Curious City

One Curious City listener was skeptical about whether real people actually win WBEZ’s pledge drive giveaways. They do. But there’s a little more to that answer. Plus, an economist who studies fundraising explains why people give money during pledge drives in the first place. This episode was originally published on March 3, 2022.

An on-air spot soliciting car donations is a fixture of public radio, but do people actually donate? Yes, about 50 cars are donated a month.

“Forest bathing” is the exceptionally simple Japanese practice of taking a walk — or a seat — in the woods. Why? For your health, of course! In our last episode, we learned about Chicago’s urban forest — including the $416 million in benefits all those trees provide, in terms of energy cost savings, stormwater mitigation and air purification. Today, we’re taking advantage of that urban forest by t...

Some Chicagoans have noticed city workers cutting down seemingly healthy trees. Who is responsible, and why are they cutting down these trees?

Tammy Gibson wants you to visit the gravesites of your deceased relatives. “Have you checked on your ancestors?” said Gibson, the founder of Sankofa TravelHer , an organization dedicated to honoring the legacy of African-Americans who were often denied dignity in death. As we learned last episode , Chicago’s long history of segregation affected both the living and the dead, as many area cemeteries...

Mayor Harold Washington is buried in a cemetery that was once for “whites only.” Protests and legislative fights desegregated area cemeteries.

Lakeview once had a thriving Japanese community, but it fell victim to a push for assimilation. As one Japanese-American puts it: “You had to basically be unseen.”

If you’ve had your car towed in Chicago, there’s a decent chance you had to journey down to Lower Lower Wacker Drive — likely not in the best of moods — to open your wallet and recollect your vehicle. “It's supposed to be a happy process,” said Michael Lacoco, the deputy commissioner of the city’s bureau of traffic services. In our last episode, we answered some of your many questions about Lower...

Curious City has gotten several questions about Wacker Drive over the years. We head down to the lower levels in search of some answers.

Nuclear fallout shelters are still among us, though they are not exactly ready for the apocalypse. These remnants of Cold War-era infrastructure do exist across Chicago, often in places you might not expect. This episode originally aired in 2015.

Tucked in the city’s municipal code is a law that prohibits the production, storage and launching of nuclear weapons in Chicago. We find out why the city decided this law was necessary.

It’s typical to see moving trucks winding through streets and alleys of Chicago on the first day of any month. The act of moving hardly sounds like a luxury, but as we heard in the last episode, it could be worse. About a century ago, Chicagoans only moved on May 1 and sometimes Oct. 1. That meant thousands of moving wagons clogging the streets, price gouging and exploitation. Today, people move a...

You think moving is hard work? For about 100 years, Chicagoans used to move at the same time. Moving Day: May 1.

Samuel Gompers fought for the eight-hour work day and helped create child labor laws. But for all he achieved, he was also fiercely anti-immigrant. We explore Gompers’ life, legacy and the statue built to this complicated man.

In our last episode, Curious City question-asker Emily Porter sent us on a quest exploring the world of local fashion designers , all after she found a thrift shop sweater with a tag that reads: “Maria Rodriguez Chicago.” Who is Maria Rodriguez? How did she get into the industry? And what is it like to be a fashion designer in Chicago? To answer those questions, we take a trip to the basement of t...

A question about a sweater in a thrift store turns into a search for a prominent Chicago designer of the 1980s. Along the way, we discover the city’s golden age of fashion designers.

Folk music surged in popularity across America in the late 1950s through the ‘70s, including here in the Chicago area. Last episode , we looked at how a few area coffeehouses catered to many patrons in their teens and early twenties. These were alcohol-free spaces where people could listen to live music and hangout for hours. Curious City host Erin Allen looks at one of those beloved coffeeshops o...

In the 1960s and 70s, Chicago coffeehouses were popular spots for young people. These were alcohol-free establishments where people in their teens and 20s could listen to live music or just hangout for hours.

Introducing WBEZ's latest podcast series, Making: Stories Without End. Host Natalie Moore takes you on a journey to learn about daytime soap operas and their broad reach on television. From the early radio days in the 1930s through the invention of TV to streaming, this way of telling immersive stories has endured. There are intergenerational family stories, discussions about divorce and abortion,...

Extremism in America has been on the rise . Last episode , we looked at extremist groups in Chicago and how they terrorized select groups of people and influenced housing policy in the city during the 1950s. But what does extremism look like today? Curious City host Erin Allen talks with Odette Yousef, a national security correspondent focusing on extremism at NPR, about why it’s less about fringe...

Extremist groups of the 1950s played a violent part, alongside real estate and neighborhood organizations, in keeping Chicago segregated.

Chicago is home to thousands of feral cats, and some people are looking after them.

Jun Fujita is the Japanese-American photographer behind some of the most recognizable photographs taken in Chicago in the 20th century, including his shots of the St. Valentine’s Day Massacre of 1929, the Eastland passenger boat disaster of 1915, and the 1919 Chicago race riots . Fujita was also a published poet and something of a regional celebrity, known for socializing with William Faulkner and...

Chicago is in the national spotlight when it comes to the immigration debate, but that’s nothing new to the mayoral office. We take a look back at how mayors have either embraced or rejected new arrivals.

Scientist Alice Hamilton’s investigations into toxins in Chicago’s factories led to some of the first workplace safety laws in the country. She was known for her “shoe leather” epidemiology, wearing out the soles of her shoes from all the trips she made to Chicago homes, factories and even saloons to figure out what was making people sick.