Chicago Street Course

Buckingham Fountain is a Chicago Landmark in the center of Grant Park, and between Queen's Landing and Congress Parkway. Dedicated in 1927, it is one of the largest fountains in the world. Built in a rococo wedding cake style and inspired by the Latona Fountain at the Palace of Versailles, it is designed to allegorically represent nearby Lake Michigan. It operates from May to mid-October, with regular water shows and evening color-light shows. During the winter, the fountain is decorated with festival lights.

Grant Park is a large urban park (319 acres or 1.29 km²) in the Loop community area of Chicago, Illinois. Located within the city's central business district, the park's features include Millennium Park, Buckingham Fountain, the Art Institute of Chicago, and the Museum Campus. Originally known as Lake Park, and dating from the city's founding, it was renamed in 1901 to honor US President Ulysses S. Grant. The park's area has been expanded several times through land reclamation, and was the focus of several disputes in the late 19th century and early 20th century over open space use. It is bordered on the north by Randolph Street, on the south by Roosevelt Road and McFetridge Drive, on the west by Michigan Avenue and on the east by Lake Michigan. The park contains performance venues, gardens, art work, sporting, and harbor facilities. It hosts public gatherings and several large annual events. Grant Park is popularly referred to as "Chicago's front yard". It is governed by the Chicago Park District.

Abraham Lincoln: The Head of State (also called Seated Lincoln or Sitting Lincoln) is a 9-foot (2.7 m) tall bronze statue of Abraham Lincoln in Grant Park, in Chicago. Created by Augustus Saint-Gaudens and completed by his workshop in 1908, it was intended by the artist to evoke the loneliness and burden of command felt by Lincoln during his presidency. The sculpture depicts a contemplative Lincoln seated in a chair, and gazing down into the distance. The sculpture is set upon a pedestal and a 150-foot (46 m) wide exedra designed by architect Stanford White.Although not as well known as Saint-Gaudens' Standing Lincoln (in Lincoln Park), it does demonstrate the years of attention that the sculptor gave to capturing Lincoln in a most somber light. Prior to being installed in Grant Park in 1926, the sculpture was displayed at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City and at the San Francisco World's Fair in 1915. The section of Grant Park, where this statue of Lincoln is located, was designated as the Court of Presidents in the plan for the park but, to date, this is the only such monument that has been erected.

Untitled is a 2013 bronze sculpture by Christopher Wool, installed on the north end of Chicago's Buckingham Fountain Plaza in Grant Park, in the U.S. state of Illinois. The work has been installed since August 2014. According to the Chicago Parks Foundation, the sculpture "stands out as an amorphous shape against the grid of the skyline behind".

Van Buren Street station is a commuter rail station in downtown Chicago that serves the Metra Electric Line to University Park, Blue Island, and South Chicago neighborhood; and the South Shore Line to Gary and South Bend, Indiana. The station has three tracks, with one side and one island platform. During the morning rush hour, platform 1 serves all outbound trains. Platform 2 serves local trains arriving from South Chicago, and trains from Blue Island. Platform 3 serves trains from the University Park mainline, which are usually expresses. During the off-peak hours and evening rush hour, Platform 1 serves express trains serving the University Park mainline. Platform 2 serves local trains headed for South Chicago, and trains headed for Blue Island. Platform 3 serves all inbound trains. In addition, South Shore Line trains from Millennium Station use platform 1, while trains to Millennium Station use platform 3, regardless of the time of day. One of the station's entrances is a replica of an Hector Guimard-designed, Art Nouveau-style Paris Métro entrance. The entrance was given to Chicago as a gift by the city of Paris in 2001.

The Petrillo Music Shell (sometimes referred to as the Petrillo Bandshell or formally as the James C. Petrillo Music Shell) is an outdoor amphitheater in Grant Park in the Loop community area of Chicago in Cook County, Illinois, United States. It serves as host to many large annual music festivals in the city such as Chicago Blues Festival, Chicago Jazz Festival, Taste of Chicago and Lollapalooza. It is also the former host of several smaller annual events that have moved to the newer Jay Pritzker Pavilion such as the Grant Park Music Festival, Chicago Gospel Music Festival, and Chicago Latin Music Festival. The name has been applied to two different structures: one that stood facing Hutchinson Field, near the south end of Grant Park, from 1931 to 1975; and a replacement structure facing Butler Field at Monroe and Columbus that opened in 1978. The original bandshell was commissioned in 1931 by Mayor Anton Cermak during the Great Depression to help lift the spirits of the citizenry with free concerts. In 1975, the music shell was named to honor James C. Petrillo, president of the Chicago Federation of Musicians from 1922 to 1962 and president of the American Federation of Musicians from 1940 to 1958, who created a free concert series in Grant Park in 1935. Petrillo was a commissioner of the Chicago Park District from 1934 to 1945.

