Monthly Archives: April 2019

Wolf Point & The Merchandise Mart Hall of Fame

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On Friday I went to downtown Chicago for business. Since it was a warm, clear spring day, I wanted to do a more extensive walkabout, especially in the River North area, where I attended to business. But I didn’t have much time.

Instead I was able to take a quick walk near the Chicago River, mostly on the way to my appointment and heading back to Union Station afterward. I was near the place where the river divides into its North and South Branches, which is known as Wolf Point and is the origin of the Chicago Municipal Device.

For quite a while, Wolf Point was oddly underdeveloped, at least compared with the rest of the riverfront. For instance, until recently the point was occupied mostly by a parking lot.

No more. The latest project there, Wolf Point East, is still under construction.

So Wolf Point looks a little different than at the beginning of this decade, and a lot different than it did in 1833.

Hines, Joseph P. Kennedy Enterprises, the AFL-CIO Building Investment Trust and PNC Realty Investors are the developers of Wolf Point East; Pelli Clarke Pelli did the design. The 60-story tower will have 698 residential units — upper-end rentals — that will be available late this year.

Just to the east, of course, is the 4 million-square-foot Merchandise Mart, seen here catching a shadow in the mid-afternoon.

A street runs between the Merchandise Mart and the river — the unimaginatively named W. Merchandise Mart Plaza — and from there, you can see the Merchandise Mart Hall of Fame. That is, eight bronze busts honoring one-time U.S. merchant princes, each facing the building. Joseph P. Kennedy himself commissioned the busts in the early 1950s, which was possible because the Kennedy family owned the Merchandise Mart for many decades.

The busts are in two groups of four. These are the busts to the west. They don’t look so large from across the street, but the heads are four times the size of a regular human head.
From left to right: John Wanamaker, founder of the stores by that name; George Hartford, founder of A&P; Edward Filene, founder of those stores; and Montgomery Ward.

These are the busts to the east.
Construction and taxis whizzing by made it a little harder to make an image, but in any case they are Robert Wood, a chairman of Sears; F.W. Woolworth; Julius Rosenwald, another chairman of Sears and founder of the Museum of Science and Industry; and Marshall Field.

More about each of the busts is here. Twelve years ago, at least, they looked like they needed some restoration. I didn’t get quite close enough to them this time to know whether that has happened.

The Snows of April 27

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Last Friday was a perfectly brilliant spring day, temps in the 60s. Come Saturday afternoon, snow fell. About three inches. It stuck until Sunday morning.

The green was slowly covered by white.
On Sunday, the sun came out and almost all of the snow melted. The surviving bits in the shadows disappeared with this morning’s rain. It’s pretty soggy out there now.

The grass and flowers and greening bushes and the new-leaf trees don’t seem to mind the snow. But it must be upsetting to lawn-care enthusiasts who are eager to get out there and mow their lawns.

Indianapolis Artsgarden, 2014

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Easter fell fairly late five years ago, April 20, and we traveled that weekend as well. That time to Indianapolis, where we saw the Eiteljorg Museum and ate at Maxine’s Chicken & Waffles. A good little trip.

We also spent part of that Saturday afoot in downtown Indianapolis, including a short stop at an interesting public space: the Indianapolis Artsgarden, a large domed structure built over a major intersection.

Besides connecting the adjacent Circle Centre Mall to a nearby hotel and other buildings, the Arts Council of Indianapolis — which owns the space — holds public performances there, along with art exhibitions.

Ehrenkrantz Eckstut & Kuhn Architects (now part of Perkins Eastman), who designed Circle Centre, did the Artsgarden too in the 1990s. Actually not so much a single dome as a series of glass vaults. Makes for a light, open space.

Even when occupied by fully grown trees.

No event was going on when we were there, but it was a pleasant place to hang out. I did that while everyone else went shopping at the adjacent retail. If I remember right, they found some spring clothes.

Champaign Stroll & Digressions From Kung Fu to the Match King

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After visiting the University of Illinois Arboretum on Easter, we returned to Lilly’s apartment briefly and took a walk from there a few blocks to the UIUC campus. Blocks heavy with businesses supported by students. Along the way everyone else went into one of them, Kung Fu Tea, for bubble tea to go, while I waited outside with the dog.

