Forty Years Ago
Self-help can be some of the best help in combatting crime. An alert citizen led to the arrest of a 29 year-old burglar seen climbing into a window at the Kwicky Grill, 7330 Harrison shortly after midnight. Officer Gary Leisten, Richard Bisluk and Joe Madden got their man inside the diner. Finding other nearby stores and businesses broken into, police charged the intruder with these burglaries as well. Nothing dramatic, but this is the way it should go in any community: alert citizens supplementing a sometimes overextended police force that can never be on the spot at all times. Where suspicion is seen it falls to Joe and Jen Citizen and their telephones or cell phones to put 911 into action.
From the Mar./Apr. 1966 issues of the Forest Park Review
Thirty Years Ago
“Many are the times when a well-phrased quote can beat any original thought,” said Ms. Josephine Austin, longtime director of our little old, charming but limited library. She referred, of course, to the recognized standard reference of quoted writings titled, “Bartlett’s Quotations.” The latest edition is available at our new library.
Back then, she cited such examples as this philosophical trope: “Happiness is not having what you want, but wanting what you have.””Anon. Then there’s an example of colorful prose: “Writing a book of verse is like dropping a rose petal into the Grand Canyon and listening for the echo.””Don Marquis. John Bartlett published the first edition in 1855.
The latest (sixteenth) edition is dated 1982, and because language is both fixed and ever-changing, it has been expanded to include such writers as Joan Didion (“San Francisco was where the social hemorrhaging was showing up. San Francisco was where the missing children were gathering and calling themselves hippies.)”
A most readable and rewarding reference book, Bartlett’s is a small education and a worthy entertainment. Crème de la crème.
From the May 5, 1976 issue of the Forest Park Review
Twenty Years Ago
An almost overlooked page one snippet carried the headline, “Concern over number of measles cases.” The story went on, that during the week of March 17, 1986 a rash-like illness suspected of being measles was reported to the Cook County Department of Public Health. Today, 20 years later, it’s mumps. Either way you can just see the “mediform” to be filled out: “Have you ever had the measles or the mumps, and if so, how many?” One mump would hardly seem to matter.
From the Mar./Apr. 1986 issues of the Forest Park Review
Ten Years Ago
A Chicago Sun-Times poll gave Forest Park a ranking of 139 out of 152 Chicago suburbs”for livability. Review columnist Bill Lichtenberg was only one of many who didn’t care much for what the metropolitan press had to say. Some Lichtenberg words:
“With all the caveats and disclaimers…what”if anything”did the survey actually seek to prove? To me it proved that trying to gauge livability using raw numbers, is like trying to make spaghetti out of grass clippings. Did the Sun-Times think it had an exclusive when it discovered that wealthier suburbs have bigger houses and bigger tax bills?
I’ve made some observations of my own:
That any suburb not having have Joe Scolire as its school superintendent should penalized itself 50 points for letting him get away to Forest Park.
That a category for bars and taverns per square inch would make us an easy No.
That any suburb where the average list price of a home [this in 1996] on the market is $995,000, should demand a rebate from the developers and pass an ordinance outlawing delivery of the Sun-Times.
That people who decide where to live based on a newspaper study should …never mind.
Since we were listed as a South suburb, I wondered if perhaps they transposed us with another suburb, Park Forest.”
From the May l, 1996 issue of the Forest Park Review
