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Today in Chicago History: In a scene out of ‘Casino,' Spilotro brothers buried alive in Indiana cornfield
Here's a look back at what happened in the Chicago area on June 14, according to the Tribune's archives.
Is an important event missing from this date? Email us.
The Chicago flag design: History of every star — including one for the Great Chicago Fire — and stripeWeather records (from the National Weather Service, Chicago)
1949: One-time Chicago Cub Eddie Waitkus, by then with the Philadelphia Phillies, became the inspiration for 'The Natural' when he was shot in the Edgewater Beach Hotel by Ruth Ann Steinhagen, a 19-year-old fan.
1977: Eight people were arrested during Chicago's first major gay-rights protest. As many as 3,000 people showed up outside Medinah Temple to contest an appearance by Anita Bryant, a singer and orange juice spokesperson who led a successful drive to repeal a gay rights ordinance in Dade County, Florida.
1981: Nobel Peace Prize winner Mother Teresa visited Chicago. The 70-year-old founder of Missionaries of Charity decried abortion, counseled nuns to wear distinctive religious garb and supported the church's ban on the ordination of women to the priesthood. Canonized as a saint by Pope Francis in 2016, Mother Teresa urged Catholics to dedicate themselves to service.
'We need people today to consecrate their lives just to be the touch — just to be the sweetness of Christ,' she told more than 600 people gathered at Good Counsel High School on the Northwest Side.
1986: Anthony Spilotro, 48, and his brother Michael, 41, were beaten with baseball bats then buried alive in a northwest Indiana cornfield. Contrary to what was depicted in the 1995 film 'Casino,' the brothers were driven to a Bensenville home, where Michael thought he was going to become a 'made member' of the Outfit. Instead, they were beaten with fists, knees and feet in the home's basement before they were driven to the cornfield and buried. Dental records were used by their brother Patrick Spilotro, a dentist, to identify the bodies. The details came out during the 2007 'Family Secrets' trial, which Tribune editor Jeff Coen wrote about in the 2009 book, 'Family Secrets: The Case That Crippled the Chicago Mob.'
1992: The Chicago Bulls won their second NBA championship. They did it at Chicago Stadium, by overcoming a 17-point deficit to defeat the Portland Trail Blazers 97-93 to win the NBA Finals four games to two.
1998: The Bulls won their sixth NBA title.
2016: Chicago-based Johnson Publishing announced the sale of Ebony and Jet magazines to Austin-based Clear View Group. Johnson Publishing filed for bankruptcy in 2016, and sold its extensive archive in 2019, for $30 million.
A consortium comprising the Ford Foundation, the J. Paul Getty Trust, the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, the Mellon Foundation, and the Smithsonian Institution announced in 2022, it transferred ownership of the archive to the Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture and to the Getty Research Institute.
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