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"It was first said back in the 1880s: 'Chicago is the most American of cities and to know America, you must understand Chicago.' (Miller 1997, 17; d'Eramo 2002, 8). The claim holds up to this day for two complementary reasons--one mythic and one real. Mythically, the Midwest is America's 'heartland' -- the region that speaks to the imagined core of our national identity: what the country stands for and how it wishes to be defined. Chicago is our heartland's capital. The city's unique status might also be attributable to a fundamental reality. The birth of Chicago and the birth of industrial America were contemporaneous." John P. Koval (2006). "An Overview and Point of View." In John P. Koval, Larry Bennett, Michael I.J. Bennett, Fassil Demissie, Roberta Garner, and Kiljoong Kim, eds., The New Chicago. Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 1-15, quote from p. 1.