An article detailing the finding of The Foolkiller Submarine, the mysterious sub found in the Chicago River in 1915, has been dug up in the archives of the Chicago Examiner. Offhand, I think this is the first mention of it I’ve seen in a Chicago paper outside of the Trib. The article states that Deneau…
Search Results for: label/foolkiller submarine
The Fool Killer Submarine – more evidence
The best guess anyone has put forth on the origin of the Fool Killer Submarine is that it was built by Lodner Phillips around 1849 – and had presumably been in the water ever since when it was dredged up from the Chicago river in 1915 for display on South State street. Most of the…
Heroic and Tragic Tales of Eastland Divers
Diver portrait from the Chicago American Early on in my time as a Chicago ghost tour guide, I heard a story that one of the divers recovering bodies from the Eastland had gone insane and spent the rest of his life in a mental hospital. I repeated it on a few early tours, but, unable…
Foolkiller Clue?
When the Fool Killer submarine was discovered in the river in late 1915, there were conflicting reports as to how old it was. Most newspaper reports said it had first appeared in the lake/river around the early 1870s, though no reference to it from those days has been found yet. Many then said it had…