First stop this morning is Union Station, recently named by Trains magazine as one of the top ten surviving railway stations in the USA. We then went for breakfast at Lou Mitchell's which is near the startline of Route 66, which they promote. The full diner experience, they open at 05:30 in the morning, handy for an early start.
We leave the CBD heading for a Salvation Army thrift store, definitely on the wrong side of the tracks, where Annette scores a Pyrex Crazy Daisy creamer, 32 cents including tax. We then head for the Magnificent Mile on the north side, one of the smartest shopping districts anywhere. We check out the old Water Tower, a survivor of pre-fire Chicago from 1869.
Mayor Daley is off to China to try and persuade them to bankroll a high-speed train to O'Hare airport. We rode home in a taxi made in South Korea, in the city that once produced the Checker cab. More evidence of decline. There will be no recovery until America learns to make things again.
Picture shows detail of Oliver Typewriter Company building on Dearborn Street. According to a plaque at the site the company went out of business in 1940.
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