Paul Durica and Bill Savage on Chicago by Day & Night: The Pleasure Seeker’s Guide to the Paris of America

Sponsored by the Caxton Club and the Union League Club of Chicago

April Evening Program

Chicago writers and historians Paul Durica and Bill Savage will take us on a journey through the Chicago of 1893 with their edition of Chicago by Day and Night: The Pleasure Seeker’s Guide to the Paris of America. Penned by various authors, the original book is an actual guidebook to Chicago for visitors to the World’s Columbian Exposition of 1893 and is a handbook to the rowdy city outside the elegant fairgrounds. Its descriptions of the theaters and music, architectural glories, parks and boulevards, churches and synagogues, and other elevated pursuits gave the book a veneer of high culture, but the book owed its popularity to its insider tips about Chicago’s more dubious entertainments.

A “meet and greet” cocktail reception will start at 5:30 p.m. followed by the program at 6:00 p.m. The cost is $35 inclusive per person and reservations are required. Books will be available to pre-order while registering for the program. Our speakers will be signing books prior to and after the program.

Paul Durica is the Director of Exhibitions at the Newberry Library and the former Director of Programs and Exhibitions at Illinois Humanities. From 2008-2015, he produced a series of free public talks, walks, and participatory reenactments that engaged Chicago’s past.

Bill Savage is Professor of Instruction in the English Department at Northwestern University, where he earned his doctorate. He has been researching and teaching Chicago literature, history, and culture there and at the Newberry Library since the early 1990s. His scholarly credentials for the study of Chicago night life and vice culture are complemented by three decades working as a bartender, and a great-grandfather having run saloons and illegal gambling dens from the 1890s until the end of Prohibition.

Fee: $35 with a cash-only bar including beer, wine, or soda only. Credit cards and debit cards will not be accepted.

Advance registration required via website by 4/4/2022.

Masks are optional.

Books

Registering for the in-person program will allow you the opportunity to pre-purchase copies of Chicago by Day and Night (paperback) for $15.00.

For those not attending the program, copies of Chicago by Day and Night (paperback) may be purchased for $17.00 including shipping.