Well for one what was referred to as Philadelphia is actually bigger than the Philadelphia that was measured by the census since Philadelphia had sprawled beyond its old boundaries. For another Cornwallis conducted a survey (which excluded the very young and the old) and came up with something like 22000 people in the city at the time it was occupied in 1777 with authorities noting that the city was now "sparsely populated" with more than 10000 people having fled with the rebels in advance of the British Army.

Furthermore it was known then and known now that the Census of 1790 was inaccurate. Particularly in Philadelphia where prior enumerations, called Constable Returns, were used in order to compute tax obligations. So people, particularly the poor, either declined to respond or hid relatives in order to avoid what they believed was a computation for a capitation tax.

The most reliable method of estimating the population of Philadelphia during that era relies on 1) the number of residential structures and 2) the average number of persons per structure. Estimates by various contemporaries during that era return very consistent figures ranging between 7 and 8 persons per structure. There are also very solid figures for the number of inhabited structures at several points in this era. Further, using the figure from the census of 1790 (42,500) and the number of dwellings at that time (6,784) the average persons per dwelling is 6.26 which is both consistent with prior enumeration methods above and also with accounts that the census undercounted Philadelphia's population.



Except it isn't obvious and depends on which era you're talking about. In antiquity a big city is anything over 50,000. In the Middle Ages a city with with more than 10000 inhabitants would be large.



And yet the only cities you mentioned were in Europe and North America. I can't read your mind and frankly I don't appreciate you trying to shift the goalposts in such a loaded manner. Since those seemed to be the regions you were focusing on specifically I addressed it specifically which seemed appropriate since the United States was, during the period in question, settled by Europeans and had strong cultural connections with Europe, generally had the same patterns of settlement as Europe, and thanks to their commercial (and cultural) connections experienced the same economic transformations that shifted those patterns in roughly the same period of time.

Watch out for Forth Worth too. Population is 893,000 as of 2018, adding nearly 20,000 per year

Yes, good point. Though at that rate they'll end up around 950K for 2020. At that rate, they might hit 1M people in like 2022 or 2023.

Prospect Heights Apartment Fire (Five-Alarm)
 

July 18, 2018

I don't mind the country music theme (not my scene, but it's all good), but Tex Mex?

Welcome to your friendly suburban shopping center

Pssshhh, get off your ivory tower. TexMex is delicious. Country themed however sounds tacky as fuck and doesn't make sense in a city like Chicago with zero country culture or history

^ Being surrounded by rural areas as it is, Chicago does indeed have a Country music diaspora.

In fact, most major cities in the US, whether they want to admit it or not, have plenty of country music fans

It's a giant genre of music. Of course there are fans in the greater Metropolitan area, but it still doesn't make sense to put it in the West Loop where the demographic is mostly 25-35 year old yuppies who prefer hip hop, rock, and electronic music any day over country. It just doesn't make sense

Perhaps the word country is conjuring up for you the worst of modern butt rock with a drawl that calls itself country, when in reality the are intending it to mean Americana/Roots music. The latter would have exponentially more appeal for the country hostile/indifferent.

Why doesn't it makes sense? The concept works in River North, Lakeview, and many other neighborhoods; why couldn't it work in the West Loop?

Country music is also popular in parts of Asia. My girlfriend's father loves country and made me turn to country music radio a few times when they were in the US and we were driving between Vegas and the Grand Canyon. One of his favorite artists ever is John Denver too.

Eh, you have better luck in the suburbs since it's more conservative, but the city, not so much. At least for decades the city didn't even carry CMT on basic cable packages.

Hogwash. We have tons of country music history. National Barn Dance was a Chicago institution for 40 years broadcasting (old-timey) country music on WLS to the entire Midwest and later the nation after it was syndicated on NBC Radio. The live tapings of Barn Dance were the hottest ticket in Chicago for many years. In fact, the "famous, iconic" Grand Ole Opry only began because George Hay started hosting the Barn Dance and then went rogue to start his own radio show in Nashville.

