Blackhawk Park

Located in Chicago's Cragin neighborhood, Blackhawk Park was created by the Northwest Park District, one of 22 park commissions consolidated into the Chicago Park District in 1934. The Northwest Park District first began acquiring land for Blackhawk Park in 1916. Five years later, renowned landscape architect Jens Jensen, designer of much of the West Park system, developed a plan for the park. Early improvements to Blackhawk Park included a wading pool, a playground, tennis courts, and electric lighting. In the summer of 1923, the Northwest Park District dedicated the park to honor a World War I Army unit known as the Blackhawk Division of the Allied Expeditionary Force. Composed of volunteers and draftees from Illinois, the Division took its name from the Sac chief Black Hawk (1767-1838). In 1832, Black Hawk led a group of Sac, Fox, and Kickapoo Indians west across the Mississippi into Illinois in a futile attempt to reclaim their ancestral lands, from which they had been forced in the 1820s. Though his forces were beaten back and fell to final defeat on August 2, 1832, Chief Black Hawk has long been revered for his bravery and perseverance. Jacob Dickinson Jr., a WWI veteran and son of the secretary of war under President Taft, gave a speech at the dedication ceremonies. A Chicago Tribune article reported that Dickinson Jr. asserted that naming the park for Chief Blackhawk served as “a protest against all intolerance as exemplified by the white hoods, the black shirts, and the red flags.” (This refers to various forms of fascism that were happening throughout the world at this time.) In 1926, a small brick field house with a gambrel roof was built in the park. Architect Albert A. Schwartz designed the building. Altogether, he produced six field houses for the Northwest and Old Portage Park Districts. Two years after the completion of the original field house, architect Walter W. Alschlager designed a major addition to the building that included an indoor swimming pool, gymnasium, locker rooms, offices, and a board room. In September of 1926, shortly after the construction of the original field house in Blackhawk Park, the American Legion sponsored an “Indian Pageant and Festival” there. Dozens of members of the Sac and Fox tribes camped in the park during the festival. They presented Indian dances in costume and staged an outdoor production of the play “Hiawatha.”