below is a travel article from the chicago tribune about brew-city, i thought you milwaukeeans might be interested in reading it. it's kinda stupid and makes sweeping generalizations just like every other travel article that's ever been written, but the overall tone is still very positive and upbeat about the revitalization of milwaukee.
Happy days--and nights--in surprising Milwaukee
By Mary Morris
Special to the Tribune
Published August 15, 2004
MILWAUKEE -- As we drive past the stone mansions, some with impeccable gardens terraced into the hillside, a glistening blue-green sea and white beaches below, I try to remember where I am. The Amalfi Coast, Northern California, even the Riviera come to mind.
But this is Milwaukee--a town I'd typecast for its beer drinking, sports fans with cheese wedges on their heads and TV sitcoms ("Laverne and Shirley," "Happy Days"). A town that would prove me wrong.
Last year my parents moved to Milwaukee to be near my brother. My father, who was nearing 100, had spent his entire life in Chicago. What would he do without Chicago's clubs and fancy restaurants, gritty politics and ceramic cows? As for my mother, I could not imagine her away from Michigan Avenue.
But they began to rave about the city, so I thought I'd give it a try.
On a flawless May morning, my husband and I pull up in front of the Pfister Hotel, one of the premier hotels in the Midwest and Milwaukee's oldest. Hopeful sports fans, clutching baseball memorabilia, crane their necks to see if we are San Diego Padres. We enter the stunning three-story, barrel-vaulted Victorian lobby where a child's smiley-face balloon floats among the angels.
After checking into a spacious room with a view of the lake, my husband and I do what we like to do best: We take a walk. We head east along Wisconsin Avenue toward the 1982 orange sculpture by Mark di Suvero, "The Calling," at the avenue's end. Then we see, rising against the blue sky and the lakefront, the magnificent Calatrava addition to the Milwaukee Art Museum.
A warm breeze blows as we approach the bridge that leads to this piece of pure white architecture with its angelic white wings called the brise soleil. Already tourists are lined up on the bridge and the ramparts leading to the museum, for it is the designated hour when the wings begin to open.
And at the appointed time they do, slowly, like a great bird poised for flight. We stand in awe as these wings, intended to allow filtered light into the museum, extend themselves against the horizon. (The wings open when the museum does--10 a.m.--and close when it closes--5 p.m. daily, except Thursdays when closing is 8 p.m.; they also "flap"--close and open--at noon every day.)
We descend to the street level and enter the museum. The entrance hall with the Calder mobile floating overhead, the pure white marble floor, the expansive room and unobstructed views of the lake give one the impression that a miracle is being performed here. Walking into the museum, it feels as if we are actually walking on water.
Finnish architect Eero Saarinen built the original War Memorial Center of the Milwaukee Art Museum in 1957. When the new addition was planned for what is called the Quadracci Pavilion, every major architect in the world, including Frank Gehry (who wanted to create an American Bilbao here), sought the job. Santiago Calatrava, a great admirer of his mentor Saarinen, won and built a splendid white ship, an ark complete with wings, made of steel and reinforced concrete (one of Calatrava's preferred materials).
In the Pop Art section of the gallery I pause in front of a large painting by Tom Wesselmann, titled "Still Life #51." It is an image of an orange bowling ball beside a giant Pabst beer can.
As I learn from friends in town who pride themselves on being local historians, this museum isn't the start but the culmination of good urban planning that began a century ago with architects such as Daniel Burnham, Alfred Clas and Frederick Law Olmsted. It continued in 1981 when the City Council decided not to run a freeway along Milwaukee's lakefront; the Calatrava addition to the Milwaukee Art Museum sits where that freeway would have been.
We stop for a visit with my parents, who live just off the lake. Afterwards we continue our walk along the lakefront, first heading to the grounds where Summerfest (and many other events) are held. Once this was a dumping ground for a Nike missile base, an airfield, railroad tracks, a shooting range and huge parking lots. Now there are miles of public walkways, bicycle rentals, a marina. A former pumping station along Lincoln Memorial Drive has been reincarnated as a cafe called Alterra. Milwaukee's backyard, one city planner noted, has now become its front yard.
Walking to Veterans Park, we pass the kite-flying school, which is closed, then cut past a pond dotted with paddleboats.
We drive farther north to Lake Park, a classic Olmsted park, which remains much as he intended it. Built on high ground, this small park traverses the deep ravines carved by glaciers long ago.
At Atwater Beach, we park on Lake Drive and walk down many steps to get to the beach. The water is too cold for swimming, but flopping on our towels, we end the day there.
That night my brother and his wife take us to Coerper's Five O'Clock Club, a quintessential Midwestern steak house far to the west. In the dim, smoky restaurant, which probably hasn't been redecorated since the late '50s, an Elvis impersonator sits at the table behind us. We try not to stare as my brother considers the 30-oz. steak with onion rings.
Big portions. Big chairs (the Blue Dawg Bagel on Farwell Avenue, with armchairs you can stretch out in). Big buildings (the Allen-Bradley Clock Tower, with the largest--bigger than Big Ben--four-sided clock in the world). The biggest (and best) circus parade.
