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Articles by Ken Trainor
The private side of a public life
On this snowy Sunday in mid-November, Rev. Martin Marty, still wearing his collar from preaching that morning on the anniversary of the birth of Martin Luther, is busy scraping snow and ice from the walks and stairs of the century-old Riverside Victorian he and his family have inhabited for the past 35 years. Marty and Harriet, his wife of 15 years, are entertaining this afternoon.
Re-considering Matthew Shepard
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Moral neutrality colludes with evil
Home / News / Articles / Moral neutrality colludes with evil Opinion Tuesday, November 26th, 2019 1:04 PM By KEN TRAINOR Editor The House of Blues looks a little like a haunted house — cavernous, ornate, walls painted free-form and adorned with myriad music mementos. Above the entrance, ghostly sculpted reliefs of gods of the blues stare eerily down like a gallery from Hotel California. But this Tuesday night was not devoted to music.
Bob Sullivan, 86
Home / News / Articles / Bob Sullivan, 86 Wednesday, August 21st, 2019 3:21 PM By Ken Trainor Loved what made life meaningful Robert A. Sullivan, 86, a longtime resident of Forest Park, died on July 27, 2019 in Borrego Springs, California. Born on Oct. 11, 1932 in Yonkers, New York, to Jennie and Mike Sullivan, he served in the U.S. Air Force, then worked as a copywriter at several major Chicago advertising agencies.
Bob Sullivan, 86, freelance writer, freelance thinker
Home / News / Articles / Bob Sullivan, 86, freelance writer, freelance thinker Wednesday, August 21st, 2019 3:18 PM By KEN TRAINOR Staff Reporter Bob Sullivan liked talking to strangers — on the Green Line at 10 p.m. returning from a Grant Park concert, in the passport line at the Post Office. He seemed determined to prove to them, and reinforce for himself, that "a stranger is just a friend you haven't met yet." But he would have cringed at that phrasing.
Bobbie Raymond, a bridge over Austin, dies at 80
Home / News / Articles / Bobbie Raymond, a bridge over Austin, dies at 80 The pioneering integration activist was an Oak Park icon, but also made her mark in Austin Tuesday, May 21st, 2019 11:31 AM Involved: Bobbie Raymond at a fundraiser in Oak Park. Wherever things were happening, she was there. | Submitted photo Photo courtesy of Martha Swisher Priorities: (Right) Grandson Trevor was her pride and joy. Her devotion to Oak Park was a close second.
Democracy in the graveyard?
We hope that's not a bad omen or a symbol of doom and gloom to come, but the Historical Society of Oak Park-River Forest is shining a spotlight (well, hopefully, the sun) on those permanently settled in Forest Park's Forest Home Cemetery who "worked for freedom, equality, and opportunity for all." The historical society's 27th annual guided walking tour, known as the Cemetery Walk, takes place this Sunday at 1 p.m. Employing the theme "Truth, Justice, and the American Dream," this year's walk...
Val Camilletti sold us the soundtrack of our lives
Though she lived in Cicero and grew up in Austin, for many people Val Camilletti, 78, was the most recognized face in Oak Park. An institution and vibrant presence in the village for the past 50 years, she died on July 24, 2018 at the end of a two-year battle with breast cancer. More than anything else, she was associated with music, beginning in the late 1960s when she ran record stores on Ridgeland near Lake Street, 723½ South Blvd.
Chalk up another graduating class at OPRF
The OPRF High School class of 2018 is on its way. But the sendoff wasn't Sunday's commencement ceremony. That was just the rubber stamp: Hand out the diplomas, let out one more resounding joyful cheer, then on to the parties and the rest of their lives. The real sendoff took place on May 25, the last day of school for seniors.
Mahoney meets Hamilton
The other day, we received brochures in the mail from Sullivan Auctioneers LLC in Hamilton, Illinois for a John Mahoney Estate Auction, taking place this Monday, June 11. Curious? We were too. Why would a small town in central Illinois be holding an estate auction for the late, and highly esteemed, actor who ended up calling Oak Park home? Well, the Sullivan name is a hint.
