Hidden History of Uptown and Edgewater

Hidden History

by Patrick Butler

If there's any place in Chicago that's been all things to all men, it has to be the corner of the city that is occupied by Edgewater and Uptown. Babe Ruth and Mahatma Gandhi found a place of refuge at the Edgewater Beach Hotel, but the locale has also been a sanctuary for Appalachian coal miners and Japanese Americans released from internment camps. Al Capone reportedly moved booze through a secret tunnel connecting the Green Mill and the Aragon Ballroom, "Burglar Cops" moonlit out of the Summerdale police station and a "Kitchen Revolt" by some not-very-ordinary housewives sent once-invulnerable machine ward boss Marty Tuchow on his way to Club Fed. Ferret out the hidden history of Uptown and Edgewater with veteran beat reporter Patrick Butler in this curio shop of forgotten people and places..

Genres: History

129 pages, Kindle Edition

First published September 24, 2013

Reviews

[musa b-n · Rating 2 out of 5]

Okay, this book was responsible for a lot of my book slowdown of the last month because once I was in it, I felt obligated to finish it, so I couldn't start another book, and I really ... didn't want to keep reading this book.

It's fine! I originally picked it up because living & working in uptown, I wanted some historical context for this place where I'm almost definitely going to spend the next two years of my life. I guess I was hoping for a little bit more radical of a history, though. This book was really weirdly pro-military, definitely racist, and just overall sounded a bit like someone's white racist grandfather telling me fun facts. Some of them, I'm like, "Oh wow!" and many others I'm like, "Yikes."

My boss recommended another history book that's more lefty though, so hopefully I'll be getting my hands on that soon. Glad to be done with this one.

[Ronnie Lundgren · Rating 3 out of 5]

Good for quick tidbits. Not very well organized. Subheadings would describe one thing then the subsequent paragraphs would ramble into something completely different. Reminded me of talking to an old timer at a local saloon telling you random stories about the neighborhood. The book isn’t very in depth but good for picking up every once in a while. Would probably have been a quick read if I sat down and read it straight through in a day or two.

[Kaesa · Rating 2 out of 5]

This book did not really offer anything of substance history-wise, I felt, and the tone was as if my hometown's local Pioneer Press paper from the '90s had somehow gotten hold of a time machine and was using it to report on fluff pieces from any random decade they could get to.