Gapers Block published from April 22, 2003 to Jan. 1, 2016. The site will remain up in archive form. Please visit Third Coast Review, a new site by several GB alumni. ✶ Thank you for your readership and contributions. ✶
Gapers Block went live on April 25, 2003, with a Merge post about the Berghoff adding seats in the bar. The firstcouple Fuel questions were kind of silly, but got down to business soon enough.
The oldest Slowdown calendar entry was on May 1, 2003. We went fully public on May 5, and on that day Shylo Bisnett's "A Dialogue Between KISS & ABBA" was our first Detour feature.
A couple things from the earliest days of the site are missing -- including the first incarnation of Transmission, a weekly mp3 from a local artist, shared in a box on the front page. It was hand-coded and uploaded by FTP, so there was no archive. And the first 14 months of Rearview were lost in a server transfer, so the earliest we have in the archives is from July 9, 2004.
It's good to look back at where we started, so we have perspective on where we are today, and where we're going from here. This may be the end of Gapers Block for now, but it's not the end of the incredible work being done by the writers who made the site such an invaluable resource for Chicagoans -- nor is it the end of independent journalism in Chicago. It will just be (temporarily, I'm positive) harder to find. The mission for you is still the same: Slow down and check out the city. Thank you for coming along on this particular ride.
Photos from the 1933 Century of Progress exposition tell the story of the events and people dramatized in Chicago's last world's fair. In this 144-page book, photos from the Tribune archives track all aspects of the fair from technology through entertainment.
Fifty-seven years ago today, a massive fire at Our Lady of the Angels School on the city's West Side killed 92 children and three nuns. Read more here.
Did you know that Austin was once part of Cicero Township? Its undoing as a suburb was the extension of the L line -- but not in the way you might think.
Photogrammer is a project organizing and displaying more than 170,000 photos taken between 1935 and 1945 for the United States Farm Security Administration and Office of War Information. There are 2,407 photos of Chicago and Cook County. (Thanks, Bob!)
Nancy Green, the original Aunt Jemima, was buried in Oak Woods Cemetery nearly a century ago, but nobody was sure where. Sherrie Williams, president of the Bronzeville Historical Society, finally founder her.
Witness elephants racing through the streets, a visit from the Queen of England, and a 1930 championship wrestling match with classic Movietown newsreels now available online.
As the mass shooting in Charleston rekindles conversations about the confederate flag, the ongoing Battle Flag documentary project by Chicago-based producers explores its complicated identity.
Forgotten Chicago posted the final installment of its overview of the work of architect James F. Eppenstein. Load up parts one and two and save it for lunchtime reading.
Paul Dailing writes the 1001 Chicago Afternoons blog as a sort of homage to Ben Hecht's gritty daily slice-of-life newspaper column from the 1920s. It was later compiled in to a book called A Thousand and One Afternoons in Chicago. If any part of you gladdens at accidentally wandering in to the meat packing district, or eavesdropping on late night bar brawls, or gaping at the people and places of Chicago with a sense of wonder, you will enjoy both Paul and Ben's works equally.
Twenty years ago, the City began dismantling the Henry Horner Homes and other CHA public housing projects. The Chicago Reporter looks at the legacy of that decision and what the near West Side is like now..
Curious City digs up the history of Fort Douglas, a Civil War prison camp that saw some 40,000 Confederate POWs pass through its 80 acres on the South Side of Chicago. Dig deeper into Illinois in the Civil War.
The Henry Gerber House in Old Town was named as a National Historic Landmark for its connections to the Society for Civil Rights, the first gay civil rights organization.
Check out this 1934 road map of Chicagoland -- before the expressways, before Lake Shore Drive continued south of the River, before O'Hare Airport. [via]
The Guardian looks back at the Wall of Respect, a mural constructed in the 1960s to celebrate the black experience that inspired community murals around the world.
On Sept. 26, 1957, Field Museum herpetologist Karl P. Schmidt became the first recorded victim of a boomslang snake, at the time thought to be harmless but now known to be one of the deadliest snakes in the world. [via]
Today is the 10 year anniversary of the day the Dave Matthews Band became synonymous (for Chicago residents, anyway) with the phrase "800 pounds of raw sewage." [via]
Media Burn just posted some great archival video by Phil Ranstrom from the opening of Frankie Knuckles' club, the Power House. Jump to 2:55 to hear the first of Frankie Knuckles' interview segments, and then to 6:38 to see a pretty amazing performance by J.M. Silk.
While Jackie Robinson broke baseball's color barrier in 1947, the Cubs waited until 1953 to get with the times -- and it may have been the reason for the team's long decline, writes the Reader's Steve Bogira.
Groupon offered a special $10 off deal for Presidents Day in honor of Alexander Hamilton, "one of our greatest presidents." The only problem is Hamilton was never president.
American Thinker resurrects a "forgotten masterpiece," sculptor Carl Rohl-Smith's depiction of the Fort Dearborn Massacre. Black Partridge, one of the Native Americans depicted, nearly had a new park named after him in 2009.
In 1927, Chicago scientist W.D. McNally had a hand in the development of the breathalyzer. Here's hoping you don't meet the state of the art tonight. Be safe, and happy new year!
"In Chicago, they found a woman who holds the record," claimed Ronald Reagan in a 1976 campaign rally. The real story of Linda Taylor, Reagan's notorious Cadillac-driving "welfare queen" is more nuanced.
The Nation's Rick Perlstein sums up the Ventra debacle in part 1 of a series on privatization perils. But as Robert Loerzel pointed out in the Reader back in 2010, the city's struggle with private transit operators is nearly as old as Chicago itself.
During WWII, Chicagoland played host to several POW camps. WBEZ's Curious City dove into the history of the camps, talking with both prisoners and workers.
Jack Ruby was born and raised in Chicago. His remaining local relatives talked with NBC5 about the the man who killed Lee Harvey Oswald on Nov. 25, 1963.
Nearly 50 years after JFK's assassination, an investigation found there were two other plots to kill Kennedy while he was in Chicago, three weeks before his fateful trip to Dallas.
The telltale yellow hue of cabs got its start in Chicago, when a study commissioned by cab company owner John Hertz found that it was the easiest to see from far away.
A Curious City investigation finds that Union Park was once home to a zoo of sorts, although the iron cage that held "Bob the bear" was pretty far below today's standards.
LIFE looks back at a meeting of the Anti-Superstition Society of Chicago on Friday the 13th, December 1941, where members did every unlucky thing they could think of, from breaking mirrors to laying in a coffin.
Page through Art in Chicago Business, a book published in 1966 featuring art hung in the city's major corporations' collections -- along with executives who presumably had a hand in selecting them.
On the night of June 29, 2003, 13 people died and more than 50 were injured when a wooden porch collapsed during a house party in Lakeview. RedEye takes a look at the aftermath, 10 years after the tragedy.
If you're old enough, you might remember former Loop DJ Jonathon Brandmeier performing jokey songs with his band, the Leisure Suits, back in the '80s and '90s. With Milwaukee's Summerfest starting this weekend, it seemed like a good time to share his song "Hey Der Milwaukee Polka," a true love letter to our neighbors to the north.
As SROs die out and talk of gentrification swirls, Whet Moser shares the story of the long-forgotten effort to establish Hank Williams Village, an Appalachian planned community in Uptown.
Steve Dahl is infamous for his radio antics, Disco Demolition Night and more, and now has a successful podcast network. But did you know he was also a Billboard-charting recording artist?
In 1979, Dahl recorded "Do You Think I'm Disco?," a parody of Rod' Stewart's "Do Ya Think I'm Sexy," that peaked at 58 on the Billboard 100 charts in 1979. He went on to record several other songs with his band, Teenage Radiation. Here's a sampling:
"Do You Think I'm Disco?" - 1979
"Ayatollah" - 1979
"Skylab" - 1979
"Crew Cut Hero" - 1981
"Another Kid in the Crawl" -1981
"Falklands" - 1982
Dahl also recorded two albums of original, non-parody songs in the '90s as Steve Dahl & the Dahlfins.
John H. White, one of the photographers laid off from the Sun-Times yesterday, was one of the contributors to Documerica, a national photodocumentary project in the 1970s sponsored by the EPA. White documented the black community in Chicago.
The National Archives have put his and other photographers' work from the project up on flickr.
In 2003, Chicago filmmaker Eric Fensler (who now lives in Portland, OR) created "GI Joe PSAs," a series of weird remixes of the odd PSAs tacked onto some episodes of "GI Joe" cartoons, which wet viral before anyone had ever heard of social media. The Verge examines their legacy.
Thirty years ago, Risky Business came out and made a star of Tom Cruise. Highland Park residents recall the film and its effect on the suburb. (Presumably the Drake Hotel and residents of Belmont Harbor were not consulted.)
During the Civil War, 156 members of the Chicago Board of Trade served as an artillery battery for the Union from 1862 to 1865. The battery was well decorated and only lost 19 men, nine to disease. There's a whole book about them. [via]
Jackie Robinson, whose life is depicted in 42, out this weekend, made his major league debut at Wrigley Field in 1947. A snippet of film shot by a fan shows him out on the field and signing autographs. [via]
In the winter of 1978-79, the foundation of John Wayne Gacy's home and garage were excavated to discover the remains of 27 of his victims. This set of photographs (some NSFW) by retired Des Plaines Detective Aug Schwiesow shows some of what the investigators found. [via]
In 1949, Ruth Ann Steinhagen lured former Cubs first baseman Eddie Waitkus up to her hotel room and shot him, an act that landed her in a mental hospital and was fictionalized into the book and film The Natural. Steinhagen passed away in December at age 83, the Cook County Coroner's Office announced Friday.
The St. Louis-based Preservation Research Office blog uses Chicago's battles over Prentice and Michael Reese to evaluate each city's hospital preservation experiences. The verdict: "Alas, Chicago has done the wrong thing while St. Louis years ago made a wise choice."
What was the geographical distribution of minorities changed in Chicago and other cities before and after the Fair Housing Act of 1968? Pro Publica shows you.
If it wasn't Mrs. O'Leary's cow, might it have been ...a comet? A discredited theory proposes that remnants of Biela's Comet were the cause of the Great Chicago Fire and the Peshtigo Fire in Wisconsin in 1871. (Thanks, Ron!)
Light lunchtime viewing: the debut episode of "Playboy's Penthouse," a television show hosted by Hugh Hefner and featuring guests Lenny Bruce, Nat "King" Cole, Cy Colman, Ella Fitzgerald and Rona Laffe. It was filmed Oct. 24, 1959 in Chicago.
