Every now and then, for the more than 80 years it has stood outside Soldier Field on Burnham Harbor, the Balbo monument — a slender, 18-foot tall column of greenish breccia rock, perched at the foot of the bike path — has unnerved many Chicagoans. That is, the ones who knew its history. It was a gift to Chicago from fascist dictator Benito Mussolini, erected in 1934 to commemorate a celebrated trans-Atlantic flight of 24 11-ton seaplanes from Rome to Chicago. The namesake of the monument was the leader of that voyage, General Italo Balbo, an Italian aviator who had...