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Description of  The Deadly Night of October 8, 1871: The Great Chicago Fire and the Peshtigo Fire

*Includes pictures *Includes accounts of the fires by witnesses and survivors *Includes bibliographies for further reading It had taken about 40 years for Chicago to grow from a small settlement of about 300 people into a thriving metropolis with a population of 300,000, but in just two days in 1871, much of that progress was burned to the ground. In arguably the most famous fire in American history, a blaze in the southwestern section of Chicago began to burn out of control on the night of October 8, 1871. Thanks to The Chicago Tribune, the fire has been apocryphally credited to a cow kicking over a lantern in Mrs. Catherine OLearys barn, and though that was not true, the rumor dogged Mrs. OLeary to the grave. Read more