On this day in 1895, Chicago hosted America's first automobile race. The course ran from Hyde Park to Evanston, and the winner -- one of two cars to complete the entire race -- clocked in at seven hours and 53 minutes.
The Reader's Mick Dumke has begun a five-part series looking back on the murder of Dantrell Davis, whose death helped bring about the end of housing projects in Chicago: part one, part two, part three, part four, part five.
Flickr user WayOutWardell has collected extensive area photographs, including these Woodlawn images. By the way, his name is a reference to the jazz musician Wardell Gray, who spent a lot of time in Chicago. [Thanks, Jolyon!]
In 1966, a New Trier highschooler named Michael Aisner drove to the South Side with a friend to interview Muhammad Ali. The reel-to-reel tape hadn't been heard for 50 years -- until Aisner submitted it to Blank on Blank, a new collection of "lost interviews" old and new.
SPIN Magazine assembled an oral history of the Chuck Taylor shoe, and while it's a fleeting mention, according Converse archivist Sam Smallidge, Taylor got his start working for Marquis Converse as a salesman in Chicago in the 1920s. [via]
If, at some point in the past 50 or so years, you stood in line for a hot dog and fries at the Parky's on Roosevelt Road, you know the unmatchable feeling of a real Chicago stand and the way that the best of them transcend the notion of a restaurant. Just when condemnation seemed inevitable for the building that housed the iconic spot, Chicago native Brendan O'Connor, a man with a dream and curious palate, set out to save it.
Thanks to his creative take on sausage, and the overall fast food experience, the Food Network show "3 Days to Open With Bobby Flay," chose to help O'Connor and Big Guys Sausage Stand become a reality. Bobby Flay himself showed up at the small, narrow-roofed building at 7021 W. Roosevelt Road in Berwyn and worked with O'Connor and his team to turn passion into crowd-pleasing originality. Ultimately, they stayed true to O'Connor's vision of creating a classic atmosphere, with a nod to the Chicago "Super Fans," while taking a truly unique and modern approach to traditional menu items. So far, Big Guys has been well-received, living up to its promises of big flavor, competitive prices and the quick-but-satisfying turnaround perfected by the best Chicago hot dog stands for decades. Check out the food, the vision and the Bobby Flay touch Mon-Thru 11am-2am; Fri-Sat 11am-3am; Sun 11am-6pm.
A collection of Eliot Ness memorabilia is going up for auction later this year. You'll be able to bid on such items as his Department of Justice credentials, a business card and posters from his failed bid for the mayorship of Cleveland.
No, not Disneyland, his childhood home -- 2156 N. Tripp Ave. in Hermosa, built by Walt's father and in which Mickey Mouse's dad was born. The two-story house is listed for $179,000. [via]
No direct reflections from Jordan or Pippen, but this oral history of the '92 "Dream Team" US Olympic basketball team is a great read -- and it does include quotes from Tony Kukoc, who played for Croatia against his future teammates.
On July 24, 1915, 844 people died when the SS Eastland capsized in the Chicago River. The Tribune has a gallery of photos of the tragedy and some of its victims. Lookingglass Theatre is currently staging Eastland, a new musical about it, through July 29.
A moment of typeface history: Pabst Oldstyle was based on the hand lettering Frederic Goudy created for the Pabst beer label. It was commissioned in 1902 by Schlesinger & Mayer, a Chicago department store that later became Carson Pirie Scott, for its exclusive use. You can download it now from MyFonts.
Sunday was the 75th anniversary of the Hindenburg tragedy; what you may not know is that the most famous recording of the incident is WLS radio reporter Herb Morrisson.
The Commission on Chicago Landmarks is considering landmark status for the Portage Theater, which a controversial church wants to convert into a house of worship. In A/C, Dan Kelly delves deep into the theater's history and its role as a cinema and community center.
On this day in 1992, much of the Loop and parts of River North flooded after workers repairing the Kinzie Street Bridge drove pylons into an old freight tunnel beneath the river.
Here are a few stories that should give you enough to keep you occupied for the next couple hours:
According to legend, the "606" in Chicago's zip codes is an homage to the 606 Club, a speakeasy turned supper club with strippers favored by Richard J. Daley and other bigwigs. Judging by these matchbooks, it must have been a distracting place to do business.
Lee Bey reports that negotiations have failed to save 3411 W. Douglas Blvd. The former Anshe Kanesses Israel synagogue will be demolished as early as next week.
William Heirens, the man who confessed to being the "Lipstick Killer" in the 1940s, died today at 83. Wikipedia has a surprisingly thorough history of Heirens and the Lipstick Killer case.
There's a lot of buzz going around about the city's "birthday" this Sunday, including a daunting list provided by the Sun Times filled with ways to celebrate it. However, because March 4th marks city's incorporation rather than the day it was founded, it's arguable that Sunday better resembles the day it got its first job.
On this date in 1960, the first Playboy Club opened. And earlier this month, this year, the Richard Hunt sculpture of the magazine's iconic Rabbit Head was taken down from the lobby of the Chicago office, which will close completely April 30.
Here's a second view of the rabbit head sculpture coming down, juxtaposed with the intro from a vintage Playboy film. (Thanks, Dan!)
"Machine Gun" Jack McGurn, the alleged mastermind of the St. Valentine's Day Massacre, met his own end in a bowling alley the night before Valentine's Day in 1936. The hit was believed to have been inspired by a 1932 film depiction of the massacre.
This is what you would have eaten if you flew first class on United Airlines flight from San Francisco to Chicago in 1966. More airline menus in Northwestern University Library's transportation collection.
Paul Reda has delved into the history of Miss Cora M. Strayer, a private detective on the South Side at the turn of the century. He's posted a timeline of the information he has so far, and is looking for other history buffs to help him with further inquiries. [via]
Snowpocalypse, Snowmageddon, snOMG... Whatever you called it, a year ago today, you were preparing for a lot of snow. We wouldn't know until 24 hours later that it was the third biggest snowfall Chicago had ever seen. Here's a look back at some of the sights and sounds from the blizzard.
The Field Museum will soon display (for a limited time) 20 mummies from its collection--several of which haven't been displayed since the Columbian Exhibition.
Congratulations Chicago, you've been paying over three dollars a gallon for gas for a full year now, with the highest area average in May of $4.469, according to AAA.
Sheriff Tom Dart announced today that one of the eight unknown victims of John Wayne Gacy has been identified through DNA (previously) as William George Bundy, who disappeared in 1976.
Here's an exclusive 1992 interview with Gacy by Channel 2's Walter Jacobson, 13 years after he was convicted of murdering 33 young men.
Remember the Chicago Cougars? No? Not surprising, since they were a World Hockey Association team for just three years in the mid-'70s. Their main claim to fame might be bringing about the only major-league championship to be played in Mount Prospect.
A truly evocative photo of Red Grange, one of the first big stars in the early NFL, running for a touchdown against the Philadelphia Yellowjackets on Dec. 5, 1925. [via]
There's a screening of Double Victory, a documentary about the Tuskeegee Airmen, tonight at 7pm at the DuSable Museum, with a panel discussion afterward featuring two Airmen. The screening is sponsored by the National Association of Black Journalists Chicago and is free; RSVP here.
The former Brand Brewing Co. complex on Elston may be demolished to make room for yet another big box store along the strip. Our Urban Times offers reasons why it shouldn't.
The creator of Minnie's Dream discovered his/her great grandmother's photo albums in his/her grandmother's Springfield attic. Consisting mostly of cabinet cards from the 1890s--many shot in Chicago photo studios--the site author speculates on the life Great Grandma Minnie might have lived back then.
Not the one they call Willis -- the original 1905 tower. It's one of more than a hundred architecturally significant sights you can see during the Chicago Architecture Foundation's Open House Chicago this weekend.
Speaking of apps, the Chicago History Museum today launched The Great Chicago Fire and the Web of Memory, an app for iPhone and iPad that brings to life that fateful event 140 years ago. Download it from iTunes here for 99 cents.
The Exhibit Supply Co, or "Ex. Sup. Co" or "ESCO" as they often printed, was a prolific printer of novelty cards from the 1900s through the '60s, featuring athletes and movie stars -- as well as some more risque material.
The Wilmette Beacon has interview with Peter Less, a Wilmette resident of 64 years, about the time he spent as a translator during the Nuremberg Trials. He escaped Germany before the war began, lost his entire family, and still managed to sit across from Hermann Goering, Rudolf Hess and Hans Frank and translate their words into English. After he moved to the US, he became a lawyer and still has a law practice in Chicago.
We've linked to it before, but with all the Playboy Club hub-bub, it seems like a good time to point out the Ex Playboy Bunnies Website, an online community for Bunnies new and old.
The City is preparing to celebrate the 175th birthday of the "oldest house in Chicago," the Henry B. Clarke House -- but the true oldest house may be clear across town, in Norwood Park. It was built four years earlier, and unlike the Clarke House has stayed in one place the whole time.
"My t-shirt? It's for the Duffy Florals. You've probably never heard of them." It's rare that sports fans get to play the hipster superiority card, but Peoples Garment Co. helps make it happen. (Duffy Floral, the team's sponsor, still exists, incidentally.)
On Sept. 2, the Field Museum will debut Ground Zero: 360°, an exhibit that immerses museumgoers in the events of 9/11 from the perspective of a police commander and a photojournalist. The exhibit runs through the end of the year.
An oldie but a goodie: Royko at the Goat, a short film of Mike Royko telling stories about 16-inch softball. Now with a preface from cinematographer Scott Jacobs.
There's a media league playing today -- head over to Trebes Park on Monday and Thursday nights this month to catch Gapers Block, Chicagoist, RedEye, Time Out, CHIRP, WBEZ, The
Reader, WSJ, WCIU and ChicagoNow battle it out on the dirt diamond. We play at 6 and 7pm.
There were once more than 227 miles of elevated train tracks in Chicago. Forgotten Chicago digs up what remains of several train lines demolished by the CTA over the years.
Open Culture turns up an interesting interview between Studs Terkel and Nelson Algren about Algren's move to Paterson, NJ, and why he didn't miss Chicago after he left. [Via]
At 4pm today, the University of Chicago will open a time capsule placed in the Research Institute Building's cornerstone in 1950. You can watch it live online.
