Robbins Blocks
Life Span: 1872-1910
Location: 11 & 13 Fifth Avenue and 205 & 07 South Water street
Architect: John M. Van Odel
Chicago Tribune, November 24, 1872
CRERAR, ADAMS & CO’S BUILDING.
One of the handsomest announcements of rebuilding, rising to the fine art in advertising, is the exquisitely engraved circular of the old house of Crerar, Adams & Co. The plate has four beautiful vignette pictures surrounding the card of of the firm. The first of these shows the well-remembered stand in the Robbins Block, at the corner of Fifth avenue and South Water street, as it existed on Saturday, Oct. 7, 1871. The second gives a bleak ruin, shapeless masonry in the foreground, a woeful semblance of the actual scene on the fated Monday, Oct. 9. The third presents a view of the emergency premises of the firm, on the Michigan avenue park front, where for the winter and spring months they carried on their extensive business. The fourth is a beautiful cut of the Robbins Block, 80 by 150 feet, with a fine cut stone front, rebuilt at a cost of $100,000, and one of the handsomest quarters in the new Chicago, for a firm among the most prominent in the city before the fire. Its street numbers run Nos. 11 and 13 Fifth avenue, and Nos. 205 and 207 South Water street. The block is five stories high, and one of the best buildings of our reconstruction.
Crerar, Adams & Co. Advertising Circular, as described above.
It is worth while to add here that this firm are to be credited with still another structure among the notables of our great rebuilding—the rebuilt works of Crerar, Adams & Co. and the Union Brass Manufacturing Company, a double edifice fronting 100 feet on Ohio street and 100 feet on Ontario street, and 220 feet on Franklin street, with a dividing alley in the centre, spanned by a bridge. The buildings are in substantial brick, four stories high, among the most completely appointed manufacturing premises in the city. Messrs. C., A. & Co. established in Chicago fourteen years ago, as a branch of M.K. Jusup & Co., of New York, are still closely allied with the old house, and their trade consists in furnishing all possible requirements under the head of railway supplies, best understood in their multiform variety by a glance through their salesrooms. The portion of the manufactory above referred to occupied by them is occupied in the manufacture of headlights, hand-lanterns, and all varieties of ornamental car and carriage lamps, for which many of the leading railroad companies at the East are their customers. This branch of the work employs 100 men, with an annual product of $200,000. Among other leading manufacturing specialties are turntables and the Mansfield elastic frog. The gross business of Messers.Crerar, Adams & Co. reaches several million dollars annually. They are the large owners of the Union Brass Manufacturing Company, the two industries being practically one interest.
The company is is highly prosperous, and largely the source of many of the staple products of the house. One thing deserves to be noted in the store and in the manufactory, worthy to bring it thus into prominent mention in a building article,—the taste and skill shown in providing for the convenience and comfort of the operatives and employes, who from the nature of their employment, are necessarily among the most skilled and intelligent of mechanics. J.H. Dow, Esq., onr of the partners, now in Europe, is to be largely credited with the marvelous development of the aesthetic principle, rarely enlisted to such a degree in the affairs of business.
The Land Owner, November, 1872
THE BUILDINGS OF THE ROBBINS’ ESTATE.
Among the most imposing of all our strictly mercantile structures are the two buildings of the Robbins estate, situated respectively at the northwest corner of Lake street and Fifth avenue, and at the southeast corner of South Water street and Fifth avenue, as shown in our illustrations this month. These edifices are first-class in every respect, have been displayed in their general design.
Crerar & Adams Building (Robbins’ Estate)
11 & 13 Fifth Avenue
Northwest Corner of Lake street and Fifth avenue
The Lake street building presents a beautiful iron front, with a graceful return of the same material on Fifth avenue. Its dimensions are 80 by 150 feet, five stories high, with a deep basement extending under the sidewalks. This structure has the most pleasing facade on Lake street. The openings are large, the columns just where they ought to be, and the cornice sits in its place in the most perfect proportion. Its cost was about $120,000.
Crerar & Adams Building (Robbins’ Estate)
205 & 07 South Water street
Southeast Corner of South Water street and Fifth avenue
The South Water street building is 80 by 150 feet, with a beautiful cut stone front. It is in every respect a fit companion for the Lake street structure. Its cost was $100,000. Messrs. Creerar, Adams & Co., are the lessees, as will be seen in the engraving, and of whom we make further mention elsewhere in connection with an article on their works. This reputable firm will find this building most comfortable and elegant quarters.
Work was commenced on both of the buildings early in May last. Mr. John A. Yale, the agent of the Robbins estate, has labored with a will to bring them to rapid completion, without sacrificing either solidity or perfection inn the construction. He was one of the earliest to clear away the rubbish and enter upon the work. The Robbins estate had twelve stores destroyed in the fire, which they are rapidly rebuilding.
Crerar & Adams Interior
11 Fifth Avenue
1895
Crerar, Adams & Co.
1896 Catalog
Inter Ocean, October 10, 1909
Crerar, Adams & Co., dealers in railway supplies, have bought from Henry R. Lloyd a site for a new warehouse at the southwest corner of Erie street and Fairbanks court, in the St. Claire Manufacturing district. The land has a frontage of 220 feet on Erie street by 109 feet on the court and the larger part of this tract will be occupied by a seven story structure containing 100,000 square feet of floor space, which is estimated to cost not less than $125,000. The sale was made through the Bowes Investment company.
The consideration for the land in this deal is given at $40,000 cash, and it is said that Mr. Lloyd bought it less than two years ago for $18,600. Crerar, Adams did & Co. have been located at the southeast corner of South Water street and Fifth avenue for nearly forty years and are induced to move because of the increasing difficulty experienced in handling business in that congested district.
Figure ① 205 & 07 South Water street
Southeast corner of South Water street and Fifth avenue
Figure ② 11 & 13 Fifth Avenue
Northwest Corner of Lake street and Fifth avenue
Robinson Fire Map
1886
Crerar Adams Building
Southeast corner of South Water street and Fifth avenue
Sanborn Fire Map
1906
Leave a Reply