It will undoubtedly have something to do with the original owner or building name.
Forum: Questions and Answers (Q&A)

The railroads retain ownership, unless the original railroad purchased only an easement across a farmer's land (not very common in Illinois, and probably never done in the city). In that case, the underlying property would revert to the current landowner of both sides——except that Congress passed the Rails to Trails Act so the former railroad right-of-way can be used for bike trails under the
Forum: General Discussion

I don't think it was ever a showroom; it lacks the ground floor plate-glass windows and other telltale features. Instead, I think it was a manufacturing-warehouse loft building that had many different tenants. Besides showrooms for horseless carriages, Chicago's Motor Row was full of parts distributors and even manufacturers of accessories for the motor trade.
Forum: Questions and Answers (Q&A)

I don't think the Daily News was actually printed at 56th & Oakley. That might have been the South Side distribution center, where big trucks arrived from downtown full of papers. Preprinted inserts (both advertising sections and sections, like real estate or auto supplements, printed during slack times earlier in the week) were stuffed inside and then the complete editions were loaded onto s
Forum: Questions and Answers (Q&A)

Crawford Ave. was changed to Pulaski Road by ordinance passed 12 Dec. 1933, Council Journal pp. 1271-72
Forum: Questions and Answers (Q&A)

Many immigrants were single men who lived in roominghouses or rented rooms in an immigrant family's house. When they'd saved enough, they would send for wife and family. There was a lot of doubling up, and a lot of backyard or basement "accessory units."
Forum: Questions and Answers (Q&A)

I've been watching for and photographing corner stores for several years now. I'm particularly interested in those that are "hidden" within neighborhoods, rather than those on quarter-section-line arterials that have bus lines. Especially on the North Side, many have been converted to residential units, and a few years ago I helped the Landmarks Commission put out a booklet about best pr
Forum: General Discussion

It was never an incorporated municipality. Looks like this today.
Forum: Questions and Answers (Q&A)

CERA has a forthcoming book about Chicago's PCCs. I prepared a map for the book showing the lines that used them. Meanwhile, here's a post on the CERA blog with photos, some of whose locations remain unidentified.
Forum: General Discussion

They should all be fixed now.
Forum: Forgotten Chicago Sightings

I try to aggregate all the historic Chicago maps at chicagoinmaps.com
Forum: Forgotten Chicago Sightings

Much too thin to support streetcar or trolleybus wire. And Western never had trolleybuses.
Forum: General Discussion

For one thing, people apparently no longer learn roman numerals.
Forum: Questions and Answers (Q&A)

Well, that's absurd. Perhaps they're counting lane-miles (in other words, multiplying by four all the miles of a four-lane street). If there were 7780 miles of street, over 40 percent of Chicago's entire area (234 square miles) would be streets. The actual figure is under 25 percent.
Forum: Questions and Answers (Q&A)

One probably based on a false premise. We now know that the Great Lakes have cycles of rising and falling lake levels, and the fall observed in the early 20th century, which gave rise to the lawsuit forcing installation of the locks, was probably not related to the Chicago Diversion at all.
Forum: General Discussion

Boulevard frontage roads are counted separately; Midway Plaisance is treated as two one-way streets; a few locations like Stony Island south of 67th are also treated as doubled streets; all expressways are counted double; the various levels of Wacker and Michigan are counted separately. What I'm looking at are the street centerline files that CDOT would use to make a map at roughly 1:10,000 up
Forum: Questions and Answers (Q&A)

No, of course the freight tunnels are not counted in the mileage of Chicago streets. The 4456-mile figure would overstate, probably by about two percent or so, what's actually drivable and thought of as a "street." There are lots of little 50- to 100-foot stubs around the city that people treat as private driveways, as well as sections that have been vacated for parks, schoolyards, a
Forum: Questions and Answers (Q&A)

The tunnels don't have to be snowplowed most years.
Forum: Questions and Answers (Q&A)

I remember the last time they displayed them, the organizer titled them "The White City of 1893" and "The Gray City of 1933," apparently just looking at the black-and-white photos and doing no further research. Of course, nothing could be further from the truth. The Century of Progress was a stunning display of vivid paint colors, carefully chosen for effect by designer Josep
Forum: Forgotten Chicago Sightings

CDOT says "more than 4000 miles." Looking at the city's GIS data for streets, the lengths of all centerlines sums to 4,456 miles.
Forum: Questions and Answers (Q&A)

Here's the location on a current topo map: http://www.mappingsupport.com/p/gmap4.php?ll=41.713611,-87.933611&z=14&t=t4 To see historic topos and aerial photos of the location: http://www.historicaerials.com/aerials.php?scale=1.6E-5&lat=41.7124644639649&lon=-87.9347932260741&year=1939 Byrneville is shown on railroad maps of the Chicago District, including this one from t
Forum: Questions and Answers (Q&A)

Here's a map showing Indian land cessions in Illinois. The one we're discussing is number 78.
Forum: Questions and Answers (Q&A)

The South Side developed earliest near the lake, in a variety of patterns: some areas with large lots and others with small lots and blocks. When the streets were given numbers in 1861, they simply numbered them in sequence as they were, one number for every street, no matter how close it was to the previous street. That's why the area between 12th and 39th doesn't observe the modern 800 numbers
Forum: General Discussion

They didn't use a crane, but rather hydraulic jacks and cribbing. Problem was that they did it in the bitter winter of 1977 and the jacks froze, stranding the house high in the air next to the L for a week. Here's a Sun-Times photo from the Landmarks website.
Forum: Questions and Answers (Q&A)

To clarify: the "City" had nothing to do with how the area developed, other than accepting and approving the plats as they were recorded. Land speculation was a huge industry in Chicago through the mid-20th century, and subdivision of farmland into house lots often happened many decades before any houses were actually built. This area was platted in the 1920s, but the houses date from
Forum: Questions and Answers (Q&A)

I'd love to know where to get dense seedey German-style bread and rolls (but not rye). Also if any of these bakeries make meat pies or similar savory combinations. Around here, bakery seems to mean nothing but sugary cakes and puffy white bread.
Forum: General Discussion

According to the city's plat maps, that middle square is subdivided into house lots fronting on the (never built) Edbrooke Avenue. My attempts with the clumsy Cook County Assessor's website didn't turn up any ownership information, though.
Forum: Questions and Answers (Q&A)

Well, I was certainly disappointed by it. I expected to see more artifacts from the fair besides the few natural history specimens the Field still had in its storerooms. The modern film footage to bring the famous Arnold photos to life was a neat trick, but could just have well been a youtube video.
Forum: Forgotten Chicago Sightings

My chicagobridges site has a comprehensive listing of Chicago's current drawbridges and points to other, more detailed sites.
Forum: Forgotten Chicago Sightings

Both branches definitely existed, though I can't find an exact date for their removal. The Oak Woods spur is shown on the 1895 Sanitary District map, but gone on a 1904 Talbot's railroad map. The Washington Park racetrack closed in 1905, and the tracks were probably removed by 1910. There's a line of identical teens or early 20s apartment buildings along the south side of 61st that's evide
Forum: Questions and Answers (Q&A)