The airliner levels out of its banking turn and continues in a gentle descent. The passengers hear a whir and feel a clunk as the pilot lowers the landing gear and locks it into position. A flight attendant's voice comes over the intercom: "Ladies and gentlemen, we have begun our final approach into Chicago's O'Hare International Airport. The captain has turned on the seat belt sign. Please make sure your seat belt is securely fastened ..."
The most interesting word in this routine announcement, which occurs more than 3,000 times daily in the skies over Chicago, is "O'Hare." Edward H. "Butch" O'Hare never lived in Chicago. He was born and raised in St. Louis, and he became a shining hero in the country's darkest days of World War II.
It was Butch's father, Edgar Joseph "EJ" O'Hare—also a St. Louis native—who lived in Chicago for a time. Did big business there. Came back and agreed, after a 1930 luncheon meeting at the Missouri Athletic Club in downtown St. Louis, to turn over to the Internal Revenue Service certain financial records of Al Capone's.
The O'Hares did nothing halfheartedly.
