The Chicago River

The Chicago River
Author: Libby Hill
Publisher: Southern Illinois University Press
Total Pages: 330
Release: 2019-02-21
Genre: History
ISBN: 080933707X

In this social and ecological account of the Chicago River, Libby Hill tells the story of how a sluggish waterway emptying into Lake Michigan became central to the creation of Chicago as a major metropolis and transportation hub. This widely acclaimed volume weaves the perspectives of science, engineering, commerce, politics, economics, and the natural world into a chronicle of the river from its earliest geologic history through its repeated adaptations to the city that grew up around it. While explaining the river’s role in massive public works, such as drainage and straightening, designed to address the infrastructure needs of a growing population, Hill focuses on the synergy between the river and the people of greater Chicago, whether they be the tribal cultures that occupied the land after glacial retreat, the first European inhabitants, or more recent residents. In the first edition, Hill brought together years of original research and the contributions of dozens of experts to tell the Chicago River’s story up until 2000. This revised edition features discussions of disinfection, Asian carp, green strategies, the evolution of the Chicago Riverwalk, and the river’s rejuvenation. It also explores how earlier solutions to problems challenge today’s engineers, architects, environmentalists, and public policy agencies as they address contemporary issues. Revealing the river to be a microcosm of the uneasy relationship between nature and civilization, The Chicago River offers the tools and knowledge for the city’s residents to be champions on the river’s behalf.

Chicago River Bridges

Chicago River Bridges
Author: Patrick T. McBriarty
Publisher: University of Illinois Press
Total Pages: 346
Release: 2013-09-23
Genre: Technology & Engineering
ISBN: 0252097254

Chicago River Bridges presents the untold history and development of Chicago's iconic bridges, from the first wood footbridge built by a tavern owner in 1832 to the fantastic marvels of steel, concrete, and machinery of today. It is the story of Chicago as seen through its bridges, for it has been the bridges that proved critical in connecting and reconnecting the people, industry, and neighborhoods of a city that is constantly remaking itself. In this book, author Patrick T. McBriarty shows how generations of Chicagoans built (and rebuilt) the thriving city trisected by the Chicago River and linked by its many crossings. The first comprehensive guidebook of these remarkable features of Chicago's urban landscape, Chicago River Bridges chronicles more than 175 bridges spanning 55 locations along the Main Channel, South Branch, and North Branch of the Chicago River. With new full-color photography of the existing bridges by Kevin Keeley and Laura Banick and more than one hundred black and white images of bridges past, the book unearths the rich history of Chicago's downtown bridges from the Michigan Avenue Bridge to the often forgotten bridges that once connected thoroughfares such as Rush, Erie, Taylor, and Polk Streets. Throughout, McBriarty delivers new research into the bridges' architectural designs, engineering innovations, and their impact on Chicagoans' daily lives. Describing the structure and mechanics of various kinds of moveable bridges (including vertical-lift, Scherer rolling lift, and Strauss heel trunnion mechanisms) in a manner that is accessible and still satisfying to the bridge aficionado, he explains how the dominance of the "Chicago-style" bascule drawbridge influenced the style and mechanics of bridges worldwide. Interspersed throughout are the human dramas that played out on and around the bridges, such as the floods of 1849 and 1992, the cattle crossing collapse of the Rush Street Bridge, or Vincent "The Schemer" Drucci's Michigan Avenue Bridge jump. A confluence of Chicago history, urban design, and engineering lore, Chicago River Bridges illustrates Chicago's significant contribution to drawbridge innovation and the city's emergence as the drawbridge capital of the world. It is perfect for any reader interested in learning more about the history and function of Chicago's many and varied bridges. The introduction won The Henry N. Barkhausen Award for original research in the field of Great Lakes maritime history sponsored by the Association for Great Lakes Maritime History.

The Chicago River

The Chicago River
Author: David M. Solzman
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
Total Pages: 308
Release: 2006
Genre: History
ISBN:

Provides a guidebook to the river and its waterways. Explores the physical character as well as the natural history of the river.

Rivers of the Anthropocene

Rivers of the Anthropocene
Author: Jason M. Kelly
Publisher: Univ of California Press
Total Pages: 242
Release: 2018
Genre: Nature
ISBN: 0520295021

At publication date, a free ebook version of this title will be available through Luminos, University of California Press’s Open Access publishing program. Visit www.luminosoa.org to learn more. This exciting volume presents the work and research of the Rivers of the Anthropocene Network, an international collaborative group of scientists, social scientists, humanists, artists, policy makers, and community organizers working to produce innovative transdisciplinary research on global freshwater systems. In an attempt to bridge disciplinary divides, the essays in this volume address the challenge in studying the intersection of biophysical and human sociocultural systems in the age of the Anthropocene, a new geological epoch of humans' own making. Featuring contributions from authors in a rich diversity of disciplines—from toxicology to archaeology to philosophy—this book is an excellent resource for students and scholars studying both freshwater systems and the Anthropocene.

