A loss of driving abilities often serves as a red flag to family members that a loved one may be struggling with Alzheimer’s Disease or other forms of dementia. But convincing loved ones to let others do the driving can present formidable challenges.

“We don’t like to think about it, but it can be a matter of life or death for the driver, and for anyone else who might be injured,” said Alice Keane, a retired educator and volunteer for the Alzheimer’s Association.

Keane helps caregivers from Chicago’s South Side and surrounding suburbs explore these and other difficult situations. A year and a half ago, the resident of Smith Village in Chicago’s Morgan Park neighborhood began facilitating an Alzheimer’s Association caregiver support group with fellow Alzheimer’s Association volunteer Bridget Murphy, who also is Smith Village’s life enrichment director.

The group meets at the senior community at 6:30 p.m. the third Tuesday of each month in a conference room just off the main lobby at 2320 W. 113th Place.

In 2020, Keane’s husband, former 28th District state Rep. Jim Keane, died of COVID-19 and complications related to advanced Alzheimer’s Disease. He’d also taught at Leo High School and founded the local 1700 chapter of the American Federation of Teachers. While helping him, Keane appreciated the support of an Alzheimer’s Association caregivers group in Arizona where the couple owned a vacation home.

“The purpose of the support group is support — allowing people to be free to express their frustrations and talk about things that are puzzling them,” Keane said. “It’s about listening, sharing advice, and supporting each other. It’s what I needed when I was going through this with Jim.”

After Jim’s death, and with time on her hands during the pandemic, Keane decided to help others by signing up with the Alzheimer’s Association as a volunteer and trained to facilitate caregiver support group discussions. A volunteer for the Illinois chapter — also a caretaker — was her mentor.

Keane said her experiences as a caregiver enable her to empathize with those seeing their ones lose their brilliance and mental capabilities.

Phyllis Tucker attends the caregiver support group. She and her husband, Roosevelt Tucker Jr., both live at Smith Village, He graduated from New York University and managed a successful career as an insurance claims adjuster.

“He would always do work around the house, all kinds of projects,” Tucker said. “He’d get up on our steep pitched roof. He couldn’t do those things anymore.”

Caregiver Fran Blake, also a Smith Village resident, describes his wife as having had amazing talents as well. The mother of six, Peggy Blake organized school carnivals, a teen social club and ski trips for students at St. Cajetan Catholic Elementary School. After her children were grown, she worked for local politicians.

For all three caretakers, the gravity of what was happening to their loved ones became apparent as their driving skills eroded.

Tucker, a retired registered nurse, noticed that her husband started getting lost while driving. “We’d have to make him stay where he was and go get him,” she said. “During a cold spell, he left the car running until it ran out of gas.”

The mental lapse resulted in severe damage to the car. Tucker told her husband the cost of the repairs and convinced him to let the car go. With one car remaining in the household, she took over the driving.

Blake and other family members noticed his wife Peggy repeating herself. Not long after, when the couple was still living in Palos Heights, he said, “She called me asking, ‘How do I get to Harlem Avenue?’ And this was something she’d done many times before.”

Blake intervened by hiding the keys. “It didn’t stop her desire to drive,” he said. “She still wanted to drive, but I would tell her the keys were lost and I could drive her.” He also reminded her of her struggles with double vision as a reason not to drive.

Blake wanted proof to convince his wife to give up on driving, so he consulted with her doctor who agreed she posed a risk to herself and others. The physician filled out a form provided by the Illinois Secretary of State to revoke her driver’s license.

He showed her the letter from the state. “If she could pass a driving test and written exam, her license would be reinstated,” Blake said. “For a while, she still wanted to take the test, but eventually forgot about it.”

Tucker and Blake appealed to their spouses’ sense of responsibility to convince them to stop driving, which aligns with suggestions offered by the Alzheimer’s Association.

Keane often suggests consulting the Alzheimer’s Association website for tips on dealing with driving and other challenges, including caretaker self-care. She too followed the association’s suggestion to have a conversation with loved ones about giving up driving.

As she tells it, Jim Keane put up little resistance. “He was aware of his mother’s struggles with dementia later in life, so he was more resigned to it,” she said.

Regardless of what stage of disease their loved ones were contending with, caregivers said attending the caregiver support at Smith Village has helped.

“It’s a real comfort to be able to talk with people who share the same concerns,” Blake said. “When I first came here, I was concerned about seeing that my wife was properly medicated. It helped to talk about different medications.”

Tucker needed time to process the reality of her husband’s illness but eventually realized that sharing with other caretakers was beneficial. “Most of the things I understood, but I understood it more hearing how other people thought about it and how they problem solved,” she said.

Alzheimer’s Association caregiver support groups can be found across the country. They often take place in libraries and public settings.

Besides Smith Village residents who attend the meetings, about 15 other caregivers come to the sessions. The next meeting of the support group at Smith Village is 6:30 p.m. June 18.

More resources and tips for caregivers, including how to address driving issues are at https://www.alz.org/help-support/caregiving/safety/dementia-driving.

Susan DeGrane is a freelance reporter for the Daily Southtown. 

The No Mow May movement started in the UK in 2019, and it’s gaining traction on local turf.

In early April, Homewood village officials gave a go-ahead in a social media post to residents interested in participating in No Mow May. If homeowners wanted to forgo mowing their lawns to give pollinators a chance to dine on low-growing, early blooming plants, code inspectors would waive the longstanding six inch rule for turfgrass. At least until June 7.

After that, the village can issue tickets, or exercise authority to cut lawns that don’t scale back to six inches or less. The village can also place liens on property amounting to charges for the cutting service as well as the cost of registering the liens with Cook County.

Homewood resident Jessica Matushek, a photographer and pottery maker, doesn’t seem too concerned about any of that. She’s more focused on helping pollinators.

“We’ll just see how long we can go,” she said. “If the village is promoting No Mow May, it’s a good thing to save the pollinators, it’s a positive thing to raise awareness.”

That’s almost exactly what Abigail Garofalo, an ecology educator with the University of Illinois Extension, had to say about local No Mow May campaign efforts.

Garofalo praised Homewood’s willingness to raise awareness about the dependence of pollinators on low-growing native plants that tend to blossom in lawns in early spring.

“Lawn is the most irrigated crop in the U.S. We have more lawn in the U.S., more acres of lawn, than the size of Illinois,” she said. “So, the pollinators really need our help.”

