The Telephone Pole Faces of E. 57th

On Sunday, Lilly and I drove to Hyde Park, home to the University of Chicago and neighborhood eateries such as Salonica, a Greek diner on E. 57th St. at Blackstone Ave. Yuriko, Ann and I ate there last year during our visit to see the Robie House and other Hyde Park places.

This time, Lilly and I ate there. It was busy at about noon, but the line wasn’t out of the door. The patrons were a good mix of students and neighborhood residents. At least, I’m fairly sure that the grayhairs and young families were locals; and the young men and women — every jack one of the men with a beard — were students.

Salonica, Hyde ParkLilly had an omelet, I had pancakes. It’s the kind of place that serves tasty breakfasts all day, besides Greek items and sandwiches. In a place like this, breakfast is the thing for me. If I’ve already had breakfast that day, I have another. So it was this time.

A block and half west of Salonica are two telephone poles flanking the spot where the alley between Dorchester Ave. and the small Bixler Park meets E. 57th St. Each of the poles is painted with a green image at about eye level. Facelike, green with a yellow outline and blue and orange details. Maybe it’s not supposed to be a face. Whatever it is, it’s a lively work.

E 57th St ChicagoI remembered seeing them last year, so they’ve been around at least that long. If you go to Google Streetview, you can see them as green splotches.

Nothing like a little local detail. Hyperlocal detail, it is. Not even the most experiential-oriented, don’t-ever-admit-you’re-a-tourist-even-though-you-are guidebooks or web sites can cover that kind of thing.

Execution of Justice

Execution of Justice was the first play I saw in Chicago after moving here in 1987. I’d seen a number of plays in the city before, such as Vicious, Rap Master Ronnie, and All My Sons, because it was a good thing to do when visiting town. Chicago’s got first-rate theater. Once I came to live there, I went to the theater every other month or so.

ExJustice87The play, by Emily Mann, is about the trial of Dan White, assassin of George Moscone and Harvey Milk, and the reaction to his absurdly light sentence. White had been in the news again not too much earlier, in late 1985, for committing suicide.

The “Twinkie defense” was part of the play, but I don’t remember if it was treated as the myth it is or not. As Scopes puts it, “better to believe the jury was hoodwinked by some pseudo-scientific nonsense about junk food than to acknowledge the fact that our legal system sometimes absolves defendants of responsibility for the most heinous of crimes.”

I best remember the depiction of the White Night riots, with a dark, quiet stage suddenly exploding with light and noise and the motion of actors. You could tell the audience was startled.

Moo & Oink

All of the holiday-themed merchandise you’d actually want to buy is long gone by now, snapped up at discounts in the days after Christmas. That leaves the likes of the Ugly Christmas Sweater Cookie Set that I saw for sale today: a ridiculous item at a very steep markdown. Makes 6 to 8 ugly sweater cookies, the box said. It was illustrated with cookies shaped like brightly decorated sweaters.

When and how did the notion of ugly Christmas sweaters become popular? It happened while I wasn’t paying attention. I’ll continue to be apathetic about it, so I won’t bother to look into it. (But I will record here that Lilly went to a party with that theme this year.)

I didn’t buy the cookie set. I did need some barbecue sauce, and happened across an 18 oz. bottle Moo & Oink High 5 BBQ Sauce. That I bought.

Marketing verbiage on the bottle says: “Let’s face it, you take your BBQ seriously. So when it comes to what you put on your ‘Q,’ serious BBQ lovers are brushing on the thick & tasty blend of ingredients in HIGH 5 BBQ Sauce.” The first ingredient is high fructose corn syrup.

Seems to be residuum of the Moo & Oink grocery stores that used to be on the South Side of Chicago, but which closed in 2011. I never went to any of their stores, but I did occasionally see the commercials.

