In the summer of 1882, architect Henry Hobson Richardson traveled to Europe from his home outside Boston. His goal was to experience firsthand the Medieval buildings of France, Italy and Spain that had influenced his own work but that he had previously seen only in drawings or photographs.  

Richardson wrote ten letters home during his journey, noting the cities he visited and the buildings he admired. Following his return from Europe, Richardson designed some of the most significant buildings of his career, including the Allegheny County government complex in Pittsburgh, and in Chicago, the Glessner House and Marshall Field Wholesale Store. Richardson died less than four years later at the age of 47.

 In 2025, Boston-area architect and photographer Michael Kuchta retraced part of Richardson’s 1882 travels in Spain, visiting the cities of Madrid, Salamanca, Avila, Zamora, and Zaragoza. Where possible, Kuchta replicated the photographs that Richardson collected during his journey. Like the pilgrims who each year travel to Santiago de Compostela in search of spiritual guidance, Kuchta traced a ‘camino de Richardson’ seeking wisdom about the nature of Richardson’s creative genius. 

Bronzeville is a large neighborhood on the city’s South Side running south of Cermak Road between Lake Michigan and King Drive on the east and the Dan Ryan Expressway on the west; 47th Street was and remains the hub of the neighborhood. During the “Great Migration” of the 1910s, the population of the area increased dramatically as Black Americans fled the segregated South in search of jobs and an improved quality of life. Residents included Ida B. Wells, Margaret Taylor-Burroughs, Gwendolyn Brooks, Lou Rawls, Louis Armstrong, and many others. A portion of the neighborhood was designated as the Chicago landmark Black Metropolis District in 1998.

Historian Bernard Turner will discuss how Bronzeville became a Black Metropolis and why it is now a National Heritage Area. He will take a look at the places and people who tell the important story of Bronzeville and how it has become an international tourist destination and cultural epicenter.

Our free annual program in honor of Black History Month is co-sponsored by Glessner House, Friends of Historic Second Church, Quinn Chapel A.M.E. Church, and Second Presbyterian Church.

Chicago artist, historian, and preservationist Jack Simmerling (1935-2013) was passionate about Prairie Avenue. Jack first visited the fabled street as a young boy, when he accompanied his grandfather on a visit to a friend working as the caretaker of the old Marshall Field mansion at 1905 S. Prairie. As a teenager, Jack obtained a job working with the wrecking crew tearing down the old houses, salvaging architectural fragments which soon filled his house. As a budding artist, he began creating oil paintings of the houses, and what they may have looked like in their prime. Shortly before his death in 2013, he bequeathed his entire collection of Prairie Avenue fragments and artwork to Glessner House.

In October 2025, the Ridge Historical Society, in partnership with Glessner House, opened an exhibit on Jack Simmerling entitled “Jack Simmerling: Through His Eyes,” in honor of the 90th anniversary of his birth. One half of the exhibit features a detailed look at his life and includes a selection of fragments and artworks - oil paintings, watercolors, and pen and ink sketches - from the Simmerling Collection at Glessner House. The other half of the exhibit focuses on his work documenting the architecture and history of the Beverly Hills and Morgan Park neighborhoods where he lived and operated his business, The Heritage Gallery, for more than fifty years.

This very special event will include a private tour of the exhibit by the co-curators - Bill Tyre from Glessner House, and Tim Blackburn from the Ridge Historical Society. After the exhibit tour, participants will have the rare opportunity to visit the historic 1866 Ingersoll-Blackwelder house nearby. Jack Simmerling purchased the house in 1970, restored it to its former glory, and filled it with his massive collection of architectural fragments, some of which remain today. The event will conclude with a wine and cheese reception at the house.

Join us in the beautiful home of The Fortnightly of Chicago for our annual gala, Celebrating Frances Glessner.

Frances Macbeth Glessner (1848-1932) was an extraordinarily gifted woman. Her talents ranged from embroidery to silversmithing, and jewelry making to beekeeping. An accomplished pianist, she and her husband John were among the most devoted supporters of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra during the first four decades of its existence, regularly welcoming the leading musicians of the world into their home.

The event, styled as a summer garden party, will include small bites and beverages, and the opportunity to tour the former home of Bryan and Helen Lathrop, an 1892 Georgian Revival masterpiece by McKim, Mead & White, which has served as the home of The Fortnightly since 1923. Frances Glessner was an active member of The Fortnightly for more than 50 years and presented the organization with a beautiful silver sweetmeat dish in 1905, which will be on display.

A brief program will include a welcome from the current president of The Fortnightly, remarks on Frances Glessner and her impact on Chicago, and the presentation of the annual John and Frances Glessner Award to Linda Miller, president of Friends of Historic Second Church.