A forgotten piece of Chicago history -- a Lincoln Square property that once housed police horses, was owned by Al Capone and served as a boarding house for traveling magicians and storage space for nearby Magic Inc. -- may face demolition.
At the turn of the last century, the Linguistic Survey of India recorded 179 languages and 544 dialects from around the Indian subcontinent and Burma. The Digital South Asia Library at the University of Chicago recently digitized two dozen of the phonographs and posted them online.
If you're itching to get outside and amble this weekend, check out the newest of the Chicago historical tour scene with a "Good Times Around Michigan Avenue" tour by Detour Chicago. Public tours start today and include the use of interactive iPads for each participant and plenty of info. about jazz clubs, grand balls, elite soirees, and all sorts of diversions, past and present, on the Mag Mile.
Prices for the tours range from free (kids under 12) to $26 for adults ($24 for students/seniors). The group, Detour Chicago, will also launch some other great-sounding tours this summer, including "Our Chicago Sound: Jazz, Blues & Beyond" (tickets free-$70) and "Inside the Loop: Explore the Unexpected" and they also offer up private tours and school group tours as well. They also have cool online multimedia resources great for teachers and those just wanting to learn more.
An odd chapter in Chicago and New York's pizza rivalry: Supposedly you can't get a just a slice of pizza at certain NYC institutions because of Al Capone's strong-arm tactics regarding cheese distribution.[via]
The Arts Engagement Exchange published this interesting article last week about "overcoming cultural barriers" -- basically a history of public arts programming in Grant Park and how Millennium Park is carrying on the tradition of tricking people into listening to music they wouldn't normally seek out.
Coming across an interesting tidbit about a former silent-age movie theater near my neighborhood led to one thing, and then another, and then a strange, WTF? other.
Wacker Drive is named for Charles Henry Wacker, the chairman of the Chicago Plan Commission from 1909 to 1926. He published a book, Wacker's Manuel of the Plan of Chicago: Municipal Economy, which for 12 years all CPS eighth graders were required to read -- and so can you.
BoingBoing digs up an odd 1968 film from the Yippie movement that supposedly aired on TV stations as an equal-time counterpoint to propaganda from the National Democratic Convention.
For a couple of years, the Ferris wheel from the World's Columbian Exposition was set up along Clark Street, where a post office and McDonald's now stand.
For three years in the '30s, the showboat Dixiana was moored on the Chicago River just south of the Diversey bridge. In 1937 it was to house a performance of Tobacco Road, but Mayor Kelly saw the play and banned it from Chicago. The Dixiana headed to Michigan City, IN, where it sank in the harbor. [via]
The video was a submission to an MTV contest to promote Madonna's tour, and was one of 10 winning finalists shown on the music television station. [via]
The possibility that more victims of John Wayne Gacy are buried in and around a Northwest Side apartment building has gained more attention thanks to an investigative report that implies a CPD cover-up in the late 1990s. The Cook County Sheriff's Department is considering reopening the case.
We mentioned it last year, but the Atlantic digs deeper into the first car race in America and finds an interesting angle: it was also pitted gas versus electric. The magazine shares a first-hand published account of the race, too.
Chicagology is a collection of historical photographs (oddly, with blue skies added to them) and moments from the city's history, written when those moments were fresh. [via]
Photographer Art Shay shared more photos from his archives over on Chicagoist today -- this time the lens is trained on the Honorable Richard J. Daley.
Eadweard Muybridge debuted the first motion picture device, the zoopraxiscope, at the 1893 Colombian Exposition. Read more about Muybridge, including his now lesser-known, racier stuff. [via]
Gene Siskel and Roger Ebert's "At the Movies" -- as well as its predecessors, "Opening Soon at a Theater Near You" and "Sneak Previews," and its successor, "Siskel & Ebert" -- are collected on Siskel&Ebert.org for your viewing pleasure. [via]
The National Weather Service was doing some thinking, and they decided that last week's blizzard wasn't as bad as everyone thought, and also that "1979 was messed up." So they revised the '79 and '11 snow totals and last week's blizzard dropped to fourth worst. But then they talked with some local meteorologists, who all basically said, "No way, and in fact you counted wrong." So a couple hours later, this year's blizzard was third again and everyone was happy.
50 years ago, the legacy of the homegrown Comptometer ended in Chicago. Developed by Dorr Eugene Felt using a macaroni box in 1885, the Comptometer became the first commercially-successful key-driven adding machine. Relics of its reign still exist: the original prototype at the Smithsonian, the main factory building at the 1700 N. block of Paulina (now lofts), and this nose-poke threatening ad from 1942.
In 1971, Lou Fourcher, father of Center Square Journal founder Mike Fourcher, shot some great photos of the neighborhood that once existed where UIC and the medical campus are now.
If United is really hurt for business, they might consider bringing back this men-only "club in the sky" from the 1950s -- though a women-only version would most definitely be in order as well.
Here's a "Community Settlement Map for 1950 (bigger) from the Department of Development and Planning under Mayor Richard J. Daley. The color delineations can be hard to differentiate sometimes, but it's an interesting snapshot of the city 60 years ago. Compare it to the map for 1900.
Mayor Bilandic's defeat wasn't solely due to the Blizzard of '79 -- the plow blade was already falling thanks to 9 inches of snow already on the ground the week before, and a series of other PR blunders.
The jewelry store C.D. Peacock was founded the same year Chicago was incorporated. You may be familiar with the ornate doors to its State Street store.
Though it was a deadly year in Chicago, the total number of homicides was 435, the lowest since 1965 when the total was 395. The 2010 total represents a drop of more than 54% from the all time high set in 1992 with 943 homicides.
Gridface tells the story of DJ Sim Garrett, who used to DJ at Zorine's, a nightclub owned by Arnie Morton of Morton's fame. Looking for more info on Zorine's led me to this interesting reminiscence by Robert Patrick about working at Arnie's, another Morton restaurant from the 1970s.
Ever notice the Y motif on Chicago's buildings, bridges and other places? It's known as "the municipal device," and symbolizes the three branches of the Chicago River.
An industrial film from 1942 (part one, part two) for a billboard company reveals some pretty interesting views of the city... and WWII-era advertising. Did you know there used to be billboards along Lake Shore Drive?
Historic photoblog Shorpy finds a photo of a Melrose Park aircraft plant in 1942. As noted in the comments, the plant is still there, just south of O'Hare, now producing engines for International Harvester.
Chicago was home to one of the last operating tuberculosis sanitariums in the country. Frances Archer grew up across the street, and has a great series of posts collecting its history and eventual closure.
Ever wonder about the ladies on death row who dance the cell-block tango in the musical Chicago? Journalist Douglas Perry wrote a book about the real-life murderers and their stories.
In an interview with NPR, the author of a new book called Get Capone: The Secret Plot That Captured America's Most Wanted Gangster reveals close details about the famous gangster and the way city folk felt about him: "The real issue for most Chicagoans was the damage it did to the city's reputation. We already had an image of corrupt politics, we had a mayor who was widely perceived as being one of the most venal in the country's history, and then you've got these gangsters walking down the street with machine guns shooting it out on Michigan Avenue in broad daylight." Glorious times.
The Denver Post has unearthed an incredible collection of color slides from the Great Depression. The photos are from all across America and really emphasize the poor and poorer (rich people, mercifully, are left out). Heartwarming and heartbreaking each image tells a tale of the brutal life in the real Depression. Look out for the exhilarating shots of Chicago's great railyards and the northward looking PBR sign that shows what, in that day and age, was Chicago's glorious skyline pre-Sears or Aon or Hancock.
DesignCrave compares Major League Baseball teams' original logos to their current ones. The Sox logo may look familiar to fans, but the Cubs' original is really obscure. [via]
Just off the Milwaukee shoreline, divers rediscovered a 112-year-old wooden steamship perfectly preserved in Lake Michigan's icy waters. The L.R. Doty sank with all hands (and two cats) in 1898.
From 1895: "Chicago needs a deliverer, a leader strong enough to raise the people to a higher plain of political morality. There are already too many reformers who are in the business because it is popular."
Local filmmaker Floyd Webb wrote up an interesting and thoughtful pair of blog posts about his early martial arts days in Chicago and elsewhere, and the "Mr. Miyagi" in his life. Also, look forward to his upcoming Flicks of Fury martial arts film series at ICE Theaters down in Chatham.
The Chicago Community Trust was founded on this day in 1915 by banker Albert W. Harris (of Harris Bank) and other business leaders to fund community-oriented philanthropy. It was one of the first in the nation.
The Field Museum's chatty T-Rex named Sue is turning 10 years old (well, give or take 60 million) and the museum's having a party and a fancy online auction.
Ever heard of Mazdaznan? Neither had I, but it's a spiritual movement with roots in turn-of-last-century Chicago. Here's a cookbook first published by the sect in 1901.
Check out this United Air Lines ad from the good old male chauvinist pig days. Trapped on a plane with a bunch of drunks, all smoking cigars and pipes and stuffing themselves with steaks? Uh, I'll take the train.
Transcripts of conversations between President Johnson and Mayor Richard J. Daley during the riots after the assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr. have just been released.
Before the Web, there was the Bulletin Board System, or BBS. The first public one was CBBS, launched in Chicago during the Blizzard of 1978. You might think they're a thing of the past, but at least one is still up and going strong.
Today, Whitney Gifford runs an article about the public nuisance of hatpins, 100 years ago today. "One man told me he was almost decapitated in the City Hall elevator by the sweep of a hatpin like a scimitar worn by one of the City Hall belles."
For the first time ever, the City is acknowledging the existence of Al Capone on an official sign, marking the historic location of The Metropole and The Lexington hotels, where Scarface was known to hang out.
WFMU's Beware of the Blog shares a massive MP3 of music recorded in Chicago between 1908 and 1980, which was presented in Millennium Park last summer by historian Tim Samuelson and The Numero Group.
Two years ago today, the portion of of Montrose Avenue adjacent to the Brown Line station caved in after a massive water main break. Commemorate the event, if you wish, with a newly minted t-shirt.
Fry cook on Venus digs up a gem from 1937: "From Trees to Tribunes," an industrial film about how trees from the Tribune's vast Canadian wilderness become the newsprint rolling through the presses.
Today is/would be Elvis' 75th birthday, and Chicagoist has a nice look back as well as video from his 1972 concert at Chicago Stadium. You might also be interested in this feature from the GB archives profiling Mark Hussman, one of the city's top Elvis impersonators.
