Don't bury Museum jewel in Grant Park -- Libraries and Museums,...

The Museum of Science and Industry celebrates its 75th anniversary this year. According to the museum, it's had 175 million visitors since 1933 and hosted 1.7 million visitors in 2007, including 286,000 school ...

[Catherine]

While I fully agree with the writers' observations about the Museum of Science and Industry, it should also be noted that it was Chicago's famed Marshall Field who built the impressive Palace of Fine Arts building as a gift to Chicago that was later renamed the Museum of Science and Industry.

Marshall Field was one of the driving forces behind the 1983 World's Columbian Exposition that brought the world to Chicago and it was Field's leadership and generosity that made this event possible.

Marshall Field later built the Field Museum and donated the land for The Art Institute and endowed the museum, providing the funds to acquire the art collection. Field also donated the land on which the University of Chicago was built and was the University largest benefactor.

Field's vision for Chicago, combined with his legacy of generosity and leadership that was continued by the Marshall Field's store throughout its 154 history, was central to Chicago development and standing as a world-class city.

Now we face losing one of Chicago's great treasures to private development as the CCM looks to relocate in Grant Park, the city's famed central downtown park by the lake. While there are many museums and cultural institutions, there's only one Grant Park, and once lost to privatization this rare place of natural beauty, free and clear of development, would likely be lost forever.

The public deserves better than to have elected officials and powerful private interests commandeer this protected public parkland for their private use. There are many other sites well suited for the CCM, including its current - and highly subsidized - home on Navy Pier. If the choice came down to preserving Grant Park or losing the CCM, I believe that the the public and downtown Chicago need and benefit more from Grant Park more than it does the CCM. Fortunately, this is not the decision we must make, for the we can have both - a Grant Park open, clear and free of development as well as a CCM on any one of a number of ideal locations.

[Tim]

Don't forget that Marshall Field's leadership and generosity also gave Chicago the Shedd Aquarium, named after Field's successor at the store, John G. Shedd.

Just as Marshall Field's is an iconic institution lost to make way for what was presented to the city as "progress" that amounted to nothing more than prime real estate for Macy's generic brand to expand into the region, Grant Park is another unique Chicago feature that is threatened in the name of progress. This time, to make room for the CCM to expand and relocate into prime real estate.

In both cases, Chicago stands to lose much more than it gains and the public outcry, if unheeded by the CCM as it was by Macy's, will likely result in the new CCM being as disliked and resented as is Macy's.

Grant Park is to Chicago what Hyde Park is to London, Central Park is to New York, and the Tuileries are to Paris. We owe it to future generations to preserve Grant Park just as those before us did. Where it not for the protections respected thus far, Grant Park wouldn't be here as it is today, open, clear and free of buildings and private development. Grant Park certainly wasn't protected from development all these years simply so that the CCM could build there today!

We allowed Macy's to disregard the best interests of Chicago when they replaced Marshall Field's. Let's not make the same mistake with the CCM. While there's every possibility that Field's can be restored, if the CCM builds its 100,000 square foot building on 1.74 acres of land in Grant Park, it would be a momentous task to have it removed and would be more likely to be the start of more development.