Lakeside Club
Life Span: 1884-TBD
Location: Indiana Avenue (between Thirty-first and Thirty-second Streets)
Architect: TBD
Lakeside Annual Directory of the City of Chicago, 1887
Lakeside Club—Wabash av. se. cor, Thirtieth.
Chicago Tribune, July 24, 1887
The Standard Club has recently purchased a large lot at the northwest corner of Michigan avenue and Twenty-fourth street, and is at present removing the frame houses there from preparatory to erecting a most pretentious club building one that will cost from $120,000 to $150,000. This club, as is well known, is the leading Hebrew organization of the city. It is the oldest Hebrew club and by far the wealthiest. It numbers among us members about a dozen millionaiies. The club has outgrown its present home at Michigan avenue and Thirteenth street, and a new club building became a necessity.
Ground was broken about two weeks ago on a large vacant lot on the west side of Indiana avenue, between Thirty-first and Thirty-second street; early last week the foundations were put in and at present the first story is rising, of what will be an exceedingly handsome club building. This will be the fourth club building erected by the Hebrew clubs of the city. It is being erected by the Lakeside Club, a Hebrew organization less than three years old, at a cost of $35,000.
There are now four flourishing Hebrew clubs in the city the Standard the Lakeside, the Ideal, and the West Chicago—and each owns its own club building. The West Chicago Club is the central organization of the wealthy Hebrews on the West Side; its club building is a handsome brick structure on Throop street. The Ideal is the North Side organization; its building on North Wells street, near Division, was erected by one of its members, who rents it to the club at $3,000 a year. The active membership of the clubs in round figures is as follows: Standard, 300: West Chicago, 100; Ideal, 100.
The Lakeside—the fourth and youngest of the Hebrew clubs is a South Side organization, intended especially for the accommodation of those living south of Twenty-second street, its membership is about 140. Its members are mostly merchants—a large number or whom are in the wholesale clothing business with a sprinkling of lawyers and bankers. Its original organizers were Messrs. Jacob L. Cahn, Charles Lebenstein, Samuel W. Rosenfels, Emanuel Kramer, and A. L. Mandei, all of whom are still active members. Almost all of its members are young men, not half a dozen of them being over 45. The present officers are: L. M. Friedlander, President; Ben Rosenberg, Vice President; Jacob L. Cahn, Treasurer: S. W. Rosenfels, Secretary; and Jacob L. Cahn, Peter F. Wolff, Conrad Witkowsky, W. A. Nye. David Witkowsky, H. Helter, Martin Mayer, and Martin Barbe, Directors. Adolph Moses, who was recently mentioned in a prominent way as a candidate for the Circuit Court bench, is one of the most active members, and among the other legal lights in the club are Eli B, Felsenthal, Lucius Weinschenk, and B. Rosenberg. Tho club has hitherto occupied the building covering Nos. 3001 and 3003 Wabash avenue. The new building win be a two-story and basement with mansard roof. It, will be built of pressed brick with brown stone and terra cotta trimmings and rock-faced stone basement, and will cover the entire lot—50 feet front by 160 feet deep. The club expects to have its house-warming Thanksgiving evening.
There is one feature of Hebrew clubs that is worth passing mention, and that is that 99 per cent of the club members do not belong to the orthodox Jewish synagogues. A few of them belong to no religious organization whatever, but the great bulk of them belong to independent Hebrew congregations—congregations that worship Sunday and observe Sunday as the Sabbath, and that have thrown aside all the old trammels of Jewish ceremonialism and identified themselves with methods and forms in keeping with modern times and customs.
The Chicago Clubs Illustrated, 1888
The Lakeside Club was organized in 1884, for the purpose of promoting social intercourse between its members and their families. Two houses were taken at the corner of Wabash Avenue aud Thirtieth Street, and here the Club remained until 1888, when the new Club house on Indiana Avenue (between Thirty-first and Thirty-second Streets) was opened with a grand New Year ball. The present house is an imposing structure of brick and stone, containing three stories and a basement. In the basement are the billiard rooms, cafe, the bowling alley, private supper rooms, and a dining room capable of seating four hundred guests. On the first floor are situated the ladies’ and gentlemen’s parlors, the reception room, the dressing rooms, and a fine assembly room and dancing hall, fifty -five feet wide by one hundred feet long. In the second story are the card rooms and a splendid gymnasium complete in every detail. The third floor is devoted to private apartments and the servants rooms. Entertainments of various kinds are frequently given in the Club house and in particular the general gatherings every Thursday evening have proved highly successful.
The initiation fee of the Lakeside Club is fifty dollars, and the dues are forty dollars a year.
The officers are as follows:. President, Mr. L. M. Friedlander; Vice-President. Mr. M. L. Freiberger; Secretary, Mr. S. W. Roseufels; and Treasurer, Mr. D. B. Falter. The Trustees are Messrs. Martin Barbe, Martin Meyer, H. Hefter, David Witkowsky, A. Mahler, E. A. Singer, C. Witkowsky and J. S. Mendelsohn.
I have a certificate for the lakeside club that was dated from 1912 from the state of Illinois secretary of state was Dole