But here in the Chicago area, No Mow May might be misnamed.

“Given our climate, where we are, May may not be the best option,” she said. “If you want to help pollinators by not cutting your lawn, the best time to do that here in Illinois is April.”

By May, Garofalo said, many of those early low-growing plant blossoms are gone.

“Your lawn is a living breathing thing,” she said. “It’s important to realize that anything you do to let it grow or cut it back can have an effect on related organisms.”

Grass blades allowed to grow long in May won’t supply pollinators with food. Also, cutting back grass by more than a third after it’s grown tall can weaken it and invite weeds.

“Instead of No Mow May, here in Illinois we should call it No Mow April,” Garofalo said. “It doesn’t sound as pretty, but we may need to call it something else, so people can realize May is not the best time.”

On the positive side, with April being the best time to not mow, those who haven’t yet started up their lawnmowers can feel glad they’ve already done something to help pollinators.

Throughout April, plenty of violets, dandelions and creeping Charlie added bright spots of yellow and purple to Matushek’s lush green lawn. Matushek even photographed her children—Romy, 7, and Sergio, 4—lying face up on the turf with dandelion blossoms covering their eyes.

“My children love being in nature,” she said, adding she’s comfortable allowing their children to embrace the outdoors in this way because she refrains from treating her lawn with herbicides or pesticides.

By the close of April, Romy and Sergio also discovered the wonder of picking dandelion globes and blowing their seeds to the wind.

“For me, I thought about what people are going to think?” Matushek said. “I like to challenge conformity when it comes to raising awareness about taking care of the earth and the world.”

Even so, Matushek made an effort to consider neighbors with more traditional approaches to lawn care. She let them know of her family’s intentions to participate in No Mow May and heard no complaints.

A member of the Homewood Beautification Committee even gave her an official statement noting, “I am a supporter of pollinator gardens, but I like my lawn to look nice,” he said. “I support the No Mow May campaign.”

Matushek frequently connects with area gardeners who appreciate the benefits of planting native species.

“The discussion (about No Mow May) has been, is it enough (to support pollinators)?” she said.

Matushek doesn’t think so and plans to do more.

Recently she removed sod from large areas on either side of her front walk to make room for additional native flower species. In the last few years, she’s planted coneflowers, black eyed Susans, milkweed, asters, phlox and obedient plant in her yard.

That effort also places Matushek and Garofalo on the same page.

“You can assist pollinators by providing native plants and habitats that support them,” Garofalo said.

The first steps to doing that, Garofalo said, include considering local ordinances, and how yard space is used.

“Can you plant your whole lawn with natives, or is that prohibited?” she said. “Do you still want a lawn area for kids and dogs to romp and play? Are there portions — corners, edges of your yard — you rarely set foot on?”

Garofalo recommends starting small and adding only a few new native plants each year. This can prevent homeowners from taking on too much too soon. It also provides the chance to determine whether new plants are responding well to local conditions — shade, sunlight, moisture, soil PH and terrain.

“One neighbor who’s retired, a birder, said this effort is good for the birds too,” Matushek said.

Matushek has allowed plenty of clover to infiltrate her lawn. As a result, she said, “We don’t have to water and it’s always green.”

Besides the pollinators, local rabbits also seem to appreciate the abundance of clover. Referring to evenings spent on the front porch with her husband, Peter Matushek, a high school teacher, Matushek said, “We like to sit out here with the kids and watch the bunnies eat the clover.”

Susan DeGrane is a freelance reporter for the Daily Southtown. 

For “Child Life Month” last March, Myren and others organized a weeklong celebration that included a Teddy Bear Clinic.

“We set up teddy bears at different medical stations,” Myren said. The idea was for kids to see a toy bear getting an IV, or an X-ray, or having their temperature taken, much as they would.

“We’re here to help kids understand what’s going to happen, what they can expect, to help make procedures a lot less scary,” Myren said. “We also support the whole family — parents and siblings.”

Of course, the kids got to keep the bears.

Beyond helping children experience joy and feel more at ease, Advocate’s child life specialists help them handle medical procedures that sometimes come with a dose of discomfort.

These can include blood draws, MRIs, X-rays, health monitoring and the application of peripherally inserted central catheters used for administering intravenous fluids, blood transfusions, chemotherapy and other medicines.

On any given day, Myren and other child life specialists encourage kids undergoing these procedures to blow bubbles, read I-Spy books, play with iPads, employ deep breathing, or simply engage in conversation with loved ones.

Recently the hospital acquired another form of distraction that for some kids seems to trump all others — a virtual reality system created by KindVR.

“It’s popular. Kids get excited for it and ask for it,” Myren said. “I feel like it’s an activity that definitely connects with certain kids.”

For one fourth grader who recently finished chemotherapy treatments, KindVR was a game changer.

“When I had the VR on it really helped,” said Emiliano Covarrubias, of Chicago’s West Beverly neighborhood. “It felt relaxing. I felt like I wasn’t here.”

Which means a lot, because instead of squirming uncomfortably during dressing changes needed for his central venous catheter, Emiliano was able to sit still, and all the unpleasant business was over before he knew it.

“It definitely makes this a more positive experience,” Myren said.

On a recent checkup visit, Emiliano was more than happy to demonstrate KindVR, popping on one of the headsets and taking up one of the controls.

The device offers three virtual programs — one with a safari theme, one offering an aqua experience, and another supportive of meditation. KindVR can also simulate what it’s like to undergo an MRI.

Emiliano chose the aqua experience. With his parents and Myren nearby, he sat quietly in an examining chair. As they made small talk, he entered an undersea world inhabited by a variety of sea creatures swimming among ancient ruins.

Clicking the buttons on the KindVR controller and aiming it upward, downward, diagonally and side to side, Emiliano sent streams of colorful bubbles toward clown fish, cuttlefish, stingrays and dolphins, turning them brilliant neon colors—yellow, gold, green, turquoise, purple and red.

Seals and several species of whale kept their natural colors when sprayed by the bubbles but still seemed to light up.

The soft trumpeting calls of the Orcas caused Emiliano to smile. So did the appearance of one creature that seemed a bit more engaging than the rest, Happy the Seal.

This all happened thanks to a $57,000 contribution from Constellation Energy Corporation in Braceville, southwest of Joliet.

