Ida B. Wells was born July 16, 1862 in Holly Springs, Mississippi to enslaved parents James Wells and Elizabeth Warrenton shortly before the Emancipation Proclamation. She went on to become a journalist, newspaper editor, sociologist, suffragist and an early leader in the Civil Rights Movement. Many Chicagoans are not aware that Ida came to Chicago because of the 1893 World’s Columbian Exposition and published a pamphlet entitled, The Reason Why the Colored American Is Not in the World's Columbian Exposition. Both Frederick Douglass and Ida B. Wells distributed the pamphlet outside the Haitian Pavilion at the Chicago World’s Fair and it was estimated that through their efforts over 20,000 northerners were made brutally aware of the lynchings and other persecutions still be suffered by the African-Americans in the South.  Interestingly, the Haitian Pavilion was the only place in the Columbian Exposition where Caucasians and African-Americans could dine together without persecution. She started working for Chicago’s first African-American Newspaper, The Chicago Conservator, in 1893 and married it’s owner and attorney Ferdinand Lee Barnett on June 27, 1895.  Mr. Barnett sold the newspaper to his new wife and she continued to publish it until 1914. [caption id="attachment_755" align="alignright" width="225"] The Barnett Residence from 1919 to 1930[/caption] The house that the Barnett’s lived in from 1919 to 1930 is located at 3624 S. Dr. Martin Luther King Drive and was designated a Chicago Landmark on October 2, 1995.  It became a National Historic Landmark on May 30, 1974. Ida Bell Wells Barnett passed away after a very short illness on March 25, 1931 and the following obituary appeared in the Chicago Tribune on that very same date:

Mrs. Ida Barnett, Colored Leader, 62, Dies Suddenly

Mrs. Ida B. Wells Barnett, for many years a recognized leader of the Negro race in efforts to obtain social and economic equality in the United States, died last night at the Daily hospital after an illness of only two days. She was 62 years old. Mrs. Barnett came to Chicago in 1893. Soon afterward she married Attorney F.L. Barnett.  About 1890 she had gone to England to lecture on lynching in the South.  She was one of the principal organizers of the Negro Fellowship Club at 3005 South State Street, a gathering place for colored youth.  In 1917 she went to Washington to present to the President and Congress a memorial of the National Equal Rights League asking that lynching be made a crime under federal law and to protest against segregation of Negro workers in government service. Besides her husband, Mrs. Wells Barnett is survived by four children.  The family home is at 328 East Garfield Boulevard.

Both Ida and her husband, Ferdinand, are buried in Chicago's historic Oakwoods Cemetery. Happy 153^rd Birthday to Mrs. Ida Bell Wells Burnett!   Find Chicago History The Stranger Side on FACEBOOK Find Ray Johnson on Twitter and Google+

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I grew up in Cicero, Illinois and spent many days at the open houses at the Hawthorne Works location of the Western Electric Company.  I remember how huge the place was but didn't realize how big it really was.  Turns out that if you lived in or around Cicero in the early part of the 20th Century you or someone you knew worked for Western Electric.  Rather sad how the only thing remaining is a single tower set back near a shopping mall. Of course many Chicagoans know that today is the 100th Anniversary of the tragedy that claimed the lives of 844 people who were mostly families of Western Electric employees headed to Michigan City for a company picnic.  The ship capsized in the dock and the rest is really history. My wife's great uncle retired from Western Electric and among his prized possessions were a copy of the company Newsletter that was published after the disaster with the names of the victims and a postcard of the Eastland reissued by the now defunct Cicero Historical Society. With all of the recently discovered video footage and photographs of the horrors of the Eastland, I thought it would be nice to post a photo of the ship in happier times. [caption id="attachment_764" align="alignleft" width="300"] The S.S. Eastland in Happier Times[/caption] [caption id="attachment_765" align="alignright" width="300"] Back of re-issued Eastland Postcard[/caption] Find Chicago History The Stranger Side on FACEBOOK Find Ray Johnson on Twitter and Google+

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This Saturday, August 8, 2015, will be the fifth in a series of fundraisers by the North Riverside Historical Society to raise money to restore the neon sign from the Melody Mill Ballroom which was one of the last remaining ballrooms from the Big Band Era. The origin of the Melody Mill is filled with conflicting stories and controversy.  According to The Diamond Anniversary Edition Commemorative Book of Village History, the Melody Mill was purchased by Benjamin Lejcar Sr. in 1929 from the Brush Brick Company of Lyons after a small fire damaged the back portion of the property.  A very good article entitled Remembering the moonlightFifty years of memories at North Riverside's ballroom written by local historical Chris Stach references a December 8, 1930 and a December 11, 1930 Riverside News article that describes an arson that nearly destroyed the building.  The December 11^th article mentions the owners’ names as Anton Bezchleba and Joseph Skaykes. I had also found an article in the Chicago Tribune of September 29, 1932 that described a dynamite bomb being thrown from a speeding auto into the lobby of the ‘Melody Mills, a taxi dance hall and sports emporium’.  Otto Martinek, the North Riverside Police Chief, stated that the operator of the dance hall was Anton Beschleba and that he believed that rival dance halls were responsible for the bombing. [caption id="attachment_773" align="alignright" width="300"] Melody Mill, Diamond Anniversary Edition Commemorative Book of Village History[/caption] Regardless of the beginnings, Benjamin Lejcar Sr., his wife Elsie and sons Ben Jr. and Clarence were responsible for the great success of the Melody Mill for almost 6 decades.  The last dance was held on April 29, 1984.  The estimates of the attendance of the last dance range from 3,751 to 5,700.  This was pretty spectacular since the average attendance was about 500. During the heyday of the Melody Mill, they would draw such big band greats as Stan Kenton, Jimmy Dorsey and Tommy Dorsey while about 3,000 young dancers would stroll across the 15,000 square foot dance floor. In addition to “living” dancers there are two versions of a phantom dancer making an appearance at the dance hall. One version of the story is supposed to have taken place in 1934 and involves a dancer named “Wally” who danced with a blond woman in a white gown and while driving her home she asks to be dropped off at Woodlawn Cemetery.  Wally returns to check on her at her mother’s residence and the woman tells Wally that the girl has been dead for three years. Another story is similar but was supposed to have occurred in 1933 but involved a dark haired girl in a “flapper-style” dress common in the roaring ‘20s.  This girl, however, asks to be dropped off at Jewish Waldheim Cemetery.  I have also heard some versions that she goes as far as Forest Home. [caption id="attachment_774" align="alignleft" width="300"] Melody Mill Postcard[/caption] Both stories sound strikingly similar to the phantom hitchhiking dancer known as “Resurrection Mary”.  Mary is a blond in a white dress who danced at the Liberty Grove Hall and Ballroom at 4615 S. Mozart in Chicago or the still extant Willowbrook Ballroom in Willow Springs.  Mary asks to be dropped at Resurrection Cemetery in Justice, IL. Either way, you really can’t have a legit ballroom without a dancing, hitchhiking ghost. The Village of North Riverside purchased the property in 1984 and found that it would have been too costly to bring the building up to code in order to turn it into a multi-use recreational building and the building had to be torn down to make room for the current Villiage Commons at the same address of the old ballroom at 2401 S. Des Plaines Avenue in North Riverside. The Melody Mill neon sign was eventually donated to the North Riverside Historical Society and they have been looking to raise the estimated $24,000 needed to restore the sign to its former glory. I spoke with Bryant Rouleau, Village of North Riverside Program Coordinator and Historical Society member.  Bryant told me that they have changed the theme of the dance every year and this year they have decided to honor the ballroom’s phantom dancers with a “Ghost Ball” [caption id="attachment_775" align="alignright" width="300"] The Melody Mill sign is in need of $24,000 worth of restoration[/caption] The Steve Cooper Orchestra will be playing a wide selection of big band music including “Moonlight on Melody Mill” which has its own bit of controversy.  Ben Sr., according to Stach’s article claimed to have written the song while family members of songwriter, Henry G. Cramer, claim he was the author. The fundraiser ball will be held on Saturday, August 8, 2015 from 4:00pm to 7:00pm at the Village Commons, 2401 S. Des Plaines Avenue in North Riverside.  Tickets are $30.00 each and include beer, wine, appetizers, music and dancing. Tickets can be purchased in person at the Village Commons   Dress code ranges from formal to comfortable dance clothes.  For further questions call (630)258-7099   Find Chicago History The Stranger Side on FACEBOOK Find Ray Johnson on Twitter and Google+

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You might be wondering why a history blogger is venturing into the crazy world of Donald Trump, Hillary Clinton and the reality show of the 2016 presidential race.  Well to be more specific, I am actually a Chicago history blogger.  Anyone who has studied the history of Chicago has also been a student of the ruthless, cutthroat, immoral and many times corrupt environment of Chicago politics which is a heck of a lesson in politics as a whole. In the interest of full disclosure I do not truly identify with either the Republican or Democratic Party although my voting has leaned very strongly to the Republican.  I am truly, as many Americans are now, interested more in who is best for the country and not necessarily what party they belong to.  I also have functioned as an election judge for the past 5 years and am registered as a republican judge but only because you are not allowed to act as an independent judge or any other party judge for that matter. So why do I have a strong suspicion that Donald Trump is secretly working for the Democratic Party? Reason One:  Distraction If you recall, Hillary Clinton was under serious negative pressure from the media.  She was under scrutiny for a myriad of issues from Benghazi, her private email server, the Clinton Foundation and foreign government donations, and questions about her fundraising to name a few. [caption id="attachment_779" align="alignright" width="300"] Trump has been a great distraction for Hillary[/caption] Then along comes Trump.  Cascading down the escalator on June 16, 2015 to announce that he is running for the presidency as a republican, and oh yeah to mention how Mexico is sending drug dealers and rapists across the border! At that moment in time both the conventional media and social media said, “Hillary who?” Let’s face it. Trump, while supposedly leading in the polls, is a train wreck.  You don’t really want to stare but you just can’t look away.  While he does say out loud what many people are thinking he says it in a way to create controversy and web site views and ultimately it takes a huge amount of pressure and scrutiny off of Hillary. In addition he has made a concerted effort to alienate the Hispanic as well as the female population through insensitive although more than likely well planned inflammatory comments and has done that as a republican. (Not surprisingly the two market segments that republicans have been trying to win over Reason Two:  The Possible Accidental Candidate I am not a big believer in polls but they do tend to influence the decisions of the voters and according to many of them Trump, at least before the first republican primary debate, was the leading republican candidate.  Many people I have spoken with who are voters both democratic and republican are becoming more and more convinced that while he is a leader in the polls he is not taking his run seriously and do not see him as a serious candidate.  What that means is that if the RNC by some miracle or tragedy gives Trump “the nod” then Hillary will almost certainly beat Trump in the general election. Reason Three:  Divide and Conquer Let’s say that Trump doesn’t receive the republican nomination.  He has already said during the first debate that he cannot guarantee that he will not run as an independent.  He was the only candidate of the ten that wouldn’t make that guarantee.  I appreciate his honesty but what does that mean? What it means is that the republicans that do believe in Donald Trump for president will pull votes away from the republican nominee thereby splitting the votes and also virtually guarantee a Hillary Clinton victory.  (That applies to any of the republican hopefuls who could run as independents in the general election and not only Donald Trump) Conclusion: Americans are Smarter than the Politicians Think If Donald Trump is not a political ploy or plant then Hillary must just be the luckiest candidate in recent history and can consider this an early Christmas present.   If Donald gets the nomination, Hillary is in.  If Donald doesn’t get the nomination and runs as an independent then Hillary is in. But it doesn’t have to be that way.  I have faith in the voters and our system.  I believe that Americans are much smarter than the politicians give us credit for.  Don’t fall for the political games that Chicagoans and those that follow Chicago politics are so familiar with. In 2016 vote for who you truly believe will help our country and put the interests of the American people over their own personal interests and economic gains.  This applies to all voters whether you consider yourself a republican, democrat, independent or any other party affiliation.  And finally, make sure that you actually vote.  One other trick that politicians use to gain or remain in power is the power of apathy.   Find Chicago History The Stranger Side on FACEBOOK Find Ray Johnson on Twitter and Google+

