White background with dark blue text, light blue silhouette of Chicago (Hancock buidling) with "VM" in red in middle of button.

In 1972 IBM introduced a virtual machine operating system. This button may refer to an IBM convention or event related to this that took place in Chicago at the time.

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Black and green text on white background.

Jane Byrne was the first female mayor of Chicago. Known as a reformer, she lived in the housing project Cabrini-Green to bring attention to the crime rate there. She was also the first mayor to recognize the gay community. In 1981, Dan Goodwin climbed the Hancock Tower dressed as Spider-Man and Mayor Byrne intervened when the Chicago Fire Dept wanted to hose him off the building. He continued to the top, receiving cheers from the crowd of onlookers.

Red silhouetted section of the Chicago skyline with a white heart, red Chicago stars, and text on lower third of button below the image on white background.

This button is possibly a reference to an annual food drive event held by the City of Chicago, benefiting the Greater Chicago Food Depository. The event typically takes place at Thanksgiving. "Sharing It" Day is the largest one-day, indoor food drive and the single largest contributor to the Greater Chicago Food Depository.

Celluloid button with the building in the center and red background. Blue outer edge with white text.

Montgomery Ward & Co. was founded in Chicago in 1872 by Aaron Montgomery Ward. Montgomery Ward became a successful mail order business after many false starts, including its early inventory being destroyed by the Chicago Fire. Montgomery Ward was a direct competitor with Chicago-based Sears. Around the time of this button, the company mailed out three million 4-pound catalogs to its customers.

Black text over a ringing alarm clock illustration on white background, white text on blue background on lower third of button.

This slogan was used by radio and television broadcaster Art Hellyer. Since the mid-1940s, Art Hellyer has been a cornerstone of Chicago broadcasting. He was a television announcer, sports broadcaster, news anchor and feature reporter with WLS-TV (and its predecessor, WBKB-TV). He also spent time with WMAQ-TV & WBBM-TV. He was the deep voice heard over many advertisements. He is probably best known locally for his over 50 years in radio, where his dry, off-beat sense of humor and outspoken ways thrilled fans and infuriated management. Over the years, Art Hellyer had worked for WCFL-AM, WBBM-AM, WJJD-AM, WGN-AM, WAIT-AM, WIND-AM, WMAQ-AM, WLS-AM and WLS-FM. Hellyer's zany wit and "take no prisoners" attitude was a huge hit with listeners, but got him fired frequently. Regardless of his many firings, Hellyer was the #1 rated on-air personality in Chicago four different times, on four different stations, in four different decades.

Black text on yellow background, black on upper and lower third of button.

Donald Rumsfeld was elected to congress in 1962 at age 30. Born in Evanston Illinois,  he represented the 13th district for Illinois in the United States House of Representatives. He was re-elected in '64, '66, and '68.

Michael Jordan sitting on a basketball, yellow textured coloring in background with "It'll Be Sweet 2 Repeat" on the right side.

This button was given out by Chicagoland McDonalds' in support of the Chicago Bulls winning the championship for a second year. In the 1990s, the Bulls won 6 championships.

Image of a white sock with wings with red letters outlined in white and blue going across it and white letters above on a blue background

The 1959 World Series featured the Chicago White Sox versus the Los Angeles Dodgers. Known as the “Go-Go Sox”, they were last in the American League in home runs but led in stolen bases, fielding percentage, and the lowest team ERA. This series marked the first games ever played on the west coast, first game to exceed 90,000 in attendance and more than 400,000 fans. This was also the first game where neither team’s pitcher pitched a complete game. The Sox lost to the Dodgers in a 4-2 game series.

White text on red background with white signature and text on blue lower third.

Edward Kelly  was Mayor during 1933 World's Fair. He oversaw the construction of Soldier Field and banned Nelson Algren's book Never Come Morning from the Chicago Public Library. He was the first of five mayors from the Bridgeport neighborhood of Chicago (including the Daleys). He was known for machine politics and corruption.

Blue text with white background and red arrow pointing upward.

This button references the famous quote, "And now it's on to Chicago and lets win there" from Robert Kennedy's victory speech after winning the California primary and moments before his assassination at the Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles. The button was made for a group of Gene McCarthy campaign staffers who were working to get Bob Kennedy’s supporters to support McCarthy after Kennedy’s assassination.