History
The site was once Orchard Place, a small farming community. During World War II a Douglas plant there built C-54 military transports, served by an adjoining airfield. In the mid-1940s the field was known as Orchard Field, and the three-letter code ORD still comes from that name.
In 1949 Chicago renamed it O'Hare Airport to honor Edward "Butch" O'Hare, the U.S. Navy's first Medal of Honor recipient of World War II. It was the world's busiest airport by passenger traffic from 1963 to 1998.