog" was never more bitterly attacked than then. As the fall months arrived, Chicago was in a whirlpool of politics and of parades which made Blaine's "plumed knights" look like a high school procession. The great occasion was "Chicago day," when both parties put forth their utmost in dis- play and in seeming rancor. The "sound money parade," organ- ized by single-standard business men, wound endlessly through streets whose sidewalks, like windows and roofs, were jammed with boisterous onlookers, including many entire families. Headed by Gen. Joseph Stockton as grand marshal, there were 52,000 marchers on foot, 2,274 on horseback, 178 carriages, and 125 bands. Not a single automobile, but ten tallyhos ; over a hundred floats and more than 90 political clubs. Big stores and factories turned out groups with symbolic adornments. The bakers carried immensely long loaves of bread. The hatters, with canes and new- silk tiles, marched, singing : "Hippity, hippity hop, McKinley is on top. Hippity, hippity, hoop, Bryan's in the soup." A huge gilded buzz-saw on a float carried the legend: "Don't monkey with the buzz-saw." That same night the silver parade sought vainly to outdo that of the "sound money" men. Through the same streets, but only- ISO JOYS OF THE WANING DECADE 20,000 strong, this procession passed with torches and amid vol- canos of red fire, yelling for Bryan and for Altgeld. They sang : "Bryan, Bryan, Billie Bryan, We'll take him to the White House flyin'." Or they proclaimed on banners: "We love Mark Hanna, nit." And: "Bryan, Brain and Brawn against Bonds, Boodle and Bluster." Typical Chicago groups in the parade were "Tom Carey's In- dians" from the stockyards, in full war paint, and the silk-hatted Cook County Democracy. Notable among the latter was "Bobbie Burke," credited with power in the Carter Harrison administra- tion that was soon to follow. The day, which included a big meeting at Tattersalls and over- flow gathering on the streets, ended with half the city exhausted, and a dozen or two people in hospitals, some of them emergency hospitals— the first to which the city had ever had resort. As for the end of the campaign, it made history that belongs elsewhere than in these pages. But Bryan did not go "to the White House flyin'." Calm, amiable McKinley went there instead. Two years from that time the Ohioan, as President, led a mighty demonstration in Chicago. A war had been fought with the nation whose nobility had ridden in the World's Fair processional. The war had been won easily by the major power. And now Chicago stepped out with a monster peace jubilee. The President, worn by the strain and assailed by anti-imperialist critics, reviewed the long military, naval and civic parade from the stand in Michi- gan Avenue. Interminable numbers of troops, including yellow- faced soldiers from Cuba and white-haired Grand Army men, filed along. At LaSalle and Washington Streets they passed under a triumphal arch. Mayor Carter Harrison, who had been "ubiquitous," the reporters mentioned, got a tribute of his own. Gov. John R. Tanner got considerably less. At that time a storm was about his ears in tempestuous Chicago over a "traction grab" called the Allen bill, the invention of Charles T. Yerkes. (It lost.) 131 CHICAGO S GREAT CENTURY In the evening there was a huge banquet, at which Franklin MacVeagh, toastmaster, introduced such heroes as the President, Gen. Miles, Gen. Shafter, Secretary Gage, and Capt. (later Admiral) Sigsbee. The captain of the ship whose sinking helped bring on the war, said: "The Maine always will be remembered in the right way, but never for revenge." The Chicago crowds did not hear this, and relatively few got into the jubilee at the Auditorium, but they had opportunities elsewhere to stare at such varied celebrities as Wu Ting Fang, Booker Washington, Samuel Gompers, and Mrs. John A. Logan. And there was one group of girls who never forgot the moment when they presented to the fragile Mrs. McKinley, at her hotel, bouquets of white flowers. More intrinsically Chicagoan was the fete of October, 1899, when the city almost reverted to World's Fair pomp in a "Fall Festival" grouped about the laying of the new federal building corner-stone. Once more to the city where he had so many friends came President McKinley, older, graver, and not far from his end. The Chicago committees had made extravagant prepara- tions; State Street was afire with eagerness. Mayor Harrison was again "ubiquitous." There were difficulties. Building labor men had become more powerful and more outspoken than for years past. In the follow- ing year they were to tie up the city's building activities in a knot. There was a clash over a plan to have non-union masons set the corner-stone. A charge was made that $5,000 had been paid to stop this opposition. For a time, until settled, this row over- shadowed the march of preparation. Then the cloud blew away. Leadership passed from Charles H. Truax to Laverne W. Noyes. Plans went on. Another Chicago day procession; Chief of Police "Joe" Kipley, with his tuft of beard, leading police platoons; Marshal Denis Swenie in his fire-buggy; Gen. Wesley Merritt, Cols. Sanborn, Stuart, Moriarity, Marshall, of the militia ; McKinley, Sir Wilfred Laurier, Senor Mariscal of Mexico, bowing from a stand as the 132 JOYS OF THE WANING DECADE troops marched on, to pass "between the gorgeously decorated skyscrapers, rising like great flaming towers." There was a court of honor — World's Fair echo — on the lake front. Then, while thousands sat where the Federal Building was to rise — taking seven years to complete — and others watched from the "dizzy heights of the Marquette and Monadnock Buildings," the President threw on a trowel-ful of mortar, and Lyman Gage said: "The city we love is here to have a temple worthy of her greatness." But William E. ("Billy") Mason, then ex-senator, threw to the crowds sentences that rang unpleasantly on the ears of some of the celebrities : "Let us think more of 'tone' than of volume in our society. . . . Are the streets clean and kept for the use of the people, or for the greed of stockholders ? Do tall buildings pay taxes ? . . . The test is, not how many churches, but how much Christianity." Billy's warnings were drowned in the shouts which, day after day, greeted the "parade of industry," the "parade of all nations," and much more. The Century's sands began to run out. Headlines of the period : "Painters' strike still on." "Washington Park race- track denounced by citizens." "H. H. Kohlsaat out of journalism." (For a few years only, it should have been added.) "Old-fashioned New Years' calls revived." "Blanche Walsh in 'La Tosca.' " "Fun in 'Charley's Aunt.' " ("Innocently humorous, not bril- liant," wrote Amy Leslie.) "Tonight: Mansfield in Cyrano de Bergerac." "Jefrries-Fitzsimmons Fight in Moving Pictures." "Admiral Dewey and wife welcomed here." "Hotels full to the roofs." "War on basement dives." The huge, loose- jointed, warm-blooded city, with 1,698,500 in- habitants, was reeling on to another era. Its business was again splendidly prosperous, but the municipality, thanks to a new asses- 133 CHICAGO S GREAT CENTURY sor-and-reviewer system which had "not been given time to demon- strate its value," was low in funds. The new buildings were rising higher, and were all-steel; but Jacob Riis called the slums the worst he had seen. Chicago had pioneered with a juvenile court; but boys were still forming gangs. The city had a new small parks commission, but its smoke was about as dense as ever. Civic spirit was mounting, but there was a necessary warfare on "grey-wolf" aldermen; underneath the streets was building a freight tunnel system which promised to be a contribution to prog- ress, but alas! its birth was attended by talk of scandal; on the one hand, banquet orators declared Chicago a glory of civiliza- tion; on the other, a minister cried, desperately, "Redeem our city!" And another said: "What we have is not liberty, equality and fraternity, but paternalism and protection." Out of all this confusion rose the calm voice of science, pointing out that Chicago, like civilization as a whole, owed most of its greatness to discovery and invention. "What would life be," asked a sage newspaper writer, reviewing the nineteenth century, "without the lucifer match, the common steel pen, the typewriter, the sewing machine, the bicycle and the phonograph, not to men- tion the latest novelty, the automobile?" And a patent office chief declared : "It is not unreasonable to pre- dict that the horse will have practically disappeared from the streets of large cities by the first of the next century (2000 A. D. !) and that also the problem of navigation by air will have been solved." 134 CHAPTER XVI Dawn of a Speed Era 1 AS the century "turned/' some things gained a pace faster than predicted. For example, horseless vehicles. The automobile, first a rumor from Europe, then a feeble ex- periment at the World's Fair, became a phenomenon as notable as the skyscrapers. It passed rapidly from being an object of jeers to being a means of sport and of "dare devil" tests. Presently, this dubious experiment began to look more practical. Rich men were "sinking" money in it, the people heard; shops were busy. Yet when occasional motor-cars appeared, fleet horses snorted at the sight. And bicycles still flashed about town by the thousands, while the annual "Pullman road race" was a sports event of magnitude. Skeptics about the automobile were prone to remember the event of Thanksgiving Day, 1895 ; officially a "motocycle contest" sponsored by The Chicago Times-Herald. On that day, five machines neither pulled by horses nor propelled by feet set out to tour the city and win prizes, also to outdo a recent demonstra- tion in Paris. The queer contraptions stood in line where the Midway enters Jackson Park, trying to start. It had snowed hard. There were soft drifts and slush. The motors balked. At 8:30 a. m. someone yelled "Go !" but it was twenty-five minutes before any of the machines pulled themselves together and took off. They hobbled down the route — the gasoline car of Charles E. Duryea, the Morris and Solom Electrobat, the H. H. Mueller motocycle, the De la Vergne and Sturgis electric car, the R. H. Macy machine. One hour from the start, the laboring contestants passed the Auditorium. Along Michigan Avenue they were cheered and hooted like political paraders. On they fought, around the boule- vard system, but encountering "terrible weather hazards" as they left the best streets. The day wore on and waned. The drivers fought with their bucking motors. At last, long after darkness fell — at 7:18 p.m., to be exact — a little wheezing car returned 135 CHICAGO S GREAT CENTURY to the starting-point. "Duryea wins!" He had done fifty-four miles in ten hours and twenty-three minutes. (There was some excitement in the city, but perhaps not as much as over the fact that the University of Michigan football team beat the University of Chicago that same day, 12 to 0, before a big crowd, including society people in tallyhos.) Mr. Duryea, a Chicagoan, was thus a veritable pioneer, but not merely as a chauffeur. He had been a bicycle-maker ; then, with J. Frank, had built a "gas carriage" in 1891, and by 1894 they had developed a four-cylinder motor with electric ignition. A great period of experimentation was on, when men in workshops toiled hopefully at the problem, some following the lead of Daimler, Krebs, or Benz, others taking different paths. The work of Henry Ford, who had developed his first automobile in 1892, was scarcely known in Chicago, but some of its own manufacturers, such as C. E. Woods, maker of electrics, got attention. And thereby hangs a tale. One summer day in 1899 (the same year, incidentally, in which Ford dropped everything to set up his automobile business)* a Woods electric crept up Michigan Avenue from 22nd Street on an expedition to test a city ordinance. This law, not long in effect, provided that horseless vehicles should keep off of boulevards ! In the car, besides the driver, were Mr. Woods, an official of a new automobile association, and two newspaper reporters. Through the traffic went the horseless expedition, sticking close to the curb and looking out for a policeman. Blue-coats were passed, but gave no chase. "They don't know about the silly law," growled one of those aboard. Little prospect, in fact, appeared of getting arrested. Finally, at the Auditorium corner, a policeman, sunning himself, was sum- moned. The car stopped and the officer strolled over. "Will you be good enough to arrest us for violating the boule- vard ordinance?" was asked. *W. C. Durant was then a maker of carriages; Walter Chrysler a rail- road mechanical expert; Alfred P. Sloan, Jr., a recent graduate of Massa- chusetts Institute of Technology; Harvey Firestone a rubber manufacturer about to start his tire company. 136 DAWN OF A SPEED ERA He hesitated, but at length obliged and climbed aboard. A re- porter sat on his lap while the offending car was driven to the Harrison Street police station. The present writer vouches for this story. He was one of the two reporters. The "silly law" soon had to become a dead letter. Motor-cars were forcing their way everywhere. They were drawing good- sized checks from wealthy men, and were on display before wide- eyed crowds. Weird creatures they were, with tinny tonneaus, long-shanked steering-wheels, right-hand drive, tall seats, con- spicuous lamps. Some models, like the electric in which Fire Marshal Swenie rode at the Dewey day anniversary in 1900, had a sort of "rumble seat." Gasoline engines snorted and popped. Other engines left trails of steam. There were no limousines, so in winter the passengers wrapped up like polar bears. Stores did a big business in fur coats, or "dusters" in summer, and in goggles and veils. Ford was advertising an eight horse-power motor for $900. The Peerless, with "direct drive," cost a maximum of $6,000. Pope had a Toledo car that "literally skims along the roughest road with no perceptible noise beyond the mere purring of the chain drive." Cadillac cars could stop in a distance equal to twice their length, even when running at an 18-mile speed. Winton had a canopy top and "full lamp equipment." As for electrics, the Stanhope could run more than 50 miles on a single charge. Only men dared the new adventure at first, but soon dauntless women seized steering-wheels and dashed off at eight or ten miles an hour. Beauty experts sent out warnings. Obesity, they said, was caused by "the pastime." It was predicted that people would partly lose the use of their limbs. A dreadful thing called the "motoring face" was discovered ; an expression of "rapt intensity, stern compression of the lips, and quick, nervous manner; a destroyer to good looks." But these were not the worst troubles. The cars often had to be cranked for fifteen to twenty minutes. Tires had to be pumped and patched; no one thought of carrying "spares." There were 137 CHICAGO S GREAT CENTURY no gasoline stations along highways. And sometimes the cars, even though warranted, refused absolutely to run. Then an auto salesman who had done a good day's business would find his joy ruined the next day by customers angrily returning their purchases. Despite all, the popularity of motoring grew from month to month, and emotional Chicago adopted it as heartily as any other city. Before long even the sterling hansom cabs of four-wheelers began to feel the competition of the motor-driven taxi, which, in 1909, was described as "an automobile landaulette seating four people; fares plainly indicated on the taximeter. All taxicabs are painted red." C. A. Coey was one of the first — if not the first — to operate a taxi company. Soon arrived Walden Shaw, another taxi pioneer; then John Hertz and the Yellow Cab. Salesrooms for autos were cropping up here and there (although as late as 1903 only 11,235 were manufactured in the entire country). "Motor Row" on Michigan Avenue got a good start. An automobile club came into existence; racing became frequent and well paid, despite the fact that, even in 1904, the speed of bicycle racers was barely exceeded. The engines and models rapidly improved. Traffic became heavy, even alarming. A wide- tire ordinance had to be passed, a good-roads congress held. Thus the industry entered its gigantic chapter; and Chicago, though Detroit and other cities became the manufacturing centers, shared in the general prosperity. Regarding this prosperity and related matters there must be a few paragraphs. It will be seen that the speed of the 1900s was not confined to automobiles. To start with, the Chicago population was growing at the rate of nearly 50,000 a year. The great industries and the tall tiers of offices were absorbing youth from the Middle West, from the South, from everywhere. Added to these, and generally more talked about, were the newcomers from foreign lands. By 1909 there were over 1,000,000 either born abroad or counted as "for- eign-language," and the languages or dialects they could speak numbered no less than forty. Chicago by that time was the second 138 DAWN OF A SPEED ERA largest Bohemian city in the world, the third Swedish, the third Norwegian, the fourth Polish, the fifth German. It would soon outstrip even these records. The Jews had flocked in so as to stand well up in the roster; 50,000 were rated as speaking Yiddish. The Italians had