Two Ukrainian Village Churches

The Open House Chicago sites were only open until 5 pm on either Saturday or Sunday or both, and it was almost 4 when we headed to Ukrainian Village by El from the South Side and then a westbound bus. A little tiring, but I wanted to see the interiors of Sts. Volodymyr & Olha Ukrainian Catholic Church and St. Nicholas Ukrainian Catholic Cathedral before the event finished. It was worth the effort.

Sts. Volodymyr & Olha is a massive brick presence just south of Chicago Ave.

Sts. Volodymyr & Olha Ukrainian Catholic ChurchYaroslav Korsunsky, an architect from Minneapolis designed the church in the 1970s, reportedly in a Byzantine-Ukrainian style the early second millennium AD. I’m no expert on that, but I will say that the interior is stunning.

Sts. Volodymyr & Olha Ukrainian Catholic Church Sts. Volodymyr & Olha Ukrainian Catholic Church Sts. Volodymyr & Olha Ukrainian Catholic Church, Oct 18, 2014Sts. Volodymyr & Olha Ukrainian Catholic Church, Oct 18, 2014 A few blocks north is St. Nicholas. It too is a striking church.

St Nicholas Ukrainian Catholic Cathedral Note the 480-light chandelier.

St Nicholas Ukrainian Catholic Cathedral And the fine stained glass.

St Nicholas Ukrainian Catholic Cathedral Afterward, we didn’t feel like walking the additional blocks to see Holy Trinity Orthodox Cathedral, which we visited last summer when it happened to be open. It’s also resplendent, and has the distinction of displaying an icon that includes not only the founder of the parish, but the architect of the building, Louis Sullivan.

Three Bronzeville Churches

It was a first for me: a church with a lime-green interior wall, all the way around, and a large cross created by colorful lights, as a fixture on the ceiling. To find this church, you take the Green Line south to the 43rd St. station, and then walk west on 43rd. At Wabash Ave., turn left – to the south — and there you are, at 4315 S. Wabash: The First Church of Deliverance.

First Church of Deliverance, Oct 18, 2014

I’ve seen it described as a rare example of Art Moderne in a house of worship. I’ll go along with that. One Walter T. Bailey designed the structure toward the end of this career, which involved a practice in Chicago and Memphis, doing (among other designs) a number of Knights of Pythias buildings, including this one I’d never heard of near Nashville.

Lee Bailey, writing for WBEZ, says: “The church was built in 1939 and designed by Walter T. Bailey, the first African American to hold an architecture license in Illinois. Those terra cotta-clad twin towers were added in 1946, designed by Kocher Buss & DeKlerk. The building’s modernity wasn’t by chance. In the 1930s and 1940s, First Church was an exceedingly modern congregation.

“The Rev. Clarence H. Cobbs was only 21 when he founded the predominantly black First Church congregation in 1929. The church began its radio broadcast in 1934, giving Cobbs and his 200-member choir a national reach and influence. The congregation’s choir revolutionized the sound of gospel music in 1939 when its organist and composer Kenneth Morris convinced Cobbs to install the newly created Hammond electric organ at the church. The church’s gospel festivals in old Comiskey Park in the 1940s drew thousands.

“In 1953, the congregation became the first black church in the U.S. (quite possibly the world) to broadcast its services on television. WLS-TV carried those services live — a significant development, in retrospect — for 12 straight weeks. Songs that later became gospel standards made their debut at the church under Hobbs, including the staple ‘How I Got Over.’ ”

The interior is auditorium-style, and green is the first thing that strikes you. Then the details, especially the luminous ceiling cross.

First Church of Deliverance, Oct 18, 2014Up closer to the front.

First Church of Deliverance, Oct 18, 2014First Church of Deliverance, Oct 18, 2014Nearby, at 4359 S. Michigan Ave., is the Centennial Missionary Baptist Church. Once upon a time, it was the Eighth Church of Christ, Scientist. Actually, not that long ago.

Centennial Missionary Baptist Church, Oct 18, 2014It too is an auditorium church, but more semicircular. In that way it reminded me of the Seventeenth Church of Christ, Scientist, which is downtown.

