May 2022 Bulletin
Upcoming Events
First Annual Promontory Point Day Events
Thursday, May 26, 2022: The Promontory Point Conservancy will hold a press conference at 4pm at the National Register plaque to announce the May 26th birthday of the Point's renowned landscape architect Alfred Caldwell as the First Annual Promontory Point Day.
Saturday, May 28, 2022: Promontory Point Day celebration at the Point, 9am-5pm. Family friendly activities including music, dance, kite-flying, lawn games and more.
Sunday, May 29, 2022: The History of Promontory Point and Nancy Hays Promontory Point Photography Exhibition, with Jack Spicer, via Zoom and in-person at HPHS 2-4pm at 5529 S. Lake Park Avenue. Register for Zoom here.
An on-line photo gallery of Nancy Hays photographs is located on the HPHS web site at: https://www.hydeparkhistory.org/blog/nancy-campbell-hays-photo-gallery.
Tours May 28-29: Jack Spicer will lead a tour of Promontory Point on the 28th at 10:30am. Bill Swislow will lead tours of the Point revetments on the 28th at 1:00pm and the 29th at 10:30am. Tours will start from the National Register Plaque across from the 55th Street underpass. For more information check the Conservancy web site.
Hyde Park Book Club – Monday, June 20, 7:30pm in-person at Jimmy’s Woodlawn Tap, 1172 E. 55th Street. June Sawyers, author of Chicago Beer: A History of Brewing, Public Drinking and the Corner Bar will join us with singer-songwriter Chris Farrell.
Hyde Park Book Club – Monday, July 18 7:30pm in-person at HPHS, 5520 S. Lake Park Avenue. Betty Hechtman, HPHS member and author of Murder Ink: A Writer for Hire Mystery will join us.
Hyde Park Stories: Harold Washington and His Legacy, A Celebration of His 100th Birthday – Saturday, July 30, 2:00pm in-person at Augustana Lutheran Church. Contact: kathy@rogerhuff.com
Hyde Park Book Club – Monday, August 15, 7:30pm via Zoom. Deborah Cohen author of, Last Call at the Hotel Imperial: The Reporters Who Took on a World at War. will join us. The idea for the book was conceived at Special Collections Research Center and features two UChicago alumni journalists. Register here.
Hyde Park Book Club – Monday, September 19, 7:30pm via Zoom. The September book selection is Time for Frankie Coolin by Bill Granger. We will be joined by Bill Savage for the discussion. Register here.
Hyde Park Book Club – Monday, October 17, 7:30pm via Zoom. Christopher Blattman, professor at the University of Chicago and author of Why We Fight: The Roots of War and the Path to Peace will join us. Register here.
Hyde Park Book Club – Monday, November 21, 7:30pm via Zoom. Jeff Deutsch, director of the Seminary Coop Bookstore and author of In Praise of Good Bookstores will join us. Register here.
Hyde Park Book Club Committee:
Carol Vieth
Michal Safar
Dottie Jeffries
Contact: BookClub@HydeParkHistory.org
Web Site: https://www.hydeparkhistory.org/book-club
Special Event – Celebrating Olmsted in Chicago 2022
April 26, 2022, marked the 200th birthday of Frederick Law Olmsted, author, conservationist, social reformer and America’s seminal landscape architect. Olmsted and his successors designed some of Chicago’s most beloved and important greenspaces including Jackson, Washington Parks and Midway Plaisance and the University of Chicago campus.
To celebrate Olmsted's birthday and his core belief that parks are democratic spaces for all people, Hyde Park Historical Society and Washington Park Camera Club are pleased to announce that they have teamed up to present Olmsted in Chicago 2022. The celebration is part of Art Design Chicago Now, an initiative funded by the Terra Foundation for American Art that amplifies the voices of Chicago's diverse creatives, past and present, and explores the essential role they play in shaping the now.
