While browsing the stacks of the Regenstein Library at the
University of Chicago some years ago, noted historian Neil Harris
made a surprising discovery: a group of nine plainly bound volumes
whose unassuming spines bore the name "The Chicagoan". Pulling one
down and leafing through its pages, Harris was startled to find it
brimming with striking covers, fanciful art, witty cartoons,
profiles of local personalities, and a whole range of incisive
articles. He quickly realized that he had stumbled upon a Chicago
counterpart to the New Yorker that mysteriously had slipped through
the cracks of history and memory.Here Harris brings this lost
magazine of the Jazz Age back to life. In its own words, the
"Chicagoan" claimed to represent 'a cultural, civilized, and
vibrant' city 'which needs make no obeisance to Park Avenue,
Mayfair, or the Champs-Elysees.' Urbane in aspiration and first
published just sixteen months after the 1925 appearance of the "New
Yorker", it sought passionately to redeem the Windy City's unhappy
reputation for organized crime, political mayhem, and industrial
squalor by demonstrating the presence of style and sophistication
in the Midwest. Harris' substantial introductory essay here sets
the stage, exploring the ambitions, tastes, and prejudices of
Chicagoans during the 1920s and '30s. The author then lets the
"Chicagoan" speak for itself in lavish full-color segments that
reproduce its many elements: from covers, cartoons, and editorials
to reviews, features, and even one issue reprinted in its
entirety.Recalling a vivid moment in the life of the Second City,
the "Chicagoan" is a forgotten treasure, offered here for a whole
new age to enjoy.
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