Fancy a tipple? Then pull up a stool, raise a glass, and dip into this delightful paean to the grand old saloon days of yore. Written by Chicago-based journalist, playwright, and all-round wit George Ade in the waning years of Prohibition, The Old-Time Saloon is both a work of propaganda masquerading as "just history" and a hilarious exercise in nostalgia. Featuring original, vintage illustrations along with a new introduction from Bill Savage, Ade's book takes us back to the long-gone men's clubs of earlier days, when beer was a nickel, the pretzels were polished, and the sardines were free.

Unreliable news minutes of the great people, and area, of Michigan's Upper Peninsula. Yooper Times 1st Collection is an assortment of short news stories like no other. Tales from da Yeti Lodge, da Bait Mall, da Fish, Beer & Beard Show, City Hall and the now-legendary 8-Point Bar & Grill. Get to know people from every corner of da U.P., folks like our Mayor, da New Cop, the Dead Guy, One-Eyed Ray and Buck Fishen (Fishen Reports with Gil and Dirk plus those other two oofs). It's all about da people makin news above "da britch" yah, eh

In 1921, Ben Hecht wrote a column for the "Chicago Daily News" that his editor called "journalism extraordinary; journalism that invaded the realm of literature." Hecht's collection of sixty-four of these pieces, illustrated with striking pen drawings by Herman Rosse, is a timeless caricature of urban American life in the jazz age, updated with a new Introduction for the twenty-first century. From the glittering opulence of Michigan Avenue to the darkest ruminations of an escaped convict, from captains of industry to immigrant day laborers, Hecht captures 1920s Chicago in all its furor, intensity, and absurdity.

"The columns in "1,001 Afternoons in ""Chicago" are scruffy time capsules of an earlier Chicago, an era that is long gone but still recognizable to readers' imaginations. Michigan Avenue, Lake Michigan, street names such as Dearborn and Adams and LaSalle and Wabansia, places such as the Art Institute of Chicago--they're all here, sprinkled amid Hecht's nervous little haikus of urban life. He calls Chicago 'a razzle-dazzle of dreams, tragedies, fantasies, ' and his tales capture gorgeous scraps of it, vivid vignettes starring businessmen and hobos and cops and socialites and janitors. . . . Thanks to Hecht, the Chicago of 1922 and the Chicago of 2009 bump into each other, shake hands, exchange greetings. Then, this being Chicago, they go for a drink and talk about old times. New ones too."--Julia Keller, "Chicago"" Tribune"

"The hardboiled audacity and wit that became Hecht's signature as Hollywood's most celebrated screen-writer are conspicuous in these vignettes. Most of them are comic and sardonic, some strike muted tragic or somber atmospheric notes. . . . The best are timeless character sketches that have taken on an added interest as shards of social history."--L. S. Klepp, "Voice Literary Supplement"

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"Once you've become a part of this particular patch, you'll never love another. Like loving a woman with a broken nose, you may well find lovelier lovelies. But never a lovely so real."
Ernest Hemingway once said of Nelson Algren's writing that "you should not read it if you cannot take a punch." The prose poem, "Chicago: City on the Make," filled with language that swings and jabs and stuns, lives up to those words. In this sixtieth anniversary edition, Algren presents 120 years of Chicago history through the lens of its "nobodies nobody knows" the tramps, hustlers, aging bar fighters, freed death-row inmates, and anonymous working stiffs who prowl its streets.
Upon its original publication in 1951, Algren's "Chicago: City on the Make" was scorned by the Chicago Chamber of Commerce and local journalists for its gritty portrayal of the city and its people, one that boldly defied City Hall's business and tourism initiatives. Yet the book captures the essential dilemma of Chicago: the dynamic tension between the city's breathtaking beauty and its utter brutality, its boundless human energy and its stifling greed and violence.
The sixtieth anniversary edition features historic Chicago photos and annotations on everything from defunct slang to Chicagoans, famous and obscure, to what the Black Sox scandal was and why it mattered. More accessible than ever, this is, as Studs Terkel says, "the best book about Chicago."

Showcasing the first Ferris wheel, dazzling and unprece-dented electrification, and exhibits from around the world, the World's Columbian Exposition of 1893 was Chicago's chance to demonstrate that it had risen from the ashes of the Great Fire and was about to take its place as one of the world's great cities. Millions would flock to the fair, and many of them were looking for a good time before and after their visits to the Midway and the White City. But what was the bedazzled visitor to do in Chicago?

"Chicago by Day and Night: The Pleasure Seeker's Guide to the Paris of America, a very unofficial guide to the world be-yond the fair, slaked the thirst of such curious folk. The plea-sures it details range from the respectable (theater, architec-ture, parks, churches and synagogues) to the illicit--drink, gambling, and sex. With a wink and a nod, the book decries vice while offering precise directions for the indulgence of any desire. In this newly annotated edition, Chicagoans Paul Durica and Bill Savage--who, if born earlier, might have written chapters in the original--provide colorful context and an informative introduction to a wildly entertaining journey through the Chicago of 120 years ago. "