Greetings,
I have been told they are the same.....

they are not.

Gloria, if I read UCD's chart from Jon correctly, Hardy Chicago is a stand-alone cultivar with no other synonyms; the closest relatives were ‘Sal’s fig’, ‘Dark Portuguese’, and ‘Abruzzi’ (these last 3 UCD considered to be identical/nearly identical) and another cultivar 'Pied De Bouef.'   Black Ischia was most similar to 'Nero.'  That said, who knows what strains nurseries are actually selling compared to the specimens UCD collected and profiled. 

http://figs4fun.com/Links/FigLink1110.pdf

DNA testing can be... human and chimp share 98.7% of their DNA, but they are different animals. i would trust my taste buds before DNA tests on those figs.

i thought they tasted more like pork. 

They all taste like chicken.