The company holds an annual Fishing for a Cure fundraiser tournament at Braidwood Lake. Longtime tournament volunteer and Braidwood generating station employee Chris Boblak understood the event’s positive impact on charities and nominated Advocate Children’s Hospital as a beneficiary of 2022 proceeds.

Boblak’s own son Dominic was admitted to the hospital in 2020. While there, he benefited from the hospital’s Creative Arts Therapies program which provided games, art projects and even magic shows for him and other patients.

With Constellation’s donation, Advocate Children’s Hospital opted to add a tech-oriented approach for connecting with patients. Five KindVR headsets were made available to children being treated at the hospital’s Oak Lawn and Park Ridge locations.

The devices can be adjusted to suit patients whether they are sitting upright or lying down. They can also be sanitized and fitted with fresh face pads between uses.

Emiliano, like many other children, enjoys technology and video games. At home, he plays Fortnite and Minecraft with his dad, Xavier Covarrubias, who works for a technology firm that develops technological solutions for businesses. He seemed pleased to witness how KindVR helped his son.

“I thought it was pretty neat,” he said. “It’s a form of technology that’s really helping kids with their hospital experiences.”

More than 70 hospitals use KindVR therapy routinely with their patients, according to the company’s website.

Even so, the child life specialists are still likely to retain certain low-tech approaches for connecting with patients such as playing card games.

“Emiliano plays a mean game of Uno,” Myren said.

“I’m just really glad we came here,” said Emiliano’s mother Maricela Suarez. “Everyone has been so helpful and welcoming. The level of engagement has been topnotch.”

Susan DeGrane is a freelance reporter for the Daily Southtown. 

Their fine craftsmanship placed the school first in a competition that also drew the participation of another 55 students from Argo, Joliet West and Stagg high schools.

“Argo and Stagg were good too, but Evergreen Park really crushed it,” said Dave Viar, welding instructor and mechanical technologies development chair at the college. Viar along with professionals from the welding industry judged the competition, which also included a written examination.

The perfect welds made by the Evergreen Park students contained no undercuts or gashes in the adjoining metal plates and no open pores. But that’s not surprising because this wasn’t the first time students from the program have excelled on the regional stage.

“We’ve had five winners in the last seven years,” said John O’Connor, an Evergreen Park shop teacher who earned an education degree from Trinity Christian College after working 20 years as a sheet metal worker and Local 73 member.

Under his watchful eye, students learn how to safely perform MIG, TIG, Arc and Oxy-Acetylene welding.

In the school’s metal working lab, they also receive 10 hours of OSHA safety training, learn metal forging, lathing, plasma cutting, gain a familiarity with HVAC, and learn about career opportunities in the welding field.

Welding uses intense heat to form permanent bonds between metal surfaces in cars, trucks, ships, planes and other aerospace vehicles. It’s also used to construct buildings, bridges, power plants, oil refineries, small electronics, medical equipment and nanotechnology.

It’s a profession that will require some 360,000 welding professionals by 2027, according to the American Welding Society, which has designated April National Welding Month since 1996.

Considering the growing demand for welders, MVCC has made an outsized effort to attract students to the welding field.

Prepandemic enrollment in the college’s welding program was around 120. Now it’s 160, Viar said. “We run six days a week, Monday through Friday with three classes, and Saturday with two classes.”

This was the eighth year of the college’s high school welding competition.

“It’s a chance for area high schools to weld and compete to see who’s best, and it’s also to prepare students for welding classes at Moraine Valley,” Viar said. “But a lot has to do with building relationships with high schools to get teachers, parents and students to believe there’s more out there than the traditional college education. There are great opportunities in the trades.”

For the second year in a row, Zack Gumban, an Evergreen Park senior, took first place in the welding competition overall, winning a $1,000 scholarship to MVCC. He became enamored with the high school’s metal-working lab while shadowing as an eighth grader.

“I loved all the fire,” he said. “Plus, I always had fun doing construction projects and hobbies with my dad.”

He plans to study nursing but also is keeping his options open for a dual career that will likely include welding.

Diego Abonce, also an Evergreen Park senior, finished second in the overall competition, receiving a $500 scholarship to Moraine Valley. He too discovered the high school metalworking lab while shadowing as an eighth grader. Like Gumban, he considers himself a hands-on learner.

“I like this much better than sitting in class reading,” Abonce said. “I’d much rather be in the lab building something.”

Fellow senior Aidan Brunner finished third overall, winning $300 in welding gear. Brunner plans to attend MVCC after graduation and also is aiming to join the Pipefitters Local 597.

When he first saw the metal lab at Evergreen Park Community, “I felt like a little kid, looking at all the machines, which were a bit intimidating,” he said. “But my dad’s a plumber. He doesn’t do welding, but he uses soldering in his work. I’ve been in this class all four years. I thought it was really cool seeing the demonstrations of welding.”

Gumban, Abonce, Brunner and fellow senior David Lucio have taken on special roles as teaching aids at their high school metalworking lab, where they help their teacher prepare materials and assist other students.

Lucio plans to study at Moraine Valley to become a first responder, possibly a firefighter. He said his knowledge of welding will help him better understand structural issues related to building emergencies.

Moraine Valley Community College maintains a welding lab outfitted with 20 welding booths and offers a welding curriculum as a 2.5-year full-time student program. Part-time students can finish in four years, taking one class per semester, Viar said.

“Any student coming out of our program will be far and above entry skills required at any entry level welding job,” Viar said.

The program also has strong ties with the Pipefitters Local 597 and the American Welding Society, Viar said.

“We partner with companies that do aerospace welding, medical welding, aluminum welding. Here in Cook County, the union pays well, and union work is great,” he said.

Though local non-union shops do not pay as much, they still pay well, Viar said.

Besides teaching at MVCC, Viar works for a woman-owned weld-inspection company, McNDT Pipeline Ltd. He also maintains close connections with local companies employing welders and sees lots of opportunities for welders, machinists, boilermakers and pipefitters.

“Welding is a lucrative vocation if students are willing to give the time and effort to obtain the training and knowledge,” Viar said. “I have always loved welding. It’s provided me and my family with a good life. You’re not going to be rich, as in a highfalutin member of the economy. However, you will make six figures. I met a 22-year-old in Georgia making $225,000 as a pipeline welder.”

Other top Evergreen Park Community High School welders who participated in MVCC’s 2024 high school welding competition were Matt Feeley, Robert Cipolla, Ben Sanchez, Rachel Thomas and Alex Carmody.