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Dark History Con is a convention showcasing the darker side of history and Brian Ward, its creator, makes no apologies. “For as long as I can remember, I have been fascinated with ‘Dark History’; Killers, mobsters, tragic events. My hobby has been to research these things and visit sites related to them. I hope to educate a little about the events along the way.” The convention is not all about the morbid side of history but rather the side of history that many would like to bury as Ward explains: “The Dark History Con is an annual event showcasing the darker side of history. Crime, gangsters, serial killers, spree killers, assassinations, public enemies, women's suffrage, the civil rights struggles, Native massacres, tragic events, anything not covered in ‘history books’.” [caption id="attachment_783" align="alignright" width="300"] Brian Ward inspecting John Dillinger documents[/caption] There are many people out there who would say that some parts of history should be forgotten or that writing books, lecturing or holding conventions where murderers are talked about is somehow glorifying them or what they have done but that is not the intent according to Ward. ” I would like to state that I do not intend to glorify any perpetrators of crime, only educate people as to what they did. I feel this "history" is just as important as any other. I always try to visit sites related to any victims as well and to show them the proper respect” While the convention may not be for everyone, most people have heard the phrase that those who do not study history are doomed to repeat it. The Holocaust was something that I am sure the world would love to forget but to do so would be a great tragedy.  While it was arguably the most evil, heinous and brutal chapter in human history the United States Holocaust Memorial and Museum in Washington D.C. is dedicated to telling the story. From their website:  “Today we face an alarming rise in Holocaust denial and antisemitism—even in the very lands where the Holocaust happened—as well as genocide and threats of genocide in other parts of the world.” Ward echoes the same sentiment.  “Lest we forget, it is the victims of these events that are the most important to remember. We do not glorify any of these people or events. They are however part of our history, a part that is very important to remember and learn from.” Chicago, like many large cities has had its share of dark history such as the Fort Dearborn Massacre, the Great Chicago Fire, Haymarket riots, Iroquois Theatre fire, gangsters, madams, and serial killers. The Dark History Con is taking place this year in Champaign, Illinois at the Fluid Event Center on September 19^th and 20^th. Tickets for the event are $5.00 for a daily pass and $8.00 for the weekend. If you would like more information on Dark History Con or purchase tickets, you can go to their website DarkHistoryCon.com and if you would like to contact Brian Ward you can do so at darkhistorycon@gmail.com     Find Chicago History The Stranger Side on FACEBOOK Find Ray Johnson on Twitter and Google+

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This year has pop culture and trivia geeks chomping at the bit.  October 21, 2015 is the date that Doc sends Marty McFly forward in time 30 years.  Marty goes forward in time to stop his son, Marty Jr. from participating in a robbery and then things get crazy. [caption id="attachment_790" align="alignright" width="300"] October 21, 2015 Marty McFly is set to make an appearance[/caption] There have been a number of hoaxes over the last few years that taut various dates as the future date and you can read about those on Snopes. Convinced through careful and painstaking research (wasn’t really that hard) that October 21, 2015 was the actual date the wheels started turning. When you are a history geek your head is usually full of names, dates and places.  Sometimes those details converge unexpectedly and you end up with research projects or even articles where different players or events in history converge. I knew that October 21^st had some significance in my head and then it dawned on me because I am a serious 1893 World’s Columbian Exposition geek.  The Expo which became known as the “White City” was a world’s fair held in Chicago from May 1, 1893 until October 30, 1893 and was conceived to honor the 400^th anniversary of Christopher Columbus discovering the “New World”.  While the Expo opened a year too late (should have been 1892), the dedication ceremonies were held on October 21^st of the previous year. [caption id="attachment_789" align="alignleft" width="150"] Christopher Columbus[/caption]   Why were the dedication ceremonies held on October 21^st when everyone knows that October 12^th is when we celebrate Columbus Day? Historians agree that 12 October 1492 was the date that Columbus stated in his journal that he first sighted and visited what many believe to be the Island of San Salvador in the District of the Bahamas.   The issue is that Columbus was using the Julian Calendar and we currently use the Gregorian Calendar which after conversion would place the correct date as October 21^st and therefore the date of the dedication ceremonies of the Columbian Exposition. Did the screenplay writer, Bob Gale, or the director of Back to the Future II, Robert Zemeckis, use the date of October 21^st to send a shout out from one explorer, Marty McFly, to another great historic explorer? I supposed only they could answer that question and who knows maybe they will see this article and help solve a mystery. On a side note, I noticed that Chicago-born director Robert Zemeckis also has the Cubs winning the World Series this year!  There is always hope! [caption id="attachment_791" align="aligncenter" width="850"] Cubs win World Series in 2015[/caption] Find Chicago History The Stranger Side on FACEBOOK Find Ray Johnson on Twitter and Google+

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At first I thought that it wouldn’t be fair that I should be writing a review of Assassination Theater.  After all I love history and I am a former criminal investigator so it was right up my alley.  I thought it would be rather like a Republican doing a review of the Republican National Convention but then I thought who better to be able to critique such a novel approach to presenting Hillel Levin’s and retired FBI agent Zach Shelton’s theories regarding the perpetrators of the assassination of arguably one of our most beloved presidents. Hillel Levin, the playwright, is an investigative reporter and has written extensively about organized crime to include two books, When Corruption was King and In with The Devil.  He also has written two major articles on The Outfit for Playboy Magazine, “Boosting the Big Tuna”(2007) and “How the Outfit Killed JFK” (2010). Mr. Levin made himself available to the audience both before and after the production and I took the opportunity to speak with him briefly before the production.  I had attended grade school with the nephew of mob boss, Tony Accardo who is a prominent figure in the production as well as conducting some research on another author’s project that intersects Levin’s work albeit peripherally.  He was extremely gracious, very easy to speak with you could tell instantly how much he truly is dedicated to sharing this view of the assassination with his audiences. [caption id="attachment_798" align="alignleft" width="300"] Author and playwright, Hillel Levin, speaks with audience members[/caption] The venue was very intimate being a theater on the second floor of the Museum of Broadcast Communications at 360 N. State Street.  I had not been to the Museum in over 20 years and this was a new location for me.  The stage was small but ample for 4 actors and minimal scenery and props.  The majority of the scenery was taken care of by three large projection or television screens that would show photos of persons of interest based on where the story was at the time. Let’s just say that the story was the primary focus of the performance and quite a story it was.  For approximately 2 ½ hours with a 10 minute or so intermission audience members became part of the JFK investigation.  By that I mean that audience members (or at least I) felt like they were detectives who were being brought up to speed on a long term investigation that they were just now becoming a part of. As a history geek and a lover of a good conspiracy story, I was amazed not only of the acting of Michael Joseph Mitchell but of the seemingly endless amount of detail that he had to have memorized before even thinking about trying to portray Hillel Levin who was in the audience as well (no pressure).  Since I don’t really know Hillel Levin personally, I can’t speculate as to how well he portrayed him but I can say that I forgot that he was playing a part and truly started believing that he was the writer. Mark Ulrich, who played Levin’s retired FBI associate, Zack Shelton, played a very believable investigator.  He reminded me of about half a dozen real-life detectives that I had worked with. I also cannot say enough about the versatility of actors Ryan Kitley and Martin Yurek.  I actually lost track of the number of characters that they played throughout the performance ranging in age from 20 to 90 years old with no makeup and only very slight costume changes which might include a set of glasses or a hat!  Some of the characters they jumped in and out of included Lyndon Johnson, Robert Kennedy, J. Edgar Hoover, Senator Arlen Specter, Supreme Court Justice Earl Warren, Lee Harvey Oswald, Jack Ruby, and a plethora of agents, cops, hoods and henchmen. The play is not for everyone however.   If you have difficulty keeping up with a fast paced story with a multitude of interconnected characters then you might want to wait until there is a written version of the story first or at the very least read a couple other books or watch a couple of other documentaries on the JFK assassination so you can keep up with the story. From the opening scene the audience is bombarded (in a good way) with names, dates, places, people, groups, organizations, military units, government agencies, law enforcement units, cops, crooks, hit-men, politicians, doctors, photos, documents and a partridge in a pear tree! [caption id="attachment_799" align="alignright" width="231"] A sketch of President Kennedy's head wound which conflicts with other documents.[/caption] And if that is not challenging enough for a playwright, actor and especially a director (Kevin Christopher Fox did an amazing job!) they managed to weave it all together in order to show very convincingly that major players in organized crime including Chicago’s own Tony Accardo and Sam Giancana had the motive, means and opportunity to commit and get away with the most high profile murder to hit the nation since the assassination of Abraham Lincoln. The only thing that detracted from the telling of the story, which may or may not be in control of the production itself, was the lack of adequate ventilation.  At times the warm temperature and lack of air flow became a little bothersome. I would highly recommend this production to anyone with a love of American history or conspiracy theories but really believe that all Americans at least need to familiarize themselves with the evidence presented because this is no work of fiction. The show runs through November 7^th at the Museum of Broadcast Communications at 360 N. State Street and more information is available at the Assassination Theater Website.   Find Chicago History The Stranger Side on FACEBOOK Find Ray Johnson on Twitter and Google+

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I was actually born in 1966 the same year as the Batman TV series starring Adam West and Burt Ward started.  I used to look forward to the series after it came into syndication and while I did think that Catwoman was pretty cool, my first celebrity crush was Yvonne Craig.  I even remembered her name to this day which helped me out in some Trivial Pursuit games. I don’t know what it was about her.  I think it was that she seemed so kind and dainty and then when she put on the Batgirl costume it became obvious that she could take care of herself.  I did feel that even when she was helping Batman and Robin and fighting crime there was still a bit of vulnerability about her and let’s not even get into my jealousy over the fact that Robin seemed to have a bit of a crush on her. Of course there was more to Yvonne than Batgirl, she co-starred with many Hollywood Stars including Elvis Presley in It Happened at the World’s Fair and Kissin Cousins. She lived quite a full and blessed life even after Hollywood with a career in real estate, world traveling with her husband, Kenneth Aldrich, and being very active in philanthropic circles. My regret is that I never had the opportunity to meet her.  She passed quietly with family after a 2 year battle with breast cancer. You can read more about Yvonne on her official website including a word from her family as well as her official obituary.   Find Chicago History The Stranger Side on FACEBOOK Find Ray Johnson on Twitter and Google+

