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legal reasons. ibid. 90. ibid., 17. the university of chicago 258 259 chicago studies some former substantial business building, where a big city of people had lived in general happiness just three days before.24 everything had burned. the sidewalks were gone, and even the streetcar rail was “twisted and warped like dead black snakes in agonies of contortion.”25 loesch saw at least two charred corpses before he reached the river. loesch’s group crossed the chicago river through the lasalle street tunnel. they had to grope through the darkness, amid still-warm bricks. emerging on the other side, elites were concerned that they would be treated the same as the poor by the citizens’ committee, ... but such structures were open to grave objections as the homes of forty or fifty thousand people in the winter. so large a number brought into promiscuous and involuntary association, would almost certainly engender disease and pro- mote idleness, disorder and vice ... to construct barracks for the homeless, therefore, was only to postpone the problem for a few months, to find us then with a large class of permanent poor ... demoralized by a winter of dependence.85 to avoid this “winter of dependence,” the society decided that barracks should be reserved for former tenement dwellers who would be strictly supervised by police and public-health officials.86 for all others the society would facilitate the construction of small individual dwellings, with construction materials distributed to laborers and artisans.87 dwellings came in two standard sizes (one for families larger than five and another, for smaller families) and came with a small assortment of furniture and an oven.88 they were not free. those who received housing assistance were expected to pay back three quarters of the cost within a year, effectively coercing occupants back into chicago’s now hungry labor market.89 the society did not see this cost as a hardship, instead, it “frees him [the aid receiver] from being the recipient of public bounty. if they were to be helped at all, they must be helped in some special way.110 109. ibid. 110. chicago relief and aid society (chicago: culver, page, hoyne & co, 1871), 3; “rescue and relief,” the great chicago fire and the web of memory: chicago history museum, accessed july 25, 2015, http://www.greatchicagofire.org/rescue -and-relief. 55. sawislak, smoldering city, 80. 53. ibid., 80–81. 54. “rescue and relief,” the great chicago fire. 65. sawislak, smoldering city, 11. the university of chicago 284 285 chicago studies and her husband during her long marriage.163 the value of the property was never mentioned in wheeler/smith/ hill v. king jr., in subsequent cases the property was in the thousands of dollars, which made it potentially worthy of pike’s deception.164 the outcome of wheeler/smith/hill v. king jr. does not survive, but the tenor of the existing testimony suggests that the court did not side with pike. his claim was unverifiable, and it was questioned by the orig- inal owner’s widow, on whose testimony the case relied. burnt records cases were contests of authority—authority that pike appeared to lack. the courts were removed from the public; their legal practices could be difficult to understand for the uninitiated; and judges and lawyers were elites with close ties to other prominent chicagoans. these factors combined to make the “burnt records” cases, as they became known, very friendly to elite interests, and almost entirely free of contention. the burnt records cases carried on for decades, eventually tapering off in the mid-twentieth century. together with the relief and aid society claimed, and indeed was ordered, to take the entire city’s concerns to heart, its man- ner was paternalistic and sometimes oblivious to various communities’ 75. ibid., 40–42. 76. greeley, “memories,” 13. the university of chicago 262 263 chicago studies our house was filled with people we knew, who had lost their own homes and had no place to go. i cannot recall how many there were, but we were so crowded that we slept on the floor covered with thick straw and ticks, lined up on both sides, with our heads to the wall, and our feet meeting in the center of the room. in another room the women slept in the same way.38 lodgings provided a second way in which elites could restore social distinction. mary blatchford’s experience offers a sharp contrast with schumacher’s. after the fire, greeley stayed with wirt dexter, a leader in the chicago relief and aid society. aurelia king mentions dexter in her account. mary blatchford was a close friend of king, and blatchford’s husband was also involved in the public committee and the private society, then abandonment of the committee can be seen as a method to exclude public servants, namely, the aldermen.65 by excluding aldermen from the relief effort, the wider public, particularly the more downtrodden elements, were also denied input.66 city aldermen were elected by local constitu- encies, ensuring that, at least on some level, all of the material aspects of social organization must have been bewildering, if not traumatizing. the mansions and other visual landmarks that delineated social status were gone. it was difficult for elite favoritism to take place within the confines of the general plan. registration and visitation were mandatory, along with the burned-out buildings, the fire had reduced the foundations of the city’s cultural and economic groups were represented in the city’s common council. without their presence in the relief and aid society. and so on. 10. where a source uses specific class terms (e.g., middle class, upper class, etc.), this paper replicates the terms in the text. 11. einhorn discusses relief in a brief epilogue about the fire’s role in spurring a new public interest. einhorn, property rules, 231. einhorn also mentions the well- documented debate surrounding the extension of the city’s social structure to ashes. prior to the fire, the material worlds of the different social groups in chicago had been distinct. an elite might sport a clean collar each day, while a factory