As terrible as the Great Chicago Fire was to the city of Chicago back in 1871, the lessons learned from this disaster and the reconstruction that followed from the ashes and rubble actually helped turn Chicago into one of the great cities in the United States. This paper will examine what happened and why, what the leaders of Chicago learned from the experience, and how the will and spirit of the people of Chicago along with financial support from a sympathetic nation and beyond forever changed the city of Chicago for the better. Introducing Chicago Chicago was a thriving city in the late 1800s. In fact, it was the lumber capital of the world. (2) Buildings, streets, and sidewalks were all made of wood taking advantage of Chicago’s abundance …show more content…
of lumber. The development of the railroad system in the United States during this same time provided a means of transport to export lumber for trade. (1) The railroads moved grain, meat, and lumber into Chicago for processing. (9) Chicago was the nation's biggest market for grain, meat, and lumber, with an increasingly important role in the production of iron and steel and in financial matters. (9) Like other major cities in the United States, Chicago was taking advantage of the economic boom that followed the American Civil War. It was a city on the move. Unfortunately things were about to change. The Great Chicago Fire started on October 8, 1871.
There had been a terrible drought that year leaving the wood on the city’s buildings, streets and sidewalks dry and brittle. Building codes were pretty much ignored adding to the risk that these structures were not safe and sound. Chicago was a perfect spot for a major fire to break out. There are many theories on how the fire actually started. The most common theory is that a family’s cow knocked over a lighted lantern inside the barn. From there the fire grew and spread quickly, destroying many homes and commercial office buildings and even ships in the harbor. On October 10, when the fire was finally brought under control, there was an estimated 300 people dead and 100,000 people left homeless (4). Over 17,000 buildings were destroyed. (4) The estimated damage caused by the fire was in the hundreds of millions of dollars. …show more content…
(4) Looking to Rebuild The people of Chicago, while devastated by the tragedy, pulled together and quickly made plans to rebuild their city. People from around the world came to their assistance with charitable contributions. “Many businesses in other cities had economic interests to protect in Chicago—New York vendors, for example, conducted trade with interior states through Chicago merchants. The support of businesses in other cities helped the city to emerge from the ashes of the great fire.” (1) Since most of the business district was destroyed by the fire, the city’s architects had few constraints in designing new building structures. The city expanded as it rebuilt, and most visible signs of the destruction were erased within a year. In the aftermath of the Great Fire, Chicago gained the reputation of a rising city and a place of opportunity, renewal, and future promise. “The rebuilding of Chicago was a tremendous endeavor. Insurance companies in America and Europe rose to the occasion, writing checks to pay for the damages. Cities in America and abroad sent $5 million in relief funds and thousands of donated books to replenish Chicago's libraries. Fortunately much of the city's infrastructure—its grain elevators, railroad lines, water supply, and sewage systems—remained intact. The city was able to resurrect itself quickly. Before long, Chicago began to attract entrepreneurs, businessmen, and well-known architects, who found ways to profit from the reconstruction efforts.” This shows just how helpful the rest of the world was in helping Chicago rise from this terrible tragedy. (1) Lessons Learned There were many lessons learned after the city planners and leaders got together and made plans to rebuild their city. One lesson learned was the over use of flammable materials like wood for their buildings, sidewalks, and streets. Another lesson learned was allowing builders to ignore construction regulations and building codes that if enforced might have lessened the damage.(5) A third lesson learned was mother nature. City planners failed to recognize the risk of a major fire from prolonged drought conditions causing their wooden structures to become dry and brittle. A fourth and final lesson learned was the importance of communication. Newspapers from around the world reported details of the fire and progress reports in rebuilding the city. This public awareness led to many charitable contributions to help pay for the reconstruction.. Without this mass communication, Chicago may have never received the necessary funds it needed to rebuild.(5) Improving the City Despite the fire’s devastation, much of Chicago’s physical infrastructure, including its transportation systems, remained intact.