grown from a very few to 25,000. There were good-sized colonies of Czechs, Croats and Serbs. A hundred people spoke Manx, a few score Basque, a similar number Ice- landic. Nor was this more than a small part of the philological puzzle of Cosmopolis-on-the-Lake. The city had spread out in widening circles, with a constant shifting movement and a tendency to sprout "little cities." New transportation lines helped these, but the eagerness of people to move far out strained the car systems. And after years of pro- test and argument new ordinances were forced through all ob- stacles. A twenty-year franchise, reconstruction work and impor- tant extensions were features of these 1907 measures, which had the support of Mayor Fred A. Busse, successor to Harrison. The companies spent millions. By 1909 the new program, affecting lines covering a territory twenty-six miles long, was practically in effect. One line, which advertised "1,500,000 passengers a day," was also boasting of 1,000 pay-as-you-enter cars, speedy and "well ventilated." To this point, within less than twenty years, had come the "plain man's automobile," so primitive in World's Fair time. And the elevated lines, barely started then, had reached out to more than 180 miles of track. As the population jumped, so did building; 9,000 or 10,000 new structures went up during 1909; the biggest boom since the World's Fair. The school buildings were crammed with more than 300,000 pupils. Eager readers took two and a half million books out of the public library and its fourteen branches. The Chicago Civic Opera was launched, after years of dependence on the East for opera. Banks were going strong, with an increase of nearly $400,000,000 in deposits between 1900 and 1909, and another increase after the depression of 1907 was overcome. The great packing-houses, the grain interests, the manufacturers (put- ting out nearly a billion dollars worth of stuff annually), were busy full blast. Nearly everything had grown. One variation was 139 CHICAGO S GREAT CENTURY the item of arrival of vessels in Chicago Harbor — a steady decline since 1892. The big ore boats were going to the Calumet. Still unfulfilled, after seventy years of prophecy, was the mag- nificent project of a ship canal to the Mississippi. Yet a victory almost as important had been won. After two attempts there had been built a sanitary canal which "worked." Its building had continued through all those years when the World's Fair came to being, then when famine and riot raged, then while the newer city ideals were flowering. By the end of 1899 persistent engineers and brigades of workmen, helped by great machines built to meet the special conditions, had pushed the broad excavation through earth and rock to Lockport. They had built at that point the powerful controlling works on a scale that minimized the poor little pumps of earlier days. They had dug out more than 42,000,000 cubic yards of material, and had spent over $31,000. The task had occupied successive boards of trustees, engineers from Samuel Artingstall through the period of Lyman Cooley to the regime of Isham Randolph, and had been pursued by politics and by protests from St. Louis and various Illinois towns. Then, when all was ready, the trustees had been compelled, owing to injunction proceedings by St. Louis, to open the canal (January 17, 1900) not only without the staging due to the occasion, but with actual stealth. Would it all "work?" Would the city's health be saved? The answer seemed fully clear in the proud days of 1909-10, when it was found that deaths from typhoid, numbering nearly 2,000 in 1891, had been reduced to less than 300. Infant mortality had been cut in half. The drinking water of a city requiring that more than 400,000,000 gallons be pumped for it was now (almost) pure. And the state of Illinois, helping the ship-canal vision look realistic, had voted $20,000,000 for the purpose. "With this start," said a publication in rosy 1910, "the federal government and the states in the Mississippi Valley may be de- pended upon to carry the deep waterway project through to the Gulf." 140 DAWN OF A SPEED ERA What a decade! Here are a few headlines: "Big Building Strike Settled/' "Montgomery Ward Plans Skyscraper, with Tower." "Streeter Battles Constables." "City Club Organized." "Judge Dunne Elected Mayor." "Dowie Defies Creditors." "Mrs. Potter Palmer Leads Charity Ball." "Sixty Thousand Arrests Last Year." "Death of Marshall Field." "Death of President W. R. Harper." "Theodore Thomas Dead." "Orchestra Hall Dedicated." "Big Graft Investigation." "Taft Nominated in Coliseum." "Sunday Evening Club Started." "White Sox Are World Champions." "First Ward Ball Called Off." "Landis Fines Standard Oil $29,000,000." "Association of Commerce Organized." "Chicago the Great Central Market." "New Municipal Court Cures Evils." "A. A. Michelson Gets Nobel Prize." "Six Hundred Movie Theaters in Town." "Emma Goldman Ejected From Hall." "Rockefeller Gives U. of C. $10,000,000." "Patten Gives $200,000 to Northwestern." "Cudahy Gives $130,000 to Loyola University." "Big Packers Indicted." The most amusing headline, possibly, was that which proclaimed that a federal court had decided that Edmund Rostand plagiarized "Cyrano de Bergerac" from S. E. Gross's "Merchant Prince of Corneville." The only parallel was the decision of Judge Tuthill, in after years, that "Bacon wrote Shakespeare." The most terrible headline of the decade? It was this, on December 30, 1903: 141 CHICAGO S GREAT CENTURY IROQUOIS THEATER BURNS Fear 500 May be Dead in Matinee Disaster. There were 596 dead, when at last the tragic roster was com- plete. A combination of a primitive curtain, locked exits, and poisonous gases turned the pretty new theater into a scene of panic combined with heroism. From this destruction arose a movement for safer theaters which spread even across the Atlantic. What a decade, indeed, with four-wheeled machines careering about, and even stranger contrivances occasionally rising in air! The air-plane era had arrived, even before the automobile age was better than started. In fact, they had arrived practically together, one may say if he look back to the feats of a thoughtful elderly man on the Indiana sand dunes. There in the years 1896 and 1897 he would arrive almost daily, with a companion and a sort of toy with wings and struts. While country folk watched sardonically from behind bushes, the two experimentors would launch the embryo air-ships on the wind and make them soar. Later the elder man, a retired railroad engineer named Octave Chanute, ventured to ride on his own gliders, or aeroplanes. He made hundreds of flights, risked death many times, and got bumps galore. Then the Wright brothers, frankly using the Chanute model and following much the same aerodynamic principle as his, pulled off their sensational exploits at Kittyhawk (1903) and the country was filled with their renown. Chanute, who got publicity only off and on, was cheered by winning a prize at the Paris Show of 1908. He went to Paris and was acclaimed. Returning, he was feted mildly, and delivered a speech which proved that as a seer he was not without limita- tions. Although he predicted that too many machines in the air would be dangerous — which came true — he also said, if correctly quoted : "Aviation is a sport. To think of it in terms of commerce is silly." Chanute died in 1910. His name was given to the air-field at Rantoul, 111. 142 DAWN OF A SPEED ERA This pioneer, in his seventies, was able to read of notable air- plane feats both in America and abroad. The English Channel was crossed. Lincoln Beachey flew over Niagara Falls, passing under the arches of the steel bridge and flying as far as the whirl- pool. Every few days someone crashed. This did not hold back the "dare-devils," nor prevent the growing manufacture of machines. The culmination for Chicago was an airplane exhibition on the lake front in August, 1911. Famous pilots, American and foreign, did their stunts before a crowd averaging, it was said, 250,000 a day — counting, one supposes, those who watched from skyscraper windows. The Aero Club of Illinois and the International Avia- tion Meet Association put on the show ; B. J. Mullaney managed it. Both glory and death were harvested by the gallant flyers. W. R. Badger, of Pittsburgh, was killed when his biplane collapsed. St. Croix Johnston of Chicago fell into the lake, perishing. But the survivors created records and collected much prize money. Beachey did new stunts, including an altitude record of 11,642 feet. Tom Sopwith and Rene Simon climbed 1,640 feet in 3:55 minutes. Sopwith also took the speed record for flying with a passenger — 57.7 miles an hour. There were many other unheard-of triumphs during the eight days of the meet, after which so many Chicagoans had stiff necks. Perhaps they were especially thrilled when H. N. Atwood landed on the beach from St. Louis, having accomplished the flight in a single day! 143 CHAPTER XVII Birth of City-Planning 1 IT IS probable that Chicagoans were never more proud of their city than during the ten years following 1900. They saw the Michigan Avenue parapet of buildings rise, almost in a solid row. They crashed through difficulties like strikes and financial setbacks. At times they exploded in protest against crime and vice; but prosperity blinded most of them to such evils. A plebiscite might have produced a majority vote that Chicago was practically perfect. Just at this time a group of citizens came forward with a polite reminder that, in physical arrangement at least, the city needed a reform. They pointed to the fact that, in its hurry to get started and to accomplish things, it was gangling, badly organized, waste- ful. Nor was it beautiful enough. All this was embodied in a book full of handsome colored pictures, describing what Paris and other capitals had done, and portraying a Chicago which would outshine any of those capitals, if the conception were carried through. The book had only a limited circulation, but the newspapers helped out, some of them calling the scheme the "City Beautiful," others referring to it by its correct name — The Chicago Plan. Ex- ponents of the latter discouraged the term "City Beautiful." It was sentimental, and it roused the shirt-sleeve elements, already inclined to criticize, and made them cynical. The plans were ex- hibited at the Art Institute. They interested the visitors exceed- ingly. People of taste voted excellent the pictures by the artists, Jules Guerin and Fernand Janin. But there was many a citizen who picked up his Sunday newspaper and exclaimed : "Very pretty, but just a dream — and why spoil Chicago?" Such voices did not count for much. The skeptics did not know how carefully and long all this planning had been going on. Apparently the first stirring of the big idea was no later than the World's Pair year, when men who had worked so enthusiastically together on the Exposition began to think of making some of its beauties permanent. The lake, at least, was a stable asset. Its 144 BIRTH OF CITY PLANNING shore could be beautified beyond the hopes of a prior generation. So the South park board, then headed by J. W. Ellsworth, started to discuss a shore-line connection between Jackson and Grant parks. City leaders were aroused also. The Commercial Club as early as 1894 discussed at one of its meetings, "What Shall Be Done With the Lake Front ?" In 1896 D. H. Burnham produced a sketch of an ideal lake front. This picture, interesting by way of comparison with the region as it is today, may be found in the Chicago Plan book. It shows a south shore drive, a lagoon, islands, and other features. Mr. Burn- ham revealed his design to some influential men, and later related his "dream," in eloquent terms, at a dinner of the Merchants Club. He spoke likewise to the Commercial Club, whose interest had been kindled by Franklin MacVeagh and others. The Womans Club and the Art Institute also lent much encouragement, as did other civic organizations. Gradually the Plan was getting to a wider circle. In the mean- time the expansion of parks in general was being boosted by every- one who could get a hearing. The special parks commission, whose first head was Aid. William S. Jackson and its secretary Arthur W. O'Neill, turned in a report which stirred new energy; small "beauty spots" began to dot the South Side and were promised for other regions. A commission on "outer belt" parks went to work, encouraged by Henry G. Foreman, Jens Jensen, Dwight H. Per- kins and others, educating people on the subject of making a paradise out of the forested fringe through which rivers crept, beyond the city limits. All this was part of an "uplift" in which the spirit of the city, distracted so often by trouble and toil, swung back to its best impulses. When it flagged, someone said, "Remember the World's Fair," and forward went the enterprise. Slowly Mr. Burnham and his helpers, working in quarters pro- vided for them in a skyscraper roof-studio overlooking the lake, assembled their ideas and drew their pictures. For two years, if not longer, they labored. And during those two years the Mer- chants' and Commercial Clubs formed a union under the name of the latter. An organization of one hundred, including enthusiasts for Burnham like Franklin MacVeagh, Edward B. Butler, Victor 145 CHICAGO S GREAT CENTURY F. Lawson, Frederic A. Delano, was ready to be the publisher of that able but not best-selling book, "The Plan of Chicago." It came out in July, 1909. The authors, as given on the title-page, were Mr. Burnham and his assistant, E. H. Bennett. The roster of the Commercial Club general committee is worth quoting, for some of the pioneers in that effort are well remembered, others not so well. They were : Charles D. Norton Clyde Carr Charles H. Wacker John V. Farwell (II) Frederic A. Delano Charles L. Hutchinson Walter H. Wilson Rollin A. Keyes A. C. Bartlett Joy Morton Edward B. Butler Charles H. Thome Mr. Norton was chairman, Mr. Wacker vice-chairman, Mr. Delano secretary, Mr. Wilson treasurer, and Walter L. Fisher legal adviser. More than one of the committee had been a director of the World's Fair. So the rhapsody in pictures had its debut before a city which little understood. What would the city do with it? A new generation should perhaps be reminded that, a quarter century ago, only a comparatively thin strip of "made land" ex- tended east of Michigan Avenue ; that where that street approached the river it was a lane between buildings of a past age, and that people going to the North Side used the narrow, obsolete "Rush Street bridge," which crossed at an angle. Early motorists cannot forget that halt and clamor at the foot of the bridge, where they grazed each others' bumpers — if any — and got yelled at by teamsters. It must be remembered, also, that in that era, to whose joys people refer while forgetting its distempers, the river itself elbowed, its way past banks covered with grimy if not rickety structures ; its south bank being bordered by the rear-end of produce houses. There were also wharves, not of the very earliest construction, but some of them rotting. The odors of the river, despite its current "uphill," were still noticeable, and they merged with the smells, 146 BIRTH OF CITY PLANNING pleasant or noisome, arising from the great South Water Street mart. Past these things, and rounding the old Wolf Point, at the forks, the stream continued southward and northward, with the dark forms of industrial buildings, some of them old wrecks, mir- rored in it. South of the Loop, the 12th Street of an inconsiderate era cut into Michigan Avenue, while west of the river it ran narrow and cluttered between shacks or hurry-up buildings occupied by swarms. Farther west Ogden Avenue penetrated thinly many a dark area. In various parts of the city, since reached by The Chicago Plan, there had been little thought of improvement. And the webs of railroad tracks, crowding ever toward the city's heart, cut off effectually an orderly outward growth from that center. Anyone can observe for himself the change in some of these localities. He can also see that a great deal of development pointing years beyond 1933 remains to be accomplished. Yet now the Chicago Plan is not merely a program but a civic movement which everyone recognizes and, morally at least, supports. At its outset it was an amazing novelty. It had to be "sold." Charles D. Norton left Chicago for the East, and upon Charles H. Wacker, his successor, devolved the task of persuading Chicago to believe in its "Plan." He was appointed by Mayor Busse to be chairman of the citizen commission which superseded the Com- mercial Club committee. Mr. Busse grasped the worth of the scheme to Chicago, "put it over" with some pretty rough aldermen, and gave it a hearty send-off in a message to the city council. Then Mr. Wacker stepped out as missionary. For many months he per formed intense and self-sacrificing work, writing, lecturing, testifying, "selling" the plan more ardently than ever he had pro- moted business affairs of his own. His lieutenant, Walter D. Moody, worked equally hard, and the vice-chairman, Frank I. Bennett, was a source of strength. "Literature" rained upon news- paper desks. Booklets, including a simplified version widely cir- culated in the schools, were printed and sent broadcast. Every agency was appealed to ; every voice that could be enlisted said "It is good business to have a beautiful city." The quarters of the commission in the Hotel Sherman resembled, at times, those of a high-powered political campaign group. 