31 December 2023
We’ve had so much fun looking back into Chicago history this year.
Photo editors Andrew Johnston and Marianne Mather and myself sincerely enjoy bringing you great finds from the Tribune’s archives each week. We hit the photo stacks almost daily to see what surprises might lie within the thousands of manila file folders there — especially since most of these items are not already digitized. The thrill of the chase is when we discover these rarely seen treasures and share them with you.
In 2023, we marked a variety of milestones — from Chicago Bears owner Virginia McCaskey’s 100th birthday to the 20th anniversary of the overnight shut down of Meigs Field by Mayor Richard M. Daley to the 50th anniversary of the first cell phone call (which was made on a Motorola phone) and the 75th anniversary of the Tribune’s infamous “Dewey Defeats Truman” headline.
Next year we look forward to marking even more significant occasions. And if you have any suggestions, please get in touch with us.
Did you miss a week? Here’s a comprehensive list.
Jan. 5: Chicago Bears owner Virginia McCaskey — who turns 100 today — in her own words
Jan. 12: Martin Luther King Jr. leads ‘the first significant freedom movement in the North’
Jan. 19: WGN-TV’s Tom Skilling recalls the city’s coldest and snowiest January days
Jan. 26: Curling, ski jumping, ‘Silver Skates’ and more — our favorite sports from winters past
Feb. 2: 10 longstanding Black-owned businesses to support all year
Feb. 2 (Special edition): ‘It’s GROUNDHOG DAY!!!!!’
Feb. 9: Love bites — delicious Valentine’s Day recipes from our archives
Feb. 16: Michael Jordan — 23 stories about No. 23
Feb. 23: Curious and quirky stories about the Cubs and White Sox at spring training
March 2: 10 things you might not know about Chicago’s mayoral election
March 9: Murder, mayhem and ‘all that jazz’ — the real women who inspired Oscar winner ‘Chicago’
March 16: March Madness was born in Illinois. Here’s history of Chicago teams in the tournament.
March 23: Hot dogs! Pizza! Popcorn! Lemonade! Chicken pot pie! Get your food history, here!
March 30: Meigs Field — shut 20 years ago by Mayor Daley — and Northerly Island’s evolution
April 6: Dick Tracy and ‘handie-talkie’ paved way for Motorola’s first cellphone call in 1973
April 13: A look back at the Golden Gloves, longest-running, largest non-national amateur boxing event in America
April 20: Watch and revisit ‘The Mystery of Al Capone’s Vaults’ hosted by Geraldo Rivera
April 27: Lee Elia’s rant, 40 years later: How the Cubs manager’s 3-minute tirade became one of the most infamous speeches in history
May 4: When British royals — including King Charles — visited the Windy City
May 11: Medinah Temple — from Shriners to circus, couches to casino — through the decades
May 18: 100 years of mayoral inauguration speeches from William Dever through Brandon Johnson
May 25: World’s Columbian Exposition, 1893 and Century of Progress, 1933-1934
June 1: 10 key moments in the city’s sanctuary movement
June 8: Vietnam Veterans Welcome Home Parade of 1986
June 15: 50th anniversary of Secretariat’s ‘runaway’ race at Arlington Park in 1973
June 22: The disappearance of ‘Foolkiller No. 3′ in Lake Michigan
June 29: Nine No. 1 draft picks made by Chicago’s professional sports teams
July 6: We started baseball’s first All-Star Game — 90 years ago
July 13: 5 largest crowd estimates in city history
July 20: The first Special Olympics at Soldier Field — 55 years ago
July 27: The 5 hottest days in city history
Aug. 3: How Wrigley Field got lights and why Cubs fans had to wait past 8-8-88 to raise ‘W’ flag
Aug. 10: Bernie Sanders, Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. protest against ‘Willis wagons’ in schools
Aug. 17: 10 biggest bummers in 100 years of city history
Aug. 24: ‘The whole world is watching’ to the ‘Macarena’ — the city’s political convention past
Aug. 31: How Illinois became the first state to recognize MLK Day
Sept. 7: Jimmy Buffett, our favorite tourist
Sept. 14: 10 key moments from the ‘Summer of Sammy’ Sosa and the race to 62 home runs
Sept. 21: Rites of fall — 5 things to love about autumn that aren’t football
Sept. 28: Pelé, Hamm, Beckham, Rapinoe, Messi and more. When soccer’s big names came to play
Oct. 5: Worst Chicago pro sports teams
Oct. 12: Friday the 13th
Oct. 19: 5 ways to celebrate Halloween and spooky season with treats from the archives
Oct. 26: 10 key moments in George Halas’ life on the 40th anniversary of his death
Nov. 2: 5 things that led to ‘Dewey Defeats Truman,’ the newspaper’s most famous headline
Nov. 9: How the city celebrated war’s end and welcomed its veterans home
Nov. 16: How McCormick Place’s Lakeside Center came to be on the lakefront
Nov. 23: Quintessential Thanksgiving movie ‘Planes, Trains and Automobiles’ has local roots
Nov. 30: Chicago-style pizza may owe its existence to a bad enchilada
Dec. 7: Nobel Prize winners with Chicago connections
Dec. 14: Shuttered local bakeries where we wish we could shop this holiday season
Dec. 21: How Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer became a Christmas icon
Andrew Johnston’s pick: WGN-TV’s Tom Skilling recalls the city’s coldest and snowiest January days
The beloved WGN-TV chief meteorologist — who is celebrating his 45th anniversary at the station — will retire at the end of February.
