In the 1990s, Chicago transformed itself from a would-be Rust Belt casualty to the global metropolis it is today. If you weren’t living in Chicago in the ’90s, you missed out on life.
The decade didn’t start out so promisingly. In 1992, U.S. Steel South Works, which had once employed 20,000 workers in Chicago, produced its last bar of product. But that, as it turned out, was emblematic of Chicago’s economic past giving way to its future.
As Chicago became a destination for those new employees — and a whole lot of Big Ten graduates — it gained population in the 1990s, the only time since the 1950s a Midwestern metropolis has done so.
These fascinating photos were taken by Elmar that show street scenes of Chicago in June 1900.
