North Lawndale, Chicago Apartments Ð The Polish Culture in Chicago's West side Neighborhood.

Once part of Cicero Township in 1869, the eastern section of North Lawndale to Crawford Avenue (Pulaski Road) was annexed to Chicago by an act of the state legislature, later streets were platted and drainage ditches were installed between Western and Crawford Avenue. Millard and Decker, a real estate firm that subdivided the area in 1870, supplied the name ÒLawndaleÓ. In 1871, after the fire, the McCormick Reaper Company (later International Harvester) occupied a new large plant in the South Lawndale neighborhood. As a result, many plant workers moved to eastern North Lawndale. The remaining area west of Crawford Avenue was annexed by a resolution of the Cook County Commissioners in 1889.

In 1892 the Bohemian Catholic Church, Our Lady of Lourdes was established at the corner of 15th & Keeler, and in 1909 the Czech Freethinkers School Frantisek Palacky was built at 1525 S. Kedvale. The Czech immigrants that settled there termed the Merigold Novy Tabor (New Camp). The ultimate Czech institution to come to North Lawndale in 1912 was the Ceska Beseda (Bohemian Club) at 3659 W. Douglas Blvd. Chicago's Czech elite, as well as the visiting Czech elite of the rest of the United States and Czechoslovakia attended this club.

This was the place for its refined members to celebrate and enjoy literature, drama, and music by the most celebrated and talented Czech artists. The Bohemians spread throughout the rest of the North Lawndale neighborhood and were the original owners of many of the beautiful graystone buildings that graced the picturesque streets of the neighborhood. Many of the elite members of the Bohemian community resided in the vicinity of the 1800 & 1900 blocks of S. Millard Ave.