The only reason you're rolling your eyes at country music in Chicago is because we all decided to forget about Barn Dance, and because Los Angeles and various other cities - Nashville, Atlanta - stole the role Chicago had as the nation's second center of mass culture.

^Bless your heart, I reckon you're correct!

Great, but none of our history as being a frontier town is relevant to country theme. The vast majority of Chicago's history goes from fur trading to boom town, to industry, to commerce. Nothing about Chicago ever screamed country roads. When have you ever seen Chicago displayed as you describe it in popular culture or historical documentation? It was always more of an east coast town trapped in the middle of nowhere. You are reaching so damn hard

Three things:

1) The only time I voluntarily listen to country music is of I'm in a pickup hauling manure, because then it seems the natural choice. Fortunately that's rare.

2) A big, cosmopolitan city should be able to accommodate *all* sorts of people and cultures. Do you really think that Uzbek culture is any more sophisticated than US country culture is? Just because it's far away doesn't make it more sophisticated.

3) Chicago is surrounded by country for hundreds of miles in all directions. What is country if not part of regionalism, which global cities should embrace as part of their heritage. Lobster fishermen are the East Coast version of country, yet New York embraces them almost as much as Boston.

how about this, if its a concept that has an audience and is well executed it will do fine. if it dosent or is poorly executed it will bomb. we live in a big city, i think its possible for entertainment options outside of ones you personally support to exist.

also fwiw, there was once a significant Appalachian population that lived in Uptown (hence, Carols). Fitzgeralds in Berwyn has also been successfully running for decades catering to Americana/"roots" music and audiences

also maybe im missing something here but this isnt even going to be a venue..its just a restaurant. Fulton is an adult disneyland at this point and more or less turning into what River North was in the 90s. i dont see any reason to pretend its anything else or that this is somehow hallowed ground in 2018.

tex mex is what it is. i think Uncle Julios and the like is crappy too, but whatever, its easy enough not to eat at those joints if its not your thing, take the pink line a few more stops and you should have no problem finding something more authentically Mexican

"Chicago has No history with Country Music" except when it did.

WLS National Barn Dance

One of the most popular and longest running programs on radio was WLS Radio's National
Barn Dance. The show blended music, comedy and down-home theatrical skits that lasted well over five decades. The Barn Dance's influence on country and western music was second only to the Grand Ole Opry, which got it's start on WSM in Nashville.
The National Barn Dance debuted on April 19, 1924, the first Saturday night after WLS signed on the air.

By 1931, the whole show was moved to the Eighth Street Theatre (located directly behind the Stevens Hotel, now the Hilton) on Wabash Avenue and 8th Street. While officials at WLS and the theatre initially had no idea how well attended the shows would be, as the weeks, months and years rolled by, listeners showed up by the thousands to fill the 1200 seat theatre twice every Saturday night (7:30pm and 10:00pm). In fact, according to WLS' own figures, nearly three million people attended the Barn Dance performances at the Eighth Street Theatre during its 26 year run there. Every year the crowds got bigger and the lines got longer. Shows were sold out up to eight weeks in advance and lines of people snaked down Wabash waiting to enter on Saturday evenings. Many showed up hours before showtime and carefully guarded their spots in line, despite having reserved seats inside.

In addition to airing locally on WLS' 50,000 watt signal, the National Barn Dance was picked up for regional airing on NBC's Blue Network in 1932. By the next year, over 30 stations coast to coast were carrying the evenings second show, which was sponsored by Miles Laboratories - makers of Alka Seltzer. In 1949, ABC-TV televised approximately 39 weekly episodes of the National Barn Dance, which by then, featured nearly 100 performers per show......

Wow, I've never heard of the National Barn Dance! Very interesting. I know country music is pretty popular in the suburbs. A friend of mine is a country singer in the suburbs who tours around the area, but they never play in the city. The west loop is kind of a destination for people from the suburbs to come to the city for entertainment these days, so it makes sense there could be some country music as well. I wish there were alot more blues venues. I mean that's a Chicago thing, which gets little attention.
It's kind of ironic that no one bat's an eye when there's entertainment and dining from countries on the other side of the world all over, but if someone wants to have music from a part of the US some peoples feathers get all ruffled.

its
not
a
venue

Literally "right behind" the Hilton. It was torn down to add more convention space. Interesting history here:

https://southloophistorical.wordpres...e-c-1900-1960/

Some John Denver music (like Country Roads and Rocky Mountain High) sound very Japanese Shinto if you really listen to the lyrics. It's like animalism/nature spiritualism.