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A number of colored painted panels from the Hooden Palace of the Japanese Exhibit at the 1893 World’s Columbian Exposition were recently discovered by the Chicago Park District in a storage area. Following the Columbian Exposition or “The White City” as it became known, the nation of Japan gifted it’s Hooden Palace Exhibit to the City of Chicago to have and hold forever.   The Japanese exhibit was located on Wooded Island in Jackson Park and was located in what is now the Osaka Garden or “Garden of The Pheonix” [caption id="attachment_808" align="alignleft" width="300"] The Ho-den Palace as it stood in 1893 on Wooded Island, Jackson Park[/caption] Unfortunately, after a tragic fire (arson) in 1945, most if not all of the Palace was believed to be destroyed except for four hand carved transom panels which were re-discovered in 1973 and are now restored and displayed at the Art Institute in Chicago. [caption id="attachment_161" align="alignleft" width="300"] Pheonix Transom Panels at the Art Institute[/caption] That was until earlier this year when the Chicago Park District discovered the painted panels which were originally thought to have dated from the 1933 Fair. Within the last couple months I was researching the Cahokia Courthouse which stood on Wooded Island and I had met with Julia Bachrach at the Chicago Park District Special Collections.  We had to enter one of the storerooms where pictures were stored.  She knows how much I love the history of the Columbian Exposition and made me swear to secrecy when she allowed me into the archives and I saw the panels!  (I kept my promise Julia!) [caption id="attachment_810" align="alignleft" width="300"] The Panels as C.D. Arnold captured in his 1893 photography[/caption] What a great find and I can’t wait until the Art Institute has the opportunity to restore the panels and put them back on public display.  They are amazing now and I can’t wait to see them again!   Find Chicago History The Stranger Side on FACEBOOK Find Ray Johnson on Twitter and Google+

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On August 27, 1922 the legend of Peabody’s Tomb began.  Many people may not know the legend by name but if you grew up on the west side of Chicago or in the near west suburbs you might have heard about the old mansion and estate that high school kids would sneak into late at night.  The story was always the same.  A group of adventurous kids would sneak onto the property in an effort to locate the final resting place of a rich old guy who was buried on the property.  Some say that the old guy was buried with his gold.  Others say that if you find the chapel that housed his body you would see the guy in a see-through casket floating in oil.  The trick was you had to avoid the “monks” who were patrolling the estate looking for trespassers.  If the monks caught you, you would be given the choice of having the police called and being arrested for trespassing or you could kneel on rice or broomsticks while saying prayers for forgiveness until the monks released you. The legendary estate did and still does exist as the Mayslake Peabody Estate and the “old rich guy” refers to Chicago coal baron, Francis Stuyvesant Peabody. Francis Stuyvesant Peabody was born in Chicago to Francis B. Peabody and his wife Harriet in July of 1859 in the family home at Rush and Erie Streets.  His father Francis B., an attorney, had just settled in Chicago from Maine two years earlier. [caption id="attachment_817" align="alignleft" width="200"] Francis Stuyvesant Peabody, Photograph provided by Mayslake Peabody Estate/Forest Preserve of DuPage County.[/caption] Francis S. eventually graduated from Yale in the class of 1881 and made his way back to Chicago where he worked as a messenger boy in the Merchants’ Loan and Trust Company.  He became interested in the coal business and 2 years later he formed Peabody, Daniels & Co.  Daniels later disposed of his interest in the company and it became Peabody & Co. and was later incorporated. By 1894, Francis S. had grown his business to gross sales of $10,000,000 annually. Francis S. married May Henderson on November 23, 1887. May was the step daughter of John H. McAvoy, Board of Trade operator and founder and president of the McAvoy Brewing Company. Francis and May had two children; Stuyvesant “Jack” Peabody born on August 7, 1888 and May, born April 28, 1891. [caption id="attachment_818" align="alignright" width="212"] F.S. Peabody’s daughter, May and son, Stuyvesant “Jack” Peabody, Photograph provided by Mayslake Peabody Estate/Forest Preserve of DuPage County.[/caption] Mrs. Peabody died of Typhoid fever while travelling in the company of one of her best friends, Mrs. Florence Clark. She died on November 27, 1906 in Nice, France approximately one week after contracting the disease. Her daughter May was 15 ½ and her son Jack was 18.  Both of the children were away at school at the time. In 1908, Francis met Ms. Marian Bryant while on a trip in Europe and married her in 1909. F.S. Peabody was a great businessman, an avid sportsman, and active in politics and humanitarian causes.  He lost a campaign for Cook County Sheriff in 1894 and had to remove himself from consideration as the democratic nominee for the U.S. Senate because of business concerns.  He was a strong supporter of the Salvation Army during World War I and was awarded the degree of L.H.D. doctor of humane letters by the Temple University of Philadelphia as well as being decorated by the King of Italy. From 1919 on, he concentrated on what was to be his retirement estate in Hinsdale (now Oak Brook) IL.  He acquired 848 acres of land from various land owners in the area and hired the architect, Benjamin Marshall to design what would eventually become a 39 room Tudor-Style Mansion at a cost of about $750,000. This country estate, which he named “Mayslake Farm”, became the premier show farm in the nation.  It included two lakes, one of which he named Mayslake after his first wife and daughter, 60 buildings, elaborate stables and an outdoor arena. He would invite many socialites to join him on drag hunts on the property. A drag hunt was a more humane way of fox hunting whereby a carcass or pelt of an animal was drug behind a horse and the dogs set loose to catch the scent of the drag rather than a live animal. After one particular hunt on August 27, 1922, Mr. Peabody was missing.  A search started immediately and the body of Mr. Peabody was found by the superintendent of the estate, Albert E. Cox.  Mr. Peabody was lying beside his favorite horse, Dunbar, about 200 yards from the residence.  Mr. Peabody was taken to the residence and physicians were summoned.  Later it was determined that Mr. Peabody did not fall from the horse but dismounted and collapsed of an apparent heart attack.   He had no history of heart disease and was in very good health. The family did not wish to reside there any longer and the property was sold to the Franciscan Province of the Sacred Heart, Order of Friars Minor in 1924 at a highly discounted price of $450,000.   The family commissioned the Friars to build a monument to Francis Peabody.  It would be a replica of the Portiuncula Chapel in Assisi, Italy, which takes its name from the “little portion” of land where St. Francis of Assisi received his call to serve the poor.  The monument was originally located on the south side of May’s lake near the spot where Francis Peabody had died.  The Franciscans converted to mansion to a retreat home and it became a popular spiritual respite from 1925 to 1991 with over 250,000 people spending weekends reflecting on biblical applications to life’s difficulties. [caption id="attachment_816" align="alignleft" width="168"] The Chapel that once marked the place of death of Francis S. Peabody is now on the north side of the estate.[/caption] Eventually the friars sold off portions of the land to local real estate developers and the chapel, along with Mr. Peabody’s remains, had to be relocated to the northeast side of the estate. In 1990, the Franciscans announced that they were going to sell their remaining acreage, which included Mayslake Hall, to a real estate developer who planned to raze the buildings and replace them with luxury homes.  A massive campaign was undertaken which resulted in a referendum that enabled the Du Page County Forest Preserve District to purchase the property in 1992. I had the opportunity to speak to both people who swear they have been chased by the monks and a monk (more correctly Franciscan Brother of the Order of Friars Minor) who used to reside on the grounds in the early 1970s.  The brother told me that they were not usually allowed on the grounds at night because they didn’t want to be responsible for the legend’s longevity.  There was one incident, however, that still brings a smile to his face. On October 4, 1971, the Feast of St. Francis, they were preparing the chapel for a midnight mass by lighting candles because there was no electricity in the chapel.  It was about 11:00pm and they turned to leave.  Just then they were confronted by a group of teenagers who immediately turned and ran screaming, “We’re sorry!  We just wanted to see it! Please don’t hurt us!”  He said they laugh about it to this day. The grave of Mr. Peabody no longer exists on the property and was transferred to Queen of Heaven Cemetery in Hillside but his estate house is alive and well.  In fact the house is going through a great restoration and the Forest Preserve District is always looking for donors.  There are tours at the house every Wednesday and Saturday.  There is also an exhibit called “Unrest and Relaxation: A Look into 1915” in honor of it being the 100^th Anniversary of the Forest Preserve District of DuPage County. You can find more history of Mayslake as well as a detailed list of events and tours on their website.   Find Chicago History The Stranger Side on FACEBOOK Find Ray Johnson on Twitter and Google+

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Charles Ford Heath is a name that few remember when discussing the “Crime of the Century” On May 21, 1924, 14 year old Bobby Franks did not come home from the Harvard School for Boys in Chicago’s elite Kenwood Neighborhood. [caption id="attachment_830" align="alignleft" width="217"] Bobby Franks with his father Jacob Franks[/caption] Nathan Leopold, 19 and Richard Loeb, 18 were extremely intelligent sons of wealthy Chicagoans and both were pursuing post graduate work at the University of Chicago.  They became inseparable friends and Loeb believed that wealthy, intelligent people were above the law.  Loeb believed that they could commit the “perfect crime” and convinced Leopold that they could get away with it. After kidnapping young Bobby Franks, actually a second cousin to Loeb, they beat him strangled him and left his body in a culvert near Wolf Lake close to the Indiana border. They had sent a typed ransom note to Bobby’s father, Jacob Franks, using the alias George Johnson but young Bobby’s body was found by a construction worker before they could extort $10,000 from the Franks family. The hunt for “George Johnson” was underway and they police had put together a likely description of the culprit based on the educated style of prose used in the ransom letter. The police received an anonymous letter from a person claiming to be the killer of Bobby Franks that said he planned on killing himself.  Chief of Police Collins then issued the order to keep all attempted suicides under surveillance and that is where 35 year old druggist Charles Heath enters the scene. Charles was at Mercy Hospital after his wife, Anna Vetter, found him in a stupor in the bedroom of their home at 6251 Harper Avenue with mercury and Veronal (barbital) pills by his side.  This was only two days after the disappearance of Bobby Franks. Charles and Anna had been married since April 17, 1913.  Anna had one daughter, Marian, who was 16 years old from a previous marriage and they had one daughter together, Charlotte, who was 8 years old. Charles had lost his job on the same day that Bobby Franks disappeared and his wife had explained that he had not been in the best of health since he went bankrupt two years ago and lost the druggist business he had at 1524 E. 64^th St. Police stationed themselves at Charles’ bed at Mercy Hospital and his wife believed that they had already come down pretty hard on her husband because their home was only one block away from the drug store that the kidnappers had told Jacob Franks to proceed to with the ransom money. [caption id="attachment_831" align="alignright" width="300"] Mercy Hospital in 1910 where Charles Heath escaped the police[/caption] Police were shocked when they discovered that even though he was under surveillance he had somehow left Mercy Hospital undetected. On Tuesday May 27^th, Charles Heath checked into the Coker’s Hotel in Louisville, Kentucky.  He had a cousin in Louisville named C.C. Krause.  He showed up at Krause’s house at 2620 Portland Street and told him that he sold his business in Chicago and that he was there looking for a job.  Krause said he seemed like he was in good spirits and left his house on Tuesday night at about 10:30pm to return to the hotel. When he checked into the hotel he told the clerk that he had to leave Chicago because he was beaten up by a group of men due to the fact that he was named in the newspaper as a dead ringer for the killer of the Franks boy. On the Morning of the 28^th a maid entered Heath’s room saw him motionless in bed but presumed him asleep.  She did not return until the next morning where she found him in the same position and called the authorities.  The police transported him to Louisville City Hospital where he was kept under surveillance.  He had taken another dose of Veronal and was alive but unresponsive.   Newspaper clippings of the Franks case with his name listed as a suspect were found in his pockets.  There was also a note. [caption id="attachment_832" align="alignright" width="300"] Louisville City Hospital where Charles Heath Died[/caption] “Please notify Mrs. C.F. Heath, 6251 Harper Ave. Chicago.  Please give me full Masonic rites.  Tell them that I will not be with them anymore.” While police officers waited at Charles’ bedside in Louisville for him to regain consciousness, Nathan Leopold was sitting in Chicago talking to police about a pair of glasses that were found with the Franks body.  Only three people in Chicago were sold glasses with a very special hinge mechanism and one of them was Nathan Leopold. Richard Loeb was the first to confess blaming Leopold for everything but eventually both came clean and the “Trial of the Century” was in motion. Tragically, at the same time the confessions were taking place in Chicago a young druggist was dying in Kentucky.  On June 1, 1924 Charles Heath died at the City Hospital in Louisville Kentucky thinking that he was the main suspect in a child murder and not one newspaper covered the story of his death. [caption id="attachment_833" align="alignleft" width="300"] Death Record of Charles Ford Heath[/caption] Chicago had their killers and a young druggist’s widow and mother of two moved back to Porter County Indiana to live with her family.       Find Chicago History The Stranger Side on FACEBOOK Find Ray Johnson on Twitter and Google+

