Rustymuscle, Thank you for the reply. Despite the lack of an address for a dance hall or ballroom, I still have the image of a brightly lighted building. What made it remarkable to me, that back in the mid or late 40s, it was the utterly dark and quiet in that area. Walking at night one would hear only the loud, hourly chiming, of nearby of St. Michael's church clock. Consider that the spea
Forum: Questions and Answers (Q&A)

When I was a kid, in the mid 40s, while walking with my parents down Larrabee street at night; I saw what I think was the outside of a brightly lighted dance hall. It was located on the west side of Larrabee, about halfway between Willow and Menomonee streets. I wonder if anyone reading this forum can remember it, so far back in the 40s.
Forum: Questions and Answers (Q&A)

In regard to Division Street; I have recently read that there once was an A&P Grocery store on East Division, now long gone, "where a lot of movie stars came to pick up food." This must have been in the time of Chicago's movie-making industry, around 1914.
Forum: Questions and Answers (Q&A)

Robert L. Morris, I found this about the Terrace Theater: http://cinematreasures.org/theaters/5226
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Thanks b.a.hoarder for clearing that up for me. I looked at Google Maps street view of the area and see how much it has changed. The restaurant on the northwest corner of Archer and Narragansett is now a parking lot, but I see the bakery still exists on Narragansett, an essential business for sure. ;-)
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Wasn't there a small picnic grove, and perhaps also called the Polonia Grove, located at the southwest corner of Archer Avenue and Narragansett Avenue, at the end of 55th Street?
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The Plaza movie theater on North Avenue, near Orleans Street, was a theater my parents and I walked past many times in the 1940s, which my parents seemed to quietly shun and never entered, despite the fact they were avid movie goers. Another movie theater that looked interesting to me at that time, and was called the Kino, which appeared to show only German language films, also located on Nort
Forum: Questions and Answers (Q&A)

I ounce visited Sieben's with my father; my aunt's brother was bartending at the time. What I remember most was the huge beer mugs . . . but I probably was under age then and couldn't drink.
Forum: General Discussion

What movie theaters did you go to in your distant past? Mine were, the Biograph, Century and Gold Coast. When I was a kid, the Biograph's Saturday afternoon movies; mainly Westerns and serials, like Flash Gordon. All of the above theaters, except for the Biograph, I attended with my parents in the 1940s. I also remember the Lane Court on Armitage near Clark, also in the 40s.
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We kids had few places to play a game of baseball or touch football, unless we walked a mile or more to nearby Lincoln Park. So we played on the street or a factory's yard or on the lot across the street from our school at the corner of Burling and Armitage Streets. The front yard of the factory on Burling made a good place in winter to play a skate-less hockey game on its frozen puddles, but unkn
Forum: Questions and Answers (Q&A)

b.a.hoarder I once explored out of curiosity in the direction of the canal, in line with Merrimac Avenue - the street on which I once lived - sometime in the mid 50s, but only as far as I now can remember, to the remnants of the old I & M canal. The area you write about was the Chicago Portage of the early French. I am also familiar with St. Daniel's, having attended it in the 1950s,but not
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Where would you walk and what route would you take to revisit long ago personal landmarks and haunts of your past city life?
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Kchi, Ogden's Grove, a beer garden and meeting ground, near the north branch of the Chicago River at Willow Street near Clybourn Avenue, was the location of many picnics in the late 1800s - probably attended by members of my family - and was the meeting place on Sundays for the German labor unions.
Forum: Questions and Answers (Q&A)

There is, or was, an Ehrhardt Picnic Grove in Park Ridge, Ilinois. Hope this helps.
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HOLTANEK, I agree with Challenging Chicago-Everyday life 1837-1920 by Perry Duis and also, another of his "The Saloon". And in regard to "The Devil in the White City" by Erik Larson, one can see the former location of Holmes's place on the northwest corner of 63rd and Wallace: now a parking lot on Google Maps street view.
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For anyone interested in Clearing, I recommend this fine book: A little known story of the land called Clearing : a book of the people, whose deeds history has recorded, by the people, who have helped through countless interviews over the years, and for the people, who seek this unknown land of the past / by Robert Milton Hill.(published 1983) Available at these libraries: Suburban lib
Forum: Forgotten Chicago Sightings

daveg, Thanks for your reply. I suspect that interest Chicago history is now passe.
Forum: Questions and Answers (Q&A)

What is your most memorable Chicago history and/or Chicago mystery book? By the way, I've read a few of both. My home (late 30's to early 50's) was the Lincoln Park/De Paul area.
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This book may also be helpful -- To Die in Chicago: Confederate Prisoners at Camp Douglas 1862-65 by George Levy - (published in 1994, 2nd edition 1999). The book is available at several Chicago Public Libraries.
Forum: General Discussion