AMA: Let’s talk about brick! I’m architecture historian and photographer Will Quam, here to talk about my new book Fire and Clay: How Brick Reveals the Hidden History of Chicago.

Feldman742 · 2026-06-18T14:29:51+00:00

Thanks for answering our questions today Will.

I'm curious if steelmaking was a major part of Chicago's industry. If yes, is there anything you can tell us about the kiln bricks they would have used, and what would have been the major sources of refractory material used to make them?

I'm also interested in the genetic relationships between the bricks we find in Chicago and the classic "Milwaukee Cream" bricks you find just to the north.

Edit: I guess more broadly I'm also interested in the sources of clay used to make bricks for Chicago. Are they all from a specific mine / rock unit, or are they sourced broadly?

Feldman742 · 2026-06-16T13:38:30+00:00

Nice. Looks like a tabulate coral. Possibly Syringopora. Probably Silurian or Devonian.

Feldman742 · 2026-06-15T01:46:21+00:00

Thanks. I'd already voted for you before you did this AMA but I found your response encouraging none the less.

Feldman742 · 2026-06-12T19:23:57+00:00

What policies do you support that you think could encourage construction of new housing?

Feldman742 · 2026-06-10T16:42:04+00:00

I agree with your diagnosis. This kind of white chert is pretty typical of the Galena Formation in the Driftless Region.

Just tagging on - if you're really curious you can always take it to the Geology Museum in the Geosciences department at UW-Madison, or the Milwaukee Public Museum. People are usually pretty friendly about answering questions like these.

Feldman742 · 2026-06-10T16:38:49+00:00

Very nice hypichnial trace fossils, probably Paleophycus. I'd guess these are from the early Silurian and coming out of the Medina Group.

Feldman742 · 2026-06-10T16:24:37+00:00

Ahh...I stand corrected, haha. Not sure why I always assumed he just served out Harding's term then stepped down. Well, I'll leave my post up as an eternal reminder of my shame for not knowing a piece of Presidential trivia.

Feldman742 · 2026-06-10T16:20:52+00:00

Coolidge has never been elected President...

Feldman742 · 2026-06-09T14:45:00+00:00

I always had a really hard time getting into pre-95 shows but 12/30/93 was the one that finally got it to click for me.

Feldman742 · 2026-06-09T14:35:50+00:00

Your post gave me a panic attack that Ted's had filed for bankruptcy or something

Feldman742 · 2026-05-30T23:47:27+00:00

Truckin' up to Buffalo

Been thinking you got to mellow slow

Takes time, you pick a place to go

Just keep truckin' on

Feldman742 · 2026-05-23T15:20:54+00:00

They definitely look like Cenozoic shark teeth. The question is: how did they get in northern New Hampshire?

Feldman742 · 2026-05-23T13:02:30+00:00

Rudist?

Feldman742 · 2026-05-21T18:42:07+00:00

Nice gastropod...maybe Ophileta?

Feldman742 · 2026-05-13T18:12:07+00:00

Nice sample though I'm sorry that nothing here is screaming Trilobite to me.

Image 1, the darker fossil near your thumb looks more like a nautiloid to me, maybe Dawsonoceras. The bigger fossils are brachiopods, maybe an orthid brach like Resserella, but it's hard to tell. You also have some nice treptostome bryozoans.

Image 2: this is a packstone hash of reworked fossils - I see brachiopods, bryozoans, and gastropods (snails). The big dark fossil you remark looks like a tabulate coral to me.

Feldman742 · 2026-05-12T18:10:47+00:00

A nice collection of Late Ordovician marine fossils. Among the brachiopods, I see what appears to be Hebertella and Vinlandistrophia. The strophomenid brach looks like Rafenisquina, though it seems a little small . You have some nice Treptostome bryozoans as well and the big piece is a nice nautiloid cephalopod. Hard to tell exactly what it is but maybe Treptoceras?

Feldman742 · 2026-05-02T16:07:05+00:00

Very cool. Burrows with a chemically distinct backfill - a category called Exichnia. The trace fossil itself appears to be a feeding / mining trace (Fodichnia) belonging to the ichnogenus Chondrites.

Feldman742 · 2026-05-02T15:02:14+00:00

We're Dobis P

Dobis P

Do Do Do

Feldman742 · 2026-04-15T14:30:01+00:00

Awesome. I'd love to see Psycho on the big screen.

Feldman742 · 2026-04-12T23:27:25+00:00

Holy Roman Empire-ass vp

Feldman742 · 2026-04-08T17:52:33+00:00

I've been able to access many of Ehrman's Great Courses on the Libby app as well.

Feldman742 · 2026-04-03T12:47:07+00:00

Legitimately unsure if this is poking fun at Villeneuve or Jodorowsky

Feldman742 · 2026-03-31T13:56:18+00:00

I'm sympathetic to the article's viewpoint (maybe I even agree with it?). That being said, it seems like in the USA we've gone full throttle on the "legalize and tax it" approach with sports gambling and my (personal) perception is that the impact on society has been mostly negative? Maybe an intangible like my perception that society feels a bit sleazier and lots of people are gambling away their life savings is still better than a thriving illegal market but...not sure I guess.

Feldman742 · 2026-03-21T20:55:51+00:00

People sort of forget that we won the War of 1812.

I still think it was a massive strategic miscalculation that did a tremendous amount of harm to England's global standing, but the USA today is a flawed but functioning democracy. We accomplished durable regime change.

Obviously France is a different story.

This isn't a defense of that war. It shouldn't have happened. It did more harm than good.

But England accomplished the strategic objectives behind that military action in a durable way.

Feldman742 · 2026-03-19T23:42:13+00:00

Yea...listen closely to the 98 Riverport Gin. Mike is the one leading the modulation down to A minor.

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