The Chicago Portal

Chicago's population of approximately 3 million people and its metropolitan area of over 9 million people make it the third-most populous city and metropolitan area in the United States. Adjacent to Lake Michigan, it is the largest Great Lakes city and among the world's 25 largest urban areas by population. Incorporated as a city in 1837 after being founded in 1833 at the site of a portage, it became a transportation hub in North America and the financial capital of the Midwest. Since the World's Fair of 1893, it has been regarded as one of the ten most influential cities in the world. Among its influences are Chicago Pile-1, the first artificial nuclear reactor, and Chicago school architecture. It boast some of the world's tallest buildings (Chicago Spire, Willis Tower, and Trump International Hotel and Tower). The University of Chicago is a leader in many fields and has contributed to academic thought, such as the Chicago school of economics or Chicago school of sociology.

Today, Chicago has diverse cultural offerings: teams from each of the major league sports (Bears, Blackhawks, Bulls, Cubs, and White Sox), a financial district anchored by the Chicago Mercantile Exchange on LaSalle Street in the Chicago Board of Trade Building, and an arts culture anchored by the Art Institute of Chicago and Millennium Park as well as Chicago Landmarks such as Wrigley Field. The Magnificent Mile is a fitting tribute for a city that has revolutionized retail merchandising with mail order catalogs, the money-back guarantee, bridal registry and using posted prices on goods.

Chicago hosts O'Hare (the world's second busiest) and Midway International Airports as well as the renowned 'L' rapid transit system. Chicago was once the capital of the railroad industry and the nation's meatpacking was hubbed at the Union Stock Yards. Chicago has seen the influence of Al Capone and the Cook County Democratic Organization run by Chicago Mayor Richard J. Daley. More recent Democrats from Cook County include the first African-American female United States Senator, Carol Mosley-Braun, and the first African-American United States President, and former Senator Barack Obama.

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Arts Club of Chicago is a private club located in the Near North Side community area of Chicago in Cook County, Illinois, United States, a block east of the Magnificent Mile, that exhibits international contemporary art. It was founded in 1916, inspired by the success of the Art Institute of Chicago's handling of the Armory Show. Its founding was viewed as a statement that art had become an important component of civilized urban life. The Arts Club is said to have been pro-Modernist from its founding. The Club strove to break new ground with its shows, rather than collect the works of established artists as the Art Institute does. The club presented Pablo Picasso's first United States showing. In addition, the 1951 exhibition by Jean Dubuffet and his "Anticultural Positions" lecture at the Arts Club were tremendous influences on what would become the mid 1960s Imagist movement. Another important presentation in the history of the Arts Club was the Fernand Leger showing of Le Ballet Mecanique. The Club's 1997 move to its current 201 E. Ontario Street location was not without controversy, because the club demolished its former interior space designed by Ludwig Mies van der Rohe and moved only the central staircase to the new gallery space. However, the new space is 19,000 square feet (1,800 m²), which is 7,000 square feet (650 m²) larger than the old space.

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Credit: Jack Delano, Farm Security Administration

The Chicago and North Western Railway (AAR reporting marks: CNW, CNWS, CNWZ; unofficial abbreviation: C&NW) was a Class I railroad in the Midwest United States. It was also known as the North Western. At its peak, the railroad operated more than 5,000 miles of track in seven states.

