this hurts most, i'm sure you all will agree-- after the park closed for its final season, the owners soon met and gave their final decision it was the end of riverview, over the protest of long-time manager (and minority owner) george schmidt. with that george has said at the time he tried to re-open riverview for one additional week as a 'farewell' to all of chicago before demolition began.
Forum: Questions and Answers (Q&A)

i don't recall any downtown store named Vaughn's myself. it's not important, but someday i'm confident i'll get to the bottom of it
Forum: General Discussion

right now the largest extent of old exposed streetcar tracks I have found anywhere in chicago is on pine st (about 5500 west) where lake st jogs from running along the south-side of the commuter train viaduct over to the north-side of that viaduct. underneath that pine st viaduct there are many feet of old rails including curvatures, both directions too
Forum: Forgotten Chicago Sightings

the exact S&B address on n. cicero was 3319 n cicero. it is a newer building that S&B built late '60s replacing an older smaller building at the same address. after S&B went out-of-business the new 3319 building was bought by USPS and became the new location of their Irving Park post office which had been in the 3900 N. block of cicero previously (torn down mid-'80s). it remains
Forum: Forgotten Chicago Sightings

the late '50s saw the start of the immensely popular Kenner's Girder & Panel / Bridge & Turnpike Construction sets, which came in several sizes. A couple years into production, responding to customer complaints about beam breakage, Kenner's changed plastic material from polystyrene to polypropylene. Breakage issues ceased, however the beams no longer fit together with the precise snap
Forum: Questions and Answers (Q&A)

Riverview closed because the land it occupied was worth far more in sale, than the revenue generated by continuing to operate the park in short the park co-owners wanted to cash out. george schmidt wanted to continue operating but he was out-voted the same exact scenario played out a few years ago with Kiddieland out on north avenue. they sold the park property because the cash offer consi
Forum: Questions and Answers (Q&A)

there's a fantastic hardcover book published around 10 years ago about the CA&E and it's smooth as silk joint operation over the old garfield park line tracks. It includes some marvelous color photographs (it was co-authored by Bruce Moffat) of their trains on the elevated
Forum: Questions and Answers (Q&A)

i think the CA&E wanted to continue using their downtown terminal, after all it was already there. accessing the Loop via the very roundabout 'paulina st connector' tracks would be totally unacceptable to commuters constructing a ramp to bring CA&E trains up from the new Congress median on to paulina st connector doesn't make sense--simply construct a differing ramp little a bit furthe
Forum: Questions and Answers (Q&A)

that's a pretty good Garfield line superimposed type 'map' in that it makes miserably plain how the Garfield line always was intended to be the 'sacrificial lamb' for congress expressway construction, automatically spelling doom in a way for the CA&E. That's sort of why I suspect something else must've been promised to the CA&E early on ('40s) for them to go along with such a potentially
Forum: Questions and Answers (Q&A)

using the Paulina St connector for CA&E trains to access the loop tracks (from the congress median) to me seems a rather far-fetched approach. all they really needed was to ramp up to the easternmost portion of the Garfield park line (to access their terminal) which of course was still being used by the CTA including that scherzer bridge. much simpler. the extra right-of-way all along the
Forum: Questions and Answers (Q&A)

the CTA at the time may well've been caught as off guard as everybody else when CA&E threw in the towel, and in any event they wouldn't be laying track for them per se, the CA&E would get that done as long as the right-of-way was there, which it was (as the congress expwy finished). the CA&E really didn't need a new downtown terminal, did they, they just needed to be able to get to th
Forum: Questions and Answers (Q&A)

you are correct that the connection to the dearborn st subway from the congress median didn't materialize until afterwards, although CTA's remarks to CA&E in '56 were to thwart any future plan the interurban might've contemplated at the time i can't help but get a nagging feeling there was more to this CA&E end story than ever was made public. promises made but not kept
Forum: Questions and Answers (Q&A)

the CTA waited until '56 to tell the CA&E they couldn't use the Dearborn subway? That's pretty late in the (construction) game, and I wonder if the interurban had held serious designs on that possibility. After all there were congress construction accomodations put into place (tunnels & right of way) to such extent SOMEONE had a specific notion where the CA&E might terminate. And th
Forum: Questions and Answers (Q&A)

