The Babuk Report

Category: History

  • Canadian Architects of the Chicago School 1880 – 1935

    A striking feature of Chicago that amazes visitors and newcomers alike is the ability of taxi-cab drivers to identify city landmarks by their architect.  The Thompson Center? – why that’s Helmut Jahn.  The Loop Post Office? – it’s Mies van der Rohe.  The Pritzker Pavilion at Millennium Park – Frank Gehry!

    The part of the story that few seem able to recount is how many of the architects cited are Canadian.  Frank Gehry – from time to time claiming to be Torontonian or from someplace thereabouts – is one example.  But dig a bit deeper into Chicago’s heritage…

    While everyone can recite the name of at least one Frank Lloyd Wright building, few realize that the River Forest Tennis Club in River Forest was originally built as a carbon copy of the “Frank Lloyd Wright Pavilion” in Banff National Park.  The Tennis Club was moved and altered in 1910, but many basic parts of the existing building are just as they were built in Banff.  Why Banff, you ask?  In his travels to Japan, a favourite steamship of Wright’s was the Canadian Pacific “Empress of Asia”, which left from the Granville Street Terminal in Vancouver.  In those day, Canadian Pacific sold “through tickets” that accommodated passengers in their ocean liners, trains and hotels in trips around the world.  One of the easiest ways to get from Chicago to Tokyo was to take the Canadian Pacific Railway train through Moose Jaw, spend a couple days at the Banff Springs hotel, and in just a couple steps from your train stop in Vancouver, catch your steamer from the same building.  One of Wright’s protégés – Francis C. Sullivan of Ottawa – introduced him to many contacts within the Canadian Department of Public Works, including the Banff National Park Warden and Superintendant.

    Likewise, many marvel at historic buildings in the Chicago Park District or along the Chicago River, or delight in presentations at the Graham Foundation.  When he was sixteen, Hugh Garden was one of three sons of a Toronto family that immigrated to Chicago. For a time, Garden worked in Frank Lloyd Wright’s Oak Park studio before partnering up with other architects to establish a prolific Chicago practice.  As Designer in Charge, he was responsible for projects like the Madelener House and the hotel addition to the former Chicago Athletic Association.  His client relationship with the Chicago Park District produced memorable works such as the Garfield Park Refectory and the Columbus Park lanterns; his last major project was the former Marshall Fields Warehouse complex along the North Branch of the Chicago River.

    And meanwhile, several buildings in Chicago – the clubhouse of the Union League Club of Chicago being a good example – are credited to William LeBaron Jenney, despite the building having been built in 1925 and Jenney having died in 1907.  William LeBaron Jenney was a Chicago Architect who invented the steel cage skyscraper frame, for which Chicago became known world-over as the birthplace of the skyscraper. Few recognize that Jenney mentored and appointed a successor Architect to assume his practice – a Hamilton, Ontario native named William Bryce Mundie. A quiet and unassuming fellow, Mundie was never-the-less a professional and social pillar of Chicago. Upon his hiring in 1884, Mundie was given the assignment of being the Project Architect of the Home Life Insurance Building, a landmark building recognized as the world’s first skyscraper. Mundie became a partner in what became Jenney and Mundie Architects in 1891. Louis Sullivan credited Mundie as being the inventor of the “Skyscraper Setback Style” in a treatise describing the Manhattan Building.  Instrumental in the adoption of building code and professional regulation standards, he was appointed Supervising Architect to the Chicago Board of Education in 1898. Here, his personal mission being to bring school construction to high standards of safety, in the aftermath of the Iroquois Theater fire tragedy.  A Board Member of the Canadian Club of Chicago and of the Illinois Saint Andrew Society, he was also the First Vice President of the American Institute of Architects. He donated his services – twice – to build and rebuild the Scottish Home in North Riverside. And, of course, he was a Member of the Union League Club of Chicago, and Architect of its present clubhouse.

    So, we all know the architectural landmarks of Chicago, but do you know of the Canadian landmarks here?