147 CHICAGO S GREAT CENTURY And this was a real campaign for Mr. Wacker, though he sought no office. Had not Chicago responded, he would probably have been more humiliated than a tail-ender in an actual election. But he won — f or his city. The first test was not in the number of complimentary letters received at headquarters, but in a city council vote authorizing the widening of West 12th Street. The ordinance won, though it had ten opponents. In the following year, 1911, property owners were given a hearing before the board of local improvements. The ses- sions were stormy. Lawyers for suspicious frontage owners howled : "The people won't go into this blindly. They want to know how much they will have to pay." "No one ever noticed any congestion in West 12th Street," was another argument, decidedly specious. George A. Mason, attorney for the board, defended the plan ably, only breaking out once or twice into a remark like : "You would think we were trying to sell the people a gold brick." Mr. Wacker made one of his winning talks, boosting the West Side, and saying : "We don't want to make a boulevard for automobiles, but a business street. We want to improve this city so that Chicago will not be merely an overnight stopping place for people going to New York to buy." The ruddy- faced planner had to force his way through an angry crowd when he left the room. Fists were shaken in his face, and he heard the word "robbery." After all this, it might have been expected that when the proposal for a bond issue was presented to the people at the election of Nov. 5, 1912, it would be voted down. But the plan to cut a wide path through the congested West Side was, by that time, better under- stood. It won by over 21,000 on the same day when Woodrow Wilson defeated Taft and Roosevelt for the Presidency. The victory of West 12th Street received a scant paragraph in the morning papers, which can scarcely be blamed for this at the end of a campaign that had included the nomination of Taft in the Coliseum, the passionate third-party selection of Roosevelt in Orchestra Hall, and much other excitement. As for the Chicago Plan, it was now well launched. But fate 148 BIRTH OF CITY PLANNING had it that the man who had sketched a reorganized Chicago and had not forgotten the tumultuous West Side should not live to see the first public improvement under his Plan take form and receive a popular vote. Mr. Burnham had died in Germany in June. While the West 12th Street improvement was going through its discussion stage, the second and more conspicuous project, called the "Michigan Avenue extension," was moving along. People of an earlier decade had talked about it vigorously.. Even Mayor Cregier, in the '80s, had mentioned the idea of linking North and South Sides by a boulevard. Mayor Harrison (the younger) even before 1905, had listened to suggestions by Mrs. Horatio N. May and by Aid. Honore Palmer, son of Potter, and had started consideration of the enter- prise. In 1904 he addressed the city council about a wider Michigan Avenue and appointed a committee of aldermen — two of whom were Robert R. McCormick and John J. Coughlin — to consider the "boulevard on stilts," as some people called it. With the arrival of the Chicago Plan commission, "improve Michigan Avenue" became a phrase uttered with new fervor. First, the commission urged the widening of the great street from Jackson Boulevard to Randolph, and this was accomplished in 1910. Next, there was brought before the city council the elaborate project of the commission to widen the street clear to the river, span the latter with a two-level bridge big enough to take care of traffic for a good many years, and transform the ancient Pine Street into North Michigan Avenue. It was truly a gigantic scheme, involving not only action by the aldermen, but invasion of a narrow, dark, and solidly built quarter north of Randolph Street, the construction of a huge, expensive bridge, then a North Side revolution in streets and a struggle with property owners. But the project moved steadily forward through the years 1911 to 1914, and in November of the latter year friends of the necessary $3,800,000 bond issue piled up for it a majority of 78,846. It had been "bitterly fought by the outlying districts," wrote Walter D. Moody, "on the contention that it was an improve- ment for the rich automobile crowd and that they should pay the 149 CHICAGO S GREAT CENTURY entire cost." Such battles were doubtless annoying, but every one of them brought publicity for the Chicago Plan. Some of those who looked back could remember a Michigan Avenue that ran almost on the lip of the lake, one whose northern part crossed land where the little fort had stood, and on which, later, covered- wagon people had camped. And some of the same elder folk were viewing, with a sense of history, what was being done to elaborate and beautify the lake front itself. Here again were long conferences over maps, heated discussions in committee rooms, and worry over the dove-tailed jurisdictions of the govern- ment, the city, and the South Park board ; not to speak of the rights held by the Illinois Central railroad. But the power which the Plan Commission had generated, and the united will to improve Chicago once for all, gradually beat down the obstacles and legal tangles. Through nearly ten years citizens worked to unravel the knotted skein. Legislative action was necessary to acquire the riparian rights of property owners, in order to capture that long stretch of shore between Jackson and Grant Parks. Then the Illinois Central problem was tackled, at first by the Commercial Club plan com- mittee, headed by Edward B. Butler. An agreement was reached, but soon sharp-sighted citizens, including Charles E. Merriam, Lessing Rosenthal and members of the City Club, insisted the rail- road should make greater concessions. A new compact was signed, accompanied by an agreement of prime importance to the lake front — a site for the new Field museum, provided for handsomely in the will of Marshall Field. There were more controversies, a court test of the agreement, a protest from the war department over apparent threats to harbor development, the raising of the question of electrification, and various snags interposed by aldermanic "philosophers." All these at length were brought to the verge of conclusion. Thus in three directions the Chicago Plan was pushing its way through a sort of No-man's land of legal and physical hazards, encountering even figurative barbed wire, but unfaltering. At one time (1912-4) it had run full tilt against powerful railroad interests in connection with the project for the new Union Station, and had at least come off with a partial victory, though beaten on the question of putting that huge terminal as far south as 12th Street. 150 BIRTH OF CITY PLANNING By 1917, through work that lapped over from the term of Mayor Harrison into that of Mayor William Hale Thompson, the widen- ing of West 12th Street was completed and hailed by a procession of thousands in bannered automobiles. The Michigan Avenue extension had reached the point of wrecking some of the old build- ings south of the river. The forest preserve project, given an eloquent presentation in the Plan literature, had been indorsed by the people, organized, and well started in the purchase and im- provement of wooded tracts. West Side arteries like diagonal Ogden Avenue were to be extended. Mr. Wacker was as busy as a bee. His friends were toasting his success. Chicago itself was encouraged, full of grand proph- ecies, vigor and idealism. It had "settled" the vice question, following an elaborate report by Dean Walter Sumner's commis- sion, through breaking up the segregated district. It had put "Billy" Lorimer out of the senate. The University of Chicago had been granted a conditional $1,000,000 by Rockefeller's General Educa- tion Board for the great medical school. Through approval of the woman's suffrage act (1913) there was expectation of political reforms. The city had an electrification commission and a com- mittee on public efficiency (then headed by Julius Rosenwald). It had adopted a county pension plan to aid widows with children. Social agencies (thirty-two settlements and twenty-six listed charity groups) and even peace societies flourished and grew, like the ambitions of those seeking to reform the city's physical organism. Then the newspaper headlines became thicker and blacker. The war in Europe reached across the Atlantic. And Chicago faced, instead of Utopia, its share in Armageddon. 151 CHAPTER XVIII The War Years 1 WAR builds no cities. There were Chicago enterprises which had momentum enough to carry them to a finish in spite of all, but the greater part were halted. Instead of mass meetings on behalf of local improve- ments or benevolence, citizens met to take solemn pledges that the government be upheld in the crisis. Young men were hurrying to recruiting posts. The militia were being turned over to the gov- ernment. Older men, seconded by the women, left off committee work for parks, boulevards, or social welfare to take memberships on "war boards," which multiplied like the flowers of that mem- orable spring. Factories, in addition to those already making barbed wire, or shell forgings, or wheels for the allies, began to turn out engines of war instead of peace-time products. There was a hectic pros- perity, but it did not help chamber of commerce statistics. The packing-houses roared with extra activity. The Pullman Company put in shell-machining equipment to fill an enormous contract. Another company ran a plant night and day turning out motion picture outfits. Clothing sold to the government for more than $230,800,000 was rushed out of garment factories. The Deer- ing branch of the International Harvester Company was turned over to the fashioning of machine gun casts, ammunition wagons and other things alien to the program of the harvester pioneer, Cyrus McCormick. So swept, with a scope much greater than a few such details can picture, the war drive over Chicago industry during 1917-18. Offi- cials and foremen, many of them chafing because they were found essential to home activity, faced problems almost too great to be overcome; but they overcame most of them. Their personnel wrecked by enlistments and otherwise, their mail rilled with urgent demands from the government, they worked desperately to find men and fill orders. When they could not hire men, even old ones, 152 THE WAR YEARS they accepted women and boys. The workers were often clumsy or unreliable. One concern reported that it obtained only one able "hand" out of each twenty-five employed. Every valiant brain, or nearly everyone, was bent on keeping up the terrific pace of production to supply fighting men's needs; nearly every thought had to do, more or less, with "over there." Those who looked back to Civil War days, so distant yet so vivid, realized that "this was different." Apallingly different! It was not a case of straggling, huzzaing squads, with a few bullets in their pouches, entraining for a nearby state. Instead there were armories echoing the tread of well-filled regiments who would de- part silently for distant camps, and later enter ships to sail — whither? In place of a single board of a few men to coordinate and rule, there was a vast pattern of committees, bureaus, and "administrations." Alongside the minute picture of a Civil War Chicago, contributing what it could, rose the flaming chimneys of an industrial giant, hurling from its many mouths streams of destructive material in forms unknown to the nineteenth century. The "general orders" came from Springfield, where Gov. Low- den sat sleepless in the old-fashioned statehouse. The coordination was furnished by the State Council of Defense. In Chapter VIII were given the names of the Union Defense Committee of 1861-5. Here are those of the State Council of 1917-18: Samuel Insull, chairman B. F. Harris, vice-chairman John P. Hopkins, secretary until his death in October, 1918 Roger C. Sullivan, successor to Hopkins J. Ogden Armour, treasurer. Other members : Dr. Frank Billings, Mrs. Joseph T. Bowen, John H. Harrison, Levy Mayer, John G. Oglesby, Victor A. Olander, David E. Shartahan, John A. Spoor, Fred W. Upham, Charles H. Wacker, John H. Walker. Most of these individuals are remembered today for services other than these which, with a devotion "business" could hardly 153 CHICAGO S GREAT CENTURY inspire, they gave to Illinois and Chicago during the time of the World War. They sat in patient conferences, days and nights with- out number, while the crowds were cheering passing bands and banners. Having organized peace-time workers on a big scale, they set themselves to shape military affairs, pull everything together, and enforce upon a half-protesting public stern sacrifices, while all the noise went on elsewhere, and the glory was won in lands 3,000 miles away. Although so remote, the tempests in these countries could almost make themselves heard in a comparatively serene city of the Amer- ican midland. The telegraph had, since the Civil War, been sup- plemented by the instantaneous cable and the wireless. Movies considered excellent, though silent, came across when the censors let them come. Newspaper enterprise was at a peak. About all that lacked were the Atlantic telephone, the "talkie," and the short- wave radio. There were "missions" from overseas. The one which first stirred Chicagoans to a more than emotional heat was that of Mar- shal Joffre and Minister of Justice Viviani, from France. They reached American shores the month following America's declara- tion of war. Mayors of large cities rushed invitations to them, while one held back — the mayor of Chicago. There was an outcry. Why no invitation ? Was he disloyal ? the roused patriots demanded. He explained, "Chicago is the sixth German city," and a great deal more. It was the duty of the city council to hold out a welcom- ing hand, said he. The council promptly did so, not merely to the Frenchmen, but to the British mission, which was headed by Arthur Balfour. From the great English statesman came polite refusal to visit the city whose executive head had taken such a stand. But the French marshal and the minister, with their entourage, arrived on a May morning to find the city decorated for them and a brilliant program prepared. Sight of the blue-clad, ponderous but benign figure of Joffre, contrasted with the formal costume and pale face of Viviani, evoked demonstrations which seemed not merely hero- worship, but proof of passionate support of France. There were pageants three times a day, visits to the universities, streams of 154 THE WAR YEARS callers at the Richard T. Crane home, where the visitors were guests. An immense meeting was held in the Auditorium. The governor spoke. Viviani and Joffre were heard. To the gilt-arched ceiling rose in waves "The Marseillaise" and "America." Mayor Thomp- son, despite all, was there to "say a few words of greeting" to the Frenchmen. Scarcely had the echoes of those high-pulsed days died out than there arrived the incidents of the draft. It was June 5, 1917, when to every specified place in city and country poured men of all nationalities to register. They stormed the draft boards the minute the "polls were open," while young women of the Navy League auxiliary scooted about town in motor-cars delivering copies of President Wilson's war message. At other places, also, the recruit- ing stations, there were lines of young men, preferring to offer themselves rather than be taken. Strange incidents cropped up. A crowd of Serbs raised protest because they had been, somehow, designated as Germans. Two thousand men in cells at the bride- well, the city prison, registered, and only 5 per cent claimed exemption. There was a greater city- wide proportion of such claims, it was found, after the more than 300,000 names filled the books of draft boards. Meantime, not only men who put in exemption claims, but some who dodged or objected, were seized by police or federal agents. Notable was the case of a religious zealot who maintained that the scriptures taught "Thou shalt not kill." But despite the objectors, conscientious or not, the registration was a "landslide" for war. And a Chicago Herald editorial writer did not write too fancifully in employing the words : "Slow to wrath, America in a day becomes strong and terrible. There was the rush of winged victory in the air on June fifth — and Europe caught it." Even more portentous must have seemed to embattled nations the "draft" parade later in the summer, when through Chicago's chief streets tramped ten thousand men civilian in garb, but already proud of their membership in the newly christened National Army. The city was brilliant with all the flags of the allies. The Russian emblem was conspicuous ; a thing strange to remember now. And 155 CHICAGO S GREAT CENTURY the flags of "little countries" told of their ambitions. Crowds cheered; some who watched felt that the spectacle of the dusty ranks was both noble and pathetic. Notable was the group who carried a reminder that they were "258 men" ; that is, those whose numbers came first from the glass bowl in Washington. What with the draft, the liberty loans, the food measures, and a thousand other things, the summer was thronged with events. A new rumor each morning; a new surprise each afternoon. There were all the bustlings about, the hurrahs, the partings, that attend the chaos of war wherever fought ; only this movement was vaster and more determined than any that had called for partic- ipation by Chicago. Month after month rose such novelties as the Four minute men (the idea of Donald Ryerson, Chicagoan) shout- ing to "movie" audiences between reels ; meatless days and wheat- less days ; control of fuel ; appeals for greater crop production ; parades by such visitors as the Canadian Black Watch; thronged rallies in the Auditorium and elsewhere; visits from more celeb- rities than even during the World's Fair; streams of lads with suit-cases entraining for the Great Lakes Naval training stations ; others hurrying to the officers' camp at Fort Sheridan ; queer things like the collection of hundreds of spyglasses and telescopes from their owners ; beneficent things like movements for the moral and hygienic betterment of conditions near the training camps. All through that summer and autumn ran incidents of the depar- ture of men in stiff uniforms, off for the camps, off for mysterious destinations. In the same months were heard intermittent grumbles or outbursts from those who did not believe in the war. Came a culmination in September, when the "People's Council of America for Democracy and Peace" opposed itself to the effort of the patriots. Meeting a cold shoulder from various states, they tried out Chicago — and "made the first page." Mayor Thompson saw no reason to prevent their assemblage ; the constitution prescribed free speech. "Thank God," he was quoted as saying, "some folks haven't the power to change the constitution of the United States every fifteen minutes." 