1923, Chicago's Highways Old and New by Milo M Quaife, HB 1st ILLUS + MAPS

Description: VERY NICE EXCELLENT CONDITION BOOK ON THE HIGHWAYS OF CHICAGO PUBLISHED IN 1923. Authored by Milo M. Quaife, with an Introduction by Joy Morton, FIRST PRINTING IN OCTOBER OF 1923, published by D.F. Keller. The book is in EXCELLENT TO NEAR FINE CONDITION. The only wear issues are with the board, and those issues are very slight - light board edge wear, moderate corner wear, clear unrubbed gilt titling front board and spine. No interior marks, 278 clean and solidly bound pages, slight age-toning around the page edges. SEVERAL MAPS (only two shown in listing photos) AND MANY B&W ILLUSTRATIONS. A nice review of the book found online: "Chicago's busiest highway went from Detroit to Chicago. The 300 miles by stagecoach cost around $30. The journey, optimistically advertised as six days, could last several weeks. Seating was three across on a hard narrow bench. Passengers painfully bumped knees with those opposite--often for 24 hours straight. Part of the journey might be in an open farm wagon. The road was a winding Indian trail improved just enough for the stagecoach to strike tree stumps instead of trees. Heat, cold, choking dust and ravenous mosquitoes added to the bruising experience. In the frequent muddy patches, passengers hopped out to assist the horses and walked or helped push. Often the coach would hit some obstacle, ejecting everybody into the mud or a swollen river. Drownings were not uncommon. If the impact broke a wheel, passengers walked several miles to the nearest house to spend the night. Taverns, the hotels of the time, served meals of bread, butter and salt pork at a community table. Everybody discarded manners to spear the choicest bits. Flies were common, cleanliness not. Ah, bedtime. Beds were shared with one or two strangers, the floor with many. Bedbugs provided company to all. Other highways to Chicago had their own wonders. Long lines of Hoosier wagons used State Street to bring farm products to Chicago. Southwest of downtown was the Nine Mile Swamp, described as the worst road in the West. Travelers on Green Bay Road occasionally perished from starvation or Indian attack. Some tavern keepers in Southern Illinois specialized in robbery and murder. Chicago Highways Old and New tells these stories, and more, about the roads leading to Chicago. The early highway era lasted from the 1790s until the coming of the railroads in the 1850s. The map is a Chicago history classic itself. Like Andreas, Quaife was a giant of Chicago historical literature. He wrote or edited hundreds of books and articles about Chicago, the Midwest and the West, including forty-three of the Lakeside Classics. In 1959, at age 79, he died prematurely in an automobile accident. He was still editing the Lakeside Classics and working on other books." B69

Price: 70 USD

Location: Chevy Chase, Maryland

End Time: 2024-11-24T20:40:24.000Z

Shipping Cost: 6 USD