City of the Century: The Epic of Chicago and the Making of AmericaThe epic of Chicago is the story of the emergence of modern America. Here, witness Chicago's growth from a desolate fur-trading post in the 1830s to one of the world's most explosively alive cities by 1900. Donald Miller's powerful narrative embraces it all: Chicago's wild beginnings, its reckless growth, its natural calamities (especially the Great Fire of 1871), its raucous politics, its empire-building businessmen, its world-transforming architecture, its rich mix of cultures, its community of young writers and journalists, and its staggering engineering projects—which included the reversal of the Chicago River and raising the entire city from prairie mud to save it from devastating cholera epidemics. The saga of Chicago's unresolved struggle between order and freedom, growth and control, capitalism and community, remains instructive for our time, as we seek ways to build and maintain cities that retain their humanity without losing their energy. City of the Century throbs with the pulse of the great city it brilliantly brings to life. |
Contents
Let Us Build Ourselves a City | 176 |
The Chicago Machine | 198 |
The Streetcar City | 254 |
Stories in Stone and Steel | 301 |
Sullivan and Civic Renewal | 354 |
The New Chicago | 378 |
The Battle for Chicago | 435 |
After the Fair | 533 |
Notes | 555 |
Bibliography | 639 |
Acknowledgments | 683 |
Other editions - View all
City of the Century: The Epic of Chicago and the Making of America Donald L. Miller Limited preview - 2014 |
Common terms and phrases
Addams American architects architecture Armour Art Institute Auditorium Baker became began Bertha Palmer building built Burnham Burnham and Root called canal capitalists cars Carter Harrison Charles Chicago Fire Chicago River Chicagoans city's civic Club Columbian Exposition Company construction cultural Daniel Burnham downtown Dreiser engineering ethnic fire Frank Lloyd Wright George Pullman Gurdon Harper Harrison Haymarket Hubbard Hull-House Hutchinson Illinois immigrants Indian industrial Irish Jane Addams Jenney John Joliet Journal Kinzie labor lake land later lived Louis Sullivan Marquette Marshall Field Michigan modern neighborhood Ogden Olmsted Palmer Papers Park Philip Armour political Potter Palmer prairie Quoted rail railroad reformers reporter Root saloons skyscraper social South steel story Street Theodore Dreiser thousand tion town trade urban Ward West William women workers World's Fair wrote Yerkes York young