Centennial Missionary Baptist Church, Oct 18, 2014

Centennial Missionary Baptist Church, Oct 18, 2014

A nice woman named Doris gave us a tour, including not only the main part of the church, but some back rooms. Open House Chicago notes that “Designed in 1911 by architect Leon E. Stanhope, the Centennial Missionary Baptist Church was originally home to the Eighth Church of Christ, Scientist. Designed in the neoclassical style, with a striking red domed roof, it was one of the longest-running African American Christian Science congregations.

“The building only recently became home to Centennial Missionary Baptist Church – which itself boasts a distinguished history. Their first house of worship was a building owned by Lorraine Hansberry, and numerous gospel music greats performed over the years.”

The third church we visited in Bronzeville, Mount Pisgah Missionary Baptist Church, 4600-4622 S. King Dr., began as the Chicago Sinai Temple in the early 1910s, designed by the prolific Alfred Alschuler. I didn’t take any exteriors, but Design Slinger has some good images.

The exterior is stately, while the interior is gorgeous.

Mount Pisgah Missionary Baptist Church, Oct 18, 2014Mount Pisgah Missionary Baptist Church, Oct 18, 2014Mount Pisgah Missionary Baptist Church, Oct 18, 2014Design Slinger says: “In 1910 architect Alfred Alschuler drew up plans for a Chicago Sinai building complex that would include an auditorium for worship and a large community center which would house offices, classrooms, meeting spaces, a gym and a pool…. as members moved further south, a large corner lot was purchased at 46th and Grand Boulevard to serve as a new home base.

“Since the congregation was part of the Reform tradition, Alschuler followed a design scheme that was popular at the time with other congregations in not proclaiming that the building was a house of worship, by choosing a historical classic architectural style. The restrained sophistication of Greco/Roman refinement would convey to the passerby that this was a substantial edifice, it could be a bank or a library, but not wear its religious affiliation on its sleeve.”

By the 1940s, the Jewish population in the area couldn’t sustain a synagogue, and the structures became part of the high school run by Franciscans. In 1961, Mt. Pisgah Missionary Baptist congregation acquired the property.

 

Open House Chicago 2014

On October 18, the day after I got back from New York, I should have done the reasonable thing and puttered around the house. The weather that morning, cool and drizzly, encouraged that. But it was Open House Chicago weekend. No time to stay home. Yuriko and I drove to Oak Park, parked the car, and took the El downtown.

I quote myself from last year, since the event was essentially the same this year: “The CAF describes it this way:  ‘A free, citywide festival that offers behind-the-scenes access to more than 150 buildings across this great city. Explore historic mansions, hidden rooms, sacred spaces, private clubs, offices, hotels, iconic performance venues and more much – all for free.’ Note the emphasis on free.

“Sounds like my kind of event. At each place there were volunteers at folding tables taking attendance in the form of asking you your zip code. At a few places, you had to join a short guided tour, but most of the time you just offered your zip code, walked in, and looked around. Not all of the spaces were open 9-5 on both Saturday and Sunday, so it was worthwhile to check the CAF guide to the event, which had such details, as well as useful maps.”

Last year, I went by myself, and hit sites downtown and points north. This year, we also saw downtown sites, but then went south and west. In order, we visited the Lyric Opera, the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago, 190 S. LaSalle, the Inland Steel Building, and the Kemper Building (all downtown); the Forum, the First Church of Deliverance, the Centennial Missionary Baptist Church, the Welcome Inn Manor, and the Mount Pisgah Missionary Baptist Church (all Bronzeville); and Sts. Volodymyr & Olha Ukrainian Catholic Church and St. Nicholas Ukrainian Catholic Cathedral, both in Ukrainian Village (and both places that were closed when we visited this summer).

