Buildings and Landmarks in The 1870's
In 1868, on the retirement of Potter Palmer, Messrs. Field and Leiter removed their dry goods business from 110 and 112 Lake Street to the Singer building at the northeast corner of State and Washington Streets, which they occupied until the Chicago Fire in 1871. Fashionable residences and the Second Presbyterian Church are seen at the right.
West Washington Street showing the funeral of the Right Reverend Henry John Whitehouse, Bishop of Illinois, on August 10, 1874. The procession is led by the choir which is shown ebntering the Episcopal Cathedral of S.S. Peter and Paul at the corner of Peoria Street.
Pine Street, now North Michigan Avenue, looking north from Erie Street.
Kerfoot's 'Business Block,' erected by Mr. W.D. Kerfoot and his clerk at Washington and La Salle Streets on the day after the Great Fire is the office where until recently was the Chamber of Commerce Building, the home of the Chicago Real Estate Board. From left to right: Alexander Wolcott, Emil Rudolph, Geo. Birkhoff, Jr (above), Wm. D. Kerfoot (below), W. A. Merigold, Sam Ashton
What is now Chicago's busy motor row was this quiet boulevard. It is South Michigan Avenue looking north from Twenty-first Street. On the northwest corner is seen the home built by Frederick Haskell in 1869. The house next to it was occupied by Chauncey B. Blair; next to that of William V. Kay; then came the residence of John Doane; then Henry Keep, the father of Chauncey and Albert Keep; and then George Schneider, the banker. On the northwest corner of the Twentieth Street was the Second Presbyterian Church. The house with the turrets, on the east side of the street, was that of Uri C. Balcom, the lumber-man, and on the northeast corner of Twentieth, the old Calumet Club.
The Chicago Interstate Industrial Exposition was first projected in 1871 by J. Irving Pearce, William F. Coolbaugh, Potter Palmer, Cyrus H. McCormick, and R.T. Crane and opened in 1873. Although there was a deficit every year until 1877, these enterprising citizens felt that it was good business for it helped to re-establish confidence after the Great Fire. Here Theodore Thomas' summer night concerts and many grand operas were given in the eighties. It was razed in 1891 to make way for the Art Institute.
A toboggan slide at Drexel Boulevard and Forty-fourth Street, reviving pleasant memories of a long gone day when tobogganing was great fun and the danger of accidents was hardly considered. The warming house and the skating-pond at the right could only have added to the pleasure.