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Ferdinand Wythe Peck (1848-1924) was a wealthy 
Chicago
(''City in a Garden''); I Will
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, Illinois
Illinois ( ) is a state in the Midwestern United States. Its largest metropolitan areas include the Chicago metropolitan area, and the Metro East section, of Greater St. Louis. Other smaller metropolitan areas include, Peoria and Rockf ...
, businessman and philanthropist, best known for financing Chicago's Auditorium Building
The Auditorium Building in Chicago is one of the best-known designs of Louis Sullivan and Dankmar Adler. Completed in 1889, the building is located at the northwest corner of South Michigan Avenue and Ida B. Wells Drive. The building was des ...
.
He was the youngest son of Mary Kent Peck and Phillip F.W. Peck. The family moved from Rhode Island
Rhode Island (, like ''road'') is a state in the New England region of the Northeastern United States. It is the smallest U.S. state by area and the seventh-least populous, with slightly fewer than 1.1 million residents as of 2020, but it ...
to Chicago in the 1830s and made a fortune in real estate
Real estate is property consisting of land and the buildings on it, along with its natural resources such as crops, minerals or water; immovable property of this nature; an interest vested in this (also) an item of real property, (more general ...
. Peck and his brothers took over the family fortune when their father died, and soon were among the wealthiest families in Chicago.
Ferdinand was a civic-minded individual, and was involved in many projects around the city. He was a founding member of the Illinois humane society, and served on the city board of education. He was also a patron of the arts, particularly concerned with making high art available to the working classes. To this end, he organized the Chicago Grand Opera Festival in 1885.
Out of the Festival grew a desire for a more permanent expression of his ideals. Shortly after the Haymarket Square riot, he began planning in earnest for what would become the Auditorium Building.
To make his idea real, Peck hired architects Dankmar Adler
Dankmar Adler (July 3, 1844 – April 16, 1900) was a German-born American architect and civil engineer. He is best known for his fifteen-year partnership with Louis Sullivan, during which they designed influential skyscrapers that boldly addr ...
and Louis Sullivan
Louis Henry Sullivan (September 3, 1856 – April 14, 1924) was an American architect, and has been called a "father of skyscrapers" and "father of modernism". He was an influential architect of the Chicago School, a mentor to Frank Lloy ...
, who had worked for him previously to prepare the space for the Grand Opera Festival. Peck provided much of the funding and the central vision for the building, and the final design reflected his ideas as well as those of the architects.
Peck served as the Commissioner-General for the United States at the Paris Exposition, 1900.
He died in Chicago on November 4, 1924, and was buried at Rosehill Cemetery
Rosehill Cemetery (founded 1859) is an American garden cemetery on the North Side of Chicago, Illinois, and at , is the largest cemetery in the City of Chicago. According to legend, the name "Rosehill" resulted from a City Clerk's error – the a ...
.
There is currently an elementary school in southwest Chicago, at 3826 West 58th Street, named after him.
References
* {{DEFAULTSORT:Peck, Ferdinand 1848 births 1924 deaths Burials at Rosehill Cemetery Philanthropists from Illinois