Motor Row Historic District | |
Location | Chicago, Illinois |
---|---|
Coordinates | 41°51′10″N87°37′26″W / 41.85278°N 87.62389°W |
Area | 28 acres (11 ha) |
Built | 1905-1936 |
Architectural style | Early Commercial, Mission/Spanish Revival |
MPS | Motor Row, Chicago, Illinois MPS |
NRHP reference No. | 02001387 [1] |
Significant dates | |
Added to NRHP | 2002 |
Designated CL | December 13, 2000 |
The Motor Row District is a historic district in Chicago's Near South Side community area. Motor Row includes buildings on Michigan Avenue between 2200 and 2500 south, directly west of McCormick Place convention center, and 1444, 1454, 1737, 1925, 2000 S. Michigan Ave., as well as 2246-3453 S. Indiana Ave., and 2211-47 S. Wabash Ave. [2] The district was built between 1905 and 1936 by a number of notable architects.
Auto rows developed in numerous US cities shortly after 1900 as car companies sought to create districts where the sale and repair of cars could become an easy urban shopping experience. At its peak, as many as 116 different makes of automobiles were sold and repaired on Motor Row. Current-day marques that formerly had showrooms on Motor Row included Ford, Buick, Fiat, and Cadillac. Other marques with showrooms there that have since dissolved include Hudson, Locomobile, Marmon, and Pierce-Arrow. Currently, only one car dealer (Fiat/Alfa Romeo) still stands in Motor Row while the remaining buildings have been or are being redeveloped into condominiums, nightclubs, and retail storefronts.
The range of buildings in Motor Row illustrates the evolution of the automobile showroom and related product and service buildings, from simple two-story structures used for display and offices to multi-story buildings housing a variety of departments for the repair, storage, painting, and finishing of automobiles. Many of the buildings were designed by significant architects, including Holabird & Roche, Alfred Alschuler, Philip Maher, Albert Kahn, and Christian Eckstorm. The overall design highlights elaborately carved stone work, ornate facades and intricately scrolled ironwork that decorates recessed automotive doorways.
Though characterized by its auto showrooms, Motor Row was also home to newspaper The Chicago Defender, a newspaper voice for Chicago's large African American community. Chess Records was also located in Motor Row and acts such as Muddy Waters, The Rolling Stones, Willie Dixon and many other blues artists recorded there.
Motor Row was designated a Chicago Landmark on December 13, 2000. [2] It was added to the National Register of Historic Places on November 18, 2002. [1]
In recent years, Motor Row has been undergoing a transformation into a music and entertainment district. [3] Motor Row Brewing [4] (formerly known as Broad Shoulders Brewery) opened in the district in January 2015. [5] [6] Riff Music Lounge opened in the district in 2013. [7] Motor Row Brewing closed in 2021 as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, and shortly thereafter a new brewing company, Duneyrr, was started in the same space by two former Lagunitas employees. [8]
In 2011–2012, local officials attempted to lure a Cheap Trick-themed restaurant, music venue and museum to the district; however, this deal fell through in 2013. [9] [10] [11] [12]
In December 2024, the building which had formerly housed the E2 nightclub was torn-down after an emergency demolition order was issued. The building had been disused over the more than two-decades since the E2 nightclub stampede occurred in 2003. [13]
Heineken N.V. is a Dutch multinational brewing company, founded in 1864 by Gerard Adriaan Heineken in Amsterdam. As of 2019, Heineken owns over 165 breweries in more than 70 countries. It produces 348 international, regional, local and speciality beers and ciders and employs approximately 85,000 people.
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Woods Motor Vehicle Company was an American manufacturer of electric automobiles in Chicago, Illinois, between 1899 and 1916. In 1915 they produced the Dual Power with both electric and internal combustion engines which continued until 1918.
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Glazed architectural terra cotta is a ceramic masonry building material used as a decorative skin. It featured widely in the 'terracotta revival' from the 1880s until the 1930s.
The E2 nightclub stampede occurred on February 17, 2003, at the E2 nightclub above the Epitome restaurant at 2347 South Michigan Avenue in the South Loop neighborhood of Chicago, Illinois, in which 21 people died and more than 50 were injured when panic ensued from the use of pepper spray by a security guard to break up a fight. The club's owners were convicted of criminal contempt for their persistent failure to keep the facility up to code, and sentenced to two years probation.
The Schoenhofen Brewery Historic District is centered on the former site of the Peter Schoenhofen Brewing Company at 18th and Canalport Avenue in the Pilsen neighborhood of Chicago, Illinois.
Rush Street is a one-way street in the Near North Side community area of Chicago in Cook County, Illinois, United States. The street, which starts at the Chicago River between Wabash and North Michigan Avenues, runs directly north until it slants on a diagonal as it crosses Chicago Avenue then it continues to Cedar and State Streets, making it slightly less than a mile long. One lane also runs southbound from Ohio Street (600N) to Kinzie Street (400N) as part of a two-way street segment. It runs parallel to and one block west of the Magnificent Mile on the two-way traffic North Michigan Avenue, which runs at 100 east up to 950 north. The street, which is also one block east of the one-way southbound Wabash Avenue, formerly ran slightly further south to the Chicago River where over time various bridges connected it to the Loop, Chicago's central business district.
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The Historic Sixth Street Business District is a set of largely intact two and three-story shops along the main road coming into Racine, Wisconsin from the west. Most of the buildings were constructed from the 1850s to the 1950s. The district was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1988.
The B.F. Goodrich Company Showroom is a B.F. Goodrich Company showroom located at 1925 S. Michigan Ave. in Chicago's Motor Row District. The showroom was built in 1911 to sell B.F. Goodrich tires and distribute them to other Chicago retailers. Christian Albert Eckstorm, a Chicago architect who designed many of the Motor Row showrooms, designed the building. The Second Empire building features a mansard roof with a terra cotta balustrade, three dormers with terra cotta frames, a partial cornice, and large second-story windows with arched lintels. Like most Motor Row buildings, its architectural ornaments are primarily located near the top of the building. B.F. Goodrich used the showroom until 1929.
Homer B. Roberts (1885–1952) was a graduate of Kansas State Agricultural College and veteran of World War I who was the first black man to attain the rank of lieutenant in the United States Army Signal Corps. He began his auto business by placing ads in the local paper advertising used cars. By the end of 1919, Roberts had negotiated over 60 car sales exclusively for African-American buyers. He hired two salesmen to work his lot, offered auto insurance and payment terms to customers, and later founded Roberts Motors, the first African-American owned car dealership in the United States.
The Maxwell-Briscoe Automobile Company Showroom is a historic automobile showroom located at 1737 S. Michigan Avenue in Chicago's Motor Row District. The showroom was built in 1909 for the Maxwell-Briscoe Motor Company, which was founded in 1904 by Jonathan D. Maxwell and Benjamin Briscoe. William Ernest Walker, a Chicago architect who specialized in large-scale commercial buildings, designed the showroom. The four-story building is divided by brick piers; the ground floor features large plate-glass windows designed to showcase the company's automobiles, while the upper floors feature banks of double-hung and triple-hung windows between the piers. The building uses terra cotta extensively for decoration; a terra cotta stringcourse encircles the building above the first floor, terra cotta pediments and sills frame the window banks, and a terra cotta frieze runs below the roof line. Maxwell and Briscoe used the building as a showroom until 1915; it is one of the oldest surviving auto showrooms on Motor Row.