From the President

Vol. XIX No. 1 - SPRING 2008

By: Betty Mayian

Our Twentieth Anniversary Celebration on April 18 at the Edgewater Beach Apartments is dedicated to the late Marie Morrissette. Her daughter, Marie Hopkins, noted that Marie was born to J. Perry and Marie Loeffler Quinlan. The Quinlan families were residents of Edgewater and Mr. Quinlan was one of three owners of the Edgewater Coal Company. Our thanks to Alderman Smith for arranging for the Dedication proclamation from the City for Marie.

We are hoping to see all of you at the celebration, which promises to be a lot of fun. It starts at 6 p.m. At 6:45 p.m. there will be a short tour of the building. We will also have a slide program of some historical scenes in our community. The dinner is a buffet and Steve Solomon will be playing keyboard for us. And then, of course, we will have a fabulous Silent Auction with some unusual items, theater tickets and more.

March was Women’s History Month and we honored that theme on March 15th at our 20th Annual General Meeting. Our program on that date included a display of our new collection items, donated by the North End Women’s Club. (Please come and see it.) This group has disbanded after over 100 years of community service. They have turned over their archives, a beautiful silver tea urn and a check to be used to preserve and display their collection.

April 5th is the date for the first of three more Saturday afternoon programs of old time radio shows, performed by the “Those Were the Days Radio Players, Chicago North.” We are following the tradition of having them on Saturday from 2:00 to 3:00 p.m. There will be a Great Gildersleeve and a Jack Benny hosting Ronald Coleman. The second hour from the Radio Players group will be August 23rd. November 22nd will finish the year with another hour of fun. Join the growing number of fans seeing how shows were put on in the Golden Age of Radio. As always, admission is free and there will be coffee and cookies.

The next exhibit will be shared with the North Lakeside Cultural Center. Kathy Gemperle will be curating the exhibit at both NLCC and EHS. The dates will be from May 1st to June 7th. Please contact us if you have a chair and a story about that chair. The title of the exhibit is “Once Upon a Chair.” Each chair will be displayed with the writing behind it on the wall. We would really like some children’s chairs if you happen to have any. The entrance fee is $5.

A correction has to be noted from the last Scrapbook article. I mentioned Thom Greene’s exhibit and program and said it would be in May. However, Thom will show his exhibit in the fall (after the Home Tour in North Edgewater). I am so looking forward to this special exhibit by our very own architect, Thom Greene. He will display his “Thom Greene’s Lost Edgewater” drawings and plans that will show designs he conceived for our neighborhood, but which never materialized.

The most anticipated and exciting exhibit we have ever had was the one on the 1893 Columbian Exposition (Chicago World’s Fair). It was so popular that it will be returning this summer (following the Chairs Exhibit in June and preceding the Thom Greene architectural exhibit). Exact dates will be announced via email. If you don’t get our messages, call the museum. There will be new photos, so there will be an excuse to return, even if you have seen it before. Bob Remer will again host this exhibit and give a presentation. Watch for the exact dates. What an amazing interest everyone has in this exhibit.

Do you remember our DVD program: “Edgewater Through the Eyes of Experience”? It has been so well accepted and appreciated that some requests have been made for us to do a follow-up program. This could become a project for 2009. Any ideas? Please send any thoughts via our website or mail it to us at the museum.