Martin C. Tangora <fax# 312-922-8112> Date: Mon, 17 Nov 1997
Dear Chancellor Broski,
Landmarks Preservation Council of Illinois (LPCI), a statewide, nonprofit organization dedicated to the preservation of Illinois's historic architecture, urges the University of Illinois at Chicago to work towards the adaptive reuse of the historic buildings of the Maxwell Street neighborhood as part of UIC's South Campus expansion plan. The Near West Side neighborhood popularly known as "Maxwell Street" is a monument to America's multicultural heritage. The small commercial buildings that remain there today bear witness to important aspects of Chicago history, including: the history of the Near West Side as an important "port-of-entry" neighborhood for Chicago immigrants, especially Eastern European Jews; the history of the Maxwell Street Market, Chicago's best-known and longest-standing open-air marketplace; and the history of Chicago blues.
Despite much demolition and redevelopment in the last fifty years, physical evidence of the Near West Side's history remains, of which Maxwell Street is an important part. The remaining buildings along Maxwell St. , Halsted St., and Roosevelt Road represent the area's prominence in the lives of Chicago's Eastern European Jews, for whom Maxwell Street was the predominant residential neighborhood during the late 19th century and early 20th century. Important businessmen, government officials, and entertainers grew up in or had close ties to the neighborhood, including Barney Balaban, President of Paramount Pictures; CBS founder and President William Paley; musician Benny Goodman; Supreme Court Justice Arthur Goldberg; and community organizer Sol Alinsky.
Even after many had moved to better neighborhoods, Maxwell Street remained a center of retailing. The open-air marketplace that filled Maxwell Street provided many cash-poor entrepreneurs with a start in business, while providing Chicago's poor a cheap place to shop. Successful marketplace vendors often graduated to storefronts on Maxwell and Halsted, while the most successful opened stores in the Loop. Some of the more prominent Chicago businesses that got their start in the Maxwell Street area include Chernin's Shoes, Bigsby and Kruthers, Kuppenheimers, Morrie Mages Sporting Goods, Karrols Men's Clothes, Keeshin Bus Lines, and Vienna Beef. On Maxwell Street, people of modest means could achieve the American dream of prosperity.
By the 1920s, Maxwell Street saw an influx of Mexican immigrants. St. Francis of Assisi Church, located at 813 West Roosevelt Road, remains an important landmark to the aspirations of Mexican-American residents of the Near West Side, being designated one of the first Spanish-speaking parishes in Chicago in 1927.
Also during the twenties, African-Americans began to live and work in the Maxwell Street neighborhood. They followed in the footsteps of earlier groups, finding this neighborhood an inexpensive place to start a business. They also brought blues to Maxwell Street. As early as the 1920's, the neighborhood saw young blacks performing on Maxwell, as well as Halsted and Roosevelt. Early blues singer Papa Charlie Jackson lived at 624 West Maxwell and recorded "Maxwell Street Blues" in 1926.
The UIC currently is acquiring land within the Maxwell Street neighborhood and is developing, with the assistance of the real estate company Mesirow Stein, a redevelopment plan for the area, which will become part of the university's South Campus. LPCI strongly urges the University to preserve and adaptively reuse the historic buildings along Maxwell Street, Halsted Street, and Roosevelt Road as part of this redevelopment. Maxwell Street's historic buildings cover less than 10% of the expansion area and would not interfere with the university's plans for academic buildings, dormitories, or other related buildings.
Maxwell Street has great potential, both as a neighborhood commercial district for the university's expanded South Campus, and as a historic attraction. A sensitive rehabilitation of these historic buildings, and their integration into the university's development plan, in an opportunity for the university to create a unique community that reflects its history while looking ahead towards tomorrow's challenges.
Very truly yours,
Martin C. Tangora,
Vice President, LPCI
Chair, Chicago Programs Committee
cc: Maxwell Street Historic Preservation Coalition
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