Dinosaur Jr.’s second act is a feel-good gift that keeps on giving. These unwavering indie-rock lifers seem to have access to a bottomless well of arena-ready solos and riffs, brain-sticking melodies, and hurricane-force noise.…Read More
A man is accused of shooting a woman multiple times last year in Chatham on the South Side.
Deangelo Cooper, 33, is charged with attempted murder and illegal possession of a firearm in the Sept. 21, 2020, incident which took place in the 600 block of East 81st Street, Chicago police said.
Cooper allegedly shot a 29-year-old woman five times, seriously injuring her, police said.
Cooper was arrested Thursday in suburban Homewood, police said.
He was scheduled to appear in court Friday.
Man charged with attempted murder in September Chatham shootingon May 7, 2021 at 7:54 pm Read More »
It is no secret that Chicago police have lost the trust and confidence of many people living in high-crime neighborhoods. It’s one reason just one in two murders and about one in 20 non-fatal shootings leads to an arrest. People won’t cooperate with police if they don’t trust them.
In the weeks ahead, however, Chicago could take a step forward in rebuilding trust if the new police contract with the union representing most rank-and-file police officers mirrors the contract agreed to last summer by sergeants, lieutenants and captains.
Under the “supervisor’s” contract, citizens can file anonymous complaints and trigger investigations without disclosing their identity until the investigation is well underway. The existing Fraternal Order of Police contract, however, prohibits anonymous complaints.
The requirement that citizens sign affidavits on the front-end identifying themselves has been a major barrier to accountability because people are afraid of intimidation or retribution by police. This issue was cited in the 2017 report by the Department of Justice that led to the federal consent decree now driving reforms in the Chicago Police Department.
Yet another provision of the supervisor’s contract eliminates the practice of destroying police disciplinary records after five years. This same measure was negotiated by the FOP years ago and remains in place today, denying the public an officer’s complete disciplinary history.
Finally, the supervisor’s contract explicitly takes on the “code of silence” by affirmatively recognizing officers who report police misconduct. The so-called “Serpico” provision was named for the New York City police officer who exposed corruption in the New York City Police Department back in the 1970’s.
All of these provisions in the supervisor’s contract are a floor, not a ceiling, for the FOP contract. We should go much further to bring meaningful accountability and transparency to policing, professionalize our police department and rebuild public trust.
The Chicago Police Department appears to understand this. CPD recently unveiled a new dashboard showing trust levels by area. Not surprisingly, trust levels are considerably lower on the South and West Sides, where our organization, Chicago CRED, works to reduce gun violence.
Every one of our participants can share personal stories of being roughed up by police even before they were teens. Ask them to free associate images with the word “fear” and they often mention police officers. They’re terrified of police and will do anything to avoid them.
Most of our men have lost family members and friends to prison and gun violence. They themselves have spent years in the criminal justice system. Many have been shot.
We have only begun to address their collective trauma and there are thousands more we have yet to reach. There is a lot of painful history to confront, including confessions coerced through torture, convictions obtained with false evidence, and outright corruption in elite units, as well as the everyday indignities suffered by people of color at the hands of police.
Right now, gun violence in Chicago is approaching record highs. We’re up 20 to 30% over last year, when the city had roughly 780 homicides and more than 4,000 shootings.
With the summer months coming, we and our partners across the city are redoubling efforts to reach young men at risk. Thanks to the federal government, there is more funding available for support programs that can begin to address the trauma of gun violence afflicting tens of thousands of Chicagoans let alone the underlying conditions that breed violence — including joblessness, housing affordability and racism.
We’re heartened to see CPD recommitting to community policing in some higher-crime neighborhoods. We also take note of some Black police officers who are openly critical of the police union. We salute their courage and willingness to challenge police culture.
But changing a culture does not happen overnight and, for all our forward progress, there will always be setbacks. Two recent fatal police shootings following late-night foot chases have prompted calls for a much deeper reckoning on policing. It is long past time to “reimagine public safety” and ask whether many “crime” problems would be better solved by outreach and social service workers, instead of armed police.
Right now, no one is winning. The community is isolated and resigned to living with injustice. Police are viewed with suspicion. They increasingly face gunfire on the job and have pulled back from engaging with people. Officer wellness is suffering. Fewer people are pursuing careers in law enforcement.
