Chicago Club

Chicago Club
U.S. National Register of Historic Places
Chicago Club
Location:	Chicago, Illinois
Coordinates:	41°52′36.94″N 87°37′28.73″W / 41.8769278°N 87.6246472°W / 41.8769278; -87.6246472Coordinates: 41°52′36.94″N 87°37′28.73″W / 41.8769278°N 87.6246472°W / 41.8769278; -87.6246472
Built:	1929
Architect:	Granger, Alfred Hoyt; Bollenbacher, John Carlisle
Architectural style:	Romanesque
NRHP Reference#:	05000109 [1]
Added to NRHP:	February 28, 2005

The Chicago Club, founded in 1869, is a private social club located in downtown Chicago. Its membership has included many of Chicago's most prominent businessmen, politicians, and families.

Press coverage

The Chicago Club's by-laws specifically forbid working members of the press from entering the building. The one exception to this rule seems to have been in 1982 when a Chicago Tribune editor was able to obtain limited access. (The club's firm ban on press photographers apparently held as the Tribune produced four water-colour paintings of the club interior in lieu of photographs.)^[2]

"… [T]he interior splendor of the Chicago Club is as private as a stately home in England, which it much resembles in décor. Indeed, few pedestrians passing by the eight-story red-granite clubhouse at Van Buren and Michigan even know what the place is. Club members – with such names as Field, Pullman, Lincoln, McCormick, and Blair – may have shaped Chicago history. But they also have developed a sense of privacy that politely but firmly excludes: 1) The entire world, except for the club's 1,200 carefully selected members; 2) Until recently, women; and 3) Reporters and photographers. "We'll fight to the death on that one," growls one club board member…

An introduction into the business high society that runs the Chicago Club has the flavor of "being a debutante," as one member puts it. How do you get in? Don't ask. How tough is it to join? In a word, very. Not only is there a long waiting list, but an applicant needs a sponsoring member, a seconder, lots of letters of support, and a good deal of patience. Most applicants test the waters first, so formal rejections are few. But not even the well-connected can breeze in. As one recent entrant recalls: "I knew most leading members when I arrived in Chicago, and my sponsor was a senior club member. But he had to take me – personally – to the business offices of all 12 club directors. No, we couldn't do it by phone. We had to book appointements, then make small-talk for half an hour in each place."…

Historians might argue that the Chicago Club no longer has the power it wielded in the days when its "millionaires' table" was the lunchtime gathering place of Marshall Field, George Pullman, N. K. Fairbank, John Crerar, and a half-dozen others, each worth millions in the days when that sum meant something. "Everything to be done in Chicago was discussed by that group, and then word was passed out", as Stanley Field put it. … But a visitor, seated on a lobby sofa, and those who sweep in for lunch, could hardly disagree with the recent pecking-order manual, "Who Runs Chicago?" Its conclusion: "The Chicago Club is the center of power in Chicago. It is mandatory for the city's biggest executives to join it, unless they want to be considered not-so-big executives. There are some society matrons who rank the Casino Club above the Chicago. But hell, you can't make many deals sitting around playing bridge with a a lot of old biddies." "

University of California "Centrality Study"

G. William Domhoff, professor of sociology at the University of California, ran a network analysis study on the membership of think tanks, policy-planning groups, social clubs, trade associations, and opinion-shaping groups across the country for a research project he was doing on San Francisco's Bohemian Club. The Bohemian Club turned out to be the 11th "most connected" organization in the country. Only three social clubs ranked higher: New York's Links Club (3rd), San Francisco's Pacific Union (7th), and The Chicago Club (8th).

Name of Organization	Type of Organization	Centrality Score (0-1)
1. Business Council	Policy-planning group	.95
2. Committee for Economic Development	Policy-planning group	.91
3. Links Club (NY)	Social club	.80
4. Conference Board	Policy-planning group	.77
5. Advertising Council	Opinion-shaping group	.73
6. Council on Foreign Relations	Policy-planning group	.68
7. Pacific Union (SF)	Social club	.67
8. Chicago Club (Chicago)	Social club	.65
9. Brookings Institution	Think Tank	.65
10. American Assembly	Policy-planning group	.65
11. Bohemian Club (SF)	Social Club	.62
12. Century Association (NY)	Social club	.48
13. California Club (LA)	Social club	.46
14. Foundation for American Agriculture	Think tank	.45
15. Detroit Club (Detroit)	Social club	.44
16. National Planning Association	Policy-planning group	.36
17. Eagle Lake (Houston)	Social club	.33
18. National Municipal League	Policy-planning	.33
19. Somerset Club (Boston)	Social club	.32
20. Rancheros Vistadores (Santa Barbara)	Social club	.26

^[3]

See also

• List of American gentlemen's clubs

References

1. ^ "National Register Information System". National Register of Historic Places. National Park Service. 2006-03-15. http://nrhp.focus.nps.gov/natreg/docs/All_Data.html. 
2. ^ "Chicago's Ace of Clubs - How difficult is it to get in? Don't Ask" Anderson, John (April 11, 1982). The Chicago Tribune, p. J12
3. ^ G. William Domhoff, "Social clubs, policy-planning grups, and corporations: A network study of ruling-class cohesiveness," The Insurgent Sociologist, Vo. 5, No. 3, 1975, p. 178.

http://www.thechicagoclub.org/