Politically and socially, would Chicago fit in better with the east coast?

[Tex?Il?]

Originally Posted by savalas

What about Milwaukee?

I was thinking the same thing. Milwaukee, Cincinnati, and St. Louis are the most Germanic major cities in the U.S. They were the corners of the "German triangle"

[5Lakes]

Originally Posted by Tex?Il?

I was thinking the same thing. Milwaukee, Cincinnati, and St. Louis are the most Germanic major cities in the U.S. They were the corners of the "German triangle"

Do Milwaukee and St. Louis have a big Oktoberfest? You're right, it would make sense that they would but I just know that Cincinnati has the biggest.

Anyway, I'll take the German fests in Lincoln Square any day over St. Patrick's day regardless of which is the bigger deal.

[grapico]

No...Chicago while not at the far end of the social and politically conservative spectrum, is by no means a peer of the east coast cities in this either. Chicago gets its liberalness from the working class.

[mas23]

Originally Posted by Tex?Il?

There have been several threads like this in the past, including some that I have put together myself.

I would say no, unless you think that Atlanta is not a southern city, just because it is bigger and more cosmopolitan than Charlotte, Birmingham, etc.etc.

Here are some reasons why despite being as big as it is, Chicago is midwestern in more ways than people realize, in ways that go beyond simple geographic location.

BTW: A great book to read that discusses this very well is "Cities of the Heartland: The rise and fall of the industrial midwest." by John C. Teaford.

Boston, New York, and Washington D.C. (Philly and Baltimore more so never had the huge industrial complexes that Chicago had. On the east coast, manufactuing In terms of the huge industrial complexes, Chicago while being more economically diversified, does share this with Detroit, and St. Louis, etc. The east coast cities were never became major producers of steel, and stuff made from steel. As well as beer. There was always a larger focus on goods like textiles, clothing, etc.

Chicago, while having many residential high rises, does not have row houses to the same extent as the east coast. (and one midwest city: Cincinnati has neighborhoods that surround downtown, which are architecturally more like Greenwich Village than anything Chicago has (Over the Rhine). Chicagos inner neighborhoods are dominated by "workers' cottages" Peaked roof houses that while sit on lots that are no bigger than a postage stamp, nonetheless are detached.

Chicago is simply bigger, and like you said more diverse, etc. so is going to be "ahead of the curve" than Detroit, Cleveland, Cincinnati, St. Louis, and Milwaukee. That is what makes people think otherwise. Earlier in the 20th century Chicago was no more diverse than the other cities of the great lakes. Cleveland and Detroit had huge Greek, Jewish, Polish populations. And although they don't have the same migration as the did back then, some places like metro Detroit have the largest Arab population in the country.

But these cities are changing too, with more young adults living downtown. Growing with their hispanic population. In fact Detroit more than anywhere else is one city that has the fewest barriers to innovation, where artists are flocking from New York to take advantage of the dirt cheap loft space in the old factories.

On the other hand, if you look at Google earth, there are not the enormous vacant lots where there used be railyards, steel mills (The empty land of the south shore works is larger than the entire loop: does that exist in Boston, D.C. or New York. (maybe in Philly).

Here are few other things to consider: There is an active, working steel mill (Finkel) on the western edge of Lincoln Park, one of the most fashionable neighborhood in Chicago. Lakeview, the second most lively neighborhood revolves around a ballpark where people eat hot dogs and drink Old Style. There is not even a major sports venue on Manhattan itself. The mets and Yankees are not nearly a center of focus to many Manhattanites, the way the Cubs are in Chicago. I mean Wrigley Field is often considered a top attraction! Other coastal cities are way to transient to develop those team loyalties, to the extent as they are in Chicago.


IMO, transient and transplant go along with being more diverse and cosmopolitan. Others may disagree.


Also, Chicago doesn't really have the unique career opportunities that bring in the absolute most ambitious, dream seekers that the highest level ivy leagues of the Boston area do, or the federal national politics of D.C., the entertainment industry or LA, or the high tech of the Bay Area. (Obviously there are hugely ambitious people in Chicago, and many movers and shakers of all kinds, but it doesn't have those niches).

Really the types of careers, industries, and jobs that Chicago offers are really not fundamentally different than Dallas or Houston. Finance, corporate headquarters, etc.

Is Dallas, Austin or Houston more like California cities because they are more glitzy, and culturally diverse than the rest of Texas? If not, then neither is Chicago an east coast city.

St louis' overall architecture is alot like the east cost also

[Tex?Il?]

Originally Posted by mas23

St louis' overall architecture is alot like the east cost also

Very true.

The two river cities of St. Louis and Cincinnati got somewhat big before the great lakes cities in the mid-19th century, and therefore have more architecture that is similar (IE: true row houses, etc.) to what is seen in Baltimore, Philly, Boston, etc.

