The first episode of the four-part series, called “Exodus,” details the first wave of migration north from southern states that helped turn the Bronzeville neighborhood of Chicago into a Black metropolis.

Almost six decades later, urban historian Shermann “Dilla” Thomas is making sure new generations know the details of Martin Luther King Jr.’s time in Chicago through his educational tours of the city’s neighborhoods.

While it is now a time-honored tradition, the establishment of the holiday had a prolonged, difficult path to acceptance.

José “Cha Cha” Jiménez in the 1960s founded the Young Lords as a street gang to counter the growing hostility toward the Puerto Rican community in Lincoln Park, at the time one of the most impoverished neighborhoods of Chicago.

Chicago is home to one of the largest urban Native American populations in the United States. More than 65,000 Native Americans live in the greater metropolitan area, representing about 175 different tribes.

“Too many in Illinois believe we need to travel to the East Coast to visit locations on the Underground Railroad, unaware of the enormous activity that took place in their own backyards here,” task force member and Tazewell County Clerk John Ackerman said.

In 1966, the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. came to Chicago’s West Side to protest against discriminatory housing practices. The neighborhood went into an uproar following his assassination in 1968, resulting in numerous riots and looting. “When the West Side Burned” outlines the destruction and struggle to recover.

African Americans were fighting for their rights through common law long before what many people know conventionally as the Civil Rights Movement. That’s the conclusion award-winning scholar and author Dylan Penningroth came to in his book “Before the Movement: The Hidden History of Black Civil Rights.”

Since the 19th century, Chicago has hosted 14 Republican National Conventions, the most recent in 1960. This week Vice President Kamala Harris will accept her nomination at the 12th Democratic National Convention to be held in Chicago.

“We can’t let these things fade,” President Joe Biden said Friday. He added, “I know this may not seem significant to most Americans, but it’s of great significance. ... It can happen again if we don’t take care of and fight for our democracy.”

The ceremony comes just 5 1/2 weeks after the shooting death of Sonya Massey, a 36-year-old Black woman, by a white sheriff’s deputy in her Springfield home after she called 911 for help.

A series of events inspired the four co-founders to start Raíces Chicago Story Coalition, a nonprofit capacity-building organization that supports archival and storytelling projects by and about Latino communities. 

The Margaret A. Muir sank only a few miles off the entrance to Algoma Harbor. It went undetected for more than a century despite hundreds of boats passing over it each fishing season.

In 2020, the United States Mint created a commemorative coin collection to honor the Negro National League on the centennial anniversary of its founding. An exhibit of those coins opened at the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago’s Money Museum this month. 

Before Saturday’s apparent attempted assassination of former President Donald Trump, there have been multiple instances of political violence targeting U.S. presidents, former presidents and major party presidential candidates.

The African Descent-Citizens Reparations Commission is tasked with researching and reporting on possible reparatory actions for Black residents who are descendants of slavery. Leaders said the public’s input will be used in developing proposals for policymakers.