Chicago Metro History Fair
Useful Websites for Popular Topics
Quicklinks: Jane Addams | Architecture | Burnham Plan | Businesses | Chicago Black Renaissance | Chicago Fire | Chicago Sewers | Cook County Forest Preserve | Early Chicago | Great Migration | Haymarket | I&M Canal | Labor | Lakefront | Mayors | Photographs | Pullman | South Side Community Art Center | Special Olympics | Stock Yards | Theater | Transportation
Search the catalog for books and other materials on these topics.
Addams, Jane
About Jane Addams
(Jane Addams Hull-House Museum)
Urban Experience in Chicago: Hull-House and its Neighborhoods, 1889-1963
(Jane Addams Hull-House Museum)
Site includes a chronology of the life of Jane Addams.
Architecture
Architect Louis Sullivan
(Chicago History Museum)
Chicago Imagebase
(University of Illinois, Chicago)
Use the “Table of Contents” button on the left to access collections. Highlights include Robinson Atlas of Downtown Chicago (ca. 1886), Chicago’s Loop (1893) as seen by Rand McNally’s artists and 1939-1941 WPA land-use maps of the Loop.
Chicago Landmarks
(City of Chicago, Chicago Landmarks)
Includes pages about Chicago Landmarks, biographies of Chicago architects and virtual architectural tours.
Burnham Plan of Chicago, 1909
Burnham Plan
(Encyclopedia of Chicago)
Read a digitized copy of the Plan of Chicago.
Without Bounds or Limits: An Online Exhibition of the Plan of Chicago
(Art Institute of Chicago)
Businesses
Mail Order
Mail Order
Mailing to the World
(Encyclopedia of Chicago)
Montgomery Ward & Co.
Sears, Roebuck & Co.
(Encyclopedia of Chicago)
Trade Catalog Collection
Hundreds of catalogs from Chicago companies in the Chicago Public Library collection.
Restaurants
McDonald’s
(McDonald’s Corp.)
McDonald’s Corp
(Encyclopedia of Chicago)
Restaurants
(Encyclopedia of Chicago)
Chicago Black Renaissance
Chicago Black Renaissance
(Encyclopedia of Chicago)
Chicago Renaissance
(Chicago Public Library)
Digitized images from the Library’s collections.
Chicago Fire
Chicago Timeline: 1871, The Great Fire
(Chicago Public Library)
Find links to other sites, including The Great Chicago Fire and the Web of Memory, an online exhibit at the Chicago History Museum.
Site of the Origin of the Fire
(City of Chicago, Chicago Landmarks)
Chicago Sewers
Chicago Sewers
(Chicago Public Library)
Digitized images from the Library’s collections. A complete list of photographs is available.
Ellis Chesbrough, Engineer
(Chicago Tribute, Markers of Distinction)
Sanitation in Chicago
(Encyclopedia of Chicago)
Cook County Forest Preserve
Cook County Forest Preserve
(University of Illinois, Chicago)
The archives of the Cook County Forest Preserve include photographs, documents, blueprints and a finding aid to the collection.
Early Chicago
American Experience: Chicago, City of the Century
(PBS)
This site includes a timeline, Chicago, 1671-1859.
Illinois Country
(Illinois State Museum)
Illinois Indians
(Illinois State Museum)
Journals of Father Jacques Marquette
(Chicago Public Library)
Letters by William Burnett
(Chicago Public Library)
Native Peoples of the Great Lakes Region
(TEACH, Great Lakes)
References to Jean Baptiste Pointe DuSable
(Chicago Public Library)
Reminiscences by Gurdon S. Hubbard
(Chicago Public Library)
Great Migration
Chicago: Destination for the Great Migration
(Library of Congress)
Haymarket
Chicago Anarchists on Trial
(Chicago History Museum and the Library of Congress)
Online exhibit and collection.
Chicago Timeline: 1886, Haymarket Riot
(Chicago Public Library)
Haymarket Tragedy
(Illinois Labor History Society)
A detailed site about the Haymarket Affair.
Illinois and Michigan Canal
I&M Canal History
(Canal Corridor Association)
The Illinois and Michigan Canal, 1827-1911
(Illinois State Archives)
Site of the Origin of the I&M Canal
(City of Chicago, Chicago Landmarks)
Labor
Illinois Labor History Society
A series of articles about labor history in Illinois.
Labor Oral Histories
(Roosevelt University)
Lakefront
Chicago’s Lakefront
(Chicago Public Library)
Digitized images from the Library’s collections.
Chicago’s Lakefront with Geoffrey Baer
(WTTW)
Millennium Park Construction Photographs
(Chicago Public Library)
Digitized images from the Library’s collections.
Mayors
Chicago’s Mayors
(Chicago Public Library)
A chronology of the city’s mayors featuring their biographies and text of their inaugural addresses.
Harold Washington Archives & Collections
(Chicago Public Library)
Remembering Harold: Photographs from the Harold Washington Archives and Collections
(Chicago Public Library)
Digitized images from the Library’s collections.
Photographs
Photographs from the Chicago Daily News, 1902-1933
(Chicago History Museum and the Library of Congress)
More than 55,000 images from this Chicago newspaper.
Pullman
A. Philip Randolph Pullman Porter Museum
American Memory: Pullman
(Library of Congress)
Materials related to Pullman porters and Pullman Cars.
Historic Pullman Collection
(Chicago Public Library)
Pullman Porters
(WTTW)
Pullman Strike
(Encyclopedia of Chicago)
South Side Community Art Center
Archives of the South Side Community Art Center
(Mapping the Stacks and South Side Community Art Center)
History
(South Side Community Art Center)
Landmark
(City of Chicago, Chicago Landmarks)
Special Olympics
Eunice Kennedy Shriver
History of the Special Olympics
(Special Olympics)
Stock Yards
Meat Packing
Packinghouse Unions
Union Stock Yard
(Encyclopedia of Chicago)
Union Stockyards
(WTTW)
Theater
Chicago Theater Collection
(Chicago Public Library)
Theater
Theater Companies
(Encyclopedia of Chicago)
Transportation
American Memory: Chicago Elevated Railroads
(Library of Congress)
A number of photographs of the el. Search for “Chicago elevated railroads” to view more than a hundred photographs.
Chicago Transit Authority
Rapid Transit System
(Encyclopedia of Chicago)
Chicago’s Public Transportation Policy, 1900-1940s
(Illinois History Teacher)
An article by Paul Barrett in Illinois History Teacher published by the Illinois Historic Preservation Agency.
CTA Facts at a Glance
(Chicago Transit Authority)
Public Transportation and the Failure of Municipal Socialism in Chicago, 1905-1907
(Illinois History Teacher)
An article by Richard Allen Morton in Illinois History Teacher published by the Illinois Historic Preservation Agency.