4.8 • 642 Ratings
🗓️ 5 November 2017
⏱️ 12 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
From Chicago Heights to Mount Prospect, here's why Chicago suburb names flat out lie about their elevation.
Click on a timestamp to play from that location
0:00.0 | It's Curious City, where we take your questions about Chicago and the region. |
0:06.2 | And investigate. |
0:07.5 | Report. |
0:08.1 | Explore. |
0:08.9 | From W.B.E.Z. |
0:14.0 | I'm Logan Jaffe, and I'm just going to admit it, I grew up on a cul-de-sac in a Florida neighborhood named Oak Forest, which didn't have |
0:22.7 | many oaks. Or come to think of it a forest. Questioner John Leahy noticed a similar discrepancy |
0:30.1 | where he grew up in Chicago's northwest suburbs. It started years ago with a family joke. |
0:35.1 | My dad has a very dad-like sense of humor. |
0:38.8 | And for years, when we were heading up north and coming back, we'd say, oh, yes, we just |
0:44.0 | finished our trek up, you know, Mount Prospect and came down Arlington Heights and through |
0:49.9 | rolling meadows. |
0:51.3 | And it would be this joke of these town names that clearly do not line up with |
0:57.2 | their actual geography. The geography of the Chicago area being flat, flat, really flat. Well, it just seems so odd. |
1:12.3 | Why do so many suburbs names imply elevation? |
1:15.9 | Hmm. |
1:16.5 | A curious observation. |
1:18.5 | But John's right. |
1:19.8 | The names are spread from the north suburbs to the south suburbs. |
1:23.7 | And the west suburbs, yeah, there too. |
1:26.6 | Highland Park, Arlington Heights, Mount Prospect Heights, Prospect Heights, |
1:30.6 | Paylose Heights, Chicago Heights, Barrington Hills, Palos Hills, Rolling Meadows. |
... |
Please login to see the full transcript.
Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from WBEZ Chicago, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.
Generated transcripts are the property of WBEZ Chicago and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.
Copyright © Tapesearch 2025.