Dan Sinker bought the 1972 book 2010: Living in the Future from a public library 25 years ago. The moment has finally arrived to find out how different the world is.
The Ex Playboy Bunnies Website tells the tale of the legendary Playboy Clubs through the eyes and fuzzy tails of its iconic waitresses. (No nudity, but still probably NSFW.)
A century ago, Bell & Howell's (click the Company History tab!) HQ and factory was located on Larchmont Avenue, where they made Filmo movie cameras. Tough, dependable, and, in some cases, quite lovely, Filmo cameras were the preferred brand among filmmakers in the early days of motion pictures.
The NYTimes covers cellphones and the industry's drive to keep people chatting on them when they shouldn't. Interestingly, the piece shows a photo of a 1983 event at Soldier's Field, when Ameritech executives (huge trench-coat fans, apparently) gathered to watch the first cellphone call.
Chicago's own Indiana Jones, Universtiy of Chicago celebrity palentologist Paul Sereno, unveils five new species of ancient crocodiles that he unearthed in the Sahara over the past few years. The new findings include the PancakeCroc. We're guessing it didn't eat flapjacks.
If you do, you should check out the videos GB reader Anna sent us documenting the Wicker Park coffeehouse's last weeks and the interesting folks who worked and hung out there.
"Bunky's Pickle" has a nifty photo of three Chicago recording studios from a 1976 issue of the Billboard Recording Guide, all staffed, unsurprisingly, by total dudes.
Check out this podcast of Chicago superstar Lupe Fiasco's interview on Chicago Public Radio about the The People Speak, a new documentary spinoff of sorts from The People's History of the United States by Howard Zinn. An excerpt preview of the film will show at 8 tonight along with live readings by Fiasco and others at Northwestern University's Leverone Auditorium.
You can learn some amazing trivia about the city by just reading the brief descriptions of city parks. For example, Gompers Park was named after Samuel Gompers, president of the American Federation of Labor, who got his start in Labor as president of a local cigar makers' union.
About 28 years ago a fellow by the name of Dan Goodwin scaled both the John Hancock Center and the Sears Tower and a few other famous skyscrapers. Now he's back with a book. Look out! There goes the Spider Dan!
Lodner D. Phillips was an inventor and engineer in turn-of-the-century Chicago who specialized in submarines and diving suits. One of his subs, which claimed the life of its owner and his dog, was pulled out of the Chicago River in 1915. [via]
On President Obama's to do list: Sign a resolution declaring Casimir Pulaski an honorary citizen of the U.S. If he signs the resolution, which was sent to his office after being unanimously passed by the Senate yesterday, this Polish Revolutionary War hero would become the seventh foreigner who's been granted this status.
We Are Supervision blog shows a series of old '70s and '80s Chicago gang calling cards. Crudely drawn, sometimes offensive, and frequently opaque, they're also quite compelling.
While we're digging into the archives, Granta's story on the semi-forgotten tunnels that led to the "Great Loop Flood of 1992" gives us the opportunity to link again to this site about the Chicago Tunnel Railroad Company.
"Chicago femme fatale, known to police as 'The Nemesis Sweetheart,' claims sixth victim in underworld--one husband, five lovers." Librarian/researcher/authorJess Nevins finds and posts amazing historical headlines like that to his Twitter page under the "on this day in 1929" #otd1929 tag.
Bernadine Dohrn, writing on the Huffington Post, reminds us that "Were this in Colombia, the Congo or Myanmar, we would recognize that children who are recruited into warring groups by much older adults to fight as child soldiers must be disarmed, demobilized, rehabilitated and reintegrated into the community."
James Degorski, the second suspect in the infamous Brown's Chicken Massacre case, was found guilty this afternoon. Now all that remains is sentencing before this grisly tale finally comes to a close.
Chicago's hospitality is world famous -- but the city's less savory entertainment options for visiting opthalmologists and auto part salesmen were a bit more on display in the '50s than today. [via]
Then you may want to consider buying Al Capone's Wisconsin retreat. It has "407 secluded acres with a 37-acre private lake, an eight-car garage and a guard tower."
We debut a new occasional feature in A/C today: Chicago Revenant, which sheds light on some of the lesser known neighborhoods of the city. First up, Dunning and Schorsch Village on the Northwest Side.
The Chicago Reader's blog points us to this home video from the 1930s that shows plenty of family and canine fun but also gives a rare moving picture look into Jackson Park and the lakefront.
Taking full advantage of the buzz surrounding Public Enemies, the gun that fired the fatal shot for John Dillinger in 1934 will be up for auction along with its holster, a letter and press photos on July 28.
Chicago Rocked! 1990-1999 is the working title of an - as yet unpublished - book by former Q101 radio show host, James VanOsdol. The book chronicles the Chicago music scene in the 90's, as experienced by those who were at the core of it; and VanOsdol himself. He plans to independently publish the book and is currently seeking donations.
After Memorial Day weekend, it's nice to see some veterans get the "thank you" they deserve. Recently, Honor Flight Chicago took several area World War II vets on a special trip to the memorial in Washington D.C.
"Hot Doug" Sohn and culinary historian Bruce Kraig will be discussing the history of the hot dog at Kendall College tonight; details in Drive-Thru and Slowdown.
A public grand opening ceremony Sunday for the Illinois Holocaust Museum & Education Center in Skokie will feature Nobel Laureate and Holocaust survivor Elie Wiesel, in addition to former President Bill Clinton and a host of local and international dignitaries. Thousands of guests are expected, so plan ahead for transit, and get more details in Slowdown.
Local storyteller Syd Lieberman is bringing the Battle of Gettysburg to life with a new blog, Voices of Gettysburg, featuring first person accounts of the bloodshed. The blog is a companion to Lieberman's new story, Abraham & Isaac: Sacrifice at Gettysburg.
What would Jane Addams have said about the Burnham Plan? That's the question asked in a forthcoming book timed to the 100th anniversary of the great plan for our city.
Can't make it down to the Oriental Institute but want to learn more about mummies? The University of Chicago Magazine created an interactive mummy dissection that combines photographs, CT scans and interviews with researchers to examine the Institute's 2,800-year-old dummy -- without cracking the seal.
My family lineage is a bit murky and hard to trace, so I'm always flummoxed when people ask me where my ancestral heritage came from. Even so, I'm enthralled by the stories of Chicagoans who can visit the homes their ancestors lived in -- but this post by John Tolva is one of the best I've read.
Unless you're a K-12 student or a government official, you might have forgotten that the first Monday in March is Casimir Pulaski Day. Chicago Public Schools, Cook County government offices, and the Chicago Public Libraries are closed today.
In celebration of Abe's 200th on Thursday, The Newberry Library and the Chicago History Museum have launched Lincoln at 200, a pair of online exhibitions about our 16th president, featuring hundreds of nineteenth century photos, maps, manuscripts, letters, cartoons and broadsheets. The site offers a tool for zooming in close, allowing close inspection without getting yelled at by a museum security guard.
Most Insignificant News Item of the Day: After more than 100 years, the H.J. Heinz Company is removing the pickle from the logo on its ketchup bottle and replacing it with the more appropriate tomato. The Chicago connection? The pickle logo idea was hatched during the 1893 Chicago World's Fair.
"[B]lacks in Chicago are the most isolated racial group in the nation's 20 largest cities, according to a Tribune analysis of 2008 population estimates. To truly integrate Chicago, 84 percent of the black or white population would need to change neighborhoods."
The "unique" local political scene gets yet another national dissection. This time, it's The Atlantic. And this time it's from October, 1930. The more things change...
So what were you doing when you heard the news? The Chicago Reporter wants to know your reaction when you first heard that Barack Obama had won the election as part of their upcoming "50 Days/50 Voices" project. Video, audio and essays are all welcome.
Picture this: You/your baby/your toddler/your dog are dressed up as a sock monkey for Halloween and someone poses the question, "Oh, a sock monkey. Nice job with the local costume." You stare back at them blankly. The horror! You didn't know that the sock monkey was created in Rockford, Illinois! Read up, and don't be afraid.
Tune in to WYCC at 6:30pm on November 9th for the premiere of Buck O'Neil and Black Baseball in Chicago. O'Neil was a Negro League player and coach and subsequently spent more than 30 years with the Cubs becoming the first black coach in the majors. More info at the Chicago Baseball Museum website.
After a hiker discovered money and identification of missing Chicago-based adventurer Steve Fossett while hiking in the mountains of eastern California this week, the wreckage of his plane has been found as well.
The Florence and Laurence Spungen Family Foundation recently acquired a collection of over 250 postal documents from World War II, many of which were smuggled out of concentration camps. The collection will be exhibited in the Illinois Holocaust Museum and Education Center in Skokie, which opens next year.
Architecture fans take heart. Plans are afoot to rebuild Dankmar Adler and Louis Sullivan's Pilgrim Baptist Church, which caught fire in January 2006 (one of three Sullivans to burn to a crisp that year). The current estimate for repairs is $37 million. Donations are encouraged.
The Old Town School of Folk Music is assembling a huge "Timeline of Music" that will encompass the varied flavors of music that its students study, know and love. The school's executive director Bau Graves posts an invitation on his blog for music lovers to contribute to what he wants to be "the most flamboyant and informative bulletin board in town."
Some cool shots of 1950s Chicago (part 1,part 2) by Institute of Design student Leon Lewandowski. Keep an eye on bighappyfunhouse for more amazing found photos. (link found at Pete Lit)
While Chicago suffers through a devastating crime wave, the Smithsonian takes a look at a murder that rocked the city and the nation...84 years ago. If the case sounds familiar it might be because you ran across it here first.
Not another googlemap -- an actual map of Chicago's gang activity in 1926, as well as ethnic and socioeconomic data. Did you know that where Cabrini Green is was once "Little Sicily?"
As the Sun-Times asks Chicagoans for their favorite memories from the past, no doubt many would include the one-of-a-kind Maxwell Street. A new DVD looks at the history of the cultural crossroads and includes a 1964 documentary on the street, vintage recordings of some of the blues legends who plied their trade on the street and a 38-page booklet.
The Library of Congress has uploaded an impressive amount of photos to Flickr, including these breathtaking pix of trains and railway workers taken in the 1940s. In color!
On June 2, 1883 the first electric elevated railroad had its first trial run around the main building of the Chicago Railway Exposition. The expo ran from June 5 through June 23, during which the prototype train carried over 26,000 passengers.
