The latest batch of documentaries arriving from WTTW-Ch. 11’s generally worthwhile and entertaining “Chicago Stories” series may strike you with déjà vu, since each concerns a topic that has been covered and covered and covered in the past. But Chicago’s history is a rich mine, and so, even while providing some familiar nuggets, these new programs also show us that there is always fresh material to find.
Peter Marks and Tania Lindsay are the producers and writers of “The World’s Fair of 1893” (airing Oct. 2). The program necessarily gives us such usual suspects as the first Ferris wheel, the brilliance of architect and planner Daniel Burnham and the untimely death of his partner John Root, and a bit too much of that energetic killer H.H. Holmes, who prowled the fair for potential female victims.
But the nicely paced episode punctuates what a remarkable undertaking the fair was, and what a grand success it became. There are many old photos showing what it took to transform a “swamp into a spectacle,” the White City filled with some 65,000 exhibits, including electric lights which were new to millions of visitors pouring in from farms — some of whom also tasted that new dessert, the brownie, brought to life by society doyenne Bertha Palmer. Talking heads include smart historian Adam Selzer. We meet, on the lighter side, Walt Disney’s father, a construction worker on the site, but also sad reminders of the fair’s racial inequities.
Having for many years been intrigued by the mysterious, fortress-like building on La Salle Street near Chicago Avenue, it was great to be taken inside by “Toy Town” (Oct. 9), from writer and co-producer Rachel Pikelny and co-producer Eddie Griffin. The building was demolished some time ago, but in its day it was a busy nest of inventors working for Marvin Glass & Associates, then the leading toy design company in the world, helping Chicago justifiably claim the title of “Toy Town.”
Yes, we gave the world deep-dish pizza and Cracker Jack, but such foodstuffs pale beside the mountain of toys that poured from the city. Do you remember, among the many toys and games of your youth, Lincoln Logs, Radio Flyers, Yakity-Yak wind-up chattering teeth, Busy Biddy Chicken, Rock ‘Em Sock ‘Em Robots, King Zor, Ants in the Pants, the Evel Knievel Stunt Game and Simon? They and many more came from Chicago, with the aforementioned Mr. Glass as a brilliant businessman and leader. Jeffrey Breslow is richly informative. Now an admired sculptor, for more than 40 years he made toys and games, many of them while working with Glass. He was in that headquarters building in 1976 when a disgruntled employee came and killed three colleagues and then himself. Though that tragedy interrupts the playfulness of this hour, which also shows Glass as something of a suburban playboy, and follows the dizzying rise and fall of Beanie Babies, this program manages to delight. My only problem is that I have no memory of playing with most of the toys shown. Is that because my parents were cheapskates or because my memory is getting foggy? Don’t answer.
As we all know — just look up — Chicago is a skyscraper forest and “Skyscrapers” (Oct. 16), with Daniel Andries as producer and co-writer with Peter Marks, comes at us with stunningly intelligent commentary from a large crowd of passionate architects and other commentators. Though I could have done without such overwriting as “towers so tall as to seem otherworldly,” it’s easy to enjoy learning that architect Bruce Graham’s inspiration for the Sears (now Willis) Tower came from a pack of cigarettes and that the former Hancock Center sways eight inches in a stiff wind. The show relates the trouble that halted for a time the Hancock’s construction and devotes important minutes to the work of architect Bertrand Goldberg’s Marina City. Also featured is John Moutoussamy, who in the early 1970s created the 820 S. Michigan Ave. business home of publisher John Johnson’s Ebony/Jet. Moutoussamy was the first Black architect to design a downtown building and he was also a devotee of the cigar-chomping Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, who we learn had an outsized influence on our skyline. Many fine voices have been marshaled for this episode, among them Tim Samuelson, the city’s first and only cultural historian; Lee Bey, who writes about architecture for the Sun-Times; and my former colleague Blair Kamin, whose writing about architecture for the Tribune earned him a Pulitzer Prize in 1999. Their voices provide perspective and understanding, entertainingly informative.
Finally, “Home of the Irish” (Oct. 23), courtesy of producer Eddie Griffin and writer Michael Harvey, is as familiar as familiar can be. But in touching on the well-known signposts of the story — fleeing the famine, coming here to work tough jobs while facing “No Irish need apply” discrimination, Mrs. O’Leary’s poor innocent cow, joining the police department, entering politics, Richard J. Daley — it does so with a certain assurance and some fine commentary from Daley biographer and former Tribune colleague Elizabeth Taylor, and many others. You will learn why, as former TV and print political reporter Mike Flannery says, “Irish Chicago is a great success story,” built on a foundation of resilience and perseverance. Yes, you’ll watch the Chicago River turn green and see and hear the sounds of Irish dancers. But you will also meet that artful chronicler of the Irish experience, writer James T. Farrell, in his fictional trilogy of the ups and downs of Studs Lonigan. A happier tale is the story of the life, near death, and remarkable rebirth of Old St. Pat’s Church, via its pastor for decades, Rev. Jack Wall. And if you have never heard of a music-loving cop named Francis O’Neill, this hour will enlighten you on that score.
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