chicagotribune--2020-09-28--COVID-19 closed Illinois schools the same week it infected a CPS speech pathologist and her parents.

COVID-19 closed Illinois schools the same week it infected a CPS speech pathologist and her parents. Six months later, she’s planning her father’s funeral.

“ I did not get into this job to work with kids on a computer , ” she said .
@ @ @ @ @ anybody wants to happen .
The teachers don ’ t like this , the parents @ @ @ @ @ , the kids don ’ t like this , the clinicians don ’ t like @ @ @ @ @ for us to stay safe , this is what we have to do right now @ @ @ @ @ any of my colleagues to go through what I went through in March .
”

By Friday, March 13, private schools around Chicago were starting to shut down as Illinois confirmed its 46th case of the coronavirus. Mayor Lori Lightfoot said that day she had no similar plans for Chicago Public Schools, but it made no difference. Hours later, Gov. J.B. Pritzker ordered schools closed by the following Tuesday.
Beth Eysenbach, a CPS speech pathologist, drove from her home on the North Side to south suburban Homewood to spend the weekend with her parents, both in their mid-70s. She wanted to help them with groceries and make sure they were prepared to weather the pandemic in the safety of the house she grew up in.
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CPS speech pathologist Beth Eysenbach at her family's home in Homewood. Eysenbach's parents were hospitalized with COVID-19 in March and her father died. (Antonio Perez / Chicago Tribune)
When she got there, her mother had a high fever, and her father had a cough and weakened appetite.
In the following days, their conditions worsened. Eysenbach went back and forth with medical professionals on the phone. She stopped worrying about getting her parents tested for COVID-19 and focused on getting them into the hospital.
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Between caring for both parents and making phone calls, she had little time to exercise their dogs. Late one night while walking the miniature schnauzer, Pepper, and Chihuahua, Molly, she noticed that her back hurt. Soon other muscles started hurting. She realized she hadn’t just been too busy to eat; she had lost her senses of taste and smell.
“I started getting achier and achier,” she said. “Right after they went into the hospital I was like, I’m getting sick. This is the aches and pains of COVID.”
On March 19, Lightfoot announced all CPS schools would remain closed through April. The next day, both of Eysenbach’s parents were admitted to Advocate South Suburban Hospital in Hazel Crest.
Her mother was released March 25, but her father had to be intubated. Deemed the sickest of the three, he was the only one able to get tested, she said. By the time a contact tracer called, he was dead.
Geoffrey Eysenbach, 77, died March 30 of pneumonia and novel coronavirus, with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease also noted by the Cook County medical examiner. He and Virginia Eysenbach would have celebrated their 54th wedding anniversary this month.
“I know that this news is a gut punch for all of us in many different ways," the Rev. Jeremy Froyen told parishioners of Eysenbach’s church in a video announcement. "We lost a friend today, but his spirit will continue with us in our memories, in the many lives that he touched and changed during his time with us. I wish I could say that this is the only death that we’ll experience from this virus, but projections warn us that it won’t be.”
Pepper became deeply depressed, no longer sleeping, just walking around the house until he collapsed, Beth Eysenbach said.
CPS speech pathologist Beth Eysenbach was walking her parents' dogs, including Pepper, a miniature schnauzer, when she started feeling sick with what she presumed was COVID-19. (Antonio Perez/Chicago Tribune)
Eysenbach tried to take care of her mother, back home but still recovering, even as her own symptoms intensified. Week one, her fever was low-grade. Week two brought worse body aches and higher fevers. Week three, the aches improved, but she still had fevers at night. As the virus ran its course, she experienced many of the same symptoms as her parents, only less severe: cough, sore throat, chills.
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While they isolated, family and friends left meals on the porch, and she waved from a window.
Sick leave turned into bereavement leave, then spring break. Even as other symptoms subsided, returning to work only compounded the headache.
“We were coming back from spring break; we have all these documents that we are supposed to read and these new policies," Eysenbach said. With all of the new learning platforms to figure out, “it was enough to make your mind explode in general.”
Even now, six months later, fog sometimes clouds her head. She can’t be sure if it’s lingering effects of COVID-19 or related to the Lyme disease she was diagnosed with a few years ago. She had been in remission.
“Sometimes I feel like I am doing super well, and sometimes I feel like I am just struggling to find words, struggling to stay focused,” she said. “… I am constantly writing things down.”
She’s left sticky notes all over the place, to remember new passwords, make sure her mom can get medication online, find the life insurance policy, keep track of all the other things that need to be taken care of when somebody dies. That means spending a lot of time at her childhood home.
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“It is kind of hard being here, because the house is missing someone,” Eysenbach said.
Geoffrey Eysenbach worked for many years for Ingersoll Products, where tractor parts were made. Though he loved a good martini, he helped facilitate an addiction recovery program for colleagues, his daughter said. He was in a middle management job when the factory closed, then went back to school and became a teacher in the south suburbs.
CPS speech pathologist Beth Eysenbach and her father, Geoffrey Eysenbach, in 2018, during the family's annual Christmas lunch at the Walnut Room at Macy's. He died of COVID-19 and pneumonia in March.
“He really enjoyed working with kids, watching kids learn new things and being able to facilitate that,” Eysenbach said.
When she had insomnia as a child, he would take her for walks to help her fall asleep. He taught her self-hypnosis skills that she uses still.
She knew her father to be smart, artistic, a lover of music and reader of science fiction, mysteries, religion, spiritualism and poetry. She keeps finding poems and observations he wrote down in journals or on scraps of paper, prompting her to laugh or smile.
When he discovered a new interest, he’d want to learn everything about it. He dabbled in photography, woodworking, calligraphy and stained glass, which is displayed throughout the house.
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Gardening was a constant, and he’d spend an entire year planning his garden, growing plants from seed in the basement so they’d be ready to put in the ground at the right time.
The family had hoped things would get better over the summer and has not yet said their final goodbyes, but is now planning his funeral.
“In all honesty, we weren’t ready to have it right when he died,” Eysenbach said. “My mom and I were both sick, both still contagious.”
Eventually, she got a COVID-19 test, after feeling recovered, to make sure she was negative. She also tested positive for antibodies. She wishes she and her mother had been able to get tests when they would likely have proved positive.
“She should be counted; I should be counted,” Eysenbach said. “I know I had it, but I’ll be counted as negative. … That has happened with so many people probably that we are never going to know the true number."
Her father had planned to be cremated and interred at the columbarium of the Episcopal Church of St. John the Evangelist in Flossmoor, where he was a member for close to 35 years and sang in the choir.
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Rev. Froyen put prayer requests for the Eysenbachs in church bulletins, asking anyone who had contact with them in the weeks before they fell ill to follow public health guidance and to let both the church and their doctors know if they developed symptoms.
After Geoffrey Eysenbach’s death, Froyen assured parishioners that once the community was able to gather again safely, they would celebrate his life and legacy.
“Please, please, heed the advice of our public health officials," Froyen said. "By staying home and avoiding contact with others, you are helping to save lives. Together we’ll get through this crisis and we’ll be together again soon enough.”
The positivity rate is still high enough in the area that the church, which suspended worship services starting March 13, is limiting the size of gatherings. So the family is planning a small service, for which a relative who is a professional cantor is recording some of Geoffrey’s favorite hymns.
“No singing, unfortunately, which is just terrible because my father just loved music,” Eysenbach said.
As Eysenbach plans the services, she is also figuring out a new routine at school, starting a new year virtually for the first time. She works with nearly 50 students, at five different schools on the West Side, helping them with elements of speech such as vocabulary.
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“Some students are doing well; others would be disappearing, like, ‘Wait, where did you go?’” she said. “Whereas if I was at school, I would have gone to get that student … 'It’s time for speech, let’s go.’”
Like in normal times, the other day she popped into a classroom with some of her students and taught a lesson for the whole class. She just got funding for a document camera through a campaign on DonorsChoose, a site where people can help fund projects at high-needs schools.
She has an idea to collect leaves to package with white paper and crayons for an art activity that doubles as a chance to build vocabulary.
Without her colleagues, she doesn’t know how she would have made it through the spring. One walked her through what a Google classroom was. She has a friend she can call with all her questions.
“I did not get into this job to work with kids on a computer,” she said. "This is not what anybody wants to happen. The teachers don’t like this, the parents don’t like this, the kids don’t like this, the clinicians don’t like this, but in order for us to stay safe, this is what we have to do right now. I would hate for any of my colleagues to go through what I went through in March.”
A member of the Chicago Teachers Union’s executive board, she’s concerned about the district requiring employees such as clerks to work in person, despite reports of unsafe conditions. “A lot of us are very scared that this is going to be a slippery slope: ‘If this person is going in, why can’t this person?’” she said.
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Between March and Sept. 9, the day after fall quarter began, at least 258 CPS and charter school employees or vendors had tested positive for COVID-19, and eight died, according to the district. CPS employs 37,775 people, which doesn’t include vendors.
Those who’ve had the virus include staff working remotely and the minority required to do work in school buildings. While CPS officials did not clarify how many cases involved employees who had been working in person, they said 123 were “actionable,” requiring an intervention such as a “pause in operations” at a school.
It was hard at first wondering about where her parents got the virus, and whether she was the source.
“For a long time I was thinking, maybe I gave it to them," Eysenbach said. “Because I live in the city and I work with kids that are constantly sick and whose parents are front-line workers, and maybe I had it and I passed it on to them.”
The last time she left their house before discovering them sick, she thought, “Maybe I shouldn’t have given them a hug. Maybe I shouldn’t have given them a kiss goodbye.”
But it was hard to know what to do. The government had not yet advised wearing masks.
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“They got it so early, not a lot of people knew what was going on,” Eysenbach said.
After experiencing so much firsthand, misinformation shared on social media has been frustrating. Half a year later, she hopes people will take the virus seriously.
“We’ve got to lower the incidence of COVID," she said. “… You do not want to go through this. It’s not like the sniffles; it’s not like the flu. You don’t know if you’re going to be the one that it hits hard.”
hleone@chicagotribune.com


chicagotribune--2020-09-28--Merrillville teen charged in Gary homicide

Cowart was shot in the chest while on the porch .
He stumbled into the front door , collapsed and @ @ @ @ @ floor .
He later died at the scene .

