When battle lines were drawn in Charlottesville, standing among the white supremacists, neo-Nazis, and Ku Klux Klan members ("some very fine people," according to President Donald Trump) were men brandishing shields bearing the image of an ax bundled with wooden rods—a symbol of fascism.

That weekend's tragic events, which swirled around a "Unite the Right" rally against the city's decision to remove a public Confederate statue, reminded Northwestern University history professor Bill Savage of the disturbing fact that there's a 2,000-year-old Roman pillar on Chicago's lakefront, donated to the city by fascist dictator Benito Mussolini.