June 19, 2000

Oak Park centennial celebration to
start rolling next year

By ERIC LINDEN

Planning began last week to decide how Oak Park next year should
celebrate its founding nearly 100 years ago.

Oak Park as a separate municipality came into being in January 1902,
after a successful election the previous fall decided that the village
would break away from Cicero Township to the south. Oak Park community
leaders long have informally discussed how to mark the village's
centennial year, and the Historical Society of Oak Park and River Forest
last week started the formal process by asking residents their opinion
of a "draft proposal."

According to the proposal from the Historical Society, which is based in
Pleasant Home, the landmark home owned by the Park District of Oak Park
in Mills Park at 217 S. Home Ave., the centennial celebration would
begin on Oct. 6, 2001, about a month before the 100th anniversary of the
referendum to break away from Cicero. On Nov. 5, 1901, Oak Park voters
decided by 862 to 160 votes to break away from Cicero Township.

Under the plans so far, the Oct. 6, 2001 homecoming at Oak Park and
River Forest High School would recognize the Oak Park centennial, and
the celebration officially would begin with a kick-off "birthday
banquet" on Nov. 5 next year. Then a full year of activities, displays,
festivals, lectures and historic-themed events would be held.

"The Historical Society will partner with individuals, businesses,
governments, organizations and, of course, the (Oak Park village
government) to make these activities a reality," reads the Historical
Society's proposal.

All that and more is to provide detail about the separation movement and
the community's development since then. Native sons such as architect
Frank Lloyd Wright and writer Ernest Hemingway and other much-publicized
aspects of Oak Park's history, housing and architectural development
will be referred to, and the movement in the last 30-plus years to work
to develop a racially integrated and otherwise diverse community also is
to be spotlighted.

"The more recent legacy of building a diverse community through public
policy is much heralded but only partially documented," the society's
proposal says, "In a nation that still grapples with issues of race
relations, Oak Park's ... decision to build an integrated community is a
national model. ... While Wright, Hemingway and a handful of others may
provide an important part of the community's identity, the legacy of
embracing diversity is likely to remain the most nationally significant
aspect of the community's history."

Little detail about that and other aspects of the centennial celebration
has been decided so far, but there are other parts of the centennial
celebration that have been proposed. The Historical Society envisions
street banners, centennial village decals, history-themed murals on
viaducts, special sections in various newspapers, historic house markers
and centennial themes at area festivals such as Hemingway Fest and "A
Day In Our Village."

Events and activities that are even more unique also are to be part of
the centennial plans now. For instance, a photography contest would
spotlight "Oak Park, Then and Now"; residents would be encouraged to
hold block parties with centennial themes after doing research on the
history of their blocks; contests would be held to identify the oldest,
newest and most unique homes; and then, historic residents would be
celebrated as part of a new "Hall of Fame."

According to the Historical Society, "That means an exhibit detailing
the life and legacy of Dr. Percy Julian and others whose achievements
left a special mark on the village or whose accomplishments transcend
the borders of Oak Park."

Dr. Julian, a nationally known and honored chemist, was one of the first
black residents of Oak Park whose family was fire-bombed at their Oak
Park home. Many residents rallied around the family, though, and the
Julian family made its mark on many aspects of Oak Park life. A public
junior high school is now named for Dr. Julian, but past suggestions at
a public statue or other structure  honoring Dr. Julian have not come to
fruition. In the most recent public endorsement, the three candidates
for election to the Oak Park village board in 1999--current trustees
Barbara Ebner, Carolyn Hodge-West and William "J.J." Turner--pledged to
help lead efforts to have a public statue of Dr. Julian built in the
village.

The Historical Society says in its centennial proposal that the
quasi-Hall of Fame exhibit will not solely be about Julian, but would
honor other noted Oak Park historic figures and would include artifacts,
photos and other memorabilia from the Historical Society and from local
residents would be solicited to share their own items to honor the Hall
of Fame roster.

"The publicity generated by this new effort ... will allow this exhibit
to bring the story of Oak Park up to the present," according to the
draft centennial proposal. And also, residents would be asked to
contribute stories about their families for "The Oak Park Centennial
Family History Project" that also would be part of the exhibit honoring
the people in the unofficial Hall of Fame.

The centennial celebration also calls for progress on another
long-proposed but unrealized idea: creation of a Heritage Center in Oak
Park. Under this proposal, first made nine years ago by then-Village
Clerk Virginia Cassin, who is now chairman of the board of the Ernest
Hemingway Foundation of Oak Park, and by the Historical Society, a
facility would be developed as storage space for all manner of historic
documents, photographs, and artifacts related to Oak Park's history. The
contents would be available and the facility open to residents,
visitors, scholars and others. The Heritage Center also would offer
special  programs, changing exhibits and traveling exhibits to schools
and other public sites.

The Historical Society said it would be an advocate for the center,
starting with the centennial. "We will work to build consensus in the
community for new construction or for the retrofitting of an existing
building with proper climate controls and the space for the new
comprehensive history exhibit," the Historical Society pledged. The
organization also will "pursue a new home and better location," away
from its current second-floor space in Pleasant Home.

A published centennial history of Oak Park also is on the Historical
Society's docket. Other history books about Oak Park have been
published, but the society envisions a new one that both "explores the
roots of the community and carries the story of the village's
progressive spirit through the year 2000."

A year's worth of other activities also is being planned, including
markers at places and/or buildings that were important to Oak Park's
development but which no longer exist. The Historical Society said it
would conduct guided tours of "these spots where history happened,  and
"some likely candidates" were named, including the following:

* The cornerstone of the original municipal building, which was on the
southeast corner of Lake Street and Euclid Avenue
* The 1890s train station at North Boulevard and Marion Street
* The Austin home, which was built by the founding family of the former
Oak Park Trust and Savings Bank in Downtown Park on an estate that is
now Austin Gardens park on Forest Avenue and Ontario Street
* "Various Oak Park schools," including Lowell School, which was on the
southeast corner of Lake Street and Forest Avenue