     

  • The North Avenue Architecture Photo Party

    North Avenue, the border between the north side of Oak Park and the Galewood neighborhood of Chicago, is relatively newer than many surrounding neighborhoods. While the buildings along North Avenue post date Frank Lloyd Wright, he golfed here with friends and clients. Many used the area as a place to get away and hide from the City.  It was one of the first automobile oriented commercial strips in the Chicago area. A favorite location for drive-in restaurants, the road west of Oak Park and Galewood – known as State Route 64 – was a renowned teen hangout for street races. 

    Architecturally, the area is rich in 1920’s storefronts with highly decorative terra cotta cladding and details. Later buildings were exuberantly mid-century modern. 

    Experience the world renowned architecture of our town, which is just a scant eight miles / twelve kilometres from another equally world renowned and architecturally significant place, the Chicago Loop.  

    And besides –North Avenue has lots of great restaurants, stores and cultural attractions to discover and enjoy once you’ve completed the North Avenue Architecture Photo Party.

    Instructions:

    By walking along public sidewalks and right-of-ways contained along North Avenue between Austin and Harlem Avenues, and for an area one block north and south along Harlem Avenue; locate these architectural features and details, noting their location. 

    Oak Park is a living museum containing many private homes that just happen to be world renowned masterpieces.  No private residences are featured in the North Avenue Architecture Photo Party.   However, please respect the homeowner’s privacy and remain on the public sidewalks for the hunt.

    Here’s a sampling of the program:

    The Jetsons’ probably get their teeth fixed here.
    Terra Cotta TV
    A monumental building

    An additional feature of the scavenger hunt is the North Avenue Historical Photo Party.  This may be the most enigmatic image of them all:

    North Pole Drive In, River Forest, Illinois

    While historians agree that this was the North Pole Drive In, located in River Forest, Illinois.  It’s also agreed that its architect was Bertrand Goldberg.  No consensus exists on where this was located.  However, I have my theories….

     The entire program is on display in the lobbies of these banks on North Avenue, who have supported the North Avenue Architecture Photo Party:

    ABC Bank, North Avenue, Chicago

    Charter One Bank, North Avenue, Chicago

    Midwest Bank, North Avenue, Elmwood Park

    US Bank, North Avenue, Oak Park

    June 2010 North Avenue Architecture Photo Party is a production of:

    North Avenue Business Association

    Oak Park Architectural League

    This edition has been made possible by:

    Visit Oak Park

    Oak Park River Forest Historical Foundation

    www.3planets.com / www.shopoakpark.com

    Heitzman Architects

    Babuk Presentations, Inc / www.TourAboutChicago.com

    Keep following this event anywhere in the world at www.OakParkArchitectureParty.com

  • Lessons Learned From Both of the Post-war Development Periods

    The changing economy and its effects on the retail streetscape may be best studied in the pre-war and post-war streetscape: pre and post First World War. This particular timeframe holds fascination as it depicts a landscape before and after the automobile’s influence. Oak Park offers another excellent set of examples: it has both types of development at hand.

    Since the 1860’s, downtown Oak Park has been built up next to a commuter train station, and a rapid transit station in time. The largest source of traffic for these train stations was commuter traffic to and from Chicago. Storefronts were built up along adjacent streets. Though this area was never planned, it grew naturally, with many improvements over the years. The commuter train and rapid transit stations are still there, they generate a sizeable amount of foot traffic. While this neighbourhood has some storefront vacancies, it is a sought after location in Oak Park, perhaps one of the most economically vibrant in town. Odd, because this society has become so much more reliant on personal transportation – the automobile – since the initial development. This infrastructure and its layout still seem to work. Granted, there is an ongoing issue about car parking in this area, the sentiment being that more parking garages should be built to provide more accessibility for shoppers; in reality, the parking garages in existence draw on a substantial trade of commuters who park their vehicles to walk to the train stations.

    As an aside, a very large parking garage might hold as many as 1000 cars, whereas a fully loaded commuter or rapid transit train may hold as many as 1000 people. While parking may be an attraction for commuters, it’s effect is limited. Most transit riders still seem to find other ways to get to the train.

    While Oak Park grew naturally around its train stations in that era prior to mass ownership of automobiles, the town was bordered by country roads.

