Grant Park (originally named
Lake Park) is a large park (319 acres or
1.29 km²) in the Loop
community area of , United States
. The park's most notable features are Millennium Park
, Buckingham Fountain
and the Art Institute of Chicago
. Grant Park is frequently referred to as the
city's front yard.
It is bordered on the north by Randolph Street, on the south by
Roosevelt Road, on the west by Michigan Avenue
and on the east by Lake Shore Drive
.
History
The original idea for the town of Chicago left the area east of
Michigan Avenue unsubdivided and vacant, and purchasers of Michigan
Avenue lots were promised that it would remain unoccupied. When the
former Fort Dearborn became part of the townsite in 1839, the plat
of the area east of Michigan Avenue south of Randolph was marked
"Public ground. Forever to remain vacant of buildings."
The city officially designated the land as a
park on April 29, 1844, naming it Lake Park. When the
Illinois Central Railroad was built
into Chicago in 1852, it was permitted to enter along the lakefront
on a causeway built just offshore. The resulting lagoon became
stagnant, and was largely filled in 1871 with debris from the
Great Chicago Fire. In 1896 the
city began extending Grant Park into the lake with
landfill.
On October 9, 1901, it was renamed Grant
Park in honor of Galena,
Illinois
resident,
American Civil War General and
United States
President Ulysses S.
Grant.
The legal restrictions prohibiting any buildings in the park were
ignored in the 1800s, as various civic buildings were sited there.
Also, an
early home field of
the baseball club now known as the
Chicago
Cubs stood in the northwest corner of the park during the 1870s
and 1880s. Daniel Burnham's 1909
Plan of Chicago proposed a cultural
center, containing a library and two museums, as the centerpiece of
the park. Chicago businessman
Aaron Montgomery Ward ultimately
fought four court battles, opposed by nearly every civic leader, to
keep the park undeveloped.
The one exception Ward consented to was for
the Art Institute of
Chicago
, constructed in 1892. In the early 20th
century, Grant Park was expanded with further landfill — much of it
from the excavations of the
Chicago Tunnel Company — and
developed with a very formal landscape design by Edward Bennett.
More
landfill in the 1910s and 1920s
provided sites for the Adler Planetarium
, Field Museum of Natural
History
, and Shedd Aquarium
, which were linked together as the Museum Campus in 1998.
In 2004, a
section of northern Grant Park, previously occupied by Illinois Central railyards and parking
lots, was built over and redeveloped as Millennium Park
.
The park has been the site of many large civic events, including
the visit of
Pope John Paul II and
championship celebrations for the
Chicago
Bulls. It was the scene of clashes between
Chicago Police and demonstrators
during the
1968
Democratic National Convention. More recently, it has hosted
some of Chicago's biggest festivals, such as the
Taste of Chicago, the
Chicago Jazz Festival, the
Chicago Blues
Festival,
Venetian
Night, and, since 2005,
Lollapalooza. Lollapalooza is under
contract to be staged at Grant Park through 2018. Grant Park is
also where the
Chicago Marathon
starts and ends. The park was the location for
President
Barack Obama's Election Day victory speech on the night of
November 4, 2008.
Features
[[Image:FieldMuseum.jpg|right|thumb|150px|Chicago's
Museum Campus is the site of the
[[Field Museum of Natural History|FieldMuseum]]]]
Millennium Park
The
northwestern corner of the park was renovated between 1998 and 2004
to become Millennium
Park
, a contiguous area with a variety of artistic
features by architects and artists.
Daley Bicentennial Plaza
The northeast corner of the park hosts outdoor activities at Daley
Bicentennial Plaza.
Art Institute of Chicago
On the
western edge of Grant Park is the Art Institute of
Chicago
, one of the premier art museums and art schools in
the United States, known especially for the extensive collection of
Impressionist and American art, such
as Grant Wood's American Gothic.
Buckingham Fountain
Located
in the middle of Grant Park is Buckingham Fountain
, one of the world's largest fountains. The fountain was dedicated in
1927 as a gift to the city from Kate Sturges Buckingham in memory
of her brother Clarence Buckingham. The fountain runs during
warm-weather months with a light and water display from 9:00pm to
10:00pm.
Museum Campus
Chicago's
Museum Campus is a
57 acre (230,850 m²) addition to Grant Park's southern end.
The
Museum Campus is the site of three of the city's most notable
museums, all dedicated to the natural sciences: Adler
Planetarium
, Field Museum of Natural
History
, and Shedd Aquarium
. A narrow isthmus along Solidarity Drive
dominated by
Neoclassical
sculptures of
Kościuszko,
Havliček and
Copernicus connects to
Northerly Island where the planetarium is
located to the rest of the
Museum
Campus situated on the mainland.
Petrillo Music Shell
The
Petrillo
Music Shell
hosts music festivals such as Chicago Jazz Festival, Chicago Blues Festival, Taste of Chicago and Lollapalooza.
Children's Museum
Plans for
a new $100 million Children's Museum that will move from Navy Pier
to Grant Park were approved by Richard M. Daley. Some City Council members have
opposed the project, and it may face obstacles there.
Other facilities
Grant Park also features many shaded walking trails and Lake Shore
Trail, a paved multi-use path running along Lake Michigan for the
entire length of the park. In addition, there are 16
softball fields and 12
tennis
courts, open to the general public, and Daley Bicentennial Plaza
offers fitness, yoga, aerobics programs.
See also
References
External links