With the new police contract, the men and women of the Chicago Police Department have a real opportunity to bring us all to a better place where trust and cooperation among people and police is the norm. It not only will make Chicago safer for people. It also will make Chicago safer for police.
Arne Duncan is the founder of Chicago CRED, a violence prevention organization.
Send letters to [email protected].
Good afternoon. Here’s the latest news you need to know in Chicago. It’s about a 5-minute read that will brief you on today’s biggest stories.
This afternoon will be partly sunny with a small chance of showers and a high near 58 degrees. Tonight’s low will be around 38 degrees. This weekend will be mostly cloudy with a high near 55 degrees on Saturday and a high around 53 degrees on Sunday.
After Brother Robert Ryan died in 2017, a relative posted an online tribute, calling him “the favorite uncle” who “lived a giving life” and “selflessly” served God.
Two lawsuits paint a different picture of Ryan, one that’s become public only after his death at 83. They accuse him of having molested children over a yearslong span in which he was a member of the Marist Brothers Catholic religious order.
One of the lawsuits says victims of the abuse included students attending Marist High School on the Far Southwest Side in the 1970s.
At Marist, Ryan’s “sexual abuse of minor boys worsened in both frequency and intensity . . . and he began to engage in more violent conduct, such as anal rape and sodomy,” according to the lawsuit.
Beyond describing what it says was the emotional and physical damage caused by Ryan, the suit accuses his order of covering up for him for years. It says the Marist Brothers were aware of allegations against Ryan and dealt with them by transferring him from coast to coast, in addition to placing him in Chicago, rather than removing him from ministry. The order also failed to report the sexual abuse allegations against Ryan to the police or to inform parents, according to the suit.
Most Catholic dioceses and many independently run Catholic religious orders now inform their church communities and the public about what they deem to be credible allegations of abuse of minors by their priests, deacons and brothers.
But the Marist Brothers, who have a hub in Chicago, do not. So, unlike, for instance, the Catholic Archdiocese of Chicago, the order does not post a public list of its members in Chicago and elsewhere who have been credibly accused of sexual abuse.
Read Robert Herguth’s full story here.
The viaduct at West 49th and South Honore streets in Back of the Yards used to be just a white wall.
Now, thanks to the recent work of a group of street artists, the concrete canvas is filled with a colorful array that includes a three-eyed “fox demon” and a hamburger with arms and legs.
The artist behind the human-like hamburger goes by the name KOZMO and helped organize the group of artists who painted the wall in April.
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She lives a few blocks away and says it was the perfect spot for the group, which came together “spur of the moment, almost like serendipity,” and went to work.
Part of the work features graffiti-style designs by an artist who goes by MATR, with green and yellow letters combining to spell out the artist’s name.
Another part of the mural was done by an artist who goes by xhaust and showcases graffiti “wildstyle” art.
See more photos of the art in Rylee Tan’s story and check out our ongoing series on Chicago’s public murals and mosaics here.
The Bears-Packers rivalry may have been dominated by Green Bay the last three decades, but Steve Greenberg has a message: It won’t be much longer (will it?) before the cheese dries up and crumbles.
The Sky won’t have talented forward Gabby Williams for the upcoming season after the team put her on the full-season suspension list yesterday. Williams will play for the French national team in this year’s FIBA Women’s EuroBasket, so the Sky fielded trade offers for her on draft night, but ultimately opted to retain her rights, Annie Costabile reports.
And some of the Cubs’ young pitchers, including left-hander Justin Steele and right-hander Keegan Thompson, have started earning the trust of manager David Ross, who’s often talked about having guys he can rely on in his bullpen.
What’s a personal passion project you’re working on right now?
Email us (please include your first name and where you live) and we might include your answer in the next Afternoon Edition.
