Parks and Beaches
For outdoor amusement during the early twentieth century,
Chicagoans, as they still do today, headed for the city's parks and
beaches. During the early part of the century, however, private
enterprise and the city often vied for ownership and control of such
spaces and their activities. Though large city parks had been
established in the mid-nineteenth century, other outdoor recreational
spaces, including cemeteries, amusement parks, and beer gardens remained
in private ownership, much to the dismay of those concerned about the
unchaperoned mixing of men and women or the casual intermingling of
people from different classes, races, or ethnic groups. Likewise, many
of the city's beaches were privately owned up until the early 1930s.
Public control of the lakefront represented in part an attempt to reign
in the behavior of less conservative beach-goers, including those who
used the beaches as a venue for love-making or the procurement of
illicit booze. Click on the links below to learn more about the various
parks and beaches that existed in Jazz Age Chicago. |
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White City,
ca. 1908 |
