Grant Park Skyline

Grant Park and Chicago's public access to the lakefront exist in large part due to the efforts of A. Montgomery Ward. In the late 1890s, Chicago was planning the development of a small city of public buildings to be put on the land where Grant Park stands today. Highly irritated by this proposal, Mr. Ward found an obscure clause in the city code which decreed the lakefront be kept "forever free and clear." He launched and eventually won a 13-year court battle, "forever" keeping the view from his corporate headquarters on Michigan Avenue unobstructed.