April 23, 2008: Chicago at night

[Imigo Jones]

Happy Monkey, the "Murder Castle" was blown up and burned down by explosive arson (or in an arsonous explosion ) before Holmes's 1896 execution, either by an accomplice trying to destroy evidence or by just anybody who considered the structure's continuing existence to be an abomination. The site is in the heart of the South Side, in Englewood, at 63rd St. & Wallace, between the Dan Ryan and Halsted. If you know where to look, it's in the aerial photo, about 1 mile SW of Washington Park. Next time I'm on 63rd, I'll have to keep an eye out for the post office that was built on the site in 1938.

_____


Disclaimer before someone suspects that my writing about Chicago is fraudulent: I've never lived in Chicagoland. Due to friends and relatives, though, it's been my own "second" hometown all my life. (Chicago was the city of my father's birth, and where he lived into his 30s; and Grandpa & Grandma still lived there when I was a kid; my family lived in Lake County for a few years [my luck: they moved up there 2 years after I'd moved out on my own--but at least they gave me their new address]; and several relatives, including a brother and his family, still live in the City and in the metro area.)

So, I'm uniquely unqualified to call myself a Chicagoan. Anyway, I'd been directly past the O'Leary / fire academy site, driving up Jefferson, I don't know, a dozen, 15, 20 times; indirectly past on Roosevelt (within sight of the academy) countless times. I'd slowed down, but all those times, I'd never once stopped to visit, on foot, the Chicago Fire's ground zero and the academy's little museum.

Until this month, that is! (Must be why I'm all hot on this topic. I'm setting a pace, or word & pic volume, as a site newbie I cannot possibly keep up through subsequent topics. :p) Three weeks ago I was in town and found myself going up Jefferson from Roosevelt. Once again I was just rushing by, looking out the window at the tall flame sculpture.

This time, though, I stopped up ahead and walked back down to the fire academy. Spuck, I hope you get a chance to visit sometime! Yes, a very apt site for its current function. Dar and Bruce, the Chicago Fire Academy building--not exactly an Adler & Sullivan design --was dedicated in 1961. The "Chicago" part of the name was replaced with "Robert J. Quinn" in 1978 in honor of a longtime Chicago Fire Department commissioner who, coincidentally, bore that same name. The "Chicago" part, though, remains in metal letters in the red brick wall:

.

So, coming alongside the west wall of the building and entering the plaza (from the left side of the pic), first you see the sculpture where the O'Leary barn stood, with a plaquelike disk around its base, and a plaque by the Chicago Landmarks Commission (or National Register of Historic Places or whomever) close by. Posed across the plaza, I think, are a bronzed helmet and boots to memorialize Chicago (and other) firefighters who died in the line of duty (not necessarily the ones pictured below, but you get the idea):



Inside the building entrance is a lobby with a few items on display. Most interesting are the old horse- (or man-)drawn fire engines from the 19th century, with steam boilers providing high pressure for the pumps.

To the right of the receptionist's desk is a hallway lined with basically two-dimensional displays of CFD history, which I looked at for the better part of an hour:
* Accounts (museum-type text with photos, newspaper reproductions, maps) of big Chicago fires and other disasters the CFD responded to, especially ones that were costly in terms of human life
* Other CFD history, such as the evolution of equipment and of the organization itself
* Plaques honoring annual (and other) award winners
* Memorials for firefighters killed in the line of duty
* Display honoring the brothers and sisters for 9/11

"Chicago Line of Duty Death Total 563"
Chicago Fire Department timeline, following a text history.

It's pretty poignant and sobering, standing there soaking in the tragic and sacrificial history, while behind you are heard the footsteps of current firefighters walking down the hallway to the vending machines in the cafeteria. On the hallway floor are a few more bronzed boots.



There is an area marked in the floor that says something like "On this site on October 8, 1871, began the Great Chicago Fire." I axed the receptionist about which was the actual site of the O'Leary barn: the hallway marker, or the plaza sculpture. She didn't know, and then she asked the firemen she was chatting with, and they weren't sure, either. From the wording on the plaque by the sculpture, that seemed more like the exact spot, though maybe it too was just referring to the general site.

.

The O'Learys' place, behind which stood
the barn in which stood
the cow which kicked over
the lantern in which burned
the flame which ignited
the hay and shavings which started
the Chicago Fire that Jack built.
Left: View to the NE from about DeKoven & Jefferson.
Right: View to the NW from DeKoven. In the background are probably other surviving houses on the other side of Jefferson.

Outside again, I stepped back and tried to visualize the 1871 O'Leary place and its relation to the streets. Considering 1871 street widths and structure sizes, the plaza seemed like the right distance from Jefferson. Given the small size of the O'Leary structures, the sculpture could have also been the right distance back from DeKoven (back at the cow's quarters). I like this sort of thing to be marked accurately . (Real Chicagoans: Did you know that the bronze outline of Fort Dearborn embedded in the pavement all over Michigan & Wacker is actually several feet south of the exact spot? The northwest blockhouse, for instance, would be down the steps and out in the Chicago River, which has been partially straightened since Fort Dearborn days.)

Back to the O'Leary hood: I stepped over to the sidewalk and looked up Jefferson, up the initial path of the fire. Off in the distance are the four tall Presidential Towers (condos), on Madison near the NorthWestern depot. This seemed pretty far off, but Madison is just 1 mile from Roosevelt, and a bit less from where I was standing. The fire had jumped the South Branch of the Chicago River and had not actually burned the site of the Presidential Towers, but east on Madison all would have been destroyed from the river to the lake--which today would include the Civic Opera, First National Bank, and Carson Pirie Scott. That's just on Madison. I was imagining the fire sweeping up everything in its path between where I was standing and to Madison, then another mile up across the river and to Chicago Avenue and the Water Tower. Then yet another mile to North Avenue, along the south edge of Lincoln Park, where fire refugees were seeking refuge in the cemetery then there (and when the lakeshore wasn't nearly as far east). And then yet another mile parallel to the park to Fullerton.



Let me leave you with a Fun Fact culled from the CFD timeline:

1871.10.02 [6 days before the Great Fire]: "Benjamin Bullwinkle selected to head the newly formed Chicago Fire Insurance Patrol."