Pullman Company Main Car shop, Pullman, Illinois, Elevation

After relocating his operations south of downtown Chicago in the late 1880s, industrialist George Pullman began plans to build one of the largest company towns in the United States. Hoping to improve the lives of his workers and make a profit, he hired architect Solon Spencer Beman to design an entire community, complete with brick houses, a commercial arcade, a hotel, a library, a church, and parks. While the town was realized using the highest standards in planning, architecture, and construction methods, this great experiment ultimately failed. In 1894, when the Pullman Company cut wages without reducing rents in company-owned housing, workers initiated a massive strike that required the intervention of federal troops. Pullman was eventually forced to sell the town.