Lincoln Avenue was gussied up for the new Michael Mann filmPublic Enemies, as testified by this Flickr photo set. Johnny Depp plays Dillinger. I wonder if he's heard the (false) rumor about what happened to Little Dillinger after John was gunned down near the Biograph Theater?
In Winnetka on this day in 1988, a 30-year-old woman with a history of mental illness attempted to burn down a house, tried to poison people she knew, went on a shooting spree in an elementary school—killing one student—and shot a college student in his home before killing herself. The Tribune spoke with three people who’s lives were impacted by Laurie Dann on that terrible day.
The Unabomber, Ted Kaczynski, planted his first bomb in his hometown of Chicago in 1978. Thirty years later, Tribune investigative reporter Robert K. Elder has gained rare access to family photos and letters, and unpublished writings which contradict the Unabomber's public image as an eco-crusader. The feature will be published on Monday, but the Tribune shared an exclusive photo with Gapers Block; link after the jump.
This is a photo of Ted and David Kaczynski, taken in their Evergreen Park home in 1952.
Says Elder, "This is also a story about his brother, Dave Kaczynski, and Gary Wright, Ted's 12th target. Dave lost a brother in a very tragic, public way but formed a new, unlikely bond with Gary. Included in the story: family revelations about Ted's upbringing in Evergreen Park, the Unabomber's diary entries and news of a romance Kaczynski had in prison with a woman for 10 years via mail."
Today, in its weekly Comic Book Urban Legends Revealed series, the Comics Should Be Good site shares the sad story of Sidney Smith -- Trib cartoonist and creator of the incredibly successful but seldom remembered comic strip"The Gumps".
On April 21, 1878 Chicago firefighter George Reid and his captain David Kenyon invented the firepole, which soon made their Engine Company 21 the first responder to Chicago fires and prompted the fire chief to order poles installed in all Chicago firehouses.
The Modern Mechanix blog revisits the August 1931 issue, which announced the creation of the largest post office in the world. No mention is made of the building's suitability for condo conversion.
Watching family home movies can be duller than dirt, but there's something beautifully captivating about this slice of Chicago Americana—scenes from a wedding at St. Benedict's on Irving Park—from the 40s... in color no less. Man, people dressed so much better back then.
AREA Chicago's new 1968/2008 takes a new look at the cultural legacy of 1968 in Chicago: the Democratic National Convention, riots, Chicago 10, Daley's shoot to kill order, etc.
It's the first Monday in March, and in Illinois that means Casimir Pulaski Day. If you're a Chicago Public School student, a garbage truck driver, a Chicago librarian, or a county court employee, you get the day off! Everyone else has to work.
If you're not up for a tour, Voice of America Radio reaches back to 1929 for a report on the enduring legacy of the Valentine's Day Massacre. Capone must not have appreciated the messages on the candy hearts the unlucky seven gave to him.
Margaret Truman Daniel, the only child of President Harry Truman, has passed away at the age of 83 in a Chicago assisted-care facility. A mystery novelist, Truman is best remembered for an incident regarding her former singing career. After critic Paul Hume panned her performance, Harry sent him a letter threatening "you'll need a new nose, a lot of beefsteak for black eyes, and perhaps a supporter down below. You are a guttersnipe!" Give those critics hell, Harry!
The Chicago History Museum has acquired an archive of documents related to the 1919 Black Sox scandal. The collection was on auction in Burr Ridge and will eventually be available for viewing by the general public here and copies will be on display in Cooperstown.
20 years ago tonight, Max Headroom the Video Pirate hijacked Chicago'sAirwaves. He's never been caught. If anyone cares to confess please drop us an email.
The Tallahatchie County Board of Supervisors of Mississippi signed a resolution to apologize to hate crime victim Emmet Till's family over the conduct of the trial of his murderers (both men were acquitted and later confessed to the crime in a 1956 magazine article). Till, whose death partially inspired the modern Civil Rights Movement, is buried in Burr Oak Cemetery in Alsip, IL.
Chicago Magazine's recent profile of Jeff McCourt is not only interesting for its discussion of the Windy City Times founder's life but for its Chicago gay and lesbian history. [Thanks, Matt!]
The Oriental Institute at the University of Chicago has a video preview available for their new exhibit; Daily Life Ornamented: The Medieval Persian City of Rayy.
In just a few hours, a walking tour of Haymarket history will take off from the Hull House, but yesterday former Chicagoan Josh MacPhee and a nearby Milwaukee art historian Nicolas Lampert spoke about that history on Berkeley's famous radio show Against the Grain Radio on KPFA. Their discussion deals primarily with the history of the monuments associated with Haymarket's contested history.
There are many places and opportunities to celebrate May Day (the worker holiday that most people in the world celebrate instead of the US's Labor Day) this year and GB's Slowdown calendar will keep you in the loop! On Friday you can get some history lessons with the folk's organizing a free conference on anarchism and a film festival at Loyola, the conference continues through the weekend but the downtown walking tour starts friday at 330. Then on May 1st you can join up with the immigrant rights demonstration that promises to be huge (especially after last night's raid's in Little Village) and on May 2 there is another walking tour and celebration at the Hull House.
Now that Easter and Passover are almost here, the New York Times offers twofeatures on Chiappetti Lamb and Veal. NOTE: The first link is a TimesSelect article, so if you aren't enrolled in the program, you can either sign up or start a free trial. If you are a student or faculty member with a .edu email address, you can get a full account for free right now.
The Map Room site (no relation to the bar of the same name), currently featured links to U of C Library pagesfeaturinggorgeous old maps of the city that you can "zoomify." Zoomify? I do not think that word means what you think it means.
The Whitechapel Club is a strange bit of forgotten Chicago lore. A late 19th Century gathering of Chicago journalists who wet their whistles at a local tavern and named themselves after the London slum terrorized by Jack the Ripper, the group eventually held meetings in a room decorated with skulls, nooses, and other grisly artifacts. Guest speakers were invited to address the club, only to be insulted away from the podium, and the subject of death was routinely lampooned. Alas, it lasted only five years, but the Newberry Library holds the club's remaining papers.
If your city or county bank, library, public school or government office is closed today, it's in honor of Revolutionary War hero Casimir Pulaski. However, you will get mail and, sadly, you must feed the meter.
Now that the locally producedGeneral Social Survey completed its 26th run, the New York Times published a sneak peek of the 2006 results. Some interesting findings include a precipitous drop in the percentage of those who have a "great deal of confidence" in the military since 2004, as well as a 50% decline in daily newspaper readership since 1972.
It's 1961 and the communists have overthrown the government of the United States of America. Prepare yourself for the U.S.S.A.! What is the communists' first step? Move the government to Merchandise Mart! As J. Edgar Hoover says, read this comic now in order to "help us recognize and detect communists as they attempt to infiltrate the various segments of our society."
There was a macabre item up for auction this week: the Cook County gallows, which was built in 1887 for hanging some of the men convicted for the Haymarket Square riot. The Chicago History Museum wanted to purchase the item for their collection, but they were beat out for the item by the San-Francisco-based Ripley's Believe It or Not! Museum. No word on where the gallows will be displayed, although a spokesperson for Ripley's promises the city's history will be a part of the ultimate display of the item.
Photographer Lee Balterman shot Chicago in the '50s and '60s, and unlike many of his street photography compatriots, he included people -- lots of people. [via]
Dan Kelly and friends made a day of visiting South Side cemeteries recently, and they came across many graves of famous folk, from politicians to bluesmen.
Over at Metroblogging Chicago, contributor Artemis gives a thumbs up to Weird Chicago Tours, a 3-4 hour citywide tour of Chicago's most unusual locations, from the site of the St. Valentine's Day Massacre to Underpass Mary. The tours started this past weekend, and run Friday and Saturday nights through November, in case you need some weird inspiration in the Halloween season.
On August 12, 1833, Chicago was incorporated. The population of the town at the time was about 350 people. According to the Chicago timeline from the Chicago Public Library website, the original boundaries of the city were "Kinzie, Desplaines, Madison, and State streets, which included an area of about three-eighths of a square mile." Happy 173rd Birthday, Chicago!
Erik Larson's perennial best-seller, The Devil in the White City, has done much to resurrect interest in the 1893 World's Fair, but the event has fascinated the public ever since it came and went in a season. In today's paper, Sun-Times art & architecture critic Kevin Nance talks to Larson, author Chris Ware, historian Tim Samuelson and others about why it continues to capture our imagination. Relive the magic with an under-construction visual simulation model being developed at UCLA, and if you've not read Larson's creative non-fiction, the GB Book Club will be tackling it in September.
In 2002, BBC Radio 4's Thinking Allowed visited Chicago to do a five-part series about the city in the spirit of early Chicago School sociologists. With interviews from prominent Chicago academics, musicians, and public thinkers, the programs are surprisingly fresh four years later.
Once upon a time, Milk Duds were produced in Chicago (they're now made downstate in Robinson). Daniel Pinkwater reminisces about the allure of working next door.
Almost exactly two months after opening the Freedom Museum, the Tribune is opening another museum: the McCormick Tribune Bridgehouse & Chicago River Museum, which will be housed in a bridge-tender tower on the southwest corner of the Michigan Avenue bridge. According to the Associated Press, the building has only 1600 square feet of floor space, and will only be able to accommodate 34 visitors at a time. The museum officially opens on Saturday, and admission will be a suggested donation of $3.
"The story of institutionalized racial discrimination and economic segregation in Chicago begins in 1931." So begins the second installment of BeyondChron's provocative three-part series, "Paradise Lost: A Recipe for Gentrification in Chicago, San Francisco, and Beyond." (The first ran yesterday; the last is forthcoming.)
Today marks the conclusion of the Sun-Times's three-part series on the continuing political influence of mobster Bruno Roti Sr., even fifty years after his death. Let's just say his family sounds pretty well-connected.
This week marks the 120th anniversary of the Haymarket Riot. Accordingly, All Things Considered interviewed James Green, author of the recently published Death in the Haymarket, about the events of May 4, 1886, and the NPR website offers additional commentary about the modern-day meaning of the affair, as well as an excerpt from Green's book.
In case you missed it, the Chicago Tribune has a fascinating cover story today on the local debate over which Chicago police officer should be remembered as the first to be killed in the line of duty. Was it Casper Lauer or James Quinn? Former DEA officer Rick Barrett claims it was Quinn, as he told NPR's Melissa Block this afternoon. Further coverage from the Trib here.
