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| Apartments & two-flats, 7300 S. Union - J.R. Schmidt photo |
Schmidt - who used to write a blog for the Tribune owned ChicagoNow site - revisits the Englewood neighborhood. Alas I'm not able to show you his original post at the defunct Unknown Chicago blog, but for now at least we can see what he says about Englewood at his WBEZ digs:
And yet, the community has not given up. Much of the southern section remains stable. Here and there, some houses have been built. In 2007 a new campus for Kennedy-King College opened at 63rd-Halsted. There’s hope the college will revive what’s left of the shopping district.BTW, when he was posting at Unknown Chicago that post was linked here and some of the photographs from there were posted here as well. He shows some of those pics in this new post and takes new shots of some scenes around Englewood.
If a single building symbolizes Englewood, that would be the South Side Masonic Temple, at 64th and Green. It has been abandoned for years, and several attempts at adaptive re-use have failed. Its future is uncertain.
Yet even with broken windows and falling bricks, the temple is an impressive reminder of past glory. Will it be brought back to life? Will Englewood be brought back to life?
BTW, he does refer to Englewood in the beginning as "mini-Detroit".
Calling RAGE, calling RAGE! I'm sure you have something to say about this post!
A couple generations of my family has lived on 67th & Hermitage since the 1960s. They were the first blacks on that block may I add. I myself grew up on the low-end of Chicago and wasn't fortunate enough to live in my family's house until I was 12 in 2002. Of course, that only lasted for three years because when I looked up we were moving to a sectioned tabbed the wild 100s of Chicago. Now the house isn't no more. The church that was next door that recently held the services of Edward Bey surprisingly is still there however. The block was clean and safe. No problems. Everybody got along. Mostly retired blacks stayed in that section of Marquette road. But now I'm in the so-called mini-Detroit going to school; and yes, it is blight. Chicago, I've heard, is becoming the same. My suggestion to stop this is that adults between the ages of 40 and 50 get up and take action. Get up off your asses and get in the streets. Too many of our so-called adults are plugged into the matrix, watching so-called reality television night and day, laying in the damn bed waiting for a messiah. Get'chall asses up and take responsibility. Especially in Chicago. 48204 is coming near you. And it ain't gon be pretty. Your food is going to be shyt. You're going to have abandoned homes aside you with lawn six-feet upward. You will have to travel far out to go shopping for fresh produce. And you will be around ignorance galore. Get involved.
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