The Great Chicago Fire

The Great Chicago Fire and The Web of Memory

This website was created to mark the 125th anniversary of the Great Chicago Fire. The introduction is a great place to start as it describes how the website is organized and the parts of each section. There is a conscious effort to describe how historical accounts come to be and to what uses such a collection can be put. This event is particularly useful in this sense as Chicago was in the world's focal point at a time of great change. Reading through the impressive collection of primary sources is fascinating and is made simpler by the uncluttered layout.

From the site:

This exhibit attempts to make its own contribution to the memory of the conflagration by offering for scrutiny some of the major ways in which the Great Chicago Fire has been remembered. And perhaps its own mode of presentation, through wires and processors and monitors, is particularly appropriate, for it reminds us of the extent to which our sense of the past is always mediated.

Check out the panorama of 1858 found at the bottom of the Great Chicago Fire page. Truly there is page after page of accounts and pictures from before and after the fire. I had to make myself stop reading and clicking and get on with posting it for you.