Carolina/Dubuque Apartments, Bradley, Milner, Chicagoan
Life Span: 1892-1983
Location: NW corner of Rush and Indiana (Grand), 536 N. Rush
Architect: Henry Ives Cobb
- Lakeside Business Directory of the City of Chicago, 1899
Dubuque Flats 66 Rush
Lakeside Annual Directory of the City of Chicago, 1904
Dubuque Flats 66 Rush
Lakeside Business Directory of the City of Chicago, 1907
Dubuque Flats 66 Rush
Lakeside Annual Directory of the City of Chicago, 1911
Bradley Hotel, McGuire, Cobb & Lull Hotel Co props 536 Rush
Polk’s Chicago Numerical Street and Avenue Directory, 1928
Bradley Hotel, 536 Rush
Inter Ocean, January 26, 1892
SALE OF NORTH SIDE PROPERTY.
Apartment House to Cost $150,000-Space Leased in Ashland Block-Texans Litigate for Land.
C. S. Ennis, with Dunlap, Smith & Co., reports that General William F. Singleton has sold to W. L. Bradley the property 100×100 feet at the northwest corner of Rush and Indiana streets, for $100,000. Mr. Singleton has leased back the property for 198 years at $6,000 per year. It is stipulated in the lease that he shall immediately erect a store and apartment structure to cost not less than $150,000.
In this transaction the ground is shown to bring $1,000 per foot. The present improvement consists of five three-story stone-front residences. As these are to be torn down their value can not be considered as entering into the transaction.
The location for the use to which it is to be put is admirable. It is one block south of the Virginia apartment hotel and lies next to the Grenada flat building.
The structure which General Singleton will erect will be eight stories high and will cover the entire lot. Natural light exists on three sides and the fourth will be lighted from a court. The building will be fireproof and thoroughly up to modern standards both in construction and equipment. It will be completed by May, 1893.
In the land transactions Dunlap Smith & Co. acted for Gelleral Singleton, and Kinney d Co, for Mr. Bradley.
Inter Ocean, January 31, 1892
A DOUBLE DEAL.
Sale of North Side Property, Which the Grantor Leases Back and Will Improve.
General W. F. Singleton has sold to W. L. Bradley, of Dubuque, Iowa, the ground at the northwest corner of Rush and Indiana streets, 100×100 feet, for $100,000, or $1,000 a front foot, and has leased it back for 198 years at a rental of $6,000 a year. The lease dates from Jan. 23. The lessee is bound to erect an apartment house, at an expenditure of not less than $50,000, to be completed by May 1, 1892. Mr. Singleton, however, will expend $150,000 on an eight-story store and apartment building. The buildings go to the owner of the ground at the end of the lease. The site is at present occupied by three three-story stone-front houses built by Frank Sturges in 1872. General Singleton purchased the lot a year ago for $60,000. C. S. Ennis, of Dunlap, Smith & Co., acted for General Singleton, and W. C. Kinney & Co. acted for Mr. Bradley. The property was offered Mr. Bradley at 10 o’clock Tuesday, Jan. 19, and at 2 o’clock of the same day the sale was practically closed. This would indicate that the market for choice property is certainly not slow.
Inter Ocean, May 15, 1892
GENERAL SINGLETON’S HOTEL.
It Will Cover the Ground at Rush and Indiana streets
General W. F. Singleton will build a magnificent ten-story structure, to cost at least $350,000, on the land recently leased by him for ninety-nine years from W. H. Bradley, of Dubuque, Iowa, at the northwest corner of Rush and Indiana streets, 100×100 feet. The exterior of the building will be a combination of stone and brick. The main entrance will be on Indiana street. The upper part of the building will be cut into over 350 rooms. Work is to begin at once, and the structure is to be completed by May 1, 1893. The siructure will be used for a hotel.
Chicago Tribune, October 28, 1894
Work on the Carolina Apartment Building, at the northwest corner of Rush and Indiana streets, which has has been at a standstill for some time is to be resumed. This building has had quite a tempestuous history. In January, 1892, it was sold by W. F. Singleton to William L. Bradley and leased again by Mr. Singleton for 198 years at a yearly rental of $6,000, one of the conditions of lease being that Mr. Singleton should build by May 1, 1893, a store and apartment building to cost $100,000. This project got as far as the plans and then Henry C. Hullnger got possession of the holding and started the Carolina, which got as high as the third floor and then stopped. The property has now passed into the hands of the Dubuque company, which is composed of men of means, which will finish the building at once. It is to be eight stories and is to be divided into forty-seven apartments of from four to eight rooms, to be provided with elevators, steam heat, and electric light and is to cost $180,000.
Chicago Chronicle, November 28, 1895
A bill filed yesterday in the circuit court by the Carolina Building and Hotel Company against the Dubuque Building Company, William L. Bradley and others asks the court to compel the defendants to come to an accounting and to appoint a receiver to take charge of a flat building at Rush and Indiana streets.
