More Signs of Spring at Villa Verone

Outdoor cafe seating is outside of Villa Verone, the excellent Italian restaurant on Douglas Street.

Yet another sure sign of spring and summer returning to Downtown Elgin.

Al's Cafe Outdoor Dining is Returning

The canopy was observed going up today outside of Al's Cafe on DuPage Court in Downtown Elgin. It is a sure sign that spring is here and summer is imminent.


In previous years, the tent was larger. It appears there will be both covered and open air seating this year.


In all likelihood, one of the reasons is likely to be easier access by the wait staff to the tables. It was often tight inside the area, and it was difficult at times to navigate through the maze of tables.


Additionally, in front of the restaurant, one of the ash trees that was removed last fall in the removal project was not replaced (as noted in previous posts in this blog: http://emanationsfromchicagostreetelgin.blogspot.com/2012/04/ash-trees.html
http://emanationsfromchicagostreetelgin.blogspot.com/2012/04/dupage-court-renaissance.html).

Chooch - y - Chooch - y - Choo

This guy was spotted hanging from the scaffolding over the middle of South Grove Avenue today ready to pounce on somebody.

Actually, he was apparently put there to draw attention to the fact that work is being done at 64 South Grove Avenue for the new Chooch's Pizzeria.

Long planned, there were delays due to facade improvement and energy updating grants, as well as state grants for the planned reconstruction of the riverfront. The project is finally moving forward. A definite opening date hasn't been set.

One of the most interesting aspects of the project is a rear patio along Riverside Drive.

With the demolition of the crumbling old parking deck over the river and the construction of the new river walk, the owners are hoping to take advantage of outdoor seating overlooking the Fox River. It is said to be the first outdoor restaurant seating on the river in over 75 years.

Hopefully, they will have figured out how to battle the river moths and gnats at the height of summer by then.  Either that, or offer them as an exotic topping.

A Farewell to Keeney's

Over the weekend of April 14-15, much of the contents of Keeney's Sporting Goods was auctioned off.

The owner, Patricia Keeney, passed away 16 months ago.  Her mother passed away shortly thereafter.

The business had been open and running continuously since 1883, starting originally as a drug store.

There was hardly a person in town who didn't buy their gym suits and letterman's sweaters, jackets, and letters from Keeney's

It was adorned by a myriad of stuffed animals on the wall and a variety of sporting equipment.  Downstairs in the basement, Pat sold collections of glassware and all sorts of other things.

From my own personal experience, there was seldom a time I was at the Gasthaus (another of a handful of businesses that toughed it out through the darkest days of Downtown Elgin) when she wasn't there herself. She seemed to know everyone in town.

Second day of auction day on Sunday, people standing outside waiting to get in.

Inside on Sunday, the auctioneer could be heard. It was, in some ways, a very depressing sound to hear the liquidation of an Elgin institution.

The website of the store can still be found on the internet:

http://www.keeneyssportinggoods.com/

There was something comforting and quaint about this shop. It was always there, always. Every time I pass by, it's like a gaping hole on the streetscape.

A testament of the love and admiration people in Elgin held for her appears at the bottom of this post, but first, a couple of recent newspaper articles explains it all better than I could:

From the Elgin Courier-News, April 12, 2012

ELGIN — Karin Jones has learned the difference between the figurines, hats, purses, compacts and vintage clothes and more that Pat Keeney loved, and those she didn’t.

The things that she loved, Jones said, didn’t have price tags on them. Those are the things that when someone asked a price, Keeney would pull a number out of the air, perhaps to discourage the potential buyer and keep from losing one of her beloved pieces.

On Saturday and Sunday, the hundreds — possibly thousands — of items Keeney collected over the years will go on auction in downtown Elgin.

Keeney, 62, passed away on Dec. 27, 2010. She co-owned Keeney’s Sporting Good and PK’s Antiques with her mother, Kathryn, who passed away just five days after her daughter, on New Year’s Eve 2010.

Pat Keeney’s story — of how her friends and neighbors stepped up to keep the store running and provide an income for the two women during Keeney’s fight with cancer — made not only local news media reports but national news as well.

As executor of Pat Keeney’s estate, Jones has been working since last fall to get the vintage and antique pieces Keeney had collected over the years ready for auction.

The proceeds from the sale will go toward the medical bills Keeney accumulated during her eight-week hospitalization, Jones said.

Two days’ worth

Keeney accumulated so many vintage and antique pieces that the auction will run over two days at two locations. The first auction is set for 11 a.m. Saturday at the Haight Building, 166 Symphony Way. The second auction is set for noon Sunday at Keeney’s & PK Antiques, 19 Douglas Ave. Both auctions are expected to take several hours to get through all of the collectibles.

A preview for the Symphony Way auction is set for noon to 7 p.m. Friday and beginning at 9 a.m. Saturday.

Each auction has about 800 lots available — with many lots of similar, bundled items.

Keeney had hundreds of vintage jewelry pieces, hats and purses; perhaps 200 Elgin American compacts made at the Elgin National Watch Co.; and hundreds of assorted dresses, coats, shoes and women’s gloves dating back to the early 1900s.