Susan DeGrane is a freelance reporter for the Daily Southtown. 

“Obsession” is the word Errol Magidson uses to describe his feelings for the historic Givins Castle in Beverly, which was honored as Best Preservation Project of 2021 by the Commission on Chicago Landmarks. “Chicago’s Only Castle” is the name of the second iteration of Magidson’s book, released in late 2023, updating a work first published in 2017.

“It’s not just about the structure, it’s about all the history connected with it, the history of the world that connects us all,” said Magidson, a retired City Colleges of Chicago professor of psychology and former Beverly resident. “That history continues to unfold as more information has become available.”

Magidson first laid eyes on the massive stone edifice at 10244 S. Longwood Drive in 1977.

In 2009, he engaged with fellow members of Beverly Unitarian Church, the Castle’s current owners, to review historic documents and artifacts for the creation of a film documenting the building’s history.

Magidson was semi-retired, working part-time at St. Xavier University. “I had never made a documentary film before,” he said. “The words just popped right out of my mouth.”

For the filming, he enlisted the help of Josh Van Tuyl of the university’s Media Services Department.

For historical context, Magidson also relied heavily on Linda Lamberty, a historian affiliated with Ridge Historical Society. She assumed the role of associate producer of Magidson’s documentary film. She also helped him decipher old street names and community names, which changed frequently as Chicago expanded its borders through the turn of the century.

The new book, edited by Lamberty, reveals plenty of new and fascinating factoids, along with those already published.

The Castle’s massive limestone blocks were quarried in Joliet and shipped by rail to the Washington Heights home of Peter Millen, a young stone mason. He oversaw the work of several stone masons, housing the men in his home. He also oversaw the transportation of the carved stones by horse cart to the construction site.

Besides featuring a photo of Millen with his family, same as before, the new book includes an entirely new chapter detailing more recent reconstruction efforts that shored up the Castle’s three crumbling turrets and gave the building a new lease on life.

Standing more than three stories tall amid stately oak trees and other mansions on Longwood Drive, the Castle is an iconic symbol for the Beverly community. Consequently, the renovation effort drew plenty of support and attention.

Originally completed in 1886, the structure has known a succession of owners and caretakers.

The first was Robert Givins, a flamboyant real estate baron and prolific author. Givins founded the Chicago Real Estate Board, now known as the Chicago Association of Realtors. Though he envisioned a structure that would resemble an ancient castle, his home would be built in a rapidly changing new world.

The Castle would be located in an area then known as Tracy, which at the time seemed far away from the south border of Chicago, then set at 39th Street.

Givins wanted to be away from the hustle and bustle of downtown. In published news articles and opinion pieces, he let the world know he appreciated modern conveniences, like the Rock Island commuter train.

People in those days also skated to Chicago along a frozen ditch that hugged the Rock Island rails, Magidson said.

A robust looking man with a handlebar mustache, Givins had a knack for oration and organizing crowd-pleasing promotions. He also wrote novels about world travel, and sponsored bicycle races, not so different from cycling events later held in Beverly.

Givins made mind-boggling and sometimes oddball predictions about the rapidly accelerating speed of travel and futuristic inventions, including a device that could manufacture a ready-made husband.

Magidson’s new book confirms that Givins had real estate offices in Pasadena, California, in addition to those in Chicago. Givins was also one of the first Realtors to promote snowbird living in Florida after moving to Sarasota.

Like Givins the snowbird, Magidson now spends winters in Palm Desert, California, and the rest of the year in Northbrook.

Along with telling how Givins came to the Chicago region from Canada and ended up shaping several Chicago area neighborhoods as a developer, the new book recalls how a home deed Givins sent aloft with a balloon at the World’s Fair of 1893 opening ceremony was later discovered on a beach in Michigan. Even though the deadline for collecting the promotion prize had passed, Givins still awarded the property.

While Givins still owned the Castle, the Chicago Female College occupied it from 1895-1897. In 1901, when Chicago was considered the goldfish capital of the United States, two sisters used the Castle property as a goldfish farm.

Givins eventually sold his home to the racecar-loving Burdett family in 1909.

John Burdett’s inventions and his manufacturing company supported the family in high style. His dumbwaiters were used in the Ritz Carlton in New York City.

Prior to moving into the Castle, Burdett was arrested for driving 12 miles per hour through Lombard in 1904. The Chicago Automobile Club rallied around him to protest and pay the $100 fine, which in today’s dollars would equal $3,500.

Miroslaw Siemens, the Castle’s third owner, was a physician at Roseland Community Hospital. “He takes on new significance in light of the current war in Ukraine,” Magidson said. “He was one of the most prominent people of Ukrainian descent in this country.”:

The founder of Ukrainian National Museum, Siemens convinced President Woodrow Wilson to issue a proclamation setting up a tag day collection for Ukrainian widows and orphans. Siemens also led the group responsible for the Ukrainian Pavilion at the Chicago World’s Fair of 1933.

New to the book’s second edition, Siemens was interviewed in the 1930s by the Special Committee on Un-American Activities, which investigated Nazi propagandists before World War II. The committee would later face public condemnation for blacklisting Hollywood celebrities as Communists in the 1950s and 1960s.

Siemens denied having had anything to do with Nazis, though one organization he presided over owned airplanes used to train young men affiliated with the German American Bund, an organization that did support Nazis. Siemens made sure the airplanes were sold immediately.

In World War II, one of Siemen’s sons, Roman, became the only U.S. military medical doctor stationed in Bastogne, France. American soldiers stationed there were credited with helping to win the decisive Battle of the Bulge.

The latest and longest owner and caretaker of the Castle is Beverly Unitarian Church. With the church as overseer, the Castle serves as a congregational space but also a community space for meditation workshops, yoga classes, and al-Anon meetings. It’s also known for Christmas tree sales and community breakfasts with Santa. In 1962, the church also created an addition to house The Castle Preschool.

The social justice legacy of local Unitarians occupies a good portion of the book. New information places S. Hunter Leggitt, Jr. at the 1965 civil rights march with Dr. Martin Luther King on the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma, Alab. Leggitt, then 28, would eventually serve as a minister at Beverly Unitarian Church.

More information continues to surface about the Castle and the people whose lives it has touched, Magidson said. But he won’t be compiling a third edition just yet.