A Merrillville teen faces charges he and an accomplice allegedly killed a man in an argument over a woman on Sept. 3.
Christopher John Dukes II, 17, was charged Sept. 18 with murder, according to documents unsealed recently. No charges have yet appeared in public court filings against the alleged accomplice.
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Dukes and the accomplice pulled up to the 2300 block of Colfax Street in Gary’s Black Oak Section where they eventually fatally shot Landon Cowart, records show.
The woman told police she dated Cowart, then Dukes' accomplice, before breaking up with him and going back to Cowart, documents state.
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“It’s all a jealousy thing,” she told police.
After the other man tried to get the woman, who refused, into their dark SUV, Cowart told them to get off his property, records show.
The man and Cowart briefly exchanged words.
“Light this (expletive) up,” the other man said to Dukes, before both allegedly shot up the house.
Cowart was shot in the chest while on the porch. He stumbled into the front door, collapsed and fell on the living room floor. He later died at the scene.
Other witnesses said they heard 10-15 shots. Dukes and the other person sped away before police got to the scene, records state.
Witnesses told police there may have been other “beef” between the two. Some time ago, Cowart allegedly stole $40 from the accomplice’s mother for drugs.
Cowart also may have gotten some cash from working as a police informant, according to court documents.
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Dukes was later arrested and appeared in court. His next hearing is scheduled for Oct. 1 before Lake Superior Judge Pro Tempore Jamise Perkins.


chicagotribune--2020-09-28--Man shot by Gary police held in shooting death outside nightclub

Officers and the suspected gunman fired at each other and an officer shot the man in the leg , Westerfield @ @ @ @ @ who police haven ’ t identified , was taken to a local hospital for treatment @ @ @ @ @ released and is now in custody , according to the Gary Fraternal Order of Police @

A Gary man was shot and killed outside a nightclub downtown early Sunday morning during an incident in which Gary Police shot the suspected gunman.
Gary Police spokeswoman Lt. Dawn Westerfield said in a release that officers responded around 2:30 a.m. Sept. 27 to a shots-fired incident in the 700 block of Broadway. As they were dispersing the crowd there, they heard more shots and saw a man shooting another man already on the ground, Westerfield said.
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Officers and the suspected gunman fired at each other and an officer shot the man in the leg, Westerfield said. That man, who police haven’t identified, was taken to a local hospital for treatment, but has since been released and is now in custody, according to the Gary Fraternal Order of Police.
“We are happy to report that no other citizens or police officers were injured during the incident,” FOP lodge President Sgt. Gregory Wolf said in a statement Sunday.
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The Metro Homicide Unit will be investigating the homicide and the Lake County Sheriff’s Department will investigate the the shooting of the suspected gunman. No officers were injured.
Anyone with information is asked to contact Detective Sgt. Khristopher Adams of the Metro Homicide Unit at (219 )755-3855.
Michelle L. Quinn is a freelance reporter for the Post-Tribune.


chicagotribune--2020-09-28--If tax report is true, Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot says President Trump ‘needs to apologize’

“ For someone to use every act possible not to pay his fair share and then act like he ’ @ @ @ @ @ , disappointing ’ s not the right word .
It ’ s extraordinarily troubling to @ @ @ @ @ the IRS is all over this because if the reporting is correct , they ’ @ @ @ @ @ fight with this guy over auditing his taxes , ” Lightfoot said at an unrelated @ @ @ @ @ needs to come clean , he needs to take ownership , and frankly if the @ @ @ @ @ needs to apologize .
”

Mayor Lori Lightfoot, shown at the Chicago Cultural Center on Aug. 31, has frequently thrown barbs at President Trump. (Antonio Perez / Chicago Tribune)
Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot said President Donald Trump owes the public an apology if a New York Times investigation detailing his federal tax history is true.
“For someone to use every act possible not to pay his fair share and then act like he’s this incredibly successful businessman, disappointing’s not the right word. It’s extraordinarily troubling to me and, obviously, the IRS is all over this because if the reporting is correct, they’ve been in a 10-year fight with this guy over auditing his taxes,” Lightfoot said at an unrelated news conference. “He needs to come clean, he needs to take ownership, and frankly if the reporting is true, he needs to apologize.”
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Lightfoot, a Democrat who’s endorsed former Vice President Joe Biden against Trump, said she’s “deeply disturbed” by the reporting’s findings, which suggest Trump used “every trick in the book” to avoid paying his fair share.
“It doesn’t seem right, it doesn’t seem fair, and it explains a lot,” Lightfoot said. “It explains why he’s gone to great lengths to avoid allowing us as members of the public to take our measure of whether or not he’s living up to his responsibilities and his fair share.”
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Among the key findings of the New York Times report:
— "Trump paid no federal income taxes in 11 of 18 years that The Times examined. In 2017, after he became president, his tax bill was only $750.
— "He has reduced his tax bill with questionable measures, including a $72.9 million tax refund that is the subject of an audit by the Internal Revenue Service.
— "Many of his signature businesses, including his golf courses, report losing large amounts of money — losses that have helped him to lower his taxes.
— "The financial pressure on him is increasing as hundreds of millions of dollars in loans he personally guaranteed are soon coming due.
— “Even while declaring losses, he has managed to enjoy a lavish lifestyle by taking tax deductions on what most people would consider personal expenses, including residences, aircraft and $70,000 in hairstyling for television.”
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Lightfoot has frequently thrown barbs at Trump, who regularly invokes Chicago to bolster his “law and order” campaign theme.
Although the mayor has sparred with Trump, she also has made attempts to work with him and his family. He called her with congratulations after Lightfoot defeated Cook County Board President Toni Preckwinkle in the city’s mayoral race.
Before she was sworn in as mayor, Lightfoot went to Washington, D.C., and had a meeting with Ivanka Trump, the president’s daughter who also is a White House adviser.
But the relationship between Lightfoot and the Trumps has coarsened over time. Lightfoot ripped Ivanka Trump last year for a tweet about Chicago violence.
Earlier this year, she also blasted Jared Kushner, Ivanka’s husband and fellow White House adviser.
Lightfoot in May responded to Trump tweeting a message that included, “When the looting starts, the shooting starts” in reply to rioting in Minneapolis and elsewhere following George Floyd’s death by accusing the president of destabilizing the country and using a thinly veiled profanity.
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“He wants to show failures on the part of Democratic local leaders, to throw red meat to his base,” Lightfoot said at the time. “His goal is to polarize, to destabilize local government and inflame racist urges. We can absolutely not let him prevail. And I will code what I really want to say to Donald Trump. It’s two words. It begins with F and it ends with U.”
gpratt@chicagotribune.com


chicagotribune--2020-09-28--Kennedy construction work leaves vehicles with flat tires: ‘Like the car went down a ditch’

“ This guy was like , ‘ What do I do ?
’ And I ’ m like , ‘ @ @ @ @ @ going to have to call a tow truck , ’ ” said Mariola , who @ @ @ @ @ own damaged front driver ’ s side flat and install a small spare .
“ @ @ @ @ @ the next mile or two , there was another 10 , maybe 15 even , @ @ @ @ @ the road with their hazards on .
”

Joe Mariola shows his flat tire on Monday, Sept. 28, 2020. He says it was caused by a patchy section of the Kennedy Expressway on Sunday. (Brian Cassella / Chicago Tribune/Chicago Tribune)
As he and his wife sat stunned in their sedan Sunday night on the side of the inbound Kennedy Expressway, Bucktown resident Joe Mariola was grateful to have lost only one tire and rim.
The driver of a BMW who pulled up in front of Mariola’s black 2012 Acura TL about five minutes after Mariola’s own flat about 6 p.m., just before a sign for Nagle Avenue in the Union Ridge neighborhood, wasn’t so lucky.
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All four tires on the BMW were flat, apparently the result of a rough patch of road left behind following construction, Mariola said.
“This guy was like, ‘What do I do?’ And I’m like, ‘Yeah, you’re going to have to call a tow truck,’” said Mariola, who was able to remove his own damaged front driver’s side flat and install a small spare. “And then we noticed in the next mile or two, there was another 10, maybe 15 even, cars on the side of the road with their hazards on.”
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The Illinois Department of Transportation, in charge of expressway construction projects, was called to the area about 3 p.m. Sunday after being made aware of “a roadway defect in the left lane,” according to an email from Illinois State Police Trooper Genelle Jones.
But Jones said there were three vehicles reported to have gotten flat tires from the defective road. Video from the scene shot by Mariola’s wife shows at least a half-dozen cars on the side of the road.
The two left lanes of Interstate 90 from Harlem Avenue to the Edens Expressway were left with potholes “as part of an ongoing resurfacing project,” in which “a contractor was milling the left two lanes on I-90 ... to prepare the roadway for repaving,” according to an email from Illinois Department of Transportation spokeswoman Maria Castaneda.
Castaneda said the potholes developed after the road was reopened to traffic.
Mariola said it seemed clear there had been construction in the area because the top layer of asphalt appeared missing. He didn’t see any signs about the road’s condition but said even if it had it been clearly marked, it would have been too late to spare his vehicle.
Joe Mariola, shown Sept. 28, 2020, says his vehicle's flat tire was caused by a patchy section of the Kennedy Expressway the previous day. (Brian Cassella / Chicago Tribune/Chicago Tribune)
“We were just driving down 90 and then all of a sudden, I mean there’s a massive, out-of-nowhere drop. Like the car went down a ditch and the roads were so like unpaved and undone, and immediately I heard air coming out of the tire,” he said.
Mariola said he and his wife were returning to Chicago after having dinner with his in-laws in Schaumburg.
“The contractor had a crew on-site by 6 p.m. repairing the potholes with a temporary cold patch. They will be back on-site (Monday night) completing the repairs with a permanent hot mix patch,” Castaneda said.
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Beginning Tuesday night, she said, workers were expected to begin repaving the expressway at Harlem Avenue, working toward Foster Avenue.
Castaneda said the Department of Transportation will work with motorists who think their vehicles were damaged. Claims can be made with IDOT online.
Mariola said he thinks his damaged tire remains under warranty, so he is hopeful he will be able to get it replaced for a nominal fee. Still, he said, it’s disappointing losing so much time dealing with a problem he thinks was caused by the state.
“If we saw that many (damaged vehicles) just in the short time we were stuck out there, how many other people got flat tires?” he wondered. “It just kind of all-around stinks.”
kdouglas@chicagotribune.com
Twitter @312BreakingNews


chicagotribune--2020-09-28--8-year-old girl pulled on mom’s hair to stop her from fatally stabbing 5-year-old sister, prosecutor

8-year-old girl pulled on mom’s hair to stop her from fatally stabbing 5-year-old sister, prosecutors say

