Chicago's Historic Places: St. Ignatius Traditional Cache
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Chicago's Historic Places: St. Ignatius
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Tin with velcro. The cache is not in a location where you can
discreetly find it. I suggest finding it when students are not
going to or leaving school or at night (basically find it when not
many people are around). Please bring your own pen and be discreet!
A Chicago landmark and nationally registered historic place. My
days at UIC started everyday by passing St. Ignatius College Prep
and I was always amazed on how such a very prominent and beautiful
building once stood in a "dicey" neighborhood. These days the
neighborhood is showing change.
St. Ignatius
College Prep website
"St. Ignatius College Prep, located at 1076 West Roosevelt Road in
Chicago, was constructed in 1869 and is one of only five buildings
to survive the disastrous Chicago Fire of 1871. Toussaint Menard of
Chicago is credited with its design; it sits next to Holy Family
Church, where all school masses are held."
History:
"In the 1850s, Fr. Arnold Damen, S.J., a Jesuit, priest set out to
start a parish and college for the academically talented children
of immigrants on Chicago's near-West Side, then an area of
sprawling prairie. Construction of Damen's Holy Family Church was
completed in 1857. With funds provided by Dutch financiers,
construction of the main building of St. Ignatius College commenced
in 1869 with designs by the French architect Toussaint Menard. On
June 30, 1870, the Illinois General Assembly approved the Charter
of St. Ignatius College, and in September, 1870 St. Ignatius opened
its doors to thirty-seven young men who had completed the Eighth
grade, the extent of formal education during the time period.
St. Ignatius was one of the first colleges in the Chicago area,
predating the University of Chicago by 20 years and graduating its
first class little more than a decade after Northwestern University
did so. Students were instructed in Latin, Greek, the elementary
sciences, writing, arithmetic and rhetoric — the components of a
traditional "college" education of the era. In 1871, disaster
struck Chicago in the form of the Great Chicago Fire, but Damen's
church and college were one of only a few buildings to be spared
from the inferno. Fr. Damen sent a telegraph to Pope Pius IX early
in the day of the fire to ask his Holiness to pray to God to save
Holy Family and St. Ignatius and promised to keep a candle lit as a
memorial for as long as he lived--today the candle still burns in
the school's Cuneo Chapel.
St. Ignatius continued to grow through the 1870s and 1880s, adding
another wing to the 1869 building 1874, and becoming an early
pioneer in the new field of x-ray radiography. In 1895, the
college's enrollment had expanded substantially enough to warrant
the construction of a second building, the 1895 building. Just two
years after the debut of electric power on a grand scale at the
World's Columbian Exposition in Chicago, St. Ignatius demonstrated
its commitment to new technology when the 1895 building was
constructed with integrated electric wiring, and the 1869 building
was retrofitted to accommodate electricity.
In the early 20th century, as Chicago's population boomed the
enrollment of St. Ignatius increased commensurately. In 1922, St.
Ignatius had become so large that the Jesuit order decided to
separate the education of 14-18 year old boys into a "high school"
and the education of adult males into a separate entity that became
Loyola University Chicago. Thus, St. Ignatius Academy was born. The
school continued its mission through the 1950s and 1960s to provide
education to boys from all walks of life. However, by the 1970s St.
Ignatius' buildings had fallen into disrepair, enrollment was
declining, and the school appeared to be poised to become a victim
of urban decay. Fundraising initiatives begun in the 1970s, such as
the "Walk for Ignatius" and annual benefits (the first headlined by
Bob Hope in 1976) helped revive the school's financial health.
In 1980, the school bowed to the pressure of alumni with daughters
and began to admit girls. The infusion of females caused enrollment
to climb. In 1981, Fr. Donald H. Rowe, S.J. was selected by the
Board of Trustees as the school's new President. A charismatic,
dynamic, and controversial figure, Rowe immediately stated his
intention to begin a renaissance for St. Ignatius. Rowe began a
campaign in 1986 to completely restore the 1869 and 1895 buildings,
the latter of which was renamed the Richard H. Driehaus Building.
Additionally, Rowe set his sights on making St. Ignatius a
repository of antique art linked to Chicago's storied past. $60
million was spent restoring the two buildings to their original
architectural designs, including renovations room by room to
restore the building, its flooring, paneling, paint, fixtures, etc.
to be consistent with those of the late 19th-century. The
renovation and restoration continues to this day. St. Ignatius is
recognized on the National Register of Historic Places. In
2001-2002 the exterior of the 1869 building was renovated again and
the slate roof and the decorative copper gutters replaced, with a
stated effort to preserve the building for "centuries to come".
During the 1990s Rowe embarked upon a campaign to construct two
entirely new buildings to specification design and furnishings to
match that of the 19th-century French architectural style of the
1869 and Driehaus Buildings. This round of construction commenced
in 1994 and culminated with the Chicago and McLaughlin Centers'
full completion in 2004. The school was also an early-adopter of
high-speed Internet technology, and in 1999 became one of the first
schools in the United States to become fully Wi-Fi enabled."
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