Here’s a look back at what happened in the Chicago area on Oct. 18, according to the Tribune’s archives. If you think an important event is missing from this date, please email us.
**Weather Records**
*(from the National Weather Service, Chicago)*
– High temperature: 87 degrees (1950)
– Low temperature: 20 degrees (1948)
– Precipitation: 2.09 inches (1985)
– Snowfall: 0.7 inches (1989)
**1892**
Did the first long-distance telephone call from Chicago to New York actually happen if the guy at the other end of the line couldn’t hear a thing? Chicago Mayor Hempstead Washburne heard what New York Mayor Hugh J. Grant said, but Grant couldn’t hear Washburne. A cornet solo, however, could be distinctly heard.
“It was explained that forty receivers had been put into the circuit and these were all being used by the crowd in the room,” the Tribune reported. “This, it was said, diminished the volume of sound.”
Also in 1892, Duchess the elephant escaped from Lincoln Park Zoo. The 18-year-old female elephant got loose from her handler outside her enclosure, then went on the run—demolishing the door of a saloon on North Avenue, smashing the window of another, and walking through the fence around a vacant lot. She was captured and led back to her stall by noon.
**1924**
Three-time All-American Harold Edward “Red” Grange galloped 95 yards to score a touchdown in the opening kickoff against Michigan that also marked the dedication of Memorial Stadium in Champaign. The “Galloping Ghost” scored five touchdowns as Illinois upset Michigan 39-14.
**1938**
German architect Ludwig Mies van der Rohe arrived in Chicago. He was newly hired to head the architecture department at the Armour Institute of Technology (now the Illinois Institute of Technology) on Chicago’s South Side.
**1995**
Jesse Rankins, 11, and Tykeece Johnson, 12, were found guilty of killing Eric Morse, 5, by dropping him from the 14th floor of the Ida B. Wells public housing complex for refusing to steal candy from a store. Illinois reacted swiftly to the boys’ arrest for Morse’s murder, enacting a new law that lowered the age from 13 to 10 at which offenders could be sentenced to prison.
Want more vintage Chicago? Stay tuned for more historical highlights from the Tribune archives.
https://www.chicagotribune.com/2025/10/18/chicago-history-october-18/
