Posted on 11/14/2014 9:48:07 AM PST by Borges
Back when cable was in its infancy in the late ‘70s and early ‘80s, WGN’s 9 PM news was a “must watch” for me and Mrs. abb. There was a commentator named Lynn O’Connor who was an absolute treasure to watch and listen to. I remember well that snowstorm and campaign that put Jane Byrne in office.
Whatever her faults were Byrne really is the mother of modern Chicago. In the ‘70s, the Chicago downtown area was a dead zone - people spent as little time as possible there. Byrne brought in Taste of Chicago and various other festivals that made people actually want to go downtown and live there. The modern day Loop is a world class thriving metropolitan area because of a process that she started.
Byrne was mayor during my more carefree days when I would frequently visit friends in Chicago and go carousing to the bars on Rush Street. When Byrne was mayor Rush Street was kept “clean.” When Washington became mayor, the change was fast and noticeable; Rush Street was overrun with black hookers. You couldn’t walk from a bar to the one next door without being aggressively propositioned three times.
It was not fun anymore.
Explain to me again why it’s not polite to speak ill of the recently dead? She was a intimate and prominent member of the Chicago Machine, the most successful criminal enterprise in American history!
Speak ill all you want. The Chicago Machine is like the Fruit of the Poisonous Tree but for people who love Chicago, as I do, Byrne really made the city vital again.
First time I ever heard that Harold Washington was beloved. I guss that means that Jesse Jackson must be beloved too!
Oh I agree. I grew up as a kid in Chicago at the time and think that she did a few things to make downtown a decent place - which went into full gentrification in the 90s. Did I lose my memory, but I seem to recall her winning her race for mayor because her opponent, who was part of the Daley machine, failed to shovel the snow off the streets after a rough blizzard? And we all know if you want to be mayor of that town you have to 1) pick of the trash and 2) shovel the snow off the streets.
Harold Washington is still pretty popular here.
You are correct.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chicago_Blizzard_of_1979
The city’s inadequate response to the blizzard was blamed primarily on mayor Michael Bilandic, who had assumed the post after the 1976 death of Richard J. Daley.[2][3] Newspaper articles at the time blasted Bilandic; Jane Byrne, Bilandic’s main political rival in the Democratic primary (who had previously worked with Bilandic in the Daley administration and been fired by Bilandic when the two could not get along), capitalized on this and went on to defeat Bilandic in the February 27 primary.
Next they’ll tell me that David Dinkins was beloved in New York City.
Relly? I lived in Chicago ‘83-’85, and he was devisive. I recall that he won when the White vote split in the election. Things improved when Daily was elected after Washington’s death.
It was Len O’Connor.
Yes. I realized that after I googled his name. There are some video clips of him floating around. He was a hoot.
Shrugging corruption off is what got us Obama, and the total destruction of this country.
Who’s shrugging off corruption? That’s a given. But thgat as it may, contemporary Chicago flourishes largely due to efforts that Jane Byrne initiated. You would have to have been here in the ‘70s to see the difference.
In an ironic twist, his Republican opponent in 83, Bernard Epton, died of a heart attack just 3 weeks after Washington did.
I remember Washington proclaiming that he would be “Mayor for life.” A few months later, he died of a heart attack. I guess he was right!
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