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Chicago Fire of 1871

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Destroyed buildings and streets in the aftermath of the Chicago fire.

What Really Started the Great Chicago Fire?

The famous disaster razed a metropolis and spread a pack of colorful lies. To sift through the ashes today is to encounter some uncomfortable truths.
by Margaret Talbot via The New Yorker on October 2, 2023
Haiti Building at the World's Columbian Exposition, Chicago, Illinois, 1893. Photo courtesy of the Chicago History Museum.

The Chicago Fire of 1874 and the World’s Columbian Exposition Led to the Formation of the Black Belt

The fire of 1874 destroyed more than 80% of Black-owned property in Chicago. But Black people persisted and built vital cultural traditions and institutions.
by Tonia Hill via The TRiiBE on July 7, 2021
Lithograph of the great Chicago fire.

October 8, 1871: The Great Chicago Fire Kills Hundreds and Burns Most of Downtown

“Very sensible men have declared that they were fully impressed at such a time with the conviction that it was the burning of the world.”
by Frederick Law Olmsted, Richard Kreitner via The Nation on November 9, 1871
Drawings of houses

How Trees Made Us Human

More than iron, stone, or oil, wood explains human history.
by Daniel Immerwahr via The New Republic on December 1, 2020
Woodpeckers

Sooty Feathers Tell the History of Pollution in American Cities

Preserved birds and digital photos help pinpoint levels of black carbon in the air and the changes that led to its decline.
by Alex Furuya via Audubon on October 10, 2017
Chicago Workers' Cottages.

Chicago Workers Cottages Gave Immigrants Access to Homeownership

The cottages’ modest design provided entry-level homes after the Great Chicago Fire.
by Zach Mortice via CityLab on July 28, 2024
1905 Sanborn insurance map of San Francisco, damaged by the fires after the 1906 earthquake.

From Fire Hazards to Family Trees: The Sanborn Fire Insurance Maps

Created for US insurance firms during devastating fires across the 19th and 20th centuries, the Sanborn maps blaze with detail the aspects of American cities.
by Tobiah Black via The Public Domain Review on June 12, 2024
A photograph of four people on donkeys from the late 1800s.

A Question of Legacy

Some of my ancestors had money, and some held awful beliefs. I set out to investigate what I once stood to inherit.
by David Owen via The New Yorker on January 2, 2024
Map of Chicago Grid

Settler Colonialism in Chicago: A Living Atlas

The city of Chicago was built upon the settler colonial dispossession of Indigenous peoples and lands. That history of this conflict continues into the present.
by Andrew Herscher via Rampant on October 10, 2022
Lithograph of people fleeing the Great Fire of Peshtigo on horseback and on foot.

Why America's Deadliest Wildfire Was Largely Forgotten

In 1871, the Wisconsin town Peshtigo burned to the ground, killing up to 2,500. But due to another event at the time, many have never heard about the disaster.
by Erin Blakemore via HISTORY on July 29, 2021
Cross-shaped steel beam from the wreckage of the World Trade Center

Disasters and the Politics of Memory

The challenges involved in constructing the 9-11 Museum in New York City within the context of other man-made disasters.
by Kevin Rozario via Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History on September 1, 2014

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