In this encore edition of Ask Geoffrey, our local history expert Geoffrey Baer digs deep intothe history of Montrose Beach,revisits a Streeterville puppet showandexamines underground architecture on the Blue Line.

Whatever happened to the Kungsholm puppet theater on Michigan Avenue?

–Jon Jenkoover

The Kungsholm Miniature Grand Opera staged elaborate puppet operas at a restaurant a little bit west of Michigan Avenue at Rush and Ontario streets from 1937 to 1971. The restaurant was in a mansion originally built as the home of a member of the McCormick family, but the idea of the extravagantly-staged puppet operas actually predates the restaurant.

It started with a young Chicagoan named Ernest Wolff, who created intricate opera sets in miniature as a teenager. In 1936 (a year before Kungsholm restaurant opened), Wolff and his mother founded the Chicago Miniature Opera Company and soon Wolff was touring the country with his pint-sized puppet versions of famous operas. Then in 1940, Wolff put his opera business on hold to serve in World War II.