“Most railroad tracks were not damaged. This allowed shipments of aid to come in from across the country and around the world.” (10) This would be a critical factor in accelerating efforts to rebuild the city. New construction of neighborhoods and businesses created thousands of jobs for unemployed workers. By October 1872, new buildings worth nearly $50 million had been erected. Between 1872 and 1879 more than ten thousand construction permits were issued. Between 1871 and 1891 amount $316,220,000 was poured into the construction of new buildings. (9) Architects began designing the world’s first skyscrapers. Construction codes and fire codes were no longer ignored. The destruction from the fire opened up a broad expanse of land to build on. “To a huge degree, the design and layout of the city of Chicago and the character of the buildings are a result of the Chicago Fire,” he says. “If the fire hadn’t happened, it would look a lot different.”(6) In less than 20 years after the fire, Chicago became a major economic and transportation hub. All of these factors attracted more and more people to the city of Chicago. Before the fire, approximately 324,000 people lived there. During the next ten years after the fire, 500,000 people lived there. By 1890, 19 years later, more than one million people lived in
Chicago. Chicago is the third largest city in the United States today.(3) Had there not been a fire early on in its history, who knows what the city would look like today. The beauty of the Chicago skyline with its majestic skyscrapers may have never happened. The economic growth following the fire that created employment for hundreds of thousands of people may have never happened. The population growth that brought many diverse cultures to the city of Chicago may have never happened. History has shown that Americans are a resilient people who come together during the worst of times to rebuild their homes, their businesses, their lives and their country for the better. Sometimes good things can result from a terrible tragedy. The Great Chicago Fire of 1871 is a prime example of that.
Many businesses developed from Chicago's growing domination over the rail industry. One of those businesses was the grain business. The invention of the grain harvester and grain elevators allowed farmers west of Chicago who grew grain, to bring there grain to Chicago, store it, and keep it fresh before it was shipped on the rails. Chicago was doing so much business in grain that they established the Chicago Board of Trade. At the Board of Trade grain would be graded and large amounts would be sold for varying prices depending on their grade, but would be delivered at a later time.
In the 19th century, the population in Chicago was quickly rising to great numbers. In 1850, population reached a great 30,000. Areas in all parts of Chicago started to become extremely over crowded especially downtown. At this point, all structures were built out of wood including buildings, streets, and even sidewalks (“Chicago Fire of 1871”). About one hundred days before the great fire occurred, not even an inch of rain had fallen throughout the city, and heavy, strong winds were blowing through Southwest. Fires were a very common obstacle at the time, but nothing was even close to the fire of 1871. On October 8th, firemen received a call from the neighbor of Catherine O’Leary. Neighbors reported seeing a number of flames appearing from the cow barn. Firemen instantly spotted the fire but miscalculated how big it really was. This event became historically known as the Chicago Fire of 1871 (“People 7 Events”). The three effects of the Chicago Fire of 1871 were the financial and political
Before the fire broke out on Sunday night, October 8, 1871 there had been a large drought causing everything to be dry and extremely flammable. Many fires had been breaking out in Chicago. Records show that in 1870 the fire fighters went to nearly 600 fires. On Saturday night there had been a large fire that destroyed about four blocks and lasted for 16 hours. Another reason why everything in Chicago was so flammable was because almost the entire city was made out of wood. It was a lot worse in the middle class and poor sections of the town (19). Just about every house was made out of wood. Even buildings that claimed to be fire proof had wood roofs covered with tar. The richer part of town had stone and brick homes, but wooden interiors, wooden stables, and wooden storage buildings (Cromie, 81). Chicago was built on marshland and every time it rained the city flooded, so to help this problem the roads were made out of wood and elevated above the waterline. The day the fire started there were over 55 miles of pine-block street and 600 miles of wooden sidewalks. “Chicago in 1871 was a city ready to burn,” according to Jim Murphy, author of The Great Fire (Murphy, 18).
The City of Detroit, Michigan, seems to be a city on the decline in America. Job prospects some of the lowest in the country and one of the only cities to be shrinking, rather than growing. There are a lot of problems Detroit is facing, one of them is there incidence rate for fires. Detroit is the number one city in America for house fires, not to mention their high rate of fires in the many vacant buildings throughout the city. There are many socioeconomic factors with the city that make the incident rates rise, and response less effective.
