McCarthy Block

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McCarthy Block, Landfield Building
Life Span: 1872-1987
Location: NE Corner of Dearborn and Washington Streets, Part of Block 37
Architect: John M. Van Osdel

Lakeside Annual Directory of the City of Chicago, 1874

Commercial National Bank

Lakeside Annual Directory of the City of Chicago, 1880
Kenison Samuel W. chiropodist 3, 85 Washington
Dreyer E. S. & Co. (Edward S. Dreyer, Edward Koch and Robert Berger) bankers and real est. 88 Washington

Lakeside Annual Directory of the City of Chicago, 1885
Kenison Samuel W. & Co. (Samuel W. and Charles Kenison) chiropodists 2, 71 Washington
Dreyer E. S. & Co. (Edward S. Dreyer, Edward Koch and Robert Berger) real est. and loans 88 Washington
Weingardt Alfred M. Engraver 10, 71 Washington

Lakeside Annual Directory of the City of Chicago, 1899
Washington Shirt Co The Fred L. Rossbach mngr; Dearborn ne cor Washington and Dearborn se cor Adams

Lakeside Annual Directory of the City of Chicago, 1904
Washington Shirt Co (The) Fred L. Rossbach pres; Jackson boul ne cor Dearborn, Dearborn ne cor Washington and Adams ne cor 5th av

Chicago Tribune, May 5, 1872

THE M’CARTHY BUILDING.
On the northeast corner of Dearborn and Washington streets, where, before the fire, stood a large brick building, Mr. James McCarthy is about to erect a handsome edifice which will add to the general handsome appearance of the street in the immediate neighborhood, so that each corner of the intersection of the two streets will have upon it a handsomer building than its predecessor. The McCarthy building will have four stories and basement, 80×36 feet, the former being the Washington street. It will be of Cleveland sandstone, lavishly embellished, and built in classical style. It will have two entrances, one on the corner and the other on Washington street. The corner entrance will be covered with a handsome porch, supported by iron columns, the approach to which will be by iron steps. The cornice will be of galvanized iron, and a balustrade of the same material will be placed round the roof. The entire lower floor wIU be occupied by the Commercial National Bank, which will have a remarkably light and cheerful aspect, having nine windows on the Washington street front and three on Dearborn street. The second floor will contain five unusually large offices which can be subdivided if necessary. These will also be well lighted. The third and fourth stories are similar in design, and will be rented for offices. There will be more rooms in the fifth story, which will, doubtlessly, be required for offices until the immediate demand is supplied, when they will probably again be rented for dwelling rooms. A skylight from the northeast corner of the roof lights the hall and stairways. The genial Mr. Van Osdel is the architect, a young gentleman especially liked for his courtesy and good breeding, both by the architects in Chicago and the reporters of the daily press. Politeness costs nothing, and this advertisement of the young and gushing Hollander is as gratuitous as his gentleness and patience.

① Unity Block, ② ③ ④ Silverman Bank, ⑤ McCarthy Block

Chicago Evening Post, October 5, 1872

M’CARTHY’S BLOCK.
This corners on Dearborn and Washington streets. It is a neat edifice, built in white sandstone, four stories and basement high, and erected at a cost of $50.000.

Chicago Tribune, May 27, 1906

15TH BIRTHDAY.
The Washington Shirt Company Celebrates the Founding of the Firm–Music, Souvenirs, Flowers, and a Lively Day’s Business.
Thousands of visitors yesterday participated in the “birthday” celebration of Chicago’s well known Washington Shirt Company, while the firm kept “open house” at its attractive stores, at the corner of Jackson boulevard and Dearborn street and at Washington and Dearborn streets, The newly painted building at the latter corner at once impresses the passersby and the gala appearance of the company’s stores drew a steady stream of customers and visitors throughout the day and evening.

Lavender was the characteristic color in yesterday’s celebration; a lavender poster announced the event from the dashboards of the cable cars, while this color was also expressed in attractive souvenirs, consisting of rubber tipped Faber lead pencils and opal glass souvenir collar button boxes decorated with lavender and gold. These hoxes were designed and produced especially for this occasion and both boxes and pencils were freely distributed among the stores’ patrons yesterday.

