 |
| «
Back to Article List
« Back to Parks and Beaches |
|
| «
Back to Article List
« Back to Parks and Beaches |
| Aldermen Favor
Amusement Park
License Committee Refuses Appeal for Ravenswood Prohibition District Fight to be Continued Minority Members Will Carry Property Owners' Protest to the City Council Source: Chicago Daily Tribune, 19 January 1907, pg. 3. Members of the Ravenswood Women's club and the majority of the property owners in that part of the city made a valiant fight before the council license committee yesterday for the laying out of a prohibition district and against the invasion of the residence district of Ravenswood by the "Tyrolean Alps park," with a beer garden attachment. The delegation was so large that it was necessary for the committee to hold its meeting in the council chambers. After hearing the arguments on both sides, including some scathing personalities, and viewing a petition of protest bearing the signatures of 96 per cent of the property owners of the district, six of the aldermen voted not to establish the district. The four other members of the committee who were present announced their intention to make a minority report to the city council. Woman Suffrage Convert Made. After the vote on the proposition was announced Mrs. John McCauliff, 834 Pensacola avenue, said: "For the first time I can see the necessity and value of woman's suffrage. From this moment I am going to fight to place the ballot in the hands of women. I wonder if any of those aldermen have families?" The vote on Ald. Pringle's motion that the committee recommend for passage an ordinance making the desired district "dry" was as follows: YEAS-- Pringle, Roberts, Race, McCoid. NAYS-- Scully, Hoffman, Reece, Dailey, Kowart, Jacobs. Three speakers for each side were heard by the committee and each invoked the aid of the golden rule to carry his point. Plea of Oldest Resident. W. R. Bentley, president of the Ravenswood improvement association, said to be the oldest resident of the district, said after presenting the petition in which the side of the property owners was set forth: "I don't claim to be a reformer. I am only a clerk. I don't own any property except my home, and those whom I represent-- clerks, plumbers, workers of all kinds-- own little or no property other than their homes. "This is the fight of the men and women who wish to keep sacred their homes and who do not wish their children to be subjected to the insults and be compelled to see the debauchery that accompanies an amusement resort of the kind that this is. If it is at all desirable some other district will be perfectly willing to have it, and I do not see why it should be forced upon a community which does not want it." Angry at Women's Presence. W. J. Kelly, 2750 North Western avenue, took up the defense of the amusement park and threw a bomb into the "dry" camp by declaring he could prove that more bottled beer is sold in the already prohibition district of Ravenswood than in any other residence district of Chicago. "I have purchased $40,000 worth of real estate in this district," he said, "and now these church members and reformers, many of whom live outside of the precincts that will be affected, want to dictate to me what I shall place on that land. I say they can't do it." Protection of Homes Asked. Charles Stewart, Wilson avenue and Paulina street, was the next speaker. "The city council," he said, "has no right to thrust into the midst of our homes this objectionable park, which, as everybody knows, will be accompanied by saloons, private dining rooms, and other evils of the sort." E. A. W. Johnson, a former justice of the peace, said if the aldermen would place themselves in the position of the residents of the district, "doing as they would be done by," he felt sure the park would not get a grant for the sale of liquor. Both of the aldermen in the district-- Lippe and Reinberg-- declared against the park, saying that not one family in the district wanted it. Ald. Race will draw up the minority report which will go to the council at its next meeting. The territory proposed as a prohibition district is bounded on the north by a line 300 feet north of Sunnyside avenue, on the south by Montrose boulevard, on the east by Leavitt street, and on the west by North Western avenue. |
|
||||
|
Page authored: 5
August 2000 -
|
||||