225 - Chicago’s 91 Hoods
Not many people know that the epithet Windy City was bestowed on Chicago not for meteorological but political reasons – apparently, Chicago politicians at one time were known for the windiness of their speeches. Its Latin motto – Urbs in horto; the city in the garden – reflects its spaciousness, as it sprawls out in all directions save that of Lake Michigan, on the shore of which it was founded.
Another nickname, the Second City, belies the fact that it is now the third-largest US city, after New York and Los Angeles, with almost 3 million in Chicago proper and almost 10 million in its metro area, dubbed ‘Chicagoland’. The Indian term at the origin of the city’s name, shikaakwa, means ’striped skunk’, by the way.
Neighbourhood-wise, the branches of the Chicago River divide the city in North, West and South Side. Sociologists have further divided the city in anything from 77 up to over 200 different neighbourhoods. This map chops up Chicago into 91 ‘hoods, which obviously leaves out many of the 200-plus in the most detailed overview. But the typography, whereby the name of each ‘hood fills out its assigned space as fully as possible, is pretty cool nevertheless.
This map was suggested to me by Jez Robinson, who found it here at orkposters, who designed (and sell) the map.
According to researcher Barry Popik, “Windy City” was indeed first used to refer to the wind off Lake Michigan, and the use of “Windy City” to describe long-winded politicians was a later joke taking off on the existing nickname.
Comment by AJD — December 20, 2007 @
A pretty good neighborhood map of Chicago is for sale at http://www.bigstickinc.com/map_chicago3.asp.
Comment by Dan — December 20, 2007 @
I love the map. Very retro. Also, was Chicago really ever that windy? It’s not the windiest place in America (I think it’s some place out West), and from what I gathered much of the airflow is generated from the presence of large buildings. Anyway, I’ve been to Chicago several times and it never struck me as being more windy than, say, Seattle or San Francisco.
Comment by El Santo — December 20, 2007 @
[...] StrangeMaps linked to a site with a very cool map of San Francisco neighborhoods. Unfortunately, it’s missing Dogpatch, Lower Haight, Japantown, The Tenderloin, Cole Valley, Russian Hill, Alamo Square, NOPA, Panhandle, and Duboce Triangle, and, if you want to get specific, Polk Gulch, South Park, and Pierre Valley too. I know because I’m keeping track. I wonder if the other maps for sale at Orkposters are similarly lacking. [...]
Pingback by glyphobet • глыфобет • γλιφοβετ » Blog Archive » Cool but unfortunately incomplete San Francisco neighborhood map — December 20, 2007 @
wikipedia has a pretty good article on the origins of the “windy city” nickname. Basically, as is usually the case with such things, no one knows for sure. The oft-cited political usage seems the least well-supported by references, though.
Comment by Rubrick — December 20, 2007 @
this is from Erik Larson’s book, Devil In The White City, in which he claims the nickname stuck during Chicago’s campaign to host the 1893 World’s Fair:
“Chicago’s population had topped one million for the first time, making the city the second most populous in the nation after New York, although disgruntled residents of Philadelphia, previously in second place, were quick to point out that Chicago had cheated by annexing large expanses of land just in time for the 1890 decadal census. Chicago shrugged the sniping off. Big was big. Success today would dispel at last the eastern perception that Chicago was nothing more than a greedy, hog-slaughtering backwater; failure would bring humiliation from which the city would not soon recover, given how heartily its leading men had boasted that Chicago would prevail. It was this big talk, not the persistent southwesterly breeze, that had prompted New York editor Charles Anderson Dana to nickname Chicago ‘the Windy City.’”
great looking map of a great town.
Comment by Brendan — December 20, 2007 @
ps. I have heard that Boston is the windiest city in the US, technically.
Comment by Brendan — December 20, 2007 @
Great map with striking, effective graphics. Also seems reasonably reflective of local folk geography. Years ago worked for a few weeks in Austin. Best neighborhood name: HEGIWISCH though Bucktown and Pilsen are deserve honorable mention & of course the LOOP is classic.
Interesting to compare this map to map of current WARD boundaries which are extremly significant, much more so than in most cities.
Comment by Sea Shanty Irish — December 21, 2007 @
re: Boston of course that great city is aka BEANTOWN
Comment by Sea Shanty Irish — December 21, 2007 @
I live in Winnipeg, and the focal intersection in the downtown is Portage & Main (the first street, btw, is pronounced PORT-idje), known as, among other things, the windiest intersection in Canada. The office building I work in happens to be located at Portage & Main, and I can testify to it. When I get off the bus to go to work (just across the street and over a block) it often isn’t that windy (unless the rest of the city is, of course); but when I reach the office building, it suddenly becomes very gusty. My university grography/climatology prof explained it this way, the wind remains calm in the rest of the city because it’s mainly lower-lying buildings in a city that has no other cities with big tall structures around. Therefore, when the wind reaches the skyscrapers at Portage & Main (there’s a 30+ story office building at each corner of the intersection, I know it might not seem that tall to some of you … ) it gets quickly funnelled between the big tall buildings, making that particular intersection much windier than the rest of the city, which explains why the wind seems to gust when I reach the property of the office building.