The girl rushed into the bedroom and desperately tried to stop the attack by pulling her mom by the hair @ @ @ @ @ home in East Garfield Park shouting that her mother had killed her 5-year-old sister , @ @ @ @

A child's bicycle and other items are on the front lawn of a home in the 3200 block of West Fulton Boulevard, which was the scene of a fatal stabbing of a 5-year-old girl Sept. 26, 2020, in Chicago. (John J. Kim / Chicago Tribune)
Spying through a doorknob hole, an 8-year-old girl saw her mom repeatedly stab her younger sister with a knife hidden under a pillow, prosecutors said Monday.
The girl rushed into the bedroom and desperately tried to stop the attack by pulling her mom by the hair, then ran from the home in East Garfield Park shouting that her mother had killed her 5-year-old sister, according to prosecutors.
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She was followed moments later by the mother, Simone Austin, carrying the naked, blood-covered body of her younger daughter, Serenity Arrington, a judge was told during a bail hearing.
Simone Austin is charged with first-degree murder in the stabbing death of her 5-year-old daughter. (Chicago Police Department)
The judge denied bail for Austin, 27, who is charged with first-degree murder.
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Police arrested Austin outside her home in the 3200 block of West Fulton Boulevard around 9:30 a.m. Saturday after she told at least one person, as well as emergency personnel treating Serenity, that she “did it” and “was sorry,” authorities said.
During the hearing, broadcast on YouTube, prosecutors offered no motive for the attack. Austin, a former Walmart stocker, according to her court-appointed attorney, had recently moved with her two daughters into her father’s apartment, prosecutors said in court.
Austin’s surviving daughter told authorities that she had feared something would happen following a prior incident in which her mother paced around with the knife in hand, frightening her daughters after they spilled eggs, Assistant State’s Attorney James Murphy said.
“And you never know what can happen,” Murphy said, quoting the unidentified child’s words to investigators.
On the morning of the attack, Austin told her older daughter to leave the room, but the girl watched from outside, Murphy said. Austin’s father, returning from a trip to get coffee, heard his elder granddaughter screaming.
Before using a friend’s phone to call police, he saw his daughter undressing her bleeding child, Murphy said.
Serenity was taken to Stroger Hospital, where she was pronounced dead at 9:50 a.m., according to the medical examiner’s office.
Her death was ruled a homicide from multiple stab wounds to the neck, the medical examiner’s office said.
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Austin’s attorney asked for a reasonable bond, citing his client’s lack of a criminal background. But Judge Mary C. Marubio cited the brutality of the attack, as well as the trauma it has inflicted on the family.
The Illinois Department of Children and Family Services said it had prior contact with the family and was investigating the incident. The agency released no other details.
Austin is scheduled to return to court next month.
pfry@chicagotribune.com
Twitter @paigexfry


chicagotribune--2020-09-28--Holly Williams Madigan, who was active in Chicago’s  civic life, dies

“ She was very beautiful — I ’ m speaking of her spirit — and I went up to her @ @ @ @ @ that moment , I was caught in the beautiful aura of Holly , '' Ryan @ @ @ @ @ out of her way to find people and she listened to her friends and she @ @ @ @ @ and open doors for people and stand up for them .
”

Holly Williams Madigan was a fixture of Chicago civic affairs, sitting on boards and raising money for institutions including the Field Museum of Natural History, Rush Presbyterian St. Luke’s Hospital and the Family Institute at Northwestern University.
“Holly truly wanted to help others,” said her husband of 57 years, retired Tribune Co. chairman and CEO John W. Madigan. “That’s why she did these things. Plus she enjoyed being with other women who shared the same values that she did.”
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Holly Williams Madigan (Madigan family photo/Handout)
Madigan, 79, died of complications from Parkinson’s disease Sept. 20 at her home, her husband said. She had been a Winnetka resident for 45 years.
Born Holly Anne Williams in Evanston, Madigan was the daughter of bandleader and pianist Griff Williams and his wife, Dorothy. Madigan grew up in Evanston and graduated from Evanston Township High School.
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She attended Pine Manor Junior College in Massachusetts — now known as Pine Manor College — for a year and then returned to Evanston in 1959 when her father died. Madigan also was a model for a time.
Madigan transferred to Northwestern University, where she graduated in 1962 with a bachelor’s degree in education and Spanish. While at Northwestern she met Shirley Ryan.
“She was very beautiful — I’m speaking of her spirit — and I went up to her and introduced myself and from that moment, I was caught in the beautiful aura of Holly," Ryan said. "She went out of her way to find people and she listened to her friends and she would do things for friends and open doors for people and stand up for them.”
From 1962 until 1965, Madigan taught Spanish and journalism at two junior high schools in Wilmette. In 1965, Madigan left teaching to raise her family. She also became involved with the women’s board of the Chicago Junior League and the Benton House settlement house and community center in Bridgeport.
She modeled in fashion shows aimed at raising funds, and went on to chair Rush-Presbyterian-St. Luke’s annual fashion show in 1983 and to serve as the president of Rush’s women’s board. She was invited to join that board by a longtime friend, Marcia Hines.
“Anything she undertook, she did with excellence,” Hines said.
After Shirley Ryan’s son, Corbett, was born with physical challenges in 1978, she started Pathways, a nonprofit research and rehabilitation center for children struggling with developmental delays. Ryan recruited Madigan to join Pathways' board, and Madigan remained on its board until her death.
“Holly was really dedicated to early detection and early intervention and the things we had learned through our third son,” said Ryan, wife of former Aon Corp. CEO Pat Ryan. “For 40 years, Holly has walked the walk with us, to open doors for children. And we now have 22 million children a year who use our website and social media.”
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Madigan sat on the women’s board at the Field Museum, where she chaired the museum’s Egyptian Ball fundraiser in 1988. She served as a trustee of the Ravinia festival, as a member of the Smithsonian Institution’s national board, as a member of the board of the Antiquarian Society of the Art Institute of Chicago, and as a member of the women’s boards at Northwestern University and the University of Chicago.
Madigan also was a director and former chairwoman of Northwestern’s Family Institute, a nonprofit behavioral health organization that provides mental health services and operates psychotherapy education and mental health research programs in affiliation with Northwestern.
“She stood up for an organization that was relatively unknown,” Ryan said. “And she believed in family and brought high visibility to Northwestern’s Family Institute and so many thousands of people benefited from her visibility and speaking out about it.”
In 2015, Madigan and her husband made a donation to Northwestern’s Daily Northwestern student newspaper that included a $250,000 challenge grant. In response, the paper renamed its newsroom after the couple.
The Madigans made a similar gift to the Michigan Daily, the University of Michigan’s daily student newspaper, in 2015. The gift included donating money to support the renovation of the paper’s newsroom and endowing a need-based scholarship for the paper’s staff. They named that fund the Lipinski Journalism Fund, after Michigan Daily alum and former Tribune Editor-in-Chief Ann Marie Lipinski.
In addition to her husband, Madigan is survived by two sons, Mark and Griff; a daughter, Melanie Madigan-Nordby; a brother, Griff; and two sisters, Wendy Sadler and Lynne Twist; and seven grandchildren. Services have been held.
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Bob Goldsborough is a freelance reporter.


chicagotribune--2020-09-28--Hebron man, 60, killed in off-road vehicle incident, officials say

Michael C. Kuchta , 60 , was last seen around 2:20 p.m. when he left his house in an off-road @ @ @ @ @

A 60-year-old Hebron man was found dead early Monday after an apparent off-road vehicle incident late Sunday, according to the Indiana Department of Natural Resources.
Michael C. Kuchta, 60, was last seen around 2:20 p.m. when he left his house in an off-road vehicle, officials said.
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The Lake County Sheriff’s Department received a missing person’s report around 10:45 p.m. His body was located on private property near the Sheriff’s Department around 12:40 a.m. Monday, a release from DNR said.
He did not appear to be wearing a helmet or using safety equipment, DNR spokeswoman Terri Millefoglie said.
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The investigation is ongoing. An autopsy is pending.


chicagotribune--2020-09-28--Watch live: Lightfoot provides update on easing of some COVID-19 restrictions in Chicago

Mayor Lori Lightfoot provides an update on the easing of some COVID-19 restrictions in Chicago .
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chicagotribune--2020-09-28--As Illinois Democrats look to pick up more suburban House seats, the fight could boil down to Trump

As Illinois Democrats look to pick up more suburban House seats, the fight could boil down to Trump vs. Madigan

“ This isn ’ t a strange land for me , this is my world , ” Villa said .
@ @ @ @ @ , and I asked people to trust me , it ’ s difficult , because @ @ @ @ @ me that well .
But now , I have a proven track record in my @ @ @ @ @ so , to me , just a proven track record that I have with my @ @ @ @ @ ’ s just spreading that message over to the part of the district where they @ @ @ @ @ ”