Chicago Chronicle, January 29, 1896
FALLS HEADLONG TO DEATH. ACCIDENT IN BUILDING.
The assistant engineer of the Dubuque apartment building, Indiana and Rush streets, fell down an elevator shaft from the seventh story early this morning and was almost instantly killed. He had been employed at the place only a week and had not given his name to his superiors.
No person saw the employe fall, but it is supposed that he walked into the shaft. At midnight the elevators in the building are shut down. A few minutes after 12 o’clock three tenants asked to be taken to their rooms on the seventh floor. The assistant offered to carry them up on the freight elevator at the rear. He left the car for a moment at the seventh floor, but when he returned it had risen to the eighth floor. The hall was dark and he did not notice the change.
As the victim fell he uttered a cry which could be heard for some distance. Engineer Philip Dougherty found the crushed body at the bottom of the shaft.
Inter Ocean, September 8, 1896
ELEVATOR WAS OUT OF ORDER.
Owners of Dubuque Bullding Censured for a Boy’s Death.
A coroner’s jury yesterday censured the owner of the Dubuque apartment building, at Indiana and Rush streets, for employing an Incompetent elevator operator and permitting the passenger elevator in the bullding to get out of repair.
The censure resulted from an Inquest held upon the remains of Ernest D. Hungerford, 4 years old. Last Friday evening the boy fell from the third floor of the building down the elevator shaft. He was picked up uncon-scious, and remained in that condition until Saturday night, when he died.
At the time of the accident the boy and his mother, who is employed in the Dubuque building, had ascended to the third floor. Mrs. Hungerford stepped off the elevator and Robert E. Ayres of No. 196 North Clark street, the elevator boy, slammed the door shut. It did not catch and flew open again just as the elevator started. Hungerford, who had been left In the elevator; Jumped and fell backward beneath the elevator, which passed on up. The boy’s body struck the basement of the shaft with great force. It was acknowledged that the catch on the elevator door was not in good working order.
Inter Ocean, July 19, 1908
Virginia, Hotel Property, at the Northwest Corner of Rush and Ohio Streets, Sold to McGuire & Cobb for $400,000.
Chicago Tribune, June 5, 1938
HOTEL CHAIN ENTERS CHICAGO; HAS LEASED BRADLEY FOR 10 YEARS
The Milner Hotels, Inc., which operates a nation-wide chain of 130 hostelries from Massachusetts to California and from Minnesota to Florida and Texas, covering twenty-six states, yesterday closed a lease which provides for its entry into Chicago. The Bradley hotel, at the northwest corner of Grand avenue and Rush street, erected many years ago, has been leased for ten years by John Lull and William McGuire to the Milner Hotels, Inc.
According to Isador Ferguson, Inc., which represented all parties, the lease calls for a minimum guaranteed rental of $216,000 for the term, plus a percentage of gross profits. Several other Chicago hotels are under consideration by the corporation, it was said. The Bradley contains 217 rooms and two stores.
- Milner Hotel
Chicago Tribune, August 7, 1954
FIND NUMEROUS VIOLATIONS IN MILNER HOTEL
Rush St.Building Part of National Chain
By Clay Gowran
Numerous building code violations have been found by city inspectors in the seven story Milner hotel at 536 Rush st., it was disclosed yesterday by Richard Smykal, acting building commissioner. The hotel is part of a large national chain.
Smykal said notices would be mailed to the hotel management calling for prompt repair of broken and loose plas-ter, torn carpeting, rotted window frames, broken windows, and sagging floors in two rooms.
“There is no excuse for a national organization such as this hotel chain to permit such conditions to exist,” he said.
“It behooves the management to supervise and maintain their property more carefully.”
Ceilings, Walls Dirty
Inspectors who visited the hotel Tuesday reported plaster was broken or loose in many bathrooms. They said the floors sagged in two rooms— numbers 121 and 32. Ceilings and walls in some rooms were dirty, and paint was peeling in a hallway of the main lobby.
The inspectors stated that the basement was cluttered with old furniture, refrigerators, carpeting, broken screens, and other litter.
Smykal stated that other inspectors would be sent to the hotel early next week to check on the electrical system and structure and brickwork of the building.
Melvin J. Hopkins, manager of the hotel, asserted yesterday he has men ” working in top gear” to make repairs, altho the management has not yet been notified of the inspectors’ findings.
“Plastering is being done now, and we are in the process of tiling all floors,” Hopkins said. ” The basement is being cleaned up, and the old furniture hauled away. We are going full tilt at fixing things, and will finish the job shortly.”
Chicago Tribune, November 1, 1983
A CORNERSTONE MUST GIVE IN TO PROGRESS.
