Chicago's Cook County Hospital Saved
By Margaret Foster | From Preservation | Aug. 16, 2007
Terra cotta facade of Cook County Hospital, Chicago
Credit: Tomasz Szymanski, Landmarks Illinois
A Beaux Arts hospital in Chicago that was the inspiration for "ER" has a promising future as an office building. Earlier this month, the Cook County board presented plans to renovate the 93-year-old hospital, reversing its 2003 decision to raze it.
"We are absolutely ecstatic about the outcome of this five-year battle to save Old Cook County Hospital," says David Bahlman, executive director of Landmarks Illinois. "It's a preservation success that doesn't happen very often."
Located two miles west of the Loop, the 625,000-square-foot hospital, completed in 1914, was known as the Statue of Liberty of hospitals for its treatment of all patients, rich and poor.
In 2004 the National Trust for Historic Preservation to placed Cook County Hospital on its list of America's 11 Most Endangered Places. The National Trust's Midwest Office, along with Bahlman's group, advocated for the reuse of the building—and won.
"We basically forced the Cook County commissioners into doing a master plan and looking at their space needs," Bahlman says.
The $140 million renovation plan, which still awaits final approval, includes the demolition of a nurses' dormitory.
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