Make Big Plans: Daniel Burnham's Vision of an American Metropolis--An Online and Panel Exhibition

FAIN: GI-50095-09

Newberry Library (Chicago, IL 60610-3305)
James R. Akerman (Project Director: August 2008 to April 2016)

Development of a 60-minute television documentary on the life and work of architect and urban planner Daniel Burnham.

Make Big Plans: Daniel Burnham's Vision of an American Metropolis commemorates the centennial of the publication of the Plan of Chicago (1909) by Daniel Burnham and Edward Bennett with simultaneous exhibitions, a website, and public programming that will help Americans explore the implications of the Burnham Plan's ideas about urbanism, regionalism, and planning. The Burnham Plan will serve as a lens through which the project explores how people create the places they inhabit. The Newberry Library will develop the exhibitions, which will be presented in approximately 50 public libraries and other venues throughout the Chicago region, and to a national audience through a robust web-based exhibition. These exhibitions and programs will introduce regional and national audiences will explore the /Plan of Chicago/'s historical context, and critically examine its influence on the 20th century landscape of Chicago, its region, and metropolitan America. The project will run from 4/09 to 9/10.