By Bonita Brodt
Seven stories high, it sits shabbily in the shadow of the modern Chicago Marriott on North Michigan Avenue. Indeed, the Chicagoan Hotel, at 536 Rush St., has seen better days. Only the neon “H” glows orange pink after sundown on the “HOTEL” sign advertising rooms, some for as little as $60 a week, complete with kitchenette, air conditioning and free TV.
It is the last of its kind in Chicago, the last of what were once the grand hotels built in the late 1800s in a booming hotel district on Rush Street. That was before the Michigan Avenue bridge was constructed and the bridge over the Chicago River at Rush gave that street the distinction of being the most important passage on the city’s North Side.
Under five names, the old residential hotel has been standing for 89 years.
Last week, it closed
“I find it rather sad,” said Sally Ableman, an elderly woman who since 1959 has lived in the Chicagoan as its manager. “There is a lot of history in this old hotel, and I certainly have many happy memories here.”
As has been her custom in the afternoons, Ableman had her wheelchair positioned in the hotel lobby one day last week so she could look out of the majestic arched windows that overlook the Rush Street activity. The cavernous lobby, which Ableman said has not been painted for 24 years, provided only a hint of how it used to be.
Dull beige paint was peeling oft the ceilings. Brass plates on the stairway were dirty and dull. Orange couches were soiled, and several bulbs in the chandeliers had burned out. Mattresses, big enough for only single beds, were stacked in the lobby. Workmen were carting refrigerators downstairs.
More than a hundred people who lived in the hotel’s 214 rooms had moved out. “I know it is difficult to find a place to live.” Ableman said, “and I hope they did all right for themselves.”
Some, like Ableman, were elderly. Most had low incomes. lady had been “One here 43 years, Ableman said. “Others had been here since ’54. We didn’t have that many transients. Many people had been here for three years.
THE American Medical Association, which in recent years has quietly been acquiring millions of dollars of property near the old hotel, has made a firm purchase offer to the hotel owners, it was learned. An AMA spokesman who said last week that an attractive offer for the property was 90 cent sure,” said a sale would be completed soon. Plans for the site have not been revealed, but there has been speculation that an office-hotel or residential complex would be built there.
In its heyday, the hotel was a congenial and was intended to be magnificent.
“I recall many, many years ago when my mother invited me to come and stay with her at that hotel,” said Ira Bach, Chicago’s director of development. “This was around 1918. I was in boarding school then, and she was an actress who traveled around the country. She was in Chicago, and we stayed together there for the weekend.
“I was about 13, and I remember it as a very elegant place. Ornate with lovely elevators in the lobby, a mid-Victorian style of architecture. And, oh yes, soft music playing ir he dining room. It was the kind of place you see today in movies which depict that period.”
Plans for the original apartment-hotel, first known as the Carolina, were drawn up by architect Henry Ives Cobb, who also designed the Newberry Library and the old Chicago Historical Society building, at 632 N. Dearborn St.
C. W Westfall, formerly with the University of Illinois at Chicago and now a teacher of architectural history at the University of Virgin-ia, has done extensive research on the old Rush hotels and the mansions to the north.
He said three houses were torn down to make way for the Carolina. Plans for the hotel, to cost $350,000, a staggering figure at that time, were announced in 1892 by Gen W.F. Singieton, president of what was called the “Total Abstinence Life Association.” Westfall theorized that the Carolina was intended to be a temperance hotel for visitors to the 1893 World’s Columbian Exposition. But because of difficulties, construction was halted and the hotel was not operating in time for the fair.
It opened in 1895 as the DuBuque apartments, which offered stylish but affordable accommodations. Just down the street from the Virginia, a truly elegant and famous hotel built at Rush and Ohio by the McCormick family, the DuBuque did well for years. It had an assortment of shops in the lobby and a barbershop.
But as Rush Street took a back seat to Michigan Avenue after the Michigan bridge was built in 1920, the hotels there diminished in importance as well. As it went from the DuBuque to the Bradley to the Milner and, finally, in 1959, to the Chicagoan, this one slipped in quality and status, too.
In its last days, it became the center of a dispute between those interested in history and those interested in development.
Last year, the Chicago Landmark Preservation Council proposed that the Chicagoan be preserved and memorialized in what would have been a National Register Historical District. Emily Harris, the council’s program director, explained such a designation would not only have recognized the hotel for its place in Chicago history, but would have provided a tax incentive for its owners to make improvements and restorations.
Against that idea, however, was Nelson Forrest, executive director of the Greater North Michigan Avenue Development Association. Forrest said development, not restoration, is most important.
“The building is substandard, and we believe the property owners should have the opportunity to get a reasonable return for their investment,” he said.
Development won big in this battle.
Within a month, the wrecker’s ball is to demolish the Chicagoan Hotel, taking with it the other businesses that for years have occupied the building: Te Jay’s Adult Books, an Oriental take-out store and the Mickey Meyers Tavern.
A little bit of history will disappear as well.
- Dubuque Apartments
Sanborn Fire Insurance Map
1906
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