Buckingham Fountain

Buckingham Fountain is one of the largest fountains in the world — 280 feet across, holding 1.5 million gallons of water, capable of shooting its central jet 150 feet into the air — and it sits in the middle of Grant Park like a Baroque fantasy transported to the shores of Lake Michigan. Donated to the city in 1927 by Kate Buckingham in memory of her brother, it was inspired by the Latona Fountain at Versailles but built at twice the scale, because Chicago has never done anything at the same scale as anyone else if a bigger version was an option.

The fountain's evening light show, running from May to October, is a 20-minute choreography of coloured lights and water jets that draws crowds to Grant Park every summer night. The four pairs of bronze sea horses at the fountain's corners represent the four states bordering Lake Michigan — Illinois, Indiana, Wisconsin, and Michigan — and were sculpted by Marcel Loyau, who also worked on the actual fountains at Versailles.

The fountain's location is perfect — directly on axis with Congress Parkway, looking east toward the lake and west toward the Loop skyline, with the Museum Campus to the south and Millennium Park to the north. It appears in the opening credits of 'Married... with Children,' which is the second most culturally significant thing it's done after simply being a magnificent piece of public infrastructure that has survived nearly a century of Chicago winters.