Today, Navy Pier is one of Chicago’s most iconic tourist destinations, blending perhaps a flair for old timey fun with top of the line restaurants, lakeside boating access and vendors that line the boardwalk, from adult beverages for mom and dad to flavored nuts and cotton candy for the kids. However, as recently as 1989, Navy Pier was bordering on disrepair, overlooked by city government and underutilized despite its prime real estate. Originally opened in 1916, Navy Pier was once the largest pier in the world, housing military personnel, Red Cross teams and homeland defense units. Soon after, it began to take shape as an entertainment hub, opening a theater, largely to entertain the stationed soldiers, in addition to a street car line and an emergency room. The structure was first christened as “Navy Pier” in 1927 to honor the many Navy sailors who were spending the majority of their years stationed in Chicago.With no practical use for a Naval pier after World War II, Navy Pier found second life as a college classroom for the University of Illinois at Chicago, with an emphasis in the education of war veterans, offering a two year undergraduate program. From 1946 to 1965, Navy Pier enjoyed a period of relative prosperity, a time which re-developers sought to harp to when renovating a refurbishing the pier in the 90′s as a tourist destination. However, in 1965, the University relocated to the current IU at Chicago campus in the Chicago Circle area. With no more prevailing interest in the pier, the exhibits and attractions that had sprung up in the area soon vacated the premises as well.Thankfully for Chicagoans and visitors to the city, the Metropolitan Pier and Exposition Authority took control of the site in 1989, commissioning over 200 million towards restoring Navy Pier into the popular after work and weekend destination we know today.