After winning a slew of suburban state legislative seats long held by Republicans in 2018, Illinois Democrats are looking to expand their reach even further in November as renewed controversy swirls around their powerful leader, longtime House Speaker Michael Madigan.
Republicans for years have built their campaign strategy around vilifying Madigan, who has been speaker for all but two years since 1983, but it hasn’t paid off in a big way at the ballot box. This year, however, the GOP hopes its anti-Madigan message will resonate in a new way after federal prosecutors in July alleged that Commonwealth Edison engaged in a “yearslong bribery scheme” designed to curry favor with the speaker.
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But Madigan, who has not been charged and has denied wrongdoing, is only on the ballot in his Southwest Side district, and Democrats are hoping to capitalize on a changing suburban electorate’s dissatisfaction with the name at the top of the Republican ticket: President Donald Trump.
Illinois House Speaker Michael Madigan walks out after a House Democratic caucus meeting on Nov. 12, 2019, at the Illinois State Capitol in Springfield. (Zbigniew Bzdak / Chicago Tribune)
All 118 Illinois House seats and 22 of 59 state Senate seats are on the ballot this fall. But because 52 House and 11 Senate races are uncontested, a handful of competitive districts — largely in the suburbs — will determine whether Democrats lose or add to their veto-proof majorities in both chambers. Democrats hold supermajorities of 74-44 in the House and 40-19 in the Senate, meaning Republicans would need a historic number of victories to take control of either chamber.
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The Democrats not only control both chambers of the General Assembly and all statewide offices, but they also enjoy an overwhelming advantage in campaign cash.
With former Republican Gov. Bruce Rauner’s funding out of the picture and other conservative donors focusing their spending on defeating Democratic Gov. J.B. Pritzker’s proposed graduated-rate income tax amendment, “if it were just about money, it really would be a wipeout,” said Kent Redfield, professor emeritus of political science with the University of Illinois system’s Institute of Government and Public Affairs.
On a larger scale for Republicans nationally, spending big to keep the Democrats from picking up a couple of seats in the Illinois legislature “doesn’t really seem like a good investment if you can flip a chamber” in another state, Redfield said.
“But for the Commonwealth Edison investigation, you’re really looking at a perfect storm in terms of the Democrats building their majority, with the changes in the suburbs and then the overwhelming money advantage,” Redfield said.
“If you want to ask the question, why are they making such a huge push when they already have such big majorities in both chambers, one of the answers might be that it’s an opportunity to so damage the Republican Party in the state of Illinois that it will be very difficult for them to rebuild and to make a comeback.”
Four campaign funds controlled by Madigan together ended the second fundraising quarter on June 30 with more than $22.6 million in the bank, including more than $2.4 million in the state Democratic Party’s fund, state campaign finance records show. On the Senate side, the Democrats’ main fund and others tied to Senate President Don Harmon of Oak Park had nearly $4.7 million on hand, with nearly $4.1 million in Harmon’s Senate campaign fund.
By comparison, the Illinois Republican Party had a little more than $107,000 in its main campaign fund at the end of June. The House GOP had nearly $2.8 million in its main funds, the bulk of it — nearly $2.2 million — held by House Republican leader Jim Durkin of Western Springs. Senate Republicans had nearly $1.6 million, with $1.1 million in the campaign fund of Senate Republican leader Bill Brady of Bloomington.
None of those figures include cash raised by individual candidates, and money has continued pouring in on both sides over the past three months.
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While a more complete picture of where the campaign coffers stand will be available when third-quarter contributions and expenditures are reported in mid-October, the Democratic campaign funds together have raised more than $4.8 million in large contributions since July 1, compared with more than $1.7 million raised by the GOP funds.
Democrats are looking to use their riches to claim districts even farther afield from their traditional Chicago power base, seeking to add to the net gain of 10 legislative seats they made two years ago amid a backlash to Trump and Rauner.
In an election year turned upside down by the coronavirus pandemic, the stakes are especially high because whoever holds the balance of power in the General Assembly’s next term also will wield the power to draw new legislative district boundaries for the coming decade based on the 2020 census. Democrats drew the past two maps, consolidating their power in the state legislature over the past two decades.
The goal for House Republicans is to win at least enough seats — a net gain of four — to deny Democrats the ability to override a gubernatorial veto unilaterally, Durkin said. That could be the key to preventing Madigan and his party from redrawing legislative boundaries to their political advantage — if Pritzker makes good on his pledge to veto any “unfair” map that reaches his desk.
And while the president may be a drag on some GOP candidates in the suburbs, Durkin said the net gain of four seats House Republicans made in 2016 shows “we were not taken down by all the theatrics that were going between Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton.”
“I trust the voters, that they’re able to separate issues at the national level and that they do concentrate on state House races,” Durkin said.
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But the Republicans’ aim is to make sure that voters don’t separate state-level Democratic candidates from the controversy surrounding Madigan.
“I don’t know what else we can be talking about,” Durkin said of the ComEd case, which is part of a larger federal probe that has yielded charges against a former House Democrat and three current and former Senate Democrats. “This defies any sense of sensibility or fair play in the General Assembly, and the public needs to be educated on that.”
But Harmon, the Democratic Senate president, said voters are more concerned about the physical and financial health of their families amid the coronavirus pandemic.
“The issues that voters are raising in conversations are not about Springfield,” Harmon said.
“Voters across the state, and suburban voters in particular, are responding to the intersection of the pandemic, the economy and access to affordable health care,” he said. “That’s been our message across the state. It’s resonating, especially in the suburbs.”
Concerns about affordable health care could become even more acute between now and Election Day as Trump pushes forward with a Supreme Court nominee who could prove to be a deciding vote in striking down the Affordable Care Act, Harmon said.
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One race that exemplifies the complicated dynamics at play in campaigns across the collar counties is a rematch in the 48th House District between Democratic state Rep. Terra Costa Howard of Glen Ellyn and former Republican state Rep. Peter Breen of Lombard, whom she defeated in 2018 by a 7-point margin. It was the first time a Democrat won the district, which includes parts of Lombard, Glen Ellyn, Wheaton and Lisle.
State Rep. Terra Costa Howard of Glen Ellyn. (Terra Costa Howard campaign)
Costa Howard, an attorney and former Glen Ellyn school board member, is among a handful of House Democrats who have called on Madigan to resign as speaker and chairman of the state party since the U.S. attorney’s office unveiled its deferred prosecution agreement with ComEd. She’s also a proponent of taking the power to draw legislative district boundaries away from lawmakers, a position that puts her at odds with some in party leadership.
“What I find about suburban Democrats: We are different than my colleagues from the city of Chicago,” Costa Howard said, “because the suburbs are different, the needs in the suburbs are different.”
Still, she aligns with her party on many key issues such as abortion and the environment, and she supports the proposed amendment to the Illinois Constitution that would shift the state to a graduated-rate income tax from the current flat-rate tax.
Despite her recent public opposition to Madigan, Costa Howard voted for him as speaker in 2019, a fact her opponent is quick to note. Costa Howard, however, has vowed not to vote for him when the new General Assembly convenes next year, though she is still receiving backing from the state party and from campaign funds Madigan controls.
Costa Howard ended the last fundraising quarter on June 30 with a little more than $54,000 in her campaign fund but has since raised nearly $178,000 in large contributions, including nearly $60,000 from the Democratic Party of Illinois and nearly $6,900 from Democratic Majority, both controlled by Madigan.
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Her opponent, Breen, meanwhile, ended the second quarter with more than $98,000 in cash on hand and has raised more than $41,000 in large contributions since the beginning of July, with nearly $30,000 coming from the Illinois GOP and the House Republican Organization.
Peter Breen, who is running as a Republican candidate for the 48th Illinois House District. (Campaign photo)
Breen, an attorney for the conservative Thomas More Society and onetime House GOP floor leader, is looking to win back the seat he held for two terms by focusing on corruption and the need to “clean house” in Springfield. He’s also campaigning on traditional Republican issues such as freezing property taxes and opposing abortion.
Breen said he sees the race in the “heart of DuPage County” as “something of a bellwether.”
“How this district decides to go forward, it’s going to determine the future, I think, of the state and really how we’re going to move forward together as a state for a decade to come,” he said.
Costa Howard also sees the district as indicative of the changing attitudes of voters in the west suburbs. But the shift toward Democrats is already well underway, she said.
“Change, it’s not coming; it’s here,” Costa Howard said.
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Democrats aren’t satisfied with maintaining the gains they made two years ago.
They’re using their formidable campaign war chests to go after more suburban seats in longtime Republican strongholds such as Naperville and Elmhurst.
One top target is third-term Rep. Grant Wehrli of Naperville, an assistant GOP leader in the House, who has held the seat since 2015. Wehrli’s challenger, Janet Yang Rohr, is a school board member in Naperville and is director of global data at the investment research firm Morningstar.
Yang Rohr’s campaign ended the second quarter with nearly $25,000 and has raised more than $903,000 in contributions of at least $1,000 since then. A significant share of that money, nearly $273,000 combined, came from the Democratic Party of Illinois and the Democratic Majority funds, and Pritzker has given a total of $57,800, during the quarter that began July 1.
Illinois state Rep. Grant Wehrli. (Grant Wehrli campaign)
Wehrli’s campaign ended the last quarter with nearly $34,000, but Yang Rohr’s campaign has since far outpaced the incumbent in large contributions. Wehrli’s campaign has drawn in almost $185,000 in contributions of at least $1,000 since July 1.
Wehrli, a member of the legislative Joint Commission on Ethics and Lobbying Reform, and one of three Republican members of the special investigating committee that’s been charged with a probe into Madigan’s conduct said “there’s no doubt (Democrats) are throwing everything they have at me in an effort to silence me.”
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“There’s no doubt that Speaker Madigan wants me gone; I have been a vocal critic, not only of his corruption but the way he runs things” in Springfield, Wehrli said.
Among his top ethics legislation priorities is broadening the powers of the legislative inspector general “to actually give that individual some solid teeth to root out what’s going on. Because we clearly can’t hold each other accountable.”
Wehrli said with the amount of contributions Yang Rohr’s campaign has taken in from the Democratic Party, “she’s not going to be the most independent voice in Springfield.”
Janet Yang Rohr is running for the 41st Legislative District. (Janet Yang Rohr)
Yang Rohr called that assertion “insulting” and “misogynistic.”
Her job at Morningstar requires her to make independent assessments of asset managers, she said, “and it’s not always a very comfortable thing.”
“I’ve been tested many, many times. ... It’s something I do every day, to maintain that independence,” Yang Rohr said.
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Wehrli failed to show his independence from Rauner by siding with the then-governor during his long-running budget standoff with the Democratic-controlled legislature, which ultimately hurt residents of the district, she said.
Yang Rohr wants to go to Springfield to protect access to affordable health care, and she also favors strong government ethics laws, she said. As for whether she’d support Madigan for speaker, Yang Rohr said she’s “totally focused on November” but would always vote with the district as her top priority.
Democrats also have their sights set once again on the only House district represented by a Republican that includes a portion of Chicago. Democrats spent heavily in 2016 to try to defeat longtime GOP Rep. Michael McAuliffe in the Northwest Side and northwest suburban 20th House District, resulting in the most expensive state legislative race in the country. But after McAullife won reelection, they sat out 2018.
McAuliffe retired in 2019, with local Republican leaders appointing Rosemont Mayor Bradley Stephens to the open seat. Stephens is facing a well-financed challenge from Chicago firefighter and paramedic Michelle Darbro, who has raised nearly $767,000 in large contributions since July 1 — more than double Stephens’ haul during the same period.
Illinois state Rep. Karina Villa. (Karina Villa / HANDOUT)
In one example of how far into the suburbs Democrats think they can compete, first-term state Rep. Karina Villa of West Chicago is running for the Senate seat held since 2013 by conservative Republican Sen. Jim Oberweis of Sugar Grove. Oberweis, who’s run a series of unsuccessful campaigns for federal office, is giving up the seat to challenge first-term U.S. Rep. Lauren Underwood of Naperville for her seat in Congress.
Villa, a former school social worker and former school board member who won a House seat in 2018 that had previously been occupied by a Republican, closed out the second quarter with more than $220,000 and has raised more than $474,000 in large contributions since July 1, compared with her Republican opponent Jeanette Ward, who closed out the last quarter with nearly $18,000 and has drawn more than $314,000 in contributions of at least $1,000 since then.
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Ward is a former school board member who works as a product manager for DSM Functional Materials, and said ethics law changes and instituting legislative term limits are among her top priorities. Ward said the district’s history as a Republican stronghold bodes well for her campaign.
“It went by nine points for the Republican in the last election cycle, so that is positive for my campaign,” Ward said. “Our polling indicates that if we can get our message out about ethics, about taxes, about supporting the police, that the ideas I’m supporting are by far supported by the people of Illinois Senate District 25, as opposed to my opponent.”
Villa, meanwhile, voiced confidence in her ability to win the district despite its Republican roots, noting that she’s been “represented from Congress down at all levels by Republicans my whole life” in DuPage County.
“This isn’t a strange land for me, this is my world,” Villa said. “When I first ran, and I asked people to trust me, it’s difficult, because people might not have known me that well. But now, I have a proven track record in my state office. … And so, to me, just a proven track record that I have with my community, and now it’s just spreading that message over to the part of the district where they don’t know.”
Democrats also are spending big in the race for the House seat Villa currently occupies, which pits Democrat Maura Hirschauer against Republican Laura Curtis.
Outside the Chicago area, Democrats also are trying to defend a trio of seats in the Metro East region near St. Louis, held by Reps. Katie Stuart, Monica Bristow and Nathan Reitz. In some of the Downstate races, particularly in more rural areas, resistance to some of Pritzker’s regulations aimed at curbing the spread of the coronavirus could come into play for Republicans trying to flip a seat.
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“You’ve just got a lot more resistance, and it plays into a conservative narrative — economic liberty, individual freedom,” Redfield said.
If Republicans were to win all three of those House seats, it would “really solidify the regional partisan divide” in Illinois, he said.
Editor’s note: An earlier version of this story described former Illinois Gov. Bruce Rauner’s financial status as a billionaire. Forbes magazine does not include Rauner in its list of the world’s billionaires.
dpetrella@chicagotribune.com
jmunks@chicagotribune.com


