Just about everything good to emerge from the miserable swamp of Chicago politics has some connection to the communities lodged roughly in the area between 43rd and 60th streets on the north and south and from the lake to Cottage Grove. It’s the birthplace of independent antipatronage politics and one of the few racially integrated neighborhoods in town. The area’s divided into two wards, the Fourth and the Fifth, so ambitious activists have twice as many opportunities to rise up the political ranks, and it’s home to the University of Chicago, which over the years has launched so many self-serving urban renewal projects and economic development schemes that the locals have gotten really smart about fighting them off. Dozens of savvy politicos and politicians got their chops fighting the University of Chicago, and many of them even went to school there.
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Next came the independent crusaders of the 50s, 60s, and 70s, led by Leon Despres and Don Rose. Despres was simply the greatest independent alderman in Chicago history; he died last year at 101. He started fighting for open-housing laws and other civil rights causes almost as soon as he became an alderman in 1955, and he kept up his crusade through the tumultuous 1960s, when southwest-siders were hurling rocks at Martin Luther King. In the 20 years he represented the Fifth Ward in the City Council, Despres stood up to old man Daley on issues of patronage (he scoured the budget looking for ghost payrollers), preservation (he unsuccessfully urged the city to fight harder to save historic buildings from demolition), and open space—during a contentious 1970 council debate over the city’s proposal to construct a school in Washington Park, Despres argued that public parks shouldn’t be turned into construction zones. Daley erupted and called Despres a liar, and the alderman responded by challenging the mayor to a public debate—which Daley ignored, much to the disappointment of Despres.
Longtime Hyde Parker Don Rose, meanwhile, served as press secretary for King when the civil rights leader brought the movement to Chicago in 1965 and 1966, and he also advised independent political candidates. In 1979 Rose orchestrated Jane Byrne’s stunning triumph over Mayor Michael Bilandic and what was left of the first Daley machine. During the campaign, Rose encouraged Byrne to rail against aldermen Eddie Vrdolyak and Ed Burke, calling them an “evil cabal.” Unfortunately, once in office Byrne cut a deal with them, allowing Vrdolyak to remain chairman of the important building and zoning committee and Burke to keep chairing the police committee.
Of course, not everyone from the area has been a progressive. In the 1960s former Fourth Ward alderman Claude Holman was the anti-independent Boss Daley used to call on to mock and try to intimidate Despres whenever the mayor thought he was getting too uppity with his civil rights legislation. Holman was also a key member of what became known as the “Silent Six”—the half-dozen black aldermen who, in deference to Daley, helped thwart Despres’ civil rights initiatives in the 1960s.
The rabbi? Why, he was the great Arnie Wolf. He was my go-to source for information about black-Jewish relations. Whenever I called him he’d tell me that what he had to say was too important to say over the phone, so I’d schlep down to his synagogue and meet him in his book-lined office, where he’d proceed to tell me one great story after another about everything from marching with Dr. King to having James Baldwin (he called him Jimmy) stay at his house. The man must have had a million friends. Rabbi Wolf died in December 2008—too soon for me, but he stuck around long enough to see one of his old friends (and neighbors) get elected president.