Yesterday, we asked you: What song do you most associate with your childhood? Tell us why. Here’s what some of you said…
“‘Emotion’ by Samantha Sang and the Bee Gees. It played at the first dance I ever went to in 8th grade and the first time I ever danced with a boy and apparently I sang it in his ear.” — Michelle Perez
“‘American Pie,’ it was one of the first real conversations between my father and I about music. I asked what a levee was … and so it began.” — Andrea Gorman
“‘Mercy Mercy Me’ by Marvin Gaye, It’s a song that shaped my worldview and social consciousness growing up in the 70s. The song is still very relevant today.” — Tony Williams
“My mother would turn on a radio musical program called ‘Candlelight and Silver’ as we ate dinner. It featured light classical music, and one selection, Albert Ketelbey’s ‘In a Persian Market,’ will instantly transport me back to that apartment.” — Philip Wizenick
“‘Jump’ by Van Halen, because my mom and I always watched the Cubs games on Channel 9 and that was the intro song.” — Heather Wilson
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Afternoon Edition: May 7, 2021on May 7, 2021 at 8:00 pm Read More »
CINCINNATI — Luis Robert’s torn hip flexor will take three to four months, if not longer, for a full recovery, but it’s an injury that shouldn’t affect him after it heals properly.
Robert will not have surgery, the team said Friday. Following consultations with a number of specialists, it was determined rest and rehabilitation would be the appropriate course of action for a full recovery. Robert, who suffered the injury Sunday, was expected to be away from baseball activities 12-16 weeks with or without surgery.
“Without knowing the exact particulars [of the tear], more often than not he’s going to get back to playing at or near the same level,” said Brian Schulz, a sports-medicine specialist and orthopedic surgeon with the Cedars-Sinai Kerlan-Jobe Institute and a team physician for the Angels.
It was puzzling to some that Robert could tear a muscle running a straight line to first base with no contact. Several factors may have played into it, Schulz said.
“These athletes are so long and so fit,” Schulz said, “and he’s going from 0 to 100 almost immediately and the forces that are going through at the time, if his muscles aren’t warmed up or maybe he was just a little tight that day from the workload he had the previous day, who knows? Those forces are so great that sometimes the muscle can’t provide the support that it needs to.”
Sox assistant general manager and director of player development Chris Getz said there was no indication of “something that was nagging” Robert that would have led to the injury. The Sox are examining the injury from all angles, he said.
“With any injury, we do a deep dive and then analyze, was there something that perhaps caused this?” Getz said. “In Luis’ case, we are talking about one of the more explosive players in baseball and probably all of sports.”
Schulz said patience in Robert’s recovery process will be key. There is no way to speed up the healing process.
“It takes that long for these tissues to heal,” Schulz said. “Especially with a muscle injury, if you push too early you run the risk of going right back to where you started.”
An update on Robert’s progress will be provided in approximately eight weeks, the Sox said.
Achy Eaton
Adam Eaton got through a full first month without getting achy legs but he’s now dealing with a sore knee, which got him the afternoon off Wednesday. Manager Tony La Russa said Eaton also has a tight hamstring.
“I’m old, I’m old,” joked Eaton, 32. “But I’m OK, it’s all part of the grind.”
Eaton is second on the Sox with 16 runs scored and 18 RBI but is hitless in his last 19 at-bats, dropping his average from .268 to .211.
“Sometimes when I’m banged up I play better, so maybe turn it into a positive,” he said.
“It’s a good day for him to rest and then rest [Thursday, an off day],” La Russa said. “Need to keep him fresh because he’s very important.”
Leury Garcia started in right with Billy Hamilton in center.
Votto breaks thumb
The Reds’ Joey Votto broke his thumb when he was hit by a Dallas Keuchel changeup in the fourth inning. Votto was replaced at first base by Kyle Farmer in the sixth inning.
Votto, who has been hit 61 times in his career, is not expected to need surgery but could miss up to a month.
Luis Robert’s injury won’t require surgeryon May 7, 2021 at 8:48 pm Read More »
The sample size is too small to say the manager is in over his head. But public perception doesn’t care about that.
“Bad optics’’ is business-speak for anything that negatively affects the public perception of a business or a person. We used to say, “Who told you those pants were a good idea?” Now we just say, “Bad optics, Mr. Smithers.’’
Whatever you want to call Tony La Russa’s foggy, meandering journey to admitting he didn’t know a new Major League Baseball rule, it wasn’t good for him or the White Sox.
It happened during a recent postgame Zoom press conference, and it was painful viewing – the thin, reedy voice, the faraway look, the overall befuddlement. At a minimum, the Sox have a perception problem with their manager, which means they have a problem with their manager. There’s no use trying to distinguish between the two.