I’ve never been to Chicago (I’d like to), but, from what I know about it, it seems to be in a similar situation, no other large cities around (unlike the east coast of the US) and the wind would only encounter lower lying buildings (especially if coming from the east, where there are no buildings at all east of downtown Chicago for a while), then, when it reaches the tall skyscrapers (some 3 times taller than the one I work in) the wind immediately gets funnelled between the, making it very gusty.
Just my theory anyways.
Comment by David — December 21, 2007 @
@Dan: If the Big Stick map of Chicago is as bad as theirs of Seattle (http://www.bigstickinc.com/seattle_map_large.html), I would stay as far away from it as possible. It’s almost phonebook bad.
Comment by Lukobe — December 21, 2007 @
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Comment by frmad — December 21, 2007 @
Side note of possible interest. The general and overall Chicago area (including all the neighborhoods, suburbs, etc.) is “Chicagoland”.
Comment by bonni — December 21, 2007 @
I currently live in Rogers Park. I grew up in West Rogers Park. I went to high school and worked in the Gold Coast. I currently work in Belmont Heights. I want to move to either Lakeview or Roscoe Village. A HS buddy lives in Archer Heights. I love the beer from Goose Island. While the atmosphere in Lincoln Square and Old Time. The CUBBIES are in Wrigleyville. The hopping places are in Lincoln Park.
I love Chicago. This is my city.
Comment by phampants — December 21, 2007 @
That’s an awesome map. I love my city.
I heard somewhere that Chicago is called the “Second City” not because it was 2nd in size to New York, but because it was built from scratch after the Chicago Fire of 1871. I really have no idea if that’s true or not. I’ve also heard both stories about the different origins of the name “Windy City,” so really, who can you trust anymore?
Oh, and, yes, to reply to a poster above, I do believe that Boston is the windiest major city in the United States. The windiest location in the US is Mount Washington, New Hampshire.
Comment by hiamanda — December 21, 2007 @
Good map. St. Louis has over 91 small cities around it also. It would be fun to do one for it also.
Comment by Mike — December 21, 2007 @
Why is there a hole in the northwest, surrounded by O’Hare, Belmont Heights, Oriole Park, and Portage Park? What’s in that hole?
And I couldn’t find Wrigleyville (mentioned by phampants) on the map.
Comment by Darrel Jones — December 21, 2007 @
The “hole” near O’Hare is the town of Harwood Heights. When Chicago annexed the land for O’Hare in the ’60s (I think), they didn’t want or couldn’t get that bit, thus the hole.
Comment by ed — December 21, 2007 @
That “hole” in the city contains the villages of Harwood Heights and Norridge which are completly surrounded by the city.
Comment by Paul West — December 21, 2007 @
This post gets nearly everything wrong about Chicago… the origins of its name, the reason for its motto, the reason for its nickname, whether this map is any good.
p.s. this is an awful post and an awful map
Comment by minderbender — December 22, 2007 @
[...] 225 - Chicago’s 91 Hoods [image] Not many people know that the epithet Windy City was bestowed on Chicago not for meteorological but political […] [...]
Pingback by Top blogs, hot posts 12/21/2007 6:56:34 PM « conduong.co.cc — December 23, 2007 @
This map is graphically interesting, but I agree that it gets a lot wrong. As a lifelong NW sider, I’ve never heard the neighborhood “Polish Village.” Yea, a lot of Poles live in that area, but I think the just as sizable Latino population not to much assorted white and black folks would also disagree. Belmont Heights is also a neighborhood name that I mostly see used by people who do maps like this, not by the people who actually live there. Finally, the Native American term for Chicago doesn’t mean “striped skunk.” Where the hell did that come from? Here’s a better explanation. http://www.chipublib.org/004chicago/timeline/originame.html.
As a work of art, your map is interesting. As cartography, it’s flawed.
Comment by Ed of the NW Side — December 24, 2007 @
A very attrative work of typography, nevertheless, the southside (the largest portion of the city in land area and population) gets dissed once again. Missing are prominent neighborhoods like Back of the Yards (not Stockyards), McKinley Park, Eastside, Chicago Lawn, West Lawn, West Elsdon, Scottsdale, Gage Park, Fuller Park, Armour Square, New City (ugh) and West Pullman.
