Flashback: Navy Pier Through The Years
This 1953 postcard showing University of Illinois at Navy Pier was created by Curt Teich & Co. Found via \<a href=\"http://www.idaillinois.org/cdm/singleitem/collection/lakecou02z/id/765\"\>Illinois Digital Archives\<\/a\>
Chicago Daily News, Inc., photographer.\r\nThis 1921 Chicago Daily News photograph was taken from an airplane. Ships are visible docked along the pier. Credit: Chicago History Museum.
This 1917 Chicago Daily News photograph shows the U.S. Army 3rd Reserve Engineers folding blankets at their cots set up in the building at Municipal Pier (Navy Pier). Credit: Chicago History Museum.
Flickr user \<a href=\"http://www.flickr.com/photos/jarchie/3557850538/in/set-72157618684712248/\"\>jarchie\<\/a\> posted this 1974 photograph of Navy Pier taken from Lake Point Tower. \"This building was immediately West of the entrance to Navy Pier. It is long gone. UIC used it as a field house and mens\' gymnasium when the college was sited on the pier. It was part of the Navy\'s training facility during WWII.\"
Postcard featuring a boat landing at the east end of Municipal (Navy) Pier. Created by V.O. Hammon Publishing Company, from \<a href=\"http://www.idaillinois.org/cdm/singleitem/collection/lakecou02z/id/2854\"\>Illinois Digital Archives\<\/a\>.
This 1917 Chicago Daily News photograph shows members of U.S. Army, 3rd Reserve Engineers, gathering on the cement outside the building at what was then called the Municipal Pier. Credit: Chicago History Museum.
This 1917 postcard was created by Curt Teich & Co. Found via \<a href=\"http://www.idaillinois.org/cdm/singleitem/collection/lakecou02z/id/2898\"\>Illinois Digital Archives\<\/a\>
Found via \<a href=\"http://www.idaillinois.org/cdm/singleitem/collection/lakecou02z/id/106\"\>Illinois Digital Archives\<\/a\>. The back of this 1941 postcard says, \"The Navy Pier is the Largest Commercial and Pleasure Pier in the World, built and controlled by the City of Chicago and is located at the mouth of the Chicago River. It is three quarters of a mile in length and is devoted to commercial and recreational purposes, all the features of which are under Municipal control, open night and day free to the Public. The Pier was built at the cost of five million dollars and was constructed under the supervision of Americas able engineers.\"
This 1915 Chicago Daily News, Inc., photograph shows Frank Paschen, a contractor, and Earl Van Voorst, a civil engineer and city superintendent of Recreation Pier (what Navy Pier, also known as Municipal Pier, was sometimes called) during construction of the pier, which was completed in 1916. Credit: Chicago History Museum.
This 1929 Chicago Daily News photograph shows crowds standing on sidewalks and in the street next a boat docked at Navy Pier. Credti: Chicago History Museum.
This Chicago Daily News photograph was taken on July 19, 1916, taken during a flag raising ceremony at Municipal (Navy) Pier in Chicago. A group of Boy Scouts is looking on, and a girl and two women are holding the flag, while a boy holds the rope to raise the flag. Credit: Chicago History Museum.
Note all of the \"boater hats,\" commonly worn by barbershop quartets, in this 1929 Chicago Daily News photograph of a crowd standing on a plaza next to Navy Pier. Credit: Chicago History Museum.
This 1914 Chicago Daily News photograph shows the old Grand Avenue Pier, which is being filled in with refuse in order to build \"a new municipal pier.\" Credit: Chicago History Museum.
This 1922 Chicago Daily News photograph is a group portrait of the Pageant of Progress beauty queens gathered together on Municipal Pier (Navy Pier) in Chicago. Credit: Chicago History Museum.
Since Navy Pier is gearing up for its next facelift , we thought this would be a good time to look at its previous iterations. Born from the brain of Daniel Burnham, Navy Pier was part of the 1909 "Master Plan of Chicago," although he originally wanted five piers. That'd house a lot of tchotchke shops.
Between 1914 and 1916, the "Municipal Pier"—renamed Navy Pier in 1927—was built at a cost of $4.5 million. It housed soldiers during WWI, then came into its own as an amusement center—aka tourist trap—during the 1920s. But then The Great Depression happened, and then WWII happened. About 60,000 people trained at Navy pier during the war, including future president George H.W. Bush.
In 1946, the University of Illinois moved in, turning the mess hall into "the largest reading room" in Illinois, and it stayed until 1965. Navy Pier hosted a number of festivals and conventions, but when the new McCormick Place opened in 1971 it fell into disuse. It was renovated in 1976 during bicentennial celebrations, then was designated a Chicago Landmark the next year.
Navy Pier's last facelift was in 1995, when it turned into the row of restaurants and tchotchke shops it is today. See the Navy Pier website for the comprehensive timeline .
We found photos and old postcards in the Library of Congress, the Illinois Digital Archives and the Chicago History Museum's Chicago Daily News archives .
It was difficult to find more recently vintage photos, so watch the video below, a collage of photos from ChicagoFest At Navy Pier from 1979 to 1982.
VIDEO