chicagotribune--2020-09-28--COVID-19 cases in Illinois by ZIP code: Search for your neighborhood

Search below by street address , ZIP code or city , then click on the map to see the number @ @ @ @ @ state is not providing data for any ZIP code with five cases or fewer .

Note: With Chicago and Illinois moving into phase 5, the Tribune is no longer updating this data. If the state moves back into bridge phase, the Tribune we reassess. Daily metrics on COVID-19, like cases, deaths and hospitalizations, can be found here. And Daily metrics on the vaccination effort can be found here. More on where the coronavirus stands nationally and around the world can be found here.
Illinois releases the number of positive COVID-19 cases by ZIP code daily. The map below shows the cumulative cases for each area as well as other analysis of the data.
• Check out the Tribune’s coronavirus coverage.
• Tracking daily Illinois coronavirus deaths, cases and tests.
Search below by street address, ZIP code or city, then click on the map to see the number of confirmed and probable cases. The state is not providing data for any ZIP code with five cases or fewer.
Data as of June 10.
The map search tool above works best in Chrome or Firefox and may not perform consistently in Internet Explorer.
Note: Because of a coding error this map was displaying the incorrect rates for new cases in the last 7 days per 100,000 people — the issue should now be resolved.. The Tribune adjusted the data shown on the map below to focus on new cases, those the state tracked in the last 7 seven days. The totals for the entire pandemic are still available, but in the pop-up after tapping or clicking on a ZIP.


chicagotribune--2020-09-28--Daily Illinois coronavirus graphs: 13 new deaths, 1,709 new confirmed cases and 41,142 new test resu

Daily Illinois coronavirus graphs: 13 new deaths, 1,709 new confirmed cases and 41,142 new test results

Illinois announced 1,709 new confirmed cases of COVID-19 Monday for a total of 289,639 .
The state also announced 13 @ @ @ @ @ of 8,614 and 41,142 new test results for a total of 5.52 million .

Johns Hopkins University & Medicine tracked coronavirus cases, deaths and test totals from Jan. 22, 2020 through March 10, 2023, but is no longer providing this data. These charts will no longer be updated.
Check the Illinois Department of Public Health for the most up-to-date data for Illinois.
[ Remembering the lives of those in Illinois who died from coronavirus ]
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chicagotribune--2020-09-28--Finom Coffee among latest Chicago restaurants closing due to the COVID-19 pandemic’s economic toll.

Finom Coffee among latest Chicago restaurants closing due to the COVID-19 pandemic’s economic toll. Here’s our running list.

Earlier this summer , changes to the OpenTable website for Kiki ’ s Bistro caused some confusion over whether or not the beloved River North spot had closed for good .
The restaurant shared a clarification that , for now , it would be open for business .
Sadly , however , Kiki ’ s website changed late last week , indicating that the restaurant will close permanently after the final day of service Sept. 30 .
“ We appreciate the birthdays , anniversaries , special occasions and everyday meals that you spent dining and laughing with us .
Those @ @ @ @ @ @ @ few months , as your visits did for those many years , ” read the post .
It wasn ’ t all bad news , though , mentioning that a small-time operation remains on the radar for Kiki ’ s founder Georges “ Kiki ” Cuisance : “ Kiki , 87 , is attempting retirement with an open eye for a potential petite Kiki ’ s — a tiny , cozy reboot with the potential to offer authentic French fare you love on a very intimate scale.
” See the full story here @ @ @ @

