Salvages

i had my eye on this little 19th century two-story gable or hipped wooden frame chicago cottage for weeks after i discovered that a demolition permit was pulled to obliterate it in preparation for a new residential development. after looking it over time and again, i strongly suspected the house might very well date to the 1850's or at the...

salvage operation in progress: more to follow... recovered items cleaned and documented thus far.   end

i've been spending the past couple of weeks visiting the sites of 19th century wood frame structures undergoing demolition. nearly all of these houses have been ravaged time and again with cobbled alterations to the point where any traces revealing visual cues of age, lie squarely in the frame work. i photographically document the demolition from the time the excavator...

the image gallery below provides several collections of 19th and early 20th century fragments and bottles unearthed from various demolition and/or dig sites in the city of chicago. from wolf's point to the wood-lined privy "vault" discovered at the john kent russell house (1855) and everything in between, the gallery reveals an image "database" of buried artifacts left behind long ago by chicagons...

i have yet to post concluding remarks on the final days of the gethsamane missionary baptist church's demolition. i'm so incredibly behind on posting about my involvement in this seemingly endless demolition craze because i'm either out the door at a moment's notice to document yet another site faced with the wrecking ball or taking care of business matters at urban remains. despite...

several matching all original interior antique american square-shaped diminutive ceiling rosette tiles were recently salvaged from a late 19th century corner schlitz saloon or tavern (non-extant) located in chicago. the deeply embossed tiles, along with cove molding and wainscoting used throughout the saloon contained markings indicating the milwaukee corrugating company, milwaukee, wisc., as both the designer and manufacturer. period catalogs distributed by milwaukee...

urban remains is in the final stages of salvaging the a. finkl & sons foundry complex of mind-boggling proportions. this first set of images (shown below) were taken by owner eric j. nordstrom during the initial tour of the entire complex as it sat, frozen in time. the second batch of images represents some of the industrial furniture and artifacts we...

the following images represent a hastily assembled visual overview of the rapid disappearance of the conglomeration of gray-painted brick buildings constructed on a triangular-shaped lot during the latter half of the 19th century. as of this writing, the last of the buildings has been reduced to a pile of debris destined for both the landfill and scrapyard. the two photographs shown...

urban remains recently acquired several matching american industrial depression-era wall-mount oversized air hose reels or "aireels" salvaged from the notable chicago-based a. finkl & sons foundry undergoing demolition. nearly twenty air hose reels were found in various outbuildings scattered around the foundry complex. the wall-mount "aireel" was designed and fabricated by the appleton electric company, chicago, il. the fully functional reel...

my team and i just completed salvaging a multi-story early 20th century chicago residential masonry building with protruding ornamented tin bay window integrated with a cornice topped with opposed pier caps and voluted roofline ornament. the majority of the building's interior underwent several tasteless renovations during its lifespan, so at first glance, we didn't hold much hope in securing anything worthwhile in...

i've been told time and again that my efforts to meticulously document 19th chicago building methods and materials is "pioneering" work that is, or will be appreciated by researchers, historians, architects, homeowners, etc. in the future. however, that might be a polite way of saying it isn't terribly important or perhaps, something most researchers would gloss over - at least at this level of detail...

the other day i was looking over some of the sentimental items in one my storage rooms and i happened across a gargantuan hand-painted pine wood "stick" or gauge that was once affixed to one of three enclosed riveted joint iron reservoirs housed in the tower of the non-extant prairie school style bunte candy factory constructed in 1919. nearly 8 years ago...

shortly after the pre-fire german school building salvage concluded last weekend, we shifted gears and revisited "industrial," by exploring factories, machine shops and warehouses in the chicago area this week to replenish and/or build upon our existing supply of furniture and lighting found in that type of setting. a matching lot of "uhl art steel" side chairs were found in...

the assemblage of wood boards represent a mostly intact mid-19th century early chicago residential "privy vault" pine wood floor that was likely constructed by j.k. russell & company, chicago, il.   the defunct outhouse privy hole or "vault" floor was discovered on the john kent russell house lot, where a garage, constructed in the 1920's protected it for decades. in...

we just salvaged two heavily ornamented cast iron flanking mullion or pilaster endcaps from a victorian era red brick and limestone three-flat combination commercial/residential building shortly before it was brought down by the wrecking ball. the square-shaped single-sided endcaps or "plate guards" were the two most distinctive components of a completely intact and largely unaltered cast iron facade "system" that was likely...

with the exception of the building itself, the only remaining exterior architectural ornament left undisturbed on the historically important augustus bauer-designed german school, a survivor of the great chicago fire, is a simple, yet elegant hand-carved oversized side entrance keystone featuring a a raised and tapered panel integrated with a heavy circle with a deeply recessed opening. the circle may...

for the past two days i've devoted morning, afternoon and evening obsessively thinking about anything and everything pertaining to an augustus bauer-designed building constructed in 1869. the arrival of souvenir hunters, the police, an alderman, and other, largely unhappy individuals coalescing into a rather unnerving and heavily distracting form of preservation backlash that has made my meticulous documentation of the historically important gethsemane missionary baptist church...

a project manager working for chicago-based heneghan wrecking informed me late last week that two adjoining 19th century multi-story brick commercial buildings located along lake street were undergoing demolition in preparation for future development on the site. when i arrived onsite demolition was in progress, with a large crane taking apart the backside of one of the two buildings (possibly a former...

i just finished shooting several recovered artifacts that were used in the construction of a privy vault and cesspool likely constructed between 1855-1865 for chicago carpenter and millwork company owner john kent russell's house (non-extant).  the first of the two unusually-shaped privy vaults was discovered in the northwest corner of the lot earlier this fall, and was likely built in...

the photo gallery below offers hand-picked or "highlighted" artifacts from last week's listings (15 new items are added daily in their respective categories) on the urban remains website. as of this writing, we have surpassed the 22, 300 item mark. the ultimate goal since day one, is to have each and every artifact (housed in the showroom and warehouses), available...