Marathon Pundit: More good news on the endangered Chicago Reagan apartment

832 E. 57th St. on Jan 6th by John Ruberry

Marathon Pundit: More good news on the endangered Chicago Reagan apartment:

Well it looks like while demolition is going on at the site of Ronald Reagan's Hyde Park apartment building, the building itself remains in tact for now with a 90-day hold. The Alderman who represents that area where the University of Chicago hospital seeks to expand is more serious about a plaque to mark President Reagan's Hyde Park residence.

BTW, Ruberry at Marathon Pundit offers those concerned an e-mail address to this alderman to let them know to keep Reagan's old Chicago apartment in tact! Feel free to let her know what you think about demolishing this building.

PREVIOUS POSTS

• Marathon Pundit wants to save President Reagan's former Chicago home 
• Who knew Hyde Park had a Reagan connection?

Marathon Pundit wants to save President Reagan's former Chicago home

832 E. 57th St.

John Ruberry wants his post to be shared and so I shall share. It's safe to say Obama's Chicago neighborhood of Hyde Park was briefly home to another president almost 100 years ago. In fact a year ago I wrote a post about that apartment building where a young Ronald Reagan once lived.

A year ago there were some activists who wanted to preserve this residence, and today it's in the shadow of the University of Chicago hospital and they're looking for room to expand. This building is also owned by UChicago according to Ruberry.

The original Sears Tower

A treasure on Chicago's west side is highlight in this piece from last month from Chicago Tonight. Originally built in 1906, this was the original home of Sears when they were known as an important mail order business. Just like people are crazy about Wal-Mart today, people were crazy about Sears enough to come down to the original corporate headquarters and visit the original tower.

Unfortunately the neighborhood around Sears gradually declined and in the riots of 1968 after the murder of Dr. Martin Luther King, Sears left the neighborhood. They still used their original headquarters moving to the more familiar Sears Tower (now called Willis Tower) located downtown. Eventually the Sears complex would be gradually demolished leaving the original tower and other buildings of this complex.

As it may have been in the heyday of this site, it may once again become a self-contained community. There are homes being build and the saved buildings from this complex are expected to become condos and retail space. In this video you saw the original power plant, that is now a school. In addition mixed-income housing has been built on this site.

I hope that eventually the original Sears tower which was saved as a beacon of hope to the surround North Lawndale community where it resides may eventually become a tourist destination once again. While it may be home to retail and condos, I hope that there will be an observatory where there once was in it's heyday!

BTW, this video was presented by the late John Calloway originally in 2006!