Small Talk 10 - Chicago
I don't recommend quoting famous people in your casual conversation. It can sound too professorial. For example, someone says, Hey smell my lilacs! And you waft your hand over the flowers and reply, "Cicero said, 'If you have a garden and a library, you have everything you need.'" How does someone respond to that? They can't, really, and that makes it poor small talk.
That said, listen to what Mark Twain said about Chicago... "A city where they are always rubbing a lamp, and fetching up the genii, and contriving and achieving new impossibilities. She is always a novelty, for she is never the Chicago you saw when you passed through the last time." Right on, Mark. Smell my lilacs! And this from a guy who had never seen the Hancock building, or a Second City show, or Millennium Park.
Places always make for good small talk, because they are where we spend most of our time. So let's talk about the 'Hog butcher for the world, tool maker, stacker of wheat, player with railroads, stormy, husky, brawling, city of the big shoulders'. Ope—slipped in another quote, sorry.
Chicago
In 1836, a year before Chicago was incorporated, a group of Illinois state commissioners created a map of the city to show proposed land use. One parcel was a strip along Lake Michigan—the commissioners labeled this strip: 'Public Ground—A Common to Remain Forever Open, Clear, and Free of any Buildings, or other Obstruction Whatever.' (Gotta love the 'whatever' part.) Thanks to this declaration, Chicago now has 26 miles of continuous lakefront park. You can ride a bike path from south of the Loop to Evanston, and never lose sight of the lake, passing beaches and museums and harbors and lagoons and ball fields and a zoo and a bird sanctuary.
I just spent two weeks back in the city, and I can confirm that it continues to live up to Twain's view. Now of course every place is different every moment, but we're not getting into existential stuff today. The point is that some places are in a constant state of reinvention, a relentless pursuit of an ideal, a firm-jawed determination to prove your worth. As far as I know, no place is more like this than Chicago.
The southwest corner of Lake Michigan was a terrible site to build a modern city. It was basically a marsh, and to get from the lake to the Illinois River (which leads to the Mississippi River), travelers had to endure a grueling portage across swamps and stagnant lakes. The city's name probably comes from the Miami word Chicagoua, a type of wild garlic that grew along the river banks. That region was the homeland of many indigenous nations—the Kickapoo, the Ojibwe, the Potawatomi. But when Jacques Marquette and Louis Joliet landed their canoes there in 1673, there began a rapid period of European development that displaced native people. The displacement of people is, unfortunately, a part of Chicago's miraculous rise, and it continues today. The neighborhoods around Wrigley Field look nothing like what they were in the 90s, when I lived there, and that 'gentrification' eliminated much of the affordable housing, along with much of the character. This is the story of America, really, and it's the story of humanity.
From the beginning, settlers made outrageous claims for the future of Chicago. In 1682, the French explorer La Salle wrote, 'This will be the gate of empire, this the seat of commerce.' People must have been like, Dude, it's a swamp. But La Salle was right. By 1870, Chicago had a population of 300,000, the fifth largest city in the U.S. in just three decades. More railroads met there than any other spot on earth, carrying grain to the shipping routes of the Great Lakes. They dug a canal connecting Chicago to the Mississippi. They raised the streets by ten feet, along with all the buildings. 1,200 men jacked up the city's premier hotel, the Tremont House, while business carried on inside! They invented the grain combine, railroad sleeping cars, the department store.
Then there was a fire.
Catherine O'Leary's cow did not start the fire, contrary to legend. Conditions were ripe for fire in Chicago—a long drought, too many hastily-constructed wooden buildings, an underfunded fire department. Within hours, the wall of fire burned a thousand feet wide and a hundred feet high. It quickly spread to the downtown, which burned in five minutes. When the courthouse bell tower collapsed, it could be heard a mile away. Thousands of displaced pigeons flocked above the burning city. Great whirls of fire jumped the river and continued up through Lincoln Park and as far south as Terrace Row. People jumped into the river, into the lake, with fatal consequences.
Now here's a Chicago story: As the fire approached, the hotelier John B. Drake walked past the Michigan Avenue Hotel. Inspired by an enterprising urge, he went inside and offered $1,000 for the hotel, which the owner quickly accepted. Apparently the owner warned Drake that the hotel was certain to burn. Drake, we surmise, said, No, I think we're good. The now-named Drake Hotel still stands on some of the most valuable real estate in the country.
By the time the fire ended, 73 miles of streets and more than 17,000 buildings had burned. About 100,000 people were homeless. Then Chicago rebuilt itself. From the start, city promoters boasted of an even greater city. William Bross, publisher of the Tribune proclaimed, 'Go to Chicago now! It will be rebuilt in five years and will have a population of a million by 1900!' Once again, Chicagoans willed this prophecy into reality. The city passed a million by 1890.
The crowning achievement of Chicago's rebirth was the 1893 Columbian Exposition. This world's fair was so expansive and ambitious, it's impossible to cover in today's little chat. (If you're curious, read The Devil in the White City, by Erik Larson.) The city dumped the rubble from the fire into the lake and built on top of it. Some of these 'White City' buildings remain today, on Chicago's museum campus. Everyday inventions introduced at the fair are too numerous to list, but they include the Ferris Wheel, the fluorescent bulb, the zipper, alternating current, and Cracker Jack.
After the success of the World’s Fair, Chicago went on a run of invention and creation that continued through the 20th Century. Chicago has always been fertile ground for civil advancement. This is partly due to its geography, as the center of a powerful nation. Lots of things just have to go through Chicago, by train, plain, truck, or boat. But I think it’s also due to Chicago’s place as the ‘second city,’ that is, not New York—and these days, not Los Angeles or whatever the trendy city of the moment is. So people feel free to experiment a little more, because this isn’t quite ‘the big dance.’ There’s kind of a ‘why not?’ attitude. Chicagoans built the Art Institute before they had much art, and then some rich benefactors said Okay yeah sure here are some paintings from France that everybody makes fun of—they’re called ‘the Impressionists?’ Chicagoans built the University of Chicago without having a faculty, and then William Rainey Harper ran around the country’s elite colleges, offering raises to professors, and the next thing you know, U of C is a world class university. There’s a bunch of sewage in Lake Michigan? Let’s reverse the river. Running out of space downtown? Let’s invent the modern skyscraper. You hungry? I’ll make ya a sahsidge.
But that's history, and Chicago isn't a place to rest on its laurels, waxing about bygone glories. It's still about whadhavyadonefermelately? and I'llscraachyerback,youscraachmine. And I hope that Chicago’s brash and indefatigable spirit helps the city face the problems that all cities face today. I hope it becomes a model for fair housing, good schools, safe parks, clean transportation, and sustainable living. The city certainly has a track record of accomplishments, so why not?
Speaking of today, pride in Chicago compels me to list of bunch of superlatives—how it's the world's showcase of modern architecture, the capital of comedy, host to world-class restaurants and theater and music, rich with lovely parks, endlessly walkable, bikeable, thriving with friendly people who play softball with a 16-inch ball and no gloves. You can't help but brag about Chicago, to slap down its critics, prove its worth, long after it’s been proven many times over. This is how it got the nickname The Windy City. By the late 1800s, people were calling it that because the 'windbags' of Chicago couldn't stop proclaiming their city's greatness.
No, instead I just want to encourage you to see Chicago for yourself. Or if you live here, to look with fresh eyes on your city. And maybe skip the tourist sights and explore the neighborhoods—visit a bike shop in West Town, or a jazz club in Uptown, or a tavern in Logan Square, or a cafe in Bronzeville. If you can, come in the spring, and walk along the lake, and smell the lilacs.
Have a good one,
Kipling Knox
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