Transportation Building: IFB Home for a Quarter of a Century

At the time of its completion in 1911 the Transportation Building was the second tallest building in Chicago at 231 feet. Built on a narrow slice of ground between Federal and Dearborn streets it is only 67 feet wide but the length of a football field. It became the third home for Illinois Farm Bureau (IFB) and it's affiliates in Chicago, in just two years time, but one we finally decided to stay at – 25 years altogether. In 1927 we added offices for the newly formed Illinois Farm Supply, IFB affiliate Illinois Agricultural Mutual Insurance Company started selling auto insurance to members out of the 608 S. Dearborn address and a Chicagoan by the name of Elliot Ness joined the U.S. Treasury Department. The following year Ness moved to the Justice Department and was given the assignment of bringing down notorious Chicago gangster and bootlegger Al Capone. Ness chose the Transportation Building as his crime-fighting headquarters. 

One of Capone's men paid a visit to Elliot in his Transportation building office one day and offered him an initial $2,000 bribe followed by an extra $2,000 for every week he cooperated and left Al Capone's interests alone. An enraged Ness kicked the man out and called in the press proclaiming that neither he nor any of his loyal G-men could be bought and the their mission could not be stopped. The next day a Chicago Tribune reporter referred to Elliot and his squad of nine G-men as "The Untouchables." Eventually "The Untouchables" would being down Al Capone's gang and his grip on the Windy City. Capone was eventually sent to prison for 11 years on tax evasion charges linked to his illegal breweries. Imagine President Earl Smith riding the elevator with a Tommy gun toting G-man up the Transportation Building elevator! IFB Presidents Sam Thompson, Earl Smith, and Charles Shuman would each have had an office in the building. Eventually continued growth by IFB and its affiliates forced another move to IFB's last residence in Chicago – the American Bankers Building at 43 E. Ohio Street. 

In the 1970s the 22-story Transportation Building was boarded up and inhabited only by homeless squatters. But at the end of that decade the building saw an amazing urban renewal into loft style apartments. Today the Transportation Building is home to upscale condominiums with restaurants, businesses and convenience stores filling up the ground level.

If you are coming to IFB's Annual Meeting in Chicago this year stop by the Archives display for directions to the Transportation Building. From the Palmer House it's only about a ten minute walk to see a piece of Illinois Farm Bureau and Chicago architectural history for yourself. 

Jacob Sailors - Membership Drive Magician

We take it for granted today that acquiring and keeping Illinois Farm Bureau (IFB) members is vital to the continued well being of our organization. Just last week I worked on a graphic for the IFB Board that shows the annual membership breakdown for each district. Today we pay close attention to the ups and downs of membership, but in the early days you couldn’t even be a member of Illinois Farm Bureau. Individual membership in IFB wasn’t started until 1919 ­– a full three years after the organization was founded. Before that only the county organizations were the actual “members” of IFB.  Probably no other membership drive has been more strategic and vital to our existence than that first one in 1919. Vice-President Jacob Sailors was appointed to the task of recruiting members. Of the 59 counties who were part of Illinois Farm Bureau in those early days Mr. Sailors oversaw the membership drives in 32 counties. He hired individuals for $10 a day plus expenses to solicit membership. By the end of the 1919 he had some pretty impressive numbers. In the 32 counties he was directly responsible for membership went from zero to 40,551. In the remaining 27 counties where Jacob was not directly involved total membership was only 6,549.  Vice-President Sailors worked his membership drive magic in just over half of the counties but was directly responsible for 86% of the new members. In today’s dollars Jacob Sailors infused the young organization with $3.45 million. A great start to address the taxation, legislation, and transportation issues of the day. Thank you Jacob Sailor for believing in our organization and starting us out on a solid financial foundation. With your help we were poised to accomplish great things well into the next century.

Intro page from a 1930s Illinois Farm Bureau

Membership Drive book.