A community birthday bash for Shawn
Shawn soaks up some love, thanks to the efforts of BJ Richards (dark hair, right). | Alexa Rogals/Staff Photographer If I told you the community threw a surprise 44th birthday party at Brown Cow Ice Cream Parlor on Madison Street in Forest Park for a ticket-taker from the Lake Theatre in Oak Park who lives in Maywood, you might scratch your head and reply, "Come again?" If nothing else, it proves that, in the age of social media, you have to be careful what you say.
Pope is coming to Oak Park!
Pope is coming to Oak Park!Tuesday, May 22nd, 2018 2:27 PMShare on FacebookShare on TwitterEmailPrintBy Ken TrainorStaff writerWell, he's coming to the Lake Theatre at any rate. The new documentary, Pope Francis – A Man of his Word, opens this Friday for a limited run (two weeks for sure, after that, who knows?). The advance word is that you don't have to be Catholic to enjoy the film. After all, who doesn't like Pope Francis (except for the reactionaries, that is)?
The real royal wedding
I attended the wedding last Saturday morning. No, not that wedding. Not the one between Prince Harry and the marvelous Meghan Markle, who currently seems to enjoy the greatest name recognition on the planet — for reasons I can't quite fathom.
Surprise party for Lake Theatre stalwart
Participants cheer as Shawn Weakliss enters the room on Monday, during a surprise birthday party at Brown Cow on Madison Street in Forest Park. | ALEXA ROGALS/Staff Photographer Shawn Weakliss waits and listens to attendees sing Happy Birthday before blowing his candles out on Monday, during a surprise birthday party at Brown Cow on Madison Street in Forest Park.
Why I'm proud to be from Oak Park
Open housing marches in Oak Park in the mid-1960s led to the Fair Housing Ordinance of 1968. | FILE My pride in this village is more than mindless booster-ism. It's based on something. We haven't done everything right, but we did some big things right.
Why I'm opposed to gun control
You read that right. I oppose gun control — for the same reason I oppose birth control, which might also surprise you. Fear not. Like most reasonable people, I am strongly in favor of effective gun regulation, just as I'm very much in favor of reproductive rights. We can't control birth any more than we can control death — or much of anything else in between for that matter.
What I believe
A fellow progressive pilgrim, Shirley Lundin, recently reminded me of a column I wrote some years back stating my personal credo (literally, "I believe"). Asking "What do I believe?" is a good exercise, not just for ourselves but to pass on to others — what you actually believe, that is, as opposed to what a particular religion tells us we have to believe in order to maintain our membership creed-entials.
Helping us believe again
Senja Peters, a 14-year-old from Julian Middle School, releases a balloon on April 20 during a student day of remembrance for victims of gun violence at Scoville Park. | Alexa Rogals/Staff Photographer A lovely day for a rally, blue skies, temps climbing into the 50s, everything's coming up roses (well, eventually), the weather tipping us, perhaps, finally, into spring itself, and our kids letting it be known they're not going away, tipping us, perhaps, finally, into change itself.
Good questions, surprising answers
Just imagine the questions going through their expanding minds. Four-year-olds ask really good questions. The things we take for granted, they see fresh. My grandsons, Tyler and Bryce, were born with three of four great-grandparents still alive. At the wake for the last of the three, the boys saw the body in the casket, but were told Great-Grandpa Ray was "gone." The body still there, but the person they knew was gone.
A lovely way to start Sunday morning
Listening to the interview show, On Being, is how I begin most Sunday mornings (7 a.m., WBEZ). I think of it as a spiritual practice, an hour to worship at the altar of reason and inspiration. It gets my Sabbath off to a stimulating start.