    Using the First World War as a marker, a pivotal point in time because automobiles were becoming more widespread. The original Garden City concept of orderly development around train stations forming towns, and towns separated by open space was becoming passé ; all of the bits of the open space between established towns were now accessible point-to-point by automobile and seemed to be idyllic places to live. These areas were settled as ‘sprawl’. Our urban design patterns were still based on walkable towns, so these new areas settled by “automobile development” were awkward in their layout.

    Areas of Oak Park like North Avenue were developed in this fashion in the 1920‘s. Small storefronts with large signs were built “cheek by jowl” along a busy highway, originally intended to move traffic from one town to another without stopping in between. Automobile parking happened on either side of this broad right-of-way. Additional parking was provided along the back of the storefronts, allowing customers to enter from either a front or back door. This led to confusion and an informality, as the ‘back doors’ alongside convenient parking also doubled as the service entrance. Architect and Urban Planner Victor Gruen, in his book “The Heart of Cities” chronicled this type of development.

    In Oak Park, North Avenue has more vacancies than anywhere else in tow, and has become a favourite location for tattoo parlours and palm readers. The Village is probably coveting the property and sales tax revenue generated by marginal uses like these, and that this tax income is more difficult to come by in this economy.

    Jumping ahead many years, it was the era after the Second World War that developed an urban model that located a building in the middle of a vast parking lot, the precursor of big box retailers and shopping malls. And oddly, this type of retailer isn’t doing that well either these days.

    What goes around comes around.

  • Canadians in the Chicago School 1884 – 1935 Presentation

    The Royal Architectural Institute of Canada holds a national convention every year, entitled the “Festival of Architecture”.  This year, the Festival is being held in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, and its theme will be “Sounds Like Architecture”.

    Proudly, I will be delivering a talk “Canadians of the Chicago School 1884 – 1935” at this year’s Festival, on June 26.  This topic talks of the contributions made directly by Canadians to the development of the 1880’s Chicago skyscraper format, and the contributions those Canadians brought back to create a “Canadian” skyscraper.

    This is a presentation delivered previously to the Chicago Architecture Foundation, and to visiting student and faculty groups from various Canadian and European universities.  I’m constantly drawing on research from many sources in preparation for this preparation.

  • Mechanized Bridges in Portland

    The American Institute of Steel Construction published a story I wrote for their monthly newsletter’s ” Bridge of  the Month” feature.  The story follows:

    Waddell & Harrington, Consulting Engineers of Kansas City, built many of their patented bridges at many locations throughout the U.S. One example is the Hawthorne Bridge in Portland, OR, spanning the Willamette River. This bridge is configured as several individual spans that connect to the vertical lift span. This bridge truss however, is configured as a “four sheave” design with its counterweights concealed within the vertical, tower trusses. The lift span is 250 feet long, and can raise 110 feet for a total clearance of 160 feet above the river. Cables carry two 424-ton counterweights that are adjusted for tension with turnbuckles. The lift span is operated by two 125 hp motors.

    The Hawthorne Bridge has been described as the oldest extant example of this type of a four sheave vertical lift bridge in the U.S.

    Credit:

    Darrel G. Babuk, AIA, MRAIC is an architectural historian who specializes in presentations of early industrial age structures.  His presentation topics may be seen at www.learnaboutchicago.com.

    Image 1: Photo from Library of Congress, Prints and Photographs Division, Historic American Buildings Survey or Historic American Engineering Record, Reproduction Number HAER ORE, 26-PORT, 10-8.

    Image 2: Photo from Library of Congress, Prints and Photographs Division, Historic American Buildings Survey or Historic American Engineering Record, Reproduction Number HAER ORE, 26-PORT, 10-23.

    As a sidenote, Waddell and Harrington designed and built several “Center Lift Span” bridges in the Chicago area, including the Pittsburgh, Fort Wayne & Chicago Railway, Calumet River Bridge,  (1912 – 1913) and the Pennsylvania Railroad Bridge at 18th and Stewart Street (1910).

