Grateful Dead at the Aragon Ballroom, Chicago

Here's a poster I'd love to bid on if I could. Designed by Chicago underground cartoonist Daniel Clyne and featured in the book Art of Rock.

Mountain / Bob Segar Concert Poster, Aragon Ballroom, early 1970s

Currently on eBay and out of my price range, a Mountain / Bob Segar System Aragon Ballroom Concert Poster. Designed by Skip Williamson.

Dick Jurgens at the Aragon Ballroom

For those of you who still collect vinyl like I do, you might be interested in this auction currently running on eBay for Dick Jurgens at the Aragon Ballroom. Jurgens was a staple at the Aragon and Trianon ballrooms in the 1950s. Oldies.com has a mini biography.

Chicago Real Estate Daily announced yesterday that the current owner of the Aragon Ballroom is partnering to open a movie theatre in Uptown, which will be a welcome addition to Uptown's entertainment district.

The Last Northern Frontier

I stumbled across this today, an article in an online magazine called Jargon Chicago about the Uptown neighborhood:

Idiot Soldier at the Last Northern Frontier

by Andrew Reilly

When Thadeus Wong bought the Uptown Broadway Building for a cool $1.1 million in 2003, he probably wasn't thinking about the perpetual mystery he was about to foist onto a part of town that for so long has wondered when it was going to get a taste of that sweet, sweet municipal facelift going on everywhere else. He probably wasn't anticipating the legends that would eventually spring forth from the bookstore set to open across the street, nor was it likely he was licking his chops over the $4 million the city would later hand over to cover the cost of the seemingly endless renovation of that hulk at 4707 N. Broadway...

Read the rest at Jargon Chicago.

Interior Images of the Aragon Ballroom

The top image is available as a poster.

Vintage Glasses from Aragon Ballroom, Edgewater Beach Hotel

These glasses were tricky to photograph, so I apologize for the quality of the image. They are probably from the forties.

The one in the middle is from the Edgewater Beach Hotel. The one on the far left is from the Aragon Ballroom, and the one on the far right says Trianon/Aragon.

The Trianon, once located at 62nd and Cottage Grove, was the most expensive ballroom ever built when it opened in 1922. It closed in the fifties, and was torn down to make way for public housing in the late sixties.

Sister to the Trianon, the Aragon Ballroom was built in 1926 by Andrew Karzas, who also owned the Trianon. Karzas built the Aragon, according to historian Scott Newman, to "silence those who criticized the city's commonplace dance halls as unhealthy, immoral venues for the seduction of women, the practice of prostitution, and the then-illegal distribution of alcohol."

I have them packed away at the moment, but in the near future I'll post some vintage blueprints and black and white images of the Aragon that I have in the collection.

Tunnels of Uptown Video Tour with Fox News Chicago

Fox News Chicago visited the tunnels below Uptown Chicago in 2006. Dave Jemilo, owner of the Green Mill Jazz Club, and Brian Durack, building engineer of the Aragon Ballroom, are featured.

To play video, click on arrow in the center of the image.

Menu, Aragon Ballroom