Inmate No. 40892-424, better known as former Illinois governor Rod Blagojevich, had hoped to he would be able to return home early. Those hopes were dashed by a the federal […]
Category: Chicago
200 Years of Illinois: The Other Airship Disaster
Yesterday marked an unusual 97th anniversary. On July 21, 1919, an airship owned by the Goodyear Tire and Rubber cruised over Chicago, a pair of training runs that interested and […]
200 Years of Illinois: Triple Digits
Anyone who lived through the 1995 heat wave in Chicago remembers it, and the memories may be slightly more vivid for those who coped without air conditioning (hand up). It unfolded […]
Throwbacklist Thursday: Goils Were Goils and Men Were Men
Generally considered a bummer of epic proportions, the Great Depression nonetheless inspired a measure of nostalgia. Americans looked back to a simpler time, of lives unencumbered by food, employment, homes, […]
Fixed That For You
In 1921, with Independence Day festivities out of the way, jury selection began on the biggest scandal to hit the sports world in years: the Black Sox case, with a […]
200 Years of Illinois: Final Flight
American Airlines Flight 191 crashed on May 25, 1979. All of the 271 people aboard died, as did two more on the ground. The cause: an improperly repaired engine mount […]
Sweet home Chicago
May 11-13, 2016, the publishing industry will descend upon the City of Big Shoulders for the textapalooza that is BookExpo America. BEA, held at Chicago’s McCormick Place this spring, is […]
Sensing Chicago awarded by the Illinois State Historical Society
Sensing Chicago: Noisemakers, Strikebreakers, and Muckrakers by Adam Mack has been given an award for Superior Achievement by the Illinois State Historical Society. The awards committee noted, “This scholarly book […]
Above the Lawless
Today marks the birthday of Lucy Lawless. The woman who single-handedly turned the phrase “iconic New Zealand-born actress” from a sly joke into absolute truth, Lawless became famous as warrior […]
Q&A with Painting the Gospel author Kymberly Pinder
Kymberly N. Pinder is Dean of the College of Fine Arts at the University of New Mexico. Her book Painting the Gospel: Black Public Art and Religion in Chicago explores the […]
Alan Harper’s blues odyssey
Alan Harper left his home in England in 1979 on a pilgrimage to find the blues. His journey led him to Chicago where he worked at a sandwich restaurant and […]
A less than perfect murder
How to get away with the perfect murder is one of those bull session perennials, a topic of unending fascination. Nathan Leopold and Richard Loeb, a pair of University of […]