Cocktails and Pain reminds us that on this day 141 years ago, also a Good Friday, Abraham Lincoln was shot. The sixteenth president of the United States died the next morning.
As all of Naper-land gears up for Naperville's 175th birthday celebration this summer, the city is looking for help pulling it together. Take the brief survey and be a part of the gala. You can even buy a set of historic medallions as a keepsake.
The true story of the "Haymarket Affair" is one we'll probably never know, but Caleb Crain does a good job chronicling the apparent facts and fiction surrounding it in his review of the historical literature. Crain's impetus is James Green's Death in Haymarket, a book that bears the pithy but evocative subtitle "A Story of Chicago, the First Labor Movement, and the Bombing That Divided Gilded Age America."
Are you that creep who keeps locks of your ex's hair in an envelope? Do you have a "thing" for famous people? If so, or even if you're normal, you might enjoy an upcoming event by an auction house in Willowbrook. They're auctioning off the hair of celebrities like Mickey Mantle and Elizabeth Taylor.
Test your knowledge of local history with this interactive quiz. You can even play against a friend. It's part of the detailed site for the PBS American Experience film, Chicago: City of the Century.
Ever wonder why the Sox aren't the Socks? Wonder no more. Slate's "Explainer" takes a look at the early 20th century's rather strange linguistic priorities.
Today in Chicago history, on October 18, 1931, Al Capone was convicted on several counts of tax evasion. He was sentenced to 11 years in prison, fined $50,000, charged nearly $8,000 in court costs, and held responsible for more $200,000, plus interest, in back taxes. Capone spent time in the Cook County Jail while waiting for appeals, then was sent to the high security U.S. Penitentiary in Atlanta in May 1932. In 1934, Capone was transferred to Alcatraz, where he served until his release in 1939. For more on Al Capone, visit the History Files from the Chicago Historical Society and the Famous Cases page from the FBI.
Ever wondered what Chicagoans did for fun in 1913? Jazz Age Chicago is a highly detailed resource of information about leisure in Chicago in the first half of the 20th century. The site is chock full of historic information on the period's "bright light districts", department stores, theaters, dancehalls & cabarets, as well as essays about this new "modern life" of entertainment, leisure, and consumption.
In honor of its namesake's efforts at documenting the lives of everyday Americans, the Chicago Historical Society has announced plans for the Studs Terkel Center for Oral History [PDF]. CHS has about 5000 hours of Terkel radio programming, as well as recordings related to other projects like the recent Teen Chicago exhibit, and all future oral history efforts will bear the Center's imprimatur. Terkel was a huge influence on the StoryCorps project, which recently visited Chicago and was featured in Detour. (And, speaking of sound, GB audio content is now available via podcast; details here.)
A new DVD about the Columbian Exposition comes out tomorrow. EXPO: Magic of the White City tells the story of the 1893 World's Fair, narrated by Gene Wilder.
The Evanston Historical Society is seeking donations that represent the past 50 years of city history. The list of items of particular interest tells something of a story by itself, but if you have objects associated with the city's repeal of alcohol bans, post-1960s immigration to Evanston, or local political issues such as gun control, zoning, and school integration, and you're interested in contributing to an upcoming exhibit that traces the city's history to the present day, you're encouraged to contact the Society to arrange a donation appointment. Curatorial staff can be reached at 847/475-3410.
StoryCorps, a national project to record the stories and experiences of everyday Americans (stories that are heard occasionally on NPR's Morning Edition), is coming to the Field Museum in two weeks to add Chicago stories to its growing cache of interviews at the American Folklife Center. If you know someone who has a great story to tell, and want to record an interview for the project, keep an eye on the Chicago Public Radio site; they'll start accepting reservations this coming Friday, August 5th, for the recording of interviews.
Yale University's Beinecke Rare Book & Manuscript Library features over 90,000 high resolution images of rare books and photographs, all of them readily accessible online. Tapping "Chicago" into the search field yields fascinating images of the Union Stockyards, grain elevators along the Chicago River (Anyone care for a Schlitz?), views of the lakefront as it once was, a letter from photographer Alfred Stieglitz and many more interesting documents. A Chicago history buff could lose a lot of sleep exploring it all . . .
The Washington Post marks a nearly-passed era with its profile of Chicago's last abattoir, Chiappetti Lamb and Veal. Even as Chiappetti stands as the final bastion of its industry, times continue to change. Because of ongoing gentrification of the stockyards area, the company will be moving its facilities within the next two years. Nevertheless, it has embraced the future: like any 21st Century survivor, Chiappetti's products are available online.
On July 13, 1995, the temperature in Chicago was recorded at 106 degrees, setting the high mark in a week-long heat wave that ultimately claimed over 700 heat-related deaths. Ten years after the Chicago heat wave, the city has since mobilized 17,000 people in the city to check up on the elderly, a group of people that was most affected by the 1995 heat. And as author Eric Klinenberg (Heat Wave: A Social Autopsy of Disaster in Chicago) notes, Chicago is still learning from the 1995 experience and trying to improve its response to hot weather. Meanwhile, the high today will be around 83 degrees, so check out the city's tips for dealing with hot weather.
Curious about why Chicago's north/south streets don't quite pass muster on the compass? Just enquire at Ask MetaFilter; no doubt the folks there will be happy to debate the answer. As for the grid system, Alice has that covered in an archived Ask the Librarian.
Do you love printed ephemera? Then you'll enjoy this digitized collection of "Pamphlets and Periodicals of the French Revolution of 1848," from a collaboration of the Center for Research Libraries, the University of Chicago Libraries and the ARTFL Project. The archive is comprised of more than 100 digitized materials from 1848 to 1851, including this published letter from Louis Napoleon.
Writing for the Chicago Daily News (which ran for nearly a century before folding in the mid 1970's) George Weller was the first reporter to arrive in Nagasaki after the August 1945 atomic bombing. His reports of ruin and a mysterious disease afflicting survivors were banned by order of General Douglas MacArthur. Decades later, Weller's son discovered carbon copies of the original articles. Today, they've been made publicly available for the first time.
You already knew that, back in February 1978, Chicago saw the birth of the world's first BBS. Well, the CBBS is back in the news with the recent release of BBS: The Documentary. The DVD set features eight episodes running five and a half hours, but, honestly, the promotional site is a history lesson in and of itself.
Just as the FBI exhumes the body of Emmett Till, the Chicago Historical Society gets ready to show an exhibition that "documents brutal acts of terror from America's past"; Without Sanctuary, a pictorial history of lynching in America, opens Saturday, June 4. The display will be supplemented with drawn renderings of the trial of Till's killers, and it will be accompanied by various lectures, including one discussing his death, "the murder that changed America."
As the latest entry in its Empire archive, Harper's Magazine has posted "The Massacre of Fort Dearborn at Chicago." Originally published in 1899, the piece was written by Simon Pokagon, former chief of the Pokagon band of Pattawapomie Indians and known in his day as the "Redskin Bard." In his essay, Pokagon gathers oral and written accounts of the original attack on Fort Dearborn, and he offers a remarkable picture of the sad and troubling contingencies of history.
Stephen Dubner, who co-authored Freakonomics with U of C economist Stephen Levitt, examines a bit of Chicago sports history in the Freakonomics Blog: did the 1919 White Sox get their nickname, the "Black Sox," due to their throwing of the World Series or for their notoriously dirty uniforms?
Dick "Two Ton" Baker was a local legend from the early days of broadcasting, but is largely forgotten by anyone younger than 40. This site catalogs a vast amount of information about Two Ton, including several mp3s of his humorous songs for kids and adults alike. [via MetaFilter]
An online version of the Encyclopedia of Chicago (published in book form last fall) goes live today. Over 1,400 entries, from the Chicago Fire to Millennium Park, plenty of maps, illustrations, glossaries and timelines of Chicago history. If your knowledge of city history is lacking, this is the place to go.
Here's an interesting collection of photographs taken by prisoners at Joliet Prison between 1890 and 1930. (For a bit of background, here's a curatorial statement from a 1996 exhbition that included the collection.) You might also be interested in this site from SuburbanChicagoNews.com about the prisons in Joliet.
"There was a house in New Orleans/they call the Rising Sun" and nobody knows where it was. Local scholar Shannon Dawdy, an assistant professor in the anthropology department at the University of Chicago, and several of her students have completed an excavation of a parking garage which just may have been the site of the famous brothel from 1808 to 1822, when it burned down. Hopefully her findings help her with that book she's writing on French colonial New Orleans.
The Chicago Historical Society is going to be closed for most of next year so they can expand and revitalize the center. They expect twice as much space to be alloted so the center can have more 3-D displays about Chicago history. They're not planning to whitewash Chicago's history, though. An audio display will permit visitors to hear a history of how their neighborhood has changed. President Lonnie Bunch said, "On the one hand, neighborhoods are places of celebration, but they're also places that keep people out."
Today in Chicago History: It seems like only yesterday to long-time fans, but today marks the fifth anniversary of the untimely and tragic death of popular WGN-AM radio personality, Bob Collins. He died when the small plane he piloted collided with another plane near the Waukegan Regional Airport. Over a million listeners tuned into his morning show every day.
I grew up believing Chicago had been dubbed "The Windy City" because of our long-winded politicians. Later I learned that historians claimed Charles A. Dana of the New York Sun gave Chicago its famous nickname during the competition to hold the 1893 World's Columbian Exposition. But a New York parking ticket judge says that story is untrue. And Chicago really received its nickname from -- Cincinnati?
The Chicago blog farkleberries reminds us that today is a solemn day in Chicago history: on December 2, 1942, at the University of Chicago, physicist Enrico Fermi and scientists from his laboratory achieved the first controlled nuclear fission chain reaction, which led to the creation of the atomic bomb and nuclear power plants. At the Library of Congress' Today In History page, they've got some related scanned documents and photographs, as well as a bunch of links guaranteed to help you kill the last hour of work.
Did you know Chicago has the home of the world's first BBS? In 1978, a couple of computer programmers developed CBBS in about two weeks. It took off, and the rest is history. The whole story and more is at Chinet.com.
On this day in Chicago history a judge directed the county clerk to produce the tally sheets, poll books and ballots of the Second Precinct, Eighteenth Ward, of the city in connection with allegations of tampering in the Leman (Republican) and Brand (Democrat) senatorial race. In March 1885, three men were convicted of falsifying returns to give Brand the edge over Leman. The race was closely scrutinized because the outcome determined which political party would have a majority in the state legislature.