South Park Then and Now
On April 26, 2022, the Washington Park Camera Club launched an online photographic essay, South Park Then and Now, a celebration of Olmsted’s iconic Chicago greenspaces. One of the oldest camera clubs in the Chicago area, the Washington Park Camera Club is predominantly composed of African American members from the city’s South Side. The online photo essay weaves together historic and contemporary images of Olmsted’s South Park: Jackson, Washington Parks and the Midway Plaisance. With recent photography by twelve members of the club, the project documents continuity and changes over time while also highlighting the importance of Olmsted’s landscapes in the past as well as the vital role they play in the lives of Chicagoans today. The video can be viewed here.
Summer Walking Tours
Chicago parks historian Julia Bachrach will lead free walking tours of Jackson, Washington Parks and the Midway Plaisance, Frederick Law Olmsted’s iconic Chicago landscapes.
Jackson Park: Learn about the Olmsted firm’s three successive designs for Jackson Park: the original plan of 1871, the dazzling fairgrounds for the 1893 World’s Columbian Exposition; and the transformation of the site back to parkland after the fair. Highlights include the iconic Wooded Island.
Dates and Times: Saturday, June 25th, 10am-12pm. Saturday, July 16th, 2-4pm. Register Here.
Midway Plaisance: This tour will illuminate Olmsted’s plan for the Midway Plaisance as a grand boulevard between Jackson and Washington Park, the site’s transformation into a carnival area for the World’s Fair, and Olmsted’s vision for a canal as its centerpiece after the exposition. Highlights include the site of the original Ferris Wheel, a major attraction of the 1893 fair.
Dates and Times: Saturday, June 25th, 2-4pm. Saturday, August 6th, 10am-12pm. Register Here.
Washington Park: Learn about the ways Olmsted expressed democratic principles in his design for Washington Park, and how the greenspace became an important oasis for African American newcomers during the Great Migration. Highlights include the park’s original sheep meadow.
Dates and Times: Saturday, July 16th, 10am-12pm. Saturday August 6th, 2-4pm. Register Here.
RECENT EVENTS
Three Girls from Bronzeville with Dawn Turner, Monday May 16
On Monday, May 16th, the Hyde Park Book Club had the honor of welcoming author Dawn Turner to the club to discuss her memoir, Three Girls from Bronzeville: A Uniquely American Memoir of Race, Fate, & Sisterhood. They were three Black girls. Dawn, tall and studious; her sister, Kim, younger by three years and headstrong as they come; and Dawn’s best friend, Debra, already prom-queen pretty by third grade. They bonded – fervently and intensely in that particular way of little girls – as they roamed the concrete landscape of Bronzeville, a historic neighborhood in Chicago’s South Side, the destination of hundreds of thousands of Blacks who fled the ravages of the Jim Crow South. Three Girls from Bronzeville is a riveting coming-of-age memoir that offers a penetrating exploration of race, opportunity, sisterhood, and the powerful forces that allow some to flourish…and others to falter. Dawn Turner is an award-winning journalist and novelist. A former columnist for the Chicago Tribune, she spent a decade and a half writing about race and people whose stories are often overlooked and dismissed. Her commentary has appeared in The Washington Post and on PBS NewsHour, CBS News’s Sunday Morning, NPR, and elsewhere. She has held fellowships at Harvard University, the Maynard Institute for Journalism Education, and the University of Chicago. The session was recorded and the video can be viewed here.
PRESERVATION NEWS
Jack Spratt Coffee House Commemoration
On May 15, 1943, one of the earlier sit-in protests against racial inequality occurred at the Jack Spratt Coffeehouse, then located at 47th and Kimbark. The protest was organized by civil rights activist and co-founder of the Congress of Racial Equality James Farmer. The site is long demolished, but a group of local activist/historians recently met to discuss ways in which the event and site could be commemorated.
More information on the history of this event and be found here.
For more information on this initiative contact Benjamin Ginzky at bgnzky@gmail.com
HPHS Memberships
The Hyde Park Historical Society strives to make programs and activities as accessible to the community as possible, which means that the website, newsletter, archives, open houses and nearly all programs are free and open to the public. To make this possible- we need your support!
To Become a Member or Renew a Lapsed Membership:
1. Visit www.HydeParkHistory.org
2. Go to “Support Us” and then “Become a Member”
3. Choose whether you would like an Individual or Family membership
Or go directly to: https://www.hydeparkhistory.org/become-a-hphs-member