Professor Carl Smith, Franklyn Bliss Snyder Professor of English & American Studies Studies in American Culture will teach “The Plan of Chicago” in spring quarter, 2009.
The Plan of Chicago, whose centennial will be observed in 2009, is often called the Burnham Plan, after its principal author, leading architect Daniel Burnham (who lived in Evanston and whose firm designed several Evanston buildings, including Fisk Hall, as well as major buildings in Chicago and other American cities). Inspired by his triumphant success as director of construction of the 1893 World's Columbian Exposition, Burnham became a founder of modern American city planning, including proposals for Washington, Cleveland, and San Francisco, as well as Manila.
The culmination of his career as a city planner was his work, with several other prominent Chicagoans, on the Plan of Chicago. Arguably the most influential document in the history of American urban planning, the Plan is the result of exhaustive thinking and extensive discussion. Published as a book, it is full of stirring prose and magnificent illustrations. It proposed many of the city's most distinctive features, including its lakefront parks and roadways, the Magnificent Mile, and Navy Pier. It established the concept of comprehensive city planning in the United States and encouraged the re-conceptualization of urban life itself.