Walking Chicago's Coast (Virtual Program)

This program features Michael McColly and his recently published book, Walking Chicago’s Coast: A 63-Mile Journey to the Indiana Dunes. 

McColly shares stories from his walk along Chicago's shoreline from Rogers Park to Indiana Dunes National Park, and the inspiration behind this remarkable journey. Through his stunning photography, he explores Chicago’s ever-changing landscape, its layered history still present in the waters of the coast, and the challenges of environmental degradation and inequality that shape life in the metropolis.

Along the way, McColly reflects on the awe-inspiring beauty of Lake Michigan, a vast body of water so immense it can be seen from the moon, and the two remarkable parks that bookend the journey: Chicago’s urban lakefront, built on landfill, and Indiana’s Dunes, shaped by thousands of years of natural forces.

Michael McColly's essays have appeared in The New York Times, the Boston Review, and The Sun magazine. He is the author of the Lambda Literary Award-winning memoir, The After-Death Room, chronicling his journey reporting on AIDS activism in Africa, Asia, and the United States.