What we’re about
This group celebrates the birthdays of the inspirations for Chicago’s great streets, by walking the entire length of each street. The streets serve as a narrative thread weaving together disparate communities, industrial remnants and new developments, history and mystery. As of August 2019 we have crossed Chicago for 70 consecutive months, covering streets such as Belmont (11 miles), Lincoln (7 miles), King Drive (12 miles), Lake Street (8 miles), and Western Avenue (24 miles). Walks feature numerous stops at interesting locations on the way, generally chosen “on the spur.”
See also our Facebook group at https://www.facebook.com/groups/WalkingAcro....
Upcoming events (4)
See all- A is for both April and Archer Ave.Burger King, Summit, IL
This will be our 2nd time walking Archer Ave, though there are plenty of you who were not there in Jan 2016 when we did it last. Neither was I, and I love those old thoroughfares that got people where they were going before the interstates. In this case, Archer got our ancestors out to Lockport, which is also well worth a visit.
We'll meet at 10 am at Burger King, 7205 Archer Ave, Summit, IL. We'll walk about 10.5 miles to Archer and State. I'm thinking old-school diner lunch stop at Huck Finn's, but we can sort that out closer to walk time.
Here is Rob's description of the walk from 2016, which includes my favorite bit of Archer lore... Resurrection Mary, the ghost who tries to hitch rides from dance clubs along Archer back home to Resurrection Cemetery.
Here's a little Archer blurb from Preservation Chicago:
Finally, just for kicks, here is some silent footage where filmmaker Bill Birch is trying to get the perfect shot of the #62 navigating the Archer/Ashland overpass, which they were very excited about in 1958, even on a dreary winter day. Birch later filmed the under L tracks cop car pile-up scene in the Blues Brothers, having spent decades filming random Chicago street scenes for the City.