What are you even talking about? "Nothing about Chicago ever screamed country roads"??? What about country music screamed "country roads?" I think you are taking a much too literal interpretation of what country music is. It's not an art form based on rural infrastructure or the word "country", it is an indegenous style of music that's popular with people all over this region. I have friends that own a yacht who live in Lincoln Park and they constantly go to country music festivals, I think you are reaching when you think you can just draw a line between some municipal boundaries and say "this is the country". You can't claim Chicago doesn't have country roots just because today it lacks gravel roads and dually pickup trucks. It's not about bitumous surfaces, it's about the day to day lives of the people of this region of which Chicago is the epicenter for 1000+ miles in all directions. More than a handful of those people have passed through, lived in, or visited this commercial center of the heartland over the years. I don't know how anyone thinks they can separate Chicago from the great plains and Midwest and Mississippi and great lakes basins and call it an "East coast Town trapped in the Midwest".

"what about country music screamed country roads"

Really dude? Alright, this conversation is over because you are clearly living on some other planet where country means whatever you want it to mean and not what the fucking name represents.

https://www.greatamericancountry.com...-20-road-songs

Hmmmm, what songs indeed. Fuck outta here bum

edit: it's sad my run of good behavior was ruined by such a dumb argument :D

I mean... the Stockyards were kind of country right? Presumably they had cowboys of some sort or other.

Tex Mex food, along with country music may even appeal to some Mexican immigrants who came from rural areas. My girlfriend’s family, all of which are from Central Mexico, are self described “rancheros” that love country music. If you have a discriminatory music taste, simply do not come.

Someone way earlier made a good point that country music of old is good. Real countryusic. The shit they put out now is atrocious.

But texmex is putrid. Literally.

That was me. Most of what they call mainstream country music these days on the radio is like the worst of butt rock with growly southern accents and camouflage baseball caps. It bears little relation to classic country from the 40's-60's acts, or the Glen Campbell's/John Denver's singer songwriters, to the more primitive bluegrass and Americana roots music that came before all of them. It reminds me of that movie Ghost World where the girl takes the guy who is a delta blues aficionado to some tool bar where a band called Blues Hammer was playing:haha:

Speaking of music in the West Loop, has anyone been to the restaurant across from Duck Duck Goat, Kuma's Corner?

It blasts heavy metal 8 hours a day. Even walking past feels like an assault on the ears. I can't imagine trying to digest food in there. I would much rather have a country place there - and I say that as a sometime fan of metal.

the original kumas in avondale has been around since the early 00s and had a mostly metal/punk clientele. the chefs and bartenders working there liked to play loud music and named all the burgers after bands, so thats the way it was. there was also sort of a "if you dont like it go eat somewhere else" kind of vibe. i guess it kept the lames away (as did explicit S&M pornography on the walls). it was a super tiny kitchen with good line cooks so the quality control was solid and it was usually worth waiting for. then it got on the travel shows and the "best burger in the city" lists and the suburbanites flooded in and they expanded to other locations. now its mostly a dumb watered down gimmick (along with the crazy toppings, which frequently are overbearing and not harmonious with the burger itself). their quality has also taken a nosedive IMO, which tends to be the case when formerly tiny operations expand suddenly chasing profits. far better burgers in the city these days. at the time it was one of the first places trying to do "fancy" burgers before the whole fad caught on. im sure some will disagree with me but i dont think its worth bothering with anymore, esp at $15-20 plus tip

Arguably the growth of country music fans (especially young ones) in cities and suburbs has fueled the growth of bro country. They all lead pretty cushy lives and don't wanna hear songs about heartbreak, hard times or hard work, so all the new stuff is just girls, beer, whiskey, tailgates/dirt roads, and good times. Plus it functions as "wholesome" party music when you want to forget that black people exist.

