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Navy Pier is a 3,300-foot (1,010 m) long pier on the Chicago shoreline of Lake Michigan. The pier was built in 1916 at a cost of $4.5 million; it was a part of the Plan of Chicago developed by architect and city planner Daniel Burnham and his associates. As Municipal Pier #2 (Municipal Pier #1 was never built), Navy Pier was planned and built to serve as a mixed-purpose piece of public infrastructure. Its primary purpose was as a cargo facility for lake freighters, and warehouses were built up and down the pier. However, the pier was also designed to provide docking space for passenger excursion steamers, and in the pre-air conditioning era parts of the pier, especially its outermost tip, were designed to serve as cool places for public gathering and entertainment. The pier even had its own streetcar. It was known as a romantic spot for young lovers.
Even as Chicago Municipal Pier was being built, the invention of mass-produced cars and trucks was beginning to wreak havoc on the package freight and passenger steamboat industries of Lake Michigan. The pier proved to be much more successful as a public gathering place. During the 1950s, it is estimated that an average of 3.2 million visitors frequented the pier annually, with peak attendance for the "Pageant of Progress." This decade is sometimes called the pier's "Golden Age."

The use of the pier for serious marine purposes reached a temporary peak during World War II, when the city leased the pier to the U.S. Navy. The Navy's air group training arm made the pier a quay for a pair of converted flattops, the U.S.S. Wolverine and the USS Sable (IX-81), which were used as freshwater trainee carriers. At this time, 60,000 sailors as well as 15,000 pilots including future President George H. W. Bush, used this area for training. In honor of this service, Chicago Municipal Pier's name was changed to Navy Pier.
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia