Reenactments
Bringing Chicago’s History to Life
Beginning in 2010, Pocket Guide to Hell produces free, interactive reenactments of significant moments from Chicago’s past.
Whenever possible, the reenactments occur on or near the site of the original event, often in the city’s streets. Blind casting, often with contemporary individuals cast as their historical analogues, allows the reenactments to represent the city of today. All members of the public have a part to play in the story being told. Original costumes and props and live musical performances add to the sense of spectacle.
The reenactments seek to open up a form often associated with living history villages and martial conflicts to tell different kinds of stories and to connect people to the past of places they encounter everyday.
Explore our reenactments below:
The Mystery of Al Capone’s Vaults
In April 1986, journalist Geraldo Rivera hosted a live television event in which he excavated the sub-basement of the soon to be demolished Lexington Hotel, once occupied by 1920s gangster Al Capone. A ratings hit and a historical disappointment, the event affirmed the public’s fascination with true crime and the city’s association with criminality.
The Battle of the Halsted Viaduct
In 1877 in the middle of an economic downturn, railroad workers across the United States went on strike after railroad owners colluded to cut their wages. In Chicago, workers from other industries joined in solidarity, leading to conflict with the Chicago Police Department and later the United States Cavalry on Halsted Street in the Pilsen neighborhood.
1915 Parade of the Unemployed
In the winter of 1915 activists Lucy Parsons and Irwin St. John Tucker led a march of 1500 unemployed and starving workers from Hull House, a settlement house, with the goal of reaching City Hall to petition for public works projects and food relief. Mounted police broke up the march less than a mile from its starting point.
125th Anniversary Haymarket Reenactment
In May 1886 a bomb went off in the middle of a protest against police violence and a push for the eight-hour workday in the area known as the Haymarket. To mark the 125th anniversary of this event of international significance, Pocket Guide to Hell produced a full-scale recreation, with the public taking on the role of the one thousand striking workers and representatives of 30 arts and cultural organizations portraying the close to 200 Chicago Police officers who attempted to break up the mass meeting moments before the bomb went off.
The Whitechapel Club
In the early 1890s, Chicago journalists and some professional men created a drinking society that met in the back of a Calhoun Place saloon and took its name from area of London where the Jack the Ripper murders occurred. Filling the room with various morbid curiosities, such as skulls for wall sconces, Club members workshopped their literary works and feted prominent visitors to the city.
The Compass Players
In the summer of 1955 in a Hyde Park tavern a group of actors, activists, and University of Chicago students created Chicago improv. While the Compass Players would eventually lead to Second City, their first performance was anything but a joke, often touching upon serious social issues.
The World Finder
As part of the 1893 World’s Columbian Exposition in Chicago, theater impresario Steele MacKaye attempted to stage The World Finder, which would recreate Christopher Columbus’s arrival in the Americas with a cast of thousands in an immense theater called the Spectatorium. Unfortunately for MacKaye, the American economy collapsed.
Behind the Scenes with the Mediums
Near the end of the nineteenth century, psychic mediums conned the grief-stricken through seances, automatic writing, and spirit portraits. It was up to magicians to expose the fraud and protect the public from the spiritualists, including the notorious Bangs Sisters of Chicago.
Like a Secondhand Sea
Three reenactments at various sites unfolding over the course of a single afternoon tell the story of how human beings have impacted the Chicago River and Lake Michigan. Marquette, Joliet and their voyageurs canoe down the coast of the lake in 1673 as Captain George Wellington Streeter establishes the squatter community of the District of Lake Michigan in 1886 while a team of city dignitaries celebrates the reversal of the Chicago River in 1900.
Ben Hecht’s House Party
For a time in the middle of the Chicago Renaissance in the 1910s, journalist and future playwright Ben Hecht lived in a boarding house in Hyde Park. In 2012 he decided to have some of his literary friends over as well as celebrate the current residents of the home, the Custer family.
Studs’ Place
Long before gaining notoriety as a radio host and author of oral histories such as Working and The Good War, Louis “Studs” Terkel starred as himself in an early television show that was improvised and broadcast live. To mark the centennial of Terkel’s birth, performers Roger Payton, Christopher Rathjen, Nick Wagner, Rachel Wilson and special guests Scott Montgomery Priz, Bill Savage, and Sally Timms return to Studs’ Place, performing live in the front bar of the Hideout while the episode is “broadcast” to the audience in the adjoining Chinook Lounge.
The First Ward Ball
At the turn of the twentieth century century, two corrupt alderman, John “Bathhouse” Coughlin and Michael “Hinky Dink” Kenna, presided over the First Ward, which contained Chicago’s vice district. Each year at the Coliseum, residents of all social strata paid tribute to their elected representatives at the wild, wooly First Ward Ball.
Chicago Children’s TV Show
Chicago has a rich tradition of locally created children’s television. This celebration of the past and present includes performances by Chic-A-Go-Go, Barrel of Monkeys, Elephant & Worm, and Adventure Sandwich; cartoons by Lille Carre, Drew Dir, and Emily Kuehn; acrobatics by Aloft Loft; and music by the Old Town School of Folk Music’s Young Stracke All-Stars and Brass Inferno Productions.
The Pit
In the late 1880s futures traders in Chicago attempted to corner the wheat market, a plot that served as the basis for Frank Norris’s 1903 novel The Pit. Protagonist Curtis Jadwin’s attempt to gain control of the market and the esoteric world of futures trading is reenacted as an athletic contest, complete with play by play coverage.
The 160th Anniversary Lager Beer Riot
Civil unrest started in 1855 in Chicago when immigrant communities protested against the nativist policies of City Hall, particularly those directed at Irish saloons and German beer halls. A brief skirmish between the protestors and the city authorities, fought on opposing sides of the Chicago River, is staged as a dodgeball match.
Joe Hill’s Funeral
Don’t Mourn. Organize. Pocket Guide to Hell ends with a reenactment marking the centennial of the funeral of Industrial Worker of the World organizer and artist Joe Hill. Like the funeral in Chicago, the reenactment includes plenty of music and the sharing of Hill’s ashes. With performances by LeRoy Bach, Janet Bean & Sally Tims, Martin Billheimer, Fluffy & Psalm One, Bucky Halker, Jon Langford, Khari Lemuel, and Holly Stevens.
Garroway At Large
Experience the Chicago School of television and learn about the life and career of Dave Garroway in this first virtual reenactment courtesy of LumpenTV. With performances by Justin Amolsch, Lily Emerson, Kevin Hogan, Dana Kroop, Bennett Lynn, Charlie Malave, Meredith Milliron, Walter Podrazik Christopher Rathjen, and Rachel Wilson.
Back With You Again: Celebrating 75 Years of Kukla, Fran, Ollie, and Chicago Children’s TV
This homage to the classic television show looks at the life of Burr Tillstrom and the longer history of puppetry in Chicago. With performances by Brandon Cloyd, Kevin Hogan, Dana Kroop, Laura McKenzie, Chris Rathjen, and Kevin Michael Wesson, and musical direction by Charlie Malave. Special guests include Adventure Sandwich, Jim Engel, Opera in Focus, Walt Podrazik, and Dassnia Posner.