Mr. F. L Rossbach, the president and executive head of the Washington Shirt Company, was the recipient of hearty congratulations from Chicago business Acquaintances, patrons, and friends on this fifteenth year of success, and the entire staff of “Washington” young men shared in the enthusiasm of the celebration. One happy feature of the day was the receipt of a handsome oil painting of an excellent likeness of George Washington, the gift of a local artist.

fisk

Chicago Tribune, May 30, 1956

As far as our research has shown the following is the roll call of Loop buildings built in in 1872, the first year after the fire, and are still standing.

McCarthy bldg., southeast corner of Dearborn and Washington. Another maze of fire escapes, arches, bulges, bay windows, gaudy signs and shop fronts.

Chicago Tribune, October 25, 1973

By Paul Gapp
Urban affairs editor

The Landmarks Preservation Council has asked city officials to con- sider saving four 19th Century buildings in a north Loop area proposed for urban renewal and partial demolition.

All the structures are in the block bounded by Randolph, Washington, State, and Dearborn Streets.

They are:

The Springer Block

Unity Building-137 Dearborn St. “The only office building by Clinton Warren, the famous hotel architect, and once one of the biggest and most famous buildings In Chicago,” the council said.

McCarthy Building (also known as the Landfield Building—the northeast corner of Dearborn and Washington Streets. “Designed by John M. Van Osdel, it is one of the few surviving buildings downtown dating from 1872, the year after the great fire. A fine example of the style of the period Very interesting in its juxtaposition to Civic Center plaza and nearby buildings,” the council said.

Methodist Publishing House – now known as the Stop-and-Shop warehouse, 12 W. Washington St. The council said it was designed by Otis L. Wheelock and is “a nice example of the bay window variant of the Chicago , enhanced with Sullivanesque ornament.”

None of the buildings have been designated an architectural landmark by the city.

The Council, a private organization, made its plea to save the building in a letter to Lewis W. Hill, the city s urban renewal commissioner. It suggested a small governmental committee be formed to study the buildings.

A federal environmental impact statement will be required if the city moves ahead with the renewal project, the council said. Such statements must include an evaluation of architecturally important buildings.

An undetermined number of buildings would be torn down and the cleared land sold to developers for construction of housing, office, and other structures in an irregularly shaped six-block renewal area.

Hill said it will take six months to complete a feasibility study of the -dollar project.

Chicago Tribune, August 27, 1987

Civic Groups Rush To Save landmark
By John McCarron, Urban affairs writer
Three of Chicago’s top downtown civic groups are mounting last-ditch efforts to reverse, or at least slow down, City Hall’s decision to sacrifice the landmark McCarthy Building to speed redevelopment in the North Loop.

Their positions vary, but all three groups are upset that city planners intend to push approval of the demolition at a series of rapid-fire meetings next Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday.

“We need more time to look at this,” said Mitchell Kardon, staff planner at the Metropolitan Planning Council. On Wednesday the council sent a letter to Planning Commissioner Elizabeth Hollander protesting the city’s high-speed timetable.

Meanwhile, the leader of a second group, Ed Lawrence of Friends of Downtown, urged the city to obtain new bids on that part of the North Loop urban renewal. Other developers may be willing to save the McCarthy, Lawrence said, or at least pay more money for land underneath the McCarthy, which the developer stands to get at a fraction of its estimated worth.

An even stronger protest was lodged Wednesday by the Landmarks Preservation Council of Illinois.

The council has been accused in the past of not standing up for the McCarthy. But the group’s new executive director, Carol S Wyant, issued a ringing statement accusing the city of violating its landmarks laws, and of trying to “end-run” the public with a “horrifying precedent.”

Leaders from all three groups were scheduled to meet Thursday afternoon in an et-fort to reach a united front.

At the center of the uproar is a dowdy, five-story office building—half hidden under an accretion of grime and garish signs—across the street from the Daley Center Plaza on the northeast corner of Dearborn. and Washington Streets.

