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Chicago’s Cabbage War: West Ridge vs. Rogers Park

So there is this: An animated story based on a very odd question from Laura Jones Macknin (recognize her? She’s a voice-over artist and actor!)

Here’s the gist: 

What was behind the so-called Cabbage War in West Ridge and Rogers Park? I would like to know more because, you know … Cabbage War.

We’re glad we took it on (full story w/ podcast episode and animated video ) since the research we dug up gives a new perspective on the relationship between two of Chicago’s northernmost neighborhoods: the lakeside Rogers Park and its neighbor just to the west, West Ridge. Here’s how conflicts over booze, parks and taxes prompted these neighbors two Chicago neighborhoods to break into all-out vegetable warfare. Research help came from the Rogers Park/West Ridge Historical Society. That group’s name, perhaps, is a reminder that warring sides can put aside their differences – at least when they involved slurs of a vegetable nature. 

Notes

  1. wbezcuriouscity posted this

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