Part 1, The Black City Summary

It is the late 1880s and Chicago is a big city where people come to gain independence and make it on their own. Thousands of people take the train to Chicago everyday. Thousands leave Chicago every day too, but some are never heard from again. It is a violent city that has a large gray area between morality and vice. It allows things to happen that are not necessarily socially acceptable in other parts of the country. The people are riding on the edge of wickedness in every part of the city. The streets are dirty, and the smell of the slaughterhouse reminds them that the city itself is a slaughterhouse. Some people are slaughtered morally, others literally.

H. H. Holmes disembarks from the train. He savors the smells and the sights that surround him as he...