Heat Wave: A Social Autopsy of Disaster in Chicago Book

Of course, I have an obligatory heat wave story- I was 9 and spent the worst of it in my dad's North Side apartment without power or AC. We took turns taking cold baths. I was too hot to even read. That's how you know it's bad.

Despite the fact that I was there, I never realized what a public health disaster this heat wave (and other previous and subsequent ones) was for Chicago until this book was assigned to me in grad school. A quick survey of Chicagoan friends and family found that not a single one knew of the huge death toll, although they certainly remembered the heat wave. Given the global trends toward creation of larger cities and overall warming climate for many temperate North American cities, this is a very relevant warning.