The statewide shutdown of restaurants and bars for on-premise service took effect March 16. Since then, several restaurants and bars have reopened for dining and drinking, as Chicago and the state have rolled out gradual reopening plans. But not all of them have made it.
This article lists bars and restaurants that have been forced to close due to the financial strain of COVID-19 regulations. Note that these closures are strictly finance-related and are not due to illness among any of the business’ staff.
We will update the list, sorted alphabetically, as needed.
NEW CLOSINGS
Lagunitas taproom likely won’t reopen in 2021
Lagunitas Brewing likely won’t reopen its Chicago taproom until at least 2022 due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the brewery’s chief marketing officer said Thursday. The taproom, which opened in 2014, is situated directly above the brewery, in the center of Lagunitas’ South Side building. Lagunitas CMO Paige Guzman said she’d “be surprised” if it reopened this year due to concerns about virus spread. The taproom has been closed since the pandemic took root in the U.S. in March. Lagunitas is among the first Chicago bars or restaurants to acknowledge a 2021 reopening as unlikely. See the full story here.
— Josh Noel
FULL RESTAURANT CLOSINGS LIST
25 Degrees
The downtown restaurant and bar did not mention the pandemic shutdown specifically, but a Facebook post announcing its closure noted that it was “due to our current situation.”
Arlington Cake Box Bakery
Chicagoland residents have been celebrating special occasions with the baking of Arlington Cake Box Bakery for 71 years, but the bakery announced in a Facebook post last week that it closed Sept. 20. “We are so grateful for the level of support you have shown us, not only in these unprecedented last six months, but also in the past 71 years,” read the post. The bakery first opened in 1949 and had been on its third generation as a family business.
Bad Hunter
The dining room at Bad Hunter is reflected in a mirror on the back wall. (Anthony Souffle / Chicago Tribune)
Bad Hunter — known for its vegetable-and-grains-forward menu — and its second-floor event venue, The Herbarium, closed for good because of the COVID-19 pandemic. The West Loop restaurant, which survived a fire and re-opened in 2019, was voted the Chicago restaurant with the best plant-based menu in the Chicago Tribune Readers’ Choice Dining Awards earlier this year. — Grace Wong
Band of Bohemia
Band of Bohemia, which announced in July that it was closing temporarily, first earned a Michelin star in 2016 and had retained it every year since through 2019. (Antonio Perez / Chicago Tribune)
Five-year-old Band of Bohemia, whose pioneering vision of brewing beer and serving creative, ambitious food was ultimately rewarded with a coveted Michelin star, is going out of business after filing for bankruptcy. The Ravenswood brewpub filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy liquidation Oct. 16 in the Northern District of Illinois. According to court records, Band of Bohemia is more than $1 million in debt. But in a statement Oct. 21, Band of Bohemia founders Michael Carroll and Craig Sindelar blamed the economic fallout of the COVID-19 pandemic for the closure. The restaurant has been closed since July, when owners said it would be shuttering temporarily. See the full story here. — Josh Noel
Baobab BBQ
The barbecue spot, which used South African flavors to riff on traditional ‘cue, announced in May on its Facebook page that it would close permanently due to the effects of the shutdown, writing: “When a small business’s revenue is interrupted it is devastating; when it’s a restaurant, earth shattering best describes it.”
Bar Biscay
An array of "pintxos," popular small bites offered at Bar Biscay. (Terrence Antonio James / Chicago Tribune)
Bar Biscay, the restaurant that lit up West Town with coastal-Spain sunshine, has closed, for keeps, after a 2½-year run. Partner Scott Worsham said in a posting on Facebook that, “The time has come to say goodbye to our groovy, Atlantic-coast inspired French-Spanish-Basque funhouse, our Oasis of Joy. He blamed COVID-19 and “factors beyond our control.” See the full story here. — Phil Vettel
Bite Cafe
Noah Sandoval (Oriole, Kumiko/Kikko) will join with friend Bruce Finkelman, managing partner of the 16″ On Center restaurant group (Longman & Eagle, Dusek’s Board & Beer, Revival Food Hall), to create Pizza Friendly Pizza, opening later this summer in the Bite Cafe space. Finkelman said, “Once the quarantine hit, I realized that that type of restaurant wouldn’t be able to exist in the post-COVID culinary scene.” — Phil Vettel
Blackbird
Blackbird restaurant in Chicago on Monday June 29, 2020. (Zbigniew Bzdak / Chicago Tribune)
The highest-profile Chicago restaurant victim of coronavirus to date has been Blackbird, closing for good after more than 22 years as one of the area’s finest restaurants. “We’ve labored long and hard over this decision,” said partner Paul Kahan. “But in an incredibly small, tight dining room — operating at only 25% capacity for who knows how long — and removing the opportunity to do private dining, it becomes incredibly difficult to manage.” — Phil Vettel
Blue Nose Brewery
Small southwest suburban Blue Nose Brewery has closed due to the economic fallout of the coronavirus pandemic. Blue Nose co-founder Jordan Isenberg said he made the decision in late October 2020, after the state ordered suburban Cook County bars and restaurants to close for indoor business for a second time to stem the spread of COVID-19. He kept the decision largely to himself while winding down the business, he said. See the rest of the story here. — Josh Noel
Bonci (Wicker Park)
Three different options at Bonci (Arugula, dried tomatoes and bufala mozzarella) (zucchini, ricotta, lemon zest and black pepper) and (prosciutto and fior di latte mozzarella). (Nick Kindelsperger / Chicago Tribune)
The second Chicago location of the world famous pizzeria was located in Wicker Park, but Eater Chicago reported that Bonci’s director of U.S. operations said consolidating to one location (West Loop) was necessary in light of the pandemic.
Bonfire
The no-frills steakhouse in Homer Glen confirmed via Facebook message that it has closed for good due to the effects of the pandemic shutdown.
Bottled Blonde
Bottled Blonde has closed after years of legal drama. (Phil Velasquez / Chicago Tribune)
Bottled Blonde, the River North bar better known for its legal drama than pizza, closed permanently July 27, due to the coronavirus — but COVID-19 violations are not among the complaints against it. The business “surrendered their business licenses, permanently closing the River North bar after a series of serious nuisance conditions dating back to 2017,” according to a statement from the Department of Business Affairs and Consumer Protection. The bar had not received any citations related to COVID-19, wrote the department spokesperson.
The district manager of Bottled Blonde said, “It’s been an uphill battle since we came into this neighborhood. We had fights with the city, fights with the neighborhood. With the COVID thing, you need revenue to keep up those fights. We can’t stay open and operate at limited capacities.” See the full story here. — Louisa Chu
Boulangerie (Belmont Avenue)
La Boulangerie closed its location at 915 W. Belmont Ave. (Nick Kindelsperger / Chicago Tribune)
The French bakery chain La Boulangerie has closed the Lakeview location on Belmont Avenue. The Logan Square and Ravenswood bakeries remain open, but for pickup and delivery only.
Bridgeport Coffee Co. (Loop)
The Chicago coffee roaster closed its Loop location in June, confirming the shuttering as a result of COVID in a blog post. Its other three in Bridgeport, Hyde Park and the South Loop remain open.
Cactus Bar & Grill
The Cactus Bar at 404 S. Wells St. in Chicago. (Phil Velasquez / Chicago Tribune)
The recent closure of Cactus Bar & Grill leaves the South Loop financial district without a 31-year-old standby. Cactus confirmed the closure with a note on its website, writing that they knew in the middle of August that the bar wouldn’t make it: “With few offices in the Loop occupied, and a challenging situation with our land lord, the crisis’s financial devastation became insurmountable.” The bar was a staple for lunches and drinks in the Loop.
Cafe Marie-Jeanne
The announcement that Cafe Marie-Jeanne will close drew lines outside the Humboldt Park restaurant Friday, Nov. 20, 2020. By Saturday, owners had to close early after running out of food. The wait Sunday was four hours. (Terrence Antonio James / Chicago Tribune)
Cafe Marie-Jeanne (1001 N. California Ave.), co-owned by the husband and wife team of Michael Simmons and Val Szafranski, announced Nov. 19 on Instagram that they would close permanently: “The string has run out for CMJ. We hung in as long as we could and it’s time to let go. Everything must end. WE WILL MISS YOU ALL!” Over the following weekend, fans flocked to the Humboldt Park restaurant known for its French-influenced dishes for one last taste. Lines stretched down the block, and Simmons had to shut down early Nov. 20 because he ran out of food. On that Saturday, the wait in line took four hours. The restaurant closed Nov. 23. See the full story here. — Nick Kindelsperger
Candyality
Candyality is known for its collection of retro candies, among hundreds of other confections.
Andersonville has one less spot to sate your sweet tooth, as Candyality has announced in a Facebook post that it will be closing its location in the neighborhood at the end of September. The closing comes “with great sadness” after spending more than 5 years in that space, the post reads. The Chicago-based candy store — which has also had locations in Wicker Park and Water Tower Place during the past several years — is still open at its Lakeview location, 3737 N. Southport Ave., and offers local delivery.
Cafe Cancale
The strawberry sundae with sea salt ice cream at Cafe Cancale. (Brian Cassella / Chicago Tribune)
The One Off Hospitality property in Wicker Park was another casualty of the pandemic, closing at the same time as Blackbird.
California Clipper and coffee shop C.C. Ferns
Detail of the Vesper at California Clipper in 2017. (Chris Sweda/Chicago Tribune)
Both the Clipper and attached cafe C.C. Ferns shuttered permanently due to the COVID shutdown. However, there have been conflicting accounts between Hogsalt Hospitality owner Brendan Sodikoff and landlord Gino Battaglia as to how the fallout was navigated, according to reports from Eater Chicago and Block Club Chicago, respectively.
Chicago House Of ‘Za
The North Center spot for all-vegan pizza shared an Instagram post announcing its permanent closure, citing the financial effects of the pandemic shutdown as part of the reason: “With the current pandemic, as well as the enormous cost of operating a business in Chicago, we are unable to stay open for business any longer.”
City Mouse
City Mouse restaurant in the Ace Hotel opened in 2017. (Terrence Antonio James/Chicago Tribune)
City Mouse, the Ace Hotel restaurant operated by the team behind Giant and Chef’s Special, is closing after three years. Sunday, Oct. 18, will be the last day, the restaurant announced Wednesday in a statement. Jason Vincent, one of the partners at Giant and Chef’s Special, declined further comment. Giant and Chef’s Special bar announced just Tuesday it was launching a food truck to get their creative cooking to a larger audience. The space is going to be occupied by the Alinea Group, starting in November; owner Nick Kokonas confirmed that Alinea has leased the space for a three-month residency, but offered no additional details. For more details, see the story here. — Phil Vettel
Conga’s
The Norwood Park restaurant, which also featured music and dancing, announced it would be closing on Facebook. The post read, “I’m deeply saddened to announce Congas Restaurant will not be opening again. Covid-19 made me realize the most important things in life.” Another post teased a return for the Congas name, but as more of a venue-esque space.
Danny’s Tavern
After rumors of a closure had persisted on social media for weeks, Danny’s Tavern has confirmed it closed permanently. The Bucktown dive was well-known for its dance floor and its popular party celebrating The Smiths. The closure comes five years after the bar nearly shuttered once before and ends the bar’s 34-year stay on Dickens Avenue.
Davanti Enoteca
Davanti Enoteca in Little Italy.
The Little Italy location of Davanti Enoteca has closed for good, and, according to a report from the Sun-Times, it appears finances were a factor: “A demand letter dated June 12 from the landlord ... said the establishment was nearly $60,000 behind on rent.” The letter was posted on the window of Francesca’s, a sister restaurant also owned by chef David Harris.
Ditka’s in Chicago
Mike Ditka lookalike Don, center, and his wife Marian Feuling eat during a birthday party dinner at Ditka's restaurant in 2019. (Camille Fine / Chicago Tribune)
The economic effects of the mandated shutdown were a contributing factor in the closure of Mike Ditka’s Chicago restaurant in May. Other locations remain open, including Ditka’s in suburban Oakbrook Terrace and Grill 89 in suburban Westmont.
Eden
People settle in for dinner at the restaurant called Eden, 1748 W. Lake St. in Chicago, on Wednesday, March 15, 2017. (Terrence Antonio James / Chicago Tribune)
Eden, a Cal-Mediterranean restaurant popular with pre- and post-event United Center crowd (among others), closed in mid-July after a run of just over 3½ years. Eden opened on west Lake Street in December 2016 and made friends quickly, both for its pretty, bright-white interiors and Devon Quinn’s skillful cooking. The owners said in a release that “While we recently reopened our doors to an immensely positive response, the larger economic impact resulting from the coronavirus pandemic has made it impossible for us to sustain operations.” Read the full story here. — Phil Vettel
Emerald City Coffee Shop (Sheridan)
The Emerald City Coffee Shop location on Sheridan Road closed permanently Oct. 31, according to a post on the cafe’s Instagram page: “The uncertainty of the pandemic and other financial stressors were too much to bear and we’re so, so bummed to see ECC Sheridan go, but it’s the tough choice we had to make.” Emerald City, which was also known for its breakfast burritos, occupied a noticeable space below the Sheridan Red Line stop for years and was a neighborhood favorite. The Emerald City Coffee in Uptown, at 1224 W. Wilson Ave., remains open.
A Go Fund Me campaign launched earlier to save the Sheridan location has been taken down. But a new Go Fund Me has been launched, this one to help laid-off baristas. “The purpose of this fundraiser is to help cushion the blow that our ECC Sheridan staff will experience in the coming days,” the campaign reads. It seeks $5,000 and by the afternoon of Nov. 4 had raised $2,100. — Adam Lukach
Fahlstrom’s Fresh Fish Market
Owner Glenn Fahlstrom confirmed that he would be closing the Lakeview seafood spot in an online post shared on the restaurant’s website and social media pages. The post, in part, read: “The new restaurant model is asking owners to put employees in harm’s way so that their business can possibly survive. That is an ‘acceptable risk’ I cannot take. The restaurant business as I know it is gone and will not return for years. It was hard enough when the playing field was supposedly level, now it is tilted beyond recognition. So, I am closing Fahlstrom’s Fresh Fish Market.”
Fat Rice / Super Fat Rice Mart
At the beginning of the pandemic shutdown, Fat Rice pivoted to become Super Fat Rice Mart, a market for meal kits and various grocery goods. Later, current and former Fat Rice employees went public with allegations of harassment and mistreatment by owner Abe Conlon, and the location has been closed ever since, with no public mention of a reopening date.
Fat Willy’s Rib Shack
Rib tips at Fat Willy's Rib Shack, 2416 W. Schubert Ave. (Michael Tercha / Chicago Tribune)
The North Side is losing another barbecue spot after Fat Willy’s Rib Shack announced Thursday evening that it will close Sept. 27. The Logan Square restaurant has been in the neighborhood for more than 19 years and has a loyal following of diners who go there for baby back ribs, pulled pork, brisket and mac and cheese. See the full story here. — Grace Wong
Finom Coffee
Cream and sugar station at Finom Coffee in the Old Irving Park neighborhood of Chicago. (Louisa Chu / Chicago Tribune)
Finom Coffee — the popular two-year-old cafe in Old Irving Park known for serving Hungarian small plates, along with coffee, tea and baked goods, out of a snazzy art-deco storefront, has closed. Chef Rafa Esparza posted an upbeat message on Instagram: “It was a beautiful moment in time and the whole crew slayed from day one!” See the full story here. — Adam Lukach
Foodlife
The multi-station food concept located in Water Tower Place confirmed its closing in early June, although owner Lettuce Entertain You declined to comment exactly why. — Nick Kindelsperger
Fountainhead
Guests sit on the popular rooftop patio at Fountainhead in Ravenswood in this 2015 photo. (Lenny Gilmore / RedEye)
For the past 10 years, Fountainhead bar and restaurant has occupied the northeast corner of Damen and Montrose, one of Ravenswood’s essential intersections, bringing an enviable selection of whiskey and barrel-aged spirits to the neighborhood. In late September, the restaurant announced in social media posts that its run will come to an end Nov 14. “The past year has been difficult for everyone but pressures facing our industry at this time make it financially impossible to operate past the roof deck season. We made every effort to make adjustments to operate in this ‘new normal’ but with limitations restricting revenue and without funding to offset this condition it is impossible to continue,” read the post. Fountainhead owners are working with building ownership to find the “right concept” for the prominently situated storefront. Rhe Fountainhead Market — located next door — will remain there. — Adam Lukach
Francesca’s On Taylor
As with Taylor Street’s Davanti Enoteca — the two restaurants share ownership — the Italian restaurant in Little Italy has closed permanently, with reports indicating that rent-payment issues were at least partly to blame.
Gino’s East
The Gino’s East restaurant at 500 N. LaSalle St. has closed, a victim of a decline in business downtown, according to Jordan Himmel, chief information officer for Chicago-based Bravo Restaurants (which owns Gino’s East, Ed Debevic’s, Edwardo’s Pizza and Eduardo’s Enoteca.) The location closed in March, but other Chicago locations remain open.
Guthrie’s Tavern
Ron DeNicolo and his wife, Cynthia, take a photograph outside Guthrie's Tavern, 1300 W. Addison St., on July 21 in Chicago. DeNicolo said he and Cynthia had their first date at the bar 10 years ago. (John J. Kim / Chicago Tribune)