Let’s not make this into a discussion of whether people on the other side of 75 are capable of doing jobs as big and taxing as La Russa’s. Let’s not because it’s unfair to paint with a broad brush, and let’s not because I don’t want to get hit over the head with a barrage of broad brushes. Let’s limit this to the 76-year-old La Russa’s ability to manage the Sox.
Is he capable of a job that has brought many younger men to their knees?
The sample size is too small to say he definitively can’t. Anybody can have several bad moments over a 30-game span. The issue for La Russa and the Sox is that there was always going to be very little room for error in the public-perception category. It’s why it hasn’t taken long for perception to start galloping toward reality: If it doesn’t look like the skipper knows what he’s doing, maybe it’s because he doesn’t. If he looks doddering, maybe it’s because he is.
Unfair? Fair or unfair don’t matter here. What matters is our new friend “optics.’’ There’s no rush to judgment. There’s only judgment.
In a 1-0 loss to the Reds on Wednesday, La Russa didn’t know he could have used someone other than closer Liam Hendriks as a 10th-inning base runner. The new extra-inning rule states that the spot in the order that makes the last out of the previous inning becomes the designated runner at second base – unless the person in that spot had been the pitcher. It means that La Russa could have used Jose Abreu instead of Hendriks, who had been a base runner just once before in his 11-year career. After the game, a reporter had to inform the manager of that.
It’s incriminating that nobody on La Russa’s staff had filled him in. But the coaching staff isn’t standing in the spotlight. La Russa is. So there he was Wednesday, very much alone, looking like someone who calls for a ride at 3 a.m. but can’t describe where he is.
“I’ll re-read that situation,” he said to The Athletic’s James Fegan, who told the manager of the rule during the press conference. “I’m guessing you know the rules better. Now I know.”
Boy, oh, boy.
There have been several other occasions that the manager has goofed up. In a game in late April, he kept starter Lucas Giolito in for too long, and a 2-1 lead over the last-place Tigers turned into a 5-2 loss. Afterward, Giolito said he was tired. La Russa admitted he wasn’t aware of it. He did something similar with Matt Foster earlier in the month.
But Wednesday’s mistake was the most public and damaging.
La Russa needed to start the season with synapses blazing and a youthful energy belying his age. He hasn’t come close to that standard. I don’t know if he can climb out of the hole he has dug for himself. But if the temperature of the city is any indication, not only are few people willing to extend him a hand, many are grabbing for shovels.
All this over a few bad-look moments? Yes. Public perception matters in a multibillion-dollar industry. In this case, it matters more because it involves the third-oldest manager in baseball history. It matters when that manager hasn’t been in a dugout since 2011.
One thing we can say with certainty is that Sox chairman Jerry Reinsdorf cares about public perception about as much as he cares about 14th century French poetry. But what if La Russa continues to struggle, dragging down a talented team with him? What’s larger, Reinsdorf’s desire for another World Series title or his loyalty to close friends? I’m not sure I want to find out the answer.
Plenty of people will disagree with my contention that it’s too early to judge La Russa. Plenty of Sox fans believe that a Hall of Fame manager shouldn’t be making the mistakes he already has made.
But we’ll know soon enough if his problems are passing or here to stay. Too much is at stake. The Sox are a talented team with aspirations of a big postseason push. A manager shouldn’t be allowed to get in the way of that. That’s not perception. That’s reality.
The victims were found along the Illinois River west of a park boat ramp around 7:20 p.m. Thursday.
Three people died after apparently igniting a “black powder substance” and causing an explosion near Starved Rock State Park, a coroner said.
First responders were called to an area along the Illinois River west of a park boat ramp where they they discovered three dead males around 7:20 p.m. Thursday, authorities said.
“With assistance from the (Illinois) State Police, the Kane County Bomb Squad Unit & the FBI, it was determined that the individuals appeared to have ignited a type of black powder substance along an area near the riverbank,” LaSalle County Coroner Rich Ploch said.
Black powder was the original gunpowder and can be used to make fireworks.
The three died from injuries they received in the explosion, Ploch said. Autopsies were planned. The victims’ names have not been released.
The explosion occurred about 75 miles southwest of Chicago.
Muslim worshippers clashed with Israeli police at the Al-Aqsa mosque compound late Friday, a major holy site sacred to Muslims and Jews, who refer to it as the Temple Mount.
