After 58 years of publishing in Chicago, Playboy Enterprises recently announced the move of all editing, art, and photography operations to Los Angeles. Readers of the announcement, largely communicated through Facebook and other social media, could hardly believe their eyes—and needless to say, they weren’t looking at any centerfold. Say it ain’t so, Playboy!
The first issue of Playboy, December 1953 CHM collection
January 23rd, 2012by John Russick Filed under: Events, History
New Year’s parade in Chicago’s Chinatown, 2011
Happy Chinese New Year, Chicago! Today, January 23, is the first day of 4710 according to the Chinese calendar. It’s the year of the dragon. If you can, check out the New Year’s parade in Chinatown this weekend. It kicks off at 1:00 p.m. on Sunday, January 29, on Wentworth Avenue south of Cermak Road. And, if you go, remember to wear something red for luck in the coming year and wish everyone, “Gung Hay Fat Choy,” or Happy New Year!
Footage from the 2011 Chinese New Year parade in Chinatown:
As we honor Martin Luther King, Jr., this national holiday weekend, I’d like to focus on his mentor and adviser Bayard Rustin (1912-1987), whose 100th birthday we mark this year. For both African American men, Chicago served as important preparatory ground for grassroots activism and community building, and as preliminary training for national speeches and civil rights demonstrations.
Bayard Rustin outside the March on Washington office, around 1963. Photograph courtesy of Bennett Singer.
January 12th, 2012by Russell Lewis Filed under: History
Although Chicago and its people have changed dramatically over the last 175 years, one aspect of city life has been consistent and fairly predictable: winter. Chicago’s reputation for prohibition gangsters and machine politics is perhaps trumped only by its frigid temperatures and blinding snowstorms that typically span the six months of winter weather, beginning in November and finally ending in April.
Four civilian men and one policeman standing by an automobile stuck in the snow during a snow storm in Chicago, Illinois, 1926 ICHi Number: DN-0080913
Winter weather records are not only the stuff of Chicago legend and lore, but they also serve as the foundation for bragging rights about the toughness of city denizens. Chicago thermometers dipped to 23 degrees below zero on December 24,1872, establishing a record low that stood for 109 years until temperatures fell to 26 degrees below zero on January 11, 1982. Since 1886, which the Tribune called “the winter of blizzards,” the city has experienced 44 snowstorms that produced ten inches or more of snow. Different generations of Chicagoans have embraced different blizzards as the defining moments of their lives in the city. Anyone who experienced the monster storm of January 26-27, 1967, which dumped almost two feet of snow (23 inches) on the city and brought Chicago to its knees, will find it hard to take more recent storms as serious contenders. But for others, last February’s 20.2-inch snowfall and the closing of Lake Shore Drive that stranded hundreds of people in their cars, will forever define their version of Chicago winter.
Police officers helping women during a blizzard ICHi Number: DN-0090290
Yet by every measure, the blizzard of March 25-26, 1930, now long forgotten, was truly historic, capping the city’s snowiest winter ever–58.2 inches. Over a period of 44 hours, a new record of 19.2 inches of snow fell on the city–14.5 inches accumulating in a 24-hour period, another record. According to the Tribune, it was the “worst blizzard in history:” ten people died, all schools and public transportation closed, 22,000 workers shoveled snow off of street car lines, 12-foot drifts made street impassible, and thousands of motorists were stranded. Was it the worst blizzard in history? Those who lived it will always view it as the mother of all Chicago blizzards. But until global warming transforms Chicago weather into balmy temps—and it looks like it is already starting this year—there will always be another snowstorm vying for Chicagoans to anoint it as the worst blizzard in history.
Automobiles driving on Michigan Avenue during a snow storm in Chicago, Illinois, 1926 ICHI Number: DN-0080912
Two policemen pushing a car stuck in snow during a snow storm in Chicago, Illinois, 1926 ICHi Number: DN-0080911
LaSalle Street depot in blizzard, 1929 ICHi Number: DN-0090245
Take a look at a time-lapse video from Chicago’s 2011 blizzard:
The first issue of Playboy, December 1953
