![]() Like nearby Beverly, this Chicago neighborhood is an Irish-American bastion of the city’s Far South Side. Mount Greenwood is literally one of the most Irish neighborhoods in the country. Hinky Dink’s is one of many historic Irish pubs in Chicago’s Mount Greenwood, a southwest side neighborhood. It’d be a perfect place to visit on a custom private tour. Today, the Kerryman is a nice, cleaned-up Irish pub. Through the ’80s, punk bands played here including the Dead Kennedys, Naked Raygun and Husker Du. Under that name, you would come here to don your mohawk and piercings for the premier punk rock club in Chicago. When that closed, it became a succession of lesbian and gay bars during the ’60s and ’70s before reopening as O’Banion’s. A generation later the bar was converted into the city’s largest strip club, the Liberty Inn. Dion O’Banion and Bugs Moran, the bosses of the North Side Irish gang, used this tavern as their home base in the neighborhood. This building first gained notoriety when it was known as McGovern’s Saloon during the heyday of the Chicago gangster. Hard as it is to imagine today, buildings like this dominated the city at the end of the 19th century. Its classical façade with a cornice and arched windows with keystones are a perfect example of Chicago’s Italianate architecture. The building itself is clearly a remnant of the immediate post-fire building boom. But you’d be wrong! The Kerryman traces its history back to bars that were once the haven of Irish gangsters, strippers, lesbians, gay men, and punk rockers, though, sadly, not all at the same time. ![]() Located at Clark and Erie in River North, you’d be forgiven for thinking this lavishly landscaped spot was a tourist trap ala Portillo’s or Hard Rock Cafe. The Kerryman may have the richest and craziest legacy of these historic Irish pubs in Chicago. The Kerryman’s stately Italianate architecture hardly reflects its completely crazy history. Plus, their menu of Irish faves like Galway Bay mussels and curry chips is out of sight. It certainly doesn’t hurt that the interior of carved and varnished wood, stained glass windows, roaring fireplace, and Gaelic designs on the ceiling felt cozy and familiar enough to stay forever. I was sort of shocked to remember there was a Midwestern winter outside upon departing. Coming inside, the great drinks and live Irish fiddle music utterly transported me to the old country. I once visited Chief O’Neill’s on a night of a howling December snowstorm. The pub is famed for its authentic Irish music performances, vexing trivia night, and hugely popular beer garden. Located on Elston in Avondale, it’s an oasis of Irish pub goodness in a desert of big box shopping. What Chief O’Neill’s lacks in longevity it makes up for in authenticity. Okay, so a bar that opened in 1999 isn’t as historic as one that was operating a century prior. The eponymous Chief O’Neill’s overlooks the dining area. I couldn’t take my eyes off of its ornate carvings when I visited on one of our custom private tours. They believe it may have been exhibited at the 1893 World’s Fair. ![]() The gorgeous wooden back bar, made by the famous Brunswick company, is the pub’s pièce de résistance. on a leafy block that feels quintessentially Bridgeport. It sits at the corner of 38th and Union, just a few blocks from the (in)famous Hamburg Athletic Club where Daley I started his political career. The pub is located in a brick building that clearly dates back to the 19th century. The clan’s third generation run the joint today. The tavern reputedly dates all the way back to the 1890s and has been in the Shinnick family since 1938. In fact, this neighborhood staple may be the oldest of the historic Irish pubs in Chicago ever since the nearby Schaller’s Pump closed. Shinnick’s is one of the oldest historic Irish pubs in Chicago.īridgeport is one of a few South Side pockets of Irish heritage and Shinnick’s is a historic bar right at its heart.
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