Guthrie’s Tavern, one of Chicago’s oldest and most popular neighborhood bars, announced it would be closing permanently, citing the city’s rollback of phase four rules for bars as a primary cause. Guthrie’s has occupied the corner of Addison Street and Lakewood Avenue for 34 years. It closed July 23. See the complete story here. — Adam Lukach
Habana Libre
Per a post on its website, Habana Libre closed permanently “due to the impact of coronavirus.” The Cuban restaurant had been in West Town since 2007.
Hamburger Mary’s
Hamburger Mary's opened on a key corner in Andersonville in 2006. (Michael Tercha / Chicago Tribune)
Andersonville’s Hamburger Mary’s — the only remaining city location of the nationwide network of independent franchises — announced Sunday on Facebook that it would be closing Nov. 1. Ownership listed the building for sale last year, and the lease ends at the end of December, but the coronavirus pandemic expedited the closing process, according to the post. The burger-focused restaurant, an outlet of the San Francisco-based chain, opened on a high-profile in Andersonville in June 2006, featuring drag shows, karaoke and bingo, along with the burgers. The closing announcement also teased ownership interest in reopening at another location: “We feel it’s best to wait until spring before we look for a possible new space.” The restaurant will host regular business hours until its final day of service Nov. 1. — Adam Lukach
Hot “G” Dog
Duck sausage, topped with lobes of foie gras and sea salt flakes, from Hot "G" Dog (5009 N. Clark St.). (Kevin Pang / Chicago Tribune)
Andersonville lost a hot-dog joint — at least the rest of 2020 — from the former Hot Doug’s chef with the closure of Hot “G” Dog. A Facebook post from the restaurant said its owners hope to return eventually, but the COVID shutdown had made business unsustainable for now.
Imperial Lamian
After more than four and a half years of serving rainbow-colored soup dumplings, roast duck and vegan spring rolls, Imperial Lamian is closing its doors in River North. The Chinese restaurant cited pandemic-related challenges as its reason for closing. Imperial Lamian, which opened in the spring of 2016, was lauded by the Chicago Tribune as having the best xiaolongbao (or XLB for short) in the city. Dozens of people expressed how much they would miss the restaurant in the comments section of the social media posts. See the full story here. — Grace Wong
Income Tax
Income Tax brought a much-needed wine bar to Edgewater, furthering the trend of easy-drinking, non-pretentious wine lists. (Phil Velasquez / Chicago Tribune)
Ownership for the laid-back Edgewater wine bar confirmed via email that the pandemic’s effect on Income Tax’s financials led to its closing. It had been open since 2016.
Jeri’s Grill
The diner on Western Avenue was a monument to greasy spoons of yore, open for 57 years and 24 hours a day, and was cut down by COVID-19, reported Block Club Chicago in May. “If there was no COVID, we’d be open,” owner Frank Di Piero told the publication.
Katana
Katana brought its robatayaki-style restaurant to the River North neighborhood in 2017. (Katana)
A spokesperson for the parent company of the River North sushi restaurant wrote in an email: “Yes, the COVID closure was a devastating financial hit for us and the reason behind our closure … The Chicago location was very special to us, and we were sad to close.”
Kiki’s Bistro
Diners raise a toast during a wine dinner at Kiki’s Bistro, 900 N. Franklin St., May 4, 2006. The restaurant announced it would close permanently at the end of September 2020. (Wes Pope / Chicago Tribune)
Earlier this summer, changes to the OpenTable website for Kiki’s Bistro caused some confusion over whether or not the beloved River North spot had closed for good. The restaurant shared a clarification that, for now, it would be open for business. Sadly, however, Kiki’s website changed late last week, indicating that the restaurant will close permanently after the final day of service Sept. 30. “We appreciate the birthdays, anniversaries, special occasions and everyday meals that you spent dining and laughing with us. Those memories have sustained us through the last few months, as your visits did for those many years,” read the post. It wasn’t all bad news, though, mentioning that a small-time operation remains on the radar for Kiki’s founder Georges “Kiki” Cuisance: “Kiki, 87, is attempting retirement with an open eye for a potential petite Kiki’s — a tiny, cozy reboot with the potential to offer authentic French fare you love on a very intimate scale.” See the full story here. — Adam Lukach
Kroll’s South Loop
One of the South Loop’s signature sports bars, Kroll’s South Loop, announced in a Facebook post that it would be closing its doors at the end of the summer. “We fought hard,” read the announcement. “The burden of operating under the current conditions is too great and, come fall, will be impossible to continue under the current indoor capacity restrictions of 50 patrons. … We do not know whether this closure will last until next spring or forever. Only time will tell.” Kroll’s will remain open for dinner service Thursdays through Sundays until it concludes its 15-year run at the end of summer.
La Buona Vita
La Buona Vita, a Northern Italian restaurant in downtown La Grange closed its doors after a six-year run. In a message posted on the restaurant’s now-defunct website, owner Jim Barron named COVID-19 as the proximate cause of his restaurant’s demise. — Phil Vettel
La Fontanella
The owners of the longtime Italian restaurant had already planned to sell the building and restaurant prior to the pandemic, according to Block Club Chicago.
Lawry’s The Prime Rib
Lawry's, known by generations of Chicagoans for its prime rib, steaks and lush steakhouse trappings inside a former mansion, will close after service Dec. 31, 2020. (Abel Uribe / Chicago Tribune)
Lawry’s The Prime Rib, which has been a fixture on Ontario Street (just west of Michigan Avenue) for 46 years, called it quits at the end of 2020. The coronavirus, last summer’s civil unrest and an expiring lease all contributed to the decision, said Ryan Wilson, CEO of Lawry’s Inc. “In a year of incredible turmoil, this is a tough one for sure,” he said. “But with the industry in general in such a state of flux, we felt we had to push the pause button,” he added, leaving room for Lawry’s to reopen. “I think there’s a future for Lawry’s in the Chicago area,” Wilson said. See the full story here. — Phil Vettel
Links Taproom
Links Taproom. (Leigh Loftus / ThinkLeigh Photography)
Michael Quinlan, owner of the Milwaukee Avenue beer bar in Wicker Park, wrote in an email that Links was planning to move out of its storefront at some point in 2020 due to an acrimonious relationship with its landlord. Due the the COVID-19 shutdown, he decided to pull the plug on Links in March. As of late July, Quinlan indicated that ownership is “going to wait until things stabilize until we make our next move.”
Mesa Urbana
The Mexican restaurant will be consolidating operations, closing its Glenview restaurant and moving everything to its location in Portage Park, per a note on its website. The note cited the “situation” from COVID-19 as the impetus for the decision.
Mity Nice Bar & Grill
Along with Foodlife, this Water Tower Place restaurant from Lettuce Entertain You closed in early June. Ownership declined to disclose specific reasons.
Monty Gaels Tavern & Grill
The Irish tavern in Ravenswood closed permanently due to the burden of the pandemic shutdown, ownership confirmed in a Facebook message.
Passerotto
Passerotto in Andersonville in July 2018.
The Andersonville restaurant announced over Labor Day weekend that it would be closing its doors permanently, in part due to the coronavirus pandemic. Passerotto’s last day is Sept. 12. Chef Jennifer Kim said the decision to close was a result of multiple conversations with staff and investors, and ultimately they decided that “operating a restaurant safely in the midst of multiple pandemics was going to negatively affect our community in the long run.” A pop-up project was also teased on the restaurant’s profile. See the full story here. — Grace Wong
Pepper Canister
The casual River North bar announced June 15 via Facebook it would be permanently closing, although it did not specifically reference the costs of shutting down for the pandemic as a reason.
Rainforest Cafe
Rainforest Cafe at the corner of Ohio and Clark Streets in Chicago on Thursday, August, 13, 2020. (Zbigniew Bzdak / Chicago Tribune)
The Rainforest Cafe in the Near North neighborhood has closed sooner than expected after it shut down during the coronavirus pandemic. The restaurant at 605 N. Clark St. was expected to close within two years, when its lease expired. That timeline was accelerated by the coronavirus pandemic, which has left the Chicago restaurant closed since March, said building owner Sean Conlon. He recently negotiated an early termination of the lease with parent company Landry’s Restaurants. He plans to redevelop the site. See the full story here. — Ryan Ori
Ramen Misoya (Streeterville)
Tonkotsu ramen at Ramen Misoya. (Michael Tercha / Chicago Tribune)
The Loop lost one of its best bets for ramen in August with the closing of Ramen Misoya’s storefront in Streeterville. “Due to a loss in business caused by the Covid-19 shutdown, we can no longer justify continuing operations at this time,” read a post on its Facebook page. On the bright side, the Mount Prospect location of Misoya remains open.
Redmond’s Ale House
Remond’s Ale House has closed due to the financial stress of the COVIID-19 restrictions. The Wrigleyville bar, which had been at the corner of Sheffield and Roscoe for years, was known for offering an abundance of drink deals and for being an area staple for game-watching due to plenty of TVs and good sightlines.
Rickshaw Republic
Owners confirmed via email that the state’s COVID-19 shutdown caused financial losses that required the Indonesian restaurant in Lincoln Park to permanently close.
Ronny’s Steakhouse
Ronny’s, a cafeteria-style “steakhouse” that had occupied two separate downtown corners for years, announced plans to close due to the coronavirus in a Facebook announcement over Labor Day weekend. “We won’t say ‘good bye’ but rather ‘until we meet again,’” read the post. The Loop staple began 63 years ago at the corner of State and Randolph and, in recent years, operated at the corner of Clark and Lake.
La Sardine
La Sardine's terrine de foie gras featured layers of creamy foie gras mixed with thinly sliced black truffle, drizzled with a tart and slightly sweet cherry sauce and crowned with slices of extra buttery brioche. (Nick Kindelsperger/Chicago Tribune)
La Sardine, which has been a fixture in the West Loop for nearly 22 years, has closed for good. “It’s sad,” said partner and executive chef Oliver Poilevey about closing La Sardine, founded by his parents, along with Le Bouchon in Bucktown. “A month, month-and-a-half ago, I thought we were going to make it.” La Sardine has no outdoor space in which to set up tables, but had eked by with meals-to-go and, eventually, indoor dining with the 25% capacity limitation. Then the weather turned warm and the unthinkable happened: The air conditioning broke down. Looking at $80,000 in repairs, Poilevey knew he could not risk taking on the cost. “There’s no way we could pay for that, heading into the fall with no rent abatement,” Poilevey said. “Throwing 80K at something and then having to close — that’s not a good plan.” Le Bouchon remains open for pickup and indoor dining, though space inside is limited. For the full story, go here. — Phil Vettel
Siam Rice
Siam Rice, 117 N. Wells St., has called it quits after 18 years. (Alex Garcia / Chicago Tribune)
Siam Rice (117 N. Wells St.) has closed after 18 years in the Loop, according to a note posted on the Thai restaurant’s window. "Unfortunately, we have come to the decision that it is no longer viable to operate our business during these uncertain times,” the note said. “This was a difficult decision for us, however, recent events and current pandemic conditions have left us concerned for the safety of our customers as well as our staff.” The note ends with an apology to customers and the hope that the restaurant will be able to return in the future. The restaurant’s last day Sept. 15.
Simply It
The Vietnamese restaurant, which had been in Lincoln Park for nearly 14 years, closed permanently in April, reported Block Club Chicago. COVID-19 restrictions and unworkable margins gave owner Tuan Nguyen “no choice” but to close, he told Block Club.
People eat and drink as others pass by Southport Lanes in Chicago's Lakeview neighborhood on Sept. 17, 2020. (John J. Kim / Chicago Tribune)
Southport Lanes
Southport Lanes has lasted nearly a century by evolving, at various times serving as a tavern, bowling alley, speak-easy, brothel and illegal off-track horse betting venue. But the Lakeview mainstay, which opened not long after another pandemic, couldn’t survive COVID-19. Read the full story here. — Ryan Ori
Step Down Cafe
The Pilsen coffee shop announced on its Facebook page that it would close permanently due to the effects of the pandemic.
Taco in a Bag
The Big Jim Reeves was a big hit at Taco in a Bag. (Nick Kindelsperger / Chicago Tribune)
Taco in a Bag has closed after five years in Lincoln Square. The shop specialized in playful versions of walking tacos, a dish where components one would normally find on a taco are instead poured into a bag of corn chips. The restaurant announced the closure on Facebook with a surprisingly irreverent, if slightly hopeful video. The owners assured fans that, “we will be back...promise!!!!” Block Club Chicago first reported the closing.
Taqueria Sabor y Sazon
The popular Pilsen taqueria closed permanently in May. The financial difficulties of trying to survive the pandemic’s hospitality restrictions were insurmountable, the owners said.
Tin Fish
The Tin Fish restaurant closed in Tinley Park. (Bob Bong / Daily Southtown)
The coronavirus claimed another high-profile restaurant victim with the permanent closure of Tin Fish, a highly regarded restaurant in south-suburban Tinley Park. A sign on the front door of the seafood restaurant and oyster bar thanked customers “for 18 great years,” and said the decision to close came “with a heavy heart.” “I’m not happy, but it’s something a lot of us are going through,” said partner Curtis Wierbicki, who launched the restaurant in September 2002 with partner Colin Turner. The restaurant closed in July. See the full story here. — Phil Vettel
Tintos & Tapas
Laura Rivera, the owner of the Spanish small plates restaurant, confirmed via email that the closing of Tintos & Tapas was due to the financial strain of the COVID-19 shutdown, as well as its effects on how it operated: “My chef and I cried the last day we were there to clean up,” she wrote. “Carryout is not a model that works for my type of operation at all. Frankly, it is demoralizing to become a fast food.”
Toast Restaurant
Owner Jeanne Roeser confirmed in a Facebook message that she had closed both the Bucktown and Lincoln Park locations of the 24-year-old breakfast favorite: “I couldn’t imagine reopening and surviving with reduced capacity and putting my staff and their families at risk of harm.” Roeser also posted a goodbye note on Facebook, which reads in part: “Nothing lasts forever in this world and it is time to move forward and see what this next phase will bring. I wish you peace and good health, my friends.”
Trattoria No. 10
A goodbye post on the reliable Italian restaurant’s website alluded to the pandemic shutdown as cause for its shuttering, reading, “With no theater and no convention/tourism business for the foreseeable future, there was just no way we could realistically reopen.”
Two Lights Seafood & Oyster
A post on the Old Town restaurant’s Facebook page confirmed that Two Lights has closed, although it did not mention whether or not the shuttering was due to the financial effects of COVID.
U.B. Dogs
U.B. Dogs served classic Chicago hot dog stand fare with serious culinary ambitions. (Nick Kindelsperger / Chicago Tribune)
U.B. Dogs (185 N. Franklin St.), a stellar hot dog joint that served a flawless fully loaded Chicago hot dog, freshly grilled burgers and great fries, has closed. With the coronavirus pandemic forcing countless downtown office workers to telecommute from home, the Loop-based U.B. Dogs decided it was time to close for good. Owner Joe Plonka announced the decision on Facebook: “While it breaks our hearts to announce our permanent closure, we wanted to take the time and properly thank our customers and family for their support over these last 10 years. Unfortunately, it’s time for us to end this chapter.” See the full story here. — Nick Kindelsperger
Unicorn Cafe
Unicorn Cafe had been serving coffee to Evanston for almost 30 years before the coffee shop closed permanently due to the financial effects of COVID-19, reported the Daily Northwestern earlier in September. According to the Daily report, ownership said the cafe was getting only 8-10 customers per day. Aside from being a local staple, Unicorn Cafe was one of only a handful of area coffee shops that offered the highly touted Sparrow Coffee.
Wells St. Market
Wells Street Market, which reopened July 6 after weathering the first three months of the coronavirus shut down (and was the first Chicago food hall to resume service) announced it will close for keeps Sept. 18. “From all of us at the Wells Street Market, it has been an honor and a joy to serve Chicagoans every day,” the company said in a release. The food hall made its debut, at 205 W. Wacker Drive, in June 2018. The food hall format had enjoyed a boom in Chicago in recent years. But most have not reopened since the coronavirus shutdown. Only Time Out Market has reopened. But a new market, Dr. Murphy’s Food Hall, launched in early August in the former Cook County Hospital. — Phil Vettel
The Whale closing indefinitely
The Whale (2427 N. Milwaukee Ave.), the glitzy Logan Square restaurant named for what casinos call an obscenely wealthy gambler, closed indefinitely last week. In a message posted on Facebook, the owners blamed the closing on the tight restrictions the state has imposed on restaurants. “Today we were forced to make the decision to lay off all our team members and close our doors to service. The restrictions that have been put on us by the elected officials are suffocating our industry and leaving us no choice. There has been no plan in place or system for relief.” The Whale opened last year, quickly amassing a strong following, though we found the food to be less than stellar. While it’s unknown how long the restaurant will be closed, the owners promise it will eventually return. “We WILL re-open and come back strong. We look forward to serving you again when that time comes.” — Nick Kindelsperger