At the Douglas Avenue store, bidders will see the antique trunks, glass Christmas ornaments, Depression glass, board games and more.

The sale items were either at Keeney’s Sporting Goods or in the home the two Keeney women shared. Kathryn Keeney’s estate sale was held last summer, and the sale does not include the sporting goods and furniture from that part of the store, Jones said.

Elgin backer

One of the conversations Jones had with Keeney as she was treated for her cancer was that when it was time to have an auction, she wanted it in downtown Elgin with an Elgin auction house handling the sale, Jones said.

“It was important to her that it happened in Elgin,” Jones said. “I know it means a lot to her, that this is in Elgin and with an Elgin business.”

Auction Consultants Inc. of Elgin is handling the sale.

“She had a lot of stuff,” said Shawn Dunning of Auction Consultants. “She seemed to like Indian things. She had a lot of Indian jewelry, Mexican sterling. There are 250 lots of just jewelry.”

But like any large collection, “one person finds it a treasure, the next person does not,” she added.

Dunning, who has 45 years of estate auction experience, has seen larger personal collections, but the Keeney collection is special in that it is a piece of the local store that Elgin residents might be able to take home with them. “Or, a piece of Pat” that they can have, Dunning said.

It is bittersweet, Jones said, to see Keeney’s treasures going to auction now. “It was Pat’s dream to have a store of just the vintage things, and get rid of all of the sports equipment,” Jones said. “This is what she wanted to do. The accumulation of her stuff is unbelievable.”

Lots of history

Since she and other friends and volunteers started sorting through Keeney’s years of collecting, Jones said she has felt as if she got to know the woman she considered a friend a little better.

“We would laugh, finding cupboards filled with compacts in her bedroom. She loved the vintage stuff,” Jones said.

Because there is so much to look through, Dunning recommended that those interesting in bidding come to one of the preview events prior to the auction.

“Come to the preview,” Dunning said. “Look at the things, look at the condition. There are treasures everywhere, and it is a fun outing,”

Dunning also encouraged parents to bring their children along, too. “Bring your kids through there, to see period clothing and show them, ‘This is what we wore in the 1960s and 1970s.’ Don’t let having kids hold you back” from attending.

From the TribLocal, December 30, 2010:

Friends of Patricia Keeney locked up her downtown Elgin store one last time, not knowing if it will ever reopen.

But they took solace last week in knowing that their efforts to keep Keeney’s Sporting Goods/PK’s Antiques open right up until the shopkeeper’s death put her at peace.

“We kind of all agreed mission accomplished,” said close friend Karin Jones. “We did what we set out to do.”

Keeney, 62, died Dec. 27, less than two months after being diagnosed with multiple myeloma. She had been running the store at 19 Douglas Ave. since her father’s death in 1993, but the family’s history as business owners in Elgin actually dates back 127 years.

Friends who oversaw the business while Keeney was sick say the fate of the store is  in the hands of her attorney.

“It’s been a from-my-heart experience,” Jones’ husband, Gentry, said of volunteering. “It’s time to move on.”

The store was crowded as customers said they wanted one more chance to look through Keeney’s array of goods.

Cassie Hurt of Elgin was wide-eyed as she sifted through vintage dresses in the basement shop. Nearby, Keeney friend Ron Weiner, who owns Mr. Cheap’s Mattresses, was looking through postcards from the early 1900s.

“These are anthropologists’ treasures here,” he said.

Upstairs in the shop where John Janiszewski bought his Elgin High School letterman jacket in 1977, he checked out the sporting goods.

“I’m going to miss the fact that it’s some place to come down and talk on your way passing through town,” he said. “The door was always open for anybody.”

Karin Jones said while her best memories of Keeney are from before her illness, they also shared quite a few laughs the past two months. She smiled as she recalled how mad Keeney became when she got out of the hospital and saw that her window displays had been changed. Jones told her friend she would change them back to just the way she wanted, but Keeney eventually calmed down and relayed the real reason for her anger.

“She said, ‘I got to thinking when I walked back in that store, it wasn’t that you guys had rearranged the windows, it was that I wanted my life back and I wanted to be able to work all day,’” Jones said as her eyes welled with tears.

Sales stopped about 6 p.m. Tonya Hudson, executive director of the Downtown Neighborhood Association, led more than 50 people in the store in a brief closing ceremony.

“You weren’t just a customer if you came into her store. You were a friend and she had friends from all walks of life,” Hudson said. “They were as diverse as the products in her store.”

Those friends took turns sharing memories of Keeney.

Bill Jones had the group laughing with the story of how Keeney  was robbed several years ago, but didn’t really start fighting until the robbers started to take  her signature turquoise jewelry. She sent them running out the door.

Jones applauded the volunteer efforts that kept the store open while Keeney was sick.

“I just want to say how proud I am to be part of this community. … This is such a special loving experience,” he said.

Keeney’s cousin, Robert Mulroney, also expressed his gratitude.

“This is her family,” he said of the volunteers. “She loved this town and everybody in it.”

