Chicago skyline view, 1906-1909, showing smoke and smog in heating season
Title
Chicago skyline view, 1906-1909, showing smoke and smog in heating season
Subject
Loop (Chicago, Ill.)
Smog
Description
This is one of the planning photographs among Edward H. Bennett's groups of images from the era of the 1906-09 Plan and its implementation into the 1920s.
The view shows both the irregular character of the central business district's masonry structures southwest of the Railway Exchange Building, the roof of which was Bennett's vantage point, and also the smog resulting from the coal smoke billowing out of office building chimneys.
This was a "before" photo, something for the City Beautiful Movement to work on. The 1909 Plan of Chicago prophesies (Burnham's word, see his 1908 letter) a city of controlled heights for buildings like that of Paris, France and Washington, D.C., both the subjects of major planning efforts--Paris in the mid 19th C. and Washington c. 1902 and following (Macmillan Plan on which Daniel Burnham was a member of the team). Chicago, though, was the effective birthplace of the skyscraper, and this development, engineered in part also by Burnham, doomed hope for any height control in Chicago's Loop business district.
The view shows both the irregular character of the central business district's masonry structures southwest of the Railway Exchange Building, the roof of which was Bennett's vantage point, and also the smog resulting from the coal smoke billowing out of office building chimneys.
This was a "before" photo, something for the City Beautiful Movement to work on. The 1909 Plan of Chicago prophesies (Burnham's word, see his 1908 letter) a city of controlled heights for buildings like that of Paris, France and Washington, D.C., both the subjects of major planning efforts--Paris in the mid 19th C. and Washington c. 1902 and following (Macmillan Plan on which Daniel Burnham was a member of the team). Chicago, though, was the effective birthplace of the skyscraper, and this development, engineered in part also by Burnham, doomed hope for any height control in Chicago's Loop business district.
Creator
Bennett, Edward H. (Edward Herbert), 1874-1954
Publisher
Marcia O. and Edward H. Bennett III Collection
Date
1906? - 1909?
Rights
Relation
Marcia O. and Edward H. Bennett III Collection (Lake Forest College)
Format
image/tiff
Type
Image
Identifier
lfspbennett00090.tif
Coverage
Chicago Loop district
Original Format
photographic print
Physical Dimensions
14.2 x 8.7 cm (4 1/2 x 3 1/4 in)
Files
Collection
Citation
Bennett, Edward H. (Edward Herbert), 1874-1954 , “Chicago skyline view, 1906-1909, showing smoke and smog in heating season,” Digital Collections - Lake Forest College, accessed April 18, 2024, https://collections.lakeforest.edu/items/show/2032.