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Brighton Park, McKinley Park

Brighton Park and McKinley Park are predominantly Hispanic neighborhoods situated along the busy commercial thoroughfare of Archer Avenue. The arrival of railroads and the Illinois & Michigan Canal attracted industry and working class residents to the area, and both neighborhoods are very much industrial and residential to this day. Trivia buffs should note that McKinley Park’s 37th Street and Honore intersection was designated in 1977 as Chicago’s geographic center by then-Mayor Michael Bilandic.

McKinley Park/Brighton Park: Pleasant Chicago Neighborhoods Along Archer Avenue

Written by Alan Solomon, with research assistance from the Chicago Neighborhood Tourism Project.

McKinley Park and Brighton Park share much.

Both have parks, though McKinley's is a large, lovely green space with ballfields, a lagoon, swimming pool and some of the tallest trees in the city -- and Brighton's is a mere playlot. But the original Brighton Park was a racetrack that sat on what, in 1902, became McKinley Park's park.

Both neighborhoods' residents are predominantly Hispanic, mainly Mexican.

And Archer Avenue is the common artery that keeps both McKinley Park and Brighton Park pumping commercially.

These are pleasant, working-class communities. While neither has a commercial district with the fiesta-like atmosphere of nearby Pilsen's 18th Street or Little Village's 26th Street, both have points of interest for visitors.

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Public Transportation:

EL: Orange line to 35th/Archer. Bus: 35, 39, 52, 62, 49. For more travel information, visit www.transitchicago.com.

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Brighton Park/McKinley Park continued...

McKinley Park, the park, is one of the points. It's not only a beauty, but it was an experiment that became forerunner to a series of inner-city parks that attempted, with success, to establish permanent recreational green spaces in the increasingly industrialized Chicago of the early 1900s. Ten of the South Side parks were dedicated in 1905 alone, and all remain treasures today.

As testimony to its value, McKinley Park (the park) is bordered on its Pershing Road side by some of the Central Manufacturing District, an impressive concentration of large-scale brick warehouses -- some still in use, some not -- whose massiveness is at once handsome and overwhelming. Names carved above entryways are reminders of that "Big Shoulders" era: Westinghouse Electric, Goodyear Tire, Standard Brands and more.

In the Brighton Park neighborhood is Five Holy Martyrs Roman Catholic Church, where in 1979 Pope John Paul II held an open-air mass for 17,500 people in its parking lot along 44th Street between Richmond and Francisco Avenues. Though the surrounding community is overwhelmingly Spanish-speaking, weekday and Sunday masses are split evenly between Polish and English; 43rd Street, where it borders the church, has been renamed Pope John Paul II Drive.

And in both neighborhoods, there are dining opportunities. The original Lindy's Chili, launched in 1924 and now with several locations, is here on 37th Street and Archer Avenue, paired with Gertie's Ice Cream.

There are plenty of taco opportunities, most on or just off Archer Avenue. Two favorites are Tio Luis Tacos, near Lindy's, whose steak tacos have a nice bite supplied by a subtle sprinkling of pepper bits; and El Rey Del Taco & Burritos, on California Avenue at 42nd Street (across from Kelly High School), whose marinade gives the steak in those tacos some extra flavor.

Despite the rooftop shark, it's easy to miss little La Palapa, on Damen Avenue near Archer (just south of the Stevenson Expressway/I-55), but the Mexican-style seafood served in this onetime hotdog joint is for real. Ignore the plastic fish and seagulls on the walls and dig into the house mussels. The restaurant is in the shadow of venerable Huck Finn, a 24-hour diner that has another outlet in the West Lawn neighborhood (and a third in the 'burbs).

Here's one last sight to see.

On 36th Place near Albany Avenue in a Brighton Park factory district is Crawford Steel Co. The artwork on its exterior walls is a cultural cross between graffiti and mural -- expertly executed, with the company's permission -- and it is a wow.

For more information about Brighton Park/McKinley Park, please contact the Brighton Park Neighborhood Council at 773.523.7110.