Barn Dance may have been taped here and had huge success, but somehow I doubt the Chicagoans of the time were tuning into the broadcasts or buying all those tickets. Not so with today's country. There is indeed a large number of country music fans in Chicago, which is why we are able to support two large country music festivals in city limits alone (Smokeout and Lakeshake) plus numerous venues like two locations each of Bub City and Joe's Bar.

“Plus it functions as "wholesome" party music when you want to forget that black people exist.”

So when a song by Darius Rucker or Cowboy Troy comes on does the party host race to their phone to change the song becuase they’re black?

Sad songs and waltzes aren't selling this year...

(Fiddling while Rome burns if you will)

I would argue that the disdain for country music has little to do with the music itself and more to do with the demographic that listens to it. It’s essentially the Trump voter. Obviously this is a generalization, but it’s not a horrible approximation of that demographic.

I have a friend who loves country music but hates Trump, for example. So exceptions are going to be aplenty

Are we so lazy that every potential difference is defined by political/cultural reasons? Not everything is politics.

no, i hate "it" because its generic, mindless, factory generated pop music, disguised as "Country" because the lyrics feature the words "truck" and has an electric fiddle and banjo

• Video Link

there are obviously talented and creative county artists who exist outside the corporate machine apparatus, but thats not what i imagine most people are talking about here

Yeah as I said before, the earliest stockyards in Chicago literally had farmers driving their herds in to market where they could be processed and shipped East on the railroads. Of course this quickly was replaced by a centralized facility (Union Stockyards) that was fed by railroads coming from rural areas in all directions. However, the notion of farmers and cowboys coming to Chicago to market their herds didn't change with the advent of rail shipping to bring the stock to Chicago. The rail was an obvious improvement to farmers who no longer needed to drive their herds very far thus avoiding the loss of marketable weight as the animals were forced to travel long distances.

The irony of this is that sometime in the 1950's my great grandfather who owned a family farm just West of Green Bay, WI became one of the first farmers in WI to switch from Dairy cattle to beef cattle. All his cattle were taken to Chicago to be sold. He used rail shipping exactly one time because the cattle were left for days on a siding in the city where they collectively lost hundreds of pounds of weight that he could have cashed in on. From that point on he paid truckers to drive the cattle down from Wisconsin and accompanied them in person the whole way. So all of you who claim Chicago has no country roots can just deal with the fact that my own great grandfather was one of many farmers who would come into Chicago multiple times a year to ensure they were getting the best price for their produce. Chicago is the agricultural marketplace of the world, just because that's grown into financial behemoths like CME Group doesn't make the roots of Chicago as the agricultural capital of humanity any less.

Fun fact I learned from my Grandma when she was telling me the beef cattle story: Apparently everyone thought they were crazy when her parents switched to beef cattle, but it was wildly profitable and the next year they were able to buy a Harvestore steel silo which is apparently a status symbol among farmers. So whenever you see a farm with a row of big blue HARVESTORE TM silos you know they are the baller farmers.

no, it's because contemporary "country" music sucks.

i'll grant the genre it's very important and illustrious past.

but what it's morphed into over the decades, becoming utter corporate musical garbage, is a travesty.

The same thing can be said about rap, rock, pop, and any other music genre.

Not so fast.

While I have become deeply political now in my 30s and yes admittedly I do make a loose connection between country listeners and conservative worldview, I have to reign myself in by acknowledging this is a weak link stereotype. Probably a majority do lean (or lay) right because of country's rural identity, but that doesn't make the statement that country fans = ignorant resentment Trump voter true. Correlation is not causation.

