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"Fort Sheridan was established to protect the city’s commercial interests and was intended to be a permanent military post to keep the peace and ensure that labor skirmishes would not disrupt the city’s activities. General Philip H. Sheridan, the great Union Civil War military leader, was assigned to command an army division from Missouri at the site.
In the decades of 1870 and 1880, the City of Chicago suffered from labor unrest that climaxed in the infamous Haymarket Riots of May 1886. U.S. troops were employed to quell the uprisings. Finally in 1886, Marshall Field, a prominent Chicago entrepreneur, led a petition by area businessman to the Secretary of War to set aside area land for a military installation. The Fort Sheridan area was selected as the 632 acre site and plans were put together for Fort Sheridan’s development.
Fort Sheridan’s first real military activity began after the 1890 Battle of Wounded Knee in South Dakota when a group of the defeated Lakota tribe were impounded at the Fort.
In 1894, the Fort played a role in the Pullman Company Strike in Chicago when disagreements between union officials and management of that giant railroad car company erupted in violence.
When the Spanish American War started in 1898, Fort Sheridan served as a temporary transit center for troops headed to battle zones.
The reserve training camps provided a logical expansion into active duty training centers following the declaration of war in April, 1917. Fort Sheridan became an induction center and Midwest training center for men entering the army from Illinois, Michigan and Wisconsin.
Following the war, the great influenza epidemic of 1918 saw an additional temporary expansion need as 60,000 patients were treated at the Fort.
When World War II became a reality with its peacetime draft, Fort Sheridan became one of four Recruit Reception Centers in the country, processing large numbers of recruits. During the War the Fort was the administrative control headquarters for prisoner of war camps in Illinois, Michigan and Wisconsin.
During both the Korean and Vietnam conflicts Fort Sheridan again served as a reception and processing center for military personnel . The post was also the logistical support for 33 Nike-Hercules missile sites throughout the country.
By the 1980’s, no regular combat troops were stationed at the Fort and its main functions had evolved into supervision of reserve activities around the Midwest.
Fort Sheridan did serve to actively support the Desert Shield and Desert Storm programs by mobilizing active, reserve and National Guard units for these conflicts.
The Fort was officially closed by the Army on May 28, 1993."
Unlike most forts, it was designed by a major architectural firm, Holabird and Roche. Although the Chicago architects were responsible for its major components, auxiliary buildings were constructed from standardized plans of the quartermaster general. O. C. Simonds landscaped the complex.