This week's cornerspotting is of the old Mercy Hospital at 26th and Prairie. One reader nailed it right out of the gate, but the following guess missed. Ha! The demolished Richardsonian structure grew to encompass an entire city block by 1910 or so, about when the old picture was snapped. The Sisters of Mercy has been a chartered "institution of healing" in the state since 1851, and acquired the 20-acre South Side site where multiple buildings now stand wayyyyy back in 1864. By the 1950s, the Sisters already had plans to demolish the old hospital building and replace it with something modern. A fire on September 13, 1963 didn't destroy the building but certainly helped them toward this end. Local architecture firm C.F. Murphy & Associates, of One Prudential and Daley Center fame, was commissioned for the new borderline-brutalist hospital block. That went up across the street, in conjunction with city-led "slum" clearance. On the exact site of the old building is brand new Senior housing. Hey, at least Mercy didn't book it for the 'burbs.
·Hint: Friday the 13th Exacted a Crippling Blow on This Chunky Castle [Curbed Chicago]
·Mercy Hospital 1968: A Prescription for Reinvestment on Chicago's Near South Side [Wordpress]
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