Richard Nickel's Chicago: Photographs of a Lost City

A marvelous - if somewhat depressing - photographic tour of Chicago's architecturally and historically significant buildings, especially downtown, taken in the 1950s to early 1970s. Depressing, of course, because so many of those buildings have been demolished or, in a few cases, otherwise lost. Most of the buildings photographed are from the era between the Chicago Fire of 1871 when much of the downtown area was obliterated and 1930 when the Great Depression stopped almost all construction activity until after World War II.

For me, it's especially interesting since Nickel was active in the time when I worked in the downtown area, roughly 1958-1983 (minus a couple years). On the sunny side, I did get to see many of the buildings first show more hand and one of my favorites, the Rookery Building on LaSalle Street, still exists and was renovated maybe 20 or so years ago. The interior of that building is stunning, I think. If you have nothing to do on a rainy afternoon Google image search "Rookery Building, Chicago" and you will be rewarded with many fine images.

Included are some photos of people in Chicago and some non-architectural items. Nickel was a wonderful photographer with a good eye for setting, angle, subject matter and the like. Especially for Chicagoans of a certain age, this is a reminder of how much of the architectural heritage of Chicago was lost.

Richard Nickel was killed in 1972 when a floor collapsed above him in Louis Sullivan's Chicago Stock Exchange Building which was then being demolished. The trading room of the Chicago Stock Exchange lives on at the Art Institute of Chicago.

If you are interested in Chicago architecture, the Chicago Architecture Foundation's tours and literature are valuable. The tours are especially interesting, fun and informative. show less