From many flags, one people
This first ran on April 4, 2012. It has been slightly updated: Fifty years ago today, Harriette Robinet, like most mothers of that era, was home with the kids. Her husband, McLouis, better known as Mac, was teaching at UIC. No different, really, from most other days. Except April 4, 1968 was no ordinary day. Several hundred miles to the south in Memphis, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. had just been murdered.
A night at your museum
Frank Lipo shows off some of the myriad items at the OPRF Museum. | File Oak Park River Forest Museum will host their first "Night At Your Museum" tonight (Wednesday), April 4 from 7 to 8:30 p.m. Light refreshments will be offered. Oak Park River Forest Museum is located at 129 Lake St., at the corner of Lake and Lombard. Admission for members is free, regular rates apply to non-members. For more information, visit their website, oprfmuseum.org.
Traffic calming on the left bank of Marion
A bright Friday morning, 9 a.m., the rush of commuters to the Metra and the Green Line having already subsided, the day's commerce begins. With a half hour to "kill" and an hour remaining on my meter, fortified by coffee, I take a window seat at Lea, the restaurant on Marion Street that specializes in "French street food." It's not France, but I can imagine it from here, French cafes being famous as sanctuaries from the mainstream, a harbor from which to watch the world flow by.
Soul Force for change
Soul Force for changeTuesday, March 27th, 2018 3:22 PMShare on FacebookShare on TwitterEmailPrintBy Ken TrainorStaff writerResheeda Graham-Washington and Shawn Casselberry, authors of Soul Force – Seven Pivots toward Courage, Community and Change, will lead a presentation titled, "Soul Force Training Experience: Equipping Leaders for Courageous Community Transformation" on Wednesday, April 4, marking the 50th anniversary of the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr. The event, co-sponsored...
A walk through the woods
It always seemed very much, to me as a child, that I was living in a poem — that my life was the poem. When you're in a very quiet place, when you're remembering, when you're savoring an image, when you're allowing your mind calmly to leap from one thought to another — that's a poem. That's what a poem does.
'Share'-ity begins away from home
For a long time, I couldn't get a handle on the panhandler issue. I almost never gave. At best, I ignored them. At worst, I bristled with annoyance. I tried to rationalize all this — and failed utterly. It wasn't guilt so much, although that played a role. I simply didn't like what it was doing to me. Then about two years ago, I attended a Unity Temple service highlighted by Henry Mollicone's Beatitude Mass: For the Homeless.
Upholding the covenant of community
After reading about the murder of Sergio Quiano — and the testimonials by Matt Baron, Bill and Lynne Higgins, and others in Wednesday Journal — I wondered, "How did I miss this guy?" After all, he was frequently sighted walking the streets of Oak Park, the same streets I've been walking for the past quarter century. I'm familiar with all the "regulars" as I call them, solitary figures whose lives I often wonder, but too rarely inquire about.
Never stop calling B.S.
High school students. All but adult, yet with none of the surrender of adults. None of the conditioned passivity and resignation to "the way the world is." Their B.S. meters far more highly tuned than ours. They see right through the hypocrisy of purchased politicians like Marco Rubio, whose convictions are sold to the highest bidder. "Pathetically weak" as grieving father Fred Guttenberg described Rubio's and President Trump's comments following the latest school massacre.
Blossoming under the same sun
Our country is like a really old house. I love old houses. I've always lived in old houses. But old houses need a lot of work, and the work is never done. And just when you think you've finished one renovation, it's time to do something else; something else has gone wrong. And that's what our country is like. You may not want to go into that basement, but if you don't go into that basement, it's at your own peril. And whatever you are ignoring is not going to go away.
A valentine for the ones we miss
'I'll miss you forever," Bryce says as I buckle him into his car seat for the ride home at the end of our day together. "And I'll miss you until next week," I reply, kissing the top of his head several times. Tyler is a less dramatic. He smiles and says, "I love you, too … Mr. Boogerman." What is it about boys and boogers? It seems hardwired into the male gene. Boogers or not, my 4-year-old grandboys are becoming more complex. And so am I.
