NOTE: For a description of the wide variety of small light industry currently operating in Gladstone Park, go to Industry in the Community section. At its end are photos of representative enterprises ranging from engineering offices to screen printing companies to electrical manufacturers. The file here speaks of the history of the development of the industrial corridor in the community from the 1920s forward.

N. NORTHWEST HIGHWAY INDUSTRIAL CORRIDOR

The bulk of industry in Gladstone Park is located on N. Northwest Highway, an old Indian trail that starts near W. Foster at the southern end of the community. From there it travels north into Norwood Park where N. Northwest Highway transitions into that neighborhood’s business district.

While some industrial buildings arose just before the Great Depression of the 1930s, most of the machine shops and light industry established themselves during the postwar boom starting in the late 1940s, greatly boosting the economic vitality of the area. Most structures are of sleek, sturdy midcentury modern brick design that have been easily adapted through the years for many different purposes without significantly changing their exterior appearances. Some concerns, such as Aeronautical Electric Company, which makes specialized lighting systems, and Midwest Swiss Embroidery/Screen Printing have been long-standing members of the manufacturing community, in business since 1944 and 1950 respectively.

With the Union Pacific rail line paralleling N. Northwest Highway’s buildings to their rear, the location of Gladstone Park’s Industrial Corridor has had a huge advantage through the decades for transporting its goods by truck, rail, and air. And those advantages have only grown. Onramps to the Kennedy Expressway are only a block away from W. Foster in the southern part of the community give access to nearby O’Hare Airport (and all points west) as well as to the center city of Chicago (and all points east).

An aerial view of N. Northwest Highway showing the location of industrial properties parallel to the Union Pacific rail line with the Kennedy Expressway (entered close by off W. Foster) just behind the tree line. The Kennedy, traveling directly to Chicago and all points east also goes in the opposite direction to nearby O’Hare Airport and all points west, making for enviable transportation options via rail, truck and air. This property at 5540 N. Northwest Highway stands out as one of the largest manufacturing complexes in the Gladstone Park community. Still, it shares the low-rise characteristics of the local corridor with brick (mostly) one-story construction with plenty of space for large loading zones and parking. Built in 1950, the building has sleek and spare mid-century modern architectural features. Photo courtesy of Loopnet, which was marketing the 45,000 square foot building for $2,250,000 or $50 sq ft. in March, 2022. (https://www.loopnet.com/Listing/5540-N-Northwest-Hwy-Chicago-IL/17358747/)

Unusual in its landscape for the city of Chicago, the N. Northwest Highway Industrial Corridor in Gladstone Park developed in small yellow and red brick buildings. Most are one story in height. Although a few larger concerns occupy the equivalent of a city block, most are on small lots. Besides the low-rise aspect of construction, buildings had the room to spread out on much less expensive land 11-12 miles from the center city. That gained industrial enterprises more adjacent property than in most urban areas of the city with extra space for parking and loading zones.

The photo above is one of three of the 5600 and 5700 blocks of N. Northwest Highway showing the one-story small-scale landscape of much of Gladstone Park’s industrial corridor. The physical setup, by its very nature,creates opportunities that cannot be found elsewhere in Chicago. Because many of the buildings are modest in size and lease at some of the most inexpensive rates in the city, entrepreneurs need only limited amounts of capital investment to set up new manufacturing operations and service industries in the community. While some buildings are from the early 20th Century, many are examples of midcentury modern design from the 1950s/1960s and are easily adapted for many purposes without destroying their architectural integrity. The photo above shows the lower section of the 5600 block of N. Northwest Highway; the next two photos show the upper section of the same block contiguous with the end of the 5600 block as it merges into the 5700 block respectively. Photos by author.

An informal survey of the ages of the 33 buildings on the west side of N. Northwest Highway’s 5200 to 5700 blocks conducted by the author using Cook County’s tax assessment data showed that the oldest was erected around 1919 and the newest around 2013. However, the greatest numbers of buildings on which information could be found (some 25) revealed most were constructed during the period between the late 1940s and early 1960s. Structure after structure, many are attached to one another and appear original, as shown in the three streetscape photographs.

The end result is that Gladstone Park may have some of the most vibrant small industrial properties within a historically-intact midcentury modern building zone in Chicago. A more formal study documenting the ages and history of its buildings would be advantageous with the goal of preserving the 100-year-old architectural character of its Industrial Corridor that has always served it so well.