Marked for Demolition in Marktown

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Oak Street, Marktown

Around the turn of the last century, it became a trend among wealthy industrialists to provide planned housing for workers – an effort to Americanize and “civilize” new immigrants and maintain tight control over the labor force. George Pullman famously pioneered the approach in the South Side neighborhood that bears his name today. Experimental cast-in-place concrete houses were built for steel mill workers in Gary, Indiana. And in nearby East Chicago, Clayton Mark sought to create an idyllic and uplifting village for his own mill workers – at least, as idyllic and uplifting a village as can exist surrounded on all sides by heavy industrial plant. That place is now known as Marktown, a verdant postage stamp of a neighborhood just south of the intersection of 129th Street and Dickey Road, and its future is very much in question.

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St. Laurence Under Demolition

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St. Laurence

St. Laurence, at the western edge of South Shore, has stood as a landmark in the community since 1911. When it was built, more than a decade before the real estate boom that saw South Shore become a truly urban neighborhood, it served the small railroad suburb known as Parkside.

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Abandoned House on the Prairie

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Bridgeport

Although clearly appearing abandoned (see update), this house in Bridgeport is not on a real prairie. To its left is the Stevenson Expressway, to the right is Palmisano Park. The park features rolling hills and grassland, and only opened a few years ago. The land was at one time used as a quarry, and later a landfill.

The effects of a highway are clearly visible in the nearby parcels. Surrounding vacant lots and overgrown sidewalks indicate a past long forgotten.

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Former R/C Bottling Plant and Steel Strapping Company Razed

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47th (1)

About a month ago, heavy equipment and salvage workers were making quick work of what remained of a large factory complex in Brighton Park.

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