Seeing a post on the Old 9 Span Bridge & how it was called Forsyth Ave. Viaduct, I wrote this up right quick on the bridge's namesake & the originally marshy land it was built to cross. The longest bridge over land in the world when it opened in 1937! Connecting Roxana & Woodmar, East Chicago & Hammond --
*CROSSES OVER: The Gibson Yards.
Largest rail yard in America for primarily the shunting of cars carrying automobiles, maybe still is. Named for the Gibson Siblings who eventually moved & started Brass Tavern in Munster. Also the area Joseph Hess, Sr, originally settled in 1849 before moving to around 169th & Kennedy Ave.
Area was where the original railroad in Chicagoland from the East/Detroit terminated before Chicago -- the Michigan Central's "West Point" aka Gibson. People got off & took a stagecoach to Chicago from here, passing the Hohman Inn & toll bridge on the Grand Calumet River by state line on the way. Prior to Hammond incorporating, people from Hammond had to cross dunes & ditches to Gibson to get their mail!
Indiana Harbor Belt Railroad (IHB) built their wheelhouse at Gibson Yards on 161st St. & incorporated in 1906. All traces of the original, 19th-Century settlement known as Gibson have been gone for over a century.
Can you believe prior to this bridge there was a "poorly engineered" subway for cars, horses, & pedestrians to cross instead? Built circa 1912. Wow!
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*NAMED FOR: Jacob Forsyth
Jan. 12th, 1821 - Jan. 29th, 1899
Born in Londonderry, Ireland.
Arrived in America at around 16 years old.
He emigrated from Belfast to settle in Pittsburgh originally.
Died of kidney failure following a bout with influenza.
Worth approximately $20 million when he passed.
THE ROAD STARTED UP NORTH ON HIS LAND.
Forsyth married Caroline M. Clarke -- the younger sister of George Washington Clarke (the high school namesake), & thus inherited basically all of Wolf Lake area, much of Robertsdale, of Whiting, of East Chicago, of Chicago's Eastside (aka Colehour), & of the harbor of South Chicago. As much as 16,000 acres or more at one point, down to 6,000 acres at his time of death! He sold Standard Oil much of the land needed for their Whiting Refinery!
The "Swamp Baron" who maintained a farm of haymaking & mules in "Sheffield," as Robertsdale near 5 Points was known at the time. (Wolf Lake was once Sheffield Bay!) His mules were leased to help level the land Whiting was built upon!
Before all that -- After working a while on the Ohio River, he was sent to Chicago as the Pennsylvania Railroad’s Western freight agent in 1857. Between 1857-1865, he represented in Chicagoland the Pennsylvania, the Erie, and the Grand Trunk railroads. He then went on to grow his real estate holdings in the Calumet Region to become the "land baron" we remember him as today. He helped a further 3 railroads come to Calumet area following his work founding the City of East Chicago with General Joseph Torrence.
But Forsyth lived a life of culture & opulence in Chicago most of the time. He passed away a millionaire, aged 78, at his residence in the super-rich Prairie District of Near South Side Chicago -- 1915 Michigan Ave. His wife Caroline, who provided him his early land holdings he built his fortune with, passed away less than 4 months later in April 1899. Both buried in Rosehill Cemetery on the North Side of Chicago.
Forsyth bitterly fought the City of Hammond, Indiana, annexing then-unincorporated Robertsdale & Roby (Ed Roby's land.) He lost that legal battle April 19th, 1897 when the US Supreme Court deferred to a lower court's ruling -- 125 years ago this year Hammond secured its lakefront and clean water source! Wonder if that bitterness aided in Indianapolis Blvd. being the name eventually, as it used to be Indy Blvd. only around the state line at Chicago.
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