Do you ever wonder what Chicago looked like before the Great Fire of 1871? The University of Chicago's Map Library has digitized an entire slew of wonderful maps that document Chicago's urban landscape before and after that traumatic conflagration. The growth of the city during that time was great indeed, transforming the small city from a population of 109,000 to more than one million by the 1880s. Expansion rapidly took hold as the Union Stockyards opened, George Pullman crafted his model city and railroad sleeping car plant, and the South Works steel mill came alive. All told, the collection here contains over a dozen richly detailed maps, including a guide map of Chicago from 1868, a plan for Lincoln Park from the 1880s, and a map of the Union Stockyards from 1887.