Here's what happened in the Chicago area on Oct. 18, according to Tribune archives.
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Weather records (from National Weather Service, Chicago)
- High temperature: 87 degrees (1950)
- Low temperature: 20 degrees (1948)
- Precipitation: 2.09 inches (1985)
- Snowfall: 0.7 inches (1989)
1892: Did you do it? first long distance telephone call from Chicago to New York will actually happen if the guy on the other end of the line doesn't hear anything?
Chicago Mayor Hempstead Washburn heard what New York Mayor Hugh J. Grant said, but Grant did not hear Washburn. However, the cornet solo was clearly audible.
“It was explained that there were forty receivers connected in the circuit, all of which were used by the crowd in the hall,” the Tribune reported. “They said it reduced the volume of the sound.”
Also in 1892: Elephant Duchess escaped from the Lincoln Park Zoo. The 18-year-old elephant broke free from her handler near her enclosure and then ran, destroying the door of a North Avenue saloon, breaking the window of another and going through a fence around a vacant lot. By midday she was captured and taken back to her stall.
1924: Three-time American champion Harold Edward “Red” Grunge rushed 95 yards and scored a touchdown in the opener against Michigan, which also marked the victory Memorial Stadium dedication in Champaign. The Galloping Ghost scores a goal five touchdowns as Illinois upset Michigan 39–14.
1938: German architect Ludwig Mies van der Rohe arrived in Chicago. He had recently been hired to head the architecture department at the Armor Institute of Technology (now Illinois Institute of Technology) on the south side of Chicago.
1995: Jesse Rankins, 11, and Taikis Johnson, 12were found guilty of murder Eric Morse5 years, thrown from the 14th floor of the Ida B. Wells apartment complex for refusing to steal candy from a store.
Illinois quickly responded to the boys' arrest for Morse's murder by passing a new law that reduced the age to 10 from 13 in which criminals could be sentenced to prison.
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