city, Lake county, northeastern Illinois, U.S. North Chicago lies on Lake Michigan (Michigan, Lake), about 35 miles (55 km) north of Chicago. The area was primarily agricultural until the establishment of a wire manufacturing plant in 1891. Other industries soon followed. A strike at a plant in 1937 led to a major U.S. Supreme Court (Supreme Court of the United States) ruling in 1939 (National Labor Relations Board v. Fansteel Metallurgical Corporation) declaring sit-down strikes illegal. Today the city is a centre of pharmaceutical research and production; candy is also produced. North Chicago is the site of Rosalind Franklin University of Medicine and Science and the Great Lakes Naval Training Center (1911). A Veterans Administration hospital is to the south. Inc. 1909. Pop. (1990) 34,978; (2000) 35,918.