Hey, it's Curious City intern, Natalie Dahlia.

Okay, so take a walk outside, or if you prefer, look outside your window and gaze away at the mountainous grandeur of the Chicago area foothills, the Everest of the Midwest.

Just kidding, that's not what you see. Chicago is super flat.

So why do so many places around Chicago have names that would make you think otherwise?

This week, we revisit an episode where Curious City alum Logan Jaffe helped answer that question. Coming up,

making a Mount Prospect out of a molehill. If you're already a WBEZ member, thank you. Right now,

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monthly gift by $3 today at WBEZ.org slash donate. 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 many

oaks. Or come to think of it a forest.

Questioner John Leahy noticed a similar discrepancy where he grew up in Chicago's northwest suburbs.

It started years ago with a family joke.

My dad has a very dad-like sense of humor. And for years, when we were heading up north and coming back, we'd

say, oh, yes, we just finished our trek up, you know, Mount Prospect and came down Arlington Heights

and through Rolling Meadows. And it would be this joke of these town names that clearly do not

line up with their actual geography.

The geography of the Chicago area being flat, flat, really flat.

Well, it just seems so odd.

Why do so many suburbs names imply elevation?

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