Free Event, Partner Event
Partner Event | Dave Truitt Historical Documentary Series: “Eastland: Chicago’s Deadliest Day”
Date
Saturday, November 1, 2025
12:30 pm - 3:00 pm
Location
Chicago History Museum
1601 N. Clark St.
Chicago,
IL
60614
United States
Join us for a free screening of Eastland: Chicago’s Deadliest Day and a panel discussion moderated by author Jay Bonansinga featuring:
- Michael McCarthy, author of Ashes Under Water: The SS Eastland and the Shipwreck That Shook America
- Dr. Caitlyn Perry Dial, SS Eastland Disaster expert, public historian, and director of development at Michigan State University Libraries
- Chuck Coppola, executive producer, writer, and narrator of Eastland
- Harvey Moshman, executive producer, writer, and editor of Eastland
On July 24, 1915, passengers packed aboard the SS Eastland never suspected that the Great Lakes excursion steamer had a dark past. But others knew, and the tragedy that would end 844 lives became Chicago’s shameful secret. Eastland combines storylines of greed, corruption, exploitation of immigrants, a cover-up, and hundreds of casualties in one of America’s worst maritime tragedies. In addition, it features rare newsreel footage, previously censored for Chicago audiences.
Free; RSVP required.
Schedule
12:30 p.m. – Theater doors open; snacks available
1:00 p.m. – Film screening begins
2:30 p.m. – Panel discussion begins
3:00 p.m. – Event concludes
Eastland: Chicago’s Deadliest Day and the Dave Truitt Historical Documentary Series are underwritten exclusively by CAPTAIN DAVE’S FOUNDATION
Questions? Contact Nell McKeown, development events manager, at mckeown@chicagohistory.org or (312) 799-2112
Parking is available in the parking lot at 1730 N. Stockton Dr. and may be validated for $10 at the Museum’s Ticket Desk.
“Stunningly effective and shockingly memorable . . . with real-life characters worthy of a big-budget feature film.”—Roeper/Chicago Sun-Times
“One of the most compelling and electrifying documentaries I’ve ever seen. A brilliant film . . . extraordinary and haunting.”—Kogan/Chicago Tribune
“Eastland has it all: heroes, villains, corruption, legal shenanigans, carnage, teenage adventurers, greed, humor, injustice, and even romance. This is history at its most vivid.”—Library Journal
Winner of two Emmy Awards, NY Festivals TV Film Awards, Indie Fest, Impact Docs, Telly Awards, Video Librarian—Best Documentaries of 2020
CHUCK COPPOLA has more than 35 years of news experience, as a reporter for network-owned television stations in Chicago, San Francisco and for CNN. In 2003, during the initial weeks of the war in Iraq, he provided nearly 700 live reports from overseas to television and radio stations across the U.S. His investigative reporting has exposed design flaws in U.S. Army equipment provided by U.S. manufacturers, and weaknesses in the U.S. Federal Emergency Management Agency’s response to natural disasters. His work has earned nine Emmys®.
Harvey Moshman and Coppola collaborated on two previous documentaries that have earned multiple Emmys, including the 2005 discovery of the U.S.S. Lagarto, the first of 52 American WWII submarines lost in battle to have been found since the war.
HARVEY MOSHMAN is a multi-Emmy® Award winning producer who spent a couple of decades at WTTW working on everything from FRONTLINE to WILD CHICAGO. He teamed with collaborator Chuck Coppola to produce the first Eastland documentary in 2001 for Channel 11’s “Chicago Stories.” As independent producers, they went on to create LOST & FOUND: THE SEARCH FOR USS LAGARTO—the discovery of a missing American WWII submarine at the bottom of the Gulf of Thailand “overdue from patrol, presumed lost.”
Harvey & Chuck traveled to Canada in 2017 to shoot reenactment scenes for this version of EASTLAND aboard the SS Keewatin – the last Edwardian era steamer still afloat anywhere. Previously censored and undiscovered newsreel footage wasn’t found until 100 years after the disaster in, of all places, Amsterdam. EASTLAND has garnered two Midwest Emmys® and several national awards.
Harvey’s current series, WILD TRAVELS (the national successor to WTTW’s local “Wild Chicago”), is a guide to America’s most unusual, offbeat and quirky destinations and is broadcast nationally on PBS stations and streaming worldwide.