The book and documentary DVD are available at Bookie’s bookstore in Beverly and can be ordered online.

Susan DeGrane is a freelance reporter for the Daily Southtown. 

Kolenda, who turns 80 in March, spreads that message as she teaches morning and afternoon dance fitness classes on Tuesdays and Thursdays at the Evergreen Park Senior Center, 9547 S. Homan Ave.

“There’s something to be said about getting together with others when you work out,” she said, after a recent class. “Staying fit and healthy is not about a hard workout every day, but being consistent with an exercise program and moving, moving, moving in your daily life.”

Before all that moving starts and after each set of dancing exercises, she instructs class members to take their pulse rates so they can compare
resting with workout rates.

For 10 minutes, she leads the room with light stepping — forward, backwards and sideways. Music ranges from popular Broadway musicals to disco and contemporary, but all tunes share an eight-count beat conducive to dancing and movement.

Kolenda steps up the pace with more rigorous dancing, followed by marching moves and clicking time on drumsticks.

The benefits extend beyond physical.

“The good thing about dancing is that it forces you to take your mind off your cares,” she said. “You have to focus on the steps.”

Next comes stretching, tummy tucks and arm strengthening moves with rubber balls and small weights, then a brief meditation.

Though Kolenda leads the class with vigor and confidence, she never pushes anyone beyond their limits.

“Say we’re doing 16 reps, if you can’t do it, don’t worry, just get back into the routine when you’re ready,” she said. “Of course, everybody wants to be in step and participate. That builds endurance and coordination, but the point is not to worry about it, just keep moving as much as you can.”

That approach seemed to work for Evergreen Park resident Rosemary Reed.

“When I started here a year ago, I couldn’t balance, it was like I had two left feet,” she said. “Now, everything comes together.”

Kolenda started teaching fitness classes at Aerobics in Dance in Beverly in 1980, when her daughter was just a young child. Around that time, she attended an IDEA Health & Fitness Association convention in San Diego, where celebrities such as Jane Fonda were promoting aerobics, then a new concept.

“But unlike Jane,” Kolenda said, “‘I never taught, ‘Feel the burn.’ I’ve never taught pushing ‘til it hurts.”

Kolenda later co-owned a fitness business called The Aerobics Station, but eventually stepped away to focus on leading classes.

A nurse who attended Aerobics Station classes encouraged her to become a fitness presenter and instructor for Little Company of Mary Hospital, where Kolenda ended up leading the hospital’s Women’s Wellness Week activities for 15 years.

Exposure to the healthcare setting may have saved Kolenda’s life. While in her 60s, she awoke one night with severe chest pains. Several of her relatives had died early due to heart disease. “I knew I was vulnerable,” she said.

Fortunately, she knew not to ignore the warning signs, just as she tells class members.

“Because I followed my own advice and sought care quickly, doctors said my heart had no damage,” she said. “That wouldn’t have been the case if I had waited.”

Kolenda is trained in CPR, as required by the Evergreen Park Recreation Department, which took her on as a part-timer eight years ago.

While fitness is Kolenda’s main focus, it’s her knack for promoting emotional well-being that keeps people coming back.

She encourages a sense of celebration. Having performed in community theater, she sometimes wears holiday costumes, including a pilgrim for Thanksgiving, and spooky characters for Halloween.

“We have a lot of fun,” she said. “This is a fun group. I’ve watched people standing by their cars, talking together for a half hour after class. Then they go for coffee. Pretty soon, they start doing fun things together outside of class.”

Opal Easter-Smith attends the morning classes. She recently went with fellow classmates to the Elmhurst History Museum to take in the Lost Chicagoland Department Stores exhibit.

“It’s great,” said Opal Easter-Smith. “It gets me out of the house and keeps my body functioning, which is important. I’m a caregiver for my husband.”

Judy Peterson of Palos Heights said, “I go to the afternoon class, where we go out for wine after.”

Karen Noble sometimes joins the wine group. She started taking dance fitness classes from Kolenda more than 30 years ago in a church community room in Beverly.

“It was great because all the moms could bring their children,” Noble said. “The deal was each mom would volunteer to babysit the kids for one class each month or so, while the rest of us got to exercise.”

Just as back then, several class members regard Kolenda and her classes as a support system.

“Many of us are retired now, and there’s the issue of loneliness.,” Noble said. “These are our same people we see all the time.”

Relating to the group “as family,” Kolenda keeps plenty of get-well and sympathy cards on hand for class members to sign when people experience illness or lose a loved one.

“Twice, I’ve received cards,” said Terry O’Hara. “Once was for a leg injury. It was very uplifting. I don’t even know all the people who signed it, but it made me feel so good!”

Anne Findley has taken Kolenda’s fitness classes on and off for the last five years. “My husband had throat cancer and that was brutal,” she said. “While I was taking care of him, Barb took care of my mind and body. The music she plays is the soundtrack to my life.”

While recovering from her grief, Findley took a six-month course in Chicago architectural history to become a Chicago River tour docent. Kolenda and fellow class members helped to prepare her.

Janet Quinn also has drawn support from the group after losing a husband. “My husband would say, ‘Sometimes the hardest thing is to walk out the door.’ For this class, that’s what I am doing.”

Kolenda lives by the maxim, “The less you do, the less you can do.” Which explains why instead of sitting at home on her birthday, she’ll be on a four-day cruise with girlfriends.

Susan DeGrane is a freelance reporter for the Daily Southtown. 

“Winter sowing offers a way to kick-start gardens when the winter cold is making people wish to get out into the garden,” Schaller said. “It offers a way to give plants a nice start.”

To help people get started, she’ll be hosting a program, “Winter Sowing for Monarchs,” from 6 to 7:30 p.m. Feb. 8, at Plum Creek Nature Center, 27064 Dutton Road in Crete Township.

Schaller will lead a hands-on demonstration focusing on early cultivation of common milkweed, a host plant of monarch butterflies. She’ll also talk about the butterfly’s migration from Mexico to Canada, its life cycle, and why it’s so important to support monarchs in Illinois.

Illinois, the “Prairie State,” made the monarch its state insect in 1975. That’s because the state lies directly within the butterfly’s migratory pathway and plays a major role in the creature’s life cycle.

Among the state’s better known prairie plants is common milkweed. Monarchs not only feed on nectar from common milkweed blossoms which bloom in large pink clusters, they also lay their tiny eggs on the underside of the plant’s broad leaves. The monarch’s black, white and yellow ringed caterpillars also eat common milkweed leaves, then form jewel-like chrysalides, which hang from those leaves.

