As I rode back north through Lincoln Park, an interesting building at 2128 N Halsted caught my eye. Although today it's used at the boutique clothing shop Guise Chic, it was formerly used as a police station, dating back to 1888. According to the Forgotten Chicago web site, this is one of the oldest disused police stations in Chicago.The other 1888 station no longer in use is at Maxwell and Morgan and is famous for appearing in the TV hit series Hill Street Blues and the 1996 film Primal Fear.
Unfortunately, one of my pedals broke during my ride home. No great loss - I didn't like them anyway. So the next day I hobbled my way back down to Performance Bikes in Lincoln Park to buy new pedals. 
On the way home from the bike shop, I spotted an interesting building with the name Turn Verein Lincoln and a relief bust of a bearded man on it. The building is currently home to the Lincoln Park Athletic Club, which makes sense since a "Turn Verein" is the original German name for a workout club or gynmastics association. The bearded man is undoubtedly Friedrich Ludwig Jahn, who is considered the father of gymnastics or turnvater for his pioneering work in that sport in the early 1800s.EDIT [8/4]: In yesterday's Sun-Times, there was an article about a father-son renovation team who rehabbed a 113-year old building (the former Vorwaert Turn Hall) in Tri Taylor West. As it turns out, that building also has a relief bust of Friedrich Ludwig Jahn on it and the building served as a sports center at one time. These guys did a fabulous job fixing up this gem. Be sure to check out the photo gallery online. (I love it when the online version of a newspaper story has more info or pictures than the paper copy.) I definitely plan to go visit that other Jahn building (2431 W. Roosevelt) some time soon. Use Google Street View to see what the building used to look like.
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