  • More Poetry

    In response to a recent musing about William McGonagall, friends from Vancouver have since brought to my attention Sarah Binks, the Sweet Songstress of Saskatchewan.  A regular feature on a CBC Radio broadcast, her works included poetry like this:

    “My Garden”

    A little blade of grass I see

    Its banner waving wild and free

    And I wonder if in time to come

    ‘Twill be a great big onion

    Would anyone be upset if they learned that Sarah Binks was simply a fictitious fabrication of a University of Manitoba professor? 

    http://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.com/index.cfm?PgNm=TCE&Params=A1ARTA0007148

    I shall never attempt to write about a snowy winter day in Oak Park ever again.

  • Visions of Winter, Melted Away…

    The Firth of Forth Rail Bridge, Queensbridge, Scotland

    A recent presentation to the Scottish-American History Club about the Firth of Forth Rail Bridge would not have been complete in historical context without mention of the Firth of Tay Bridge Disaster.  One in the audience chuckled, and mentioned a poem composed about the disaster written by William McGonagall.

    “…On the last Sabbath day of 1879,
    Which will be remember’d for a very, very, very, very, very long time…”.

    While Robert Burns wears the honour of Poet Laureate of Scotland, William McGonagall is hailed as the absolute worst poet to have ever come from Scotland, and possibly the worst poet ever in the history of the English language:

    http://www.mcgonagall-online.org.uk

    Thought of this prevented my writing much about winter.

  • Happy New Decade!

    Happy New Year.  It’s surprising to see that we’re already a decade into the new century.

    Previous posts have spoken about vacant storefronts and even vacant buildings, all from the aftermath of the latest economic turn.  There is so much vacant space out there that based on current absorption rates, some markets have several years supply of some building types like… condominiums.  It could take several years to recover to get back to where we were. This empty space in empty buildings simply sits and waits.  No one has really caught on to the idea that this space could be re-adapted to different uses.

    In the meantime, one may deduce a similar “oversupply” of the people who design and build. In this case, many of these people have “re-adapted” out of necessity.  While this is good for them, it has left an enormous void of talent, skill and expertise that has left the marketplace.  A colleague (formerly) in the print publishing business suggested that it may take as long as twenty years for the architectural profession to make up lost ground, lost to a “brain drain” caused by the current economy.

    There are fascinating opportunities coming out of all this.  While cities that best depicted the late twentieth century – the Sunbelt – have stalled from an oversupply of built space that led to sharp drops in real estate prices; many cities of the early twentieth century – the Rust Belt – are retreating. 

    It’s like Las Vegas vs. Detroit.

    Las Vegas just opened an incredibly huge hotel complex; its economic viability is yet to be seen.  Residential housing prices in the Las Vegas area are still depressed, though many feel this reveals some “great buys” in the real estate market that services retirees.  The retiree market doesn’t depend on finding employment to sustain housing costs.

    Detroit has even better deals – well, lower prices – in residential real estate.  At first glance, Detroit may seem to be unsustainable and unaffordable: although prices are low, the potential market is people who work.  In a city without jobs, housing at any price is unsustainable and unaffordable. 

    I’ve heard many a seminar presentation about cities like Detroit recently, and Detroit is the oft-cited example. It was a much larger city in its heyday a few decades ago: having shrunk in population but not geographical area, it’s saddled with much more infrastructure than it needs and can support.  Many are projecting Detroit to be a very viable city if it trimmed its infrastructure and broadened its economic base to support a city of its current population levels – still one of the largest cities in the United States.  Some are even proposing urban agriculture for Detroit, a very novel “reuse / re-adapt” concept.

    Michigan Central Railroad Station, Detroit
    Michigan Central Railroad Station, Detroit

    Speaking specifically about Detroit as a precursor and example, it has the potential to be a very vibrant smaller city; the buildings that supported a larger city have been left behind.  Several buildings buildings have been left in ruin – the former Michigan Central Railroad Station, various hotels and office buildings, even industrial complexes where automobiles were once assembled.

    In archaeology, we know of classical ruins, of medieval ruins and the like.  Here, we have a new category:  modern ruins. Quite fabulous modern ruins, at that.

    Regardless, it’s still a decade into the new century. Just as the nineteenth century economy was different than the twentieth century economy that followed; the nineteenth century set up the twentieth century’s economy.  The same may be true of the twentieth and the twenty first century’s economies.  The economic structure of the new century hasn’t revealed itself.