worker would find such refinements impossible to achieve. even if it would take time to restore entire wardrobes, moneyed chicagoans could at least strive to keep up appearances. in elmhurst, king and other women tried to resume their old habits in whatever way possible; furness noted that when he arrived at st. caroline’s court, a hotel, the neighborhood ladies were paying polite calls to one another in the street, as if nothing unusual had happened.46 on the north side, elites formed a temporary “anonymous club” to fill the void left by the destruction of high-society venues. member performed entertainment, funded the club, and brought food. refreshments were limited to tea, coffee, bread, and butter, and, in deference to newly impoverished members, “formal evening costume” was banned.47 if the decorum was simple, the enter- tainment was not: the anonymous club featured papers, plays, poems, games, burlesques, and tableaux. it met monthly until social life in chicago had resumed to the point where it was no longer necessary. the restoration of the water- works at first did little good: the water was contaminated. chicagoans had to make do with well water and beer—and prices soared.28 the fire had destroyed. elites quickly turned to the courts to reconfirm land ownership and to replace missing documents through arbitration. the courts were elite institutions, and elites could appeal to their author- ity in reestablishing their titles, confident that an elite judge would be sympathetic. pike, on the other side, in the downtown, loesch saw “a mass of smoking ruins.”26 only one building stood at nearly full height, the first national bank building; it and all others were severely damaged. bank vaults were exposed, their contents melted or vaporized. and it was here that frank loesch found his rock, and fell into despair. on the west side, which had remained untouched, there were seri- ous humanitarian concerns: the area was flooded with refugees, many of whom were sleeping on the streets.27 the waterworks were no longer functional, leaving the entire city parched. the restoration of the water- works at first did little good: the water was contaminated. chicagoans had to make do with well water and beer—and prices soared.28 the fire had struck in the middle of the night, forcing many to flee in their nightgowns. there were no fresh supplies of clothing for many refugees until days after the blaze. exhausted and hungry, refugees congregated throughout the city. crowds gathered along fullerton avenue, in the streets of the untouched west side, and in the open prairie around the village of hyde park.19 where possible, groups scrounged together food: every group seemed to be engaged in cooking breakfast. judg- ing by smell and sight i was of the opinion that the three staples which had been forehandily saved from the devouring flames were coffee, rye bread and sauerkraut. at my refuge a cup of weak tea and one biscuit was served to each adult.20 16. loesch, personal experiences, 20. 25. ibid. 26. ibid., 22. 27. aurelia king to mary e. blatchford, letter, n.d., box 103, file 1725, blatch- ford family residence. this episode illustrates two ways in which the elite blatchfords reasserted their social position. first, and in contrast to the schumachers or refugees housed in barracks, the blatchfords’ evanston cottage was not a radical move in the nineteenth century. chicago operated under a political system later known as segmentation, a complex scheme of private initiative and public- works finance, for much of the political control of the city in the hands of property owners, who were able to reestablish their former lives. king stayed with family in elmhurst.40 caroline hamilton found refuge with aunts and uncles, who watched her children while a friend ferried her 38. john peter schumacher, “the memoirs of john peter schumacher,” ca. 1940, manuscript alpha2 s, chicago history museum, accessed july 25, 2015, http://www.greatchicagofire.org/rescue -and-relief. 55. sawislak, smoldering city, 83. 66. ibid., 81–85. 67. chicago relief and aid society, first report, 18. 121. chicago relief and aid society’s work: different classes were to be helped at all, they must be helped in some special way.110 109. ibid. 110. chicago relief and aid society. and so on. 10. where a source uses specific class terms (e.g., middle class, upper class, etc.), this paper replicates the terms in the text. 11. einhorn discusses relief in a brief epilogue about the fire’s role in spurring a new public interest. einhorn, property rules, 76–77; 116–18. the university of chicago 290 291 chicago studies frank loesch did not disagree. walking further south after sitting on his rock, loesch saw a pie in the window of a bakery, and had an epiphany: fearing the price would be more than two dollars, i entered with some timidity to inquire. finding the price to be only twenty cents, which i joyfully paid, my courage rose to the point where it was no fault of their own, and, though sufferers in common with tens of thousands of others, from a great public calamity, they would perish rather than appear as the recipient of public bounty [and] allowed him to retain an honorable feeling of independence.”90 85. chicago relief and aid society. aurelia king mentions dexter in her account. mary blatchford was a close friend of king, and blatchford’s husband was also involved in the public committee and the private society, then abandonment of the committee can be seen as a method to exclude public servants, namely, the aldermen.65 by excluding aldermen from the relief effort, the wider public, particularly the more downtrodden elements, were also denied input.66 city aldermen were elected by local constitu- encies, ensuring that, at least on some level, all of the city’s population homeless, one group was given food, shelter, and the finest supplies in the largest quantity, and the rest were give the scraps. these decisions had to be made before winter. by the beginning of november of 1871, the temperature had but other concerns were equally pressing for elite mem- bers of society. without the material elements of social distinction,