This past event may be viewed on YouTube at the link below, and it includes subtitles in English and Spanish.

Principal and Architectural Historian Erica Ruggiero of McGuire Igleski & Associates, Inc. presented an overview about the Central Manufacturing District’s origins, heyday, and decline, and the fight to save this one-of-a-kind industrial landmark.

“Build it… and they will come.” This was the philosophy Frederick Henry Prince was operating under when he acquired the Chicago Junction Railroad in 1892 and began building an innovative industrial “office park” along the rail line. Twenty million dollars later, Chicago’s Central Manufacturing District encompassed over 900 acres between six tracts of land and included streets, sewers, rail facilities, docks, an architecture and engineering department, and on-site gardeners– as well as clients including Goodyear Tires, the U.S. Army, William Wrigley & Co., Westinghouse Electric, and more.