Portage Park, Chicago
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Portage Park, Chicago
Portage Park is located on the northwest side of the City of Chicago, Illinois and is one of 77 officially designated Chicago community areas. Portage Park is bordered by the community areas of Jefferson Park and Forest Glen to the north, Dunning and the suburb of Harwood Heights to the west, Irving Park to the east and Belmont-Cragin to the south. The area is notable for its Six Corners outdoor shopping district, centered at the intersection of Irving Park Road, Cicero Avenue and the diagonal Milwaukee Avenue, the Portage Theater and for its namesake - Portage Park. The name of the park was taken from the major portage linking the Des Plaines and Chicago rivers along what is today Irving Park Road. The area was so swampy that in wet weather, Native Americans and trappers were easily able to paddle through the area in either direction without leaving their canoes. In those days, the Des Plaines was perhaps the most significant way to the Illinois, and then on to the Missi ...
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Community Areas Of Chicago
The city of Chicago is divided into 77 community areas for statistical and planning purposes. United States Census, Census data and other statistics are tied to the areas, which serve as the basis for a variety of urban planning initiatives on both the local and regional levels. The areas' boundaries do not generally change, allowing comparisons of statistics across time. The areas are distinct from but related to the more numerous List of neighborhoods in Chicago, neighborhoods of Chicago; an area often corresponds to a neighborhood or encompasses several neighborhoods, but the areas do not always correspond to popular conceptions of the neighborhoods due to a number of factors including historical evolution and choices made by the creators of the areas. , Near North Side, Chicago, Near North Side is the most populous of the areas with over 105,000 residents, while Burnside, Chicago, Burnside is the least populous with just over 2,500. Other geographical divisions of Chicago exi ...
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Jefferson Park, Chicago
Jefferson Park is one of the 77 community areas of Chicago, located on the Northwest Side of the city. The neighborhood of Jefferson Park occupies a larger swath of territory. Jefferson Park is bordered by the community areas of Norwood Park to the northwest, Forest Glen to the northeast, Portage Park to the south, and the suburb of Harwood Heights to the west. The Guatemalan consulate is located in Jefferson Park at 5559 North Elston Avenue. History Settlement in the vicinity of Jefferson Park began in the 1830s with John Kinzie Clark and Elijah Wentworth, whose claim was near what is now the Jefferson Park Metra Station, where he operated a tavern and inn. The tiny settlement of traders, hunters, and farmers consisted of simple one and two room log cabins until Abram Gale, for whom Gale Street is named, built the first frame house in Jefferson. Jefferson Park became the hub of an independent township that was incorporated at the nearby Dickinson Tavern as Jefferson Tow ...
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Animal Trapping
Animal trapping, or simply trapping or gin, is the use of a device to remotely catch an animal. Animals may be trapped for a variety of purposes, including food, the fur trade, hunting, pest control, and wildlife management. History Neolithic hunters, including the members of the Cucuteni-Trypillian culture of Romania and Ukraine (c. 5500–2750 BCE), used traps to capture their prey. An early mention in written form is a passage from the self-titled book by Taoist philosopher Zhuangzi describes Chinese methods used for trapping animals during the 4th century BCE. The Zhuangzi reads, "The sleek-furred fox and the elegantly spotted leopard ... can't seem to escape the disaster of nets and traps." "Modern" steel jaw-traps were first described in western sources as early as the late 16th century. The first mention comes from Leonard Mascall's book on animal trapping. It reads, "a griping trappe made all of yrne, the lowest barre, and the ring or hoope with two clickets ...
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Native Americans In The United States
Native Americans, also known as American Indians, First Americans, Indigenous Americans, and other terms, are the Indigenous peoples of the mainland United States ( Indigenous peoples of Hawaii, Alaska and territories of the United States are generally known by other terms). There are 574 federally recognized tribes living within the US, about half of which are associated with Indian reservations. As defined by the United States Census, "Native Americans" are Indigenous tribes that are originally from the contiguous United States, along with Alaska Natives. Indigenous peoples of the United States who are not listed as American Indian or Alaska Native include Native Hawaiians, Samoan Americans, and the Chamorro people. The US Census groups these peoples as " Native Hawaiian and other Pacific Islanders". European colonization of the Americas, which began in 1492, resulted in a precipitous decline in Native American population because of new diseases, wars, ethni ...
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Chicago River
The Chicago River is a system of rivers and canals with a combined length of that runs through the city of Chicago, including its center (the Chicago Loop). Though not especially long, the river is notable because it is one of the reasons for Chicago's geographic importance: the related Chicago Portage is a link between the Great Lakes and the Mississippi River Basin, and ultimately the Gulf of Mexico. The river is also noteworthy for its natural and human-engineered history. In 1887, the Illinois General Assembly decided to reverse the flow of the Chicago River through civil engineering by taking water from Lake Michigan and discharging it into the Mississippi River watershed, partly in response to concerns created by an extreme weather event in 1885 that threatened the city's water supply. In 1889, the Illinois General Assembly created the Chicago Sanitary District (now the Metropolitan Water Reclamation District) to replace the Illinois and Michigan Canal with the Chica ...
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Des Plaines River
The Des Plaines River () is a river that flows southward for U.S. Geological Survey. National Hydrography Dataset high-resolution flowline dataThe National Map , accessed May 13, 2011 through southern Wisconsin and northern Illinois''American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language,'' Fourth Edition in the United States Midwest, eventually meeting the Kankakee River west of Channahon to form the Illinois River, a tributary of the Mississippi River. Native Americans used the river as transportation route and portage. When French explorers and missionaries arrived in the 1600s, in what was then the Illinois Country of New France, they named the waterway ''La Rivière des Plaines'' (River of the Plane Tree) as they felt that trees on the river resembled the European plane tree. The local Native Americans showed these early European explorers how to traverse waterways of the Des Plaines watershed to travel from Lake Michigan to the Mississippi River and its valley. Parts of ...