The lights were turned off and the shop was locked. Those who pass by will see a large banner across the front gates.

“Thank you, Keeney’s, for 127 years of memories,” it reads. “Rest in peace, Patricia. You are missed.”

A big get well poster placed outside the store before Pat Keeney passed away and signed by many in the community was framed and placed on the wall of Ravenheart Coffee. The owner of Ravenheart, Victor Gonzalez, a good friend of Pat's, passed away a few months ago himself.

You Scream, We Scream...

231 Douglas Avenue

Going by at the corner of Douglas Avenue at Kimball Street, I noticed a sign (a very hopeful sign) of an ice cream parlor possibly going into the storefront. 

It is in the same building as the Douglas Street Sports Pub, which was once part of a car dealership and showroom.

Immediately adjacent to The North End where I live, it could definitely be a great addition to the neighborhood. No plasticized corporate Baskin-Robbins/Dairy Queen/Oberweiss here, hopefully.

Currently, the closest ice cream is part of a Dunkin' Donuts at the south end of Downtown, at Clock Tower Plaza.

New Businesses

From the Courier-News, posted April 6 2012 1:44pm:

ELGIN — Less-expensive rent than Cook County, a neighborhood feel, ready infrastructure and an urban area with plenty of recreation opportunities were all some of the reasons several new businesses said they chose downtown Elgin.

Elgin’s Downtown Neighborhood Association celebrated the opening or relocation of eight businesses to the downtown area on Thursday evening with a progressive ribbon cutting — stopping at each location for a half-hour to welcome the new businesses, owners and employees to Elgin.

Of those eight, seven businesses are new to Elgin since January, said Tonya Hudson, director of the downtown association.

The new businesses recognized are A&R Global Logistics, Charles Fast Foods, Elgin Home Health Care, Elgin Knit Works, Fat Cat Custom Guitars and Music Shop, Prairie Rock Grill and Robert Mikulski & Co.

SpaceTaste Gallery, formerly on Douglas Avenue, moved over the weekend into a new location at 215 E. Chicago St. and also was recognized.

Read the whole article: http://couriernews.suntimes.com/news/11731232-418/new-businesses-enjoy-feel-of-downtown-elgin.html

Downtown Madness 2012

In what has become an annual event, capitalizing on the NCAA tournament at the same time, The Downtown Neighborhood Association sets up the "Downtown Madness" competition  It allows customers to vote for their offerings from various restaurants. This year, it was opened up and made into a "crosstown" competition, and the voting was fierce.

Not to denigrate anyone, because it's all great food: a sausage and pepperoni pizza, especially from Danny's, is going to beat anything with avocado in it any time (my personal opinion). However, Elgin Public House is possibly my favorite restaurant and bar in the entire city.

The link to the Daily Herald article:  http://www.dailyherald.com/article/20120405/business/704059737/

This year's champion, Danny's Pizza, located out on McLean Boulevard.

This year's runner-up, and last years champion, Elgin Public House.

Mad Maggie's Lament

Mad Maggie's.  Opened in a former JCPenney store on South Grove Avenue, the place was huge.  It was sleek.  It was set up to handle anything.

It had a great stage, good staff, lots of televisions, and comfortable seating.  They put on first class shows with regional bands.  It had great outdoor seating in the DuPage Courtyard.

It suffered from internal issues among the owners.  Too bad they squandered the place.  It briefly reopened under a new name, but was never the same.  The sign outside was never changed.  The "E" is missing at the bottomm, now.  It's a sad relic to what could've been a real instituion.

Someone is trying to reopen the place as another venue, but they seem to be hitting problems.  Too bad.  Something needs to be there.

The Importance of Coffee

My addiction is coffee.  I always loved it.  However, when my oldest daughter lived in Seattle, Birthplace of the Holy Grail of Coffee (Starbucks), where there are drive-thru coffee kiosks on virtually every corner, I became hooked.


There are Starbucks and Caribou outlets within the city, but there are two independent shops downtown:  Domani and Ravenheart.  Both are fantastic - excellent coffee, friendly service, great atmosphere.



Domani is a small shop.  Its owner, Leo, and his staff, are terrific people and dedicated to their clientele.  You could never ask for better and more personal service.  Their sandwiches are without question the best in town.

It provides cafe-style seating, and is very intimate.

The Italian sandwich is my favorite food in town.

http://www.facebook.com/DomaniCafe

Ravenheart is a larger place.  It is staffed by a great core of three people who always provide great service.  Any caffeine, any style, any way you want it, it's there.

After I retired, I started spending an inordinate amount of time here, largely due to the wifi (recently upgraded) and the more comfortable seating.  It's virtually become a part of my daily existence.

It was looking out the window of the place every day that really inspired me to start this blog. The changing weather, the people walking and driving by, the activity up and down the street, unavoidably overheard conversations, interesting customers, local news articles - they all played a role into this.  I started getting a sense of the pulse of Downtown Elgin in here, so a lot of my stuff here is going to be sown here.

http://www.facebook.com/RavenheartElgin