Dotted with tiny specks of gold, the light green casings eventually turn dark. From these, fully mature orange and black butterflies emerge.

Schaller decided to combine a workshop about monarchs and winter sowing, she said, “because it’s something gardeners can be doing now to get ready for spring, and monarchs are a poster child for native plants and sustainable gardening practices.”

Other native plant candidates for winter sowing, Schaller said, include bee balm, coneflower, goldenrod, blazing star, phlox and lobelia.

For the workshop, Schaller will supply common milkweed seeds harvested from her home garden in Homer Glen, as well as seeds provided by family and friends. Participants will be instructed on how to modify clean plastic milk jugs to create outdoor plant containers.

“A hungry critter can eat seedlings, so our greenhouses will keep the plants safe,” Schaller said. “Plus, they offer a great way to keep plants organized and labeled in our gardens.”

Schaller has tried this method of milkweed cultivation at home, transplanting seedlings to smaller cups. “I’ve shared hundreds of common milkweed plants with friends and family,” she said. “Milkweed plants have extra-long roots, which is a great feature of native plants, but we’ll be removing them from the containers before then.”

Plenty of nonnative plant seeds are appropriate for winter sowing, as well. These include plants such as lavender, catnip, sage, kale, broccoli, cauliflower and cabbage, said Schaller, whose home garden contains two raised vegetable beds and a variety of native plants.

There is a $5 fee to participate in the workshop, which covers materials. Registration is due by Feb. 6 at https://www.reconnectwithnature.org/news-events/event-calendar/winter-sowing-for-monarchs/ or 708-946-2216.

Susan DeGrane is a freelance reporter for the Daily Southtown.

“People from other parts of Chicago don’t even know Hegewisch exists,” said Ogorek, a Hegewisch native now living in Danville. “They think it’s a suburb of Chicago, or in Indiana.”

Ogorek identifies herself as a public historian and earned a master’s degree in history from Purdue University. Three of her other Arcadia books explore early underpinnings of Chicago’s industrial sector — all with connections to Hegewisch.

One examines the Calumet River system which connects the St. Lawrence Seaway to the Mississippi and Gulf of Mexico. Another covers South Shore and South Bend Rail Line which for decades has shuttled workers and tourists between locations in Chicago. Another sheds light on the Chicago & Western Indiana Railroad, a short line that gave five major railroads access to Chicago.

As with those books, Ogorek doggedly pursued facts and historic images, sometimes even venturing out of state to do research. But her “Hegewisch” book contains more personal connections.

She and her parents moved from Hegewisch to Calumet City when she was just 4, but she insists her family remained rooted in the old Chicago neighborhood.

“All of the relatives were there, and seven out of 12 of the people from my parents’ generation lived there until they died,” she said.

Much of Ogorek’s early knowledge of Hegewisch came from family gatherings, when relatives would eat cake, drink coffee, and play a guessing game about Hegewisch locals. “They called it ‘Who Was She From Home?'” Ogorek said.

Her maternal grandfather, Joe Pavich, hailed from Dalmatia, a region of Croatia, and operated Joe’s Tavern at 13259 S. Baltimore. He’s pictured in the book, along with several other relatives including Ogorek’s father, Walter Ogorek, a World War II Army sergeant.

Some images came from a collection maintained by Mike Aniol, owner of Aniol Ace Hardware, 13416 S. Baltimore St. But for the lion’s share of photos and information, Ogorek spent more than a decade researching historic materials housed at the Southeast Chicago Historical Museum in the hulking Chicago Park District Calumet Park fieldhouse on Lake Michigan.

Appearing there at a recent open house, Ogorek sold copies of “Hegewisch” and instructed first time visitors to check out the permanent display of historic Hegewisch photos and artifacts among other exhibits dedicated to Chicago’s South Chicago, South Deering and the East Side neighborhoods.

The name Hegewisch was bestowed by Adolph Hegewisch, president of US Rolling Stock Company. The wooden boxcar manufacturer once headquartered in New York City established operations throughout the United States, including one that opened in 1884 on what was then the outskirts of Chicago, at Brandon and Brainerd Avenues.

Housing was needed for workers, so around that time, investors set up the Hegewisch Land Company with Adolph Hegewisch as administrator.

The land syndicate purchased several hundred acres to north of the U.S. Rolling Stock plant, then sold off residential and commercial plots.

“(Adolph) Hegewisch never owned any of the homes as with other company towns like Pullman,” Ogorek said. “People bought the plots and built their own homes. That was it.” It’s doubtful there was any form of municipal government in early Hegewisch either, Ogorek said, but Adolph Hegewisch did work with the community to set up fire and police stations.

“The way it worked with a lot of company towns back then was they would maintain the infrastructure, mostly to keep things running, and to keep people happy,” she said. US Rolling Stock was sold at auction in 1893. The plant later resumed operations as US Car, then Western Steel Car and Foundry, then Pressed Car Company. Pressed Car eventually made military tanks and household appliances on the site.

Ogorek’s opens the book with a view of Hegewisch seen through the eyes of a reporter for the Inter Ocean newspaper in 1905.

The journalist came to interview Oscar “Battling” Nelson, a resident destined to fight the longest match in modern boxing history — 42 rounds — to become lightweight boxing champion of the world.

Though the City of Chicago had annexed Hegewisch a decade and a half earlier in 1889, the reporter noted the quiet of a country town surrounded by prairie, with streets not paved and water running through ditches.

Some of the neighborhood’s first European residents were farm families. Brits, Germans and Scandinavians were followed by Polish, Greek, Italian and more German immigrants seeking employment in manufacturing.

Over the decades, they made railcars, buses, fuselages for airplanes, military tanks, stoves, chemicals and automobiles. US Steel established a warehouse in Hegewisch. Ford built an assembly plant that still produces cars.

Hegewisch residents also sought work in nearby steel mills now long closed, as well as at a meat packing plant in Hammond, Indiana.

Early 20th Century commutes entailed miles of walking in all types of weather, crossing railroad bridges and riding in unheated railcars. During lean times, the first wave of factory workers resorted to hunting game and carving huge blocks of ice from Wolf Lake. “The ice was used to refrigerate railcars transporting meat to other parts of the country,” Ogorek said.