The Weather Channelwill feature Chicago in a holiday edition of its Storm Stories premiering this weekend. It's the story of the wreck of the Rouse Simmons, the "Christmas Tree ship" that brought trees across Lake Michigan to Chicago and was lost in a storm in 1912. (Incidentally, Storm Storiesis produced in Chicago.) "The Christmas Tree Ship: A Holiday Storm Story" premieres Sunday at 8:00pm (CT).
The World's Columbian Exposition of 1893 inspired the building of some amazing structures, some of which were captured in this beautiful portfolio of lithographs. You may also be interested in IIT's Digital History Collection, one of the most comprehensive online resources on the fair.
Today in Chicago history 750 non-operating employees of the Chicago, North Shore & Milwaukee and the Chicago, Aurora & Elgin Electric Railroads were laid off following a week of strikes by 500 operating employees of the railroads. The workers went on strike to demand a wage increase of nine cents an hour -- four cents more than they were initially offered. Outraged commuters sent telegrams to the White House, pleading for President Roosevelt to intervene and end the strike.
Here's a nifty site about the tunnels and rail operation that existed under the Loop until the 50s, and what a lot of the tunnels looked like in the 1980s. "Construction on Chicago's unique freight tunnel network began in 1899 in the basement of a tavern in the heart of the Loop near LaSalle and Madison Streets..."
One of my earliest memories was a visit to Dispensa's Kiddie Kingdom out in Oak Brook. I remembered very little, but this simple fan page jogged my memory. The scariest thing is that the site now holds the state's tallest building outside of Chicago - Oakbrook Terrace Tower.
In 1978 the National Socialist Party of America (Nazis) attempted to hold a march in the Village of Skokie. The suburb at that time was home to a large Jewish community, including many Holocaust survivors. The event received national attention and was even turned into a made-for-TV movie, Skokie, in 1981. Now, the Skokie Public Library brings us the Attempted Nazi March Collection Digitization Project, a comprehensive archive of materials relating to the incident. Download and read the original newspaper articles relating to the march, listen to real audio recordings from the 1977 and 1978 Village of Skokie Board of Trustees meetings, and watch a documentary film about the proposed march. Highly recommended.
Gothamist mentions an obscure slang term associated with the Flatiron Building (New York's, not the Wicker Park knock-off): "23 Skidoo," supposedly said by NYPD dispersing men hoping for a little upskirt action thanks to the breezes by that building. Turns out it may have originated in Chicago instead.
According to the North American Vexillological Association (vexillology = the study of flags - who knew?) Chicago's city flag is the second most attractive city flag in the nation. Right behind Washington DC and their ugly clone of Chicago's clean blue lines and red stars. What were those vexillologists thinking?
After years of research, the University of Chicago Press has published the authoritative history of Chicago with the monumental Encyclopedia of Chicago. The website has a wealth of information including some gorgeous sample pages. To celebrate, the Encyclopedia will be publicly unveiled at a pro-am
city-wide trivia contest on Wednesday at the Harold Washington Library (see more in slowdown). So here's the plan: Buy the book, memorize, win!!! What could be simpler?
Helen Kirkpatrick, Jane Meyer, Virginia Prewett and Sigrid Shultz are among the accredited female correspondants that worked for Chicago newspapers during World War II. Their stories and the profiles of eight other women are part of Women Come to the Front: Journalists, Photographers and Broadcasters During World War II, an online exhibition from the Library of Congress.
The Abraham Lincoln Historical Digitization Project, hosted by Northern Illinois University, "presents historical materials from Abraham Lincoln's Illinois years (1830-1861)." These materials include Lincoln's own writings and other primary texts, images, videos and interpretive materials. Lincoln/Net is a rich archive of literature concerning Abraham Lincoln and the early statehood of Illinois.
Everybody loves firefighters. Little girls and boys turn a cardboard box and a stuffed toy into a firetruck. Some big girls and boys have different steamy thoughts when they pass a firehouse. And because of the history of large-scale fires in Chicago they deserve our reverence. But they also deserve a monument. A group made up of mostly firefighters is set to break ground for the monument before the end of the month and they could use a little support. They're only $49,000 short and all donations are tax-deductible.
No, not a new label. Illinois now requires insurance companies to disclose the records on any insurance policies they or predecessor companies issued to cover slaves. The records are being compiled online at this online registry, which went live yesterday. The Tribune has a report on the site's immediate effects.
Today's the 70th anniversary of John Dillinger being shot in front of Chicago's Biograph theater, and if you feel like celebrating the death of 1934's Public Enemy #1, then you'll want to head on over to the Red Lion Pub at 2446 N. Lincoln (across the street from the Biograph), for tonight's celebration of Dillinger Day. They'll be screening movies and newsreels on Dillinger at 8:00, Michael Flores of the Psychotronic Film Society will give a talk on Dillinger, and then at 10:00 a procession of bagpipes will retrace Dillinger's final steps from the Biograph to the nearby alley where he died.
...and she's hanging out by the docks at Montrose Harbor. But Saint Barbara's namesake isn't what you'd expect—she's a replica of a wooden fishing sailboat native to the west coast of Ireland, and the first-ever Galway Hooker to be built in the United States. Until she makes her historic journey to Eire next summer, you can see this gorgeous hand-crafted boat at Montrose Harbor (docked on the north wall) and at the Milwaukee Irish Fest, August 19-22.
It wasn't exactly the proudest moment in Chicago's history, but it sure got plenty of attention focused on Chicago DJ Steve Dahl. On July 12, 1979, in the middle of a White Sox-Tigers double header, Dahl held his infamous Disco Demolition, in which a number of disco records were blown up in the outfield of Comiskey Park. The event triggered a riot in the park, and caused the Sox to forfeit the second game. Considered the worst on-field event in baseball history, Disco Demolition is remembered with a mixture of fondness and horror by Chicago residents. Tonight at 8pm, Channel 11 will present a one-hour special commmemorating the event, with never-before-seen footage of the evening. WCKG is also hosting an anniversary celebration at Harry Caray's, 33 W. Kinzie, from 8pm to 10pm, where you can meet the disco demolition man himself!
The Chicago Historical Homicide Project began with the discovery a handwritten log of more than 11,000 homicides "maintained consistently and without interruption by the Chicago Police Department over the course of 60 years, from 1870 to 1930." Now these handwritten documents have been transformed into a searchable database providing a unique view into the history of Chicago during this period. The website also hightlights some of the most well-known crimes of the period including the trial of Leopold and Leob, the race riots of 1919, and the Haymarket Affair. This is really an incredible resource so go check it out.
The Chicago Tribune has a story today that leads you on a guided tour of some of the remains of the World's Columbian Exposition of 1893 that took place right here in Chicago. Visit Jackson Park, see the replica of the Statue of the Republic, and find the location of the infamous hotel built by serial killer H.H. Holmes.
So I was surfing the pages to find out how to report a problem with water in the city. Answer: Call the (no-joke) Leak Desk (312-744-7038). While visiting, I found some neat facts about sewage, including this really neat presentation about the history of sewage in Chicago. Not as boring as it sounds.
Tune in tonight to WTTW Channel 11 to see "Breaking Ground: The Story of the Oriental Institute." The hour-long program airs at 9pm and provides an in-depth look at the history of this unique Chicago institution. Then, tomorrow night, the Chicago Stories program on PBS presents "Pioneer to the Past: The Life and Times of James Henry Breasted," the founder of the Oriental Institute. For more information on both of these programs, see the official press release.
Every time we drive down Touhy, my mother points out the grassy field near O'Hare Airport that marks the site of the crash of American Airlines Flight 191. Today marks the 25th anniversary of the tragedy that killed all 273 people aboard -- still the deadliest accident in U.S. aviation history.
Eighty years ago, Nathan Leopold and Richard Loeb murdered 14-year-old Bobby Franks just to see if they could get away with it. They thought it would be a perfect crime, but instead were quickly arrested and tried. Their defense attorney was none other than Clarence Darrow, of Scopes Monkey Trial fame. Today the Chicago Historical Society opens an exhibit on the murder and trial; the show runs through September.
Bohemian National is not a golf or tennis tournament. It's a huge graveyard at Foster and Pulaski and is worth a visit to check out some of Chicago's roots in Eastern Europe. A historian on the graveyard will be leading walking tours for $10 at 10am and 1:30pm. Plus, at 12:15, there will be a concert by the "Moravian Societies Singers" in folk constume. While Bohemian National doesn't have the celebrities that other graveyards do, it's still got some fascinating headstones, including pictures etched into metal of the people buried there.
A new exhibit opens tomorrow at the Chicago Historical Society tomorrow: Teen Chicago, a look at the influence of teenagers in Chicago's history. ABC 7 reports that the exhibit will include information from all though the 20th century (from child labor in the early 1900s to teens being drafted for Vietnam), as well as oral histories recorded by 15 teenagers.
The Chinatown Museum Foundation, created in 2002, has found a home, the Sun-Times reports. The foundation, created to showcase the richness of the culture in Chinatown, acquired a building on West 23rd Street, and hopes to have its grand opening by the end of the year. Its first exhibition, scheduled to open in the summer of 2005, will compare and contrast the role of Chinese culture in the world expositions of 1893 and 1933, both held in Chicago.
The Chicago Historical Society has launched a new website aimed at kids aged 6-12 that "uses the symbols and design of the Chicago flag to explore the city’s rich and diverse history." Although the site is designed for children, the rest of us can have fun here staving off boredom for a few minutes, too. My Chicago features several games including an interactive Chicago flag that lets you create your own flag and a Chicago Fire game in which you "match photographs of objects that were found after the fire and try to guess what the objects were before they were melted." You can also create your own poem about Chicago in the Chicago Refrigerator Poetry game. Yes!
Recently workers at the Board of Trade building made a very interesting discovery: dozens of old chalkboards which were used to display the changing stock prices to traders on the floor. Some of the boards date back to 1930, and still have chalk streaks on them. Obviously, they're of great historical interest, and the building's vice president, Kevin Lennon, says that some of them will end up over at the Chicago Historical Society.
Discovery.com re-states a claim made first in 1883 that the Chicago Fire may not have been started by Mrs. O'Leary's cow. The Great Chicago Fire claimed 300 lives and destroyed most of the downtown area in 1871. But does this cow deserve the blame? The Discovery Channel says no. Instead, Robert Wood, a retired physicist, claims it was a fragment from Biela's Comet which also induced blazes north of Chicago that burned millions of acres of farm and prairie lands. Wood speculates the main body of the comet crashed into Lake Michigan, with peripheral fragments causing the fires in Chicago, Wisconsin and Michigan.