JERUSALEM — Palestinian worshippers clashed with Israeli police on Friday evening at Al-Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem’s Old City as weeks-long tensions between Israel and the Palestinians over Jerusalem soared again.
The Palestinian Red Crescent emergency service said 53 people were wounded in clashes with police there and elsewhere in Jerusalem, including 23 who were hospitalized. It says most were wounded in the face and eyes by rubber-coated bullets and shrapnel from stun grenades.
The clashes were the latest in a deadly day that saw Israeli forces shoot and kill two Palestinians after three men opened fire on an Israeli base in the occupied West Bank.
They erupted when Israeli police deployed heavily as Muslims were performing evening prayers at Al-Aqsa during the holy month of Ramadan. Video footage from the scene shows worshippers throwing chairs, shoes and rocks toward the police and officers responding by opening fire. Israeli police also closed gates leading to Al-Aqsa inside the walled Old City.
Dozens of Palestinians in an east Jerusalem neighborhood are at risk of being evicted following a long legal battle with Israeli settlers, and Palestinian protesters have clashed with Israeli police in the city on a nightly basis since the start of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan.
The unrest has drawn attention from across the region, with neighboring Jordan warning Israel against further “provocative” steps, and Iran seizing on the sensitivities around Jerusalem and encouraging the violence.
In the attack on Friday morning, Israeli police said three attackers fired on the base near the northern West Bank town of Jenin. The Border Police and an Israeli soldier returned fire, killing two of the men and wounding the third, who was evacuated to a hospital.
Some 70,000 worshippers attended the final Friday prayers of Ramadan at Al-Aqsa, the Islamic endowment that oversees the site said. Thousands protested afterwards, waving the green flags of the Islamic militant group Hamas and chanting pro-Hamas slogans before dispersing peacefully.
Israelis and Palestinians are bracing for more violence in the coming days.
Sunday night is “Laylat al-Qadr” or the “Night of Destiny,” the most sacred in the Muslim holy month of Ramadan. Worshippers will gather for intense nighttime prayers at the Al-Aqsa mosque compound in Jerusalem’s Old City, a flashpoint site sacred to both Muslims and Jews, who refer to it as the Temple Mount.
Sunday night is also the start of Jerusalem Day, a national holiday in which Israel celebrates its annexation of east Jerusalem and religious nationalists hold parades and other celebrations in the city. On Monday, an Israeli court is expected to issue a verdict on the evictions.
Israel’s archenemy Iran was meanwhile marking its own Quds, or Jerusalem, Day on Friday. The national holiday typically features anti-Israel protests and fiery speeches by Iranian leaders predicting Israel’s demise.
“The downward and declining movement of the Zionist regime has begun and will not stop,” Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said in a televised address. He called for continuing armed “resistance” in the Palestinian territories and urged Muslim nations support it.
This year, Ramadan has coincided with an uptick in Israeli-Palestinian violence focused on Jerusalem, where Palestinian protesters have repeatedly clashed with Israeli police over restrictions on outdoor gatherings at the Damascus Gate leading into the Old City.
On Thursday, Israeli forces arrested a Palestinian suspected of carrying out a drive-by shooting earlier this week in the West Bank that killed an Israeli and wounded two others.
On Wednesday, Israeli troops shot and killed a 16-year-old Palestinian during a confrontation near the West Bank city of Nablus. The military said several Palestinians had thrown firebombs toward soldiers.
In recent days, protesters have scuffled with police and settlers over the threatened eviction of dozens of Palestinians in the Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood in east Jerusalem. Several Palestinian families in Sheikh Jarrah have been embroiled in a long-running legal battle with Israeli settler groups trying to acquire property in the neighborhood north of the Old City.
Israel captured east Jerusalem, along with the West Bank and Gaza — territories the Palestinians want for their future state — in the 1967 Mideast war. Israel annexed east Jerusalem in a move not recognized internationally and views the entire city as its capital.
The Palestinians view east Jerusalem — which includes major holy sites for Jews, Christians and Muslims — as their capital, and its fate is one of the most sensitive issues in the conflict.
Neighboring Jordan, which made peace with Israel in 1994 and is the custodian of Al-Aqsa, weighed in on Friday, saying “Israel’s continuation of its illegal practices and provocative steps” in the city is a “dangerous game.”
