October 30-31, 1971: A Visit to Muskegon, Michigan
	July 18-August 7, 1971: My Return Home From Korea
	Return to the Index for 1971

NOTE:
You'll note that there is a pretty long gap in the album here. The reason is that during my period of getting set up in my apartment, getting my new duty assignment (which was to work as a deputy Finance Officer for Fort Harrison at first, and then to move to being a Project Officer for the JUMPS-Army Project), and beginning to get my feet on the ground on post and off, I didn't take that many pictures.

And it is the pictures that I've taken which are the raison-d'etre for the album. This photo album is not a complete diary, unless those "diary entries" involve the explanation or description of one or more photos I've taken. When I do end up taking some photos around Fort Harrison or at my apartment complex, I'll show you around those locations as well.

For now, though, I want to describe the next event that DID result in some photographs being taken, and that was my first visit to Chicago- now just a little under 200 miles away.

One of the officers you saw on some earlier pages this year devoted to goings-on at the Camp Howze Officers Club, Ed Haywood, was one of my best friends at Camp Howze. He rotated back to the States in March, I believe, a few months before me. We stayed in touch, and in September, after I'd gotten my "sea legs" at the Finance Center, I called him in Chicago to see if we might arrange a visit. The date was set for this weekend, October 16th-17th.

I got directions from Ed to his apartment in Evanston, a suburb on the north side of Chicago itself. Ed was married before he went to Korea, and he had a little girl already. Ed worked at the Hugh Leather Company on the west side of downtown Chicago.

I left my apartment early on Saturday morning, went around the north side of Indianapolis, and then took I-65 north to the Chicagoland area. South of the city, I headed west on I-90 for a short stretch, and then followed I-90 as it turned north again to pass by downtown Chicago on the west. (This Interstate Highway continues past Chicago and out to the Northwest past Madison, Wisconsin, and then it heads west all the way to Seattle.)

I wasn't going that far, though. Following Ed's directions (which he gave me when I expressed an interest in driving through downtown Chicago on the way to his house, I got off of I-90 at Ohio Street and headed east.

At right is my route through downtown Chicago. I did not know it at the time, but Ohio Street is north of the Chicago River, and the actual center of downtown, where most of the taller buildings are, is south of the river. But I took Ohio Street (taking a picture at point #1 while I was stopped at a light) to the intersection with Michigan Avenue, and then turned north. Michigan Avenue is called "The Magnificent Mile" for all the high-end stores that line the street, and all the expensive apartment buildings nearby.

A short distance north I saw the iconic Chicago Water Tower ahead of me, and I took a picture of it and some of the buildings around the Avenue (at point #2). Just past that I saw the John Hancock Center, the newly-completed (1969) second-tallest building in the country (located at point #3). I pulled over to the side of the avenue and found a place to park for a moment, got out of the car, and took an unfortunately bad picture looking up at the tower. This was not a nice day in Chicago; it was overcast and threatening.

I hopped back in my car and continued north on Michigan Avenue, merging onto Lake Shore Drive, the iconic Chicago expressway that runs ten miles north from here all the way to Hollywood Ave. Just a half mile up, I saw a turnout for North Avenue Beach (point #4) where I was able to stop, get out, and take a picture looking back the way I had come. This area is known as Chicago's "Gold Coast", as the most exclusive places to live in the city are right along Lake Shore Drive at this point.

Here are all four of those pictures:

(#1) On Ohio Avenue, Looking East

(#2) The Chicago Water Tower, Looking North

(#3) The John Hancock Center

(#4) Looking South at Chicago's Gold Coast

NOTE from 1979:
This year, I took all the letters that had accompanied my slide home, and all the other narratives I had written so far, and typed them all up neatly on my new IBM Selectric typewriter. A lot has happened since this particular page was created, not the least of which was the fact that I did this re-typing in my 36th-floor condominium in Chicago!

That's right; I will eventually (actually not so far in the future) move here to live, and wind up buying my own apartment in a building that was just being completed at the time I took picture #4 above. Even more coincidentally, it sits on a site exactly four blocks west of where I was standing when I took the picture above.

So these four pictures will not by any means be the only ones I will take in Chicago- just the first of many. Another one of those circles I keep talking about has just opened.

I continued north on Lake Shore Drive to its end, and then went further north, another five miles or so, to the suburb of Evanston, Illinois, to find Ed's house with no problem at all. Ed had me spend the night with his family, and I tried to repay his kindness by taking him and his wife to dinner at a local place he favored. On Sunday morning we all went to a nearby park and had lunch at his house. Then I followed Ed downtown where he showed me where he worked at Hugh Leather as the Sales Manager. We spent a bit of time reliving some of our Korean experiences until mid-afternoon, when I left Ed to do some work he needed to and headed back to Fort Harrison.

I know I should have taken a lot of pictures during my visit, just as I should probably have taken many more while overseas. Sadly, I won't realize how nice this would have been until many years later. But at 25 years old, being able to look back didn't seem all that important.

Incidentally, while Ed and I stayed in touch for a while via Christmas Cards, I eventually did not get one from him, and I have no idea why, or where he might have gone. I do know that Hugh Leather eventually closed as the Chicago downtown expanded to swallow the industrial areas that used to lie just west of the Chicago River. You can find references to Hugh Leather online, but the company is long gone.

You can use the links below to continue to another photo album page.

	October 30-31, 1971: A Visit to Muskegon, Michigan
	July 18-August 7, 1971: My Return Home From Korea
	Return to the Index for 1971