Factory work spelled opportunity for men and for women. Of the 43 boardinghouses of the early Hegewisch days, 23 were operated by women. Other women worked as laundresses and seamstresses. Still others later operated schools, set up libraries, and published a local newspaper.

Though heavy industry shaped lives of toil, as Ogorek tells it, people still managed to organize picnics and parades, play baseball on company teams, honor fallen heroes, worship in local churches, attend movies, practice music lessons, organize scouting projects, cultivate water lilies, and create cookbooks.

After World War II, Chicago’s only trailer park — now prefabricated homes — took root in Hegewisch to supplement much needed housing for veterans and their families. Construction of brick bungalows also commenced on streets with letters for names.

For decades, the Hegewisch Chamber of Commerce and the Hegewisch News complained about Chicago aldermen failing to secure amenities other Chicago wards took for granted.

A circa 1949 photo shows one of Ogorek’s cousins in a snowsuit, standing on a patch of ice. The caption notes children skating on puddles and swimming in Wolf Lake for lack of skating rinks or swimming pools.

Library access was also inconsistent, Ogorek said.

Things improved in the 1980s with construction of the Mann Park swimming pool, a skating rink and permanent library branch, but not long after, Chicago Mayor Richard M. Daley announced plans to flatten Hegewisch to establish a third regional airport. Activists fought back. The airport never came to be.

Ogorek ends her book where it all started — the land first occupied by U.S. Rolling Stock. In 2019, CRRC Sinfang America, 13535 S. Torrence, began making a new form of rolling stock — railcars for the Chicago Transit Authority.

“It’s the same land, just a different address, a different entrance,” Ogorek said.

“Hegewisch” is available for purchase at the Southeast Chicago Historical Museum, 9801 S. Avenue G, Chicago, which is open on Thursdays, or online at www.arcadiapublishing.com.

Susan DeGrane is a freelance reporter for the Daily Southtown.

Curious parents attending a Christmas Without Cancer fundraiser at the entertainment venue were invited to enter. Dubbed by its operators as “Hidden in Plain Sight,” the trailer housed a mock-up of a teen’s bedroom where people could discover the trappings and telltale signs of substance abuse.

John Roberts, of Tinley Park, a retired Chicago police captain who cofounded HERO along with Brian Kirk, called the trailer an essential tool for stemming the growing heroin/opioid epidemic.

Along with its eye-opening trailer, HERO offers services including a family support group, grief support group, drug education, Narcan training, and access to educational speakers.

Roberts and Kirk both lost sons to overdoses just months apart. Unfortunately, their story is becoming all too familiar.

For people aged 18 to 45, drug overdose has become widely asserted as well as contested as the leading cause of death in the United States.

Either way, 106,699 Americans died of overdoses of illicit and prescription drugs in 2021, according to the National Institutes of Health’s National Institute on Drug Abuse.

The annual figure is nearly twice the number of U.S. military deaths related to the Vietnam War and more than twice the number of country’s gun-related deaths in 2022. It’s also an annual death count that has nearly tripled in the last decade, due to illicit drugs and marijuana being laced with highly addictive and often lethal fentanyl.

Fentanyl is considered 50 times stronger than heroin and 100 times stronger than morphine, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. It’s approved by the Food and Drug Administration and added to many pain killers to make them stronger, but it’s also made illegally and added to illicit drugs.

“Many people don’t even know it’s in what they’re using, and they die,” Roberts said while standing outside of the Hidden in Plain Sight trailer. “People are afraid to face the truth as to the dangers of drugs.

“Parents will ask fellow parents if they’ve had the sex talk with their kids, but now they have to have the sex talk — and the drug talk. We have to educate parents, loved ones and law enforcement on what to look for and how to respond.”

Roberts’ son, Billy, died at age 19. “I want people to know my son, just like their loved ones, was more than his addiction. He was a great kid, a great soccer player. He was a leader. He had many friends. You would never think something like this could happen to him.”

When the family moved from Chicago to Homer Glen, Roberts noticed changes in Billy, who was spending more time alone and struggling to connect with new classmates.

HERO educational materials list signs of possible substance use as problems functioning at school and work, health problems such as lack of energy and weight loss, unclear thinking, and sudden requests for money.

After his son’s death in 2009, Roberts began a crusade to provide police departments with training on administering Narcan to overdose victims. His own son was saved twice by the local fire department.

Roberts and Kirk established the Hidden in Plain Sight trailer in partnership with the Will County State’s Attorney, New Lenox Police Department and Lincolnway Christian Church.

In the last seven years, they’ve brought the trailer to summer festivals, fundraisers, school and community events.

“This year, we set a record with over 50 events,” Roberts said. “Usually, we appear at 30 to 40.”

Lining the trailer’s walls are stash containers for hiding drugs. Available online and in local vape shops, these take the form of specially constructed soda cans, water bottles, light bulbs, key fobs, toy cars, Apple watches and orthotics for shoes.

Additional homemade stash compartments litter the bed, including oversize athletic shoes with heels hollowed out, shirts with slashed under collars, pants with slashed waistbands and a stuffed animal with a seam ripped open. A belt with a wear pattern marking the size of an arm instead of a person’s waist represents a tool for tying off and shooting up.

The trailer also features a desk littered with household items, including baking soda, used for making drugs.

Overhead, a poster reveals how over-the-counter cold and antidiarrheal medications are often abused, as well as how a heavily scented muscle rub can be used to throw off drug-sniffing dogs.

Co-founder Kirk retired from his involvement with HERO in 2019, but Roberts’s daughter, Bonnie Tongson, is the group’s community outreach coordinator and often staffs the trailer. A small army of volunteers also supports the organization, Roberts said, though additional help and financial support are still needed.

At the event in Merrionette Park, Tongson and HERO executive director Jan Dombrowski educated visitors about seemingly ordinary items, including a hooded sweatshirt constructed with special tube ties that enable people to vape undetected.

“I talk with people in active addiction or recovery,” Dombrowski said. “I also go to head shops and see what people are buying. We also talk with local police departments.”

Using a seat belt strap, Dombrowski demonstrated a hiding place many rely on when stopped by police — the portion of the seat belt that crosses the shoulder. “They tape the drugs to the inside,” she said. “Police don’t even think to look there unless they know.”

The Hidden in Plain Sight trailer stocks free doses of Narcan and plenty of educational materials for parents and loved ones.