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The Chicago Cubs are a Major League Baseball team that plays in the National League (NL) Central Division. Since their inception as the White Stockings in 1876, the Cubs have employed 56 managers. The duties of the team manager include team strategy and leadership on and off the field. The Cubs have had 13 general managers. The general manager controls player transactions, hiring and firing of the coaching staff, and negotiates with players and agents regarding contracts. The first person to officially hold the title of general manager for the Cubs was Charles Weber, who assumed the title in 1934. The franchise's first manager was Baseball Hall of Famer Albert Spalding, who helped the White Stockings become the first champions of the newly formed National League. After co-managing with Silver Flint during the 1879 Chicago White Stockings season, Hall of Famer Cap Anson began an 18-year managerial tenure in 1880, the longest in franchise history. Under Anson, the team won five more NL pennants. Anson won 1,283 games as the White Stockings' manager, the most in franchise history. After taking over for Hall of Fame manager Frank Selee in 1905, Frank Chance—another Hall of Famer—managed the team through the 1912 season. During his tenure, the franchise won four more NL pennants in 1906, 1907, 1908, and 1910, winning its only two World Series titles in 1907 and 1908. Chance's .664 career winning percentage is the highest of any Cubs manager. After Chance, from 1913 through 1960, the Cubs employed nineteen managers, nine of which were inducted into the Hall of Fame. Owner P. K. Wrigley then began experimenting with the managerial position until Hall of Famer Leo Durocher assumed the managerial role for the 1966 season. In the last 37 seasons since Durocher, the Cubs have had 22 managers. Jim Frey and Don Zimmer led the team to the National League Championship Series (NLCS) in 1984 and 1989, respectively. Dusty Baker's Cubs lost in the 2003 NLCS during the first year of a four-year managing tenure. Baker's successor and current Cubs manager, Lou Piniella, has led the team to two consecutive National League Central Division titles during his first two years. Piniella's contract is expected to end with the conclusion of the 2009 season; the Cubs hold an option for a fourth year. The Cubs' current general manager is Jim Hendry. (Read more...)

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Harold Innis was a professor of political economy at the University of Toronto and the author of seminal works on Canadian economic history, media, and communication theory. In spite of his dense and difficult prose, Innis is considered by many scholars to have been one of Canada's most original thinkers. He helped develop the staples thesis, which holds that Canada's culture, political history and economy have been decisively influenced by the exploitation and export of a series of staples such as fur, fish, wood, wheat, mined metals and fossil fuels. Innis's communications writings explore the role of media in shaping the culture and development of civilizations. He argued, for example, that a balance between oral and written forms of communication contributed to the flourishing of Greek civilization in the 5th century BC. He warned however that Western civilization is now imperilled by powerful, advertising-driven media obsessed by "present-mindedness" and the "continuous, systematic, ruthless destruction of elements of permanence essential to cultural activity".

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"Chicago—is—oh well a façade of skyscrapers facing a lake, and behind the façade every type of dubiousness." — E. M. Forster

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The Historic Michigan Boulevard District is a historic district in the Loop community area of Chicago in Cook County, Illinois, United States encompassing Michigan Avenue between 11th (1100 south in the street numbering system) and Randolph Streets (150 north) and named after the nearby Great Lake. It was designated a Chicago Landmark on February 27, 2002. The district includes numerous significant buildings on Michigan Avenue facing Grant Park. In addition, this section of Michigan Avenue includes the point recognized as the end of U.S. Route 66. This district is one of the world's most well known one-sided streets rivalling Fifth Avenue in New York City and Edinburgh's Princes Street. It lies a quarter of a mile south of the Chicago River, Michigan Avenue Bridge and the Magnificent Mile.

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Wikinews Chicago, Illinois portal

• August 23: Lou Piniella retires after fifty years of baseball
• August 14: Former US Representative Dan Rostenkowski dies aged 82
• August 3: Illinois jurors begin fifth day of deliberations in Blagojevich corruption trial
• July 22: Former Illinois Governor Blagojevich rests in corruption trial

Did you know?

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  ...that the Arts Club of Chicago (pictured) arose from the success of the Art Institute of Chicago's handling of the Chicago showing of the Armory Show?

• ...that the Bud Billiken Parade and Picnic is the largest African American parade in the United States?
• ...the AT&T Corporate Center is the tallest building built in Chicago in the last quarter of the 20th century?
• ...that Jerrold Wexler helped save a transaction to purchase the Denver Nuggets, helped save Goldblatt's from bankruptcy and led the Drake Hotel to a National Register of Historic Places listing?

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