Some interesting Chicago facts!

Some other facts . . .
The 4 stars on the Chicago flag represent Fort Dearborn, the Chicago Fire, the World's Columbian Exposition, and the Century of Progress Exposition.

Among the Field Museum's most prized jewels is the 5,890-carat Chalmerz topaz, which weighed 10,200 carats in the rough.

Chicago has 29 miles of lake frontage and 15 miles of public beach.

Lake Michigan:
more than 10,300 years old
307 miles long, 118 across at its widest point
average depth is 279 feet, maximum depth is 923 feet
contains roughly 1,350 trillion gallons of water
covers an area of 22,300 square miles

Chicago is home to the world's largest population of Poles outside of Warsaw.

The Chicago Public Library is the world's largest public library with a collection of more than 2 million books.

The world's largest cookie and cracker factory, where Nabisco made 16 billion Oreo cookies in 1995, is located in Chicago.

The central water filtration plant, located on the lakefront north of Navy Pier, is the largest in the world.

Chicago's Oceanarium is the world's largest indoor marine mammal pavilion and doubles the size of the John G. Shedd Aquarium, which is the largest indoor aquarium in the world.

The Chicago Post Office at 433 West Van Buren is the only postal facility in the world you can drive a car through.

The official flower of the city of Chicago is the chrysanthemum.

The Art Institute of Chicago holds the largest collection of Impressionist paintings outside the Louvre in Paris.

The Chicago River is always dyed green on St. Patrick's Day.

Jesse Owens, Frazier Thomas, "Wheaties," and Muddy Waters all have a Chicago street named in their honor.

Stephen Douglas, who beat Abe Lincoln in debates by defending the rights of slave owners, lies buried beneath a monument to him off 35th Street at South Shore Drive in the heart of Chicago's South Side black community.