chicago history
Before visiting Chicago, find out what made Chicago
Chicago. Do you know why it's called the "Windy" City?
Or Where did Chicago get its name? We may not have
thousands of years of history, but what we do have
is interesting!
- No one can be sure when native Americans first lived in the Chicago region, but evidence can be traced back to 1000 AD.
- By 1600’s there were many Indian tribes in the region, and in 1673 Indians directed French explorer Louis Jolliet and missionary Jacques Marquette to Lake Michigan. The two who had been exploring the Mississippi River learned that the Indians in the region called the area ‘Checaugou after the wild garlic growing there.’
- Various explorers and traders travelled through the area over the next 100 years, and in 1779 Quebec trader Jean Baptiste Point du Sable established a fur trading store.
- After the revolutionary war, the United States increasingly focused it’s attention on the western frontier. Due to Chicago’s position on Lake Michigan, the Government built Fort Dearborn in install a permanent presence in the area. The Americans, French, British and Indians turned their energies into profiting from the fur trade.
- In 1818 Illinois became a state, and in the 1820’s, Chicago developed as a small town with a population of fewer than 200.
- Canal construction swelled the population to more than 4,100 by 1837.
- By the 1850’s (with canal having opened in 1848), Chicago grew quickly. Shipping began to flow through the Chicago River from the Caribbean to New York via the Great Lakes. Railroad construction absorbed workers freed from canal construction, and the city quickly became the hub of America’s freight and passenger trains
- By the 1860’s, Chicago population had hit 100,000. The Civil War has boosted business through steel and tool-making.
- On October 8 1871 the Chicago Fire, supposedly started by Mrs. O'Leary's cow, devastated the city killing 300 people, destroying 18,000 buildings and leaving 90,000 people homeless. However rapid new growth followed soon after, with the best architects in the world pouring in to rebuild the city. Rebuilding added to the city’s economy, and by 10 years after the fire, the population had tripled.
- At the turn of the century, Chicago had a population of 1.7 million as industries continued to prosper. Tough working conditions were bad, but immigrants continued to flow in from Midwestern farms and impoverished nations in Europe, joined in the early 20th century by blacks from the south. Between 1910 and 1919, Chicago’s black population had risen from 44,000 to 110,000 in a bid to escape from the repression in the south, and with the offer of work in the factories.
- The nationwide enactment in 1920 of Prohibition made alcohol consumption illegal. The city’s vast population of Irish and Germans immigrants were reluctant to adhere to prohibition laws, and gangs made fortunes in dealing in illegal beer, gin and other intoxicants. Al Capone was the mob boss in Chicago from 1924 to 1931. Fuelled by prohibition, he took control of city’s South Side in 1924 and expanded his empire by making ‘hits’ on his rivals. 1933 saw prohibition repealed and Chicago’s people returned to the bars in droves.
- After suffering through the ‘depression’, the city experienced sudden affluence during WWII. People flocked to Chicago for jobs during the war years and in 1950 the population peaked at 3.6 million.
- The 1960’s saw the Civil Rights movement gain momentum, leading to a succession of marches and rallies throughout the city and it’s neighbourhoods. Following the assassination of Martin Luther King in 1968, the West side exploded in riots and went up in smoke. Whole stretches of the city were laid to waste and the politicians were helpless to stop the violence.
- In the 1970’s, many of the factories and steel mills closed as companies moved to the suburbs or the southern US where taxes and wages were lower. The late recession of the 70’s saw many blue-collar workers out of a job with little hope of replacement work. However 1974 did see the development of Sears Tower (the worlds tallest building at the time), and in 1975 the Water Tower Place shopping mall opened on N Michigan Ave.
- The mid 1980’s economic boom in the US was especially strong in Chicago. Scores of young urban professionals found jobs in the fast-growing service and professional sectors that helped spark a real estate boom and saw large portions of the North Side renovated.
- Having long been known as the second city after New York, the 1990 census saw Chicago fall to third in the roster behind Los Angeles in terms of population.
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