156 THE WAR YEARS The view of Governor Lowden, however, was embodied in the words : "Freedom of speech will be respected, but will not be used as a cloak for treason." Governor Lowden was determined the pacifist meeting should not be held. To make sure, he sent the Ninth regiment of the national guard. By the time the sleepy-eyed soldiers had tumbled out of trains, the big peace demonstration had faded away. But bitterness against Thompson prevailed for some time. He was hanged in effigy in front of the Public Library, and his portrait was removed from walls of clubs. (Note: Chicago re-elected him mayor in 1919, and in 1927 restored him to office after four years out of it.) While anti-pacifist excitements went on, accompanied by raids on I. W. W. houses and offices, the militant youngsters were still clambering into railway-cars, thirsting for life at Camp Grant or other camps, and decorating the coaches with signs such as : "Look us over ; Berlin or Bust." "Berlin Special of the Knock-em-dead Boys." "Spaghetti special No. 43. We'll spaghetti in Berlin." In a sign like this last spoke a half-humorous pride of nationality, which combined with a hot pro- Americanism. The vast "melting- pot" produced, contrary to the predictions of some, a unified spirit which was precisely what had come forth in 1861. This unity included even a majority of the German-speaking citizens, and it was evidenced not only in soldiers' shouts, or in formal addresses, but in the liberty loan campaigns. In all of these the "foreign division" turned in subscriptions which made a brave showing indeed. As a whole, the city's response to the crisis in 1917 was tre- mendous. In October Mr. Insull, as chairman of the State Council of Defense, told an audience facts like these : The city had sent 29,000 volunteers instead of its quota of 11,000. The draft quota of 25,000 had been promptly supplied. To officers' training camps 2,000 had gone. Soldiers of all classes had been supplied to the number of over 100,000. Contributions to the Red Cross had amounted to $5,000,000. 157 CHICAGO S GREAT CENTURY 4 Such were a very few of the aspects of Chicago during the second war of first magnitude which had occurred since the city was born. Nineteen eighteen saw the results of organization and of sacrifice, in the dispersal of the city's youth over foreign fronts, and in their triumphs. The city saw also grief. It acquired gold stars. It came into months of memorial meetings, and sorrowful but impressive rolls of honor found publication. The terrific struggle abroad was drawing to a close, although the "folks at home" could not be sure. They cheered the Chasseurs Alpines ("Blue Devils") of France and a squad of the foreign legion. They listened to many more speeches, and raised hundreds of millions additional money for liberty loans. They endured "heatless Mondays." They went by thousands to the "War Exposition" in Grant Park, viewed fourteen carloads of war trophies, airplanes in flight (no longer a novelty) demonstrations of trench life and battle. This was in September of 1918. Signs pointed to a collapse of German effort, though few could read these signs. Then, suddenly, a black headline (in some news- papers) "Armistice Signed," and there was a madness of joy in the streets, bells, whistles, cascades of paper streamers from build- ings. That afternoon, with equal suddenness, came a chilling denial. But the good news was merely a few days delayed. There was a Sunday of suspense, and then, at 1 :55 o'clock Monday morning the eleventh of November, word of the actual armistice flashed into newspaper offices and extras began pouring into the streets accom- panied by siren whistles. Those streets, almost dark, suddenly became brilliant and thronged. (Hard to believe it was 11 o'clock in the morning in France ! ) The news ran about like quick-silver. Blue-jackets on leave, sleeping in hotels, rushed from their rooms, and bandsmen were assembled to start a mammoth celebration. For two whole nights and a day the frenzy of joy possessed the city and its great half -circle of suburbs. Sleep was abandoned for rude parades under the skyscrapers, while red fire was burned and rockets whizzed aloft. People donned carnival dress in a hurry, appearing as harlequins, as Colombines, as devils. Women hugged 158 THE WAR YEARS and kissed every man in uniform they met. The saloons flourished till dawn in defiance of law. There was a merry game of knocking off hats, and men wore waste-baskets to protect their headgear from joyful clubbings. Such glimpses fail to tell the story of Chicago's armistice cele- bration, duplicated more or less throughout the country. If dignity disappeared, so did the gift of prophecy, for a procession of real hearses came upon the scene, bearing legends: "Funeral of the kaiser." Grimly, against the background of delight, rolled in the lists of Chicago dead, wounded and missing. They appeared in news- paper columns adjoining those describing the return of peace. 159 CHAPTER XIX Post- War Toils and Troubles 1 /""CHICAGO'S towers had scarcely ceased to echo riotous joy ^-^ when citizens went into action on a Platform of Recon- struction. And who should present this but the Chicago Plan commission ? It had been vigilant, though handicapped, throughout the war. Now it sought to pump new enthusiasm into the people for com- pletion of the far-reaching projects set forth ten years earlier. In a memorial addressed to the city council by the commission the latter cited President Wilson's warning, just uttered, that men must be put to work, and that public enterprises should go forward. There was an appeal to Chicago's pride : "Where yesterday was the wigwam, today is the national center of population, commerce, education, music and constructive art." Spurs to effort lay in the words : "It is not too late to replace procrastination with our vigorous support of the reconstruction program . . . Cease unnecessary bickering and get together . . . Vim and vigor lead to victory." The platform, as elaborate as that of a national convention, though framed for the needs of a single city, went on to demand action on nearly twenty improvements. The planners could foresee, though the average man could not, such noble spectacles as the vast and beautiful sweep of lake front, reserved for the people's rest and pleasure; the majestic perspective of North Michigan Avenue and that great bridge on the very spot where early traders had paddled across the little river to the log fort ; the broad double boulevard following the angles of the river itself, clear to the forks (the "South Water Street improvement") ; a curve in the south branch, which interfered with property development, straightened ; an outer boulevard and bridge connection between Grant and Lincoln Parks; the forest preserves extended by thousands of acres; West Side streets widened through ugly, congested areas; even a new post-office building (which did not arrive until the 160 POST-WAR TOILS AND TROUBLES 1930s) and better railway terminals. Lightly, the "platform" touched upon the matters of a zoning commission and a new city charter. "All we now need is the spark of ignition," cried the message. But, as it proved, there was need of a great deal more. In fact, it was impossible, during the year or two following the war, to keep the attention of the masses fixed steadily upon making a greater city. The tall ships kept coming into New York harbor, bearing on their decks swarms of shouting youngsters, crazy for recreation — and for jobs. They sped homeward, to be slapped on the back, and then to become part of a heavy task of readjustment. Here were the boys in khaki, added to what President Wilson called a "floating residuum of labor." Good men worked at the situation, but it was bad. And already there were signs that these returned troops were, for the most part, deeply disgusted because, while they were "over there," the country had given final approval to the 18th amendment to the constitution. Just what this would bring about, the work-a- day throngs scarcely suspected ; but they would soon find out. Also, there lay at the heart of Chicago's cosmopolitan soul a trouble which, in a way, recalled furious passions antedating even the Civil War; the problem of the negro. For generations he had, with reason, considered Chicago a bright spot on the northern map, a warm and friendly place where he could carve a fortune without too much interference. The World War brought his great chance. Big industry of Chicago needed the negro, and gave him work. And so, during the last two years of the war, some 65,000 colored folk came from the South to the lake-side city, as part of a race migration more dramatic than any in American history. They captured houses or hovels in some parts of the city, and in other parts, notably on the South Side, whole flocks of houses. The movement apalled not only real estate owners, but social workers ; it called to big-hearted and wealthy citizens such as Julius Rosen- wald, who nearly ten years before had begun to pour his philan- thropy into education and succor of the black people. But the Chicago scalawag felt for these cheerful, though often 161 CHICAGO S GREAT CENTURY ragged, newcomers nothing but hate. White and black men jostled each other at the gates of "plants"; they clashed on pleasure- grounds and glared at each other on street-cars. All this feeling, needing only the shock of a minor quarrel, boiled over one Sunday in July, 1919, and for half of the following week a guerilla war- fare raged between mobs of armed men, apparently too strong for control by the police. As the flames rose from burning negro homes, and as shots, even in loop streets, cut down fugitives, Chicago stood still in horror, wondering, once more, whether it could guide its own destiny. The city government, urged to issue a request for militia, stuttered. The burnings and shootings spread ; on at least one night police poured revolver shots into a crowd of negroes. Then a heavy pressure upon the city hall brought a request, which Governor Lowden promptly granted, for militia regiments. The ugly storm died down, and a thoughtful commission went to work to define the causes and seek remedies. Thirteen years later it seemed to many people that the only real remedy was to apply, and live, the Golden Rule. As for certain of the reigning politicians, it began to appear that their charity was extended not so much toward the sufferings of an unfortunate race as toward the ambitions of a lot of crooks and murderers. If this had been something new in Chicago, the "good citizens'* (who greatly outnumber the bad) might have been moved to halt the tendency right there. But the Chicagoan was not greatly to blame if he yawned, or laughed, when he heard about movements to check crime. If he was not old enough to remember the bad old days of the '70s or '80s, perhaps he could recall carnivals of vice and robbery at World's Fair time and could remind himself that the community voice against such evils was about as forcible as the peeping of a brood of new-born chickens. Later, so ran the citizen's retrospect, boards, federations and commissions had put up a fight against dens of immorality, or against grafting police — in 1917, for example, the Committee of Fifteen declared that one-tenth of the police force was "inherently crooked" — and for their pains 162 POST-WAR TOILS AND TROUBLES these federations and whatnot had been given the names of "muck rakers," or (more jeeringly) "up-lifters." Meantime, another very old football of debate, the liquor ques- tion, became tangled with the argument over crime. It had been kicked about since village days ; had stirred up passionate crusades by Prances E. Willard and many others ; had haunted mayors clear up to the time of Thompson, who early in his first term (threatened by a grand jury, it is said), closed the saloons on Sunday. There was no quarter between drys and absolute wets, either in the 70s, the '90s, or the 1920s. And there could be no doubt that the city had a raging thirst. So, while dinner-parties debated whether it was not too great an insult to personal liberty to meddle with the "fun" that was going on, the amiable law-breakers dug in on a fresh front. They acquired a new and very popular set of allies, the bootleggers, and a set of new weapons, including the low-priced bomb and the machine gun. A cool, narrow-eyed alien named John Torrio, who had inhabited Chicago's "bad lands" for some years, began to think of himself as a chieftain. Soon he acquired a corpulent under- ling named Alphonse Capone. In justice to the hard-worked citizen, of whose idealism there is little doubt, it must be said that he was kept badly informed ; nor, perhaps, did anyone outside of the hoodlum rings know exactly what the clever leaders of those rings were doing. It was far easier to watch the rise of tall buildings, and to see Michigan Avenue forging its way northward. Yet there had been symptoms, sensa- tional enough, which should have warned other people besides sociologists. Gangs had, of course, flourished since the city was full grown ; the education of boys in crime was commonplace ; Hull House and juvenile court officials strove to arouse the public. But in the brilliant 1920s, it was not a matter of clashes with fists and hurling of bricks. The ambush came into fashion. So did the use of the automobile in pursuit and "getaway." A youth named Teddy Webb had been acclaimed as the pioneer, back in 1912, in using fast motor-cars in his banditries. The new hoodlum organ- izations employed every such device of speed, as well as the "prin- ciples" of cowardly skulking and shooting people in the back. They charted their business with a thoroughness worthy of a public 163 CHICAGO S GREAT CENTURY utility and carried on operations with a nice conception of profit and loss. Soon arrived murders more baffling than those which, in earlier time, had sent many men to the gallows. In some cases the slayers were as good as identified ; but the business of liquor rings, growing each year, was fortified by the employment of the "best" lawyers. Also, it became known that there were ways of silencing witnesses. And when witnesses showed a preference for being silent, neither police nor prosecutors exerted themselves unduly to open their months. Simultaneous with all this, there was going on a lot of interior tumult and plotting among certain labor organizations. Brass knuckles, very seldom revolvers, had been the vogue twenty years before, when one Martin B. ("Skinny") Madden was a boss. But the revolver and sawed-ofl shotgun were the favorite weapons after the World War. The public knew little about the "inside" of labor matters, and was helpless anyhow. But a few people discerned that the career of a man like "Moss" Enright, convicted of killing another dubious character in 1910, pardoned in 1913, and himself slain (by the newly popular sawed-off shotgun) in 1920, had a certain significance. Such careers were not few in the 1920s, at the same time when the urge to put up tall, magnificent buildings was growing. The tough element among the unions — not the pre- dominant element, by any means — fought for its graft. And the birth of the Landis award commission in 1921, following the build- ing-wage decision of the white-haired federal judge, was attended by a bitter struggle. Thus the hideous butcheries, the plots and counter-plots, which streaked with blood and terror some of these years while the World War was receding into history, are seen to have originated in conditions which were ancient and deep-seated, but which de- veloped the faster as the city became busier, more ambitious, more preoccupied, and worse governed politically. In addition, the thieves and murderers managed to surround themselves with so much glamour that they often shone as heroes. The romance (in both life and death) of a man like Dean O'Banion, young, handsome and reported to be generous, "outdid the movies" — which had not then got to the point of outdoing the 164 POST-WAR TOILS AND TROUBLES truth in gangster films. And when a smartly dressed and good- looking thug named "Marty" Durkin killed a federal officer, was caught and returned to Chicago, he was met at the station by crowds admiring his lovely grey suit and maroon handkerchief, and girls cried: "Ain't he a sheik!" 