ML - Michigan Avenue

2013 - Issue 2 - Spring

Michigan Avenue - Niche Media - Michigan Avenue magazine is a luxury lifestyle magazine centered around Chicago’s finest people, events, fashion, health & beauty, fine dining & more!

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F ront Runners chicago goes to washington THIRTY YEARS AGO, HAROLD WASHINGTON MADE HISTORY BY BECOMING THE WINDY CITY���S FIRST BLACK MAYOR. BY MEG MATHIS ���W e are a multiethnic, multiracial, multilanguage city, and that is... really a source of pride, because it adds stability and strength to a metropolitan city as large as ours.��� So said Harold Washington in his April 29, 1983, inaugural address as Chicago���s 42nd mayor. The city���s first African-American chief executive, Washington embodied those qualities in overcoming seemingly insurmountable obstacles during a rancorous, racially divided election, defeating the likes of incumbent Jane Byrne, future mayor Richard M. Daley, and the late Bernard Epton. By the time he took office at 61, Washington had already served 11 years in the Illinois House of Representatives, three years in the Illinois State Senate, and two years in Congress; with equal parts knowledge and charisma, Washington devoted much of his tenure as mayor to minority involvement, neighborhood development, and the creation of an ethics commission. Despite his untimely death shortly into his second term, Washington���s legacy continues to thrive in Chicago���s culturally rich institutions; as he remarked on that historic day in 1983, ���With the same adventurous spirit of Jean Baptiste Point DuSable when he founded Chicago, we are going to do some great deeds here together.��� MA 12 PHOTOGRAPHY BY ANTONIO B. DICKEY/CHICAGO PUBLIC LIBRARY, SPECIAL COLLECTIONS AND PRESERVATION DIVISION, HWAC 1983.4.29 On April 29, 1983, Judge Charles E. Freeman swears in Harold Washington as the new mayor. MICHIGANAVEMAG.COM 012_MA_FOB_FR_Spring13.indd 12 2/8/13 1:50 PM

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