A Chicago anniversary roundup as 2024 nears its end

As hard as we try, we invariably make it to December and realize we’ve run out of time to acknowledge some of the year’s bigger anniversaries.

This year we’ve written about Chicago getting its first Catholic cardinal in 1924. We dove into the interesting and maybe just a bit gross history of the Chicago River Swim race. We recounted the grand opening and many dedications of Soldier Field. We investigated the little-known history of the first gay rights organization in the U.S., started by Henry Gerber in Chicago. And we looked back at the murder and mayhem that brought down gangsters John Dillinger and Dean O’Banion, as well as the infamous teenage killers Nathan Leopold Jr. and Richard Loeb.

We have more anniversary stories to write, but alas, we only have 52 Sundays to publish stories from Chicago’s past — a past that spans more than 200 years — and we have run out of time. In the name of shoving every last bit of fun (and history) that we can into 2024, here are three important anniversaries we’d like to bring to your attention.

The Southeast Side starts building Model T’s in 1924

When Ford opened its Chicago plant in February 1924 on the banks of the Calumet River in the Southeast Side Hegewisch neighborhood, it was the dawn of the automobile age and the mass production assembly line.

Built at a cost of about $8 million, the massive Torrence Avenue factory employed 2,000 workers at the outset, with the capacity to turn out 600 “flivvers” — a nickname for the Model T — each day, according to a Tribune story at the time of its launch.

More Top Picks Andaseat Kaiser 3

The new plant built nearly 107,000 Model T’s in its first year and expanded to Ford delivery trucks in 1925. In 1927, it switched to producing the new Ford Model A. There have been almost 16 million vehicles produced in Chicago over the course of 100 years, including iconic bestsellers such as the Taurus sedan and Explorer SUV, along with a few less successful models, such as the short-lived Ford Freestyle crossover.

Ford’s Chicago Assembly Plant celebrates 100 years on the Southeast Side, from building the Model T to the Explorer

The 2.8 million-square-foot plant, which sits on 113 acres, has navigated ups and downs over the years, building more than 15 nameplates and undergoing several major retooling projects to modernize the facility. It has survived blizzards, strikes, a pandemic, wars, changing tastes, layoffs, plant closures and the inexorable march of time.

The city’s only automotive plant has employed generations of families, fueling Hegewisch’s transformation from a swampy backwater to a neat neighborhood of tidy bungalows and parks.

“It’s one of the plants that, with that variety, stands out a little bit,” said Ted Ryan, Ford’s resident historian. “So many plants build one thing. Chicago’s always built a little bit of everything.”

The Chicago Temple turns 100

Towering 568 feet above street level, the Chicago Temple was the tallest building in Chicago when it was completed after being commissioned by First United Methodist, a historic congregation whose founding predates the city’s by two years. The church enlisted the venerable firm now known as Holabird & Root — the same architects behind Soldier Field and Palmer House — to design a “city temple … Gothic in structure, with a churchly tower (and) a radiant cross at its pinnacle.”

Though now dwarfed by other skyscrapers, the Chicago Temple still claims the Guinness-approved record for the tallest church building in the world. Even La Sagrada Familia in Barcelona tops out 2 feet short of the Chicago Temple spire.

Unlike Gaudi’s behemoth in Spain, the Chicago Temple was intended to be mixed-use from its inception. Leopold and Loeb lawyer Clarence Darrow opened an office there in 1925, the year after the Temple opened its doors — and the same year he took on the Scopes “Monkey Trial.” Pugnacious Hyde Park Ald. Leon Despres also practiced in the building, first on the 14th floor and then the seventh, where his law firm remains.

The Chicago Temple is turning 100. Its birthday gift to itself? Fixing its historic organ.

Lawyers are still overrepresented among building tenants today, but there are some eclectic outliers: a pointe shoe manufacturer, a natural-hair wig company. Save a brief absence from 1992 to 2002, the Chicago Temple has also hosted the offices of the United Methodist Church’s regional bishop.

The Temple’s centennial is dampened somewhat by the condition of its renowned E.M. Skinner organ, also turning 100. The instrument boasts 5,589 pipes across seven divisions, four manuals, 73 stops, 93 registers and 92 ranks. At present, only about half of the organ functions as it should.

A 90-year love affair with Chicago’s Billy Goat Tavern

It shouldn’t be too surprising that a bar commonly known for being the official hangout of journalists would be mentioned frequently in the Tribune. But it’s also clear that even if the bar were located 5 miles from downtown, it still would have shown up in the paper. That’s primarily thanks to the original owner, William Sianis.

The first mention came on June 19, 1938, four years after Sianis purchased the Lincoln Tavern at 1855 W. Madison St., across from the old Chicago Stadium (which was replaced in 1995 by the United Center). As the article explains, within the first year of opening, Sianis renamed the bar the Billy Goat Tavern after a goat fell off a truck and wandered into the bar: “Billy — that’s the goat — brought good luck to Mr. Sianis because business improved at his restaurant when the goat was put on the floor show. Mr. Sianis grew a set of whiskers just like Billy’s so Billy would feel at home.”

More Top Picks Best Cpap Cleaners And Sanitizers

Whether or not William Sianis really thought the goat was lucky, he sure loved taking it around the city.

Of course, not every establishment enjoyed having a live goat parading about, which leads us to one of the most infamous events in Chicago sports history. On Oct. 7, 1945, the Tribune briefly reported that at Game 4 of the World Series between the Chicago Cubs and Detroit Tigers, “Billy Sianis, owner of a tavern near Chicago Stadium … insisted on bringing a goat into the box seat section.” The goat was turned away, even though it had a sign on it that read, “We Got Detroit’s Goat.” Though the Cubs lost the game, you’ll notice that nothing about a curse or a hex was mentioned.

While mostly sportscasters frequented the original Billy Goat location on the West Side, once it moved to Lower Michigan Avenue in 1964, it became the de facto hangout for Tribune and Sun-Times reporters, leading to even more Billy Goat press. By March 23, 1967, Herb Lyon made it official: “Surely this town’s most colorful joint is the Billy Goat Tavern, run by even more colorful Billy Sianis, 72 — the newspaper guys’ second ‘office.’”

Sam Sianis, who turned 90 this year along with the tavern, proved just as quotable as his uncle. He came from Greece by way of San Francisco in 1960 to work for William, helping when the tavern relocated and then running the operation since his uncle’s death in 1970.

On Aug. 11, 1973, Will Leonard wrote that Sam Sianis had even continued the Cubs curse: “Armed with two tickets, he and another goat tried to get into Wrigley Field and were turned away. ‘That does it,’ quoth Sam. ‘The jinx is still on.’”

That ‘marvelous burger place’: 84 years of Tribune coverage of the Billy Goat Tavern

He has also been the beneficiary of the publicity bonanza generated and perpetuated by his uncle’s cursing the Cubs in 1945 (finally broken, of course, in 2016) and by the 1978 “Saturday Night Live” skit inspired by the “cheezborger, cheezborger” mantra at the Goat and starring John Belushi, Bill Murray and Robert Klein.

There are now eight outposts, some of them snazzy and sleek. But there is a charming timelessness to the oldest of them, which carries the classy address of 430 N. Michigan Ave. but sits in darkness on Hubbard Street and Lower Michigan Avenue.

“We still have a few from the papers who come in but not as many,” says Bill Sianis, Sam’s eldest son who runs the day-to-day operations. “Those who come in don’t come in every day like the old days. And there are still a lot of people who come from others cities and ask to see the stool where Mike Royko sat.”

Have an idea for Vintage baiduhai? Share it with Ron Grossman and Marianne Mather at [email protected] and [email protected]