I used to work in the Lyric Opera Building – 35 N. Wacker, but that’s the office component of the structure. The Lyric Opera of Chicago, while in the same structure, is actually a separate entity, with the theater space owned by the opera company. It’s a lavish place. Looking toward the stage, where work was under way on the set for the next production:

Lyric Opera Theater, Oct 18, 2014Away from the stage:

Lyric Opera Theater, Oct 18, 2014Opulent as it is, the Lyric wasn’t my favorite downtown space this time. Rather, we were surprised to find a former law library on the 40th floor of 190 S. LaSalle

190 S LaSalle, 40th FloorThe story is that the developer built out the space for a major law firm tenant when the building was first developed in the 1980s. Thirty years later, law libraries of this kind are obsolete, and the original tenant’s gone anyway (I noticed that a major commercial real estate company occupies the offices on the same floor as the library space). The former two-level law library’s now a posh meeting space.

190 S LaSalle, 40th FloorIt has some great views, all four directions.

190 S LaSalle, 40th Floor view looking southThat’s looking south, with the Chicago Board of Trade and its Ceres statue prominent in the view to the left and the South Branch of the Chicago River to the right.

Everywhere a Sign

A question to ponder: How can Crème Caramel Chicago’s product be so good? Ingredients: milk, eggs, sugar, cream, caramel, vanilla. That’s it. Yet in the words of Shakespeare, it’s a wow.

It’s also a product of EU Foods, though it has nothing to do with that supranational entity, I think, since it was made in Bensenville, Illinois.

Another thing to ponder: a thematic men’s room sign.

Samurai bathroom attendantI saw it about a year ago in Dallas at the Ann & Gabriel Barbier-Mueller Museum. As I write this, the wires – quaint, that term – are burning up with news of the first U.S. Ebola case, and the honor goes to Dallas. Well, why not? Texas excels at so much else.

I doubt that we’ll get an epidemic, though. What we will get is excessive news coverage. Just another reason to avoid cable news, out in that vast wasteland. Vaster now than when I was born; a regular Sahara.

Newton MinowI didn’t know that Newton Minow had an honorary street sign in Chicago, but I saw it downtown last month. I’m happy to report that at 88, Mr. Minow is still alive and kicking.

A Handful of Pilsen Murals

Distinctly cool today. Call it fall. I’ve read the British consider that usage quaint, or maybe bumpkinish, since “fall” passed out of common usage for them in the 19th century, replaced by “autumn.” Here in North America, we kept the more Anglo-Saxon, and evocative term, though it’s roughly on par in usage with Latinate autumn.

Makes you wonder (me, anyway) why a Latinate equivalent for spring didn’t catch on – “vernam” maybe. Or “aestam” for summer and “hiemiam” for winter (I can see why that didn’t catch on. An alternative would be “brumam” for winter). That’s the kind of thing that occurs me when I see a few leaves floating by.

I need to spend a little more time in Pilsen, where St. Procopius is located. Some years ago I visited National Museum of Mexican Art, back when it was known as the Mexican Fine Arts Center Museum, which is in the neighborhood. The museum had a really good collection of Día de los Muertos-related art on exhibit, which it does every October.

Pilsen’s also got good Mexican food and outdoor murals to look it. We didn’t have a lot of time to wander around and look at them during the bus tour, but I managed to run across a few. Such as this door-sized one, dated this year.

Pilsen mural, Sept 2014A larger one.

Pilsen muralAnd a more horizontal one.

Pilsen mural, Sept 2014I saw a few more from the window riding by. There are many more.

First Baptist Congregational Church

By the time we got to the last church on the tour, we were feeling the overload. At least I was. It’s the kind of feeling that drives you back to your room for an evening of television – a bad movie in another language is just the thing — after spending the day looking at grand churches or magnificent museums or arresting ruins or even just intense, one-thing-after-another cities, or some combo of all these.

First Baptist Congregational Church Well, one more. We can handle that. The last one for bus #4 was the curiously named First Baptist Congregational Church at 60 N. Ashland Ave. Its Gothic Revival outside hinted that it was going to be another big, spectacular church inside. That’s a good thing, of course. But the effect wears off a little after four others.

