23 Jun

Posted at 13:19h in Bldg. 51, Events & Announcements, Featured Posts, Miscellaneous, New Acquisitions, New Products, Salvages by

long ago when i studied the chicago world's fair or "columbian exposition" of 1893 i wondered what, if anything, remained from the "white city" long after it was burned down and/or demolished. where did all the statues go? the lamp posts? [gallery columns="4" ids="10798,10799,10794,10795"] like many others,...

23 Jun

Posted at 10:05h in Bldg. 51, Events & Announcements, Featured Posts, Miscellaneous, New Acquisitions, New Products, Salvages by

once again i arrived on another heneghan wrecking job site (my crew and i recently completed salvage work at the a. finkl & sons foundry and the howard johnson excavation site) where a massive wooden rood truss warehouse constructed in 1918 was undergoing demolition. [gallery ids="10449,10455,10454,10456,10464,10452"] when the demolition permit...

22 Jun

Posted at 18:02h in Bldg. 51, Events & Announcements, Featured Posts, Miscellaneous, New Acquisitions, New Products, Salvages by

i've amassed this large collection of antique chicago-based bottles (mainly "soda" or "mineral water") through auctions, excavation sites, privies, and private collectors over the past 8 months. with the "unearthing chicago" book taking shape, i'm scrambling to find many more bottles to fill in many...

15 Jun

Posted at 15:38h in Events & Announcements, Featured Posts, Miscellaneous, New Acquisitions, New Products, Sales and Promotions, Salvages by

the photo gallery below offers a glimpse of some of the newest artifacts recently acquired from last week's listings (15 new items are added daily in their respective categories) on the urban remains website. as of this writing, we have surpassed the 23, 400 item...

10 Jun

Posted at 01:08h in Bldg. 51, Events & Announcements, Featured Posts, Miscellaneous, New Acquisitions, New Products, Salvages by

this was the first job site where i was unable to document the demolition of a late 19th century chicago two story wood-framed residence. it contained both old growth notched timber sills and girts with mortise and tenon joinery. in my place, i sent my...

08 Jun

Posted at 13:56h in Bldg. 51, Events & Announcements, Featured Posts, Miscellaneous, New Acquisitions, New Products, Sales and Promotions, Salvages by

late last week i was bombarded with several 19th century chicago soda and ale bottles sourced from auctions, fellow bottle enthusiasts and privy pits. a few will go into my personal collection of historically important 19th century bottles with the most notable being the cobalt blue glass george lomax...

07 Jun

Posted at 17:10h in Events & Announcements, Featured Posts, Miscellaneous, New Acquisitions, New Products, Sales and Promotions, Salvages by

the photo gallery below offers a glimpse of some of the newest artifacts recently acquired from last week's listings (15 new items are added daily in their respective categories) on the urban remains website. as of this writing, we have surpassed the 23, 400 item...

02 Jun

Posted at 17:18h in Bldg. 51, Events & Announcements, Featured Posts, Miscellaneous, New Acquisitions, Salvages by

between residential and commercial salvages, i'm making an effort to also  visit and dig multiple excavation sites that are seemingly popping up all around chicago. digging up these "portals to the past" has provided me the opportunity to collect more data in the form of bottles, fragments, building...

26 May

Posted at 13:31h in Bldg. 51, Events & Announcements, Featured Posts, Miscellaneous, New Acquisitions, New Products, Sales and Promotions, Salvages by

i was absolutely delighted to begin the week by acquiring an assortment of original early 20th century cast bronze and brass "bare bulb" industrial incandescent light fixtures salvaged from various new york city subway stations. the subway station fixtures are  so incredibly simplistic and visually attractive...

22 May

Posted at 17:10h in Bldg. 51, Events & Announcements, Featured Posts, Miscellaneous, New Acquisitions, New Products, Salvages by

when time permits, i'm moving from one excavation site to another to look for pieces of the past before those "time portals" are once again closed when construction begins. i must admit, i have not "scored" any major privy vaults containing a condensed collection of material...

22 May

Posted at 17:08h in Bldg. 51, Events & Announcements, Featured Posts, Miscellaneous, Salvages by

prior to this demolition, a cluster of similarly built late 19th century brick worker's cottages just west of damen avenue had been largely unaltered since they were constructed around 1885-1890. unfortunately, one of the closely-shaped houses was brought down earlier this week, leaving a gaping hole that...

22 May

Posted at 12:18h in Bldg. 51, Events & Announcements, Featured Posts, Miscellaneous, New Acquisitions, New Products, Sales and Promotions, Salvages by

i've managed to gather well over a hundred rare and richly colored soda and/or mineral water bottles dating to the mid-19th century over the past month. since the rapidity of bottle acquisition has made it incredibly difficult to populate the urban remains website with these great finds,...

20 May

Posted at 09:23h in Bldg. 51, Events & Announcements, Featured Posts, Miscellaneous, New Acquisitions, New Products, Salvages by

the assemblage of photographic images shown in the gallery below offer a glimpse of my most recent visit (two consecutive days of shooting) to the notable a. finkl & sons chicago foundry that is rapidly being taken apart and discarded by several on-site excavators operated by...

19 May

Posted at 14:25h in Miscellaneous, New Acquisitions, New Products, Sales and Promotions, Salvages by

earlier this week urban remains came across a treasure trove of chicago public school science classroom anatomical models, charts and posters, fossils and other interesting specimens. the images below provide a small sampling of the acquisitions that have been photographed and added to the website.    the images...

19 May

Posted at 12:00h in Featured Posts, Miscellaneous, New Acquisitions, New Products, Salvages by

after thoroughly documenting and/or collecting any and all data from wood beam sill plate corners from various 19th century chicago residences, i'm trying to determine what to do with them since i have nearly 100 individual specimens finished in a nearly identical manner to the...

11 May

Posted at 16:13h in Bldg. 51, Events & Announcements, Featured Posts, Miscellaneous, New Acquisitions, New Products, Salvages by

the photographic essay below offers a brief glimpse at a day of savaging artifacts during a single afternoon at a chicago area standard oil (of indiana) brick factory building constructed as a distribution and handling center for several decades. the building is set to be demolished...

06 May

Posted at 09:59h in Bldg. 51, Featured Posts, Miscellaneous, New Acquisitions, New Products, Salvages by

demolition of the downtown chicago howard johnson inn, constructed in the late 1960's, is nearly complete. in preparation high-rise development that will be constructed on the site (located at the corner of la salle and superior), the wrecker has spent the past few weeks systematically "potholing" the...

06 May

Posted at 09:54h in Bldg. 51, Events & Announcements, Featured Posts, Miscellaneous, New Acquisitions, New Products, Salvages by

last night i finished editing images of two incredible artifacts carefully removed the a. finkl & sons foundry. both depression-era artifacts join the ever-growing number of antique american industrial objects and furniture being salvaged from this notable sprawling chicago industrial complex. before being taken down and brought...

05 May

Posted at 12:37h in Events & Announcements, Featured Posts, Miscellaneous, New Acquisitions, New Products, Salvages by

as part of our ongoing salvage efforts at a notable chicago foundry complex, we finally gained access to yet another building on the sprawling industrial campus; the building formerly served as a distribution center for standard oil of indiana. there, we discovered several matching, unusually-shaped dirk saaf-designed...

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