East Garfield Park area. duration: 4 min, 18 sec. credits: google maps, no profit intended.
Chicago West Side Past and Present
Video and Pictorial Study of all of Chicago's West Side
East Garfield Park area. duration: 4 min, 18 sec. credits: google maps, no profit intended.
So Iam sure you have researched this but I use to provide Health care services to the women and children who lived here when it was Tab House which was run by Interfaith. The Director of Interfaith told us that the house was built by a wealthy Madam who ran a brothel that catered to the wealthy business Tycoons of Chicago before the turn of the century. When the house was built it was outside the city limits so she had not problems, but as the city expanded west the wealthy families that built mansions along Washington and Warren Boulevards objected to the presence of a brothel. The house had an elegant dining room where the Madam wined and dined the wealthy patrons. When I first worked the I recognized the Building as a former Convent of the Mercy nunds where I went to visi with my mother my little sister’s former teacher. The dormitory were built to house the students of St Patrick’s Academy a private Boarding school run by the Mercy nuns. In the early half of the century women often died in childbirth and fathers needed some place to send their children while they worked. The children would live at a boarding school and visit their families on the weekend, The school itself was several blocks west and was bought in the early seventies by the original Mike Square Health Center for whom I also worked from 1070-74. We had our Christmas party in the school building. It was quit beautiful , but Mile Square never had the money to maintain it and they did not secure the building so vandals stripped it and it was eventually torn down.Vista had owned the former convent but they also never maintained it and when Interfaith took the building over for Tab house it was in bad shape they told us. You could tell though that once it had been a beautiful mansion in it’s day. The director of Interfaith also knew that it had been a boarding school in the past. I have been told that the nuns who lived there also taught at other West side parishes early in the century and they would walk west down Washington Boulevard to those schools like Resurrection and St Kate’s and then walk back after school because those parishes did not have convents yet.
thanks for your added input.