bild

Chicago, Illinois USA - Chicago Police officer on the Magnificent Mile...Chicago is the largest city by population in the state of Illinois and the Midwest of the United States. Adjacent to Lake Michigan, the Chicago metropolitan area (commonly referred to as Chicagoland) has a population of over 9.7 million people in three U.S. states, Illinois, Wisconsin and Indiana, and was the third largest metropolitan area in 2000. One of the largest cities in North America, Chicago is among the world's twenty-five largest urban areas by population, and rated an alpha world city by the World Cities Study Group at Loughborough University. It is the third-most populous city in the United States after New York City and Los Angeles, with a population of nearly 3 million people...Chicago incorporated as a city in 1837 after being founded in 1833 near a portage between the Great Lakes and the Mississippi River watershed. The city soon became a major transportation hub in North America and the transportation, financial and industrial center of the Midwest. Today the city's attractions bring 44.2 million visitors annually. Chicago became notorious worldwide for its violent gangsters in the 1920s, most notably Al Capone, and for its political corruption in one of the longest tenures of political machinery in the United States. Chicago was once the capital of the railroad industry and until the 1960s the world's largest meatpacking facilities were at the Union Stock Yards. O'Hare International is one of the world's busiest airports and the second busiest in the nation...The city has a notable and famous political culture, is a stronghold of the Democratic Party, and has been home to numerous influential politicians, including the first African-American president-elect of the United States, Barack Obama...Chicago is called the "Windy City", "Chi-Town", "Second City," and the "City of Big Shoulders". (KEYSTONE/NOOR/Jon Lowenstein)