RIP WTS
by admin
This is the base of what used to be the enclosed water tower at Washburne Trade School. Towers and stairwells are the most difficult parts of old brick factory buildings to demolish, so they are often left standing until the rest of the structure around them is torn down. That’s what happened here, and as the Washburne water tower became more isolated from the rest of the complex (see the gallery below) it began to resemble a monument of some sort. I had naively hoped that it would be left standing, but as you can see that didn’t happen. Now 31st and Kedzie can finally be classified as an 11 acre Empty Lot.
Remember the metal letters above the door to the tower that spelled out “WASHBURNE TRADE SCHOOL”? Me too…I wonder what happened to those.
LINKS: The ForgottenChicago.com page on The Last Days of Washburne, and there are two years worth of blog posts about Washburne in the archives. Now I have to sort through thousands of photos dating back to 2004 and figure out what to do with them. Fun.
Goodbye, old friend. Sad.
I’m so torn about it…
She was my favorite place for many years, and then she became a whore to the UE Photo community.
After a certain point–like, when hundreds of Washburne photos started showing up on flickr and there were groups visiting it almost every weekend–it became hard to see the place with fresh eyes. But wanting to properly document WTS when I started visiting years ago is what made me move from “casual point and shoot snapshot guy” to whatever it is I am now. It is also what made me want to start this website, in a way.
I still think tearing WTS down was a huge waste. Whatever replaces it better be really awesome.
Oh, have no fear, the gravel, weed filled lot is going to be AWESOME!!!
Man , was that a great place to have fun at!!!!
WE lived right in front of the silos on 51st place
Sorry , wrong blog site, we live in front of the Fleishmann Malting Co.