A cheat sheet produced by the Drug Enforcement Administration lists text emojis commonly used to communicate about drug purchases. Snowflakes, snowmen and eight balls represent cocaine. References to meth appear as crystal balls or test tubes. Drug dealers advertise their wares with a crown, money bag and electrical plug. A cookie represents a drug batch.

Roberts said the November event was the last one for the trailer in 2023, but appearances will resume in spring.

For now, the HERO crusade continues during the winter months with the trailer’s contents — minus the bed, desk and dresser — displayed at schools, churches and other indoor locations upon request.

A HERO family support group meets Tuesdays from 7 to 8:30 p.m. at Lincolnway Christian Church, 690 E. Illinois Highway, New Lenox. A HERO grief support group meets the first and third Tuesdays from 7 to 8:30 at changing locations. More information is at www.TheHeroFoundation.org.

Susan DeGrane is a freelance reporter for the Daily Southtown.

“Girl Scouts was fun, but it wasn’t what Jack was doing,” said Grace, now a senior at the Chicago High School of Agricultural Sciences. “He went to Camp Owasippe for a week every summer and came back with all kinds of stories about all the fun things he got to do.”

Those activities included kayaking, horseback riding, archery, shooting skeet, rappelling, sailing, boating, swimming and camping.

Wanting to experience those same adventures, Grace joined the Boy Scouts of America in 2019, two years after the organization began welcoming girls.

Grace not only earned a merit badge for kayaking. She eventually taught kayaking at Camp Owasippe to other Scouts earning their badges. She also joined the ranks of more than 1,000 young women across the nation who have achieved Eagle Scout status in recent years.

Grace was not the only girl from Troop 637 to be honored as an Eagle Scout in September by Father Perez Knights of Columbus Council 1444 at Queen of Martyrs Parish in Evergreen Park, where the troop meets on Sunday evenings. Her sisters Kaitlin and Molly, both freshman at the Chicago High School of Agricultural Sciences, also achieved the BSA’s highest honor, along with Ella Devine, a senior at Mother McAuley Liberal Arts High School.

The four were the first girls in Troop 637 to become Eagle Scouts.

Like Grace, Molly Sullivan joined the Scouts wanting to participate in archery, water sports and camping. She and her fraternal twin Kaitlin both joined the BSA at age 11 and achieved Eagle Scout status when they were 14.

Becoming Eagle Scouts at such an early age is “unusual,” said Ken McCann, a committee chair with the troop.

“Yes, they really just powered on through,” he said.

To qualify as an Eagle Scout, a candidate must have been involved in scouting for at least six months, have obtained 21 merit badges, and taken on leadership roles in Scouting. They must also complete an Eagle Scout project.

Eagle Scout projects are intended to foster leadership skills. They must benefit the community and engage other members of the troop in bringing about their completion. The projects also frequently require first obtaining approval and cooperation from community organizations and community members.

“A lot of people hold off until they’re 18,” Molly said. “They can do it sooner, they just can’t do it after 18. Plus, a lot of people put it off because they have to do a lot of paperwork.”

On that note, the Sullivan girls’ mother and Scoutmaster, Jessica Sullivan, joked, “We weren’t idle during COVID. We held virtual Scout meetings, and we had campouts in the backyard with YouTube.”

Grace led many of those virtual meetings with the family gathered at the coffee table in the living room. All three girls worked on their merit badges.

Molly’s Eagle Scout project involved organizing and overseeing the sprucing up of two parking lots affiliated with Queen of Martyrs.

“We repainted guard rails, took out overgrown bushes and a huge pile of debris around a light pole,” she said. “It took two days. It taught me how to manage people, but also to meet other people’s needs even though you’re dictating what they do in that moment. It also taught me about time management.”

Kaitlin’s project was to orchestrate the painting of a meeting hall/lunchroom. “We painted it two, three coats, the school colors,” she said, referring to the blue and white walls.

After getting approval from Queen of Martyrs school for the paint colors, and assembling paints and painting materials, Kaitlin went about overseeing other troop members, volunteers and parents in the four-day painting project.

“I felt lots of people were asking me difficult questions, it was very stressful at times,” Kaitlin said. “But it taught me important life lessons.”

She also agreed with Molly’s description of Troop 637 as a supportive “second family,” in helping her.

Grace’s Eagle project involved leveling and repainting paving stones in the church’s memorial courtyard. To do this, she created a master map of the stones so that they could be returned to their rightful places after fellow Scouts and volunteers finished clearing away tree roots, leveling the soil and repainting the stones.

The hardest part of overseeing the project was staying in a supervisory role, Grace said. “I just wanted to get in there and do it.”

Like the Sullivan sisters, Ella Devine was inspired to join the BSA by a brother who was involved. “I like trying new things, going outside of my comfort zone,” she said. “I wanted to have some adventures.”

Ella organized a food drive for Turpin Cares, a nonprofit that provides food, hygiene products and relief items to homeless people and others in need on the South Side. Her efforts included creating collection bags printed with information to inform people living near Queen of Martyrs of the collection, pickup times and items needed.

Fellow Scouts deposited the bags on doorsteps, then retrieved them on the appointed day, taking the donated items to the church for sorting. In all 500 items were collected.

“I just got a sense of joy, knowing I was helping people,” said Ella who is considering a career in hospitality. “It felt good. I also learned how to control people — not in a bad way — but how to manage them, get them to do certain tasks. It was a nice experience, getting to learn to be a leader. I think it would help me in the future.”

Grace also expressed gratitude for the chance to help others.

“You feel like you are helping your community,” Grace said. “Kids at school are not seeing each other in drab surroundings at lunch. It’s much happier and brighter now. The parking lots are cleared. And older parishioners are able to relax in the courtyard with memories of their loved ones, now that there are no tripping hazards. It feels good to have a positive impact on people’s lives.”

Since 2017, the BSA has welcomed more than 160,000 girls into Cub Scouts and Boy Scouts, according to the organization’s website. The organization honored 61,353 new Eagle Scouts last year, with Scout members and volunteers collectively completing more than 13 million hours of community service.

Other Troop 637 Eagle Scouts honored in September by Father Perez Knights of Columbus Council 1444 were Rex DeVries, Christian Morales, Patrick Panarese, and Stephen Devine, Ella’s brother.

Susan DeGrane is a freelance reporter for the Daily Southtown.