Hey there, it's Curiosity Fellow Marie Mendoza here.

I'm not a native Chicagoan, and when I first moved here six years ago, I was struck by a little phrase I saw plastered over some billboards, usually of car dealerships.

You probably heard it before.

Uh-oh, it's the man from Nissan.

He's here in Chicago Land to me.

Chicago Land. Chicago Land. Chicago Land. Chicago Land. The Chicago Land.

10-9-9-9, only in Chicago Land.

Yep, Chicago Land. When I first heard it, I was like, wait, what?

This sounds like some mythical place you would read about in a book, or maybe Disneyland's lesser-known sister.

Not a whole metropolitan area. And I'm from New York's tri-state sister, not a whole metropolitan area.

And I'm from New York's tri-state area, which is aptly named.

It turns out this has been a major curiosity for a lot of you over the years. How did Chicago land get to be a widely used term?

There's no Detroit land or Cincinnati land or Phoenix land.

I think I heard something either on the radio or a commercial where they said the

Chicago land area.

And I realize I use that term all the time.

And I think, okay, well, you've got Chicago, the city.

You've got the Chicago area, which I think of as Chicago and the suburbs.

And Chicagoland, which I think is the same thing.

So to me, Chicagoland area is just redundant.

The term Chicago land has become such a part of the DNA of the region that I think that most

people haven't thought to question where it even came from.

...