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Portage
Portage or portaging (Canada: ; ) is the practice of carrying water craft or cargo over land, either around an obstacle in a river, or between two bodies of water. A path where items are regularly carried between bodies of water is also called a ''portage.'' The term comes from French, where means "to carry," as in "portable". In Canada, the term "carrying-place" was sometimes used. Early French explorers in New France and French Louisiana encountered many rapids and cascades. The Native Americans carried their canoes over land to avoid river obstacles. Over time, important portages were sometimes provided with canals with locks, and even portage railways. Primitive portaging generally involves carrying the vessel and its contents across the portage in multiple trips. Small canoes can be portaged by carrying them inverted over one's shoulders and the center strut may be designed in the style of a yoke to facilitate this. Historically, voyageurs often employed tump lines on t ...
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Portage Theater
Located at Six Corners in the Portage Park neighborhood of Chicago's Northwest Side, the Portage Theater is one of the oldest movie houses in Chicago. The Portage Theater opened on December 11, 1920 as the Portage Park Theatre (the former name is still visible on the building's facade). Built for the Ascher Brothers circuit with 1,938 seats, the Portage was the first theater built specifically for film (and not vaudeville) in the area. The Portage Theater's interior features a megaphone-shaped auditorium based on a formal Beaux-Arts opera house design. When the theater was taken over by Balaban and Katz in 1940, its marquee, entrance lobby and foyer were redecorated in a sleek, streamlined art deco style to complement other prominent art deco designs at Six Corners such as Sears department store and the Klee Brothers building. The Portage remained a popular fixture of the neighborhood, becoming a second-run movie house in the 1960s. In the 1980s, the theater underwent a dr ...
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Milwaukee Avenue (Chicago)
North Milwaukee Avenue is a street in the city of Chicago and the northern suburbs. Route description True to its name, the street, which began as a Native American trail, eventually leads north to the state of Wisconsin and through Kenosha and Racine towards Milwaukee, though not directly. Starting with a short section at N. Canal and W. Lake Streets, it begins in earnest at the corner of N. Des Plaines and W. Kinzie Streets and heads northwest for about before joining Skokie Highway (U.S. Route 41) in Gurnee, Illinois, which eventually merges at Interstate 94 where Skokie Highway and the Tri-State Tollway split off, continuing to Milwaukee. From Harlem Avenue northwards it is Illinois Route 21. Milwaukee Avenue is a popular route for bicyclists. The southeastern end of Milwaukee Avenue is the most heavily bicycled stretch of road in Chicago, with cyclists accounting for 22% of all traffic there on a randomly selected day in September. The street is lined with storefronts, r ...
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Six Corners
Six Corners is a shopping district in the Portage Park neighborhood of Chicago's Northwest Side. History The area's name is from the intersection of three streets—Irving Park Road, Cicero Avenue and Milwaukee Avenue. Its history as an urban center began in the 1840s, eventually becoming the largest commercial center in Chicago, outside of the Loop. There is evidence that Native Americans used a ridge along Milwaukee Avenue as a campsite, which would have been higher than the generally swampy surrounding land. Architecture The area is host to a number of examples of prominent architecture, including the art deco Sears and Klee Buildings, the classical revival Portage Theater and the landmark Peoples Gas Irving Park Neighborhood Store. Present Although the shopping district has fallen on hard times in recent years, the area has been slated for redevelopment as an urban pedestrian shopping district with the recent reopening of the Portage Theater, the upcoming construction of ...
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Belmont Cragin, Chicago
Belmont Cragin is one of 77 officially designated Chicago community areas located on the Northwest Side of the City of Chicago, Illinois. It is designated Community Area 19, and is located NW of the Loop. History Beginnings The first business to open in Belmont Cragin was a saloon opened by George Merrill sometime after 1835, when he settled with his family at the intersection of Armitage and Grand Avenues. Operating the saloon out of his home, Merrill catered to truck farmers carrying produce over the plank road to the city. The corner, named Whiskey Point, prompted many colorful and romanticized legends but attracted few permanent residents. In 1862, Michael Moran established a hotel at Whiskey Point, but the area remained rural until 20 years later, when Cragin Brothers & Company moved their tin plate and sheet iron processing plant near Whiskey Point. The plant and warehouses covered , and the Chicago, Milwaukee & St. Paul Railroad built a station at Leclaire Avenue to a ...
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Irving Park, Chicago
Irving Park is one of 77 officially designated Chicago community areas located on the Northwest Side. It is bounded by the Chicago River on the east, the Milwaukee Road railroad tracks on the west, Addison Street on the south and Montrose Avenue on the north, west of Pulaski Road stretching to encompass the region between Belmont Avenue on the south and, roughly, Leland Avenue on the north. It is named after the American author Washington Irving. Old Irving Park, bounded by Montrose Avenue, Pulaski Road, Addison Street, and Cicero Avenue, has a variety of housing stock with Queen Anne, Victorian, and Italianate homes, a few farmhouses, and numerous bungalows. The CTA Blue Line runs through this neighborhood with stops at Addison, Irving Park, and Montrose. History Beginnings Irving Park's development began in 1843 when Major Noble purchased a tract of land from Christopher J. Ward, upon which Noble established a farm. The boundaries of that farm today would be Montr ...
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