Maxwell Street first appears on a Chicago map in 1847. The street was named for a Chicago physician by the name of Dr. Philip Maxwell. It was originally a wooden plank road that ran east-west from the south branch of the Chicago River. The...

During the “polar vortex” a few months ago, my trusty printer of 7 years decided to stop working. Penny, as I called her, did a great job for many years. A dozen cartridges and reams of paper later, Penny the Printer decided it was her...

Although so far this winter, the temperatures have been very mild, I can recall January's of past we were not so fortunate. According to records I reviewed, 9 of the 15 coldest days in Chicago where the temperature was at least 20 below zero...

Growing up in the Chicago suburbs, many of the kids in our neighborhood had pet snakes. It seems we use to collect baseball cards and coins and rocks and fossils and beer cans and pretty much anything else you can find enough of to stick on a...

A year ago tonight I received a phone call from my primary care physician, late on a Friday night, before a long 3-day holiday weekend. Can’t be good news I thought. The conversation went something like this: Dr. Feinberg: Dr. Kaplan, this...

My first time in a hospital that I can recall is when I was 6 years old. We were visiting my grandmother on the North side of the city when my father began to complain of abdominal pain. It worsened over the next few hours and my mother and I...