Wolf Point, Chicago

Wolf Point is the location at the confluence of the North, South and Main Branches of the Chicago River in the present day Near North Side, Loop, and Near West Side community areas of Chicago. This fork in the river is historically important in the development of early Chicago. Located about 1.6 miles (2.6 km) from Lake Michigan,^[1] this was the location of Chicago's first three taverns, its first hotel, Sauganash Hotel, its first ferry, its first drug store, its first church, its first theater company, and the first bridges across the Chicago River. The name is said to possibly derive from a Native American Chief whose name translated to wolf, but alternate theories exist.

Historically, the west bank of the river at the fork was called "Wolf Point," but in the 1820s and 1830s it came to denote the entire area and the settlement that grew up around the river-fork. Wolf Point is now often used more specifically to refer to a plot of land on the north side of the fork in the Near North Side community area owned by the Kennedy family, now occupied by Wolf Point South Tower. Today the north bank at the fork, is the location of a high-rise and a construction site, the west bank includes condominium high rises, commercial skyscrapers, and railroad tracks, while the south bank includes part of the Chicago Riverwalk and serves as the transition point of Wacker Drive from an east–west street to a north–south street, above which the 333 Wacker Drive building curves in line with the riverbend.