North Lawndale Walk

We will meet at the McDonald's at 3200 W Roosevelt Road. You should be able to find parking on any of the streets. Watch for permitted streets around the police station.

Last year or the year before, I led a walk in the area, where we passed many of the Synagogues-Turned-Churches. There were 3 on my list that we didn't see. We'll go past those on this walk as well as the Homan Rail Farm and Altenheim Line.

From roughly 1910 to the early 1950s, North Lawndale was a major center of Chicago Jewish life, housing roughly 65,000 Jewish residents—one-quarter of the city's population—at its peak in 1946. Known as "Deutschland" to older Eastern European Jewish immigrants, the area was a densely populated, vibrant community of Russian and European Jews with over 60 synagogues, the Jewish People’s Institute (JPI), and a bustling commercial strip on Roosevelt Road.

Following World War I, many Jews moved from the overcrowded Maxwell Street area to North Lawndale, which became a 90% Jewish neighborhood, often described as a "Jewish Mecca"

The 5.48 mile loop walk can be found here.

Lunch options:

• La Patrona 3046 w Cermak - we ate here a few weeks ago and it was delicious!
• La Catedral - 2500 S Christiana
• El Burrito Feliz - 3219 W Cermak