Good afternoon, Chicago. ✶
I have always been fascinated by things in our city that seem as if, no matter how much changes around them, they remain exactly the same.
Like how the Old Water Tower building has stood still for ages amid the chaos. Or how the concrete facade of the 63rd Street Bathing Pavilion stakes its place on the beach. And let’s talk about how the gold dome of the Garfield Park Field House always seems to shine, even on cloudy days.
Inside the Fine Arts Building on South Michigan Avenue, you’ll find one of the last human-operated elevators in the city — a piece of history that will soon be a thing of the past.
Below, we’ll take you for a ride inside this piece of old Chicago.
Plus, we’ve got the stories you need to know this afternoon. 👇
⏱️: A 7-minute read
— Matt Moore, newsletter reporter (@MattKenMoore)
TODAY’S TOP STORY
Fur-st week back: Chicago college campuses welcome students, emotional support animals for new school year
Reporting by Jacquelyne Germain
Furry resources on campus: As a flurry of students returns to college campuses across the Chicago area, many will bring emotional support animals to their dorms. The animals offer companionship and can help manage depression, anxiety and specific phobias, according to the Americans with Disabilities Act. Unlike service animals, emotional support animals tend to have no special training to assist individuals with disabilities.
An increase in need: Gregory Moorehead, director of DePaul University’s Center for Students with Disabilities, said each year he sees more emotional support animals living on campus, a trend he links to more students coming to college with mental health concerns. “When I came to DePaul in 2016, we had probably between 10 and 15 service and assistance animals,” Moorehead said. “Now, we have roughly between 50 and 60 of those animals registered with our office each school year.”
One student’s experience: As Northwestern University junior Amaya Mikolic-Berrios naviagtes life with depressive disorder and panic disorder, she shares her dorm with Hero, her emotional support dog. “Having that company, having another life to take care of, can really help bring you out of difficult mental spaces,” Mikolic-Berrios said.
WHAT ELSE IS GOING ON?
Firefighters salute the ambulance delivering Lt. Kevin Ward’s body to the Cook County medical examiner’s office Tuesday.
Ashlee Rezin/Sun-Times
- Firefighter dies weeks after being injured in blaze: Chicago Fire Department Lt. Kevin Ward, 59, has died more than two weeks after he and two others were injured while battling a fire in a home near O’Hare Airport.
- New details of White Sox park shooting: As officials continue to say little about a shooting that wounded two women during a White Sox game Friday, a police report says at least two shots were fired, and a bullet came to rest in the hoodie of a third woman.
- Groups rally to curb overdose deaths: Organizers who have lost loved ones to drug overdoses gathered at a rally at Federal Plaza Monday to call for urgent action from local and federal lawmakers to end the crisis. The event also served as a resource fair.
- Cyclists push city on safety improvements: With Chicago being rated among the worst big cities in the world for bike safety and traffic crashes involving cyclists on the rise, bike safety advocates are calling on Chicago leaders to speed up plans to upgrade the city’s cycling infrastructure.
- West Side credit union launches online: A long-held dream of opening a credit union on the West Side — bringing vital services to a financial desert — was realized Monday as a West Side community organization launched an online venture with Great Lakes Credit Union.
- ‘American Graffiti’ turns 50: The blockbuster film, set in 1962, introduced rising stars and launched a soundtrack boom, writes Sun-Times critic Richard Roeper.
EXPLORING THE CITY 🏙️
Waclaw Kalata (left) manually operates an elevator for a guest entering the Fine Arts Building on South Michigan Avenue. Among the city’s last human-operated elevators, the cars will be replaced in the next couple of years.
Ashlee Rezin/Sun-Times
Taking a ride on the Fine Arts Building’s human-operated elevators
Reporting by Stefano Esposito
The air is hot and still as a man with a cello strapped to his back steps into a lobby where cracks meander across the vaulted ceiling and several of the light bulbs need replacing.
Up ahead, light spills from a waiting elevator car. A hand holds open one of the doors; its owner smiles and says: “Be careful. Watch your step down.” The gold-and-burgundy interior brings to mind a box seat at the opera.
Moments later, the doors clang shut. A shudder. A lurch. The rattle of an unseen chain. The elevator rises.
Among the city’s last human-operated elevators, the Otis cars at the Fine Arts Building on South Michigan Avenue are expected to be replaced in the next two years with modern counterparts.
“We have been holding on to them as long as humanly possible, and the time has finally come. Truly, it’s harder to get the parts, and it’s far more expensive to maintain,” said Jacob Harvey, managing artistic director for a building that first opened in 1898 and was built to display and repair Studebaker carriages and wagons.
But it’s going to mean the loss of something the tenants — puppet makers, piano teachers, yoga instructors, dancers, luthiers (not to mention countless tourists and architecture enthusiasts) — have held dear for decades.
BRIGHT ONE ✨
Evanston’s Jake Zivin providing soundtrack to Lionel Messi’s scoring on Apple TV
Reporting by Jeff Agrest
If you followed international soccer star Lionel Messi’s rampage through the Leagues Cup on Apple TV, you heard each of his goals called emphatically by Jake Zivin, an Evanston native and a graduate of Evanston Township High School.
“Messiiiiiiiiii!” Zivin exclaimed after the new Inter Miami star’s first goal, a last-minute, game-winning free kick in his first game. “Could it have been any other way?! Magnificent!”
Zivin shouted Messi’s name nine more times over the next six games, making his voice the soundtrack to the Argentinian’s first foray through the U.S.
“It’s a huge responsibility. It’s a big honor, it’s a privilege,” Zivin, 38, said. “I tried, especially going into the first game, knowing how big of a moment that would be for soccer in our country and how that would be a game that would be replayed over and over again if he scored a goal.”
As the lead play-by-play voice alongside analyst Taylor Twellman on Apple TV’s MLS Season Pass, Zivin figures to call more of Messi’s goals.
Zivin now lives in Portland, Oregon; his parents are still in Evanston. That’s where Zivin grew up as a die-hard Fire fan. His favorite sport was soccer, but he and his twin brother, Sam, didn’t make the high school team as sophomores. So the next year, they found another way to get involved: They broadcast the games.
“We realized our high school is producing this. Why don’t we try to do it?” said Zivin. “It was really fun. Having that experience, I realized I really love this; this is what I want to do.”
YOUR DAILY QUESTION ☕️
What’s one place that feels like old-school Chicago to you? Tell us why.
Email us (please include your first and last name and where you live). To see the answers to this question, check our Morning Edition newsletter. Not subscribed to Morning Edition? Sign up here so you won’t miss a thing!
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Editor: Satchel Price
Newsletter reporter: Matt Moore
Copy editor: Angie Myers
