October 5 Illinois History Minute

It’s October fifth. And on this day in 1868, a huge crowd gathered in Springfield for the laying of the cornerstone for a new Illinois state Capitol building, the one we have now. Construction would take 20 years, and by the time the east wall went up, the inscribed cornerstone was found to be cracked and deteriorated. It was replaced by a new cornerstone with no inscription.

Rocky Wirtz, was born on this day in Chicago in 1952. Wirtz inherited the Chicago Blackhawks hockey team from his father, Bill Wirtz in 2007.

And Michael Jordan made his first pro basketball appearance on this day in 1984. In a pre-season game in Peoria, Jordan scored 18 points in 29 minutes to help the Chicago Bulls beat the Indiana Pacers, 102 to 98.