40 years ago

The post office should have changed the name of the 900 block of Beloit Avenue to the Boulevard of Broken Bones. In the space of one year, a member of four families – in adjacent homes – managed to break a bone. Had these neighbors been in show business this might have boded well. (Break a leg!) Alas, no footlights. Only an arm break to Mrs. Jim Pinta, 940 Beloit, two leg breaks (to Ed Ringbauer, 934 Beloit, and Rick Romano, 930 Beloit and a cracked kneecap to Mrs. Ed Lambke, 928 Beloit.

How about issuing an all-points bulletin for the sidewalk contractor?

From the Sept. 17, 1969, Forest Park Review

30 years ago

“A meal without wine,” goes the old expression, “is like a day without sunshine.” So began a Review story on the subject, based on controlled tests and interviews with elderly voluntary patients at Chicago’s Wrightwood Extended Care Facility. The result, unscientifically speaking, is that a dollop of red wine, along with a sunny day, was more healthful than a sunny day by itself. Only a small glassful was to be taken daily, and that with dinner. The subjects, of course, needed physician’s approval.

The 47 participating patients were observed over 90 days by the staff to have a generally more positive attitude regarding nursing care, enjoyment of meals and better relations with fellow oldsters. These wine imbibers, not surprisingly, had a more calm and accepting reaction to stressful incidents.

From the Jan. 3, 1980, Forest Park Review

20 years ago

The Jan. 9, 1990, Forest Park Review reported a couple of unresolved investigations from 1989. The subject of each was the police department itself. In late November it was revealed that federal agents were looking into charges of organized crime gambling operations in the village. Police Chief Robert Conklin said he was unaware of such activity. The investigation centered on a floating crap game housed in two locations here. A grand jury had convened and subpoenas were served.

A second separate federal investigation occurred when officers of the F.O.P. (Fraternal Order of Police) learned of missing funds from the Order’s reserves and requested the State’s Attorney’s office to investigate.

From the Jan. 9, 1990, Forest Park Review

10 years ago

You show up for work, Walgreen’s at Harlem and Roosevelt, ready to spend the day developing photos, making enlargements, processing prints. It’s a flat, grey-sky day; the kind we’ve learned to handle at our latitude, in this season. Only three more days and we change millenniums. Still it’s a day like any other. Or is it? You hear a fellow employee call that an elderly customer has passed out, and you find yourself rushing to the fallen man.

Your name is Kevin Cantwell, you’re 22 and you’re from Berwyn. Somewhere in your mind comes the memory of a CPR class taken not long ago at Morton Junior College. You approach the man, who appears to have had a heart attack. He doesn’t look good, but who does in the throes of such bodily insult? His color is grey, like the day. Is he breathing? Slight pulse, but seconds later it’s gone.

The man was George Boliaris, 78, of Forest Park. His pulse flickers, then fades. The throat is cleared, the head is tilted back, a couple of compressions, then more – and George Boliaris breathes! Shallow breaths. More compressions. Then, too soon, he fades again. You urge him to take in air. His eyes open. His chest rises, and you determine to make him breathe again – and you do! (It’s a good one.) More compressions – this time with the promise that he will make it. The paramedics arrive, and on that flat, grey day of Dec. 28, 1999, George Boliaris was admitted in critical condition to Loyola Hospital. He died a week later, having crossed the bridge between two millenniums.

From the Jan. 5, 2000, Forest Park Review