6 days ago
Today in Chicago History: Federal officials take control of the Chicago Housing Authority
Here's a look back at what happened in the Chicago area on May 30, according to the Tribune's archives.
Is an important event missing from this date? Email us.
Weather records (from the National Weather Service, Chicago)
High temperature: 93 degrees (1953)
Low temperature: 35 degrees (1873)
Precipitation: 1.49 inches (2004)
Snowfall: None
1923: Nannette Anderson became Chicago's 'first lady speeder sentenced to jail.' She received a $50 fine and a one-day jail sentence. She stayed locked up for an extra five hours because her husband showed up late with the payment.
1924: A week after 14-year-old Bobby Franks was murdered and his body was discovered adjacent to Wolf Lake, investigators were still trying to piece together who might be responsible for the crime.
Then, a slip of the tongue pointed all eyes on Nathan Leopold. He admitted to owning a similar pair of the rare, expensive glasses as those discovered near Franks' body — and losing them at the same spot while supposedly birdwatching a few days earlier. Further questioning connected him as owner of the typewriter on which a ransom letter was typed. When Leopold could not produce either item, he became a suspect. His friend Richard Loeb was also questioned by police.
Vintage Chicago Tribune: Leopold and Loeb
Both men claimed they took a Leopold family car for a joyride that night, but their alibi fell apart when the family's chauffeur said the vehicle was in the garage the day of Franks' murder.
The 'perfect murder' Leopold and Loeb thought they had constructed actually left investigators with no other suspects but them. With the retrieval of Leopold's typewriter from a harbor in Jackson Park, the chain of evidence that connected the two young men to the crime was complete. Both confessed to killing Franks.
1937: Striking workers clashed with police on Memorial Day at the Republic Steel plant on the South Side — the only one in the Chicago area that had stayed open during a bitter nationwide showdown between a number of steel companies and the Steel Workers Organizing Committee, which was trying to unionize the plants.
Flashback: Chicago's place at the forefront of labor history
Ten demonstrators were killed and 60 were injured, as were 60 police officers.
Shortly after Memorial Day, the strike folded as workers streamed back to their jobs in Chicago and elsewhere. Ultimately, however, the union won its contract.
1995: In the largest takeover of its kind, federal housing officials took control of the Chicago Housing Authority four days after its chairman, Vince Lane, and the CHA board resigned under a cloud of mismanagement.
Housing and Urban Development Secretary Andrew Cuomo removed CHA from its list of troubled public housing authorities on Aug. 1, 1998, and returned control of the agency to the city of Chicago on May 1, 1999.
2020: A Chicago protest, in response to George Floyd's killing by police in Minneapolis, became violent and looting took place around the city for the next three days.
5 years after killing of George Floyd, protest in Chicago decries Trump directive to empower police
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