chicagotribune--2020-09-28--Finom Coffee in Old Irving Park has closed

While the post makes Finom ’ s closing official , Esparza also goes out of his way to call on @ @ @ @ @ “ keep fighting for our black brothers and sisters , and keep showing up for @ @ @ @ @ , specifically citing the lack of criminal charges for the police officers in Louisville in @ @ @ @ @

Cream and sugar station at Finom Coffee in the Old Irving Park neighborhood of Chicago. The cafe announced its closing Friday after two years in the neighborhood. (Louisa Chu / Chicago Tribune)
Finom Coffee — the popular two-year-old cafe in Old Irving Park — confirmed its closing in an Instagram post from chef Rafa Esparza on Friday. The closing is effective immediately.
In the announcement, Esparza wrote, “I won’t go on about how ‘heavy my heart is’ because I’m genuinely not sad or angry. It was a beautiful moment in time and the whole crew slayed from day one!”
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[ Finom Coffee opens on a historic corner with Hungarian-inspired cafe ]
Finom stood as one of the most eclectic coffee shops in Chicago, serving Hungarian small plates — along with coffee, tea and baked goods — out of a snazzy art-deco storefront.
Esparza founded the cafe with co-owner/chef Daniel Speer.
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While the post makes Finom’s closing official, Esparza also goes out of his way to call on Finom’s followers to “keep fighting for our black brothers and sisters, and keep showing up for people” during this time, specifically citing the lack of criminal charges for the police officers in Louisville in killing of Breonna Taylor.