Julia C. Lathrop Homes is a

Chicago Housing Authority The Chicago Housing Authority (CHA) is a municipal corporation that oversees public housing within the city of Chicago. The agency's Board of Commissioners is appointed by the Mayor of Chicago, city's mayor, and has a budget independent from that ...

(CHA)

public housing Public housing, also known as social housing, refers to Subsidized housing, subsidized or affordable housing provided in buildings that are usually owned and managed by local government, central government, nonprofit organizations or a ...

project A project is a type of assignment, typically involving research or design, that is carefully planned to achieve a specific objective. An alternative view sees a project managerially as a sequence of events: a "set of interrelated tasks to be ...

located along the line between the

Lincoln Park Lincoln Park is a park along Lake Michigan on the North Side of Chicago, Illinois. Named after US president Abraham Lincoln, it is the city's largest public park and stretches for from Grand Avenue (500 N), on the south, to near Ardmore Avenu ...

and

North Center North Center is one of the 77 community areas of Chicago, Illinois, located in the city's North Side. North Center is bordered on the north by Montrose Avenue, on the south by Diversey Parkway (Chicago), Diversey Parkway, on the west by the Chic ...

neighborhoods on the north side of

Chicago Chicago is the List of municipalities in Illinois, most populous city in the U.S. state of Illinois and in the Midwestern United States. With a population of 2,746,388, as of the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, it is the List of Unite ...

Illinois Illinois ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Midwestern United States, Midwestern United States. It borders on Lake Michigan to its northeast, the Mississippi River to its west, and the Wabash River, Wabash and Ohio River, Ohio rivers to its ...

, United States. It is bordered by the neighborhoods of Bucktown and Roscoe Village. Completed in 1938 by the

Public Works Administration The Public Works Administration (PWA), part of the New Deal of 1933, was a large-scale public works construction agency in the United States headed by United States Secretary of the Interior, Secretary of the Interior Harold L. Ickes. It was ...

, Lathrop Homes was one of the first Chicago public housing projects. Lathrop Homes was placed on the National Register of Historic Places in 2012 and is currently undergoing restoration. Lathrop Homes consists of two-story brick row houses and three- and four-story apartment buildings separated by landscaped courtyards and linked by small archways in a campus-like arrangement.Lathrop Homes: RFQ Released
, Featured Advocacy Efforts,

Landmarks Preservation Council of Illinois The Landmarks Preservation Council of Illinois – also known as Landmarks Illinois – is a not-for-profit organization founded in 1971 to prevent the demolition of the Dankmar Adler and Louis Sullivan designed Chicago Stock Exchange Building. ...

. There are a total of 925 units on 35.5 acres of land (approximately three and a half square blocks).Julia C. Lathrop Homes
Chicago's Seven Most Threatened Buildings 2007,

Preservation Chicago Preservation Chicago is a historic preservation advocacy group in Chicago, Illinois, which formally commenced operations on October 23, 2001.

(pdf)

History

Named for social reformer

Julia Clifford Lathrop Julia Clifford Lathrop (June 29, 1858 – April 15, 1932) was an American social reformer in the area of education, social policy, and children's welfare. As director of the United States Children's Bureau from 1912 to 1922, she was the first wom ...

, Lathrop Homes was one of the city's first public housing projects. The homes were built by the

in 1938 and initially leased to the Chicago Housing Authority.Harvey M. Choldin
"Chicago Housing Authority,"
Electronic Encyclopedia of Chicago, Chicago Historical Society, 2005. The buildings were designed in a

Prairie School Prairie School is a late 19th and early 20th-century architectural style, most common in the Midwestern United States. The style is usually marked by horizontal lines, flat or hipped roofs with broad overhanging eaves, windows grouped i ...

Arts and Crafts The Arts and Crafts movement was an international trend in the Decorative arts, decorative and fine arts that developed earliest and most fully in the British Isles and subsequently spread across the British Empire and to the rest of Europe and ...

style with details in a range of styles from

Art Moderne Streamline Moderne is an international style of Art Deco architecture and design that emerged in the 1930s. Inspired by Aerodynamics, aerodynamic design, it emphasized curving forms, long horizontal lines, and sometimes nautical elements. In indu ...

