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Dept. of Hog Butcher to the World
Happy Birthday Chicago!
I don't know why I'm unable to post things in the beginning of the day, and why my posts always end up at the end of the day. That's not good when you want to celebrate something on a particular day. And this one is even more delayed; Tuesday, March 4, 2025, was Chicago's 188th birthday.
There are a lot of Chicago critics, not least That Man. He really hates us, because he knows that Chicago gives him the middle finger every second of every minute of every hour of every day. He knows he wouldn't last a minute in this city.
Chicago is beautiful. It's ugly, too, but all the ugliness can't erase its beauty. About a week and a half into my stay here, my friend Ed drove Bob home from the Barbarossa, the 4 a.m. bar where he was a bartender, at the end of his shift. We headed north from the bar, taking Lake Shore Drive (now the Jean Baptiste Du Sable Lake Shore Drive, named for the black Haitian trader who may have been the first non-First Nation settler in Chicago), at 4:30 a.m.
On our right was the darkness of Lake Michigan, across fa narrow ribbon of park land. On our left were high-rises, just to the west of another strip of park land. The lights in the buildings made them look like a necklace of jewels strung across our sight. I knew right then that I wasn't just in love with Bob; I was in love with the city.
Nothing in the succeeding four decades has changed my mind. My love has only deepened.
We have fantastic architecture and outrageously amazing public works projects in our history. Did you know the first skyscraper was built here? And did you know we reversed the flow of a river - a river - because we needed to protect the city's health, and because no one convinced us we couldn't do it?
Our museums are second to none. The Art Institute of Chicago is one of my favorites, a place to wander through all day around emotionally nourishing artwork. The Field Museum and the Museum of Science and Industry, the DuSable Museum of African American History, the National Museum of Mexican Art and a raft of other amazing museums are scattered across the city, and all of them are worthwhile.
Our neighborhoods bustle with all sorts of life; theater, dance, film, and so much more.
Our food is absolutely unassailable. Yes, ghost of Bourdain, deep dish pizza is pizza, and Italian beef is brilliant. So's our Mexican and Korean food - oh, and Ethiopian, Japanese, Thai, Afghan, and so many more cuisines. Case closed, and I'm not even dissing NY pizza, which is wet cardboard with less than stellar toppings. Oh, wait; I did diss NY pizza. This is a hill I will die on ... but I digress ....
A word about my city's faults. They exist and I won't sugarcoat them.
Segregation's history still leaves its taint, still stunting marginalized communities' futures and blighting neighborhoods. It wasn't for nothing that Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. said that Chicago could teach racists from the South how to hate. Redlining by real estate agents keeping non-WASP communities out of various neighborhoods was one of racism's best tools. There were others as well, but redlining really impacted generational wealth in Chicago's black communities.
Police violence is still intertwined with the racism, with its bloodied fingers also on the throats of other marginalized groups LGBTQIA Chicagoans, Hispanic and First Nation/Indigenous neighbors all have bruises from that concerted and largely undefeated attack.
Non-police violence is an everyday occurrence and, like police violence, often tightly braided with racism.
Corruption? Oh yeah, we have it in spades. It's a ridiculous thing to say, I suppose, but the general attitude in Chicago has been "If my corrupt alderman keeps the garbage picked up, my street paved, and my parks clean. then if she takes a little off the top, so be it." Bad civics, of course. Still ....
But as I once noted somewhere, a rose that grows in a midden is still a rose. Chicago, warts and all, is beautiful.
You don't think so? Someplace else? Where? New York?
Oh please ... you wanna take it outside? Didn't think so. Here, have a shot of Malort. You can always rinse the taste out of your mouth by knocking back some Old Style beer; my treat, pal!
And here's a good epilogue to my maunderings: Chicago, by Carl Sandburg
I don't know why I'm unable to post things in the beginning of the day, and why my posts always end up at the end of the day. That's not good when you want to celebrate something on a particular day. And this one is even more delayed; Tuesday, March 4, 2025, was Chicago's 188th birthday.
There are a lot of Chicago critics, not least That Man. He really hates us, because he knows that Chicago gives him the middle finger every second of every minute of every hour of every day. He knows he wouldn't last a minute in this city.
Chicago is beautiful. It's ugly, too, but all the ugliness can't erase its beauty. About a week and a half into my stay here, my friend Ed drove Bob home from the Barbarossa, the 4 a.m. bar where he was a bartender, at the end of his shift. We headed north from the bar, taking Lake Shore Drive (now the Jean Baptiste Du Sable Lake Shore Drive, named for the black Haitian trader who may have been the first non-First Nation settler in Chicago), at 4:30 a.m.