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The city of Chicago was preparing to close out the 1893 World’s Columbian Exposition on October 30, 1893 with pomp and pageantry but it would ultimately end more akin to a funeral. Patrick Eugene Prendergast was a man of grand dreams, small means and even grander delusions.  By today’s standards he would have been more than likely termed a paranoid schizophrenic but in 1893 simply a lunatic.  He worked as a newspaper distributor but had delusions that because he supported (unofficially) Mayor Harrison’s election that the mayor would elect to give him the position of corporate counsel and would more than likely do so before the end of the World’s Fair in Chicago. [caption id="attachment_841" align="alignleft" width="227"] Mayor Carter Harrison Sr.[/caption] As would become evident at his later trial, Prendergast had a number of issues that consumed his every thought.  A single tax system, the danger of ungraded railroad crossings and of course his inevitable elevation of position from being in charge of newsboys to becoming the head attorney for the city of Chicago (Prendergast did not have a law degree). At 8:00pm on October 28, 1893, Prendergast walked to the Mayor’s house at 231 Ashland Avenue with a pistol and what he believed would be the support of the Catholic Church and the will of the people of Chicago.  Prendergast was to be their savior (much like Jesus Christ as was evident from some of his rambling writings).   Prendergast believed that Harrison, who in his mind was formerly an ally, now stood in the way of the safety and well-being of the citizens of Chicago and he had the right as well as the responsibility to murder him. Mayor Harrison was known as the mayor whose door was open to anyone and that would ultimately be his undoing.  Prendergast rang the doorbell and Mary Hansen, the maid, answered.  Prendergast gave his name and that he had business with the mayor.  Ms. Hansen thought she recognized Prendergast, let him in the entry hall, woke the Mayor and returned downstairs. There were no witnesses to the actual shooting but it happened very quickly and after a very short exchange of words according to testimony of persons in the house. Harrison was shot three times.  First in the abdomen, then above the heart and lastly in his left hand (probably a defensive wound). W. J. Chalmers who lived directly across the street at 234 Ashland heard the shots and rushed to the mayor’s house as he told his wife to call the police.  He saw Prendergast emerge from the shadows and fire a shot at a pursuer. [caption id="attachment_842" align="alignright" width="300"] The Harrison home at 231 Ashland where Carter Harrison was assassinated.[/caption] He entered the house through a haze of gun smoke and found Mayor Harrison on his back at the end of the entry hall in the threshold of his study.  The Mayor was bleeding profusely from the mouth but still conscious.  He was very quickly joined by the mayor’s son, Preston Harrison.  Mr. Chalmers folded his jacket and raised the mayor’s head while his son asked him who had shot him. Mayor Harrison simply told them that it didn’t matter and that he was shot fatally.  Chalmers and Preston told him he was going to be alright but the mayor knew otherwise.  He asked that someone call Annie Howard, his fiancé, to the scene. Preston was so angered he ran outside in an attempt to find his father’s assassin when the first police wagon arrived.  Policeman John Hurley was the first to arrive and ran in where he cradled the mayor’s head.  Chalmers took the opportunity to summon physicians but it was too late for the mayor.  He was dying from extensive internal bleeding and by 8:27pm his last word was “Annie”. Prendergast had already turned himself in at the DesPlaines Ave Police Station to Lieutenant Wheeler and was held by the Coroner’s Jury for the murder of Mayor Harrison. What followed was a very lengthy court case where attorney’s used every angle in their arsenal to spare Prendergast the death penalty.  The question of his committing the crime was never an issue but his sanity was.  At the time, Illinois law stated that the individual to be declared legally sane or insane only had to know the difference between right and wrong. [caption id="attachment_843" align="alignleft" width="300"] Page 1 of rambling letter written by Prendergast from Cook County Circuit Clerk Archives[/caption] In the end not even the great Clarence Darrow could save Prendergast from the gallows.  It would be the first death penalty plea of Darrow’s career and the only one in which he was unsuccessful at saving his client.  Darrow would later save the lives of Nathan Leopold and Richard Loeb who murdered 14 year old Robert “Bobby” Franks in 1924. At 11:48am on July 13, 1894, Patrick Eugene Prendergast was executed by hanging at the Cook County Courthouse and Jail at 54 W. Hubbard Street.  While most anyone who knew the details of the case including many physicians at the time would concur that Prendergast was insane and not a candidate for the death penalty, Carter Harrison was a very beloved man and Chicago mayor and even religious leaders of the time were calling for revenge. [caption id="attachment_851" align="alignright" width="168"] The old Criminal Courts Building at 54 W. Hubbard where Prendergast met the gallows.[/caption] Today Prendergast lies in an unmarked grave next to his father at Calvary Cemetery in Evanston and the scene of his death has been named a historic landmark and has been re-purposed as an office building.           Find Chicago History The Stranger Side on FACEBOOK Find Ray Johnson on Twitter and Google+

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There aren’t many alive today who can say that they remember the Hyde Park neighborhood of Chicago in 1924 or the heinous crime that brought Hyde Park, The University of Chicago and the city’s wealthy and privileged into the national spotlight. The closest that you are going to get is by visiting the historic Biograph Theater at 2433 North Lincoln Avenue and attending a performance of John Logan’s Never The Sinner directed by Gary Griffin. [caption id="attachment_863" align="alignright" width="300"] The historic Biograph Theater where John Dillinger's life of crime ended.[/caption] Nathan Freudenthal Leopold (played by Japhet Balaban) and Richard Albert Loeb (played by Jordan Brodess) were too very young students at The University of Chicago.  They were sons of prominent Chicago businessmen who lived in the wealthy Hyde Park neighborhood.  Leopold was enthralled by the handsome Loeb and together they set out to commit the perfect murder. [caption id="attachment_862" align="alignleft" width="300"] Jordan Brodess (left) and Japhet Balaban portray Loeb and Leopold[/caption] After meticulous planning they ultimately kidnapped 14 year-old Robert “Bobby” Franks who was a cousin of Loeb’s and walking home from the Harvard School.  Franks had no reason to suspect what was about to happen and had actually played tennis recently at Loeb’s home. Using a chisel to bludgeon young Franks and ultimately strangling him to death they burned his body with acid to avoid identification and dumped the body in a culvert near Wolf Lake. They intended to extort $10,000 in ransom money from Franks’ family but before Frank’s father Jacob could deliver the money a construction worker discovered the body along with a pair of glasses.  Those glasses turned out to have been dropped by Leopold during the disposal of the body and led to his arrest and the arrest of his partner Loeb. The case made national headlines and the famous trial attorney Clarence Darrow (played by Keith Kupferer) took up their defense.  Darrow’s 12 hour argument to spare the two young murderers from execution became legendary and was successful.  Both were sentenced to life in prison.  Loeb was murdered in prison in 1936 and Leopold was later paroled in 1958 and lived the rest of his life in Puerto Rico all the while still having a photo of Loeb on his wall. [caption id="attachment_829" align="alignright" width="300"] Nathan Leopold and Richard Loeb murderers of Bobby Franks[/caption] I had the opportunity to get a short preview at one of the Victory Gardens Theater free public programs related to the play where the public is given a behind the scenes look at the production and discussions about different present day topics that relate to the crime and the production. I plan on attending this Saturday’s full production and will follow up with a review that I am sure, based on my short preview, will be a powerful and thought provoking performance. The show runs Tuesday through Fridays at 7:30pm, Saturdays at 3:00pm and 7:30pm and Sundays at 3:00pm through December 6, 2015. You can get the full scoop on the show, the cast, order tickets and learn about public programs on their website HERE.   Find Chicago History The Stranger Side on FACEBOOK Find Ray Johnson on Twitter and Google+

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I really want this to be an open letter to a little girl who brightened our day and didn’t even know it.

My wife and I found ourselves in the lobby of the Brookfield Police Department this past Monday evening.

Like many people who visit police departments we could have thought of a million other places that we would rather be over the holidays.  I was anticipating a meeting with a Cook County State’s Attorney as the result of a domestic violence issue that had rocked our family.  We were an emotional mess to say the least.

As we sat in the small lobby with bullet proof glass separating us from the dispatcher we could hear the squawk of the radio announce another domestic violence incident that needed police officers to respond.  The dispatcher advised us that we would be waiting a bit longer because the officer we were meeting with had to be diverted to the domestic situation.

Our minds were reeling with thoughts about our situation and also of the situation that mind be going on with the other anonymous Brookfield family who had just called the police for help.   What is their situation?  Is anyone hurt?  How long had their family dysfunction been going on?  How would this situation affect their future and how would it affect their immediate holiday season?

My mind then shifted gears and thought about the officers who were responding.  What was going through their minds?  Was all the recent negative media attention concerning police officers affecting them as they responded to this latest call for help?  Was the video of demonstrators in New York calling for dead cops running through their heads as they raced toward some unknown danger?  Was the latest chant, "Pigs in a blanket, Fry 'em like bacon!" running through their heads as pulled up on the scene.   A domestic situation is historically the single most dangerous call that police officers find themselves in.  Were they thinking about their families?  What was the quickest route to the people who needed emergency help in what they knew was going to be a violent, rapidly evolving mess?  What would the victim look like?  What injuries would they find?  Would they find themselves in a life or death situation?  Would they have to kill someone to protect themselves or someone else?  Would they be on the news?  Would they see their family again?

As all of this was going on, we looked to our left to the only other two people in the waiting area.  One was a young woman probably in her early twenties and the other was a very cute and very energetic blond-haired girl who couldn’t have been older than six years old.

Why were they here?  What was their situation? What was going through minds?  Just then the little girl asked the woman, “Mommy?  Why do some people have a bad Christmas?”  The mother just looked at the girl and very quietly answered, “Because some people make bad decisions, sweetie.”  The mother looked back at my wife and I and we exchanged looks and slight smiles.

Were they there without the father for a reason?  Was he at work?  Was he in the hospital?  Was he in jail?   I was hoping that it was nothing major.  The little girl didn’t seem very affected by whatever their situation was and was asking all sorts of questions and walking around the small room looking at different signs on the wall.

I was starting to do the same thing.  I started looking around the room looking at different signs such as “Job Hunting?  Don’t have a DUI on your resume?” and other such things one does when one is in a waiting room.  My eyes caught what looked like framed drawing by a child.  As I got closer to it I could see that it was a large hand colored drawing with some text and many signatures.

Just then a police officer opened the lobby door and looked at the mother and the little girl.  He said hi to the little girl and she shrunk back onto her chair.  After all, who wouldn’t be intimidated by a guy wearing a dark blue uniform carrying a gun, handcuffs, taser, and other equipment designed to subdue or kill another human being.

Her mom smiled, looked at her daughter and asked, “Oh, so NOW you are going to be shy?”

