It received its charter in 1887, when a group of college friends, principally alumni of Harvard, Yale, and Princeton, founded the club hoping to further their collegial ties and enjoy intellectual pursuits.

The club's present building, begun in 1907 and completed in 1909, is a historic landmark designed by notable architect Martin Roche, and is arguably the first "gothic skyscraper" in Chicago.

[2] It is adorned with stained glass windows by artist Frederic Clay Bartlett and seals representing distinguished universities in the United States and Europe, including Harvard, Yale, Princeton, Brown, Columbia and Northwestern.

According to one writer: There are other historically great interiors in town: Auditorium Theater of Adler & Sullivan and Mies van der Rohe's Crown Hall are only two of the first to come to mind.

But among places where people convene to enjoy good food and companionship, I can think of no single room in this wonderfully composed and constructed city that is more stunning, that clears the sinuses more speedily or whips the viewer more persuasively into social attention than Martin Roche's Cathedral Hall.