Printes Row 2013: What Are You Looking At?

Ghost Signs Near Hubbard & Wood

Saw the first one after I left the Printers Ball in July. Simplex Wire is located in Boston, but I doubt this is the same place. There are other helpful words, as well.

Then there's the graffiti guy who tells you what was being sold in the now vacant building on 71st. Back to Hubbard Street, the3rd and 4th photos are really tough.At some point, it would be easier finding an old phone book from the 1920s.

The last photo is on Western. This is all you get, the rest is weeds and part of a shed. Is the first word Fox? There are many Fox Deluxe signs hidden in the city, evidently they ran a smart beer campaign in the 40s and 50s.

Ghosts.

Chicago Aveue Subway

It is kinda neat when you are waiting for a train in the subway at Chicago and State (there is also an elevated stop, the one you most often see in films, at Chicago & Franklin) because, for reasons unknown to me, there is a wall with doorways that separate the northbound and the southbound trains. I have other photos from past years with some pretty decent scenes on the other side of the arches, but I'm only posting here theshots I took a week ago last Monday.

Streator, Illinois

My uncle Bill Pond working on stock cars in his garage, rolling Arrow cigarettes. Auntie Irene chain-smoking Lucky Strikes. While everyone else was playing poker, I'd walk up Illinois Street from Hall to Main and buy comics in the pool hall or at The Bookshelf, which was on the last street before the road dipped down toward Bloomington. I took a lot of photos when I was back there in June, the last time I was there was in the winter of 1991. "There" meaning 1006 Hall Street. The original house is gone, I've known that by looking at Google Earth. But a friend was going to go to Ottawa to take photos of train tracks for the group chicagoswitching.org and I talked him into adding Streator to the list. I honestly wanted to walk the streets of my youth again, but it was enough to take some great train photos. The only place Streator remains now is in my fiction. "Orifices, Because"--an Every Mother's Son tale--is in my collection FOR YOU, THE LIVING by Crossroad Press. "Days of Fiction Past", to be published in DARK HIGHWAYS II one of these days. "Those Kids Again" was in an ancient issue of CEMETERY DANCE. Photos start with my route from Hall Street to Main Street, the two abandoned buildings were a gas station owned by a guy named Syfarchyk and a bar called TEETS.

Gallery 37 at Midway Airport

All of the Gallery 37 paintings were made by students, that much I know, high school students. The latter photos have been around since the late 90s. I wish I could tell you more, there is no sign for them, and the Google is not helping me.

If I have no other choice, I'll need to get a cab home after I get off the Orange Line. Only costs $15.00. But to get to where the cabs are, I have to turn away from the bus terminal, go up the escalator, then go down two halls where the artwork in question hangs on windows overlooking parking areas on the street. There are several more hallways to walk through, each created so that you can look at photos of Chicago or space (provided by the Adler Planetarium). Finally you pass through a big room and there are a dozen pieces of art by scout troops (again, Gallery 37), each of these represent one of the neighborhoods on the south and southwest side of Chicago. I'll post these one day, once I have all the neighborhoods. At the end of the "room", electric doors open, and you are on the second floor of the airport itself, Departure/Arrival signs for Red Eye and next day flights, for the most part. Escalator to ground level and past the empty luggage turnstiles. Out the doors to the long line of people waiting for a longer line of cabs.

I suppose I could have just said here's what I see when I'm going to Midway to catch a flight, but I haven't been on a plane since 2000 (to Denver). Anyhow. Behold said paintings...