Kelly digs in with author Keir Graff whose written a new book about a legendary building in the Windy City, “Chicago’s Fine Arts Building: Music, Magic and Murder.”  

My most salient memory of Chicago’s Fine Arts Building was seeing the premiere of the Talking Head’s movie “Stop Making Sense.” What’s yours? 

“The most significant memory I have is when I was working at Booklist, a large publishing convention came to Chicago and there was a literary agency housed in the Fine Arts Building and they had a party. And somehow, I wangled an invitation and came to the building. I searched around for this party that was being held in the Venetian courtyard, which is on the fourth floor. And it’s not super easy to find, but as I walked into this party my mind was blown. First of all, the place was just filled with book people, my kind of people. Also, I had no idea that this building housed this courtyard. It just seemed absolutely magical. And it was a summer night; it wasn’t oppressively hot or anything. And you could look up and you could see the nighttime sky and y u could see all these studios that opened off the courtyard. And I just thought, you know, what is this place?” 

Do we call this a coffee table book? 

“I think it’s a coffee table book. I’m fine with that. There’s a significant amount of text, but the intent really was to create a welcoming overview and introduction to this building. I really wanted to invite people into this building, you know, in multiple ways, certainly through the pictures and through the history and the story. But I didn’t want to overwhelm anybody with 80,000 words on a single building in Chicago.” 

People have talked about this building being haunted and you tell some really good ghost stories. 

“Perhaps the best known story is about a bookkeeper named Marge who was inherited – allegedly she went with the building. And so, when Tom Graham bought the building in 1979, Marge came to, and she was a loyal and faithful bookkeeper. However, she did things, you know, old school. I believe it was like a pencil and a big old ledger book or something. I cannot recall her age, but basically, as Tom Graham’s wife, Mary told me that when Marge retired, she basically went home and died shortly after. And a tenant famously later asked how Marge was doing and somebody said, ‘Well, actually Marge has passed away,’ and he turned white and said, ‘That can’t be. I just saw her in the stairway.’ So, there have been Marge sightings.” 

Photo Credit: Trope