Forgotten Chicago: Examining Vintage Postcards

The intersection in front of the Art Institute in Chicago. Photo taken by Paul Wierum, Chicago Camera Club.  The blurry image on this postcard brings about clear and cherished memories for me. I had many great days visiting the Art Institute, especially during my college years in the mid to late 1990s. Like so many other Chicagoans, I stood at this same crosswalk shown on the postcard in front of the museum at Michigan Avenue and Adams Street, usually heading to catch the train home after a wonderful day. The entire intersection looks the same today as it does on this 1920s-era postcard, excluding the old cars. I even remember the doorway behind the lamppost across the street as the entrance to Bennigan’s restaurant. Friends and I ate there many times mostly to enjoy a great laugh. I was overjoyed winning this postcard in an online auction. Others were trying hard to win it too, as the price kept rising. They probably saw it and had similar feelings about it. This postcard is t...

  A mounted Chicago police parade.  Postcard publication details are unknown.  Protests that turned violent at Haymarket Square near Des Plaines and Randolph Streets in 1886 helped make Chicago the center of the eight-hour workday movement.  On May 1, about 35,000 workers walked off their jobs to join a protest in downtown Chicago for a shorter work day. Government and police officials, however, began harassing protesters, who they referred to as unionists, reformers, socialists and anarchists.  It’s no surprise that on May 3, a long-lasting strike at the McCormick Harvesting Machine Company erupted into violence, leading to police clashes and a shooting by police that left two protesters dead. Some workers called for “revenge.” The following day would go down in history as the day of the Haymarket Riot. During the evening hours of May 4, someone hurled a bomb at police, which is likely the cause that prompted police to begin shooting wildly at protestors. S...