“Building and expanding settlements, confiscating lands, demolishing homes and deporting Palestinians from their homes are illegal practices that perpetuate the occupation and undermine the chances of achieving a just and comprehensive peace, which is a regional and international necessity,” Jordan’s Foreign Minister Ayman al-Safadi tweeted.
The Islamic militant group Hamas, which rules the Gaza Strip, has egged on the violence, and Palestinian militants in Gaza have fired rockets in support of the protesters.
Earlier this week, the shadowy commander of Hamas’ armed wing, Mohammed Deif, released his first public statement in seven years, in which he warned Israel it would pay a “heavy price” if it evicts Palestinians from their homes.
___
Associated Press writers Fares Akram in Gaza City, Gaza Strip, and Amir Vahdat in Tehran, Iran, contributed to this report.
A Chicago star in the Black Arts Movement, his work also included turning turned 32 steel fire doors at Malcolm X College into vibrant, majestic murals.
It took two years for Eugene “Eda” Wade to complete one of his biggest projects: painting 32 fire doors at Malcolm X College with images of Black culture and Egyptian and West African designs.
He transformed the 64 steel canvases — 32 10-by-four doors, front and back — into something vibrant, inspiring and majestic.
Maséqua Myers, who went on to become executive director of the South Side Community Art Center, remembers how, as a student attending Malcolm X, the doors “instilled an immeasurable amount of historical pride to hundreds of thousands of young African American students walking by them daily.”
“The doors were such a wonderful gift to give to the students,” muralist Dorian Sylvain said.
A Chicago star in the Black Arts Movement, Mr. Wade died April 15 of heart failure at Our Lady of the Lake Regional Medical Center in Baton Rouge, Louisiana.
After retiring in 2005, he moved back to his native Louisiana to enjoy a return to warm weather, according to his daughter Martha Wade. Mr. Wade was 81.
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“He was a master artist,” said Chicago poet Haki Madhubuti, founder of Third World Press Foundation.
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Mr. Wade’s doors, saved after the old Malcolm X was razed, were featured in a 2017 exhibition at the Chicago Cultural Center.
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He also repainted sections of Chicago’s Wall of Respect mural at East 43rd Street and South Langley Avenue in 1967. The building and its mural have long since been torn down, but art historians often cite it as the nation’s “original community-based outdoor Black Power mural,” according to Jeff Huebner, author of a book on one of Mr. Wade’s collaborators, “Walls of Prophecy and Protest: William Walker and the Roots of a Revolutionary Public Art Movement.”
The Wall of Respect helped launch “a revival of mural painting in the United States,” said Daniel Schulman, director of visual art for the city of Chicago’s Department of Cultural Affairs and Special Events.
It displayed images of cultural icons including Muhammad Ali, James Baldwin, Stokely Carmichael, Ornette Coleman, Wilt Chamberlain, W.E.B. DuBois, Thelonius Monk, Charlie Parker, Sidney Poitier, Nina Simone, Cicely Tyson and Malcolm X.
It also featured an image of Illinois poet laureate Gwendolyn Brooks, who recited “The Wall” at its dedication, including these lines:
It is the Hour of tribe and of vibration,
the day-long Hour. It is the Hour
of ringing, rouse, of ferment-festival.
On Forty-third and Langley
black furnaces resent ancient
legislatures
of ploy and scruple and practical gelatin.
They keep the fever in,
fondle the fever.
All
worship the Wall.
The Wall — organized by the Visual Arts Workshop of the Organization of Black American Culture — was an exuberant community counterpoint to officially sanctioned public art like the Picasso sculpture, unveiled downtown the same year. It also was an expression of Black pride and autonomy.
“The entire mural was an act of defiance,” Huebner said.
“This was public Black art, and we’ve always spelled Black with a capital ‘B,’ ” said Madhubuti, who called the Wall of Respect “one of the most critically important artistic international statements made from Chicago artists.”
Like Brooks, Madhubuti recited a poem he’d written titled “The Wall” at the dedication. It included the line:
Our heroes, we pick them, for the wall
The mighty black wall about our business/blackness
Can you dig?
The Wall of Respect was, in the parlance of the day, a happening. And it soon begat other happenings, becoming a gathering spot for poetry readings and dance and musical events.