On our right was the darkness of Lake Michigan, across fa narrow ribbon of park land. On our left were high-rises, just to the west of another strip of park land. The lights in the buildings made them look like a necklace of jewels strung across our sight. I knew right then that I wasn't just in love with Bob; I was in love with the city.
Nothing in the succeeding four decades has changed my mind. My love has only deepened.
We have fantastic architecture and outrageously amazing public works projects in our history. Did you know the first skyscraper was built here? And did you know we reversed the flow of a river - a river - because we needed to protect the city's health, and because no one convinced us we couldn't do it?
Our museums are second to none. The Art Institute of Chicago is one of my favorites, a place to wander through all day around emotionally nourishing artwork. The Field Museum and the Museum of Science and Industry, the DuSable Museum of African American History, the National Museum of Mexican Art and a raft of other amazing museums are scattered across the city, and all of them are worthwhile.
Our neighborhoods bustle with all sorts of life; theater, dance, film, and so much more.
Our food is absolutely unassailable. Yes, ghost of Bourdain, deep dish pizza is pizza, and Italian beef is brilliant. So's our Mexican and Korean food - oh, and Ethiopian, Japanese, Thai, Afghan, and so many more cuisines. Case closed, and I'm not even dissing NY pizza, which is wet cardboard with less than stellar toppings. Oh, wait; I did diss NY pizza. This is a hill I will die on ... but I digress ....
A word about my city's faults. They exist and I won't sugarcoat them.
Segregation's history still leaves its taint, still stunting marginalized communities' futures and blighting neighborhoods. It wasn't for nothing that Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. said that Chicago could teach racists from the South how to hate. Redlining by real estate agents keeping non-WASP communities out of various neighborhoods was one of racism's best tools. There were others as well, but redlining really impacted generational wealth in Chicago's black communities.
Police violence is still intertwined with the racism, with its bloodied fingers also on the throats of other marginalized groups LGBTQIA Chicagoans, Hispanic and First Nation/Indigenous neighbors all have bruises from that concerted and largely undefeated attack.
Non-police violence is an everyday occurrence and, like police violence, often tightly braided with racism.
Corruption? Oh yeah, we have it in spades. It's a ridiculous thing to say, I suppose, but the general attitude in Chicago has been "If my corrupt alderman keeps the garbage picked up, my street paved, and my parks clean. then if she takes a little off the top, so be it." Bad civics, of course. Still ....
But as I once noted somewhere, a rose that grows in a midden is still a rose. Chicago, warts and all, is beautiful.
You don't think so? Someplace else? Where? New York?
Oh please ... you wanna take it outside? Didn't think so. Here, have a shot of Malort. You can always rinse the taste out of your mouth by knocking back some Old Style beer; my treat, pal!
And here's a good epilogue to my maunderings: Chicago, by Carl Sandburg
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This is a wonderful love song to a city.
"If my corrupt alderman keeps the garbage picked up, my street paved, and my parks clean. then if she takes a little off the top, so be it."
Hey, we had more than a quarter-century of Mayor Curley.
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And thank you again for introducing me to Mayor Curley. He was amazing.
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Reversed the river?!?! Am now watching an animated Youtube video about it, cos I can't picture it. That's amazing!
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And the river engineering is truly amazing; it's like Chicago was accused of hubris, and the city didn't care. It just did it.
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re: racism
There was a public radio story some time ago (mayb the '90s?), where a bunch of black folks from South Africa came to the city. They were astonished by the extreme segregation and also the crap conditions in public housing (e.g., Cabrini Green).
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Not surprising at all. Mind you, it's gotten better. Cabrini's been torn down, and that's a win then and there.
And I'm so glad someone from the Chicago area understands my city's beauty!
Amen!
I've visited many times, and it's a magic place.
In addition to piloting skyscrapers, builders here have created such beautiful places! For example: one can (and I have) taken architectural tours of downtown on both the L (elevated metro rail) and a boat!
Re: Amen!
And if we're still here the next time you plan to come to Chicago, let me know (seriously; I mean it) and we'll get together!
Re: Amen!
The boat tours are truly wonderful --- but you need to be able to tip your head back, which I can no longer do.
I will make a plan! I hear there's a new bike-oriented path thanks to COVID -- https://www.the606.org -- which would be a great place to hang out on a breezy summer afternoon.
Re: Amen!
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Ethiopian food suffers from the curse that is known as tef. Looks like elastoplast (Ace Bandage in USA) but has a worse texture. Everything else I tried (I think it was in Dinkytown?) was good but since the "bread" was central to the meal, it was pulled down by it.
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Aww, I love that bread, although I understand that a lot of people don't, and some who can't stand it. You're right, it does look like elastoplast. Heh.
I'm glad you enjoyed your brief visit (and I think you're right about us showing up for the music party, although I can't recall any of that evening. We were so young back then ....)