Kung Fu Tea is a chain I’d never heard of. Lilly didn’t understand why I was amused by the name. But she’s unable to imagine the following variation on an old TV narrative.

“Grasshopper, when you can take the tapioca pearl from my hand, it will be time for you to leave.”

I just found out that Kung Fu is available on Amazon for no extra charge. I was an intermittent viewer when the show was originally on the air, which was 45 years ago anyway, so I might give it another go.

From Kung Fu Tea, it was a short walk to Altgeld Hall, which I’ve seen before, but not from this vantage.

On we went. A fine day for a walk. The sunny warmth had drawn a number of students to the Main Quad, where they parked themselves on the grass. That’s the Illini Union in the distance.
Some students lolled in hammocks. That’s something I don’t ever remember seeing at any of the green fields of Vanderbilt.

We circled back around the other side of Altgeld Hall and happened across this statue.
That’s the goddess Diana.
A nearby plaque says: The Diana Fountain is a creation of the Swedish sculptor, Carl Milles. It was designed for the court of a building at 540 North Michigan Avenue, Chicago, where it remained from 1930 until it was generously presented by Time Incorporated to the University of Illinois at the request of the Class of 1921.

The Fountain was dedicated here on October 23, 1971, as a class memorial, at the Fiftieth Anniversary Reunion of the Class of 1921.

Then there’s a list of “members and friends” of the Class of ’21, all of whom presumably ponied up some money for moving the statue, as well as the site work and installation. It’s a long alphabetical list from Allman to Zimmer: eight columns of 35 names each. More, actually, since some of the names represent married couples.

Fifty years plus nearly 50 more. Safe to assume all of the Class of ’21 have shuffled off this mortal coil. As has Carl Milles (d. 1955).

Here’s a digression. Another Diana Fountain by Milles is in Stockholm, at a place called the Matchstick Palace. Who built the Matchstick Palace?

The Match King, Ivar Kreuger, that’s who. I ran across him years ago in the wonderful Webster’s New Biographical Dictionary. Wiki gives a fuller description of his activities. His is an astonishing story.

University of Illinois Arboretum & Japan House

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On Easter Sunday, I drove Lilly back to UIUC, and this time the rest of the family came along for the ride: Yuriko, Ann and the dog. Been awhile since we’ve been on a trip of more than a few miles with the dog, but we figured she’d enjoy it and not be too much trouble. Except for the soda spill she caused toward the end of the trip, she wasn’t.

So we had a few pleasant hours in Champaign-Urbana, with temps in the 70s and greenery budding everywhere. Especially at the University of Illinois Arboretum.

“The University of Illinois Arboretum was developed in the late 1980s to early 1990s,” according to the university. “The original 1867 campus master plan placed the Arboretum north of Green Street where the College of Engineering currently exists. During the 1900s, the site moved to south campus, located near the Observatory, and Smith Music Hall.

“Now located at the intersection of South Lincoln and Florida Avenues, the Arboretum’s gardens, collections, and habitats are transforming 160 acres of the University’s south campus in Urbana-Champaign into an exceptional ‘living laboratory’ for students in plant sciences and fine and applied arts, as well as an oasis of natural beauty open to the public.”

I don’t know about natural beauty, since an arboretum, though working with living materials, is man-made. But if you called it artificial beauty, people think plastic or some other synthetic material. So let’s just say it’s a beautiful spot.

A trail leads from the small parking lot and toward the arboretum’s large pond.

Also on the grounds of the University of Illinois Arboretum is Japan House.
Japan House is a unit of the College of Fine and Applied Arts at the UIUC, beginning when a Japanese artist-in-residence, Shozo Sato, came to the school in 1964, with the building completed in 1998. Such rarefied arts are calligraphy, tea, ikebana and sumi-e are taught there.

Japan House itself wasn’t open on Sunday, but the grounds were.
Including a view of the zen garden.
The grounds would be a good place for moon viewing, or tsukimi. Wonder if that’s ever happened there.

Sign of the Times: The Great American Political Poster 1844-2012

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Visiting the Elmhurst History Museum for its local history collection was fine, but what I really wanted to see on Saturday — before it ends next weekend — was an exhibit called Sign of the Times: The Great American Political Poster 1844-2012. I’d picked up a leaflet about the exhibit when visiting the Elmhurst Art Museum, so that kind of marketing works sometimes.

