W.T.T.W. to Screen ‘The Great American Read’ Premiere at the Literacenter

W.T.T.W. (Channel 11), Chicago’s P.B.S. station, in cooperation with the Chicago Literary Alliance, will host a free screening of the ninety-minute-long premiere episode of the eight-part series The Great American Read (2018) at the Literacenter from 7:00 p.m. to 9:00 p.m. on Tuesday, May 22, 2018. The Literacenter is located at 641 West Lake Street, Chicago, Illinois 60661.

At this free live screening, bibliophiles will celebrate reading, share their favorite novels from the Top 100 List, and select a summer reading list. Readers of all ages are welcome. Drinks and snacks will be on hand. For adults twenty-one-years of age and older, craft beer and wine will be available, as well.

P.B.S. stated, “THE GREAT AMERICAN READ is an eight-part series that explores and celebrates the power of reading, told through the prism of America’s 100 best-loved novels (as chosen in a national survey). It investigates how and why writers create their fictional worlds, how we as readers are affected by these stories, and what these 100 different books have to say about our diverse nation and our shared human experience.”

The television series features entertaining and informative documentary segments, with compelling testimonials from celebrities, authors, notable Americans and book lovers across the country. It is comprised of a two-hour launch episode in which the list of 100 books is revealed, five one-hour theme episodes that examine concepts common to groups of books on the list, and a finale, in which the results are announced of a nationwide vote to choose America’s best-loved book.

P.B.S. and the show’s producers worked with the public opinion polling service YouGov, which conducted a demographically and statistically representative survey of 7,200 Americans asking them to name their most-loved novels. An advisory panel of thirteen literary industry professionals helped tally and organize the results based on the selection criteria of the producers.

The producers narrowed the list of America’s favorite books to 100 by limiting the poll to novels and restricting the number of titles per author or authoress to one each. [This included J.R.R. Tolkien’s three-volume novel The Lord of the Rings and the seven books in J.K. Rowling’s Harry Potter series.] Each member of the panel was able to select one novel from the survey results to discuss and possibly include on the Top 100 List.

According to P.B.S., “The list contains a broad range of fictional titles, authors, time periods, countries, genres and subject matter. The list includes books from as far back as the 1600s and as recent as 2016. From beloved world literature to contemporary best sellers, many categories are represented: 20^th century [sic] American classics, thrillers, young adult novels, sci-fi/fantasy, adventure, historical fiction, romantic stories, and books that represent the human experience told from a diverse range of perspectives.”

Viewers can download the Top 100 List here, print it out, and check off the novels they have read themselves. Viewers will vote to name one of these 100 novels America’s favorite book.

To do it, voting will open online with the broadcast of the premiere episode and continue throughout summertime, leading up to the finale in October. Viewers will be able to vote online through the Website and via social media (specifically Facebook and Twitter). In the autumn, viewers will also be able to vote through the text-messaging service S.M.S. (Short Message Service) and toll-free calling. Hosted by Meredith Viera, The Great American Read was made possible by the Anne Ray Foundation, the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, and P.B.S. viewers.

Limited seating is available for this event at the Literacenter. Register for tickets via Eventbrite here.

The Field Museum of Natural History in March, 2018

The Field Museum of Natural History’s entrance pavilions are at opposite ends of Stanley Field Hall, which has a north-south axis. The two porticos (porches) are each reached by two successive flights of stairs.

Both porticos of The Field Museum of Natural History are flanked by two small porches, which each have two caryatids (columns in the shape of maidens). On the facade, the wings are adorned with a colonnade of attached fluted Ionic columns. The building’s fluted Ionic columns have volutes (spiral-scroll-shaped crowns).

Each portico of The Field Museum is tetrastyle in antis with double-ranked fluted Ionic columns capped by volutes. An entablature crowned by a pediment rests atop the columns. The continuous frieze in each case is relatively plain. The wave-themed acroteria that crown the pediments are borrowed from the Palace of a Fine Arts, which housed The Field Museum until 1920 and now houses the Museum of Science and Industry.

The Field Museum of Natural History isn’t “just” a museum. Visitors can watch scientists at work through windows at the Daniel F. and Ada L. Rice DNA Discovery Center’s Pritzker Laboratory.

Mrs. Charles (Laura) Schweppe, a daughter and co-heiress of John Graves Shedd, the former partner of Marshall Field I who succeeded him as president of Marshall Field & Company, and who, under the guidance of Stanley Field founded the Shedd Aquarium, donated an exhibit of 100 bronze sculptures by Malvina Hoffman to The Field Museum. They represent every race, nation, and tribe in the human family (more or less). On January 9, 1933, the first group, Unity of Man, went on display.

In addition to the four figures Henry Hering (1874-1949) made for the corners of Stanley Field Hall, he also made the twelve plaster round lion head shield escutcheons that line it. These are replicas of the marble round lion head shield escutcheon he made for the pediment of the facade of The Field Museum of Natural History.

Christmas at Chicago’s Union Station

Credit: S.M. O’Connor Caption: This is a POLAR EXPRESS display in the Great Hall of Union Station.

Credit: S.M. O’Connor Caption: This is a closeup of the THE POLAR EXPRESS steam locomotive mock-up in the Great Hall of Chicago’s Union Station.

Credit: S.M. O’Connor Caption: This is the headlamp of THE POLAR EXPRESS steam locomotive mock-up in the Great Hall of Chicago’s Union Station.

Credit: S.M. O’Connor Caption: This Union Station Company rail car loaded with super-size gifts is part of THE POLAR EXPRESS mock-up in the Great Hall of Chicago’s Union Station.

Credit: S.M. O’Connor Caption: This is a Christmas tree in the Great Hall of Chicago’s Union Station.

Credit: S.M. O’Connor Caption: This Christmas tree in the Great Hall of Union Station in downtown Chicago has emblems of Amtrak, Metra, and historic railroad companies whose routes they now operate like Burlington.

Cinemas sculptor Alfonso Iannelli (1888-1965) Helped Design

This is the Pickwick Theatre Building, an Art Deco movie palace and office building erected in downtown Park Ridge, Illinois in 1928.

The architects were Roscoe Harold Zook and William F. McCaughey. Sculptor Alfonso Iannelli, who also worked on the Adler Planetarium, contributed to this building.

In recent years, the Vlahakis family, who’ve owned the building for 50 years, have been able to turn the building into a multiplex by adding smaller theaters around the original auditorium. The latest one, with a screen four times the size of the one in the auditorium, will open in time to screen INFINITY WARS in May, if all goes well.

The Catlow Movie Theater is a cinema that opened in downtown Barrington, Illinois in 1927. The Tudor Revival style of architecture is not confined to the facade of the cinema. As with the Pickwick Theatre in Park Ridge, Illinois, sculptor Alfonso Iannelli (1888-1965) played a role in the design and decoration of The Catlow Movie Theater.