In 1993, Mayor Richard M. Daley made a move that stunned the city. He sold his family's home on South Emerald Avenue in Bridgeport -- the neighborhood that has bred many an Irish political dynasty, including the Daleys -- and moved to a townhouse in the South Loop.
"To move away, as Bridgeporters say, would amount to 'acting big,'" the Tribune wrote that year, when news broke that Daley was considering the move. But he moved into the glamorous new Central Station development in the South Loop anyway, in part as a show of solidarity with the development projects that he had spearheaded in that part of the city.
Now, rumor has it that the Daleys will be making another move.
Michael Sneed, gossip columnist from the Sun-Times, wrote in her column Friday that the former mayor and his wife are hoping to get "$1 million plus" for the home.
The reason? "Mrs. Daley, who has been heroically battling metastatic breast cancer for several years, has a difficult time climbing stairs, and the couple has been living in a downtown apartment more conducive to that issue," Sneed writes.
In 2004, the Daleys caused a bit of a stir when they considered moving to a luxury home overlooking Millennium Park, the downtown marvel that, again, was a personal project of the mayor's. Then, they decided to stay put. But with the pressures of office gone, and Maggie's health at times fragile, the couple is now reportedly set to make a move.
"Sad to hear this news," writes Sloopin, a hyperlocal South Loop blog. "Although many people have many different feelings towards our old mayor, he was definitely instrumental in the South Loop's rise."
Mayor Rahm Emanuel, the first mayor from the North Side to win election since Jane Byrne in 1979, will move his family back into their Ravenswood home as soon as their current tenant moves out in June.