4 How the gangs formed, split up, signed "truces," cemented their alliances with political powers, and when strictly necessary, put to death individuals, big or little, who stood in the way, belongs to a "literature" which occupies much more than a five-foot shelf. He who chooses to review that part of Chicago's history may well do parallel reading about the growth of enterprises which added to the city's beauty. The two opposing tendencies, crime and progress, marched on together. They shared the "first page." And some of the same city officials who opened bridges, wore their best clothes at boulevard ceremonies, and spoke of the city's glorious history were, in all probability, giving secret encouragement to the gangs. The leaders of the latter, however, were aliens, transients, selfish "boarders" in a city they cared nothing about ; while the men who dreamed of a splendid lake front or of greater forest preserves were mostly Chicagoans born; at least, Chicagoans to the bottom of their hearts. The young-old city, assuming so fast a statuesque and majestic garb, was hospitable, humorous, a trifle wild at heart. It would usually counter repressive talk with the retort that people must have their fun. Half of it was shocked at the frequent murders. The other half got a thrill out of the presence of swaggering, well- tailored gunmen — so few of whom, if the people had only known it, would have dared to fight squarely with pistols at thirty paces. So the noisy and desperate period, lived under the glare of electric light prodigally spent, and amid the din of jazz orchestras and loud-speaking radios, swept on, with the towers for scenery, and the warfare of rival hoodlums for tragedy. 5 A sunny day in May, 1920 : The Coliseum is being prepared for the republican convention to nominate Warren G. Harding. But this is not why the city wears festival array. 165 CHICAGO S GREAT CENTURY Michigan Avenue, as far south as the Art Institute, is brilliant with people in Spring costume. The street is widened to the river bank, to which it slopes with a grade that once worried automobile owners whose engines were weak. The stream, flowing westward from the dimpled lake, is now crossed by the tremendous bridge, whose leaves can rise, rumblingly, high in air. Charles H. Wacker and Mayor Thompson step out of cars, at a point where a silken ribbon bars the bridge approach. The mayor takes scissors to the silk ribbon. And as it parts, a band blares out the "Star Spangled Banner" ; crowds roar ; boats under the bridge whistle madly and fire tugs send their siren calls across the loop. Another moment, and airplanes shower down masses of paper, the work of "Big Bill's" Booster clubs, hailing their hero. And an immense sign proclaims : "All hats off to our mayor. What do we live for ?" With a great click of gears and whirr of motors, the automobiles sweep across the bridge. It is one of "Big Bill's" great days, but it is also a day thoughtfully viewed, by men who have virtually prayed for it, as a culmination in creating the city of the future. And now, the other side of the dual picture : There is going on one of the endless disputes about Chicago's crime. There has been an elaborate report by the Crime commis- sion, vigilant in its way, to the effect that the city is extremely wicked. A judge rises at a luncheon to call this report "an unwar- ranted attempt to tarnish the fair name of Chicago." The director of the commission coldly replies : "The crime business is as stable in Chicago as the banking business. A chart of robberies, bur- glaries and murders for the year will have lines with less fluctuation than the business chart of the clearing-house." Moreover, while the motorists are gleefully testing the new bridge, after the ceremony, a choice group of citizens, including two judges, three aldermen, a former assistant district attorney, and a bailiff of the municipal court, are appearing in the funeral procession of "Jim" Colosimo, an underworld chieftain who has been murdered in his cafe, vacating the throne for crafty John Torrio. These various panels in the mural design of Chicago in the 1920s are equally vivid and equally historic. 166 CHAPTER XX The Skyline Changes Again 1 IF one look back over a stretch of time, he can descry very easily periods when Chicago's energies leaped forward, cover- ing immense ground before meeting a reverse. Such a spurt took place after the coming of the first railroads. Another was the recovery during the 70s, a third the progress made up to the verge of the World's Fair, still another the awakening in the '90s, caused partly by the use of electricity and of many kinds of newly contrived machinery. But the Chicago which began to appear on the horizon after the World War surpassed those others as much as the Paris in Napoleonic times outshone the mediaeval capital. It was not merely becoming statuesque, but it had wider horizons. City life pushed farther and farther into the surrounding coun- try ; villages that had been crossroads woke up and acquired bright lights; people poured into suburbs graced by examples of better architecture and by improved ideas of landscaping. Thousands of homes, in which electricity and other elements of convenience employed only during a generation made life easier, were built. The city itself was getting away from chaos and in many in- stances its new builders were taking into account the Chicago Plan. A notable example : When William Wrigley decided to put up a tall building, he chose to make it one of the two skyscraper "gate- posts" which the Plan had indicated just west of the mouth of the river. Mr. Wrigley, it has been stated, kept in touch with the Plan Commission. He shaped his building so as to fit in with one of those scenes sketched years before by the Burnham artists. Then he created a plaza helpful to the ideal treatment of the river- side, at a point where an ancient dock was moldering. That first skyscraper on the north bank of the storied stream evoked words of amazement even from people old enough to have raved over the Masonic Temple. It "stole admiration from its companion wonder, the link bridge," which was carrying its thou- sands of cars while the Wrigley Building was still incomplete. 167 CHICAGO S GREAT CENTURY It was ''the largest terra cotta structure in the world," standing sentinel not only beside the river, but over new-born North Michi- gan Avenue. "One's eyes," exulted a writer, "are drawn irresist- ibly from the almost white base through lighter strata whose limits are imperceptible up to the gleaming tower, so much whiter than the rest that it seems in the sunlight." Mr. Wrigley himself is said to have gazed entranced upon the effect, and to have resolved : "I'll keep it clean if I have to wash it once a week." In his delight, and in his feeling of kinship to the great bridge, he gave a good-sized fund for stone tablets on the bridge-houses. The B. F. Ferguson monument fund also contributed toward these ornaments. It was six or seven years before they were complete.* Not long after the Wrigley Building, and facing it, came the other "gate-post" provided for in the Plan. It was the London Guarantee & Accident Company Building. This was erected, as everyone knows, on a part of the site of Fort Dearborn. It was done in singular pattern. Interesting, but soon forgotten by many, was the fact that this skyscraper began to rise around a three- story relic which the owner refused to part with. At length, with steel columns going up, he sold. In the meanwhile, with a great rush of building enterprise, the whole district along North Michigan Avenue and east of it began to take on the aspect it now has. The effort of years before, held back by stubborn property-owners and by lawsuits — the special assessment roll was the largest in American history, it is said, and the suits numbered more than 8,000 — was at last free of its chains. Moreover, the eccentric and pugnacious Capt. Streeter, who single-handed had blocked progress in earlier days, was dead. Strange, perhaps humiliating, thoughts may have come to old- fashioned north-siders who had fought the Michigan Avenue im- *They represent "Defense" (Fort Dearborn massacre), "Regeneration" (the recovery after the fire of 71), "The Pioneers" and the "Discoverers." The former two are the work of Henry Hering, the latter two are by James Earle Fraser. The bronze tablets, honoring Joliet, Marquette, LaSalle and Tonti, were presented by the Colonial Dames; the artist, Wheeler Williams. 168 THE SKYLINE CHANGES AGAIN provement. Some had merely deprecated the plan; otiiers had demanded huge sums of money. A soap company battled in the courts for about $1,500,000, but was at length satisfied with a verdict for less than half that sum. Such disagreeable features were outdone by the greed of politicians to get their hands on the fat expenditures. The public paid and paid, while "Mike" Faherty, Thompson's local-improvement chief, plunged ahead earn- ing both blame and praise. Ambition quickly seized private concerns to beautify North Michigan Avenue. Towers shot up along its sleek length. The Tribune Company determined to enter the area, and held a com- petition of designs, selecting finally one in Gothic style and giving second place to the Sariannen entry embodying the "set-back" idea. The building rose between 1923 and 1925, digging deep into the ground and pushing toward the blue sky a tower which stood for some years as an unrivalled spectacle for people gazing along the shore east of the avenue. Visitors to the building saw features such as the Ruskin passage inlaid in the floor of the entrance-hall, beginning: "Therefore when we build, let us think- that we build forever" ; the carved "Aesop's screen" or "Tree of Life," over the entrance; the 125-foot flagpole; the tower itself, (designed by John Mead Howells and his partner, Raymond Hood, winners in the competition) and somewhat inspired by the Rouen Cathedral. The Tribune acquired a burly neighbor, the Medinah Athletic Club. In the same energetic years came the Furniture Mart, with its immense body and blue-tinged tower. Largest building in the world; no competitor — then. It went up, not far from the huge betowered Navy Pier, built in 1916, on the tract known as Streeter- ville; so known because on those sandy acres the fighting captain had made his stand. And on that battle-ground, too, rose soon an enterprise even more curiously contrasting with the captain's ideals than the Mart — the Northwestern University campus. The land had been "discovered" during the World War by a far- sighted committee of trustees. That the university should have it was settled by a large gift by Mr. and Mrs. George A. McKinlock, in memory of their son, a war victim. Mrs. Montgomery Ward, Mrs. Levy Mayer, and Mr. and Mrs. W. A. Wieboldt made other 169 n CHICAGO S GREAT CENTURY big contributions (Mrs. Ward's was $3,000,000) and the McKin- lock Campus became a reality — but not for some years. To the district, or adjacent, and not far from the water-tower dedicated by the old theater man, Mayor Rice, hurried promoters who built hotels, skyscrapers, or buildings of modest height in neat modern design. The "near north side" became a museum of architecture expressing three or four artistic eras, a rendezvous for students, painters, composers (also, the home of Harriet Monroe's magazine, "Poetry," which so encouraged Carl Sandburg and others of the post-war literary element), a region which earned a name which it also scorned as obsolete — "Bohemia." It preferred to be called "Towertown." Over all this, as the ardent period spent itself, loomed at length that proud shaft, the Palmolive Building, with its searching rays from the Lindbergh beacon. By that time, thanks to the persistence of the Chicago planners and of public officials, the south bank of the river as far west as the forks had been completely transformed. To the enormous project known originally as the "South Water Street improvement," later as Wacker Drive, one must devote the attention due to a work which outranked the raising of Lake Street in the '50s. Remember, South Water Street was one of the very oldest in the city, dating, indeed, to the original "town plot" made by the canal surveyor, James Thompson. And the industry on South Water Street, the trade in produce, was one of the fathers of prosperity. What the Plan Commission proposed, first in 1908-9, and more specifically in 1917, was to wipe out South Water Street completely, and to banish to another region the traders and all their houses. An idea fit for the Twentieth Century ! There existed not only the task of making the enterprise seem reasonable, but that of executing it. So while the "propaganda" was launched and the inevitable squabbles were dealt with, engi- neers gravely pondered what had to be done. It was a job of planting a solid boulevard good for a hundred years on a treacher- ous bank of clay underneath which lay uncertain strata of an earlier Chicago. The work involved also destruction of (and 170 THE SKYLINE CHANGES AGAIN paying for) "three quarters of a mile of old ramshackle commis- sion houses." That was the picture drawn by Mayor William E. Dever, successor to Thompson in 1923. "Big Bill" had ordered his brigadier, Faherty, "full speed ahead" the year before Dever came in. But it was under Dever that the determination to shove this thing through willy-nilly, was most forcibly exerted. The mayor laid down the law to the South Water Street protesters time after time. Then his local-improvements president, John J. Sloan, went into action with the gloves off. Three federal judges, Page, Cliff e and Wilkerson — the last- named of whom had been busy that summer sending Bootleggers Druggan and Lake to jail — turned down an injunction sought by certain produce men. Mr. Sloan at once took some wreckers and a half dozen policemen to a building on South Water Street and tore the roof off. While showers of boards and tar paper fell, the tenants tele- phoned their lawyers. "We'll pull the building out from under you if we have to!" roared Sloan. This was in October, 1924. Mr. Wacker, for whom the drive was destined to be named, hailed the rough-house onslaught as "the most important event in Chicago's history." It was more important, in some minds, than an incident the next month which expressed that other and darker theme of the urban drama. This incident was the neatly accomplished murder of Dean O'Banion in his pretty flower shop. In December of 1924 workmen began to pour concrete into caissons in the easternmost section of Wacker Drive. Caissons? Yes, indeed. This was a job like putting up a parapet of skyscrapers. The boulevard could not rest upon the clay ; it must be founded upon bed-rock, which at Chicago's heart lies eighty or ninety feet below the surface. Hence arrived crews of "sand-hogs" (caisson workers) toiling far underground. There were more than 600 of the caissons, "enough to support twenty new Palmer Houses," it was remarked. They were bound together by reinforced concrete beams, the reinforcement calling for some 171 CHICAGO S GREAT CENTURY 17,000,000 pounds of structural steel. A laboratory was set up at LaSalle Street wherein both concrete and steel received a spe- cial test. Moreover, there was a neat engineering problem in clearing the Chicago Tunnel Company subway, which was de- cidedly in the way. And at times the crews encountered rotten pilings of docks obsolete but well rooted. There were also quick- sands — and rats. The old produce houses were crumbling. The riverside looked like a section of city after bombardment. Sadly the remaining traders looked out upon the meek stream, remembering old sailing- ship days, or gay steamers setting out, or tragedies like that ghastly calamity of 1915, when the excursion boat Eastland keeled over and took more than 800 people to their death. The new city was effacing all that. True to its habit, it was banishing landmarks and memories. The South Water Street merchants flocked across the river to the region called The Valley, where they occupied a mart sanitary but inexpressive of early days. Rapidly, despite obstacles and complexities, the boulevard grew westward. In April, 1926, one of the bosses stood beside the net- work of concrete beams and timbers. Said he: "I think we can finish by fall." Not many believed him; and the public did not hear him at all. Most people were excited about another horror which sneered at Chicago progress and Chicago justice : The mur- der, by "persons unknown," of an assistant state's attorney, young William J. McSwiggin. The city vowed that "someone should swing this time." But nobody did. The reign of hoodlumism, with Capone now king — or possibly- grand vizier for a group of hidden monarchs — darkened the latter part of Dever's term as mayor. He had tackled the city's menace bravely, and more directly than political strategists thought wise. He and his efforts were going into the discard. But Wacker Drive, the two-level phenomenon stretching from the site of Fort Dear- born to the spot once occupied by Mark Beaubien's Sauganash Tavern and then by the "Lincoln Wigwam," was done in time for Dever to dedicate it. Before a joyful crowd the mayor un- veiled a bronze tablet. "They have achieved the almost impos- 172 Courtesy of Chicago Daily News Wacker Drive, Seen Between Towers, 1928 THE SKYLINE CHANGES AGAIN sible," he said of Burnham, Wacker and Sloan. (Mr. Wacker was at home ill ; worn out. He would live only three years more.) In the evening there was a banquet, with speeches tracing the history of the river back to the time of Marquette. Then the mayor returned to his office, to listen during succeeding months for reports that machine-guns had brought down another victim. And he heard plenty of them. But just as often he was thrilled to learn that a new skyscraper had been projected for Wacker Drive, which now boasts a half dozen buildings rising above 300 feet with their towers, and three that climb close to 500 feet, or higher. 