in the mid-'60s when i started LTHS i'd sometimes play that miniature golf course immediately west of the stadium on addison, with my buddy johnny c. after last class of the day. as far as mini-golf courses go it was a bit better than many others we thought. in the early '70s it was gone though, and I remember an allstate insurance company estimate/adjuster building going up right about there
Forum: Questions and Answers (Q&A)

thanks because i've not before seen that image looking east on the old garfield pk line from marshfield. it certainly makes plain that the garfield el right of way was the 'vehicle' for the congress expwy, all the moreso in that the line was 4 tracks wide (east of marshfield anyway). the congress xpwy was first planned as I understand it in the '30s, the CTA took over the transit lines in 1948
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my late uncle Johnny told me that before my grandparents bought a house in bucktown that they lived on aberdeen st (in this area), I think he indicated just north of grand ave, which would be around 1920-21, although i've been unable to pinpoint the location any better than that since
Forum: Questions and Answers (Q&A)

some people've said the western ave overpass had nothing to do with riverview in the early '60s but i'm inclined to think it did. now the city of chicago doesn't feel like fixing it so they want to tear it down, this year even. lunacy. it provides N-S drivers rare relief in a city of otherwise perpetually congested thoroughfares. IMO the real reason is the police station on the belmont corner,
Forum: Questions and Answers (Q&A)

those community discount stores mentioned above were certainly popular with my Mom in the early '60s. i'm sure i went to the one @ chicago & paulina with her and my sisters many times, and others too, but that memomy isn't particularly distinct anymore unfortunately. back then the old elevated train structure that was the 'paulina street el' (actually the old metropolitan line) still stood i
Forum: Questions and Answers (Q&A)

those stops on the congress blueline with the distant turnstyle entrances (the lombard entrance for austin stop and the east ave entrance for oak park stop, for examples) were recently under review now that IDOT is going to widen the Ike to 4 lines from 3 in that stretch. IDOT first announced they thought it best to eliminate the distant entrances altogether and the CTA agreed, but lately they bo
Forum: Questions and Answers (Q&A)

if there was an earlier link I missed it, but thanks, that one image certainly is just as remembered. they sure built that thing to last, didn't they? lasted way past not only its original purposes but long past the point anybody nearby seemed to remember what it's for. a unique albatross, and it's good to have that image because otherwise people aren't going to believe there used to be a half-b
Forum: General Discussion

i remember the building of this LS station and the new subway, but I don't recall its' extreme length having anything to do with the old A-B train stop system. entrances were built @ 2 extremes--kedzie & spaulding, and the station merely spanned it. the location of train stop always favored kedzie end, they never tried to centralize it. those entering & exiting at the spaulding ave tur
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before the Elston SOS facility opened there was a small office they had on Addison a half block west of austin
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Land 'O Sweets was on the south-side of Fullerton a block or less east of Kostner. A big place too, endless chocolate. And I never knew of the owners tragic end, but 1984 was probably the last time me and my first wife went there
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in the early '80s I went to Manzo's on I.P. for their frog legs (don't forget the garlic). or baked lasagne. then walked a block or 2 east and had TDF strawberry-cheesecake at the Harris restaurant (open 24/7)
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a northside TB sanitorium was on pulaski rd somewhere around foster, i remember my buddy Dave W. got a job there in the late '60s
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I dined twice @ LHDS with friends, probably '72 & '75, great steaks and gave me a taste for margaritas
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for the PO5-1313 days to return. my interaction when I had occasion to call them in the '60s was totally different than modern-day 911. Reasons? let me count the ways
Forum: General Discussion

if ever again I bump into my old childhood friend Ernie V. he'll surely remember the name of the store on lake st that i've been referring to. but if I've termed it a 'hobby store' per se then I must modify my claim, that is it sold Lionel Trains and at a good discount but it may've really been a catalog discount store (which's after all the thread topic) that did a lot with model trains.
Forum: General Discussion

I was born @ Walther Memorial early-'50s and've my birth certificate. At that time it was just the 'old building' there on Kedzie towards the rear, and a few years later they expanded with w/ new add-on part closer to the street
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It is correct both to say the Jewel store that was on the SW corner of Belmont & Pulaski (now a fitness center w/ parking lot) was right next door to Madonna High School, AND that it takes the place of Madonna High School. The explanation is there're TWO Madonna H.S.'s, the first an old 2-story brick building that was torn down early '60s (for comparison it resembled the old St. Ladislaus gr
Forum: Questions and Answers (Q&A)