To begin with, during the year of 1870 and 1871 Chicago was facing extreme drought. During that time period the city of Chicago was built mostly from wood, making everything extremely flammable. Richard Bales author of “The Great Chicago Fire” states in an online article, “October 8, 1871, just after nine o'clock, a fire broke out in the barn behind the home of Patrick and Catherine O'Leary at 13 DeKoven Street. How the fire started is still unknown today, but an O'Leary cow often gets the credit.” Although we are not certain what and how the fire started, we know that it quickly spread. Legends say that the O’Leary’s cow knocked over one of the fire lamps therefore starting this massive fire. You might be asking yourself, how is it possible for a small fire to spread so quickly? “Hot air rose from the flames and mixed with the cool air above it, creating convection whirls. Witnesses called them "fire devils." A fire devil could pick up a burning piece of wood and send it flying. New fires started where the flaming objects landed. (McHugh)” Firefighters were exhausted from fighting a large fire the night before; and were sent to the wrong neighborhood at first. After finally arrivin...
U.S. cities experienced rapid growth and change, and also faced new challenges following the end of World War II. The consolidation of ghettos in the inner city and the rise of suburbs are two of the characteristics and problems that consequently arose for U.S. cities. One of the biggest projects created as a solution was the public housing project. These public houses however, although in paper they seemed like a great idea, in practice they actually proved not be such a great project because they brought several tensions and problems to cities and neighborhoods.
The history of the Chicago River is an interesting part of Chicago. The Chicago River was shallow and stagnant, but it had much potential because of its location and what it provided to the city. The Chicago River altered the human population as Chicago developed into a big city. Because of the river factories and stock yards moved in and caused major problems for the city. The rise of Chicago's Stock Yards was a significant benefactor to the city's pollution problem. In the late1840s Chicago large stockyards moved into the city along the river and dumped all of the meat packing waste into the river. Because of this problems such as, sewage, factory waste, and other wastes over flowed the river, and badly polluted the river. Unfortunately the river was connected to Lake Michigan, the source of water for Chicago residents, drinking wate...
fires in the first week of October, on Saturday night, October 7, a blaze broke
The Great Chicago fire was out of control because all the errors and misunderstandings that happened. For example when William lee reached Golls drugstore to press the alarm box Bruno golls refused to hand it over with the claim he already saw a fire truck pass by, with no time to argue over the concern of his family William lee rushed back home in time to see the fire taking hold of his neighbors fence so knowing his house was about to catch fire he grabbed some valuables and food
...ite City should be put in consideration primarily. Very often people might see on the news that crime happens every day and violence and corruption are part of it. To promote a better society to future generations these serious issues should be taken into action adequately to minimize numerous deaths in the city of Chicago.
In the early twentieth century, San Francisco, a bustling city full of people with diverse cultures, stood in the midst of the Second Industrial Revolution. At this time, the brilliant inventions of airplanes, automobiles, and radios were changing the everyday lives of many. San Francisco had just recovered from the four-year burden of the bubonic plague (“Bubonic”). However, right when things were getting back to normal, a destructive earthquake hit the city on April 18, 1906. Although the shaking lasted for less than a minute, the devastated city had crumbled buildings and a substantial loss of lives. The San Francisco Earthquake of 1906 had a lasting effect on the city and its people, and it proved to be one of the most catastrophic disasters in history.
The Great Chicago Fire occurred during October 8th and 9th of 1871. The weeks leading up to this disaster were spent with an extremely watchful eye on the city due to the lack of rain. So, one spark or one small fire could start an extremely large fire because of how much wood had been used to build the city. There were even warnings given in form of a building inspection department idea that would inform the city that the buildings were “shoddily constructed firetraps”, according to the Tribune at the time. However, the city did nothing about the proposed problem of a dangerous fire breakout and paid the price.
Jacobs, Jane. "12-13." The Death and Life of Great American Cities. New York: Random House, 1961. N. pag. Print.
Sandburg wrote his poem ‘Chicago’ in 1914. The city of Chicago itself was first established in 1833, meaning it was only about 70 years old. In 1971, a fire destroyed the entire Central Business District. The years following were a slow and grueling recovery, but eventually Chicago became a “Dominant Midwestern center for manufacturing, commerce, finance, higher education, religion, broadcasting, sports and jazz….” ( Source 1).
the things to come and exited by the countless possibilities offered by one of the largest cities of the late 19th century – Chicago.