Louis “Studs” Terkel died in 2008, but today would have been his 100th birthday. Born to Russian-Jewish parents in the Bronx, Terkel spent the bulk of his life in Chicago. He married his wife, Ida in 1939, and the couple remained together until her death in 1999.

Terkel was interested in oral history, and jazz, and very politically outspoken. He was best-known for the jazz column he wrote regularly for the Chicago Sunday Times, and his long-running radio show on WFMT, called The Studs Terkel Show. His contributions to literature, music, the theater, journalism and Chicago won’t soon be forgotten.