Economy
The 2nd Congressional District was, for most of the 20th century, a thriving center of heavy industry centered around Lake Calumet and the Port of Chicago, augmented by the nearby railroad industry which had the Pullman Company as its centerpiece. The steel industry was a major component, with U.S. Steel at one time employing 20,000 district residents, but the Wisconsin Steelworks in South Deering closed in March 1980, and U.S. Steel's South Works plant in South Chicago – source of the steel for Chicago skyscrapers including the Sears Tower – was closed in April 1992; both have since been dismantled. Virtually the last remnant of the industry in the area is ISG Riverdale (formerly the Acme Steel Co.), which began a shutdown in 2001 before being sold and restructured as a smaller company. The most significant remaining industrial presence in the district is now the Ford Motor Company, which operates the Chicago Assembly plant (where the Ford Taurus is manufactured) on the border between South Deering and Hegewisch, as well as the Chicago Stamping facility in Chicago Heights. Like the 1st District, the area is struggling to overcome economic downturns in recent decades.
Local educational institutions include Governors State University in University Park, Chicago State University in Roseland, Prairie State College in Chicago Heights, South Suburban College in South Holland and Olive-Harvey College, a Chicago city college, in Pullman. The University of Chicago is directly west of the district's northern end. Hospitals in the district include Ingalls Memorial Hospital in Harvey, Advocate South Suburban Hospital in Hazel Crest, St. James Hospitals in Chicago Heights and Olympia Fields, Advocate Trinity Hospital in Calumet Heights, La Rabida Children's Hospital in Woodlawn, South Shore Hospital in South Chicago and Roseland Community Hospital in Roseland.
The Museum of Science and Industry is located almost at the district's northern tip. Various areas of the Cook County Forest Preserves are scattered throughout the suburban part of the district, particularly in the area northeast of Chicago Heights. Other notable business and industrial presences in the district include Jays Foods, a manufacturer of snack foods based in Pullman; the Norfolk Southern Railway; Allied Tube and Conduit, a piping and electrical manufacturer in Harvey ; and UGN Inc., an automotive soundproofing manufacturer in Chicago Heights .
Federal facilities in the district include Coast Guard Station Calumet Harbor in East Side and the Vietnam Veterans Memorial Army Reserve Center, home of the 308th Civil Affairs Brigade, in Homewood.
In addition to the Jackson Park Historic Landscape District and the Museum of Science and Industry's U-505, district locations on the National Register of Historic Places include:
- AVR 661, South Deering
- Bloom Township High School, Chicago Heights
- Calumet Park, East Side
- Flamingo-on-the-Lake Apartments, Hyde Park
- Flat Iron Building, Chicago Heights
- Ford Airport Hangar, Lansing
- Hotel Del Prado, Hyde Park
- Jeffery-Cyril Historic District, South Shore
- Lake-Side Terrace Apartments, South Shore
- Allan Miller House, South Shore
- Olympia Fields Country Club, Olympia Fields
- Pacesetter Gardens Historic District, Riverdale (suburb)
- Palmer Park, Roseland
- Promontory Apartments, Hyde Park
- Pullman Historic District National Historic Landmark, Pullman
- Shoreland Hotel, Hyde Park
- South Shore Beach Apartments, South Shore
- South Shore Country Club, South Shore
- Trumbull Park, South Deering
Read more about this topic: Illinois's 2nd Congressional District
Famous quotes containing the word economy:
“The aim of the laborer should be, not to get his living, to get “a good job,” but to perform well a certain work; and, even in a pecuniary sense, it would be economy for a town to pay its laborers so well that they would not feel that they were working for low ends, as for a livelihood merely, but for scientific, or even moral ends. Do not hire a man who does your work for money, but him who does it for love of it.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“The basis of political economy is non-interference. The only safe rule is found in the self-adjusting meter of demand and supply. Do not legislate. Meddle, and you snap the sinews with your sumptuary laws.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“War. Fighting. Men ... every man in the whole realm is in the army.... Every man in uniform ... An economy entirely geared to war ... but there is not much war ... hardly any fighting ... yet every man a soldier from birth till death ... Men ... all men for fighting ... but no war, no wars to fight ... what is it, what does it mean?””
—Doris Lessing (b. 1919)