The police officer squatted down to the girl’s level and said, “I heard that you have something that you wanted to give me.”  The little girl bent down and picked up a small brown box and opened it.  Inside was a stack of Christmas Cards!  The officer reached out and took the little girl’s hand and said, “Thank you so much.  Why don’t you and mom come with me and I’ll show you where all the police officer’s mailboxes are.”  They all walked into the hallway, the door shut and we were now all alone in the waiting room listening to the ever constant squawk of the dispatcher’s radio.

I looked over at my wife who had tears running down her face and my eyes were welling up.  With blurry eyes I walked over to the framed picture again in order to get a chance to read it.  What I found was a prayer written and signed by some past elementary school class.

It read:

Almighty God we pray to you

In Heaven up above

Watch over our dear policemen,

And protect them with your love.

Please guide them as they keep us

Safe both night and day

And hold them firmly in your care

Should danger come their way

Give them true strength and courage

as they serve till duty’s end.

And one more thing we ask dear Lord

Protect their families and friends.

 

I grabbed my phone and took a picture.

So, to the little girl whose name I may never know and whose face I may never see again I simply say thank you for reminding us all that there is still good in this world.  Thank you for helping me to forget, if only for a few moments, the tragic situation that my wife and I have found ourselves in and thank you for helping us all to remember those who put their life in danger every day in order to come to the aid of people they may never meet again.

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Fifty-nine years ago on the 28^th of December sisters Barbara (15) and Patricia “Petey” (13) left their home at 3634 S. Damen Avenue to see the Elvis Presley movie “Love Me Tender” at the Brighton Theater on Archer Avenue.  They never returned home. [caption id="attachment_876" align="alignleft" width="300"] The Brighton Theater where the girls saw "Love Me Tender" in 1956[/caption] That night their older sister Theresa and younger brother Joey went to the bus stop at Archer and 35^th Street to meet them and walk them home.  They never got off the bus.  Loretta Grimes, their mother, knew something was wrong immediately.  She contacted friends, neighbors and the police but nobody knew where her girls were.  Initially the police suggested that the girls were probably out with boyfriends or had run away.  Loretta knew her girls and they had never run away and did not have a reason to run away.  They did not take a change of clothes or any extra money and had left their favorite Christmas presents at home which included a new A.M. radio. Almost a week passed before the authorities started treating it as a missing person case.  Once they did, the leads starting pouring in from everywhere.  It seemed that every bus driver and cab driver in the city of Chicago had seen them.  Reports were actually coming in from as far away as Memphis, Tennessee. People claimed to have seen the girls at a bus station in Elvis’s home town and were probably there to visit their idol. The case quickly gained national attention and Elvis Presley even made a radio plea for the girls to go home to their mother.  The case still holds the record for the most amount of resources expended by Cook County in a missing person case.  Surrounding suburbs assisted and a special task force was set up. [caption id="attachment_877" align="alignright" width="300"] A squad of Chicago Motorcycle Policemen dedicated to the Grimes Case[/caption] Mrs. Grimes went through hell for almost a month with letters and phone calls coming in daily.  While some were supportive there were many phone calls that were extremely cruel.  Callers said that it served her right for letting her girls go out that late or that they got what they deserved.  She had received three letters from different sources all claiming to have abducted the girls and asking for ransom money.   The FBI was called in and determined that all three were hoaxes or crackpots. All hope for the Grimes family was lost on January 22, 1957 when a man named Leonard Prescott discovered the nude bodies of two girls on the north side of German Church Road a few hundred feet east of County Line Road in unincorporated Burr Ridge.  Their father, Joseph Grimes, who had been divorced from their mother for 11 years, made the initial identification of the girls at the scene and another family member made an additional identification at the Cook County Morgue. [caption id="attachment_878" align="alignleft" width="300"] Leonard Prescott sits in the back of a police cruiser after discovering the nude frozen bodies of Barbara and Patricia Grimes[/caption] The bodies were unclothed and frozen.  Suspects were interviewed, tips came in and finally the only person facing charges was a local drifter named Edward  Lee “Bennie” Bedwell who worked as a part-time dishwasher at the D&L Restaurant on Madison Street.  The owners of the restaurant contacted police because they remembered Bennie and a male friend with two young women who resembled the sisters. Bennie was arrested and interrogated for three days in a motel room owned by a Cook County Sheriff’s Deputy.  At the end of the third day he had written and signed a multi-page confession even though he didn’t know how to read or write. Eventually the Coroner’s Inquest and autopsy reports would clear Bedwell and the fictional account portrayed in the confession.  There would never be another arrest made in the case that amounted to anything. The funeral for the girls was held at the Wollschlager Funeral Home at 3604 S. Hoyne with Holy Mass at St. Maurice Church.  The girls were buried side by side at Holy Sepulchre Cemetery on 111^th Street in Alsip. [caption id="attachment_351" align="alignright" width="300"] A young pupil from St. Maurice School prays at the girls' caskets[/caption] The only cause of death determined by autopsy and coroner’s inquest was “Secondary Shock due to Low Temperatures-Cold”  In other words they froze to death. There have been all types of theories and believe me I think I have heard them all.  Theories such as; “It was a mob hit because the mother or father may have owed them money” or “The girls’ father did it because he got one of them pregnant” I started researching the case back in 2009 after I had left law enforcement and have spoken with many individuals who have forwarded info which in turn was forwarded to the authorities. I started a facebook page called “Help Solve Chicago’s Grimes Sisters’ Murder” as a way for those interested in the case to share remembrances, thoughts, theories and any other stories related to the case.  As of the writing of this article there are over 800 members that consist of former and current law enforcement, friends, neighbors and even relatives of the girls.  The group has generated info that has been passed on to authorities and there have been initial talks about fund-raisers to help generate reward money to help others to come forward as well. I had the distinct honor of meeting with a brother and sister of the girls a number of times and both I and the family believe that the case is still solvable but only with the help of the public. For years after the murders, Loretta Grimes worked as a matron for the Cook County Jail at 26^th and California. One deputy that worked with her remembered her as a very quiet woman who one day took him aside and asked him to never give up looking for her girls’ murderers. Mrs. Grimes died on December 8, 1989 without ever knowing who was responsible for the deaths of her girls.  She was buried at Holy Sepulchre not far from her daughters. If you are interested in joining the facebook group “Help Solve Chicago’s Grimes Sisters’ Murder” you can click the link and request to join. People with information can also send info about the crime directly to the Cook County Sheriff’s Department Cold Case Website here.   Find Chicago History The Stranger Side on FACEBOOK Find Ray Johnson on Twitter and Google+

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It bothers me, especially in the age of social media, when people rush to judgement one way or the other on issues that they may have very little knowledge about.  One of the issues that really gets on my nerves is the issue of police involved shootings.  On one side you have people making judgements about what it is like to be a 12 year old African American boy when they may be a middle-aged suburban Caucasian soccer mom and on the other hand you might have a gang member talking about how a police officer should have reacted in any given situation. What ever happened to trying to sort out fact vs. fiction or actually having conversations about a situation instead of jumping all over people on Twitter or Facebook.  Almost always there is more to a situation than what the media chooses to inform us about. After I heard about the Grand Jury's decision to not indict Cleveland police officers Timothy Loehmann and Frank Garmback in regards to the fatal shooting of Tamir Rice it was only a matter of seconds before the peanut gallery circled the wagons on both sides of the issue. What happened to Tamir Rice was an extreme tragedy and when I thought about it it brought back two very vivid memories.  The first was when I was Tamir's age.  (In the interest of full-disclosure I am a middle aged white suburbanite.)  I grew up in Cicero, Illinois which at the time was a town of about 60,000 bordering the west side of Chicago.  It had a heavy concentration of Czech and Italian residents and of course was most famous for being Al Capone's home town. I was about 12 years old when my parents bought me my first BB rifle.  No it wasn't a Red Ryder and no I didn't shoot my eye out but it could have been much worse.  I was a pretty good shot and always was very careful about where and how I shot the rifle.  I had set up a target range of soda cans in my yard and had even made sure that I had a metal backdrop to stop any BBs or pellets from going stray and taking out windows or the occasional cat. The neighbor who lived across the alley from us didn't really like us much and without me knowing it had called the police. (Even though he knew who I was and what I was doing)  In his conversation with the dispatcher he simply said he wanted to report a man shooting a rifle across the alley from his house.  He even gave the police our address. I had just finished killing some soda cans when I noticed two police cars pulling up to the front of my house with lights and sirens and two pulling into the alley.  One of the police officers kicked down our rear gate, pointed his weapon at me and yelled, "Drop the Gun!" Now I knew full well that the rifle I was holding looked very similar to an actual high powered rifle with a scope.  In fact it was part of the reason I wanted it as a kid.  It didn't look like a toy.  Thank the Lord above that the minute the cop pointed his gun at me and yelled at me I froze and my hands simply opened without me even thinking about it and the rifle fell to the ground.  I think about what would have happened if I had lifted the rifle in an attempt to show the cops that it was only a BB Gun.  I realized even at that young age that I came very close to being shot! [caption id="attachment_882" align="alignleft" width="300"] The Daisy Powerline 880 BB rifle identical to the one that almost got me shot by police.[/caption] Once I dropped the gun the police officer ran up to me and grabbed the rifle and quickly realized that it was a BB gun.   He let the other officers know over the radio.  My dad came out and the police explained that they broke our gate and pointed weapons at me because the gun looked so real and that the caller had simply reported a man shooting a rifle. Eighteen years later I found myself in a police uniform and had been dispatched to a subdivision in West Chicago after a resident called the police because their neighbor's garage door was open.  The neighbors were supposed to be out of town. I waited for my backup to arrive and then the two of us walked into the garage.  I really didn't think much of it.  We had gone to many calls similar to this only to find out that a garage door opener had malfunctioned or something had been in the way of the electric eye that causes the door to reverse direction after the car pulls away. We noticed that nothing seemed to have been disturbed in the attached garage and I tried the door leading to the house and surprisingly it was unlocked!  At that point, there could have been burglars in the house so we called dispatch to clear the channel because we had an open door.  Basically that means dispatch tells all officers to not use the radio because of the possible dangerous situation thereby giving us first priority on transmission. I was the first through the door with my partner behind me.  The door opened to a long hallway with a "T" intersection about 20 feet again.  I shined my flashlight into the pitch dark hallway and announced in a loud voice that we were the police.  At that point I saw what looked like a rifle barrel coming around the far corner as if to point at us.  I yelled "Gun!" and pushed my partner back out of the door and into the garage in order to get out of the death trap of the hallway. My mind was reeling and my partner was rather shocked as well.  I thought for a split second and realized that I might have been looking at a mirror at the end of the hallway and I might have seen my own reflection.  The adrenaline drained out of my body and I thought we should try this again.  This time I had my partner open the door and hold it open but not go in.  I stood off to the side as to not silhouette myself in the doorway and had my weapon drawn.  I again announced our presence and this time I could clearly see that looked like a rifle barrel again coming around the corner.  I yelled for the person to drop the weapon but they continued coming around the corner.  I stood ready to fire when the strangest thing happened!  They were banging the rifle barrel on the wall! The barrel kept getting longer until it became clear that it was a cane held by an older man.  There was still no acknowledgement from him that he heard us but it became obvious very quickly that he was blind! Just then a woman walked into the hallway to greet us and asked us if there was a problem.  She was blind as well.  That at least explained why there weren't any lights on.   We told her why we were there and she said that they were planning on going on vacation but the elderly man's wife had fallen ill and was taken to the hospital so the vacation was postponed. Talk about an adrenaline roller coaster!  I had told the other guys what had happened and they more or less laughed at me and said I would have had a hard time explaining why I shot a blind guy in his own house! [caption id="attachment_883" align="alignright" width="250"] I had mistaken a blind person's cane as a rifle barrel.[/caption] So I could have been a Tamir Rice or I could have been an Officer Loehmann so I can see both sides.  Mistakes, miscommunications and perceptions can unfortunately lead to deadly consequences. Should a 12 year old be playing in a public park with what appears to be a .45 caliber semi-automatic pistol?  Most people would say no.  The officers on the other hand were not told that the suspect might be a juvenile or that the gun might be a toy and they were going to a "man with a gun call"  That may have helped but I know that as a former police officer you always assume the weapon is real if you don't want to end your shift in a body bag.  However, it would have been information that I would have wanted to have if I was the responding officer. Did the officer driving the vehicle make a tactical mistake by driving right up next to the suspect with the gun and not giving themselves distance to assess the situation?  More than likely but I never like to armchair quarterback an officer's decision because I am not privy to what was going on at the time and I am not seeing things through their eyes. I believe the Grand Jury made the right decision based on the totality of the circumstances to not indict the officers on criminal charges.   The family and protesters are calling for "Justice" when their is no "Justice" to be had on either side. A mother has lost a son and a police officer has to live with the fact that he shot and killed a 12 year-old boy regardless of the legal justification.   Find Chicago History The Stranger Side on FACEBOOK Find Ray Johnson on Twitter and Google+

