#chicagohistory
Miscellaneous | Chicagoey Stuff
Watch The Oldest Footage of Chicago on Film
Yestervid compiles silent film footage of the Windy City dating back to 1896.
Miscellaneous | Chicagoey Stuff
Questions from the Historic Chicago Walking Bar Tour - Chicago Detours
Answering questions that stump the guides on the Historic Chicago Walking Bar Tour. Topics range from speakeasies, to conspiracy theories, and more as we answer your best Bar Tour questions!
History | Chicago History
Photos from the Great Chicago Fire
The Great Chicago Fire erupted on Oct. 8, 1871, and burned a large portion of the city until the fire died out on Oct. 10, 1871. It killed hundreds of people and destroyed a huge swath of the central business district, which was mainly m
History | Chicago History
The Chicago Fire
The whole Midwest was parched, caught in the thrall of a mighty drought. Chicago, with its preponderance of wooden buildings, inadequate fire codes and inferior firefighting equipment, was a conflagration waiting to happen. On this Sunday evening, it did.
History | Chicago History
Letter of Recommendation: The Thorne Miniature Rooms in Chicago
Model rooms at the Art Institute of Chicago can make an adult feel like a child again.
History | Chicago History
Statue Stories has David Schwimmer, Steve Carell, others giving voice to Chicago
It would almost be enough to have your cellphone ring and the identifying text say there's an incoming call from "Abraham Lincoln," or "Benito Juarez," or "Cloud Gate." That's a screenshot worth saving.
History | Chicago History
Rare Eastland disaster photos discovered in Chicago Tribune basement
The photographs capture the aftermath of one of Chicago's worst disasters: rows of sheet-covered bodies inside a temporary morgue, two women crying while clutching a baby in a blanket, a Coast Guard crew hauling a woman out of the river, the Eastland flop
History | Chicago History
The last remains of old Chicago
Ever wish you lived in Chicago in the '20s, '60s, '80s? Traces of old Chicago remain, from gambling dens to red light districts to payphones.
History | Chicago History
The Storyteller from Albany Park, Chicago
On Friday nights we went to the Terminal theater. It seemed like 5,000 teenagers were there. After the movie, we'd go to Purity deli for kishkes and cherry Cokes.
History | Chicago History
Unsung urban planning hero Edward Brennan made it easy to find your way around Chicago
Unsung urban planning hero Edward Brennan tamed a chaotic 19th-century street-numbering system.
Miscellaneous | Other Stuff!
6 things Chicagoans don't know but are too afraid to ask
Why are there so many bridges that are permanently raised?
History | Chicago History
Curious City looks at the history of Chicago’s ‘Dunning’ poor farm and asylum
In both life and death, the people who ended up at the notorious asylum and poor farm were some of Chicago’s least fortunate residents.
History | Chicago History
McDonald's: 60 years, billions served
Sixty years ago, on April 15, 1955, a 52-year-old former piano player and salesman from Oak Park opened a hamburger stand in Des Plaines. His name was Ray Kroc, and what's today known around the world as McDonald's was off and running.
History | Chicago History
First known film clips emerge of 1915 Eastland disaster
For years, Ted Wachholz had all the evidence he needed to believe that film footage of the 1915 SS Eastland disaster on the Chicago River existed, except maybe for the film itself.
History | Chicago History
The last remains of old Chicago
Ever wish you lived in Chicago in the '20s, '60s, '80s? Traces of old Chicago remain, from gambling dens to red light districts to payphones.
Miscellaneous | Other Stuff
The last remains of old Chicago
Sometimes we get those nostalgic pangs for a seedier, grittier, neon-lit, noir Chicago. Thankfully, there are some last remaining traces of the bygone era of smoke-filled bars, coin-operated communication, gambling parlors and porno video stores. Here's where to find them.
History | Chicago History
Chicago's Gangster Past, Minus the Romance - CityLab
A collection of photographs from the Chicago Tribune archives rejects spectacle in favor of brutal, messy truth.
History | Chicago History
Check Out This Map Of Settlement Patterns In Chicago In 1950
The settlement patterns are from 1950, but the map wasn't printed then. Can you spot the clues?
History | Chicago History
See Chicago's Past Through These Classic Magazine Ads From 1959
What can a magazine ad tell you about Chicago in 1959? Let's take a ride on the Chicagoist Wayback Machine to a time when phone numbers were as long as hashtags.
History | Chicago History
1949: Chicago by Stanley Kubrick
Steel, lingerie, trains, poverty. A "city of extremes."
History | Chicago History
Ghost signs in Chicago: advertisements from the past
Chicago photographer Debbie Mercer captures faded ghost signs hiding in plain sight on Chicago buildings.
History | Chicago History
The Great Chicago Fire happened 143 years ago tomorrow
The Great Chicago Fire blazed through Chicago 143 years ago. This timeline explains what started the fire and how it was able to spread so quickly.
History | Chicago History
Rarely-Seen Photos Spotlight The 1970s Social Scene Of South Side Chicago
To say it was a different time is putting it lightly. In the 1970s on Chicago's South Side, revelers in their finest packed into nightclubs, dancing the night away to the soulful music of the era while knocking back a drink or three at now-extinct...
