One of my friends on Twitter, Jerome Hughes, recently posted a photo of his siblings from 1970. They're standing east of the railroad tracks that are now Millennium Park. This was the year the Sears Tower was built.

Next week marks the 40th anniversary of the 1968 Democratic National Convention. That was one of the darker moments in Chicago's history, when protests led to hundreds of injuries and arrests.
The Chicago History Museum wants to interview people who either witnessed or participated firsthand: "bystanders, policemen, demonstrators, delegates, photographers, students and
individuals".

I feel sorry for Mrs. O'Leary's much-maligned cow. For 136 years, she's been blamed for the Great Chicago Fire, despite Alderman Burke's 1997 resolution to clear the Irish lass and her bovine of any wrongdoing. She certainly wasn't responsible for the extent of the damage.

The fire actually did start in the poor woman's barn on this day in 1871. But there are many, many reasons it just wasn't her, or her cow's, fault. In fact, Michael Ahern of the Chicago Republican admitted (over a decade later) that he just made it up.

If you ever need proof that Chicago loves jazz, just think of how the Chicago Jazz Festival began.

This weekend is the 29th year of the official fest, but the first music gathering in Chicago dedicated to jazz was in 1974. Duke Ellington had passed away that summer so local musicians held a memorial concert in Grant Park and attracted 10,000 people, which became an annual event.

Old St. Patrick's is the oldest public building in Chicago, but it hasn't been easy to get that title. Three times in its extended history it's narrowly escaped destruction.

The building itself was dedicated on Christmas Day, 1856. The parish had begun ten years earlier, founded by Irish immigrants who had escaped political and religious persecution in their homeland. For the first 10 years the church was a wooden structure, but in 1853 the cornerstone was laid for what was to become the best known church in Chicago.