Our man with the unflinching lens, photojournalist Jon Randolph, took his camera to Bronzeville recently. An historic old Chicago neighborhood just south of McCormick Place and extending down to the old blues, doo-wop, and commercial mecca of 47th Street and beyond, Bronzeville is being rediscovered these days.
The Mahogany dress shop
260 E. 35th St.
Illinois Institute of Technology
Campus Center
3201 S. State St.
One Stop Foods
4301 S. Lake Park Ave.
301 E. 43rd St.
The Mahogany dress shop, again
108 E. 35th St.
The arbiters of all that is hot and cool in this town may be rediscovering Bronzeville as if it somehow went away for a few years. But, as Randolph's pix illustrate, this community has never stopped being vibrant.
Once dubbed "The Black Metropolis," Bronzeville is home, in addition to IIT with its remarkable Mies van der Rohe architecture, the Illinois College of Optometry, VanderCook College of Music, Shimer College, and Wendell Phillips Academy.
Back in the 1930s, newspaper editor James Gentry popularized the new name because it accurately described the skin color of its inhabitants.
Be here next Friday for more Randolph Street. The Third City is here everyday for your reading and dawdling pleasure.
