Growing up in Springfield, IL (3 hours south of Chicago), most of the pizza served ourside of chains was the ultra thin crunchy square-cut pizza mentioned in the article (or NY-esque Neapolitan slices).

Vic's (rip) Sam's (rip) Gabatoni's Joe's JT Costello's (more recently)

all served delicious crunchy thin crust with heavily spiced sauce cut thin and usually sent out covered in paper. Any bar that didnt serve frozen pizzas served a variation of this thin crust pie.

Notably, Gallina's Pizza and Lucca Pizza were both Neapolitan style.