+
Website
Other

Chicago Historical Society: Great Chicago Fire and the Web of Memory

For Students 9th - 10th
This online exhibition provides chronological information, eye witness accounts, primary source documents, photographs, and a mix of other resources that chronicle both the event itself and the ways in which it has been remembered over...
+
Unit Plan
Polk Brothers Foundation Center for Urban Education at DePaul University

De Paul University: Center for Urban Education: After the Chicago Fire [Pdf]

For Teachers 1st - 3rd
"After the Chicago Fire" is a one page, non-fiction, reading passage about how Chicago was rebuilt after the great fire. It is followed by constructed-response questions which require students to provide evidence from the story; it...
+
Website
Other

Chicago Historical Society: The Great Chicago Fire

For Students 9th - 10th
This resource provides information, and accounts about the Great Chicago Fire.
+
Primary
Other

Chicago Historical Society: Letter of William H. Carter on Chicago Fire

For Students 9th - 10th
A letter written by an eye-witness of the Great Fire of 1871, it gives details about how the fire spread quickly and efforts to fight the fire.
+
Primary
Other

The Great Chicago Fire

For Students 9th - 10th
Read a letter by Horace White of the Chicago Tribune to a fellow editor in Cincinnati in which he describes first-hand during the days of the Chicago Fire of 1871.
+
Graphic
Curated OER

Two Men in the Ruins of the Chicago Fire. Credit: Corbis.

For Students 9th - 10th
In the wake of Hurricane Katrina, NPR discusses past natural disasters in U.S. history, the challenges and the rebuilding. From the Great Chicago Fire in 1871 to Hurricane Andrew in 1992, read about the events that changed peoples lives.
+
Graphic
Curated OER

Library of Congress: Ruins After the Great Fire of Chicago: Courthouse

For Students 3rd - 8th
The ruins of the Chicago courthouse after the 1871 fire.