John Mahoney, actor and Oak Park booster, dies at 77
John Mahoney at one of his favorite Oak Park haunts, people watching outside of Poor Phil's on Marion Street. (File) John Mahoney was a fixture — on TV (as the father in "Frasier" for 11 years), in films (Moonstruck, Say Anything, Eight Men Out and Dan in Real Life, where he wore an "Oak Park High" sweatshirt), and at Steppenwolf, where he performed in The Rembrandt as recently as last fall.
The president's state of disunion
I watched President Trump's first State of the Union (SOTU) address last week. A lot of people spared themselves the ordeal, but you never know — it might be his last. As I've always said when discussing Trump, it's not about politics. It's about psychology. Whether you support him or not, I think we can all agree on one thing: Donald Trump is an extraordinarily annoying human being. As he warms to the standing ovation from the Republicans, he becomes even cockier than usual.
DPOP phone banking for 3 guv hopefuls
The Democratic Party of Oak Park is not endorsing a candidate for governor in the March 20 primary, but has opened its office for phone banking for each of the three leading candidates. Beginning Jan. 30, the DPOP office at 6941-A West North Ave. is open on Tuesdays from 6 to 8 p.m. for phone banking for Chris Kennedy. On Wednesday evenings, starting Jan. 31, the office will be open for phone banking for State Sen. Daniel Biss. And on Thursday evenings, starting Feb.
D90 opens kindergarten registration
Find out everything you wanted to know and more about enrolling your soon-to-be- kindergartener at River Forest District 90 schools at Information Night on Feb. 1. The first day of school is Aug. 23. Hear presentations from kindergarten teachers, the school nurse, principal and leaders from the Parent Teacher Organization. The evening will also feature a tour of classrooms. Registration for D90 kindergarten begins Feb. 2 for children who will be 5 years old by Sept. 1.
Construction begins on The Depot
Construction on River Forest Park District's Metra depot headquarters started Jan. 24 and, if all goes well, will be finished by June 1, in time for the district's slate of summer programming, said Michael Sletten, executive director. "The original building's offices were scattered all over different spaces, and so we'll be consolidating offices in a secure space on the top floor," Sletten said.
Profiles in patriotic courage
Among this year's Best Picture nominees are two powerful profiles in courage, The Post and Darkest Hour. I grew up in post-World War II America, hearing all about Winston Churchill, who was my father's hero. He would regularly do Churchill impersonations for us. Two speeches cemented his place in history (and in my memory).
The Hammer hangs it up
The sign at the corner of Oak Park Avenue and Ontario Street read "Parting Words" in preparation for Rev. Harry Parker's final sermon last Sunday at First Baptist Church of Oak Park. Parker, aka "The Hammer" (allegedly), has delivered over 1,000 sermons in his 28 years as pastor of what is probably the most racially diverse congregation in the village. In actuality, he has been a notable model of reason and fairmindedness in an era of societal polarization.
What love means | Articles | News | OakPark.com
Every year without knowing it, I have passed the day When the last fires will wave to me And the silence will set out Like the beam of a lightless star Then I will no longer Find myself in life as in a strange garment And the love of one woman And the shamelessness of men As today, writing after three days of rain Hearing the wren sing and the falling cease And bowing, not knowing to what.
In mid-sentence for 47 years
Each of us tells the story differently, setting our words to music all our own. … You sing your song in your own key, in your own beautiful voice, and the cosmos listens, reverently. The story I live by is told to me by the only world that I can see and taste. … It is an evolving, unfinished story; our part in it is the making of meaning, the making of questions and celebrations, and these too evolve and expand without end.
In mid-sentence for 47 years
Each of us tells the story differently, setting our words to music all our own. … You sing your song in your own key, in your own beautiful voice, and the cosmos listens, reverently. The story I live by is told to me by the only world that I can see and taste. … It is an evolving, unfinished story; our part in it is the making of meaning, the making of questions and celebrations, and these too evolve and expand without end.