6 Not fifty years after W. L. B. Jenney's pioneering on the skyscraper, the tall building passion had a culmination. By 1930 there could be a roster like the following, which shows the height of buildings', including their spires:* Feet Board of Trade 612 Chicago Temple 569 Pittsfield 557 20 N. Wacker Drive 555 1 North LaSalle 530 Morrison Hotel 526 Pure Oil Building 523 Mather Tower 519 Carbide and Carbon 500 LaSalle- Wacker 491 State Bank of Chicago 479 Bankers 476 Straus Building 475 Furniture Mart 474 Medinah Athletic Club 471 Palmolive 468 Steuben Club 465 Feet Tribune 462 Roanoke Tower 452 Willoughby 448 Wrigley (south) 398 Tower 394 333 N. Michigan 394 Allerton Club 360 Capitol (old Masonic Tem- ple) 354 Builders 342 Merchandise Mart 340 Stevens Hotel 340 201 N. Wells 336 Morton 332 London Guarantee 325 Daily News 302 New Masonic Temple 300 Thanks to the combined efforts of builders, scientists and finan- cial agencies it had become possible to climb higher than the Washington Monument, easily and quickly. Through the years, improvements in foundations, in simplicity as well as soundness of construction, in speedy elevators with automatic control, and in organization of the armies which worked hoists, riveting apparatus Figures taken from The Chicago Daily News Almanac. 173 CHICAGO S GREAT CENTURY and all the rest — always with the laboratory in the background- had made skyscraper work a different sort of task. Those giants took their stand, one by one, on Wacker Drive. Then on the south branch the Daily News erected a building which was the first use in Chicago of the air-rights principle. It took from 1926 to 1929 to work out the legal complications and com- plete the building, which with its plaza stood in part over steam railroads entering the Union Station. Smoke was disposed of through ingenious ducts. The trains disturbed neither the occu- pants of the Daily News Building nor those of the new 42-story Civic Opera House (20 N. Wacker Drive) across the river. The only disturbance was the whistling of steamers and tugs. To old "Wolf Point," across from Wacker Drive, came the Merchandise Mart, largest building in the world; it "broke the nose" of the Furniture Mart. It also used air-rights where it bestrode the North Western Railway tracks. Marshall Field & Co. had projected this colossal building, and James Simpson saw it through. He was the more pleased to decorate the riverside, in accord with the Chicago Plan, since he had succeeded Mr. Wacker as chairman of the Commission. The river, once too murky to mirror anything, now could flash back the brilliant lights of many newcomers on its banks. People got a keen thrill when they looked along the stream, bordered by so many thousands of lighted windows and by vari-colored beacon lights. And the cluster of towers to the eastward was radiant by day and mysterious at night. And it was all very beautiful. But could it surpass the Michigan Avenue front, the fortress- like row of skyscrapers, sun-lit of a morning and blazing with "jewelry" at night? The Chicagoan, be he historian or something else, must come back to that scene. Not only must he see in the buildings, whose peaks are as irregular as a bolt of lightning, the story of a city which resolved to be a giant, but he must see in the huge landscaped expanse in front of the buildings the triumph of the urge to give the city beauty. 174 CHAPTER XXI The Deeds of a Century 1 THE city sped toward its century mark. The lake front grew toward its final transformation. At last the time had come when the destiny of that shore was certain. It had been freed of all uncertainties, all conflict, all the tangle of legalisms and "whereas-es." After thirty years, the question asked by a hundred leading citizens in 1894, "What shall we do with the lake front ?" could be answered. And the answer was, "Give it to the people — and to the sun and wind." As early as 1921, the new Field Museum, made possible by Marshall Field's $8,000,000 bequest, stood on its eminence facing south over a territory as blank as Sahara, and north toward a great tract whose confusion was only the Chicago way of getting some- thing done. The marble building rested on a subterranean forest of pilings. To build it required thousands of men and exacted toil worthy of the slaves of Pharaohs. To occupy it and move thither the treasures housed in the old Jackson Park Arts Palace was a task consuming months and calling for both patience and skill. But there it loomed at last, shining in the sunlight, or grey in the evening mist. Month by month, year by year, Grant Park swarmed with wagons, with laborers, with gardeners. The new landscape was being finished. It was being made of the city's waste ; the rubble of old buildings, the spare earth cast up from excavations, heaped into trucks, and freighted lake-wards by the little cars which ran in the twilight of the tunnel system. Scarcely had the observer seen this stratum of a "Debris Age" spread out when he began to watch the arrival of sand, then black earth, then seed, grass, and trees. And there came boulevards between the rows of baby elms. Behind the formidable hedgerow of Michigan Avenue buildings there were plots, explosions, and roar of voices. In front, there was only the immense, peaceful domain of the people — and of the Sun God. 175 CHICAGO S GREAT CENTURY 2 Before the Field Museum was done, talk started about a monster building to be erected somewhere on the prodigious terrain. Like the museum, it had to be south of 12th Street, for the Montgomery Ward injunction still held firm. Soon the public heard of a plan to build a memorial to the war heroes. Mayor Thompson and his "boosters" adopted this idea. It gathered way. It took on the out- lines of a stadium ; bond money was voted in the glow of enthusiasm for the lake front — which was also due to have a grand new Illinois Central Terminal, but did not get it. The South Park board, headed by E. J. Kelly and including civic-spirited members such as B. E. Sunny, went at the project with determination and pressed it hard during the middle 1920s, when big enterprises were ever welcome. By the fall of 1925 the immense field was enclosed by the greater part of its walls and seats, and the colonnade on the eastward side overlooked the lake. The character of memorial was kept to the fore by the American Legion and other bodies ; and "Soldier Field" was the name adopted. Former Governor Lowden so christened it on Armistice Day, 1925, before an outpouring of the Legion, of veterans of several wars headed by Gen. James E. Stuart, and an honor corps of Gold Star mothers and fathers. A year later came Vice-president Dawes to stand before another huge crowd, in a November snowstorm, and reemphasize the character of the place as a tribute to American heroism. Spectacles which put into far background all the pageantries, all the political conventions and other fetes of Chicago's history, came to the huge enclosure on the lake front. With the roar and glitter of the motor era, the blare of amplifiers, the surging of multitudes, all the outpourings of a city of 3,000,000, these displays of twen- tieth-century bigness went on, from year to year. They ranged from the Eucharistic Congress of 1926 — when altars were set up and pontifical high mass was celebrated, with a choir of 62,000 parochial school pupils, and a total attendance of 150,000 — to foot- ball contests like the Army-Navy encounter, and to prize-fights like the Tunney-Dempsey battle in 1927. That September night some 145,000 people watched the Tunney victory under electric flares. The turnstiles clicked off $2,658,000. 176 THE DEEDS OF A CENTURY 3 In the meantime, Grant Park was acquiring other features, those born of the city's wistfulness for "sheer beauty." There lay in a store-room one of the finest examples of the work of the sculptor St. Gaudens — his "seated Lincoln." It had been provided for in the will of John Crerar in 1889, and was finished in 1907. In May of 1926, after nineteen years of seclusion, the Lincoln statue was given its place in the sun, and a crowd of citizens and war veterans heard Former Judge Cutting dedicate it, and saw Norman Williams, grandson of one of the original Crerar trustees, unveil the magnificent figure. In the following year, people looking down from window-eyries of Michigan Avenue saw another tribute to "sheer beauty" begin its activity. It was a fountain, the gift of Miss Kate Buckingham in memory of her brother Clarence. "Versailles had come to Chicago," for the fountain had no rival anywhere except in that palace park near Paris. The main fountain had auxiliaries and a set of sea-horses in bronze. The jets of water were interspersed in fascinating pattern, and color effects were provided to dazzle night crowds. The Lincoln Park fountain given by Yerkes, had it been still in existence, would have been dwarfed by the Buckingham fountain as much as the skyscrapers of the '80s dwindle before those of today. Miss Buckingham placed the memorial under the care of the Art Institute, which by now had grown westward over the Illinois Central tracks, and had acquired the Goodman Theater and the elegant McKinlock Court. The Institute had retained its prestige as the only building on the actual lake front north of 12th Street ; and it no longer had to spend a big sum clearing Illinois Central cinders off its roof. For along with everything else that was won- derful on the lake front, the railroad which came in 1852 to puff and creak along the shore was now "reformed" ; at least, electrified. The agreement made just after the World War had been carried out successfully — largely thanks to the Illinois Central's president, Charles H. Markham — and by 1926 the suburban trains ran, smoke- less, in their walled-in corridor. However, destiny was not through with the lake front. While the peace armies were still busy fortifying it, three citizens of note 177 CHICAGO S GREAT CENTURY were conceiving plans to add to its grandeur. In 1925, John G. Shedd made a gift of $2,000,000, to which he added $1,000,000 the following year, for an aquarium. In 1928 Max Adler became the "father" of the planetarium ; he gave a half million dollars for this astronomical institution, hoping that it would demonstrate, said he, that "all mankind, rich and poor, powerful and weak, as well" as all nations here and abroad, constitute part of one universe." A few years earlier Julius Rosenwald had become convinced that Chicago should have a great industrial museum, on the order of those in Munich and Vienna. The result was his offer, made known to a committee of the Commercial Club in 1926, to make an initial gift of $3,000,000 for an industrial museum. These three projects went forward in their various ways and with different degrees of speed. The planetarium, as it happened, won the race and had its "grand opening" in the spring of 1930; the aquarium was ready a little later. The industrial museum project was of far greater scope and difficulty. And it became connected with another big task — the restoration of that temple in Jackson Park which had been first an art palace and then a museum of natural history. What to do with the old arts palace pestered the South Park board after 1920, when the Field collection moved north. In 1923 the board had determined to raze it, but, as a recent writer told the story, the "execution was stayed by a woman, single-handed at first and later with the aid of 6,000 other women." This woman, Mrs. Albion Headburg, prominent in club work, uttered a for- midable protest; the park board paused. Then, with the aid of Lorado Taft, George H. Maher and others, she stirred up a move- ment to repair a small part of the building. Those 6,000 women paid for it, one dollar apiece. The outcry, "Save the art palace !" took hold. In 1924, with the women behind it, a $5,000,000 bond issue to restore the whole structure passed at the polls. It is probable that Mr. Rosenwald had in mind from the first, the idea that the industrial museum might occupy that old and well- loved building. Anyway, when he announced his gift the dual enterprise of museum and of restoration quickly shaped itself. Three years after his announcement work of encasing in stone the structure, following faithfully its outlines, was begun; and though 178 3 Eh g O < g s o g o M CO w U Pi o pq THE DEEDS OF A CENTURY stalled for a time by a suit brought by one of those protesting citizens who make Chicago life so militant, this work went bravely on. Mr. Rosenwald added nearly two millions to his original three, and finally, characteristically, got his name subordinated in the official title. It became the Museum of Science and Industry, founded by Julius Rosenwald. The "old ruin," when attacked by the renovators, proved to be not so badly off, after all. A lot of the masonry was in good condition, and the steel roof trusses had been well protected by paint. The World's Fair builders knew their trade ! The nineteen-twenties. . . . Those were years when Beauty wore seven-leagued boots, when funds poured into public treasuries — to be badly wasted at times — when money was everywhere, when even universities grew rich, when anything seemed possible. Gen. Sherman might have repeated his belief that Chicago would "undertake to build a railroad to the moon." Fortunately the city was satisfied with such super-tasks as making the lake shore what the prophets had foretold; turning it into a thirty-mile stretch for pleasure and education; expanding old Lincoln Park; creating the 1000- foot- wide area named after D. H. Burnham; building Leif Eriksen drive with its memorable vistas ; and linking the north and south sides by boulevard and bridge at the river-mouth. Lake Michigan, exquisite body of water that it is, choicest possession of a city wealthy in so many ways, could at last testify that it was held at its true value. Beside the clear, white outlines of a city's real achievements, how dim are the shadows of the political battles, campaign come- dies, and even crime dramas, of "only yesterday" ! The classic buildings, with all that they mean, stand triumphant over adverse forces in city life which streaked the post-war years with sinister contrasts. Black deeds and white contended for attention. The former captured the "front page," but their victory was fleeting. It now taxes the memory of most people to recall 179 CHICAGO S GREAT CENTURY many an "unforgettable" phrase spoken in the artificial heat of a quarrel for office, or to reenact the clownings with which even a chief executive regaled merry crowds. Only an expert in hood- lum annals can repeat, date by date, name by name, that history of plot and counterplot, attack and revenge, which was once on the lips of everybody; and even details of crimes like the "St. Valentine's Day massacre" and the murder of Jake Lingle grow dim. As for Al Capone, hero of a thousand fictions told by brilliant writers from New York, London and Paris, where is he ? And on what legends are those writers busy now ? The whole gaudy, wasteful, blood-streaked period passes into its place in the sequence of Chicago events, which for eighty or ninety years past have been an alternation of darkness and light. Just as the scandal of Chicago's "Sands," the railroad riots of the '70s, the anarchist bomb, the graft and vice of the '90s, not to speak of numerous other black pages, subside into material sought only by historians, so the "reign of crime" in the puerperal 1920s sinks gradually into dust-laden oblivion in newspaper libraries. And just as Chicago's pioneer endeavors, its emergence from mud and confusion, its grand rally from the disaster of 71, its Colum- bian Exposition, and its triumph over one crisis after another, constitute its predominant story, so also its demonstrations of a noble spirit at a time when the world could think of nothing but insulting adjectives for it, represent the actual theme of its pres- ent-day phase. The city sped on towards its century-mark. It could look back over a life-time less than a third as long as the stretch between Hendrik Hudson's New York and that of J. P. Morgan. Chicago had reached its present stature in a period about one-twentieth as extensive as that between the beginnings of Paris and the French capital which knew Clemenceau, Foch, and Briand. Some of the ambitions of Chicago, supreme American phe- nomenon, had borne no fruit; but others, as the century-mark drew near, could be listed as undeniably successful. The city had striven, in the '30s and '40s, to render a low- lying wilderness a site for a prosperous, healthful place in which 180 THE DEEDS OF A CENTURY to live. By 1900 it had accomplished most of this, and, during later years, through the sanitary canal and sewage disposal plants, it made the rest almost wholly true. Chicago had taken a trickling country stream, made it com- mercially valuable, caused it to "run uphill," turned it to the uses of health; and as a sequel had forcibly straightened one of its eccentric curves. Chicago had projected a deep waterway, and before its hundred years were run, it had seen the patient hope come to the brink of fact. The city had built railroads during a period of skepticism, and within a half-century had become a railroad center knowing no equal. And when the era of travel by air arrived, the city had logically become a great axis of that activity, with a score of airplane fields and a municipal port where arrivals and departures averaged two hundred a day. Chicago had encouraged an entire agricultural district, had established the first grain exchange in the west ; had become the packing headquarters for an empire of live-stock states; had become the halfway house of traders of all kinds ; so it could employ, without braggadocio, the soubriquet of "Great Central Market." It had extended a welcome to manufacturers, and by 1929 the products of its "plants" were valued at well over $3,000,000,000. It had begun to have banks before it was ten years old, and by 1930 its people had packed away savings amounting to more than $678,000,000. It had given people a chance to work, it had incited them to work, and when the result of this was checked up in 1927, for example, it was found that men and women were being paid wages of $576,159,000. But all this was only one segment of the panorama. In its first days, Chicago demanded and got public schools. Less than a hundred years later, there was a school enrollment of more than a half million, taught by a corps of teachers as numerous as the whole population of the city in 1845. 