How Chicago's Old Money Built a Street of Mansions and Then Tore Them All Down: Prairie Avenue

In the 1870s, the three richest men in Chicago — Marshall Field, George Pullman and Philip Armour — lived within four blocks of each other on one South Side street. This is the story of Prairie Avenue: how the Great Chicago Fire sent the city's old money there, how it became "Millionaires' Row," and how, in about seventy years, almost every mansion on it was torn down. You'll meet the merchant who threw a $75,000 Mikado Ball, the sleeping-car king who was buried under concrete and steel rails, a granite house the neighbors called "that thing," a castle on Lake Shore Drive that pulled society north, a vice district a few blocks away, and the small group that bought one house for $35,000 in 1966 and helped start Chicago's preservation movement. Today only a handful of the old houses survive — the Glessner, Kimball, Coleman, Keith and Marshall Field Jr. houses, and the 1836 Clarke farmhouse that was moved back to the neighborhood in 1977. If you could walk back into one of the lost houses of Prairie Avenue for a single evening, which one would you choose? CHAPTERS 0:00 The House on the Corner, 1963 1:51 A Trail on the Prairie 3:44 The Fire That Stopped Short 5:31 Three Fortunes in Four Blocks 7:34 The Mikado Ball 9:11 That Thing Staring Me in the Face 11:25 The Strike 13:50 A Castle on Lake Shore Drive 15:52 Too Close 17:39 Hairpins and Printing Presses 19:28 The Wrecking Years 21:58 Thirty-Five Thousand Dollars 24:24 What Remains SOURCES Based on published histories and records, incl. Glessner House, "Prairie Avenue Walking Tour Guide" (William Tyre, 2022) — glessnerhouse.org; the HABS record of the Glessner House (1963); the "Lost Houses of Prairie Avenue" street markers; WTTW Chicago; Illinois Public Media; Preservation Chicago and Chicago Agent Magazine (2023 Kimball/Coleman sale); the IIT Institute of Design archives (New Bauhaus, 1937); and Wikipedia. Where accounts differ, the episode says so. IMAGES Historical photos, engravings, maps (1916 Rand McNally, Harvard Map Collection), postcards, documents: public domain in the U.S. (pre-1931, U.S. government incl. HABS, or released by the holder) — Library of Congress, National Archives, Newberry Library, Chicago Daily News, Detroit Publishing Co., Cornell University Library, National Portrait Gallery (CC0), Rijksmuseum (CC0), via Wikimedia Commons. Modern photos (Creative Commons, Wikimedia Commons; cropped/graded): • Glessner House and Second Presbyterian Church (16 photos) — w_lemay — CC BY-SA 2.0 • Glessner House (A, B, C) — Bmzuckerman — CC BY 4.0 • Glessner House Oct 2020; U.S. Soccer Federation Oct 2020 — Shruti Kansara — CC BY-SA 4.0 • Prairie Ave. near 18th St.; near Cullerton Ave.; Henry B. Clarke house; Marshall Field Jr. Mansion (2004, 2007) — David Wilson — CC BY 2.0 • Henry B. Clarke House (2022); plaques about the Battle of Fort Dearborn and the Glessner House; Chicago Women's Park & Garden — Chris Rycroft — CC BY 2.0 • RR Donnelley building (1978); Elbridge Keith House (1978); Harriet F. Rees House (1978) — Downtowngal — CC BY-SA 4.0 • Calumet Plant, R. R. Donnelley & Sons; William W. Kimball House — Teemu008 — CC BY-SA 2.0 • Calumet Plant R R Donnelly and Sons Company (A, B) — Andrew Jameson — CC BY-SA 3.0 • Armour family plot; graves of the Field family, Graceland Cemetery — Nick Number — CC BY 4.0 • George Pullman tomb; William Wallace Kimball tomb — Gerald Farinas — CC BY-SA 4.0 • Hotel Florence; Pullman National Monument — Matthew Dillon — CC BY 2.0 • Former home of William Wallace Kimball — Steve Browne & John Verkleir — CC BY 2.0 • 20070110 United States Soccer Federation — TonyTheTiger — CC BY-SA 3.0 • The Gold Coast from the John Hancock Center, 1970 — Vincent Desjardins — CC BY 2.0 • Motor Row Chicago buildings — Stephen Boisvert — CC BY 2.0 • 1812 and 1808 Prairie Ave — IMLS Digital Collections & Content — CC BY 2.0 • One Museum Park and One Museum Park West — Beyond My Ken — CC BY-SA 4.0 • Prairie Ave Chicago; Prairie Ave houses — Haha169 — CC BY-SA 4.0 • Harriet Rees House relocation — Wolfe House & Building Movers — CC BY-SA 3.0 • Harriet Rees house prepped to move; original and new locations — Steven Vance — CC BY 2.0 Links: the Commons pages named above. MUSIC (public domain U.S. 78 rpm records, 1911–1920; Great 78 Project, Internet Archive) • Chopin, Nocturne in E-flat — Hans Kronold (1913) • Elgar, Salut d'Amour — Maud Powell (Victor, 1913) • Massenet, Élégie — Maurice Dambois (1920) • Rosas, Over the Waves — Peerless Orchestra (1920) • Strauss, The Blue Danube — Philadelphia Orchestra/Stokowski (1919) • Dvořák, Humoresque — Albert Spalding (1914) • Handel, Largo — Maud Powell (1916) • Jacobs-Bond, A Perfect Day Waltz — Jaudas' Society Orchestra (Edison, 1917) • Massenet, Méditation (Thaïs) — Albert Spalding (1916) • Botsford, Black and White Rag — brass orchestra (1913) • Schumann, Träumerei — Mischa Elman (1911) Narration: synthetic voice (Microsoft neural TTS). No AI-generated images. Windy City Ledger