Surviving the deep freeze
White Christmas was a pleasant surprise, and most welcome. What followed was not. The last week of 2017 and the first week of 2018, temperatures never got within shouting distance of 20 degrees, and most of the time they were mired in single digits, one side or the other of dreaded zero. You know things are bad when 15 degrees feels balmy.
Calling all women: Help!
This past year was, in many ways, the Year of the Woman, but not the one many predicted — i.e. the first year of our first female president. Hillary Clinton lost to a self-absorbed male misogynist pig, so everyone thought the dream had been deferred yet again. But if Hillary had won (actually, she did, making it all the more galling), women might have been lulled into complacency, believing the system still works.
Happiness interruptus
One day this fall, I was sitting at a stop light on Thatcher in River Forest. To my right was the non-descript, overgrown side yard of Trailside Museum near the Des Plaines River — at least that's how I used to think of it. Now I think of it as a happy place, filled with warm memories of time spent with my two grandsons, who love the nature playground Trailside has created there: logs to climb on, a teepee made of tree branches, a graduated water table that runs downhill like a cascading river.
Among the many who made us who we are
In the past 12 months, we said goodbye to many who contributed to the tapestry that is Oak Park and River Forest. Here is a small sample of those we miss: Wendell Rayburn Sr., 87, president of two colleges and vice president of the American Association of State Colleges and Universities (1996-2006). Rose Joseph, 73, co-founder of Magic Tree Bookstore in Oak Park, grew up on a farm in Saskatchewan, Canada.
Most checked out books, DVDs at the River Forest library this year
Home /Community /Blogs /Most checked out books, DVDs at the River Forest library this yearMost checked out books, DVDs at the River Forest library this yearTuesday, December 26th, 2017 6:00 AMShare on FacebookShare on TwitterEmailPrintBy Ken TrainorStaff writerRiver Forest residents borrowed exactly 233,356 items from the River Forest Public Library this year. What burning items singed their library cards?
Topping everyone's holiday list
Like a lot of people, I was shook up when Tom Broderick took his own life two days after Thanksgiving. There was no more committed social justice activist than Tom, and he inspired and reassured those of us who can't muster the same level of commitment to such a wide array of worthy causes. With his death, he almost seemed to be saying, "It's up to you now." There's a song, written by Phil Ochs, that closes WFMT's Midnight Special each Saturday night (Kim and Reggie Harris version on YouTube).
At the Hanukkah Table: Sweet Cherry and Brown Sugar Brisket
As an impressionable teenager I was an avid babysitter and one of my favorite families would invite me to participate in their annual Hanukkah celebration. In exchange for keeping an eye on the wee-ones throughout the festive evening, I was fortunate enough to spin the dreidel and witness the lighting of the menorah before savoring a cozy meal. The hearty menu always featured fried potato latkes, braised beef brisket, rich noodle kugel, and sweet jelly-filled donuts called sufganiyot.
Our new Memorial Day
None of the many, many mass killings of the past decade has turned my stomach quite like the carnage visited upon Sandy Hook Elementary in Newtown, Connecticut, which took place five years ago tomorrow. Twenty first-graders and six staff (including the principal). Twenty first-graders — gunned down with an assault weapon. Let that image make you really, really uncomfortable because we need to remember this one.
Marathon man runs Antarctica in six hours
Wednesday Journal recently reported on a River Forest man's quest to run a marathon in Antarctica on Thanksgiving. After a five-day journey to the tip of Chile and across the Strait of Magellan, Ed Baehrend, 56, made it to Antarctica, the bottom of the world. On Nov. 23, he competed in a 26.2-mile marathon on the cold continent, crossing the finishing line at exactly 6 hours, 6 minutes and 12 seconds. Baehrend finished 25th out of a total of 38 men.
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