Thank you to the Chicago Transit Authority and public transportation workers who are providing a safe and essential service to healthcare workers, first responders, and others during the COVID-19 pandemic. Your important work is part of the city’s history. 

Explore Chicago through the 1894 diary of streetcar conductor Elmer Whiting in our Google Arts & Culture exhibit Ride Around Chicago: A City in Transition. As he traversed the city, his observations provide a glimpse into its complex and changing landscape just a year after the dazzling World’s Columbian Exposition. See it now.

Google Arts & Culture is an online platform that puts the treasures, stories, and knowledge of more than 2,000 cultural institutions from eighty countries at your fingertips. The Chicago History Museum’s portal includes stories from throughout the city’s history. Take a look into the mind of couturier Charles James, explore the history of blues music in Chicago, tour the city’s culinary history through historical menus, and so much more! Explore our Google Arts & Culture Exhibits.