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The Chicago World’s Columbian Exposition of 1893 truly was a spectacle!  Roughly 600 acres and over 200 buildings occupied Jackson Park and the Midway Plaisance from May 1^st through October 30^th.  One of those buildings was paid for entirely out of private subscriptions.  It was paid for by the members of the Merchant Tailors’ Exchanges and was aptly named the Merchant Tailors Building. The building was situated on your left as you were walking across the bridge (Now known as the Darrow Memorial Bridge) that led from the North Pond just south of the Palace of Fine Arts (currently the Museum of Science and Industry.  It would have been on your left just before you reached the Illinois State Building. The building was approximately 94 feet square which included the porticos on the east and west of the building and the rounded 14x22 attached reception rooms for men and women on the north and south side.  The reception rooms and the east entrance that had steps all the way down to the lagoon were for the private use of the subscribers who provided the $30,000 that it cost to build it. The outside of the building was covered with Staff and painted white which had it resemble many of the great buildings of the fair only smaller. [caption id="attachment_888" align="alignleft" width="300"] The Merchant Tailors Building at the 1893 World's Columbian Exposition[/caption] Solon Spencer Beman (October 4, 1853 – April 23, 1914) of Chicago was the architect and he had patterned the building after the Greek Temple known as the Erechtheion which was the last of the temples built as part of the Acropolis and finished in 402 B.C.   The Erechtheion was named after the demi-god Erechtheus, a mythical Athenian king.  It housed an ancient wooden cult statue of the goddess Athena. On the left and right side of the east entrance there were two wreath encircled green panels.  On the left an engraved scripture read, “And they sewed fig leaves together and made themselves aprons.”  On the right side it read, “Unto Adam also and his wife did the Lord God make coats of skins and clothed them.” These scriptures were supportive of their belief that the making of clothes was one of the world’s oldest trades. The floor from the entrance to the center floor under a low dome was constructed of fine ceramic mosaic tile from Maw & Co. out of Shropshire, England .  On its cream and gold colored walls there were eight mural paintings on canvas painted by Oliver Dennett Grover (January 29, 1860 – February 14, 1927).  Each mural represented a specific era in garment making history.  The first was a depiction of Adam and Eve making aprons from leaves; second, a barbarian scene; third, Egyptian; fourth, classical Greek; fifth, medieval ; sixth, Renaissance; seventh, Louis XIV to Louis XVI; and eighth, modern. Some of the artifacts on exhibit were an oil painting entitled “The Tailor Shop” by Charles Durand and a flag carried by the merchant tailors of Boston on the occasion of General Washington’s visit to the city on October 17, 1789. Also in 1893, the city of Branford, Connecticut was looking for donors to fund a city library and they were looking specifically for wealthy sons of Branford. [caption id="attachment_889" align="alignright" width="300"] James Blackstone Library in Branford, CT[/caption] Timothy Beach Blackstone was born in Branford and was the son of James Blackstone and Sarah Beach.   Timothy was the millionaire President of the Chicago and Alton Railroad and had been so since 1861 when it was known as the Joliet and Chicago Railroad.   His father had served in the both the Connecticut House of Representatives and the Senate and had also served in the Connecticut militia.  Timothy Beach wanted to be the sole donor and wanted to present the library as a memorial to his father. In many respects the James Blackstone Library was very similar to the Merchant Tailors Building.  It was designed by the same architect, S.S. Beman and the same artist, O.D. Grover who provided the artwork around the dome.   The artwork consisted of eight 6’ x 9’ paintings depicting the evolution of book making.  These are entitled, "Gathering the Papyrus," "Records of the Pharaohs," "Stories from the Iliad," "Medieval Illumination," "Venetian Copper-plate Printing," "First Proof of Gutenberg Bible," "Franklin Press," and "Book Bindery, 1895."   The library opened on June 17, 1896 at a cost of upwards of $300,000. Timothy B. Blackstone died of pneumonia on May 26, 1900 leaving an estate of over $5 million.  His wife, Isabella Norton Blackstone, wished to present a branch library to the city of Chicago as a memorial to her husband and pledged $100,000. By the time the building was completed almost four years later the cost was upwards of $250,000. The cornerstone of the Library was laid on June 23, 1902 by Mrs. Blackstone using the same trowel by which the Chicago City Library, now the Chicago Cultural Center, was laid.  Inside a cavity in the cornerstone was placed a copper-lined box containing a complete copy of the Public Library Board proceedings, catalogs, a copy of each of the Chicago daily newspapers and magazines, and a sketch of Timothy Blackstone’s life. [caption id="attachment_890" align="alignleft" width="279"] Timothy Beach Blackstone[/caption] The exterior of the library was constructed using Concord granite and contains 13,794 square feet of space.  The building was also designed by Chicago Architect Solon Spencer Beman, and again modeled after his Merchant Tailors Building from the World’s Columbian Exposition of 1893. The building has a Tiffany style dome with marble columns and four painted murals by Chicago artist Oliver Dennett Grover in the rotunda.  The murals have the titles of “Labor”, “Literature”, “Art”, and “Science”. [caption id="attachment_891" align="alignright" width="300"] The Tiffany style dome and murals in the rotunda of the T.B. Blackstone Library[/caption] Once the library was completed it became the first permanent branch library building in the Chicago Public Library System and the only one built entirely using private funding.  Mrs. Blackstone turned the keys to the building and the deed over to the Library Board on January 8, 1904. The library is located at the southeast corner of E. 49^th Street and S. Blackstone Avenue even though the library retains its address of 4904 S. Lake Park Avenue.  The library is only 1.25 miles from the site of the original Merchant Tailors Building as the crow flies to Jackson Park and serves the Chicago Community Areas of Kenwood, Hyde Park, and Oakland.   Find Chicago History The Stranger Side on FACEBOOK Find Ray Johnson on Twitter and Google+

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Barbara Bush for President?  At first I thought I was just being funny but then I thought about it.  I probably wouldn't be the only one that thought about it.  In fact I kinda wonder if the Bush family thought about it before Jeb threw his hat in the ring. I have always loved Barbara Bush and I have a feeling that both Democrats and Republicans feel the same way.  In fact I did get a chance to speak with her in person briefly when I was in the military and never really had the chance to thank her so maybe she may read this article. I was in the 3rd U.S. Infantry "The Old Guard" from February 1986 until February of 1990.  Most people know it as the unit that supplies the Tomb Guards for the Tomb of the Unknowns at Arlington National Cemetery and also the Honor Guard Funeral Detail.  The unit also does many other things and because most of us had Top Secret Presidential Support Clearances we sometimes were tasked with details at the White House. It was on a particularly hot summer day in D.C. and my squad was tasked with setting up seating and for a visiting dignitary on the south lawn of the White House.  While it wasn't the most spectacular of details it was still cool to be on the opposite side of the fence and up close to the home of America's elected leader who at the time was George Herbert Walker Bush. [caption id="attachment_897" align="alignleft" width="300"] South lawn of the White House where I spoke with Barbara Bush.[/caption] Suddenly, as we were setting up, a group of four secret service agents walked out of the main door and Mrs. Bush was following behind walking the First Dog, Millie. On the south side of the White House there is a circular walkway that leads away from the house and gets to within a hundred yards or so of the fence that people can look through as they are walking down Pennsylvania Ave. Barbara was simply taking Millie for a walk but it was pretty cool to be there.  If I remember correctly there were two agents walking a good distance ahead of Mrs. Bush and two tagging along behind her and actually one of the guys taking up the rear was tasked to pick up the doggy doo!   It always kills me to think that here is a guy wearing a suit at the top of his career in the secret service and he is picking up doggy poop!  I always wondered how they chose the guys for that duty. (No pun intended!) Anyhow, as Barbara made her way past the gate you could here people screaming her name and waving and she would wave back and it really excited a great many people.  Some even yelled Millie's name. [caption id="attachment_898" align="alignright" width="300"] Millie, the First Dog from 1989 to 1993[/caption] So as she was finishing her walk she came right up to me and asked, "Could I ask you a question?"  Of course I was taken a little aback to say the least and while the First Lady really isn't in your chain of command in the military her husband is and you don't really want to screw up in some way.   I said, "Sure Maam!"  She smiled a little and asked, "Does this stuff ever get old?"  Her down-to-Earth manner instantly made me forget that I was talking to the First Lady and I said, "Well, it gets pretty hot sometimes having to work in the military uniform but I can't say it gets old working around the White House."  I said that these types of moments are ones that you get to tell your grandchildren someday. She just smiled really big and asked me another question.  It was the answer to this question that I still regret to this day even though I know it was the best one I could have made at the time.  She agreed that it was hot outside and she asked if I and my guys would like to come in and have some lemonade! She very well could have been a neighbor in AnyTown USA asking that question and she really made you feel as though she was.  The problem is that she wasn't just any neighbor and I was a young sergeant in the U.S. Army.  I so wanted to say yes!  The problem is  I was also imagining my rank falling off my sleeve when my boss asked me why we didn't get our detail done in time and I had to answer that we were busy having lemonade with the First Lady! In retrospect I always wondered how it would have felt to drink lemonade with Mrs. Bush at the White House but unfortunately I had to turn her down. I do know that in my time stationed near Washington D.C. everyone loved Barbara and had the utmost respect for her.  She has led an amazing life. She was engaged to Mr. Bush while he served as a fighter pilot in World War II (shot down and decorated), a congressman, Vice President, Director of Central Intelligence and as the 41st President of the United States.  They also raised some kids who didn't turn out bad either! I have to say that I came up with the idea of the Barbara Bush run for office as I was watching the latest news coverage of the campaign and saw that Jeb Bush was bringing his brother George W. and his mother along with him on the campaign trail to lend a hand. Seriously!  Lets look at the options on both the left and the right sides.  On the left you have Hillary who has an untold number of controversial and shady dealings in her past and Bernie who is a self-described socialist. On the right you have The Donald, who I actually liked because of his anti-establishment attitude but now after his loss in Iowa he seems to have lost interest.  You have Ted Cruz who may have been using dirty tricks on Ben Carson in order to suck some quick votes in Iowa and Ben Carson who I wouldn't mind if I needed someone to operate on my head.  Marco I have heard speak and he actually has some great idea but may be so establishment that someone else may be pulling his strings.  I like Christie but he can't seem to get his numbers up and lets face it the other contenders can't seem to get out of the single digits. So Mrs. Bush if you are listening and have some extra time and money on your hands I think the American people would like a sweet no-nonsense gal as our first female President and if you do win maybe you could invite us over for some lemonade.  I promise I won't stand you up this time! #BABS2016   Find Chicago History The Stranger Side on FACEBOOK Find Ray Johnson on Twitter and Google+