“As a theater director, my company and the Kuumba Workshop presented numerous performances at [the] Wall of Respect, which had become a spiritual site and creative center,” Pemon Rami said.
Mr. Wade’s “religion section of the Wall of Respect was seen in the background for many of our performances,” Rami said.
Alterations to the Wall of Respect became a source of debate and controversy. At one point, Walker — sometimes called the originator of the project — asked Mr. Wade to “paint over” artist Norman Parish’s section. That caused a “lasting rift,” according to a 2017 Cultural Center show about the Wall of Respect.
In addition to the Wall of Respect, Mr. Wade worked on neighboring murals — one called the Wall of Truth, another a porcelain-enamel piece memorializing the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.
In his younger years, Mr. Wade went by the nickname Edaw — Wade spelled backwards. He later shortened that to Eda.
He also worked on public murals in Detroit, including the Wall of Dignity, at Kennedy-King College and in Baton Rouge.
“His fading 1996 ‘Legacy’ survives on a Metra retaining wall at Kinzie and Laramie,” Huebner said.
“Eda’s style of painting was unique and memorable,” said Romi Crawford, a professor at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. “His painting is, at once, figurative and graphic, bold and confident in terms of design, the maneuver of symbols, and adamant in its use of color.”
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He didn’t mind when producing his murals — like the doors at Malcolm X College — took him away from Chicago’s weather extremes.
“I went inside because it was too hot outside in the summertime, and it was too cold in the wintertime,” he once said.
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Mr. Wade felt it was important to introduce color to the doors when he took on the Malcolm X project in the early 1970s.
“When I went over there and I saw those doors, they were jet black,” he once told the Chicago Sun-Times. “They were quite depressing. I thought it was a challenge.”
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He decided to use quick-drying acrylic paint.
“You must realize that, during the time I was painting it, I had students, constant traffic back and forth, and sometimes I would have to close off a section so the students wouldn’t knock over my paint,” he said.
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Eight of the Malcolm X doors are now at the DuSable Museum of African American History.
The remaining 24 are at the new Malcolm X College, which “is working to raise funds to properly display them at the college,” said Katheryn Hayes, an associate vice chancellor.
Young Eugene grew up in Scotlandville, a community that’s now part of Baton Rouge. At 7, “He saw a little boy drawing a cowboy, and he told himself he wanted to do that,” his daughter Martha said.
By fifth grade, he had teachers asking him to decorate their classrooms and offering extra credit for doing it.
He got his bachelor’s degree in arts education from Southern University and A&M College, his daughter Jessica Scott-Wade said, and a master of fine arts degree in painting from Howard University.
Mr. Wade became a popular teacher at Malcolm X and Kennedy-King, according to his daughters.
“He always said it wasn’t about the mone,” Martha Wade said. “He just wanted to share the knowledge and share the creativity.”
He was creative as a parent, too, she said, taking his children bike-riding and on outings to the lakefront and amusement parks.
“He believed he was put here to be a father,” she said.
Mr. Wade continued creating well into his later years, switching to digital art.
“I moved from being a traditional artist — painting with paint, such as oil paint and acrylics, and things like that on a large scale or even on canvas — to painting on a computer,” he said in 2015 for a video posted to YouTube.
In addition to his daughters Martha and Jessica, Mr. Wade is survived by daughters Elizabeth J. Wade and Ivy Scott-Wade, sons Durand and Manaseh, his brother Robert and five grandchildren.
Martha Wade said a Chicago memorial service, featuring some of Mr. Wade’s paintings and a video devoted to his work, is being planned for June.
Contributing: Lee Bey
Two men were standing on the sidewalk in the 4100 block of West Adams Street Wednesday when a car drove past and someone inside fired.
A man was killed and another was wounded in a drive-by shooting Wednesday evening in West Garfield Park.
John Wesley-Reese Allen and another man were shot on a sidewalk by someone in a passing car about 7:40 p.m. in the 4100 block of West Adams Street, Chicago police and the Cook County medical examiner’s office said.
Allen, 33, was shot in the leg and lower back and was taken to Stroger Hospital, where he was pronounced dead, authorities said.
The other man, 29, was struck in the wrist and was taken to Mount Sinai Hospital in good condition, police said.
No one was in custody.
