Richard Michael Daley is an American politician who served as the 54th mayor of Chicago, Illinois, from 1989 to 2011. Daley was elected mayor in 1989 and was reelected five times until declining to run for a seventh term. At 22 years, his was the longest tenure in Chicago mayoral history, surpassing the 21-year mayoralty of his father, Richard J. Daley.
Roger Joseph Ebert was an American film critic, film historian, journalist, essayist, screenwriter, and author. He was a film critic for the Chicago Sun-Times from 1967 until his death in 2013. Ebert was known for his intimate, Midwestern writing style and critical views informed by values of populism and humanism. Writing in a prose style intended to be entertaining and direct, he made sophisticated cinematic and analytical ideas more accessible to non-specialist audiences. Ebert frequently endorsed foreign and independent films he believed would be appreciated by mainstream viewers, championing filmmakers like Woody Allen, Spike Lee, Werner Herzog and Errol Morris, as well as Martin Scorsese, whose first published review he wrote. In 1975, Ebert became the first film critic to win the Pulitzer Prize for Criticism. Neil Steinberg of the Chicago Sun-Times said Ebert "was without question the nation's most prominent and influential film critic," and Kenneth Turan of the Los Angeles Times called him "the best-known film critic in America."
The Chicago Tribune is an American daily newspaper based in Chicago, Illinois, owned by Tribune Publishing. Founded in 1847, and formerly self-styled as the "World's Greatest Newspaper", it remains the most-read daily newspaper in the Chicago metropolitan area and the Great Lakes region. In 2022, it had the seventh-highest circulation of any newspaper in the United States.
The Chicago Sun-Times is a daily nonprofit newspaper published in Chicago, Illinois, United States. Since 2022, it is the flagship paper of the non-profit Chicago Public Media, and has long held the second largest circulation among Chicago newspapers, after the Chicago Tribune.
The Trump International Hotel and Tower is a skyscraper condo-hotel in downtown Chicago, Illinois. The building, named for Donald Trump, was designed by architect Adrian Smith of Skidmore, Owings and Merrill. Bovis Lend Lease built the 100-story structure, which reaches a height of 1,388 feet (423.2 m) including its spire, its roof topping out at 1,171 feet (357 m). It is next to the main branch of the Chicago River, with a view of the entry to Lake Michigan beyond a series of bridges over the river. The building received publicity when the winner of the first season of The Apprentice reality television show, Bill Rancic, chose to manage the construction of the tower over managing a Rancho Palos Verdes–based Trump National Golf Course & Resort in the Los Angeles metro area.
The Chicago Reader, or Reader, is an American alternative newspaper in Chicago, Illinois, noted for its literary style of journalism and coverage of the arts, particularly film and theater. The Reader has been recognized as a pioneer among alternative weeklies for both its creative nonfiction and its commercial scheme. Richard Karpel, then-executive director of the Association of Alternative Newsweeklies, wrote:
[T]he most significant historical event in the creation of the modern alt-weekly occurred in Chicago in 1971, when the Chicago Reader pioneered the practice of free circulation, a cornerstone of today's alternative papers. The Reader also developed a new kind of journalism, ignoring the news and focusing on everyday life and ordinary people.
Helen Shiller is a former Alderman of the 46th ward in Chicago, Illinois. Shiller is also a published author, having written a 500-page book on her politics and activism in Chicago from 1971 to 2011. Shiller served in the Chicago City Council for six four-year terms, from 1987 to 2011. Shiller was elected to the City Council on her third attempt, as Harold Washington, Chicago's first black Mayor, was re-elected to his second term, and her election as alderman helped close the Council Wars era in Chicago government. Shiller has been described as "a reformer unafraid to take on the boys in power." A less flattering description is that she is "committed to liberal causes and destroying all within her path". Among her most significant impacts on Chicago were her advocacy for diverse, inclusive, affordable housing and helping craft Chicago's response to the HIV/AIDS crisis. Her commitment to fostering community development without displacement often brought Shiller into contention with some constituencies, real estate developers, and editorial boards. Shiller's oral history was collected by Pulitzer Prize-winning author and Uptown resident Studs Terkel in his 2003 book, Hope Dies Last. As she details in her own book, among her policy victories as a City Council member was: getting human rights legislation passed, having Chicago implement anti-apartheid legislation, creating a City Council Subcommittee on Domestic Violence, and building a unique mix-used development.
