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Plan of Evanston
lages of North and South Evanston. We surveyed these changes without any misgiving.
We were pretty well satisfied with ourselves, if the truth be told. I t didn't occur to us to question the permanence of our original advantages. We saw the big yards subdivided, the vacant squares built upon, sporadic solid rows of houses, and then flat buildings appearing here and there, without asking where our children's children were to find playground space. We drained our sewage into the lake and drank its water, without reflecting that the process couldn't go on indefinitely. We went on confiding in our isolation from Chicago, without realizing that the distance was getting shorter year by year. To put the truth-unpalatable, perhaps-in a nutshell, the civic spirit of Evanston did not keep pace with its growth.
It is a matter of historical experience, to be sure, that these two never march along instep. Like nations, cities have their great periods, when, after a long somnolence, community spirit springs wide awake-develops leaders and follows them, and accomplishes immense results. The results once attained, it goes to sleep again with them clutched, safely it thinks, in its fist.
Evanston has had its sleep, but there are many indications now that it is waking up. Certainly it is high time it did. The enveloping growth of one of the greatest metropolitan districts in the world is literally at our doorsteps. Let anyone who needs conviction upon this point devote the leisure hours of a Sunday or two to exploring, by street car, bicycle or automobile, the district bounded by Diversey, Crawford, and Howard Streets. Let him look for the old time villages of Lake View, Ravenswood, and Rogers Park.
The legend of King Canute, who ordered the tide to stop advancing up the beach, remains the classic illustration of the fatuous futility of repressive legislation when it is opposed to a natural growth. Voting against annexation; trying to dam up, by inadequate through-routes, the rush of motor traffic;
