John Wayne Gacy The Edgewater Connections

by Robert Jewell

 

Yes, you read that title correctly: There was more than one. There were two.

One is very well known: John Wayne Gacy was born in Edgewater Hospital (as was Hillary Clinton.)

The other connection is only known to a few: myself and a few of my friends.

In December of 1977 I had a fortunate event occur. I was in the Army Basic Training course in Alabama. Christmas was coming and the drill sergeants and other leaders likely wanted to be home with their families at Christmas, so the Army sent all of us “trainees” home about 1 week before Christmas Day.

This worked well for me. I was able to return to my hometown of Chicago and visit with all my friends from Edgewater and Uptown and tell them tall tales of my punishment in Basic Training in the Army to date, which had only been just over a month as I had enlisted in November of 1977.

I had some friends on the west side of Broadway near Foster Ave on a street called Magnolia. That was a residential area filled with single family homes, with a couple of 3 flats near the ends of the street. Of passing interest perhaps was that there was a preponderance of Bob’s. I knew Bob D, Bob K, and Bob C. And of course I am a Bob too. We all even dated the same girl along the way.

I think I was with Bob K. and Dan W. and another friend who lived close to Dan W. We were talking among ourselves, probably me doing most of the talking, and one of the Bob’s approached, Bob D. specifically. He proceeded to tell us about something that had happened to him the day before. My recall is he told us about an individual who had pointed a gun at him, forced him into a car, took him to his home, tortured him and did many bad sexual things to him.

Funny thing about telling tall tales is that over time, people may not take you seriously. I told tales about the Army with my entire 30 days of Army knowledge under my belt. My friend Bob D. had, over the year or a bit longer, also told some tales. After hearing his story about what had happened, all of us were at a loss as to how to react. Were we hearing another tall tale from Bob D? Was it true? Or just BS.?

We told Bob D. that he should go on up the steps and go tell Dan W’s mother his story, as she would likely know what to do and it did sound like he needed to tell someone besides us.

Bob D. had told us he had gone to the cops and told them what happened, but that the cops did not believe him. I guess we all kind of felt the same way. We did not hear much more from Bob D after that. I had to return to complete my training in Alabama and was out of the country for 3 years after that.

Looking back at news articles and reading a few books, I was able to determine the likely date we all stood out in front of Dan W’s house on Magnolia and heard Bob D. tell us what happened. It was probably 31 December 1977 or perhaps the day after that.

The person who forced him into the car was John Wayne Gacy. The first of Gacy’s bodies would be found a year later, on 21 Dec 1978. Some news accounts show there could have been 6 other victims after my friend Bob D. was forced into that car.

In talking to other friends from the 1977 time frame, one of the Gacy victims after 31 Dec 1977 was a person named Frank L. He was a boyfriend of a girl who was a classmate of a girl all of us Bob’s knew. I did not know Frank myself and never met him, only finding this out after asking some questions for the purpose of this story.

Another friend, one of the Bob’s, Bob K. specifically, recounted an after the fact story about Gacy. In 1977, we were all streetwise and aware of things around us: Undercover cops, criminally inclined people, who was out and about and when in our local neighborhoods anyway.

Bob K told me that he was near the Trumbull School on Foster near Ashland sometime before 1977, and a dark colored car had been driving nearby. It was similar to, but not exactly like a typical undercover police car, which all of us could identify from a block away if we saw one. He got concerned and made his way towards an alley somewhere behind the school and the car followed him and the driver yelled out from his car window at him. Bob ran. He did not know who Gacy was at that time. But he knew this person was not a good person and had to get away from him. After many years and many articles about Gacy and how he operated throughout the Uptown/Edgewater area, Bob K is reasonably certain that he was being chased by Gacy.