An alternative newspaper is a type of newspaper that eschews comprehensive coverage of general news in favor of stylized reporting, opinionated reviews and columns, investigations into edgy topics and magazine-style feature stories highlighting local people and culture. Its news coverage is more locally focused, and their target audiences are younger than those of daily newspapers. Typically, alternative newspapers are published in tabloid format and printed on newsprint. Other names for such publications include alternative weekly, alternative newsweekly, and alt weekly, as the majority circulate on a weekly schedule.
Creative Loafing was an Atlanta-based publisher of a monthly arts and culture newspaper/magazine. The company publishes a 60,000 circulation monthly publication which is distributed to in-town locations and neighborhoods on the first Thursday of each month. The company has historically been a part of the alternative weekly newspapers association in the United States.
James Peter DeRogatis is an American music critic and co-host of Sound Opinions. DeRogatis has written articles for magazines such as Rolling Stone, Spin, Guitar World, Matter and Modern Drummer, and for 15 years was the pop music critic for the Chicago Sun-Times.
Defiant Theatre was a Chicago-based theatre company founded in 1993 by a group of students from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, which included Nick Offerman. The eclectic troupe specialized in productions that emphasized inventive stagecraft, perverse and controversial topics, and skillful stage combat. While the company is highly regarded for original plays such as Action Movie: The Play and Godbaby, Defiant Theatre received notable attention for productions of plays by Caryl Churchill, Alfred Jarry, Sarah Kane, and William Shakespeare. Chicago Magazine named Defiant the "Best Experimental Theatre" in their August 1999 Best of Chicago issue. The company disbanded in 2004.
Neil Steinberg is an American news columnist for the Chicago Sun-Times and an author. He joined the paper's staff in 1987.
Tribune Publishing Company is an American newspaper print and online media publishing company. The company, which was acquired by Alden Global Capital in May 2021, has a portfolio that includes the Chicago Tribune, the New York Daily News, the Orlando Sentinel, South Florida's Sun-Sentinel, The Virginian-Pilot, the Hartford Courant, additional titles in Pennsylvania and Virginia, syndication operations, and websites. It also publishes several local newspapers in its metropolitan regions, which are organized in subsidiary groups.
Music Theater Works is a resident professional not-for-profit musical theatre company in Evanston, Illinois. It was founded in 1980 by Philip Kraus, Bridget McDonough, and Ellen Dubinsky.
The Hired Truck Program was a scandal-plagued program in the city of Chicago that involved hiring private trucks to do city work. It was overhauled in 2004 after an investigation by the Chicago Sun-Times revealed that some participating companies were being paid for doing little or no work, had mob connections, or were tied to city employees. Truck owners also paid bribes in order to get into the program.
Jon Graham Burge was an American police detective and commander in the Chicago Police Department. He was found guilty of lying about "directly participat[ing] in or implicitly approv[ing] the torture" of at least 118 people in police custody in order to force false confessions.
Toni Lynn Preckwinkle is an American politician and the current County Board president in Cook County, Illinois, United States. She was elected to her first term as president of the Cook County Board of Commissioners, the executive branch of Cook County government, in November 2010, becoming the first woman elected to that position.
Rick Kogan is a Chicago newspaperman, a Chicago radio personality and a noted author.
The Park Grill is the only full-service restaurant included in Millennium Park in Chicago, Illinois. Its outdoor seating area is the largest al fresco dining area in Chicago. It has placed among the leaders in citywide best-of competitions for best burger and is widely praised for its views.
Fan Expo Chicago, is a comic book convention held during the summer in Rosemont, Illinois, United States, at the Donald E. Stephens Convention Center. It was traditionally a three-day event, but in 2006, it expanded to four days. It was founded in 1972 as Nostalgia '72, Chicago Comic Con and later as the Chicago Comic and Nostalgia Convention by a local dealer named Nancy Warner.
Interview on WGN radio 