South Side of Chicago: Great President Gets Short Shrift

Today came the news that the Obama Library will, in fact, be located within a few blocks of President Reagan’s Chicago Home, demolished on April 2-4, 2013, to make room for the legacy of a president rated mediocre at best. But then history will be the ultimate judge.  What we do know, however, is this: Ronald Reagan was a great president.   

Below is the article my colleague Nick Hahn III and I wrote for the Chicago Sun-Times as the Reagan home lay in the balance in March 2013; as well as an earlier draft that tells the story of just how much this home meant to President Reagan, the only president born and bred in Illinois.

When I reflect on how the memory of President Reagan was destroyed with such callousness and, by extension, on how so much has been destroyed the last 6 years, I recall the words of another great president, associated with Illinois, Abe Lincoln, during similarly high times of peril for the nation: “This too shall pass.”

*******

Save the Chicago home of Ronald Reagan 

Chicago Sun-Times 

March 22, 2013

By Mary Claire Kendall and Nicholas Hahn III

The only Chicago home of the only president born and bred in Illinois is poised for demolition when the city’s 90-day administrative hold expires on March 29. 

The home will not be granted landmark status, we’ve already been told.

That we even know where Reagan lived in Chicago, for about a year when he was 4, is due to the dogged determination of the late Sun-Times columnist Thomas F. Roeser.

The minute Ronald Reagan was sworn in as 40th president of the United States, Roesser went to work. Candidate Reagan had mentioned to him in passing as the two scurried through Chicago’s O’Hare airport in 1979 that he had lived in the city of “I Will” as a young child.  

After the Inauguration, Roeser discovered through police records, on a tip from the president that his father’s drinking often landed him in the pokey, that the Reagans had lived at 832 East 57th Street on the edge of the University of Chicago campus.

When Reagan made it back to Chicago for the centennial observance of the United Brotherhood of Carpenters and Joiners in September 1981, Roeser arranged to have a photo of the home taken and framed for Mayor Jane Byrne to give him.

“Mr. President,” Mayor Byrne ceremoniously said, “on your return to Chicago, I hereby present you a photo of your Chicago home.” 

Looking at the photo, the President became misty-eyed as all the memories welled up inside of him. This son of an itinerant and frequently unemployed shoe salesman living in a poor, rough-and-tumble Irish working-class city had come a long way.

Today, that once-photographed building Reagan called home stands alone. It’s all that’s left of an entire block between Maryland and Drexel streets on East 57th Street, all else demolished by the University of Chicago to make way for a hospital and research facility.

Ironically enough, it sits across from the university’s newly inaugurated Center for Care and Discovery, which conducts state-of-the-art Alzheimer’s research.

The 90-day review of Reagan’s Chicago home — an essential slice of his Midwestern character — is winding down. An informed source at the city’s Department of Housing and Economic Development told us it does not meet the criteria of being associated with Reagan’s productive years, which is just as spurious a claim now as it was in 2012 when landmark status first was denied. Reagan’s productive years were made possible only because he survived near-fatal pneumonia in that home. Furthermore, the Dixon Boyhood Home, where President Reagan lived from 1920-1924 (ages 9-13), was landmarked by the federal Park Service, which sets the criteria.

That inconsistency notwithstanding, Reagan’s Chicago home will not be preserved unless the University of Chicago has a change of heart. Only the university can save it.

The Friends of President Reagan’s Chicago home proposes transforming 832 E. 57th Street into a museum and center. All the university needs to do is amend their Planned Development #43. The museum would replicate the flat as it looked in 1915 when young “Dutch” Reagan, age 4, would gaze out the window to the excitement outside. The center would celebrate Reagan’s historic presidency and his diverse and inclusive background.

The ordinariness of it all — where one of our most extraordinary presidents once lived — is worth preserving.

Mary Claire Kendall, a Washington-based writer who contributes a regular column to Forbes.com, is president of the Friends of President Reagan’s Chicago Home. Nicholas G. Hahn III is deputy editor of RealClearReligion.org and a member of the Friends board of directors.  

*******

Chicago’s Mayor Brought Ronald Reagan to Brink of Tears – Then and Now

By Mary Claire Kendall and Nicholas Hahn III

The minute Ronald Reagan was sworn-in as 40th President of the United States, the late Sun-Times columnist Thomas F. Roeser was a man on a mission.

Candidate Reagan had mentioned to him in passing, as the two scurried through Chicago's O'Hare airport in 1979 that he had once lived in the city of “I Will” as a boy. Roeser thought it might be worthwhile to know exactly where Reagan had laid his head. After the inauguration, Roeser phoned the White House and through some channels, he got his answer: Jack Reagan was a common drunk. Look it up.

Sure enough, Roeser discovered through police records that the Reagans had lived at 832 East 57th Street on the edge of the University of Chicago campus. “What struck me about that experience was the comfort that Reagan had living in his own skin, the son of an alcoholic, who suggested that his father's detention records be looked up,” Roeser later wrote. “Not many successful men – much less the president of the United States –

would so voluntarily give out that information.”

When Reagan made it back to Chicago for the Centennial Observance of the United Brotherhood of Carpenters and Joiners in September 1981, Roeser arranged to have a photo of the home taken and framed for Mayor Jane Byrne to give him.

“Mr. President,” Mayor Byrne ceremoniously said, “on your return to Chicago, I hereby present you a photo of your Chicago home.” Looking at the photo, the President became misty-eyed as all the memories welled up inside of him. This son of an itinerant and frequently unemployed shoe salesman living in a poor, rough-and-tumble Irish working-class city had come a long way.

Today, that once-photographed building Reagan once called home stands alone. It’s all that’s left of an entire block between Maryland and Drexel on East 57th Street, demolished by the University of Chicago to make way for a hospital and research facility. Ironically enough, it sits across from the newly inaugurated Center for Care and Discovery which features state-of-the-art Alzheimer's research.

Reagan’s Chicago home – the essential slice of his Midwestern character – is currently undergoing a 90-day review set to expire on March 29. But according to Eleanor Gorski, Assistant Commissioner for Historic Preservation at the Department of Housing and Economic Development, it does not meet the standard of having been the home of a famous person when that person was famous. And so, Reagan's Chicago home will not be landmarked.

Friends of President Reagan’s Chicago Home, of which we are both board members, is working to begin negotiations with the University to stop the demolition and transform the building into a museum and center. It would replicate the flat as it looked in 1915 when young “Dutch” Reagan, age 4, would look out the window to the excitement outside. The center would celebrate Reagan's historic presidency and his diverse and inclusive background.

The ordinariness of it all – where one of our most extraordinary presidents once lived -- is worth preserving.

Mary Claire Kendall, a Washington based writer, is the President of the Friends of President Reagan’s Chicago Home. Nicholas G. Hahn III is Deputy Editor of RealClearReligion.org and a member of the Friends Board of Directors. Follow him on Twitter @NGHahn3.