About
Chicagology is a pictorial walkthrough of Chicago history with a focus on the period prior to 1900. The goal is to tell the colorful story of Chicago’s growth in a fresh and friendly format and to encourage open converstions of other Chicagologists by taking advantage of the WordPress engine.
It all started as an exercise in website building and the search for genealogical content. Once basic material was collected, it was time to publish the findings and on 4 Dec 2001 Gregoryology was christened. Learning that my family has been residing in Chicago since 1858, I started to gather information about early Chicago to use as filler material. However after a year of researching, the information available about Chicago was dwarfing the data uncovered involving the Gregory family and something needed to be done. After minutes of deliberation, it was decided that Gregoryology must be broken up.
It was on St Patricks Day, 2003, that Chicagology.com was launched. It’s first gallery consisted mainly of postcard images from the turn of the century that featured the then new architecture of the metropolis. As the collection of material grew, a vast amount of pre-Chicago Fire stereoviews were obtained and the most complete collection of early Chicago images was posted to the internet.
Black and White photos (even sepia toned) tend to be flat and sometimes uninteresting. The adding of color skies to the images was not intended to be a Ted Turner colorization of classic images, but to provide a stronger focus on the buildings themselves. The buildings tend to “pop” more when placed against a colorful background. All images were originally scanned at 300 dpi then converted to the 72 dpi web standard to hold as much detail as possible while keeping the files as small as possible for fast loading and low bandwith. About 90% of all images posted on Chicagology are from my private collection.
The site is in a constant growth and change state. However, browsing through Chicagology is like flipping the pages of a book. You can visit any section or page at random, yet have no difficulty in knowing where you are.
I hope that you enjoy your visit and welcome any input that you want to offer - good or bad. The intent is to provide each visitor with a pleasant ad-free experience and to ignite a flame that discovering history is just as exciting as living it.
Terry Gregory
Chicagologist
Although you are able to search and use the contents of Chicagology free of charge, it does take time and money to maintain the site. I believe that if you use something and like it, you should encourage the creators. I am always happy to send in my donations when I find something I like and use. Any amount sent as a token “Thank You” is greatly accepted.
NOTE: Chicagology is not a registered charity AND that ANY and ALL donations made to Chicagology are NOT tax deductible.
But you will feel better about yourself.
