Rebuilding a New Chicago

Whether the outcome of Chicago government had been good or bad after the fire, it seems to be doing better than old Chicago before the fire. How had Chicago been built (government wise) better than before? Was there any flaws towards it?

Pre fire about 10 years
Via Harold M Mayer & Richard C. Wade book

In Harold M. Mayer and Richard C. Wade’s book, we see the how the city adapted to the fire and what they wanted to do, and what the mayor had done to start rebuilding.

1.The book states a quote from John Stephen Wright, who someone had asked what the ‘new’ Chicago would be like, and he simply replied, “Chicago will have more men, more money, more business, within five years than she would have had without the fire.” Now, he had said this in a matter-of-factly way, and had been so sure that this would happen, and would help the city. I believe that Wright had his own intentions for the city, while others may have thought differently. This was good for the city because if no one had done so, they would be confused and hungry, nowhere to go. If they had not done so, the people of Chicago may have started to rebel against the government.

2.After the fire had settled and been put up, most people returned to normal life, businesses kept going. The first ‘store’ to open up after the fire was Schock, Bigford & Co., they were the first opened store to supply the people after the fire. The city council had passed a law stating that all new buildings could not be built with wood, as previously before. They had to ‘fireproof’, which was still in a primitive stage, and enforcement was never very effective, although the city needed it, seeing what the buildings previously had been. I believe that what the government had done, passed the law to where all new buildings had to be built with fireproof material. This was a good choice because if they had built the city the way they had before, the city might have gone through the fire again, causing more chaos.

3.As they had started to rebuild, the workers raised the city. They saw that the city was much like a swamp, or there was a lot of water everywhere. The book states that they raised the city some amount of feet from where it originally was. This seemed to be better for the city because if something were to happen like the fire again, the city would be in trouble. If they had not raised it, Chicago would have the chance to become flooded, seeing that it was next to Lake Michigan and the Chicago River. This was a good decision because seeing the city now, Chicago is doing fairly well with the whole not flooding/being a swamp.

4.While rebuilding, the architects had come up with new ideas for buildings, making them taller and more efficient. They hadn’t realized that doing that would take many years, so they kept their sights on making regular sized buildings. What they had thought, making new and taller buildings, would shape the whole outlook on a new Chicago, more modernized over 100 years later, shown through the Sears (Willis) Tower. The architects had been smart enough to build the buildings, but they did not have the ability to do so in the harsh conditions, and they needed to make sure that the buildings that they were working on now had to stay up and were fireproof enough in case of another fire.

First Store after Fire

FURTHER RESEARCH: What had people of the city done to help the new building of Chicago?