Colonial Revival The Colonial Revival architectural style seeks to revive elements of American colonial architecture. The beginnings of the Colonial Revival style are often attributed to the Centennial Exhibition of 1876, which reawakened Americans to the arch ...

.Alan G. Brake
"Eyes on the Project: Top tier team to rethink, not raze, PWA housing gem,"
''Architects Newspaper'', February 19, 2012. The designers were a "dream team" led by Robert S. De Golyer and also including Hugh M.G. Garden, Thomas E. Tallmadge, Vernon Watson,

E.E. Roberts Eben Ezra Roberts (1866–1943) was an American architect known for his work in the early modern Prairie style, pioneered by Frank Lloyd Wright, as well as other traditional residential styles. Roberts was born in Boston and attended architec ...

, Charles White and Hubert Burnham, with landscaping by Jens Jensen.Lathrop Homes
, Chicagoland Watch List, Landmarks Preservation Council of Illinois, 2010. In 1959, the authority added an 8-story building to house seniors to the south side of the project.Ian Fullerton
"Historic tag for Lathrop? State agency recommends housing complex for national landmark status"
, ''Skyline'' December 15, 2010. In keeping with the federal neighborhood segregation policy of the time, the development was intended for whites only. As the development matured, it became racially integrated,Megan Cottrell
"Residents, public housing officials at odds over mixed-income development plan,"
''Chi-Town Daily News'', October 24, 2008. and has been called "the city's most diverse public housing neighborhood".

Crime and gangs

In recent decades, the Julia C. Lathrop homes have been subject to many of the same problems of increasing crime as other housing projects in Chicago, including narcotics trafficking and gang activity. The housing project was dominated by the

Latin Kings The Almighty Latin King and Queen Nation (ALKQN, ALKN, or LKN, also known as simply Latin Kings) is a gang active primarily in the United States. The gang was founded by Puerto Ricans in Chicago, Illinois, in 1954. The Latin Kings are one of t ...

street gang.

Proposed redevelopment

In July 2006, the Chicago Housing Authority announced its intention to demolish the Lathrop Homes and redevelop the site. Residents and preservationists protested and

Landmarks Illinois The Landmarks Preservation Council of Illinois – also known as Landmarks Illinois – is a not-for-profit organization founded in 1971 to prevent the demolition of the Dankmar Adler and Louis Sullivan Louis Henry Sullivan (September 3, 18 ...

developed a plan to renovate the complex as affordable "

green Green is the color between cyan and yellow on the visible spectrum. It is evoked by light which has a dominant wavelength of roughly 495570 nm. In subtractive color systems, used in painting and color printing, it is created by a com ...

" housing. In early 2011, the authority cleared residents from the north end of the development; in November 2011, it awarded the redevelopment contract for the site to a team with experience in architectural preservation and sustainability. In October 2012, the Chicago Housing Authority approved the demolition of 1800 units including some from Lathrop Homes; however, how many of those demolitions relate to Lathrop Homes and when demolition would begin was not announced."CHA approves demolition plan"

WBEZ WBEZ (91.5 FM) – branded ''WBEZ 91.5'' – is a non-commercial educational radio station licensed to Chicago, Illinois, and primarily serving the tri-state region of the Chicago metropolitan area. It is owned by Chicago Public Media and is f ...

, October 16, 2012.

National Register of Historic Places

In 1994, the

Illinois Historic Preservation Agency The Illinois Historic Preservation Division, formerly Illinois Historic Preservation Agency, is a governmental agency of the U.S. state of Illinois, and is a division of the Illinois Department of Natural Resources. It is tasked with the duty of ...

and the

National Park Service The National Park Service (NPS) is an List of federal agencies in the United States, agency of the Federal government of the United States, United States federal government, within the US Department of the Interior. The service manages all List ...

determined the Julia C. Lathrop Homes to be eligible for listing on the

National Register of Historic Places The National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) is the Federal government of the United States, United States federal government's official United States National Register of Historic Places listings, list of sites, buildings, structures, Hist ...

. In December 2010, the Illinois Historic Sites Advisory Council advised that it be listed. It was listed on the National Register .

References

{{National Register of Historic Places Residential buildings completed in 1938 Public housing in Chicago Houses on the National Register of Historic Places in Chicago Tallmadge & Watson buildings Public Works Administration in Illinois