181 CHICAGO S GREAT CENTURY Another first thing was a medical college. Eighty years later there were five, and four of them ranked as of the first class, In place of the solitary law school of 1847, there were seven in 1929. Before the Civil War, Chicago had two colleges, one of them in a suburb. The world war period found it with nine, including three universities, Northwestern, Chicago and Loyola, which enjoyed international rating. The former two had endowments high in the millions, and buildings which — like the University of Chicago chapel — added to the city's architecture a nobility recalling the "cathedral age." The three primitive churches were the forerunners of a religious progress expressed in more than 1200 churches and communicants by the hundred thousand. Chicago set aside its first park in 1838. Within ninety years its total park area was more than 7000 acres. And in these domains were scores of small parks, playgrounds, community houses, recreation centers. Moreover, the early impulse to make forests the people's playground had developed more than 30,000 acres of forest preserve. Chicago had nourished music from the first ; in the 1920s it had a civic opera of its own, and a symphony orchestra which had passed from the leadership of Theodore Thomas into that of Frederick Stock without pause or diminution of excellence. The city had shown signs very early of interest in art, especially the teaching of art, and long before its old age it could point to the largest art school in the world, besides collections which attracted art-lovers from everywhere. And finally, this Chicago which started its career in an era when most sciences were crude and fumbling, when medicine was primi- tive, and when the forces of nature were relatively little under- stood, had become the home of a body of scientists whose fame was even greater abroad than among their own neighbors ; a body from among whom had come four winners of the Nobel prize* ; a corps of men who had found means of conquering disease, illumining the path of general knowledge, and making life easier. ♦Albert A. Michelson, Robert A. Millikan, Alexis Carrel, Arthur H. Compton. 182 THE DEEDS OF A CENTURY 8 Not many of these things could come about had not the city exhibited from the first the joy of breasting obstacles, a willing- ness to discard useless tradition, and a warm hospitality to both new ideas and new people. It is the gusty spirit of welcome, the championship of free utter- ance, and the buoyancy of a city still young which possibly distin- guish Chicago more than all its buildings, more than even its institutions. These are qualities that attend its wide spaces, its vast arc of sky, and its command of a marine spectacle unknown except in ocean ports. They are qualities which draw to it people from distant lands, and which implant in its own folk a love for it that seldom cools. They forgive its transgressions and its incon- sistencies; they look at its brilliance, its pluck that outlasts even adversity; they think of it, with a pardonable mixture of similes, both as a big brother and a home. 183 CHAPTER XXII 1933 1 THAT little group of town-makers assembled in Beaubien's Tavern may have looked far ahead, but the real future was veiled from their eyes. They could not know that, a hundred years later, the enormous city piled upon the site of cabin and fort would magnificently celebrate what they had done, and would seize the occasion to salute the progress of mankind itself. The cycles had run their course, and successive Chicagos had erased every stick and stone of the original city. Not one of those signers of the incorporation papers remained alive. Primitive borders had stretched out to embrace a territory two hundred times the size of the 1833 town, and beyond that lay a semi-circle of related cities or villages, populous, active, and many of them beautiful. The people in them had inherited the domain of the Indian and the pioneer. Their lives scarcely resembled those of the men and women of a century earlier; for they had comforts and means of speed and contact with the world and amusements resulting from the genius and toil of many generations. This was equally true elsewhere in the world. The human race had taken control of elements which, only the day before, as time goes, had been viewed with awe or with superstitious fear, even if they were known at all. When it came time to herald far and wide the fact that Chicago was one hundred years old, the scope of the enterprise was enlarged to take in much that had been done to enhance human welfare since the birth of the city. And so, what might have been only the "Chicago Centennial" became A Century of Progress, 1933. 2 If it had been merely a "second World's Fair" — as some people persisted for a long time in thinking it — there might have been grounds for criticism that Chicago was trying to repeat itself, or 184 Photo by Torkel Korling, Chicago Michigan Avenue From Art Institute Terrace, 1933 1933 was simply swollen with pride. There was criticism of Chicago anyway, no matter what it did. The world, aged and experienced, yet gullible, had come to believe the worst of its fourth* largest city. Skyscrapers echoing the roar of guns, streets red with blood, criminals seizing the government — that was the picture of Chicago accepted by millions of people, from China to Iceland. There were men in Europe and elsewhere who were ready to say: "A new World's Fair in Chicago? what impudence!" But after a while they were no longer saying this. For one thing, they were beginning to learn that rumors of the death of civilization in Chicago were greatly exaggerated ; the fiction writers and dramatists had overdrawn the picture. And it got about that A Century of Progress was not merely a local circus, staged noisily by a city because of its birthday, but an effort to depict what had been accomplished in scientific research, in industry, in transportation, in social advancement. Nor was it an attempt to reincarnate the white ghosts of "93." Those buildings, like pre- historic temples, were gone, both physically and in meaning. The new exposition was to be independent, original, and significant of the coming century as much as of the past. Upon this, the critics changed their tune ; and it began to seem as though, at last, the best impulses in Chicago were to receive as much notice as its worst ones. The site chosen, at any rate, could evoke nothing but admiration. It was a southern "county" of that estate, founded on the waste matter of the city, that had pushed out into the lake an artificial shore. Before 1930 that area, many hundreds of acres in extent, had been made as solid as natural land, its Leif Eriksen Drive had been laid down, and its jagged bulwark of rock, defying the worst of lake storms, had been established. Moreover, it had a name — the very name most appropriate. Men had really christened it as early as 1912, when they were mourning the death of Daniel H. Burnham. In that year the Chicago Plan Commission, in memo- rial meeting, adopted a resolution which told how Mr. Burnham ♦Recent statistics published in the newspapers assign the fifth place to Chicago, with London, New York, Tokyo and Berlin ahead. 185 CHICAGO S GREAT CENTURY had "longed to rescue and preserve unmarred the constant yet ever-changing charm of Lake Michigan ; to make it an ever increas- ing beneficence to all our people . . . Master of practicalities as he was, he saw first and chiefly glittering summits and beckon- ing goals." Then came the proposal to name the great southerly water-front Burnham Park. To select that site for the "new World's Fair" was urged by the late Capt. Myron E. Adams, chaplain and Fort Sheridan worker, when he began to talk of a centennial exposition — in either 1933 or 1937 — not long after the World War. Mr. Adams got the ear of Mayor Dever, Col. A. A. Sprague and others, and the mayor presented the plan to the city council. The city was hardly ready for it, and although Mayor Dever appointed a committee (headed by Edward N. Hurley) the political upheaval of 1927, when Thompson unseated Dever, halted the project until it was revived through the efforts of Charles S. Peterson. Completion of Burnham Park and furnishing of new life to the centennial ran parallel during those years. "From the stones the builders rejected, from the muck of skyscrapers' caissons, and from the sand, ooze and slime of the lake bottom" the new land came into being and grew toward Jackson Park. An equally firm basis was being established for the plan to celebrate Chicago's birth. Late in 1927 a new committee came into existence and Rufus C. Dawes accepted the leadership. He drew into counsel strong men, and men inspired by Chicago tradition. They could look back to the World's Columbian Exposition and appreciate both its wonders and its problems. Some of them could remember the struggles of that earlier World's Fair directorate against the results of bad times and bad judgment. The confusion of those days should not recur, it was resolved. And finally a plan of financing was formed which included no governmental subsidy, no city bond issue, no stock sale to the general public, nor anything resembling Columbian half dollars. A bond issue there was, but it was taken by relatively few men and was protected not only by a guaranty fund but also by a lien on the first forty cents of each admission ticket sold. The stockholders of '93 "got out alive" ; a better outcome was promised those who invested in A Century of 186 1933 Progress, 1933. The latter was organized on the principle "Make every dollar count." At a critical point Gen. Charles G. Dawes got into action with his usual vigor. On the eve of departure for England to assume his office as ambassador he went to a number of citizens ; men, as he put it, "of the bone and sinew of our strenuous civic life." At the same time he gave out through the newspapers the characteris- tic message : "There are no prophets of evil here who say that, not withstand- ing two years of hard work and steady progress in this enterprise, this city, our pride, dear to us as having made each one of us what we are, will lie down like a dog on its back with its feet in the air and change its motto from 'I will' to 'I surrender.' Let there be no mistake ; we are not less courageous than our forbears." Within twenty- four hours the general was able to announce that the initial fund, $10,000,000, had been more than covered by guar- antees, written or spoken. Happy, he sailed for England. The go ahead signal could now be given. The staff and advisers had been largely assembled. Maj. Lenox R. Lohr had been made general manager. Daniel H. Burnham had stepped into his father's shoes as director of works. The National Research Council, impressed by the scientific aims of the exposi- tion, had granted full cooperation and had appointed a committee consisting of more than three hundred scientists of renown, organ- ized under the chairmanship of Frank Baldwin Jewett. This com- mittee gave time and energy through the years as advisers. The architectural board, as in 1893, included members from several cities : From Chicago, Edward H. Bennett, Hubert Burnham and John A. Holabird; from New York, Harvey Wiley Corbett (the chairman), Raymond M. Hood, Feruccio Vitale, and Ralph T. Walker ; from San Francisco, Arthur Brown, Jr. ; from Philadel- phia, Paul Philippe Cret. Force and originality had characterized the past work of these architects, and there never was any doubt that they would rise to an opportunity like A Century of Progress. In the spring and summer of 1930 their conceptions began to take form on the lake 187 CHICAGO S GREAT CENTURY front. The public saw going up near the Field Museum a building utterly unlike that Grecian pile — a building not of marble, but of asbestos cement board on a framework of lightweight steel, and with a roof whose material was derived from corn-stalks. This very first unit, into which the administrative offices and the experi- mental laboratories of the exposition were moved, illustrated the use of modern materials, and its design was in the advanced mood of the times. A little later, work was started on two more of the principal units, which were in as sharp contrast with each other as could be. One was the Travel and Transport building, whose main structure, 1000 feet long, somewhat suggested the lines of an ocean liner, and whose dome was more striking still, since its roof was suspended from steel cables attached to twelve towers 150 feet high. This dome was given a diameter of 206 feet, making it the largest circular dome in the world. Within the structures, artificially lighted, there was immense space for exhibit of trans- portation as it had developed during the century. But besides size, "T. & T." had a boldness of design which thrust itself to attention ; people soon learned that it was erected at a remarkably low cost per cubic foot. Meanwhile, its neighbor of 1930, the replica of Fort Dearborn, had called for another kind of effort, the study of ancient plans and material in order to reproduce exactly the frontier military post erected on the Chicago ruin in 1803. The group, with its block houses, stockade, and powder magazine, included such varisimilitudes as hand-made shingles and doors put in with pegs instead of nails. A historical collection was soon assembled in the block-houses, and the doors were opened to interested sightseers. Alongside went up in due time recon- structions of the Abraham Lincoln log cabin, and the 1860 Wigwam. It was now clear to the most skeptical that "the Fair really was going to be held." But 1931 gave further testimony. Straight through months which had brought clouds of anxiety to hover over the business world, which had throttled building enterprise, A Century of Progress continued to throw challenging outlines against the horizon. In April, 1931, ground was broken for the Hall of Science, whose purpose and name made it virtually the 188 1933 dominant building of the exposition. Four months later, though sticking to the program of doing nothing for which there was not "cash on hand/' the directors and architects were ready to start the electrical group. It began to loom up across the lagoon, on the oblong of made land called Northerly Island. To span the lagoon involved building a bridge, which had to wait until the next year, as did features like the carillon in the tower of the Hall of Science, which rang out when the building was dedicated in June of 1932. That June found five principal buildings or groups complete, except for accessories and landscaping, and two others — the agri- cultural building and the general exhibits building — under way. Only two years had passed since the first earth was turned ; only three since that "go ahead" signal. The record of '93 was being outstripped. A year before the Columbian exposition opened Jackson Park was a chaos of partly finished buildings, and armies of men were frantically battling with time. In Burnham Park in the summer of 1932 so many things