Case Closed: CTA Messed Up Damen Blue Line Address
By John Dodge
CHICAGO (CBS) -- On Monday night, CBS 2's Dana Kozlov reported on an amusing mistake surrounding the address of the refurbished CTA Blue Line stop at Damen.
Now, a follow-up to that story:
The CTA clearly got the address wrong.
It appears, in bright, shiny brass numbers, incorrectly as 1588 N. Damen.
On Monday night, the CTA said it needed to investigate, contending the current 1588 address reflects decades of official county and CTA records.
The problem is, way back in 1914, the address to the north of the CTA stop was 1560 N. Robey (the street was later renamed Damen). Just to the south: 1550 N. Robey. That means that an address of 1588 would be impossible, even 100 years ago.
By 1950, the street name had indeed changed to North Damen.
Three addresses had been added a few feet south of the CTA stop: 1552, 1554, and 1556.
So that should solve the mystery: For about 100 years, that address has been in the 1550 block of North Damen. For at least 64 years, it has been 1558 North Damen.
We can thank the legendary Sanborn Map Co. for the information.
Starting in the 1880s, Sanborn began making detailed maps of cities and towns for fire insurance purposes.
The maps including various building details, such as construction material (masonry, frame, etc.), usage (garage, bakery, theater, residence), and other information, like wall thickness and whether there were fire escapes.
The images here are taken from the 1914 and 1950 editions of those maps for the city of Chicago.