The Lost Panoramas

The Lost Panoramas
Author: Richard Cahan
Publisher:
Total Pages: 0
Release: 2011
Genre: Automobile industry and trade
ISBN: 9780978545000

With more than 150 never-before-published duotone images, taken between 1892 and 1930, this collection explores the history of the Chicago River and the impact its reversal had on the watershed all the way to the Mississippi River. Offering the most complete description available of the river reversal, the stories told here provide a better understanding as to how it was done and why it was necessary, as well as how the water from the Chicago River is treated. The photographs were pulled from a glass plate photo collection taken by the Sanitary District of Chicago.

Building the Canal to Save Chicago

Building the Canal to Save Chicago
Author: Richard Lanyon
Publisher: Lake Claremont Press: A Chicago Joint
Total Pages: 386
Release: 2012-04
Genre: History
ISBN: 9781893121713

Winner of the 2013 Abel Wolman Award for Best New Book in Public Works History. To reverse the flow of a river wouldn't be possible today, but to Chicago near the end of the nineteenth century it became a matter of survival. On the shores of Lake Michigan, connected to the Great Lakes system, with the Chicago River and easy waterway access to the expanding American West, Chicago had much that was ideal in the way of water for a burgeoning metropolis in the 1800s. It also had a flat topography and poor drainage. As the city swelled, railroads replaced water transport, the population surged, and the lake served both as water supply and sewage repository. The Chicago River became overwhelmed with the commerce of a port city and its residents' sewage. It stank at times. Deadly, waterborne diseases were spreading. Flooding from the interior tore through the city to get to the lake. What to do? Without sewage treatment, it was decided to breach a subcontinental divide, send the sewage away, and save the lake. The idea received legislative approval with the promise of a navigable canal. In the largest municipal earth-moving project ever at that point--an engineering marvel and a monumental public works success--the flow of the Chicago River was turned away from Lake Michigan in 1900. Chicago's own shoulder-to-the-wheel determination made it work. Author Richard Lanyon is the former executive director of the Metropolitan Water Reclamation District of Greater Chicago. Heavily illustrated with historic photos.

The Woman on the Bridge Over the Chicago River

The Woman on the Bridge Over the Chicago River
Author: Allen R. Grossman
Publisher: New Directions Publishing
Total Pages: 106
Release: 1979
Genre: Literary Criticism
ISBN: 9780811207140

The Woman on the Bridge over the Chicago River is Allen Grossman's first collection with New Directions. His voice is astonishingly contemporary, his often dissociated imagery bordering on the surreal--yet one hears in his verse classical and Biblical echoes and, on occasion, darker medieval undertones. The brilliance of his imagination works against a measured eloquence, setting up a fine-edged tension not unlike the prophetic verse of William Blake, the wild dithyrambs of David, or the more controlled metrics of Catullus and Villon.

Reverse Effect

Reverse Effect
Author: Jeanne Gang
Publisher:
Total Pages: 115
Release: 2011-01-01
Genre: Carp
ISBN: 9780984018307

The title word 'effect' is presented reversed, as in a mirror image.

The Eastland Disaster

The Eastland Disaster
Author: Ted Wachholz
Publisher: Arcadia Publishing
Total Pages: 132
Release: 2005
Genre: History
ISBN: 9780738534411

A pictorial chronicle of the events of July 24, 1915, when the steamship Eastland capsized and sank in the port of Chicago, killing over eight hundred people.

A View from the River

A View from the River
Author: Jennifer Marjorie Bosch
Publisher: Pomegranate Communications
Total Pages: 0
Release: 2017
Genre: Architecture
ISBN: 9780764979873

The story of Chicago is the story of its river. A View from the River is an essential guide to more than 60 significant buildings and structures along the Chicago River. This visual tour, filled with stunning contemporary photography and a variety of historical images, serves as a companion to the Chicago Architecture Foundation River Cruise aboard Chicago's First Lady Cruises. Since Chicago was founded in the 1830s, architects and engineers have designed this city through a series of unforgettable engineering marvels, from the buildings of the Chicago skyline to the Chicago River itself. The river, though a natural feature, has been dredged, straightened, and even had its direction reversed in the past 200 years. Today, the river flows through a canyon of skyscrapers, civic structures, waterside homes, and parks. As the city grows and changes, the river and our understanding of it changes as well. Now in its third edition, A View from the River is updated to reflect the city's latest developments and to further explore Chicago's past, present, and future.