As the 150th anniversary of the Great Chicago Fire approaches, historians say there is no evidence to support the story that the massive blaze that destroyed a huge swath of Chicago began when Catherine O'Leary's cow kicked over a lantern.
historians say there is no evidence that the massive blaze that destroyed a huge swath of Chicago and displaced about a third of its residents began when Catherine O’Leary’s cow kicked over a lantern.
How the immigrant from Ireland came to be blamed is a familiar story: She was a victim of prejudice and circumstance. “In the mainstream Yankee press she fit into a whole set of existing prejudices,” said Carl Smith, author of “Chicago’s Great Fire: The Destruction and Resurrection of an Iconic American City.” “She was poor, an immigrant from Ireland, Catholic and a female.”The shabby treatment made life so unbearable that the family moved to the far southern edge of the city, where they lived under the name of Walsh, Knight said.
Knight believes the one-legged horse-cart driver known by everyone at the time as “Peg Leg” Sullivan had been drinking when he accidentally dropped his cigar in the barn.
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