Hear the crack of gunfire and the boom of cannons at the Lake County Forest Preserves’ 25th annual Civil War Days. Visitors of all ages are invited to explore the military and civilian camps to learn about life in the 1860s. Continue reading →

with Yvonne Maffei
Author and Publisher of MyHalalKitchen.com

The Qu’ran defines the moment of daybreak, when the faithful must begin to fast during Ramadan, as when the ‘white thread of dawn becomes distinct to you from the black thread.’ We will gather 90 minutes before daybreak to experience Suhoor, a meal taken before commencing fasting at daybreak and attending prayers. Continue reading →

 with ROBERT DIRKS
Emeritus Professor of Anthropology
Illinois State University

America’s Gilded Age, the last quarter of the nineteenth century, is renowned for the excesses of robber barons and tycoons. The lavishness of their tables impressed contemporaries and historians alike. Continue reading →

“For many people Henry Ford’s 1913 Detroit assembly line is a symbol of technological triumph. This book shows that Chicago’s 1865 disassembly line was an earlier more complete wonder, rapidly transporting animals, keeping them healthy and watered, dividing them into a wide variety of products, communicating ownership and destination, and keeping meticulous accounts of all the processes. Continue reading →

Presented by Dave Hoekstra and Paul Nathin

Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. loved the fried catfish and lemon icebox pie at Memphis’s Four Way restaurant. Beloved nonagenarian chef Leah Chase introduced George W. Bush to baked cheese grits and scolded Barack Obama for putting Tabasco sauce on her gumbo at New Orleans’s Dooky Chase’s. Continue reading →