The exhibit includes 50 items and occupies the first floor of the museum. I could have spent an hour looking at everything, but not everyone in the family is as enthusiastic about presidential ephemera as I am. Even so, I got a good look and had the chance to explain some things to the girls, such as who this fellow McGovern was. He had a fair number of posters, for all the good it did him.

As promised, the exhibit begins with the election of 1844. As we all know, Henry Clay headed the Whig ticket.

Less well known is the Whig for vice president that year, Theodore Frelinghuysen of New Jersey. Vice presidents are often obscure, but men who ran for VP and lost tend to be even more obscure. Too bad he was never veep. Vice President Frelinghuysen has a ring to it.

The Kellogg Brothers of Hartford, Conn., did the poster. They were rivals of Currier & Ives but about as well remembered as Mr. Frelinghuysen these days. Google Kellogg and you tend to get cereal, and they aren’t mentioned in any Christmas songs that I know of.

“An Illustrative Map of Human Life Deduced from passages in Sacred Writ” (1847), which is Wiki’s example of one of their works, makes for some interesting reading.

These were the days of hand-colored prints. This one’s exceptional.
John C. Fremont and William L. Dayton, the first Republican candidates for the presidency and vice presidency, in 1856. A wonderfully named artist, Dominique O. Fabronius, did the poster, which was issued by C.E. Lewis of Buffalo. Look at Fabronius’ portrait of “Spoons” Butler here.

On to the golden age of the color lithograph: two posters from the 1900 presidential contest. First, William Jennings Bryan. A busy poster, promising no cross of gold, attacks on the Standard Oil octopus (I assume) and other things.
William McKinley and TR: an even busier poster.
The artists are unknown in both cases. I enjoyed this detail on the McKinley-Roosevelt poster.
I’ve posted about Phrygian caps before, but not in a North American context. Maybe it’s just as well that the caps are generally forgotten in this country as a symbol of liberty. Such symbols are sometimes co-opted by wankers.

The last of the two-man campaign posters: TR and his mostly forgotten VP, Charles Fairbanks. The city in Alaska is named for him, at least.
Note the fasces. Talk about being co-opted by wankers.

Fast forward a few decades. This poster offers a more folksy style for voters in the 1940 election. Note that a happy worker smokes a pipe, besides supporting Willkie.

Offset lithography was the most common means of poster-making by that time. Artist unknown in the case of the Willkie poster.

In 1964, Goldwater got a fairly standard treatment (unknown artist again) in a pro poster.
Along with a stinging anti poster drawn by Ben Shahn.
The ’72 election was represented by previously mentioned McGovern posters, but Nixon made an appearance as well.
By R. Crumb. Am I right in finding it strange that the Nixon campaign would enlist Crumb to do a poster? Well, strange bedfellows and all. Nixon and the Do-Dah man. The ’72 election was a long strange trip, after all.

The Elmhurst History Museum

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Lilly visited for Easter weekend this year. We were glad to see her.
Easter Saturday turned out to be brilliant and warm, much like the Saturday two weeks ago when we visited Elmhurst. So all of us, including Lilly this time, went back to Elmhurst to wander around in the park again, but also for something we didn’t do last time: visit the Elmhurst History Museum.

The museum, founded in 1957, is in the former home of Elmhurst’s first village president, Henry Glos, and his wife Lucy. The mansion dates from ca. 1892.
As I’ve mentioned before, the Gloses are interred across the street. I understand that street didn’t exist when they were alive — in fact, not until the 1970s — so their mausoleum and their house must have been on a single piece of land.

A few odds and ends dot the grounds. Such as the Elmhurst fire bell.

The plaque says (all caps, but I’ve regularized that):

The old Elmhurst fire bell
is here erected as a memorial
dedicated
in the Illinois sesquicentennial year 1968
to the brave men of the Elmhurst Volunteer Fire Department
who served with courage and devotion
from the days when fire fighting equipment
was crude and horse drawn
on behalf of a grateful community

The Elmhurst Historical Commission

It doesn’t look bad for a bell that’s been in the elements for more than 50 years now.