had been finished or settled that the officials could almost stop to breathe — but not quite. There were still to be guided the operations on such units as the building for states, the United States government structure, the participa- tion of foreign nations (which Mayor A. J. Cermak was promoting in Europe), the social science building, the Lama temple, reproduc- tion of the Golden Pavilon of Jehol, gift of Vincent Bendix, and the Uxmal Nunnery, illustrating the civilization of the Mayas. Likewise there were still to come "Hollywood," the concession illustrating the motion picture industry; the amusement section dubbed "The Midway; city of a million lights," various buildings erected by industries ; and not a few units which in 1932 were still tentative. An especially difficult problem was among the things settled: The tribute of the exposition to a century's development of the fine arts. This ceased to be a problem when an arrangement was made whereby the Art Institute agreed to organize a centennial exhibit in cooperation with A Century of Progress. The beau- tiful structure at Adams Street thus became a second time asso- ciated with a Chicago World's Fair. Nor was it overlooked that other permanent splendors of the lake front — the Field Museum, Soldier Field, the Aquarium, the Planetarium, The Museum of 189 CHICAGO S GREAT CENTURY Science and Industry — stood in more than a geographical relation- ship to the exposition of 1933. Nineteen thirty-three! It was at hand. The officials of A Century of Progress wel- comed it, confident that the almost military precision of their work would bring them to the goal on time, and glad that they had the earnest cooperation of the city and park governments. The public, knowing few details of the forward march, saw the towers and walls take shape, saw terraces, courts, avenues materialize on the expanse where, so few years before, there had been nothing but sand. They saw, partly as fact, partly as pictorial prospect, a grey city instead of a white, establishing itself along the deep blue bosom of the lake. They had a glimpse of illumination patterns, cascades of lights, lightning bolts, dances of light rays, which modern Merlins produced by turning on a switch. People were told : "Almost every exhibit will be doing something, making some- thing. We are off of the static ; we are for the dynamic." They were told that this exposition of science would have a range all the way from the natural sciences to the social, from chemistry to child welfare, from locomotives and light waves to "better homes/' from radio to agriculture. There would be, to quote Malcolm McDowell, "an illustrated narrative, embellished with coloring never before attempted, pictures with novelties in the form of 'live' displays which could not be presented before simply because they could not be produced, enlivened by all sorts of amusing, entertaining and joy-riding shows." No one needed to take such predictions with a grain of salt. Anyone could believe that they would come true because many of them already had. And at a time when the great city groaned with the rest of the country under the shocks of financial crises, when so many of its splendid plans were halted, and when in some quar- ters even the courage to signal "go ahead" seemed to be lacking, A Century of Progress was pressing on toward the day when the rays of a star, caught in a telescope and f ocussed on a photoelectric cell, then amplified to a point bringing a wire to life, would set in 190 A Century of Progress International Exposition, 1933 as Seen From the Lake at Night From Painting by Walter E. Ohlson 1933 motion the power and radiance waiting to bear witness to the discoveries of a hundred years. And if 1833 was the beginning of Chicago's upward journey, and if 1893 was its Great Divide, then 1933, said the soothsayers, might well lead to another undiscovered country of achievement and happiness. 191 INDEX Academy of Design 64 Academy of Sciences 64 Adams, Capt. Myron E 186 Addams, Jane 98 Ade, George— _ 127 Adler, Dankmar _ 96 Adler, Max.._ „ „ 178 Alexian Bros. Hospital 64 Altgeld, John P 106 Anarchists 91-92 Anson, Adrian C. _ 88 Apollo Club 96 Aquarium, Shedd 178 Armour, J. Ogden 153 Armour, P. D 56, 75 Arnold, Isaac N 17, 29, 55 Art Institute 78, 119, 177, 189 Atwood, Charles B. „ 105 Auditorium, The 95-96 Automatic telephone 128 Automobile era _ 135-138 Ayer, Edward E 118 Baird, Lyman 72 Balatka, Hans_ 56 Baldwin, C. W _. 74 Balestier, Joseph N 21 Bartlett, A. C 146 Bauer, Julius 64 Beaubien, Jean Baptiste 2, 11, 25 Beaubien, Madore B. _ 2, 17 Beaubien, Mark. 1, 2, 5 Beecher, Jerome 9 Beggs, Rev. S. R. 5 Bendix, Vincent 128 Bennett, Edward H 146, 187 Bennett, Frank I 147 Bernhardt, Sarah 87 Billings, Dr. Frank™ 153 Blackall, A. H _ 72 Blackstone T. B 36 Bonney, Charles C 80 Boone, Levi D 18, 38, 43 Booth, John Wilkes 57 Bowen, Mrs. Joseph T 153 Boyington, W. W 93 Brainerd, Dr. Daniel 10, 38 Breasted, James H 128 Breese, Sidney 35 Bross, William 37, 43, 93 Brown, Arthur, Jr 187 Bryan, Thomas B 58 Bryan, William Jennings 129 Buckingham fountain 177 Burley, Augustus H 15, 58 Burnham, D. H. (Sr.) 93, 102, 103, 145, 185 Burnham, D. H. (the younger). 187 Burnham, Hubert 187 Busse, Mayor Fred A „ 139 Butler, Edward B 145, 150 Butterfield, Justin 29 Cable-cars, first- 90 Calhoun, John 5 Calumet Club 77 Capone, Alphonse 163-180 Carpenter, Philo 4, 45 Carr, Clyde 146 Carrel, Alexis....- 183 Carson, Sam 64 Caton, John D 2, 8, 16, 93 Central Music Hall 88 Century of Progress, A... .184-191 Cermak, Mayor A. J 189 Chanute, Octave 142 Chappel, Eliza _ 4 Chesbrough, E. S 40 Chicago; incorporated, 2; land boom, 13-15 ; chartered, 16 ; growth in '40s, 31 ; first rail- road, 32-36; first telegraph message, 34; "raised from mud," 38; water supply, 40; foreign population, 41 ; early crime 42; church growth, 44; city seal, 48; in Civil War, 54-60; Great Fire, 67-70; Prosperity of '80s, 82; events of the *90s, 125-134; growth in "1900s," 138-9; Health, 140; in World War, 152-159; achievements of a century 180-182 193 INDEX c Chicago American 11, 21 Chicago Avenue waterworks..62-63 Chicago, Burlington & Quincy R. R 63 Chicago Civic Opera 139 Chicago Club 77 Chicago Driving Club 64 Chicago Daily Journal.- 27 Chicago Democrat 5, 11 Chicago Harmonic Society 11 Chicago Historical Society.— 64, 77 Chicago Hydraulic Co .18 Chicago Library Assn 26 Chicago Literary Club 77 Chicago Lyceum 11, 26 Chicago Medical College.- 56 Chicago, Milwaukee & St. Paul R. R 63 Chicago Plan Commission. 144-151; 160 Chicago Public Library 77, 121 Chicago, Rock Island & Pacific R. R 35 Chicago Symphony Orchestra.— 182 Chicago Times 59 Chicago "White Stockings" 65 Chicago Woman's Club- 77 Chicago & Alton R. R 63 Chicago & Northwestern Ry 63 Childs, S. D 25 Chrysler, Walter 136 City Club 150 Civic Opera House. 174 Coey, C A 138 Collyer, Dr. Robert .58, 78 Compton, Arthur H 183 Corbett, Harvey Wiley ...187 Cornell Paul 56, 65 Citizens Association. 117 Civic Federation. 117 Clarke, Col. Geo. R 99 Cleveland, Grover .105 Cobb, Henry Ives 103 Cobb, Silas B 4, 9, 12, 122 Cobb, Zenas 74 Cole, George E 118 Commercial Club 96, 150 Cook County established. 1 Coolbaugh, W. F 72 Cooley, Lyman 101 Corliss Engine 108 Couch, Ira and James- 20 Coxey's Army 115 Crane Brothers 73 Cregier, Mayor Dewitt 100 c Crerar, John, 121 ; 177 ; library 121 Cret, Paul Philippe. 187 Crime Commission 166 Crosby's Opera Houses 56, 64, 69 Cycloramas 126 D Daily News, 79; building l.174 Damrosch, Walter..- 88 Davis, Dr. N. S 62 Davis, Will J 36 Dawes, Gen. Charles G. 128, 176, 187 Dawes, Rufus C .186 Dearborn Park 27 Debs, Eugene V .116 Deering, William. 89 De Forest, Lee... 128 Delano, Frederic A .146 Dever, Mayor William E .171 Dickey, Hugh T 27 Doggett, Bassett & Hills... 72 Dole, George W 2, 4, 13 Donnelley, R. R. 56 Douglas, Camp. 59 Douglas, Stephen A 35, 43, 51, 54 Douglas Park™ 84 Drake, John B. - 86 Drummond, Thomas 58 Dunne, Peter 128 Durant, W. G_ 136 Duryea, Charles E. 135 Dyer, C V.- 25 £ Eastland disaster.- 172 Eden Musee. 126 Edison Company 107 Egan, Dr. William B 11, 15 Ellsworth, J. W 145 Eriksen, Leif, Drive- 179, 185 Eucharistic Congress 176 Eulalia, Infanta 112 Evans, Dr. John 89 Exposition Building— 78 F Faherty, "Mike" 169 Fair, The (store) ... 64 Fairbank, N. K. 77 Fallows, Bishop Samuel- . 89 Farwell, John V 52, 66, 72 Farwell, John V. (Jr.) „ 146 Federal building cornerstone. 132 Feehan, Archbishop ^9 Felt, DorrE 108 194 INDEX F Fergus, Robert 11 Ferguson, B. F., fund 168 Ferris wheel 126 Field, Eugene 102 Field, Leiter & Co - 63, 69 Field, Marshall 52, 63, 69, 121 Field Museum 118, 150, 175 Fielden, Samuel 90 Firestone, Harvey - 136 First airplanes 142 First Baptist Church 5 First building elevators 73 First electric lights 90 First elevated railway 104 First gas-light — 39 First hanging — 26 First horse-cars 51 First Methodist Church- „ 5 First Presbyterian Church 5 First steel rails 73 First telephones - 89 Fisher, Walter L 146 Fisk, D. B. & Co -. 71 Follansbee, Alanson — 22 Ford, Henry „ 136 Foreign population 41-42, 138 Foreman, Henry G 145 Forest preserves 151 Fort Dearborn, 1 ; at Century of Progress - -188 Fortnightly Club 77 Freeman, Rev. Allan B 4 French, W. M. R 119 Fuller, H. B 127 Furniture Mart 169 G Gage, Lyman, J 73 t 103, 124 Galena & Chicago Union R. R. 32-35 Gale, Stephen 11 Garfield Park 84 Gang organizations 162-165 Garland, Hamlin 127 Gates, John W 128 Gates, Philetus 28 Gem of the Prairie 40 General Electric Co 107 Goodhue, Dr. Josiah 10 Goodrich, Grant 23, 57 Goodspeed, Dr. T. W —122 Grace Episcopal Church 45 Graham, Ernest R 103 Grand Pacific Hotel- -...69, 86 Grant Park 175 Great Fire 67-70 Greeley, Horace 31 Greenebaum, Henry 65 Griggs, S. C 66 Gross, Samuel Eberly 65 H Haines, John C 52 Hall of Science 189 Hamilton, Col. R. J. ..„ 1 Hand, Johnny 86 Harmon, Isaac 2 Harper, Wm. Rainey 122 Harris, B. F 153 Harrison, Carter H. (the elder) 85, 89-90, 113 Harrison, Carter H. (the younger) „ 118, 132, 151 Harrison, John H 153 Haverly, Jack - 77 Haymarket Riot „ 91 Heacock, Russell E 2, 29 Headburg, Mrs. Albion 178 Healy, G. P. A 47, 64 Hertz, John 138 Hibbard, Spencer, Bartlett 71 Higinbotham, H. N 102 Higgins, Van H 57 Hinton, Rev. I. T 11, 24 Hoffman, Charles Fenno 3 Hogan, John S. C 2 Holabird, John A 187 Holabird, William 93, 95 Holden, C G P 65 Home Insurance Building 95 Honore, H. H 44, 84 Hood, Raymond M 169, 187 Hooley's Theater 69, 77 Hopkins, John P 153 Horner, Henry 72 Hubbard, Gurdon 4, 15, 75, 93 Hulbert, E. D — -128 Hull House 98 Humboldt Park — 84 Hunter, Capt. David 24 Hurley, Edward N 186 Hutchinson, B. P 56 Hutchinson, Charles L. 78, 119, 146 International Harvester Co 152 Illinois Central R. R., 35, 150; electrification 177 195 INDEX I Illinois and Michigan Canal 1, 15, 29 Indian Council, 1833 6 Insull, Samuel 107, 153 Iroquois Club 77 Iroquois Theater fire 142 Isherwood and McKenzie 22 J Tackson Park .120 Jackson, Wm. B 145 Jefferson, Joseph 23 Jenney, W. L. B _ 87, 95 Jensen, Jens — 145 Jewett, Frank Baldwin 187 Johnson, John 26 Jones, Fernando 15 Jones, Rev. Jenkin Lloyd 89 Judd, Norman B 54, 55 K Keith, Edson and Co 71 Kellogg, A. N 56 Kelly, E. J 176 Kenniston, David 46 Kerfoot, W. D 72 Keyes, Rollin A 146 Kimball, W. W. „ 64 Kimberly, E. S 2 Kinzie, John 17 Kinzie, John H 17 Kinzie, Juliette 47 Kiplev, Chief "Joe" 132 Kohlsaat, H. H „ 127, 133 L Lake front development - 145-146, 175 Lamont, Robert P . 128 Landis Award Commission 164 LaSalle street tunnel 62 Larned, E. C 58 Latrobe, Charles J 6 Lawson, Victor F 79 Leiter, Levi Z 64 Leland Hotel 86 Lincoln, Abraham 31, 54, 59, 60 Lincoln Park 59, 65, 84 'Liquor riots" 42-43 Locke, Rev. Clinton 45 Lohr, Maj. Lenox R 187 Lorimer, William 151 Lovejoy, Owen 55 Lowden, Gov. Frank O „ 157, 162, 176 L Lockwood, Belva 87 Lumbard, Jules and Frank 55 M Mandel Bros 64 Manierre, George „ 55, 58 Markham, Charles H. „ 177 Mason, George A ..148 Mason, Roswell B 36, 65 Mason, William E 133 Masonic Temple (old) 97 MacVeagh, Franklin 145 Mayer, Levy, 153; Mrs. Mayer..l69 McCagg, Ezra B. 48, 65 McCormick, Cyrus H 36, 93 McCormick, Edith Rockefeller..l28 McCormick, Robert R 149 McDonald, Mike 85 McDowell, Malcolm 190 Mcllvaine, Mabel 53 McKinley, Pres. William 130, 131, 132 McSwiggin, Wm. J., murder 172 McVicker, James H 46, 84 McVicker's Theater 27 Medill, Joseph 50, 54, 71 Meeker, Joseph 12 Merchandise Mart 174 Mercy Hospital _ 64 Merriam, Charles E 85 Michelson, A. A. 128 Michigan avenue improvement.. 150 Michigan Central R. R. 35 Michigan Southern R. R 35 Millakan, Robert 182 Miller, John _ 2 Miltimore, Ira....... 27, 30, 40 Monadnock building 95 Monroe, Harriet 103, 170 Montauk Block™ _ 94 Moody, D. L 56 Moody, Walter D 147 Moody, W. V _ 127 Morris, Buckner H 59 Morris, Nelson 75 Morton, Joy _ 146 "Mr. Dooley" 86 Mulligan's Brigade 55 N Nash, Fred A 34 National Research Council 187 Navy Pier 169 Newberry, Oliver _ 13 Newberry, W. L 26 196 INDEX N Newberry Library 100 New England Congregational Church 45 Northwestern University, 89, 122; McKinlock Campus 169 Norton, Charles D 146 Noyes, Laverne W 132 Ogden, Mahlon 69 Ogden, William B ~..12, 17, 27, 32-33, 36, 93 Oglesby, John G 153 Olander, Victor A 153 O'Leary cottage 67 O'Neill, Arthur W 145 Otis, Seth 26 Owen, T. J. V 2, 48 Palmer House (first) 69; (sec- ond) 86 Palmer, Potter..52, 56, 64, 65, 78, 83 Palmer, Mrs. Potter 103, 113 Parsons, Albert 79, 92 Patterson, Rev. R. W 45 Patti, Adelina 97 Paxton, Andrew 80 Peacock, Elijah 14 Pearsons, Hiram 19 Peck, Ferdinand W 84, 95 Peck, P. F. W 4, 12 Perkins, Dwight H 145 Peterson, Charles S 186 Philharmonic Society 56 Pinkerton, Allan 49, 51 Pinkerton, "Billy" 86 "Pioneer," first de luxe sleep- ing car 74 "Pioneer," first locomotive 34 Pirie, John T 64 Pittsburgh & Fort Wayne R. R. 63 Pittsburgh, Cincinnati & St. Louis R. R 63 Planetarium, Adler 178 Plymouth Church 45 Poetry Magazine 170 Pond, Irving 94 Porter, Rev. Jeremiah 4, 10 Prairie Farmer „ 37 Pullman, George M., 39, 65, 74, 75; Building, 94; town 116 Quaife, Milo M. Race riots 161 "Railroad riots," 1877 79-80 Railroad strike, 1894 116 Randolph, Isham 140 Ray, Dr. Charles H 50 Ream, Norman B 83 Reynolds, George M 128 Rice, John B 46, 61, 62 Richardson, H. H 93 Richelieu, Hotel .... 86 River and Harbor Convention.... 31 Rockefeller, John D 122 Rogers, Henry Wade. 122 Rookery, The _ 77, 94 Root, George F 55, 64 Root, John 93, 94, 97, 103 Rosenthal, Lessing 150 Rosenwald, Julius, 128, 161, 178 ; Museum 178 Rumsey, Julian S 55 Rush Medical College 12, 64 Ryerson, Joseph T 28 Ryerson, Martin A. (the elder) 73 Ryerson, Martin A. (the younger) 119, 122 St. Cyr, Father 4 St. Gaudens Lincoln statue 177 St. James Episcopal Church 17 St. Mary's Catholic Church 5 Saloon Building 11 Sandburg, Carl 48 "Sands, The" 50 Sanitary Canal 100, 140 Sauganash Tavern 1, 22, 54 Scammon, J. Young -17, 20, 32-34 48 Schneider, George 58, 73 Sears, Richard W 128 Second Presbyterian Church 45 Sessions, H. H 75 Seward, Wm. H 54 Shanahan, David E ...153 Shaw, Walden 138 Shedd, John G 178 Sherman, Gen. W. T 80-81 Sherman House 69 Sherman, John B .. 75 Shortall, John G 72 Simpson, James 174 Skinner, Mark 26, 58 Sloan, Alfred P. Jr 136 Smith, George 28 197 INDEX s Smith, "Silent" 28 Smith, Theophilus 15 Soldier Field 176 Sprague, Col. A. A. -186 Sprague, Albert A. and Otho.... 72 Spring, Giles 22 Spoor, John A 153 Stagg, Alonzo A 128 Standard Club 77 State street growth. 52 Starr, Ellen Gates 98 Stock, Frederick. — 182 Stockton, Gen. Joseph. 130 Stockyards 75-76 Stone, H. 14 Stone, Melville E 79 Storey, Wilbur F 59, 72-73 Storrs, Emory 87 Streeter, George W 120 Strowger, A. B 128 Sullivan, John L 86 Sullivan, Louis 93, 96 Sullivan, Roger C 153 Summer, Dean Walter 151 Sunny, B. E 107, 176 Swenie, Denis 66, 132 Swett, Leonard 87 Swift, Gustavus F 75 Swing, Rev. David 89 T Tacoma building 95 Taf t, Lorado 178 Taylor, B. F 27 Taylor, Dr. Graham 116 Temple, J. T 2, 5 Temple, The (Woman's) 94 Terrace Row 48, 69 Thomas, Rev. H. W 89 Thomas, Theodore.™- 88, 182 Thompson, James 1 Thompson, Dr. Mary Harris 56 Thompson, William Hale 156, 157, 166 Thorne, Charles H 146 Thornton, Wm. F 15 Tomlins, W. L 96 Torrio, John 163 Travel and Transport Building.. 188 Tree, Lambert 48 Tremont House 14, 20, 69, 86 Tribune, The, 37, 50, 71 ; build- ing 169 Trinity Episcopal Church 45 Tucker, Col. J. H 58 u "Underground Railroad" 25, 51 Union Defense Committee— 57 Union League Club -..- 77 Union Loop _ 123 Union Park _ — 65 Unitarian church 45 Universalist church- 45 University of Chicago, "old," 56, 89; "new," - - 100, 122 Upham, Fred W _ 153 V Van Osdel, John M _ 93 Vitale, Feruccio _ 187 Volk, Leonard 64 w Wacker, Charles H 146, 153 Wacker Drive ~ 170 Walker, George C 122 Walker, John H 153 Walker, Ralph T 187 Walsh, John R - - 56 Ward, A. Montgomery, 119-20; Mrs. Ward 169 Ward, Capt. Eber — .„ 73 Washington Park _ 84 Washington Square _ 65 Washington street tunnel 62 Weed, Thurlow 31 Wentworth, John 12, 24, 49-53, 75, 93 West 12th street -...148-9 Western Electric Co — 107 Westinghouse Company —107 Wieboldt, Mr. and Mrs. W. A. ..169 Wight, Ambrose - 37 Wigwam, Republican, 54; at Century of Progress 188 Wilkerson, James H 171 Willard, Frances 87, 100 Williams, Eli 4 Wilson, John M 57 Wilson, Richard L - 27 Wilson, Walter H - 146 Wood's Museum - 57 World's Columbian Exposition _ „102-113 Wright, John S 10, 14, 35, 37 Wrigley, William (building). ...167 Y Yates, Gov. Richard 55 Yerkes, Charles T. 84; tele- scope - 108 z Ziegfeld, Florenz 64 198 5-90