Questions and Answers (Q&A) Forgotten Chicago Forum
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Fifth Avenue
Posted by:
Mercer52
()
Date: July 11, 2014 09:21PM
I'm curious to know about the history of Fifth Avenue, which runs diagonally between Cicero and California, starting roughly at Cicero and Roosevelt. I know it used to be called Colorado Avenue. Why the name change to Fifth when there is not 4th or 6th? Why this random diagonal street on the West Side?
Re: Fifth Avenue
Posted by:
PKDickman
()
Date: July 11, 2014 10:38PM
A quick check of the Plat maps showed that it has been there a long time (A on the subdivisions list). It also shows that it was called Barry Point Road (as well as Colo.)
Early home Chicago turns up this:
Barry Point Trail also Berry Point Trail. One of the major Indian trails of early Chicago, it left the Chicago settlement in a west-southwestern direction, passed the point – nine miles from Chicago – where in 1834 stood [see] Widow Barry’s lone tavern in what is now the town of Riverside, then crossed the Des Plaines River at the ford where in 1827 the Laughton brothers had built their trading post. The trail is still traceable in the modern street pattern: northward from present Roosevelt Road and Cicero Avenue to the Lake Trail, where Lake Street and Western Avenue intersect.
So it appears to have been a very old road. I got saved as one of Chicago's Diagonal streets (a SW analog to Grand Ave or Lake St) but it apparently never caught on.
Early home Chicago turns up this:
Barry Point Trail also Berry Point Trail. One of the major Indian trails of early Chicago, it left the Chicago settlement in a west-southwestern direction, passed the point – nine miles from Chicago – where in 1834 stood [see] Widow Barry’s lone tavern in what is now the town of Riverside, then crossed the Des Plaines River at the ford where in 1827 the Laughton brothers had built their trading post. The trail is still traceable in the modern street pattern: northward from present Roosevelt Road and Cicero Avenue to the Lake Trail, where Lake Street and Western Avenue intersect.
So it appears to have been a very old road. I got saved as one of Chicago's Diagonal streets (a SW analog to Grand Ave or Lake St) but it apparently never caught on.
Re: Fifth Avenue
Posted by:
Mercer52
()
Date: July 12, 2014 01:20AM
PKDickman--thanks so much for that information. So interesting.
Re: Fifth Avenue
Posted by:
bowler
()
Date: July 12, 2014 01:08PM
It was definitely Barry's Point Road. To get a picture of how the original Road ran you have to go WAY back. This 1851 map of Chicago and the surrounding areas gives you a good idea:
http://www.encyclopedia.chicagohistory.org/pages/10787.html
http://www.encyclopedia.chicagohistory.org/pages/10787.html
Re: Fifth Avenue
Posted by:
bowler
()
Date: July 12, 2014 01:10PM
Here's another good explanation of the road and other remnants that still exist:
The first road, crossing the “dismal Nine-mile Swamp”, went west on Madison St. to Whiskey Point (Western Ave. ), thence southwesterly on the Barry Point Trail to Laughton’s Tavern where it forded the DesPlaines River and went southwest to Walker’s Grove, now Plainfield. Portions of it still exist as Fifth Ave. in Chicago, Riverside Drive and Longcommon Road in Berwyn and Riverside, Barry Point Road in Lyons, and Plainfield Road from Ogden Ave. to Plainfield.
http://chicagology.com/chicago-geography/early-chicago-streets/
The first road, crossing the “dismal Nine-mile Swamp”, went west on Madison St. to Whiskey Point (Western Ave. ), thence southwesterly on the Barry Point Trail to Laughton’s Tavern where it forded the DesPlaines River and went southwest to Walker’s Grove, now Plainfield. Portions of it still exist as Fifth Ave. in Chicago, Riverside Drive and Longcommon Road in Berwyn and Riverside, Barry Point Road in Lyons, and Plainfield Road from Ogden Ave. to Plainfield.
http://chicagology.com/chicago-geography/early-chicago-streets/
Re: Fifth Avenue
Posted by:
bowler
()
Date: July 12, 2014 01:56PM
Barry Point Road was definitely gone and in it's current configuration by 1871 as evidenced by this 1871 map:
http://www.encyclopedia.chicagohistory.org/pages/10601.html
There is also some good info in the book, "Chicago's Highways: Old and New". You can read it online here:
https://archive.org/details/chicagoshighways00quairich
http://www.encyclopedia.chicagohistory.org/pages/10601.html
There is also some good info in the book, "Chicago's Highways: Old and New". You can read it online here:
https://archive.org/details/chicagoshighways00quairich
Re: Fifth Avenue
Posted by:
PKDickman
()
Date: July 12, 2014 02:23PM
If you check the Plat maps, they show some of the old rights of way.
Where the road bends at at the tracks, it used to travel in a straight line.
It also used to go west of Cicero with a bend to the northwest at least as far as Lavergne but that was vacated in 1956. (as far as the map goes)
It is along the abandoned ROW of the "Old St. Charles Air Line RR" which I suspect should be the subject of another thread.
Where the road bends at at the tracks, it used to travel in a straight line.
It also used to go west of Cicero with a bend to the northwest at least as far as Lavergne but that was vacated in 1956. (as far as the map goes)
It is along the abandoned ROW of the "Old St. Charles Air Line RR" which I suspect should be the subject of another thread.
Re: Fifth Avenue
Posted by:
bowler
()
Date: July 12, 2014 06:30PM
There is also this explanation:
Q There's a curious street on the West Side called Fifth Avenue, which runs on a weird angle and has no corresponding numbered streets parallel to it. What's the story?
A When what is now the East Garfield Park neighborhood became part of the city in 1869, much of the West Side was open prairie.
According to Streetwise Chicago: A History of Chicago Street Names (Loyola University Press, 1988), the street, originally called Colorado Avenue, was renamed in an effort to boost residential and commercial development.
The new name was meant to evoke the prestige of New York's flashiest shopping strip—a far cry from the modest bungalows, brownstones and warehouses that have come to define the area.
The odd street is also the namesake of a portion of East Garfield Park dubbed "Fifth City."
Peter T. Alter, an archivist at the Chicago History Museum, says the name switch happened around 1890, near the time Chicago beat out New York for the right to host the World's Columbian Exposition fair.
"Perhaps," Alter notes, "that lessened the idea of Chicago being seen as second to New York City."
http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/time-out/why-fifth-avenue-chicago-no-fourth-sixth-avenue-194347076.html
Q There's a curious street on the West Side called Fifth Avenue, which runs on a weird angle and has no corresponding numbered streets parallel to it. What's the story?
A When what is now the East Garfield Park neighborhood became part of the city in 1869, much of the West Side was open prairie.
According to Streetwise Chicago: A History of Chicago Street Names (Loyola University Press, 1988), the street, originally called Colorado Avenue, was renamed in an effort to boost residential and commercial development.
The new name was meant to evoke the prestige of New York's flashiest shopping strip—a far cry from the modest bungalows, brownstones and warehouses that have come to define the area.
The odd street is also the namesake of a portion of East Garfield Park dubbed "Fifth City."
Peter T. Alter, an archivist at the Chicago History Museum, says the name switch happened around 1890, near the time Chicago beat out New York for the right to host the World's Columbian Exposition fair.
"Perhaps," Alter notes, "that lessened the idea of Chicago being seen as second to New York City."
http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/time-out/why-fifth-avenue-chicago-no-fourth-sixth-avenue-194347076.html