The museum has a modest but interesting collection of Elmhurst-specific artifacts.

Such as an Order of Odd Fellows sword. How often do you see one of those?
It goes along with a Shriner’s fez, a Jaycee’s collection box, some Knights of Columbus pins and other fraternal org items.

This calendar, produced by the local Rothmeyer Coal Co., belongs in the don’t-make-em-like-that-anymore file.

Notable birthdays on the calendar for January 1934 include Alexander Hamilton, Benjamin Franklin, Robert E. Lee, Stonewall Jackson and William McKinley.

A six pack of Baderbrau beer.
A short-lived Elmhurst brew (1989-1997). Never heard of it, even though Chicago’s well-known Goose Island brewery acquired the name and formula after 1997 and brewed it for a few more years. A mid-2010s revival didn’t work out either.

Better known are the Keebler elves. Keebler Foods Co. used to be located in Elmurst until its owner Kellogg Co. moved the snack operation to Michigan. I suspect not all of the elves relocated. There’s probably a neighborhood in Elmhurst where some of them still live.

You’d think the Village of Elmhurst would try to get permission from Kellogg to build an elf tree in one of the local parks. Do it right and people would come to see that.

Pho Thursday

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A good Easter to all. Back on Easter Monday.

When in doubt, eat some pho. Part of the delight is looking down into the bowl and taking in the aroma in all its richness and feeling the light warm steam on your face.

That was actually Yuriko’s lunch. But I’ve been eating pho on and off for 25 years, and I’m glad to report that delicious examples are still easy to find, essentially unchanged over the decades, and reasonably priced in all the places we visit.

Somewhere, there’s probably pho for hipsters that costs three times what we pay, but we haven’t sought that out. I didn’t have the pho during our recent lunch, however.

That’s what I had: a Vietnamese pork chop, along with sausage and an egg. Along with the pho, to be found at Viet Taste, a small restaurant — seats about 30, I think — in the inner northwest suburb of Norridge. Good food for these sometimes chilly April days. Or any day, really.

Fallen Trees

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Before any snow fell on Sunday, we enjoyed a fairly nice Saturday, sunny and not too cold. Warm enough to talk a pleasant wall at Spring Valley, our go-to place for short walks in the mixed woods and prairie when we don’t want to drive too far to do so.

I noticed that the park district had finally gotten around to removing the big white ex-tree near the edge of the Spring Valley’s largest pond.
This is what it looked like nearly five years ago, standing tall and dead.

A nearby fallen tree, which landed in the pond, is still there, but the years are taking their toll.
That inspired me to look around for some other fallen trees at Spring Valley. There are a fair number, including cut ones.

And those that look like the wind finally got them.
All very nice, but nothing as epic as I saw in Washington state, or as damaging as in the UP. Or as varied as you can find among these images.

Notre-Dame

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First heard about the Notre-Dame fire on the car radio late yesterday afternoon. Wish I could report some kind of transcendent experience at the cathedral during our visit years ago, but no. Other people’s accounts along those lines are being posted with great speed.

We were duly impressed by the stained glass, the flying buttresses and the overall sweeping majesty of the exterior. But sad to say, what I remember most was that the cathedral interior was dark.

I understand the reason. Lighting is expensive. So the cathedral wasn’t much illuminated on an ordinary day in November 1994 for the ordinary tourists who were visiting. The thing to do would have been to attend a service, but we thoughtlessly did not.

Among all the pictures I took in 1994, I have exactly one of Notre-Dame. Of course it was one of the Rose Windows. I didn’t want to use film anywhere too dark. Not that I had the equipment to take a very good image anyway.

Maybe we were lucky to be able to see it at all. Whether you credit Dietrich von Choltitz with not burning down Paris in 1944, or think that’s nonsense, the Germans could have certainly done a lot of damage before liberation, including dynamiting something so quintessentially French as Notre-Dame du Paris. Such an act would have been in character, after all.

I’ve read today that, at least, the flying buttresses did indeed buttress the walls, though the roof was lost, including wood lattices made from trees cut down between 1160 and 1170. The Rose Windows seem to be intact.

Naturally, the building will be restored. I wonder whether there will be arguments about rebuilding the completely lost spire. Considering the long history of the cathedral, it counts as a late addition.