The First National Bank building stands in ruins at State and Washington streets after the Great Chicago Fire in 1871. The Field, Leiter & Co. store, which became Marshall Field & Co., lay in ruins.

Over the span of just a few days in October 1871, the Great Chicago Fire devastated the city, claiming the lives of more than 300 people and leaving over 100,000 residents homeless.

Chicago History Museum keeps the past alive with Great Chicago Fire relic 02:06. CHICAGO (CBS) -- On the night of Sunday, Oct. 8, 1871, a fire broke out in or near a barn on what we would now call ...

AP WAS THERE: Great Chicago fire, Oct. 8-10, 1871 Associated Press FILE - This general view shows the Chicago Court house and downtown area in the aftermath of the fire in Chicago, Ill., 1871.

October 1871: Chicago is a tinderbox. ... I saw a great sheet of flame descend on a frame building one block east of our home which seemed to immediately lift, ... More About the Chicago Fire.

The building is still there today, one of about 20 downtown structures that remain from those first years after the 1871 fire. Now known as the Delaware Building, the property is trying to rise ...

While the Great Chicago Fire of 1871 reduced much of the city to ashes, a handful of structures endured the destructive blaze. Some of those buildings still stand today and pose […] ...

In The Burning of the World: The Great Chicago Fire and the War for a City’s Soul, Scott W. Berg offers new conclusions about the 1871 fire and its aftermath.

Chicago’s lagging adoption of tall timber is linked to the legacy of the Great Chicago Fire of 1871, which killed 300 people and burned through 3.3 miles of the city, taking down 17,000 ...

The difference between the two was the Chicago fire killed 250 people, left 100,000 homeless, destroyed more than 17,400 structures and burned more than 2,000 acres.