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Many people find fascination with the topic of the Salem Witch trials of 1692.  I have read a number of fascinating books on the subject and most recently a team of researchers from Salem State University have claimed to have located the actual site of the 19 executions by hanging that resulted from the trials.  The Chicago Tribune covered the story and you can read it here. [caption id="attachment_903" align="alignleft" width="300"] Proctor's Ledge, the actual site of the Salem Witch Trial Executions (Ken Yuszkus, AP)[/caption] People also find fascination with the topic of witches and witchcraft.  There are also very different ways of looking at what the term witch or witchcraft actually denotes. Some people think of a witch as an evil, old, hag of a woman who eats children such as in the folk tale of Hansel and Gretel or flies on a broom stick, casts spells and hates young girls from Kansas and their little dogs too. Others see witches as the peaceful, nature-loving followers of the Wicca religion.  In fact, according to the website www.religioustolerance.org,  there are at least 17 common meanings for witch or witchcraft. The definition that seems closest to the one that the accusers in the Salem Witch Trials used is what they deem the Gothic Satanist.  The Gothic Satanist is a worshiper of Satan who, during the late Middle Ages and Renaissance, was believed to use black magic to harm others, by involving the aid of Satan and his demons. Laws to protect the citizenry against such evil-doers were enacted and since I live in Illinois and write about Chicago and Illinois history it begged the question: Is witchcraft against the law in Illinois today? Chicago and Illinois have had their issues with witches in the past but before that let’s start with a little Illinois history. Early Illinois History In 1696 the Jesuit Mission de l’Ange Gardien  is founded in Chicagou by Father Pierre Francois Pinet and in March of 1699 he establishes the Mission de Sainte Famille de Caoquias at what is now Cahokia, Illinois and also when its written history begins. On February 10, 1763, the Treaty of Paris is signed following Great Britain’s victory in the French and Indian War and the area falls under British rule. During the Revolutionary War, General George Rogers Clark of Virginia and nearly 175 of his men took the towns of Kaskaskia, Cahokia and Vincennes from the British in July of 1778 without firing a shot.  It seemed that the French and Indians who occupied these areas were not keen on taking up arms for the British.   By December 9th of that year, Virginia claimed the “Illinois Country” and it became the County of Illinois, Virginia.  I found it interesting that our great State of Illinois was the largest county in Virginia for five years! Witch Executions on Illinois Soil There are numerous references to at least two executions of witches on Illinois soil while it was still part of the Commonwealth of Virginia.  Both cases take place near the town of Cahokia, Illinois which in 1779 was in the Kaskaskia District of Virginia. The first involves an African slave by the name of Moreau.  Moreau was brought to Cahokia [Kohos] from New Orleans by a Frenchman who soon abandoned him there.  The residents assumed he was given his freedom by his master.  He acquired a small parcel of land and began to raise pigs.  A sickness that affected the swine in the area killed off most of the pigs except for Moreau’s and he was quickly accused of witchcraft in that he either was able to protect his pigs from a natural disease through use of witchcraft or caused the deaths of the other pigs in the same manner. They also surmised that rather than being left a free man, he must have killed his owner by use of magic [“by the power of his devilish incantations”] and disposed of his body. He was arrested, tried and convicted of witchcraft and hung on a tree a short distance southeast of Cahokia.  Of course the reason that his mistress was still alive was because she was too powerful for his magic. The second case takes place in the same place, and maybe not so coincidentally, at roughly the same time.  A slave named Emmanuel was shot to death in the street at Cahokia for witchcraft shortly after the order came down from the Court of Kaskaskia to have him burned to death. Both accounts are verified by letters from John Todd who was appointed the Lieutenant or Commandant of the County of Illinois in the Commonwealth of Virginia in a letter written by Governor Patrick Henry of Virginia on the 12^th of December 1778. The letters were in the Record Book of John Todd and state:   [John Todd to Richard Winston] WARRANT FOR EXECUTION: [erased, page 18] Illinois, to wit:  To Richard Winston, Esq., Sheriff in Chief of the District of Kaskaskia:                 Negro Manuel, a Slave, in your Custody, is condemned by the Court of Kaskaskia, after having made honorable Fine at the Door of the Church, to be chained to a post at the water side & there to be burnt alive, & his ashes scattered, as appears to me by Record.  This Sentence you are hereby required to put in Execution on Tuesday next, at 9 o’Clock in the morning; and this shall be your Warrant.  Given under my hand & seal at Kaskaskia the 13^th day of June, in the third year of the Commonwealth [1779] [John Todd to Nicholas Janis, page 19:] To Capt. Nicholas Janis: You are hereby required to call upon a party of your Militia to guard Moreau, a Slave condemned to execution, up to the Town of Kohos [Cahokia]. Put them under an Officer.  They shall be entitled to pay, rations, & refreshment during the time they shall be upon duty, to be certified hereafter by you. I am, sir, your humble servant, JNo Todd, 15^th June 1779 I recommend 4 or 5 from your Compy & as many from Capt. Placey’s, and consult Mr. Lacroix about the time necessary. J.T. The slave Emmanuel was supposed to have been burnt alive but some accounts mention he was shot to death and then burned.  Either someone decided to take matters into their own hands before the troops arrived or they had mercy on him and shot him before burning him.  The details of that are sketchy at best. On September 3, 1783, America and Britain signed peace articles in Paris ending the Revolutionary War and one year later Virginia ceded its claim to western territory to the United States to settle war time debts. On July 13, 1787, Congress passed the ordinance which established the Northwest Territory and General Arthur St. Clair was appointed Governor.  Governor St. Clair travelled to the area in 1790 and in May established St. Clair County in southern Illinois.  He appointed officials and militias in both Kaskaskia and Cahokia.  The county court officials purchased the building that would later become known as the Cahokia Courthouse in 1793. Chicago Witches While I have not found any other instances of witches being executed in our state under the authority of government since 1779 there have been plenty of reports of citizens being bothered by pesky witches. Even in Chicago during the 20^th Century the Chicago Police had to deal with reports of witchcraft. I found a rather entertaining article in the Chicago Tribune written in 1903.  The headline of the article read: Many Chicagoans Believe in Witches – Police Have Lots of Trouble Because of the Black Art. The article goes on to talk about specific cases such as one where a woman was arrested upon the complaint of another woman who charged that the woman had bewitched a child.  It seemed that the woman was suspected of being a witch because she had cut a lock of hair from the child’s head and a bit of cloth from her jacket.  The woman with the aid of these ingredients purportedly recited an incantation which then caused the child’s feet to swell. [caption id="attachment_904" align="alignright" width="300"] Chicago Believes in Witches, Chicago Daily Tribune, 1903[/caption]   In another instance a neighborhood near the West North Avenue Police Station believed that the whole neighborhood was under the influence of a witch’s curse because their cows were dying for no apparent reason.  The way that the witch had accomplished this was to form a lump of wax into the shape of a cow.  An incantation is said over a group of pins which are then thrust into the waxen cow and then the whole cow is set before a fire to melt.  It was reported that as the wax figure melted the cow would be afflicted in the corresponding areas where the pins were inserted. The article goes on to make the claim that police are called three or five times per week to intervene between a supposed witch and her victim. One of the most commonly used items in the accused witch’s arsenal is a common stove poker.  In order to ruin an entire family the witch only had to lean the poker against the front door or front gate of the residence and utter the incantation, “Be Accursed”.   After a witch does this members of the entire family are affected by illness and economic disasters. Another witch can be called in to remove the curse by removing the poker but only if done quick or carefully.  Of course if a friendly witch is not found quickly, the neighborhood police officer, at great risk to himself, can quickly remove the object.  Police officers had quite a collection of stove pokers. I had written an article about a self-proclaimed witch who operated in the 1970s at what is now the Tonic Room at 2447 N. Halsted.  His name was originally Manuel Nazario Rodriquez but he changed his name to Frederic De’Arechaga shortly before becoming the self-proclaimed witch and “Pontifus Maximus” of the Sabaean Religious Order operating out of the Halsted address under the name El-Sabarum.  The business sold occult merchandise and had a small temple in the back.  De’Arechaga left Chicago sometime after 1974 but the owner of the Tonic Room still has a ceremonial dagger that was found in a window well during renovations. [caption id="attachment_905" align="alignleft" width="300"] Ceremonial Dagger probably used by Chicago witch, Frederic DeArachega[/caption] Short History of Illinois Law Illinois became a state on December 3, 1818 and and the laws of its First General Assembly appeared in the 1819 Session Laws. From 1819 through 1826 Illinois Acts appeared only in Session Laws in the chronological order of their enactment. In 1827 the Fifth General Assembly enacted The Revised Code of Laws of Illinois, In 1833, the Revised Laws of Illinois, in 1845, the Revised Statutes of the State of Illinois and in 1874 was the last official statutory compilation. From 1877 to 1981 there were only unofficial revised statutes.  In the 1980s there was a copyright dispute and finally in September of 1992 the General Assembly passed House Bill 3810, which became Public Act 87-1005, which directed the Illinois Legislative Review Board to maintain the compilation of the official statutes of the State of Illinois thereby placing it into the public domain under the name Illinois Compiled Statutes or ILCS. In the older Illinois Revised Statutes there existed Chapter 28 which was approved on March 5, 1874 and which was entitled, “Common Law – An Act to revise the law in relation to the common law” It states: “Be it enacted by the People of the State of Illinois, represented in the General Assembly, That the common law of England, so far as the same is applicable and of a general nature and all statutes or acts of the British parliament made in aid of, and to supply the defects of the common law, prior to the fourth year of James the First, excepting the second section of the sixth chapter of 43^rd Elizabeth, the eight chapter of 13^th Elizabeth, and ninth chapter of 37^th Henry Eighth, and which are of a general nature and not local to that kingdom, shall be the rule of decision, and shall be considered as of full force until repealed by legislative authority. Basically it states that the State of Illinois recognizes the Common Law of England as law as long as it was enacted prior to the fourth year of James I (1607) and was not repealed by the Illinois Legislature. Witchcraft Laws in England The Witchcraft Act of 1542 was an act passed by King Henry the VIII in the 33^rd year of his reign.  It made practicing witchcraft a felony punishable by death.  It was considered a felony without the benefit of clergy which meant that you could not be spared by the death penalty by simply reading a passage from the Bible.  It would also result in all of the persons property being seized.  The act read: It shall be felony to practice, or cause to be practiced conjuration, witchcraft, enchantment or sorcery, to get money or to consume any person in his body, members or goods or to provoke any person to unlawful love; or for the despite of Christ or Lucre of money, to pull down any cross; or to declare where goods stolen be. The act was later repealed by Henry’s son Edward VI in 1547. The Witchcraft Act of 1563 was passed in the 5th year of Elizabeth I and only made witchcraft a felony if it resulted in the bodily harm of an individual would the person be put to death.  Lesser offenses were punishable by a term of imprisonment.  The act provided that anyone who should “use, practice, or exercise any witchcraft, enchantment, charm or sorcery, whereby any person shall happen to be killed or destroyed”, was guilty of a felony without benefit of clergy and was to be put to death. The Witchcraft Act of 1604 was passed in the first year of James I and broadened the Elizabethan Act to include dealing with evil and wicked spirits.  The act was called An Act against conjuration, witchcraft and dealing with evil and wicked spirits.  The act provided that “The penalty for practicing of invocation or conjuration & conjuration or invocation, whereby any person is killed or lamed.  Declaring by witchcraft, where anything is hidden, procuring unlawful love.  The second offense is a felony.  No forfeiture of dower or inheritance.  Trial of a peer of the realm. The Witchcraft Act of 1735 was passed during the 9^th year of George II and basically turned the crime of witchcraft from a felony punishable by death to a crime of fraud punishable by fines and imprisonment.  It repealed all previous Witchcraft acts and stated: “And be it further enacted, that from and after the said twenty fourth day of June, no prosecution, suit or proceeding, shall be commenced or carried on against any person or persons for witchcraft, sorcery, enchantment, or conjuration, or for charging another with any such offense, in any court whatsoever in Great Britain. And for the more effectual preventing and punishing any pretenses to such arts or powers as are before-mentioned whereby ignorant persons are frequently deluded and defrauded; be it further enacted by the authority aforesaid, that if any person shall, from and after the twenty fourth day of June, pretend to exercise or use any kind of witchcraft, sorcery, enchantment, or conjuration, or undertake to tell fortunes, or pretend from his or her skill or knowledge in any occult or crafty sciences to discover where or in what manner any goods or chattels, supposed to have been stolen or lost, may be found; every person so offending, being thereof lawfully convicted on indictment or information in that part of Great Britain called England, or on indictment or libel in that part of Great Britain called Scotland, shall for every such offense suffer imprisonment by the space of one whole year without bail or mainprize, and once in every quarter of the said year in some market town of the proper county upon the market day there stand openly on the pillory by the space of one hour, and also shall (if the court by which such judgment shall be given shall think fit) be obliged to give sureties for his or her good behavior, in such sum and for such time as the said court shall judge proper according to the circumstances of the offense, and in such case shall be further imprisoned until such sureties be given. This act stayed in effect until replaced in 1951 with the Fraudulent Mediums Act of 1951 which was in turn repealed on May 26, 2008 with the passing of Consumer Protection Regulations targeting unfair sales and marketing practices. The book, The Strange Case of Hellish Nell, DeCapo Press, 2006, by Nina Shandler, is a great story about the use of the Witchcraft Act of 1735 to silence a medium named Helen Duncan during World War II. [caption id="attachment_906" align="alignright" width="210"] "Hellish Nell" The last person prosecuted under the British Witchcraft Act of 1735[/caption] Is Witchcraft Illegal in Illinois? So is the practice of witchcraft as defined by 16^th and 17^th century brits illegal in the current State of Illinois?  I would have to say yes. Unbelievably, the current Illinois Compiled Statutes (ILCS) still contains the words of Chapter 28 of the 1874 version of the Revised Statutes! While the Common Law Chapter 28 doesn’t exist anymore you will find it in General Provisions 5 ILCS 50 and it is still called the Common Law Act. It reads exactly the same in that Section 1 states: That the common law of England, so far as the same is applicable and of a general nature, and all statutes or acts of the British parliament made in aid of, and to supply the defects of the common law, prior to the fourth year of James I, excepting the second section of the sixth chapter of 43^rd Elizabeth, the eighth chapter of the 13^th Elizabeth, and ningth chapter of 37^th Henry Eighth, and which are of a general nature and not local to that kingdom, shall be the rule of decision, and shall be considered as of full force until repealed by legislative authority.  (Source: R.S. 1874, p. 269) If you recall as noted previously the Witchcraft Act of 1604 was enacted prior to the fourth year of James I (1607) and is of a general nature and not local to that kingdom.  It also has never been repealed by the Illinois Legislature because the State of Illinois has never had a witchcraft law of its own in order to invalidate or repeal the Common Law Witchcraft Act of 1604 which was the same law that was used to execute 20 persons during the Salem Witch Trials of 1692. Conclusion So while the practice of witchcraft may technically be illegal in Illinois due to an overlooked English law from 1604, I am not advocating for an Illinois witch hunt.   I will say though that there are quite a good many charlatans who sell themselves out to vulnerable people as “mediums” or try to tell people that they are able to speak to dead relatives and for a fee can tell you that they are in a great place and that you shouldn’t be worried. These con artists are some of the lowest of the low and benefit financially from the misery and hope of others.  They also exist in an environment that is friendly to them in the State of Illinois because as long as they place the words “For Entertainment Purposes Only” somewhere in their sales literature (Believe me it is probably not on the front page of their web sites in bold letters) they are safe from prosecution because they are only doing it for entertainment right? Maybe it wouldn’t be such a bad thing to pass a law in Illinois that would repeal the Witchcraft Act of 1604 (I don’t like the smell of burning flesh anyway)and pass something similar to the Fraudulent Mediums Act that would protect people from these bottom feeders. But if we don’t repeal the 1604 Act then at least the culprits don’t have to worry about being burned at the stake, hung from a tree or stoned because our former Governor, George Ryan, repealed the death penalty in Illinois back in 2011. Sources: Davidson, Alexander and Stuve, Bernard, A Complete History of Illinois from 1673 to 1884, H.W. Rokker, 1884 Mason, Edward G., Early Chicago and Illinois, Fergus Printing Company, 1890 Fins, Harry G., Historical and Structural Analysis of the Illinois Revised Statutes – The Major Source of Illinois Law, Chicago-Kent Law Review, Volume 59, Issue 3, Article 2 Ashton, John, The Devil in Britain and America, Ward and Downey, 1896 Pickering, Danby, The Statutes at Large, Cambridge University, 1763 Illinois Compiled Statutes, http://www.ilga.gov/legislation/ilcs/ilcs.asp, accessed February 8, 2016 “Many Chicagoans Believe in Witches”, Chicago Daily Tribune, August 23, 1903, page 42   Find Chicago History The Stranger Side on FACEBOOK Find Ray Johnson on Twitter and Google+