Riddle me this: what's five stories tall and 20 feet wide? The forthcoming Michigan Avenue Bridgehouse Museum, which is soon to open in a river bridgehouse near the corner of Michigan and Wacker. The Sun-Times reports on the museum, which will contain historical information about the Chicago River and its value to the area.
Still looking for a Valentine's Day gift for your sweetie? You could get him/her a brick from the garage that was the site of the Valentine's Day Massacre from 1929 (it's the 75th anniversary!). A mere $800 will get you a brick and a certificate of authenticity, stating that the brick is from the original garage building at 2122 N. Clark (the garage was torn down in 1967, and the bricks were bought by a forward-thinking fellow from Vancouver).
Cook County Hospital is one of the busiest healthcare centers in the country. The old building, vacant since the completion of John H. Stroger Jr. Hospital, is in danger of destruction. Preservationists want to keep this beautiful Beaux Arts building intact, but it's an uphill battle; the building came close to being razed, and isn't in the clear yet. Readaboutthebuilding and the reuse plan (PDF) offered by the Landmarks Preservation Council.
The Salt Lake Tribune tells the colorful story of Chicago Charlie, a Greek immigrant known for tall tales, eccentric stunts and prolific correspondence with soldiers during World War II. Hundreds of his letters were recently found in a buried time capsule in Copperton, Utah.
The History Makers is a South Loop-based nonprofit "undertaking the largest African-American oral history project since WPA anthropologists collected narratives of former slaves in the 1930s." The Chicago Journal has an article on the project that includes a brief profile of Regina Baiocchi, an African-American opera composer whose work has been performed by the CSO.
Digital History is a collaborative effort between the University of Houston, the Chicago Historical Society and other institutions to support the teaching of American history in at the elementary, high school and college levels. This beautiful and well-designed site includes an online textbook, encyclopedia, an interactive timeline, online exhibitions, and much more. The site also features a searchable database of over 1,500 annotated links to additional American history resources, audio archives (Real audio), and an image archive. Really fantastic stuff.
Today the city dedicates a new plaque commemorating the Iroquois Theatre fire, which happened 100 years ago today. One of the worst disasters in city history, the fire claimed the lives of 600 men, women and children -- twice the number that died in the Great Chicago Fire of 1871. The plaque will be located in the Loop's Oriental Theatre, a block from the Cook County Administration Building where six people died in a fire last October.
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Divers flock to the Great Lakes to explore shipwrecks, calling the Great Lakes one of the best places in the world to see them because the freshwater preserves wrecks better than saltwater. According to the story, "the Great Lakes hold an estimated 6,000 to 10,000 sunken ships. About 1,000 Great Lakes shipwrecks have been identified, and about 10 new ships are discovered annually."
A team of archaeologists from the University of Chicago's Oriental Institute recently discovered three new buildings in Abydos, "a rich and important archaeological site near Egypt’s last royal pyramid." Now a team being led by Egyptologist Stephen Harvey is returning to the area to begin excavation. Read more about the project in the U. of C. Chronicle.
The National Register of Historic Places has a listing of all the protected buildings, districts and other special places in Cook, DuPage, Lake, Kane, McHenry and Will counties. Plan your own tour!
You know that big pink building up at Bryn Mawr and Sheridan? It's called the Edgewater Beach Apartments. It looks like it's been there forever (and it has, sort of -- built in 1926) but it's actually a replica of one of two buildings that made up the 1,000 room Edgewater Beach Hotel. The hotel was extremely popular in the '20s, '30s and '40s, but began to fail after the construction of Lake Shore Drive. The original building was closed in 1967. Read the recollections of people connected to the Edgewater back in its hey-day.
A photography exhibit chronicling life in the African-American community of Bronzeville in the early 1940s opened yesterday at the DuSable Museum of African American History. The exhibit features more than 120 photographs of from one of the most vibrant eras of the neighborhood. Can't make it to the museum? Buy the book.
Apparently, quoting Abraham Lincoln is a popular pastime. So popular, in fact, that the Illinois Historic Preservation Agency put together a page of quotations attributed to Lincoln, letting you know whether he actually said such things as "To sin by silence, when they should protest, makes cowards of men" (he didn't). Also available: examples of facsimiles of Lincoln documents, so you can compare them to the copy of the Gettysbug Address that you've got lying in your junk drawer, to see if it's real or not.
Lester M. Gillis, aka "Baby Face Nelson," was one of Chicago's most famous gangsters. Few people realize, however, that he was killed not in the city but actually just outside Barrington, at what is now the intersection of Routes 14 and 22 in Fox River Grove.
Did you know Chicago's history goes back to 1673? The Chicago Public Library offers a Timeline that takes you from the "discovery" of the area by French missionaries all the way up to 1998's asian longhorn beetle invasion, with plenty of stops in between.
Studs Terkel has a new volume of oral history, "Hope Dies Last." Here's a fantastic Onion interview: "Hope is very personal. What's the alternative to hope? Despair. Well, if you despair, then put your head in the oven. What's the point? Am I sanguine about the future? Hell, no, I'm worried stiff. But I think the American people basically are decent. This I know."
I've been intrigued with Jane Adams since I was a wee lass. I'm impressed that one woman could create such great change in a city full of people who needed her. The Hull-House Museum helped sponsor the creation of Urban Experience in Chicago, a great website that has a reference book's worth of information in its pages. And, it has teacher's resources that seem well done.
Village Confidential: Palatine Police chronicles "a tale of deception, conspiracies, murder, bombings, low-level blackmail, organized crime operations, and behind-the-scenes politicking in Palatine, Illinois and surrounding areas." Painstakingly research, the sit takes you from 1954 all the way up to the capture of the Brown's Chicken Massacre suspects in 2002.
From 1955 to 1971 several Chicago parks hosted radar towers and nuclear missiles so powerful the Chicago Tribune called Chicago “the best defended city in the Middle West against enemy air-to-ground attacks." This website has pictures and a wealth of information about the little-known history of Jackson Park and Promontory Point.
For those of you with a soft spot for ragtime music, The Ragtime Ephemeralist may be of keen interest. The publication digs deep into the history of the genre, and the site offers additional resources, including some sample recordings. First rate!
A replica of the schooner Amistad, the slave ship taken over by its captives and made famous by the movie of the same name, will arrive at Navy Pier this Saturday for a two-and-a-half-week stint. Explore the ship and learn about the history of the slave trade and the rebellion on Amistad's decks. Sponsored by the DuSable Museum of African-American History.
Did you know that Rosehill Cemetery, at 5800 N. Ravenswood Avenue, was named Roe's Hill in 1859 when it opened? It was named after tavernkeeper Hiram Roe. A mapmaker erred and changed the name, and then a signmaker used that spelling, and the name stuck.
Did you also know that the Rosehill Cemetery is home to the largest secular collection of Tiffany art glass windows anywhere in the world? John G. Shedd (yes, that Shedd) commissioned Tiffany to design a skylight for his memorial chapel and made Louis Tiffany sign a waiver saying the design would never be duplicated. It takes about an hour and a half to tour all the windows. But, if you'd rather take an organized tour, the Chicago Architecture Foundation has one to offer.
Jean Baptiste Point DuSable is credited as the founder of Chicago, being the first non-native settler to the area. As such, the city is planning a park in his honor, not far from where his cabin once stood. Beyond that, not much is clear, the New York Times reports.
Lost Indiana is a thoughtful, well-researched and documented website that pays tribute to some of the abandoned industries and history of our midwestern neighbor. Created and maintained by a local historian, the stories and photographs have a personal touch. Highlights include photo documentation of the abandoned Gary Union Station and the Crown Hill Cemetery, the third largest public cemetery in the United States and final resting place of two presidents and John "Johnny Appleseed" Chapman. Worth checking out.
"This website tells the story about a 60-mile, two-foot gauge electric railroad that operated 149 locomotives and over 3000 freight cars in small tunnels forty feet below the streets of downtown Chicago." And it's not the CTA. Amazing photos, backstory and more about these tiny tunnels beneath us. Makes me want to go down there...
There was a time when advertisements were less PC-clean than they are today. Gold Dust washing powder is as defunct as the twin black children that graced its packaging, but a recent tear-down on Irving Park has revealed some old advertising for the brand. The Church of the Bad News has photos.
Workers digging for a new garage foundation in Dundee Township discovered a Native American burial ground that could be 1,000 years old, the Daily Herald reports. Archeologists from the Illinois Historic Preservation Agency are investigating. The IHPA now offers HAARGIS, an interactive map of historic places (buildings, gravesites, etc.) around the state.
In 1935, the Outlaws Motorcycle Club was formed in McCook, Illinois. It's now one of the oldest motorcycle clubs in the country, with chapters all over the world. Learn about the club's history and see a progression of its logo design here.
Illinois' favorite Speaker of the House, Denny Hastert holding forth on the importance of the restoration of the Frederick Douglass National Historic Site in Washington: "The values and principles that Frederick Douglass and Abraham Lincoln worked so hard for in the 1880's are the same values and principles that we are fighting for as a Republican Party today."
The quote is corrected on his official news item, but if you listened to his remarks on NPR today, you too know that Lincoln lingered on at least sixteen years after his dramatic night at Ford's Theatre.
The Baha'i Temple, that intricate white building on Sheridan Road in Wilmette, is 50 years old this year. An afternoon exploring the beautiful temple and its well-tended grounds is time well spent.
The Illinois Railway Museum in Union, IL recently acquired Illinois Central No, 201 - the last surviving locomotive operated by legendary railroad engineer John Luther "Casey" Jones. Jones drove the Illinois Central trains during the summer of 1893, shuttling passengers to Chicago's World's Columbian Exposition. The Illinois Railway Museum, with a collection of almost 400 pieces, is the largest railroad museum in the country and is operated entirely by volunteers without government or corporate funding.
Chicago's 100 year old ban on public swearing has been dropped.
As of April 2003, Police officers will no longer uphold the the ordinance which is now seen as a violation of the First Amendment. Go out and celebrate by pretending to be a sailor on shore leave!
University of Chicago's Lost Treasures of Iraq website is live. It's pretty much the only way to see just how devastating the looting of the Iraq Museum really is.