For dessert we head out to Kopp's in Glendale, to sample the world-famous frozen custard. Though it has been Kopp's since the early 1970s, it has another claim to fame: This was once the site of the Milky Way diner, a hangout for one of the creators of "Happy Days."
We enjoy our frozen custard while admiring a giant sculpture of a red spoon with a cherry in it. It's a copy of a sculpture by Claes Oldenburg that sits in the sculpture garden at the Walker Art Center in Minneapolis. Oldenburg's first wife, Patty, was a girl from South Milwaukee who sewed his soft sculptures.
Driving down Juneau Avenue early the next morning, we pass the old Blatz brewery. Ahead of us is the abandoned Pabst brewery. We are heading for the RiverWalk along the Milwaukee River. Once an oily waterway, bordered by forbidding gray buildings, its banks now harbor charming two-story town-houses, complete with private docks, and restaurants with names like the Ocean Club and Third Street Pier. Families of ducks and a small yacht float by.
At the end of the l9th Century, the architects Burnham and Clas recommended that both Chicago and Milwaukee build river walks. Chicago built Wacker Drive, but Milwaukee's plans took another 80 years. And now it is completed.
We circle back along 3rd Street, an "old Milwaukee" street that has been home to the Usinger's Famous Sausage factory since 1880. Old-style German buildings--and the famed Mader's restaurant--remain perfectly preserved. To see a Chicago street that looks like this you have to go to the Old Chicago exhibit at the Museum of Science and Industry. In Milwaukee, you can just walk along 3rd Street and have a burger too.
From the RiverWalk we drive over to the Historic 3rd Ward, just south of downtown. Here markets have been converted into art galleries and boutiques, and a school for art and design has recently opened. But this neighborhood of cobbled streets came into its own when the Broadway Theater Center opened about five years ago as the umbrella company for three venues: Skylight Opera, Chamber Theater (for traditional theater) and Theater X (an experimental venue, which recently staged a successful run of "Chomsky 9/11").
We end our morning at Sanford D'Amato's Cafe Coquette in the Historic 3rd Ward with lunch.
After an afternoon with my parents at their Prospect Avenue home, we walk back to the hotel. We pass old Victorian mansions, then turn up Knapp Street. After a stop for a Guinness at a charming Irish pub and B&B called County Clare (traditional Irish music and corned beef on Saturday nights), we continue along Astor Street.
Here we get a full appreciation of the yellowish-white bricks that gave Milwaukee its Cream City nickname. In the 1850s brick manufacturers were disappointed when their bricks didn't come out the usual red. But after a while the local brickmakers appreciated the uniqueness of the color, and many Milwaukee buildings were built with this pale-baked clay.
Along Juneau Avenue we pause to admire All Saints Episcopal Cathedral Complex with its English Gothic Revival church and eight-sided steeple. Then we come to Cathedral Square, a lively square lined with trendy restaurants and St. John's Roman Catholic Cathedral.
That night we have a five-star dining experience at Sanford, the premier restaurant of Sanford D'Amato--the chef Julia Child picked to cook for her 85th birthday. We are pleasantly surprised that the three-course tasting menu is only $45. I savor the crayfish ravioli in won-ton soup with pepper, fennel and anise; the loin of elk in cranberry sauce; and, for dessert, the cannoli with Grand Marnier and a poppyseed cookie.
The day ends at the Blu bar on the 23rd floor of the Pfister, which features live jazz and wrap-around windows. The San Diego Padres are there. I can't remember if they'd lost or won, but our mood was high as we drank blue martinis up in the sky.
Why I have fallen in love with Milwaukee is no mystery. Milwaukee is the kind of straightforward, dignified Midwestern city I remember from my childhood--a good place to enjoy the expanse of inland sea known as Lake Michigan, to get a steak and a beer, to talk with friends over coffee, to live a well-appointed, even elegant life.
Yet it has not lost its whimsical, childlike feel. On our last morning we head to the kite school on the lake, now in full flight. Along the lakefront gulls dive for fish, sailboats skitter past. In the distance we spot a schooner with five sails to the wind. The playing fields of Veterans Park are filled with picnickers and soccer games. Two men perform acrobatics with a frisbee.
Above us a white crane kite soars like a sea bird against the pale blue sky.
- - -
MORE SIGHTS
Milwaukee has many more attractions than what is mentioned in the main story. Among them:
- The Milwaukee Public Museum, best known for its "Streets of Old Milwaukee" exhibit and as the museum that first incorporated the diorama into exhibits.
- The Milwaukee County Zoo, often described as one of the best in the country.
- The Mitchell Park Horticultural Conservatory ("the Domes"), with desert, tropical and temperate walk-through environments.
- Miller Park, home to baseball's Brewers with a fan-like, retractable dome.
- You also can tour the Miller Brewery or Sprecher Brewery (a microbrewery that also makes gourmet sodas).
INFORMATION
Contact the Greater Milwaukee Convention and Visitors Bureau at 800-554-1448;
www.milwaukee.org.
-- M.M.
Copyright © 2004, Chicago Tribune
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