I have adapted a well-known song so that you have something to sing as we experience the descent of the polar jet stream to our environs. My respects to Mel Torme and Robert Wells. Chestnuts freezing in an open fieldJack Frost nipping off your noseWarm-weather songs being cried by a Continue Reading
The Sculpture at the End of the Fire
The Great Chicago Fire finally burned itself out on October 10, 1871. The exact northern end point of the fire is a matter of conjecture. Most detailed maps show it stopped at just about the spot where the Peggy Notebaert Museum is today. If you’ve been on any of my Continue Reading
John Storrs, Ceres, and The Model Who Wasn’t
Several years ago I was asked to do research for a Chicago architecture documentary. One of my assignments was John Storrs’ sculpture Ceres, which stands atop the 1930 Holabird and Root Chicago Board of Trade Building. My task was to confirm the oft-repeated story of the “model” for the sculpture. Continue Reading
The Fires of October 8, 1871
A recent short Chicago Tribune article on devastating wildfires noted the multiple Midwest fires that occurred on the same 1871 day as the Great Chicago Fire. Herein is a discussion of the fires that day and another 10 years later that was enormously destructive. The Great Chicago Fire of October Continue Reading
Ivan Meštrović and the Ox and Buffalo That Never Happened
If you’ve been paying attention since 1928, you might have noticed the two large equestrian statues on opposite sides of the Congress Parkway, just east of Michigan Avenue. They are The Bowman and The Spearman, sculpted and cast by Croatian artist Ivan Meštrović. The stories of how they came to Continue Reading