Carl Smith

Carl Smith is the Franklyn Bliss Snyder Professor of English and American Studies and Professor of History, Emeritus, at Northwestern University. His books include Chicago and the American Literary Imagination, 1880-1920; Urban Disorder and the Shape of Belief: The Great Chicago Fire, the Haymarket Bomb, and the Model Town of Pullman; The Plan of Chicago: Daniel Burnham and the Remaking of the American City; and City Water, City Life: Water and the Infrastructure of Ideas in Urbanizing Philadelphia, Boston, and Chicago. His most recent title is Chicago's Great Fire: The Destruction and Resurrection of an Iconic American City, published by Grove Atlantic.

Articles by this Author

The O'Learys and the Great Chicago Fire, November 2020 | Vol. 65, No. 7

People who know nothing else about Chicago’s Great Conflagration have heard of Mrs. O’Leary and her famous cow. But the disaster's real origins are more complicated.

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