Ignorance of the southside is common among northside natives and transplants alike. Anybody who tells you the southside has nothing to offfer is most likely a trendy wanker.
Hopefully ork’ll produce a more accurate edition. I’d buy 2!
xox, Cod
P.S.- One of these days I’d like to see a neighborhood map that includes smaller, not quite official neighborhoods like The Bush, Nabisco Hill, Stain City, Vrdolyak
Comment by CodLiverOil — December 24, 2007 @
Note folks strangemaps does not actually make the map they just reported on it. the link from the article goes to the map maker. They have maps for other sities in the US.
Comment by cyclepromo — December 24, 2007 @
That’s an awesome map. I love this city.
Comment by Bony — December 24, 2007 @
It’s interesting how Belmont Heights is generally considered a community sub-section of the larger Dunning neighborhood. On this map, Belmont Heights has been enlarged to completely _replace_ Dunning.
Let’s not denominate any neighborhood “Vrdolyak”, unless it’s filled with peckerwoods.
Comment by Jean Paul Belmonte — December 24, 2007 @
Denominate Vrdolyak? Too late. The development where his compound/house is located was given that name by his neighbors/supporters loooonnnngggggg ago when it was being built.
Notice how much detail is given to the northside while the southside is largely composed of mega neighborhoods? Ignorance of the full scope of Chicago is rampant. The media consistently ignores 50% of the city! For example New City, a lame free rag recently listed the top 100 mexican restaraunts in the city. 2 were located on the southside!?! Many maps of the city cut the southside off around 95th St., yet include portions of Evanston, Skokie etc. Ugh, I’m gettin’ a bit worked up here…
Comment by CodLiverOil — December 24, 2007 @
I just visited Chicago and was pleasantly surprised to find they are having a “Festival of Maps” at 30 different sites around the city. One site had a map that rearranged Chicago neighborhoods alphabetically from north to south, and showed how people of different races would be redistributed around the city compared to the segregation that exists today. Interesting take on the whole melting pot myth of Chicago.
Comment by elrider — December 28, 2007 @
elrider, which spot had the alphabetical map you mentioned?
Comment by jonk — December 30, 2007 @
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Pingback by 91 Hoods — One Candidate to Rule Them All? « Nefarious Thoughts for Hilarious Times — January 11, 2008 @
As a couple other posters have said, yes the entry is wrong in several different ways.
First, Chicago got its name from the wild onion; I have never in my life heard the skunk suggestion.
Second, growing up I always heard the Windy City moniker as explained by long-winded politicians. However, I’ve grown to learn that the column by Horace Greeley to be the origin of the term.
And last, the Second City is not deference to NY, but to the rapid and quite extreme growth of the city after the 1871 Fire.
Comment by daniel — January 18, 2008 @
The traditional tour-guide story has been that the quote comes from the fight for the privilege of hosting the Columbian Exposition: “Don’t pay any attention,” wrote Charles A. Dana day in and day out in his New York Sun, “to the nonsensical claims of that windy city. Its people could not build a World’s Fair even if they won it.” Problem is, this quote first appeared in the Chicago Tribune in a 1933 feature story, and no evidence of Dana’s actually writing this in the Sun has ever turned up. On the other hand, we know that “Windy City” to refer to Chicago was in common use in Detroit, Louisville, and particularly Cincinnati newspapers as early as 1880.
Comment by Mr Downtown — January 31, 2008 @
There is ALSO an EAST side albeit southeast of Chicago. We called it the East side though. It’s around the South Chicago neighborhood. In addition, think of all those nice alphabet streets (M, N, O).
Comment by JoAnne — February 5, 2008 @
The “Windy City” name came from a Shawneetown newspaper, back before the Civil War when Shawneetown was the biggest city in the state and Chicago was the second biggest.
Comment by Anon E Mous — February 26, 2008 @
As a lifelong Southside Chicagoan, I notice there are a number of “neighborhoods” missing from the Southside…as a poster earlier had mentioned, East Side…there are other areas too not there like my part of the city called “Slag Valley” (now more commonly called Vets Park, the aforementioned East Side, and The Bush (where one set of Steel Mills used to be).
Comment by Mike — March 24, 2008 @
where is wrightwood? ford city? ect,ect.love the southside.lets not forget anybody
Comment by aaron garner — April 6, 2008 @
I beg to cheerfully differ with the comment, “it sprawls out in all directions save that of Lake Michigan.” Actually, it has sprawled in that direction too — Grant Park, Millennium Park, much of Lincoln Park, Streeterville and the Gold Coast — these were all built on landfill that used to be lake.
Comment by Kevin — May 12, 2008 @
I believe that the Native American word that became “Chicago” actually means “place of the wild onion.”
Comment by James — June 19, 2008 @