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      The project envisioned here is to observe how a section of Chicago remade itself after the fire. The city made a remarkably rapid recovery after the devastation. By 1893 when Chicago hosted the World’s Fair, the primary attraction was the city itself. As William Cronon has written, “the mythic lesson that linked the Great Fire to the White City had less to do with destruction than with resurrection.”4 Some developers saw the destruction as unfortunate opportunity. An opportunity to revitalize the city.
      There were obstacles to the resurrection of the city that appeared almost immediately, such as the search for someone to blame. One target was the city’s poor, which city officials did nothing to curb in order to deflect attention from the firemen or the city’s egregious lack of emergency planning. As a result of stricter anti-fire building regulations, brick and stone as building materials were required in the devastated area of the city, many of the lower-middle class and poor families felt new construction laws unfairly targeted them. They couldn’t afford to pay the increased construction cost and without proper insurance to defray the expense they were forced to move out of the main city area.
      Meeting construction needs was also a problem. The newly elected mayor, Joseph Medill, was “unalterably opposed” to the building of any wooden structures within the city limits, but within the year there were thousands of wood framed structures and approximately six thousand small shanties.5 In the frenzy to rebuild some architects did not remember the lessons of the Fire and fell back on old construction techniques and materials. They did forgo some of the obvious contributions to the blaze such as wooden sidewalks and streets. The new building materials such as iron and steel would not only be more resistant to fire, but their strength allowed structures of unheard of heights to be built. As Cronon points out, “Rising land values encouraged architects to design ever taller structures to extract more rent from the expensive property on which they stood.”6 Although some of the laborers tried to aid the city by asking for not more than their pre-Fire wage, the city’s newspapers were noting the landlords had begun to quietly increase the rental rates for their tenants.7
      After the Fire, the city grid remained as did its political divisions of precincts and wards. Using a particular ward, a comparative study of several types of maps before and after the Fire would reveal how a portion of city did or didn’t remake itself.
      U.S. Census information about Chicago in 1870 and again in 1880 provides one source of information about life in the city before and after the Fire. These records contain information ward by ward for the city. The census reveals all sorts of information about the residents of each ward such as occupation, value real estate, age, etc. It is hoped that this information would yield an analysis of change over time in categories such as property ownership, occupation, and population.
      Fire insurance maps would also be another example of sources that would make good comparison. These before and after maps could show how construct changed. Did the construction materials change. Did the city layout vary. Were the rebuilt buildings larger or smaller? The city passed ordinances forbidding wooden building and fire-prone business which had an immediate affect on the downtown area. Still, the transformation would not be complete for nearly two decades until the opening of the World’s Fair. In 1880 the city would still have been in the process of rebuilding and development. Furthermore, the city was only a few years removed from the Panic of 1873, and there would have been a necessary slowing of construction.
      A map of a particular ward would be drawn and labeled in Adobe Illustrator and act as the template for 1870 and 1880 data to be placed on. Viewers of the site could switch between sections of the ward to make comparisons. Each map, whether its business type, construction material, or percentage of residential to business area, will provide visitors the option of toggling back and forth between the years.
      In addition, photos will be collected of Chicago in 1870 and 1880 and hotspots on the relevant maps will bring up photos of those spots. The “map” is not an illustration, but the map can certainly be illustrated. These photos will illustrate the street life of Chicago in those respective years.

5 Corinne J. Naden, The Chicago Fire, October 8, 1871: The Blaze that Nearly Destroyed a City (NY: Franklin Watts, 1969), 59.

6 Cronon, Nature’s Metropolis, 346.

7 Sawislak, Smoldering City, 182