Forgotten Chicago: Examining Vintage Postcards

  The Italian Courtyard of Le Petit Gourmet once had a cocktail bar and served lunch, tea and dinner in the late 1940s, according to a description on the back of the postcard. The Italian-style courtyard shown in the postcard was loved by many before it was razed in 1967. The scenic “slice of Italy” located near 600 N. Michigan Ave. featured shops, restaurants and about 20 apartments for artists. The courtyard was surrounded by three buildings that were fitted together between 1919 and 1926. The Chicago Daily Tribune wrote that the project was one of the earliest private urban renewal projects in the city. When the first building was acquired by the Ira B. Cook estate, Michigan Avenue was still named Pine Street and the area was surrounded by soap factories and breweries. The new owners handed the building and its development over to Architect Robert S. DeGolyer, according to the Tribune. The idea for a shop-studio compound was also worked up by artists Nancy Cox McCormick and...

Club El Bianco at 2747 W. 63 St. Postcard published by Curt Teich Co., Chicago. During the early 1900s, women had limited options for eating out. This posed a problem for women out on long errands or shopping trips, and it especially posed a problem for working women. What was a hungry lady in Chicago to do? Chicago was home to about 8,000 saloons in the early twentieth century, and many offered free food with their drinks. However, it was not considered respectable for women to patronize these establishments, and many saloons officially banned women altogether. The Berghoff Restaurant at 17 W. Adams St. Published by Thiessen Printing Corp., Chicago. Women were allowed in the restaurant area of The Berghoff but not the bar. The Berghoff, located on Adams near State Street, was one of these places. In operation since 1898, The Berghoff served free corned-beef sandwiches on rye with their 5-cent beers. According to The Berghoff’s website (www.theberghoff.com), women were not allowed at...

  The aisle on the first floor of the State Street store is 358 feet long. Postcard publisher is unknown.  Many Chicagoans continue to miss visiting Marshall Field’s during the holiday season. Just talking about the famed Christmas windows and holiday decorations brings about memories of the department store’s glory days. Many of us can recall the strong smell of perfume that would greet visitors upon entering the flagship State Street store, along with the huge white Romanesque columns decorated with Christmas fare on the first floor. The real fun, however, was taking the elevator to the 7 th floor to get a glimpse of the giant Christmas tree inside the Walnut Room restaurant. The best place to view the tree was one floor up on a balcony area. Christmas decorations on the first floor. Postcard publisher is unknown.  Frango mint chocolates were piled high in various areas throughout the store, and many visitors couldn’t resist buying a box. Frango chocolates were once ...

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...

  The Congress Hotel at 520 S. Michigan is "one of the most beautiful hotels in the middle west," according to this postcard. Published by the Aero Distributing Co., Chicago. The Congress Plaza Hotel at 520 S. Michigan Avenue is one of Chicago’s oldest and largest hotels. It was also one of the tallest buildings in Chicago for a time. With over 800 hotel rooms and so many people coming and going over the years, the Congress Plaza has seen its share of accidents, drug overdoses, murders, and suicides, earning it the distinction of being the most haunted hotel in the city. The Congress Plaza Hotel was built in 1893 to house visitors to the World’s Columbian Exhibition. In the 1920s, mobster Al Capone was known to play cards on Friday nights in a meeting room at the hotel. According to the Choose Chicago website, Capone also had a private suite on the hotel’s eighth floor. Some say that ghosts of the victims of the 1929 St. Valentine’s Day Massacre, which was believed to be or...

A Chinese-American restaurant in Chinatown. This postcard is provided by the Chicago History in Postcards website.  In the early 1900s, Chinese restaurants in Chicago became the target of various attempted restrictions. “Chop suey houses,” as they were often called, were seen as problematic for several reasons: they were usually owned by non-citizens, they were thought to lower property values, and some even thought that they corrupted America’s youth. This effort to limit the operation of Chinese restaurants was also part of the larger anti-immigrant sentiment of the time.  A crowd at the King Joy Lo restaurant on Randolph Street. This postcard is provided by the Chicago History in Postcards website. The first wave of Chinese immigrants came to the U.S. in the mid-1800s during the Gold Rush. In 1882, the Chinese Exclusion Act barred all Chinese immigrants from entering the U.S. except for students, teachers, diplomats, and merchants. When the federal court decided that restau...