I can honestly tell you that from the youngest years of my life when I became interested in music, it was the sound itself of [contemporary] country music that I found repulsive - the over the top drawl, the absurd masculinity, the party-on hillbilly lyrics - the culture attached to it I didn't fully grasp until later. I have since grown to greatly enjoy and appreciate older country music and roots music from bluegrass to Patsy to Willie and so forth (mostly the sad bastard stuff), but still have to absorb it in smaller doses as it is far from my favorite genre. Another country music "reinforcer" is our armed forces. Because the military draws a high % of recruits from the rural parts (and Red) parts of our country, there seems to be a strong proud hick/country element and that transfers to many country music fans. As a personal note that I still am a bit sore about, I had a good high school friend who joined the army after Sept 11. He went in loving underground alt rock/punk and 1960's soul/R&B and came out a country fan. I don't fully understand how such a thing happens but I suspect peer influence had a hell of a lot to do with it. Due to what I presume are stress and boredom, military people seem to like to listen to shallow good times music and much of modern country fits that bill.

I find it hard to believe 3 full pages are on county music in a Chicago centric thread.

Someone posted several [ two ]Chicagoland county festivals recently .

They left of a big one that is County Thunder in Twin Lakes Wisconsin that draws from a large region.


One funny tidbit about County Thunder some young girl was struck by lighting.


They flew her to an Illinois Hospital. Not sure of her current condition but she was very critical at the time.


Her phone is burned out and she exploded her shoe off.

https://www.countrythunder.com/wi


400 underage drinking citations


https://www.jsonline.com/story/enter...ons/821600002/



https://localtvwiti.files.wordpress....0&h=225&crop=1


Nothing to laugh about but this fest has been around for a long time.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Country_Thunder

Country Thunder is a music festival brand that hosts several concerts in North America each year. They have operated festivals in Wisconsin and Arizona since 2009, and shows in Saskatchewan since 2005 and in Alberta since 2016

...

So I'm guessing this place will have solar this and sustainable that in it but not even one recycling bin in the whole building like every other restaurant in the city. But it's green though.....

What in the average restaurant is actually recyclable?

Why does everyone get caught up on recycling? It’s the least important aspect of the green triangle R’s (1. Reduce 2. Reuse 3. Recycle). Using one reusable mug to fill up your water or coffee instead of recycling all of your disposable recyclables is infinitely more environmentally friendly.

Most restaurants use plates, glasses and utensils that are reusable for years. Nothing to recycle and as noted by Mikemak27, far better than recycling.

McDonalds has committed to all-recycled packaging and recycling areas in each of its restaurants by 2025. Not that far away. If this new global flagship restaurant does not have recycling containers, I will be amazed...

I wish it was sooner, but I guess McDonalds has to figure out how to manage the problem of contaminated waste flows. No good putting out recycling bins if lazy customers just throw their barbecue sauce containers and McNuggets in there. The occasional piece of trash in a recycling flow is no big deal, but at some point it gets too expensive to sort it out later.

When Chicago had recycling dropoffs, contamination wasn't really a problem... if you took time to seek out a dropoff point, you probably were committed enough to sort your trash correctly. Now we have blue cans in every alley, which is infinitely more convenient but also infinitely more prone to contamination from lazy citizens. Garbage can overflowing? Good thing there's this empty blue can right next to it! herp derp

Tons and tons of cardboard. Literally all food products going into any restaurant, even a fast food place like McDonald's, is going to come packed in cardboard. Everything from all the fresh vegetables to frozen fries and hamburger patties. And that's not even including all the other customer packaging, such as burger and french fry serving containers, cups, straws, lids, etc.

I'm well aware of Country Thunder, my girlfriend's friend group all goes every year while she prefers Pitchfork and Lolla.

I didn't mention it because it was secondary to my point that there are two significant country festivals in (urban) Chicago city limits. You can see skyscrapers from both of them and ride a CTA bus to the gate. This idea that country music fans don't live in the city is hogwash.

But yes, Country Thunder now seems to be a reason for city girls to wear cowboy boots and get muddy, far more than it is a festival for rural dwellers to enjoy their favorite music. Country Thunder even followed the exodus of cold-hating white Chicagoans to launch a sister festival in Arizona.

And who, in the US, is actually recycling post-consumer paperboard food containers?

Personally, I don't like some of the lyrics, like the recent "Whisky Lullaby," about a couple that divorces, drinks themselves to death, and reunite in the afterlife. It's just beyond depressing to listen to and actually made me angry the first time I heard it.