Indeed, the McCarthy Building has never been ranked among the city’s most valuable landmarks. Experts simply describe its 114-year-old red sandstone facade as a prime example of post-Fire commercial architecture. And they note it was designed by the city’s first professional architect, John Van Osdel.

Yet the McCarthy is fast becoming the most celebrated rallying point for preservationists since the old Chicago Stock Exchange was demolished in 1972. That’s because activists say the public was cheated by the city and its hand-picked developer, both of whom promised to save the McCarthy.

The old building began its slide towards destruction in 1983, when the city’s urban renewal board for downtown, called the Commercial District Development Commission, asked developers for plans to redevelop the block bounded by Randolph, State, Washington, and Dearborn Streets.

The block is considered the most crucial of the six-block North Loop project—the city’s long-running effort to assemble downtown property through condemnation and resell it at moderately subsidized prices to developers willing to build something the city

needs. In the case of the McCarthy block, the city wanted an office-over-retail complex that would boost the State Street Mall and provide a visual link from the Daley Center on Dearborn Street to the Marshall Field & Co. store on State Street.

Two development teams bid on the McCarthy block in 1983. The city chose FJV Venture, a gathering of three of the city’s most powerful development firms: Metropolitan Structures,
the Levy Organization and JMB Realty Corp.

FJV didn’t offer to pay as much for the land as the other bidder, SIDCOR Associates. But city planners were wowed by FJV architect Helmut Jahn’s proposal. Jahn not only the McCarthy promised to save the McCarthy Building, but to let its Italianate facade influence the look of the construction. He also promised a sweeping, curved, multi-story shopping atrium that would open up the center of the mega-structure so that one could stand under the Picasso statue and see to Field’s.

But in the intervening four years Jahn and FJV backed off both promises.

The McCarthy Building couldn’t be saved, they would later say, because it stands where a vehicle ramp will descend from Washington Street to a crucial underground parking lot and loading dock.

And instead of the huge central atrium for shoppers, it was decided that space would be easier to lease if the $400 million complex took the form of twin office towers above a conventional department store whose only grand entrance would be on State Street.

About the only thing that has remained constant about FJV’s 1983 proposal is the price it offered to pay for the land: $12.5 million, or $151.50 per square foot. That unchanged price has the critics howling. They claim real estate in the center of the North Loop has soared since 1983, with parcels changing hands at from $600 to $700 a square foot.

City planners say those estimates are exaggerated. But if condemnation court disagrees, the city could end up paying more than $60 million for the land, or five times FJV’s price.

“The project ought to be rebid,” said Lawrence of Friends of Downtown.

Wyant of the Landmarks Council agrees, but wants to focus public attention on how the McCarthy got away.

She was especially critical of a consolation plan announced last week by the city. Under
that scheme, FJV would double—to $4 million—the amount of money it will give to the city to carry out. preservation efforts elsewhere in the North Loop. FJV even offered to take charge of the rehabilitation of the Reliance Building, a more valuable landmark on the south-side of Washington Street.

“We are trading a significant” landmark for a wish and a promise,” Wyant said. “If the McCarthy can be traded for the Reliance, can we then trade the Reliance for the Rookery, the Rookery for the Board of Trade, Trade for the Water Tower, etc.”

suer Wyant and the other civic leaders also are angry about the city’s crash effort to the deal approved by the end of next week.

City officials confirmed Wednesday that the McCarthy demolition. way be presented next Tuesday to the Commercial District Development Commission, next Wednesday to a special meeting of the Chicago Plan Commission and next Thursday to the city council’s
Finance Committee.

NOTES:

McCarthy Block, built in 1872, at the northeast corner of N. Dearborn and W. Washington streets, fronting 36 feet on the former and 80 feet on the latter, is four stories and one basement high. John M. Van Osdel was the architect. In the early 1880’s this building was part of the Williams Block, 101-21 N. Dearborn street. Also called the Landfield Building.

In 1987, the McCarthy’s landmark status was revoked, and the building was demolished for the intended redevelopment of Block 37. The long-delayed Block 37 retail and office complex opened in 2009. The office building with the address of 22 West Washington occupies the former site of the McCarthy Building.

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