It was spectacular inside. But not in the way I expected. It perked me right up and made me want to look around. It wasn’t like any of the other churches. For one thing, First Baptist Congregational is an auditorium church, trimmed in dark woods, a very inviting design.

The view toward the front, facing the powerful organ, among other things.

First Baptist Congregational Church, ChicagoToward the back.

First Baptist Congregational Church, ChicagoIt’s also the oldest of the churches we saw that day, built as the Union Park Congregational in 1869, long enough ago that the congregation who built it had been abolitionist before the war, and active in resisting the enforcement of the Fugitive Slave Act. After the war, the congregation counted Mary Todd Lincoln as a member for a time.

They hired one Gurdon P. Randall to design their church. He was active in Chicago both before and after the war, but apparently a number of his structures were lost in the Chicago Fire. Union Park Congregational survived, since the fire didn’t reach this far west. Through a number of shifts in congregation whose details I’ll skip, the modern congregation is affiliated with both the United Church of Christ and the National Baptist Convention.

It isn’t lavish in an in-your-face way, but the detail is remarkable.

First Baptist Congregational Church, Chicago, Sept 20, 2014Got pretty stained glass, too.

First Baptist Congregational Church, Chicago, Sept 20, 2014About three years ago, a snowstorm sent one of the smaller spires crashing through the roof and the false roof over the nave (if that’s the right term for an auditorium church). That was bad enough, but apparently the wind then carried soot that had accumulated between the two roofs over the years inside the church, covering everything. The restoration was only recently completed.

St. Paul’s Catholic Church

At St. Paul’s Catholic Church at 2234 S. Hoyne in Chicago, Paul is there to greet you.

St Paul's, Chicago, Sept 2014Or at least a mosaic St. Paul does, looking absolutely certain of his mission to the Gentiles. He’s above the front entrance, and while the church has many brilliant mosaics – and who doesn’t like a brilliant mosaic? – note the bricks around the Paul mosaic. The entire church is an enormous, artful mass of those bricks. As this view from the rear makes clear.

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA“St. Paul’s Church was established by a small German community in 1876, with its cornerstone laid in 1897,” the CAF says. “Designed by Henry J. Schlacks, the church was built entirely by its own parishioners — many of whom were professional bricklayers. Singled out in Ripley’s Believe It Or Not as ‘the church built without nails,’ the structure underwent a long-term restoration project completed in 2013. The gothic-style building is visible from all sides of Pilsen due to its exceptionally tall spires and dark brick.”

Schlacks, of course, is the fellow who did St. Adalbert (see yesterday). But St. Paul was an astonishingly early work in his career, since he was only 28 at the time. “Schlacks himself took on the role of general contractor and hired men of the parish…” the CAF says. “He wrote, ‘We could find no builder in Chicago acquainted with the proposed method of construction, or who could give even an approximate estimate of the cost from my plans….’ ”

True to the tradition of its building, parishioners did most of the recent renovation, as this article in Crain’s Chicago Business (of all places) notes. And a fine job of it they did.

St Paul's, Chicago Spet 2014

It’s all brick, even the white areas on the ceiling, which were plastered over at some point. The mosaics, we were told, were completed in the early 1930s – ordered in pieces from Germany, I believe. Especially striking are Jesus and the Apostles, though they look a little like they’re at a board meeting of some kind (the nonprofit Salvation Co).

St Paul's Chicago, Sept 2013By the time we got to St. Paul’s, we were eating our sack lunches in the bus. The tour took us downstairs for more refreshments. The lower level, now an event and meeting space, was a major part of the recent renovation, and striking in its own way.

St Paul's, Chicago, Sept 2014When I saw it, I thought, Rathskeller. Perfect place to hoist a brew and sing drinking songs in bad German. In the case of the tour, however, the only drinks on offer were water, soda and coffee.