Underground
History
Janet Kuypers
11/30/19 (the 1866 date work begins on the
1st U.S. underwater highway tunnel, in Chicago)
when I first took the L train into Chicago
to commute every morning, I would take
the Red Line along Lake Michigan for work
but in most of my years in the only place
I would call my home, I was taking the train
from O’Hare airport, taking the Blue Line
and all those years I took that train, I always
wondered why a small part of that train ride
took me underground but I
didn’t ask questions, I just took the train and
never thought anything of it, I never thought
of all the concrete lining our way underground
—
Johannes immigrated here, and later
my father took over my grandfather’s
concrete construction company
—
when my father flew us to Las Vegas
we flew over the Hoover Dam; his only
words were, look at all that concrete
—
but over 150 years ago, Chicago started
work on their first underwater tunnel,
under the Chicago River, a tunnel with 1 lane
for pedestrians and 2 lanes for horse-drawn
carriages; anyone who knows Chicago now
may think this sounds ludicrous, but after
the Chicago fire, people looked for more
stable forms of travel, and underground,
away from fire, seemed the way to go
they reversed the Chicago River a decade
later, which lowered the water level, exposing
the roof of the tunnel; and ships ran aground
so the Federal government had to close
it down as a safety hazard six years later, so to
reconstruct they changed it, added concrete
and after streetcars ran, it was converted
for the subway - the underground parts
of the “L” train us Chicago commuters know
—
a lot of construction and reconstruction
existed in the Chicago rail plans, and a lot
of plans were canceled, but it’s cool to see
that this concrete that runs through my
family’s veins was a part in making those
underground tunnels us Chicagoans use today
—
some people may say that only rural folk
are grounded in the dirt of the earth
and feel real roots to this land we live on
but I beg to differ, because some city folk
like me can actually feel grounded
with the concrete we pour, that pulls us in
and literally bonds us to this land, both
above ground and even below, where we least
expect it, to make our lives more complete
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