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O.K.  I have prided myself on writing a blog that centers on history and historical research and doesn’t just rant and complain about things but I can no longer do that. A member of my facebook group, Chicago History the Stranger Side, posted an article yesterday about how the Cook County Medical Examiner’s Office is getting press for locating autopsy reports for the St. Valentines Day Massacre that took place on Valentines Day (creative name huh?) in 1929. [caption id="attachment_915" align="alignright" width="300"] The carnage inside the SMC Cartage Company after the St. Valentine's Day Massacre[/caption] I just about lost my mind when I saw that but you have to know the history to understand my reaction. The Cook County Medical Examiner’s Office’s mission, according to their website,  is to ensure public health and safety by performing autopsies and postmortem examinations to determine cause and manner of death for individuals who die in Cook County. Prior to 1976, Cook County had a Coroner who was an elected official (did not have to be a medical person) who presided over a public inquest similar to a court hearing in which the Coroner’s Jury looked over evidence presented by various people to help determine the case of death.  These cases were public and the records created by this inquest are public records as well. I conduct a good amount of research as part of my profession and I request a good amount of public records from various sources and have never run into a public office as inhospitable to the public’s right to records as this office. I can't believe the excuses coming from this office as to why they cannot provide records.  Again, I am not talking about any records since it became a Medical Examiner’s Office but referring to Coroner’s Inquest Records. I can only speak about my own personal experiences with the office because I don’t like relying on hearsay accounts. I have only requested three Coroners Reports for myself in the last 10 years and can say that I have never received any reports and only excuses when I would call to follow up.  In one instance I called about a request and always received the same answer.  The person on the phone said that the person who pulled records from the “warehouse” only would go once per week and the records were quite the mess and it could take about 6 months for a response. Now I completely understand about how records can sometimes be a mess so I gave it six months and then called back.  The person on the phone asked my how old I was.  I said that I was 42 years old.  She then said that I shouldn’t expect the report until I was 82! I am not kidding!  That was the response!  I actually had to laugh and they laughed as well and I think they may just have been frustrated with the whole process and really didn’t know how else to respond. I pretty much gave up requesting documents after that until I became involved as a researcher with the family members of Barbara and Patricia Grimes.  I had been researching the 1956 murder of Barbara and Patricia and had the opportunity to meet Jim Grimes who is one of the younger brothers of the girls.  I had read a number of accounts of the Coroner’s inquest from the newspapers who were in the public room reporting this public hearing. (I wonder how many times I can use the word public in a sentence)  Jim Grimes expressed some interest in receiving a copy of the transcripts of the inquest for the family to have.  They were never given a copy back in 1957 when the inquest took place.  I told him that he might have better luck sending a letter to the Medical Examiner’s Office and stating who he was.  The Grimes Sisters Murder is one of the most famous unsolved cases in Chicago history. We received a response back from them (wonders never cease) and they said that the file was over 400 pages so that we would need to come up with over $1,200.00!  That’s right you heard it correctly, $1,200.00!  It was actually slightly more than that but I can’t remember the exact number.  Jim called the office and explained that he was the living brother of the girls and while the employees there were very kind and professional they stated that the amount that have to charge is set by Illinois State Statute!  And guess what…they were correct! I found it hard to believe that there could exist a State Statute that could be at odds with the Illinois Freedom of Information Act but there most certainly is. Of course Jim Grimes could not come up with $1,200.00 and I didn’t have the money lying around so I told him to remind the M.E.’s office that they are required by law to at least let us review the file in the office at no charge.  They did agree to let us in the office to review the file but only as someone sat with us (which I understand for security reasons) and they limited us to 90 minutes.  We could take hand notes but no photographs. Unfortunately we only reviewed the copies that they had made so we don’t know if there were other files that weren’t copied.  After our ninety minutes we took our notes and left.  Of course in the defense of the employees they were very friendly and they really seemed to care and at one point recommended that maybe we should have a fundraiser to raise the money so that the family could have a copy.  They said that they could hang onto the copies for a while but if we couldn’t put the money together they would have to shred the copies. Many of the excuses I heard from the M.E.s office had to do with the organization of records and the lack of staff.  I actually wrote Cook County Board President Toni Preckwinkle a letter and a note on the their website stating what the issues were and that I had access to volunteers that would be willing to help organize things as well as running and making copies for persons requesting copies but that letter went unanswered. I also suggested that maybe the older Coroner’s files should become part of the Cook County Clerk of the Circuit Court Archives.  I visit the Archives about once per week and have always been amazed by their efficiency and superior public customer service.  They provide access to court records going back to the Chicago Fire of 1871 and prior and the requests take one week on average to pull from the warehouse while the cost of copies are minimal.  Again, that suggestion went in one ear and out the other if it was ever heard at all. So basically my beef is with the fact that the statute that governs the cost of copies for transcripts in the custody of the Medical Examiner’s Office ($5 per page) are directly at odds with the Illinios Freedom of Information Act. (There is a loophole in the Illinois FOIA that states in 5 ILCS 140/6  Sec 6 (b).. Except when a fee is otherwise fixed by statute) You can read both for yourselves here: Illinois Freedom of Information Act (scroll down to section 6 which covers fees) State of Illinois, Public Act 096 (which covers ridiculous fees for public documents) So forgive me if I don’t applaud the fact that the Cook County Medical Examiner’s Office found historical documents that they are responsible for finding and preserving and just in time for Valentines Day! But if you do want to read the article on their stupendous job you can read it here   Find Chicago History The Stranger Side on FACEBOOK Find Ray Johnson on Twitter and Google+

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