1962 sketch predicts bigger version of Marina City The story behind this sketch may have died with George Charney in 1997. Charney was a Chicago artist and architect. He owned an antique store on Clark Street and was the author of a 1968 book about communism. In July 1962, when Charney was art director of Chicago Daily News, an afternoon newspaper published from 1876 to 1978, the Associated Press as a wire photo distributed the sketch to newspapers across the country. Most likely, the sketch is a fantastical interpretation of Marina City but unfortunately it was presented as fact to newspapers, many of which reprinted the AP caption.

“Sketch by Chicago Daily News art director George Charney shows three circular 60-story towers planned to be erected by the developers of the now-building twin-towered Marina City. Site is on a 16-acre tract just north of Chicago’s downtown area and close to the present Marina towers. One of the striking features of the development is a great elevated roadway, winding around the towers in a gradually ascending spiral. Parking garages will be incorporated within the towers.”

Editors from Spokane to Daytona Beach apparently did not question a 16-acre Marina City being built before the three-acre version was completed.

Even in its earliest designs, Marina City was always planned as two towers. While another Bertrand Goldberg project, River City, built west of the Loop, was initially imagined as having three towers, its design did not start until the 1970s.