Professor Emeritus Dominic A. Pacyga Earns Prestigious Chicago Book Award
The Newberry Library and The Pattis Family Foundation recently announced the winner of the 2026 Pattis Family Foundation Chicago Book Award, which honors books that transform public understanding of Chicago, its history, and its people. This year’s $25,000 prize has been awarded to a book by Dominic A. Pacyga, a professor emeritus of history at Columbia College Chicago, entitled “Clout City: The Rise and Fall of the Chicago Political Machine” (University of Chicago Press, 2025). The book traces the origins of Chicago’s distinctive political system to its eventual collapse.
“Dominic Pacyga’s book takes a deep look into the mechanics of Chicago’s political world dating to 1870 and all of its many complexities,” says Astrida Orle Tantillo, president and librarian of the Newberry. “It’s an engaging story of how the city came to be what it is today.”
Pacyga is the author of several other books, including, most recently, “American Warsaw: The Rise, Fall, and Rebirth of Polish Chicago,” also from the University of Chicago Press. Pacyga grew up in Chicago’s Back of the Yards neighborhood and is also curator of the neighborhood’s Packingtown Museum.
”I am honored to receive the Pattis Family Foundation Chicago Book Award at the Newberry Library,” Pacyga says. "It is a great tribute to be recognized by the foundation and by the Newberry Library with which I have had a long and ongoing relationship. The Newberry proved vital for my early success as an historian and has continued to provide me with an important base for my work. Both the Pattis Family Foundation and the Newberry Library are dedicated to the study of what Norman Mailer called ‘the great American City,’ Chicago.”
The presentation of the 2026 Pattis Family Foundation Chicago Book Award will take place at a free public event at the Newberry Library in Chicago on Saturday, September 19, 2026, from 1 ro 3 p.m., where honorees will be recognized and speak about their work. More details about the event will be made available at www.newberry.org soon.
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