Places Michael Barera Wants to Go

A historic and oft-filmed prison stands in a Chicago suburb.

This deceivingly ordinary warehouse hides an enormous collection of pop culture treasures.

Landmark Chicago building narrowly avoided destruction.

Chicago’s incendiary role in the labor movement.

A mini Wrigley Field for mini baseball players.

This simple gravestone remembers a pig who single-hoofedly raised $19,000,000 for the Navy.

With 8,000 pipes this giant instrument is the most versatile theatre pipe organ ever built.

An actual 1957 Cadillac De Ville, encased in 15 cubic yards of concrete.

One of the largest pieces of scientific equipment ever carried on a NASA space shuttle sits in a Chicago alley.

A towering Art Deco movie palace made to look like a Mayan temple.

This awkward aquarium sculpture is one of the strangest statues in Chicago.

Chicago's Navy Pier on Lake Michigan was a training hub for aircraft carrier pilots during WWII.

One of the most powerful computers in the world can be visited by anyone who wants to experience more computing than they can handle.

Rifle through images of skyscrapers, Worlds Fairs, and more in the largest public postcard repository in America.

This historic Illinois "Muffler Man" has been converted from axe-touting lumberjack to rocket-wielding space ace.

These chunky stone towers out in Lake Michigan are the key to Chicago’s drinking water.

The clothes-washing king doubles as a community center with some unusual features, including an aviary filled with finches.

In a quiet north Chicago neighborhood rests a stunning relic of the golden age of earthenware design.

An amazing collection of scale model ships.

The world's third-largest scale model of the planets.

A goddess-topped water fountain in Chicago was created thanks to the dreams of a thirsty newsboy.

This life-size bronze statue remembers the tallest recorded human in his Illinois hometown.

You can take a class, browse the library, or visit the lavish lair of an international men's humor society.

This memorial plaque remembers a strangely shallow maritime disaster known as "Chicago's Titanic."