Living Landmarks of Chicago

Description

Living Landmarks of Chicago goes beyond the what, when, and where to tell the how and why of 50 significant Chicago landmarks. From the parlor used as a meat locker to the fight over the Field Museum, history comes to life. 

This book is a masterpiece of history and a travelogue that will inspire you to visit the landmarks you have not seen, and to go back to those that you have.

Cindy Ladage, Traveling Adventures of a Farm Girl

History lines Chicago’s sidewalks. Stroll down LaSalle or Dearborn or State and you’ll see skyscrapers that have been there for a century or more. It’s easy to scurry by, to dismiss the building itself, but a hunt for placards turns up landmarks every few feet, it seems. Here’s a Chicago landmark; there’s a National Historic landmark. They’re everywhere.

Ironically, these skyscrapers keep the city grounded; they illustrate a past where visionaries took fanciful, impossible ideas and made them reality. Buildings sinking? Raise them. River polluting the lake and its precious drinking water? Reverse it. Overpopulation and urban sprawl making it challenging to get to work? Build up. From the bare to the ornate, from exposed beams to ornamented facades, the city’s architecture is unrestrainedly various yet provides a cohesive, beautiful skyline that illustrates the creativity of necessity, and the necessity of creativity.

Theresa L. Goodrich’s writing is so delicious it makes it hard to put the book down. 

Heidi Kohz

In this dive into Chicago history, Theresa L. Goodrich tells the stories of fifty significant landmarks. Each chapter is a vignette that introduces the landmark and brings it to life, and the book is organized chronologically to illustrate the development of the city’s distinct personality. 

These fifty landmarks weave an interconnected tale of Chicago between 1836 and 1932 (and beyond). I’ve chosen each for a reason. 

I have read many histories of this, my favorite US city, and I could not put Theresa L. Goodrich’s book down. It should be available in every living landmark, at every city hotel (especially now that places like The Palmer House and The Drake have reopened.) It should be required reading for city administrators, high school history classes, and tourism bureaus. Brilliant book.

bookwriter

You might notice there are several hotels. That’s because so many wonderful old buildings have been adapted in that manner. It’s pretty cool to be able to spend the night in a building designed by Jenney or Burnham.

Landmarks listed as Original Name (Current Name, if changed)

1. Clarke House
2. Lake Park (Grant Park)
3. Charles Hull House (Hull-House Museum)
4. Lake Park (Lincoln Park & Lincoln Park Zoo)
5. Water Tower & Pumping Station
6. Page Brothers Building
7. Palmer House
8. Bryant Block (Delaware Building)
9. Nickerson Mansion (Driehaus Museum)
10. Studebaker Brothers’ Lake Front Carriage Repository (Fine Arts Building)
11. Glessner House
12. Rookery Building
13. Auditorium Building
14. Monadnock Block
15. Charnley House (Charnley-Persky House)
16. Marshall Field and Company Building (Macy’s on State Street)
17. Palace of Fine Arts (Museum of Science & Industry)
18. Art Institute of Chicago
19. Newberry Library
20. New York Life Insurance Building (Kimpton Gray)
21. Tree Studios
22. Chicago Varnish Company (Harry Caray’s Italian Steakhouse)
23. Chicago Public Library (Chicago Cultural Center)
24. Schlesinger & Mayer (Sullivan Center)
25. Orchestra Hall (Symphony Center)
26. Majestic Building and Theater (CIBC Theatre)
27. The Blackstone Hotel
28. Federal Life Building (Hotel Julian)
29. D. B. Fisk & Company (Hotel Monaco)
30. Municipal Pier #2 (Navy Pier)
31. Michigan Avenue Bridge (DuSable Bridge)
32. The Drake Hotel
33. Wrigley Building
34. Columbian Museum of Chicago (Field Museum)
35. The Chicago Theatre
36. London Guarantee & Accident Building (LondonHouse Hotel)
37. The Chicago Temple
38. Union Station
39. Tribune Tower
40. Bismarck Hotel (Allegro Royal Sonesta Hotel Chicago)
41. Oriental Theatre (James M. Nederlander Theatre)
42. Stevens Hotel (Hilton Chicago)
43. Medinah Athletic Club (InterContinental Chicago)
44. Carbide and Carbon Building (Pendry Chicago)
45. Civic Opera House
46. Adler Planetarium
47. Shedd Aquarium
48. Chicago Board of Trade Building
49. Merchandise Mart (theMART)
50. Chicago Historical Society (Chicago History Museum)