    Yet.

  • Departing Chicago?

    A recent editorial cartoon depicted Illinois as an airport. In the departures gate were the 2016 Olympic Games, a variety of major trade shows that recently announced leaving Chicago, and Oprah Winfrey.    In the arrivals gate were prisoners being transferred from Gitmo.  Much of this is directed at Chicago specifically:  the “departures” noted are all from the city of Chicago, while the “arrival” denotes a town downstate.

    Throughout mankind, cities have come and gone.  Only a few – Rome and Athens come to mind – have endured the Millennia.  Now I’m not advocating a viewpoint that Chicago has completely folded and turned into a pile of ashes, far from it.  As for this economic doldrum – maybe it can resurrect from the “ashes”?  Let’s take a look….

    This is a vibrant – dare I say global – city. Chicago is located in a commanding geographical position that as long as North America is populated, it will never go away.

    However, I’ve always thought of Chicago as being the epitome of the twentieth century – the early twentieth century.  It embodied the Industrial Revolution in the United States: its economy was a product of mechanized industry.  Yes, Chicago’s industry produced machines which created a sizeable market in itself.  Chicago’s machines cultivated an agricultural industry which was brought to the city’s markets by machines produced in Chicago.  The city’s physical layout – the skyscrapers and garden city suburbs fed by transportation devices – were shaped by machines.  The transportation devices brought people to Chicago; it became a crossroads of the world – a title that still holds true today.  Machines and industry brought people in Chicago together to socialize and do business – it became an organism of interurbanity.

    The latter part of the nineteenth century put the foundations in place for the twentieth century.  Chicago’s economy truly made it the epitome of a twentieth century city.  For the first half, anyway.

    To zero in on the garden city suburb reveals a clue as to what happened in the latter twentieth century.  The garden city suburb worked best when people moved back and forth between city and suburb by mass transit.  When the automobile supplanted mass transit, people didn’t socialize as they once did.  Further, by that time, GI’s returning from the Second World War had been exposed to warmer climes with beaches.  Those returning GI’s migrated to and established homes in places like… the Los Angeles Basin.

    So, Los Angeles – built around freeways that serviced suburbs and all of the same kinds of inventions that built Chicago in addition to a new industry of motion picture entertainment – came to be one endless suburb.  Decidely individual, built to control and even limit social interaction.  Not what the garden city suburb had intended, but then, the garden city suburb never realized the extent of proliferation of individual motorcars.

    So Chicago became old hat.  All at once.  Chicago was left to be an absolutely fabulous living museum of the early twentieth century.

    Los Angeles eventually outgrew its own makings as well.  For quite some time, I was quite determined to believe that the prototypical US city of the twenty-first century was going to be Las Vegas – completely manmade and artificial; exceptionally self indulgent to boot.

    The current real estate bust may not support the notion of Las Vegas becoming much more than an overgrown gambling and retirement mecca.

    Which brings us back to Chicago.  It has the infrastructure to pick up where it left off and grow back.  One may even compare Chicago to Detroit, a city that has become a “doughnut” with very little left in its core.  Detroit has left behind some fabulous ruins in its wake.

    But that’s another story.

    DSC00588

     

  • One Final Note about the Hanna Roundhouse

    The “Roundhouses of the World” exhibit that has been on display at the Hanna Public Library is closing this week.  In a way, it still lives on.

    The Oak Park Architectural League is having its Bi-Annual Members Show this month at the Oak Park Public Library in Oak Park, Illinois.  Being a member, my contribution to the OPAL exhibition is a condensed version of the “Roundhouses of the World” exhibit.  This exhibit depicts a bit of the work to date associated with the Hanna Roundhouse.

    Using Prince Phillip’s musing of the studio cottages of the Banff Centre of the Arts “I gather that it’s my duty to declare this facility much more open than it previously has been”; although the OPAL exhibition is currently open to the public, the grand opening, if you will, will be held on Wednesday, December 9 at 630PM.  I have been asked to say a couple words about the Hanna Roundhouse.

    The Oak Park Architectural League exhibit will remain on display in the Art Gallery of the library until December 29.