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The Montgomery Ward & Co. Catalog House is a 600 foot long trapezoidal building along the North Branch of the Chicago River at 618 W. Chicago Avenue in the Near North Side community area of of Chicago in Cook County, Illinois, United States. It once housed the warehouse and offices of the national headquarters of one of the nations first mail order companies, Montgomery Ward. It was designated a Chicago Landmark on May 17, 2000.[2] It was listed on the National Register of Historic Places and as a National Historic Landmark on June 02, 1978.[3]
[edit] History
The two earliest buildings, the old Administration Building and the Mail Order House, are constructed of reinforced concrete and were designed by Hugh Garden, a member of the distinguished architectural firm of Schimdt, Garden, and Martin.[4]
The 400,000 square foot, eight-story Administration Building served as the company's headquarters until 1974, and features sword and torch motifs on the base and vertical piers that rise uninterrupted until culminiating in a parapet with motifs similar to the base.[5] A four-story tower was added in 1929 on the northeast corner of the building, with a pyramid roof crowned with a 22.5 foot bronze statue that originally topped the former Montgomery Ward Building on Michigan Avenue.[4] An adaption of an earlier sculpture by Augustus Saint-Gaudens that had topped both Madison Square Garden in New York and the Agriculture Building at the 1893 World's Columbian Exposition in Chicago, the statue is called the Spirit of Progress, and depicts a woman dressed in flowing robes balancing on a globe and holding a torch in and a staff. [5]
Forty feet north of the Administration Building is the 2 million square foot Mail Order House, also known as the Catalog House, that was the heart of Montgomery Ward's operations. Completed in 1908, the eight-story building was painted white and capped with a flat roof, with an interior that contained miles of chutes, conveyors, and storage lofts within ceiling heights ranging from 12 to 17 feet. The west facade, following a bend in the river, is almost 1,100 feet long and a single floor covers six acres. At one time the building had its own post office branch as well as a ground-floor shipping platform that could accommodate 24 railroad freight cars.[5]
In later years, Montgomery Ward and Company added several warehouses and parking ramps, followed by a 26-story office building in 1972.[4][5]
[edit] Currently
After the bankruptcy of Montgomery Ward in 1999, the earliest buildings were converted into upscale condominiums. The project met the Secretary of the Interior's Standards with the exception of the balconies.[6] In 2004, the office tower also was converted to condominiums.
[edit] See also
[edit] References
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