University Archives News

Notes Relating to Summer

From 1909 to 1939, a popular summertime feature of the Northwestern campus was the annual North Shore Music Festival. Around 1900, Peter Christian Lutkin, dean of Northwestern's School of Music, proposed the city of Evanston as an ideal location for an annual music festival.

By 1908 Evanston was both easily accessible to the music lovers of Chicago - in May of that year elevated train service reached its new terminus at Central Street - and home to the recently-constructed Patten Gymnasium, a facility that could seat an audience of 4,000. With that, planning for a 1909 series of concerts commenced in earnest. Northwestern benefactor James A. Patten, who provided funds for the construction of the gymnasium, underwrote the initial cost of providing a removable, tiered floor that temporarily converted the athletic facility into an auditorium. Arne Oldberg, a professor in the School of Music, wrote a special overture - with allusions to the University's hymn - that was performed at the opening concert. By 1921 an organ had been installed in Patten Gymnasium and, for relief on hot summer nights, the hall cooled by ventilators blowing air over a five ton daily accumulation of ice.

The North Shore Music Festival sponsored classical music and operatic performances and became the summer home first to the Theodore Thomas Orchestra and then to the Chicago Symphony Orchestra. Lutkin became the longtime musical director of the Festival and occasionally shared conducting responsibilities with Frederick Stock of the CSO. The Festival featured performances both by renowned soloists and by choirs numbering several hundred voices. It became a major Chicagoland cultural event and a well-known venue in the world of classical music.

Financial constraints imposed by the Great Depression shut down the Festival for a period before its revival in 1937 and 1938. When Northwestern University razed Patten Gymnasium for the construction of its Technological Institute, the Festival moved, in 1939, to the University's Dyche Stadium. Unfortunately, acoustics at that location were poor and the performance disappointing. The Dyche Stadium event became the coda to the Music Festival and classical music moved permanently to a new summer home, Ravinia, in the northern suburb of Highland Park.

Programs, photographs, some administrative records, and general items relating to the North Shore Music Festival are available for use at the Northwestern University Archives.