Skyline Fishermen

Since the first wave of settlers arrived in Chicago, Lake Michigan has served as both a source of recreation and an essential part of the city's commercial life. Shipping through the St. Lawrence Seaway into the Great Lakes helped make the city a thriving commercial port because of its links to the Chicago River as well as railroad lines that branched out across the country. Because the water was too shallow for large schooners to make it close to land or enter the river, construction of the Chicago Harbor began in 1834 when government engineers cut a channel through a sandbar to the mouth of the Chicago River. On July 12, 1834, the schooner 'Illinois' was the first ship to sail up the new channel. The harbor eventually would stretch from Wacker Drive south to about Roosevelt Road, and in the early 1890s was busier than New York Harbor. To help guide ships, the city built its first lighthouse on Chicago Harbor in 1893. It was rebuilt in 1919, and featured a prism lens imported from San Francisco.