Here’s a look back at what happened in the Chicago area on Nov. 17, according to the Tribune’s archives.
Is an important event missing from this date? Email us.
Weather records (from the National Weather Service, Chicago)
- High temperature: 74 degrees (1975)
- Low temperature: 3 degrees (1959)
- Precipitation: 1.43 inches (1892)
- Snowfall: 3.8 inches (1927)
1926: The Chicago Blackhawks won the team’s hockey opener against Toronto 4-1 at the new Chicago Coliseum rink in front of 7,000 fans. The game’s proceeds benefited the Junior League.
Pete Muldoon was the first Hawks coach in franchise history. Fired after one season, he reportedly said, “This team will never finish in first place,” a statement that later became known as the “Curse of Muldoon.”
Now, there are those who claim it never happened, that Muldoon just packed up his hockey stick and quietly left town. Yet the outcome of the team’s second season in Chicago — with only 7 wins in 44 games and a last-place finish in the league’s rankings — made some wonder if the curse was real. The Blackhawks won the team’s first Stanley Cup in 1934.
1955: Process servers intercepted Maria Callas outside her dressing room in the Civic Opera House after the soprano sang her closing performance of the Lyric Opera House’s season in “Madame Butterfly.” A management group claimed she owed it some of her wages.
Callas flew to Milan, Italy, and told reporters, “I have the voice of an angel. No man can serve me.”
1984: Michael Jordan debuted the first of his signature line of sneakers in a game against the Philadelphia 76ers. The red, black and white shoes violated league policy, but Nike paid the fine for Jordan. The Air Jordan I became available to the public in 1985.
Air Jordans: A look at the sneaker institution that Michael Jordan and Nike built
2004: Sears announced its merger with Kmart. The $11 billion deal created a new company called Sears Holdings Corp., which became the nation’s third-largest retailer.
2013: During an unusually warm stretch in late fall, it was a balmy 70 degrees. But by day’s end, six people were killed in Illinois in one of the most destructive tornado outbreaks in the previous 50 years. Hardest hit was Washington, a town of 15,000 people east of Peoria, which was hit by an EF-4 tornado packing winds of 170 to 190 mph.
2016: Chicago Cubs third baseman Kris Bryant was named the National League’s MVP. Bryant received 29 of 30 first-place votes from the BBWAA to top Washington Nationals second baseman Daniel Murphy and Los Angeles Dodgers shortstop Corey Seager.
Bryant hit .292 with 39 home runs and 102 RBIs and led the league in runs scored with 121 while helping the Cubs end a 107-year championship drought.
“This year has certainly been one of the best years of my life, winning the World Series, and now this is just icing on the cake,” Bryant joked on a conference call after learning of his honor. “It’s all downhill from here.”
2017: The Rev. Jesse Jackson announced he had been diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease.
The civil rights leader and founder of the Chicago-based Rainbow/PUSH Coalition, has recently been hospitalized, the latest in a series of health setbacks in recent years.
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