Skilling recalled some of the most brutally frigid and blizzard-like conditions Chicago has ever endured. Read more here.
Marianne Mather’s pick: Curling, ski jumping, ‘Silver Skates’ and more — our favorite sports from winters past
These beautiful photos showing wintry outdoor activities that Chicagoans have loved for generations encouraged us to get outside! See more here.
Andrew Johnston’s pick: March Madness was born in Illinois. Here’s history of Chicago teams in the tournament.
Henry V. Porter, an Illinois High School Association official who was later inducted into the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame, is credited with originally using the phrase to describe the state’s high school basketball tournament in 1939.
The Tribune adopted it in 1940, but Porter’s motto remained largely a regional phenomenon for four decades until CBS broadcaster Brent Musburger, a former Chicago newspaper reporter, began using it during the NCAA tournament in 1982.
The term caught on — maybe a little too quickly. The IHSA sued to stop NCAA corporate sponsor GTE from distributing a video game bearing the March Madness title. Read more here.
Kori Rumore’s pick: Meigs Field — shut 20 years ago by Mayor Daley — and Northerly Island’s evolution
Twenty years ago, Mayor Richard M. Daley shut down Chicago’s third airport: Merrill C. Meigs Field.
A wrecking crew used bulldozers to carve giant X’s into the airstrip late on March 30, 2003. The next day — with the runway rendered useless to aircraft — Daley told reporters he was trying to reduce any airborne threat against downtown buildings “in these very uncertain times” only a year and a half after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.
For 55 years the small airport hosted private and regional charter flights, becoming the busiest single-runway airport in the United States in 1955. Dignitaries loved it because it provided easy access to downtown Chicago without the need to travel on the city’s expressways.
But it was well-documented that Daley wanted to close the airport in order to convert Northerly Island to a park. By making that transition, ironically, Daley was fulfilling a major component of Daniel Burnham’s Plan of Chicago from 1909. Read more here.
Andrew Johnston’s pick: Watch and revisit ‘The Mystery of Al Capone’s Vaults’ hosted by Geraldo Rivera
The most exhilarating live television event of 1986 was the Chicago Bears winning Super Bowl XX, for some.
For others, it was a two-hour broadcast from a basement.
On April 21, 1986 — 37 years ago — Geraldo Rivera hosted “The Mystery of Al Capone’s Vaults” from the depths of the former Lexington Hotel at Michigan Avenue and Cermak Road on the city’s Near South Side.
Spoiler alert: The early experiment in unscripted programming was one of the most fascinating busts in Chicago history. Read more here.
Marianne Mather’s pick: The disappearance of ‘Foolkiller No. 3’ in Lake Michigan
It’s an incredible true story.
An experimental capsule designed by an eccentric explorer to cross a large body of water disappears while on an epic journey, scrambling volunteers and authorities to search for it while family and friends anxiously wait for updates knowing oxygen supplies are limited.
The saga mirrors that of the submersible Titan, which was attempting to visit the wreck of the Titanic in June before it exploded, but happened 119 years ago in Chicago.
Known as Foolkiller No. 3, the 30-foot long and 20-foot wide canvas-covered vessel looked more like a floating blimp than a submersible. It was not designed to sink, but to glide — across land or water — when propelled by the wind. Its cavity was dotted with one glass porthole on each end and hollow except for an axle to help the watermelon-shaped machine turn while its occupant was seated atop it.
Peter Nissen, its inventor, packed up some food, pumped up his vessel by hand than set out to cross Lake Michigan — powered by the wind like a tumbleweed — on Nov. 29, 1904. Read more here.
Kori Rumore’s pick: How Illinois became the first state to recognize MLK Day
We remember Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. each Jan. 15, which was the slain civil rights leader’s birthday.
But, did you know, Illinois was the first state to recognize it as a holiday 50 years ago?
Schools here began commemorating the occasion in 1969. They wouldn’t, however, close for the day until Gov. Dan Walker made it a legal holiday on Sept. 17, 1973. The bill’s sponsor: Illinois Rep. Harold Washington.
It would take another decade before the federal government designated the third Monday in January as a national holiday in honor of King. By then, Washington had become Chicago’s first Black mayor. Read more here.
Marianne Mather’s pick: 10 biggest bummers in 100 years of city history
Chicagoans are familiar with disappointment.
“There’s always next year,” was the motto for generations of Cubs fans who waited 108 years between the team’s last two championships.
Yet, there have also been times when it appeared that Chicago was ready for its moment in the sun — before suddenly, unexpectedly stumbling.
Those are the disappointments that really hurt. Read more here.
Kori Rumore’s pick: 5 things that led to ‘Dewey Defeats Truman,’ the newspaper’s most famous headline
The Chicago Tribune covered its first presidential election in 1848.
The race a century later, however, would result in the newspaper’s most famous headline: “DEWEY DEFEATS TRUMAN.”
The Tribune was on deadline the night of Nov. 2, 1948. In the absence of election results, the newspaper assumed that New York governor Thomas E. Dewey (Republican) would sink incumbent Harry S. Truman (Democrat). He didn’t. And the blunder appeared atop a single edition of the Tribune 75 years ago.
The headline isn’t the only problem with the page — it’s a typographical mess. Lines and type are askew. It’s a mishmash of type styles. And in the second paragraph of the lead story, five lines of type ran upside down.
Several news organizations made the same miscalculation, but no other’s was displayed gleefully by Truman for what’s become an iconic photograph. Read more here.
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