A Pilsen primer: more than 300 years in a nutshell

To really enjoy Pilsen week at YoChicago, we suggest brushing up on the colorful history of the area. Check out this history of Pilsen for an overview that begins in 1674 with European explorer Jacques Marquette‘s winter camp where Ashland Avenue now runs between Blue Island Avenue and the river. The history also touches on the 1857 “Battle of the Sands”– an effort by the City to push Bohemians, Czechs and other Eastern European immigrants from the North Side to the largely abandoned area that was named Little Pilsen in 1870– and Pilsen’s involvement in the 19th-century labor strikes.

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