Jensen Park
History
In 1926, the City of Chicago's Bureau of Parks and Recreation began creating a two-and-a-half acre park in the rapidly growing Albany Park neighborhood. The new park soon included a small brick recreation building, a playground, and a playing field that was flooded in the winter for ice skating. The city named the park for Christ Jensen, alderman of the surrounding 40th ward. (At the time, the city regularly named parks for the standing aldermen of the wards in which the sites were located.) Jensen Park was located within the jurisdiction of the Irving Park District, and in 1930, the city transferred the site's ownership and management to the district. The district intended to build a full-size fieldhouse with club rooms, an assembly hall, indoor gymnasiums, locker rooms, and an indoor swimming pool. Due to major funding shortages, however, the project did not move forward and the district made few park improvements to Jensen Park.
In 1934, the Great Depression necessitated the consolidation of the city's 22 independent park agencies into the Chicago Park District. Using federal relief funds, the newly-created park district soon began work on Jensen Park. Site improvements included a wading pool, and tennis, volley ball, and basketball courts. In 1962, the park district enlarged the original recreation building, creating a more fully-operational fieldhouse. Jensen Park received a soft surface playground in 1993.