[edsg25]

In many ways, Chicago transends the middle west and is shares a lot with the east coast.

I think there is an important connection between the city's growth and the growth of east coast cities that goes unnoticed.

certainly places like Boston and Philadelphia began life far earlier than Chicago did. The were colonial cities; Chicago was a city of the American frontier.

But if you look at the midpoint of the 19th century, American cities were all in the "new phase", not a one had come of age. And America was still a rural nation.

It was in the era after the Civil War when true urbanization took place in the United States. The real rise of cities began with the industrialization of that was only enhanced by the war itself.

afterwards, the victorious North took the lead over the defeated and agrarian South. The true era of city building, on a massive scale began. Immigrants poured into New England, Middle Atlantic, and Midwestern cities, industries boomed, rail service has become extensive.

The Eastern Establishment still ruled the roost. The nation was run by forces that tended to be east of the Appalachians after, after the Civil War, solidly north of the Mason Dixon line.

The Midwest grew in industry and transportation, but it was still backwater compared to the east coast. Indeed, the same could be said for California before WWII and jet travel and a truly continental nation.

In the backwater Midwest, one city stood out among all others. Obviously it was Chicago. To start with, it was, more than any other, the most direct in meaningful lineage to the east coast in general and to New York specifically.

Chicago was the client city of NYC. New York was betting on its own future when it bet on Chicago. Chicago served New York like nowhere else in the Midwest. Indeed, the most powerful city of the mid-19th century, St. Louis, was at counter purposes of what New York wanted.

New York had shot ahead of its east coast rivals, Boston and Philadelphia, principly on its state's construction of the Erie Canal, an gateway through the Appalachians to the west that neither Boston or Philadelphia had or could create.

And that system of Gotham's rise...from NYC to the Hudson, the Mohawk, the Erie Canal, the Great Lakes, and on to Chicago built an east-west access that determined the real growth in America. St. Louis was about North-South river trade and New Orleans. Chicago, the client of New York, was about NY Harbor and the Atlantic.

Besides, of course, St. Louis was pretty much knocked out of the picture by the Civil War.

What ended up happening was that the real ferment of the American city in its growth in business, culture, and as an urban laboratory of social change took place mainly in the east coast's three great cities....New York, Philadelphia Boston....as well as the only middlewestern city that was able to generate such prowess, that being Chicago.

Even topography took its part: the confined limits to centralized growth that saw Chicago compact and soar in the space defined by Lake Michigan and the main and south branches of the Chicago River, the Loop itself, was somewhat akin to the type of concentration that was the story of Manhattan.

So much of what truly took place in American urbanization between the Civil War and WWI took place in New York, Boston, Philadelphia, and Chicago above all others. Chicago had a bond with those east coast cities like nothing else in the Midwest.

So we are historically linked, our true growth coming from the same era as the true growth of NY, Bos, and Philly.

Indeed, I will take this argument one step further:

take the northeast quadrant of the United States (I'll define it as east of the Mississippi and north of Ohio River and the Mason Dixon line) and look the cities of this region, from Boston to St. Louis.

I will contend that there is other one city in the other three (SE, SW, NW) quadrants of the nation that is cut from the mold of these cities:

San Francisco.

San Francisco alone outside of the east and midwest, truly came of age during the post-Civil War era of the later half of the 19th century. SF alone concentrated in tight boundaries (defined by ocean, bay, and the water of the golden gate that connects them) and real growth of population and urban stature.

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on another note completely removed from the above:

I would agree with those posters who claim a link between Chicago and Minneapolis in the sense of culture and uran quality of lives. Mpls differed from the true rust belt cities in that it was able to keep its quality of life high because it didn't go through industrializaiton. Chicago, of course, did but its white collar strengths were just too powerful to be as dominated by blue collar as other midwestern cities.

In some respects though, i don't think there is a city as similiar to Chicago as is Milwaukee. It alone of the nation's larger cities is within our backyard and there is no city in which Chicago has been more tied on a local basis than Milwaukee. We're linked. And even our lakefronts of park and harbor and beach is shared. And IMHO, Milwaukee has held up better than some of its midwestern peers because of its proximity to Chicago.

Other than that, I find that two college towns in particular, Madison and Ann Arbor, carry some of the attributes of the east coast.

Madison is, IMHO, in a virtual class by itself among mid-sized cities in the Midwest (I'm talking about once you get past the likes of Chgo, Mil, M/SP, StL, KC, Det, Indy, Cle, Cin, and Col). It is liberal. And the isthmus makes for an urban concentration like few other places in the nation.

Ann Arbor is carried more by its college town status and the prowess of U-M which is legendary. It is home to endless numbers of east coast students.

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sorry if it seems I've been all over the place on this one (I have); I may have included far more unrelated stuff than was necessary.