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Article: Chicago Fire
- Article from:
- Dictionary of American History
- Author:
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CHICAGO FIRE
CHICAGO FIRE.
Modern Chicago, Illinois, began its growth in 1833. By 1871 it had a population of 300,000. Across the broad plain that skirts the Chicago River's mouth, buildings by the thousand extended, constructed with no thought of resistance to fire. Even the sidewalks were of resinous pine, and the single pumping station that supplied the mains with water had a wooden roof. The season was excessively dry. A scorching wind blew up from the plains of the far Southwest week after week and made the structures of pine-built Chicago as dry as tinder. A conflagration of appalling proportions awaited only the igniting spark.
It began on Sunday evening, 8 October 1871. Where ...