Magdalene is an outdoor 2005 sculpture by Dessa Kirk, designed specifically for the triangular garden in Congress Plaza, east of S. Michigan Avenue at East Ida B. Wells Drive, in Chicago's Grant Park, in the U.S. state of Illinois. The statue is part of the Chicago Public Art Program.Kirk created the sculpture specifically for this site. In the springtime, tulips line the female figure's feet, and in the summertime the sculpture becomes part of the surrounding garden, as vines and flowers fill up the skirt of her dress. Kirk has similar installations in Columbus, Indiana; Three Oaks, Michigan; and Anchorage, Alaska.

Spirit of Music, also known as The Spirit of Music and the Theodore Thomas Memorial, is an outdoor 1923 sculpture and monument commemorating Theodore Thomas (founder of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra) by Czech-American artist and educator Albin Polasek, installed in Chicago's Grant Park, in the U.S. state of Illinois.

The Historic Michigan Boulevard District is a historic district in the Loop community area of Chicago in Cook County, Illinois, United States encompassing Michigan Avenue between 11th (1100 south in the street numbering system) or Roosevelt Road (1200 south), depending on the source, and Randolph Streets (150 north) and named after the nearby Lake Michigan. It was designated a Chicago Landmark on February 27, 2002. The district includes numerous significant buildings on Michigan Avenue facing Grant Park. In addition, this section of Michigan Avenue includes the point recognized as the end of U.S. Route 66. This district is one of the world's best known one-sided streets rivalling Fifth Avenue in New York City and Edinburgh's Princes Street. It lies immediately south of the Michigan–Wacker Historic District and east of the Loop Retail Historic District.

The bust of Georg Solti is an outdoor bronze sculpture by Elisabeth Frink, installed in Chicago, in the U.S. state of Illinois.

A theater company formed in 1912, the Chicago Little Theatre spearheaded and lent its name to a historic, popular wave in American Theater, the Little Theatre Movement. Founded in its namesake city by Ellen Van Volkenburg and Maurice Browne, the company was an art theater formed in opposition to the commercial values which held sway at the time. The company performed work by contemporary writers and Greek classics, as well as pioneering puppetry and puppet plays. Poetic dramas, restrained acting and new concepts in scenography were hallmarks of the Chicago Little Theatre.

The Congress Plaza Hotel is located on South Michigan Avenue across from Grant Park in Chicago at 520 South Michigan Avenue. Its eleven story edifice was originally designed by architect Clinton J. Warren as an annex to the Auditorium Theater across the street. The two buildings were linked by a marble-lined underground passage called Peacock Alley. After opening for business in 1893, for the World's Columbian Exposition, the hotel underwent two major expansions and renovations, first in 1902 and then again in 1907 which brought the total complex up to 1 million square feet (93,000 m2). The design and construction of these two additions were overseen by the firm of Holabird & Roche. The hotel now features 871 guest rooms and suites. Through the 1930s the hotel was run by hotel industry pioneer Ralph Hitz's National Hotel Management Company. At this same time, part of the hotel was used as the location for a Benny Goodman NBC Radio Show. Following the outbreak of World War II, the Government purchased the Congress Hotel and used it as a training school for U.S. Army Air Forces. It reopened for civilian use in time for the summer political conventions of 1944. At this time, John J. Mack was president of the Michigan-Congress Hotel Corporation.In 1950, the Pick Hotel Corporation bought the hotel and oversaw a major renovation of the entire hotel, which included new suites and restaurants.Another modernization project began in the 1960s, which added a ballroom and escalators.The hotel is not currently affiliated with any national chain. It has been owned by a group of investors led by Albert Nasser of Tel-Aviv, Israel, since 1987.The hotel is frequently noted as one of the most haunted buildings in Chicago. The podcast "And That's Why We Drink" used stories of the haunted activity of the hotel as a topic in their February 19, 2018 episode (episode #55).