History | Chicago History
Memories of Chicago's Extinct Businesses Kept Alive on Facebook Page
Pete Kastanes runs the page, and about 20 others, that highlight city spots that have come and gone.
History | Chicago History
51 Vintage Postcards from the Windy City
As Chicago continues to break its record for tourism year-after-year, the city has set an ambitious goal of attracting 55 million visitors to the Windy City annually by 2020....
History | Chicago History
RC Cola and Chicago: How the Underdog Soft Drink Came to Dominate The Second City Pizzerias
RC Cola was the bronze medalist in the Cola Wars. How did the brand that fought for the scraps of market share end up in Chicago pizzerias?
History | Chicago History
Vintage photographs of Chicago "L" trains and buses
Take a ride back in time on the green and cream CTA buses, trains, trolleys and horses from Chicago's public transportation past.
History | Chicago History
Hoops History in Chicago is Deeper Than the Pizza
Educate yourself on Chicago's rich basketball history.
History | Chicago History
Chicago photos of Martin Luther King Jr. added to Smithsonian
He was a young priest with a camera when the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. came to Chicago in the 1960s, but now his images of racial tumult and civil rights marches are housed in the Smithsonian.
History | Chicago History
A shot of history: Ingredients of the Chicago speakeasy
The faux speakeasy is popping up everywhere these days, but what made the original Prohibition saloon work?
History | Chicago History
Lost WWII love letters delivered to intended recipient
After almost 70 years, the letters written by a World War II sailor made the final leg of a mysterious journey Wednesday when they were turned over to Dorothy Bartos Carlberg, their intended recipient.
History | Chicago History
Life in Chicago during World War II (Gallery)
Over seven decades ago, Chicagoans had to come to grips with a cold, hard fact: The country was at war. Women by the droves went to work in defense plants and Chicago soon led the nation in war production. Consumer goods were scarce and rationed, so many
History | Chicago History
WWII love letters finally arrive in Chicago
Entrusting deep feelings to a flimsy envelope and an 8-cent stamp is an act of faith. But that's exactly what A.L. Fragakis did in 1945 when he was in the Navy and mailed two letters to his sweetheart back home in Chicago.
History | Chicago History
25 Vintage Photos of Chicago
Chicago invented the skyscraper, has hosted two World's Fairs, and boasts its own kind of formidable pizza. Despite being one of the most populous cities in the country, it hasn't all been all clear skies and Green River soda. Chicago survived one of the
History | Chicago History
'Picturing Logan Square' showcases turn-of-the-(last)-century images
Logan Square—forever changing
History | Chicago History
The Evolution Of Lake Shore Drive and Grant Park
Back in the 1920s the vast land between Soldier Field and the Chicago River resembled Lollapalooza after a rain-soaked, three-day mosh.
Miscellaneous | Other Stuff
25 Vintage Photos of Chicago
Chicago invented the skyscraper, has hosted two World's Fairs, and boasts its own kind of formidable pizza. Despite being one of the most populous cities in the country, it hasn't all been all clear skies and Green River soda. Chicago survived o
History | Chicago History
Inside the Pink Palace of the Edgewater Beach Apartments
The Roaring 20s grandeur meets contemporary simplicity at the Edgewater Beach Apartments.
History | Chicago History
99 years ago, 844 died in the Eastland disaster on the Chicago River
It was 99 years ago today, on July 24, 1915, where more than 2,500 people piled onto the Eastland on the Chicago River at the dock between LaSalle and Clark streets. They were to be the first group of an estimated 7,000 people to be transported to Western
History | Chicago History
John Dillinger Was Killed 80 Years Ago Tuesday
The first man to be named “Public Enemy No. 1” by the FBI, was gunned down outside the Biograph Theater on July 22, 1934.
History | Chicago History
The history of Millennium Park in a 3 minute video
The site of Millennium Park has been a parking garage, a rail yard, and now an architectural destination. Learn how the park evolved over a century.
History | Chicago History
Logan Square's Historic Photo Exhibit Finds Roots of Rapid Change
The photos show a neighborhood in flux and will be displayed after being compiled for a decade.
History | Chicago History
See Mid-Century Chicago in 20 Vintage Postcards
A collection of linen postcards from 1930 to 1945 shows Chicago not exactly as it was, but as a visitor would want to remember it.
History | Chicago History
Flashback: Chicago's violent taxi wars
Hopefully the current dispute between licensed cabbies and UberX drivers over the right to pick up passengers at O'Hare and Midway will remain a battle of emails, because Chicago's earlier cab wars...
History | Chicago History
1930s Chicago Gang Map Combines History, Humor, Morality
An illustrated study of Chicago's gang and crime problem in the 1930s.
Books | Chicago Readers
Printers Row Lit Fest celebrates 30th birthday
What a difference three decades make. The first Printers Row book fair, in 1985, featured about 40 booksellers and attracted a reported 6,500 attendees to what once had been a somewhat dicey neighborhood. Considering the crowds in recent years, the 2014 P
History | Chicago History
Chicagoist Flashback: Memorial Day Massacre of 1937
74 years ago today, police opened fire on a group of striking steelworkers and their families on the Southeast side. Ten were killed in the
History | Chicago History
From ballparks to backyards, Chicago's unique love affair with the hot dog
From ballparks to backyards, Chicago's unique love affair with the hot dog.
