Monday, April 22, 2013
Geneva School Board takes a moment to remember Charles "Chic" Williams, the longtime Geneva High School teacher, dean of students and Community Intervention Program coordinator who died Monday.
Geneva School District board members and staff took a moment Monday night to remember longtime educator, coach and dean of students Charles "Chic" Willliams, who died Monday. Williams was a speech teacher, varsity baseball coach, debate coach and administrator who was active in 1,001 programs at Geneva High School, but he will be most remembered, perhaps, for his work as the National Incident Management System coordinator and Community Intervention Program coordinator. "There are so many people who said, 'Chic tuned my kid around.' So, God bless you, Chic," School Board member Mary Stith said during the board-member comments portion of Monday night's meeting. District 304 Assistant Superintendent Craig Collins said Williams was the dean of…
Friday, December 28, 2012
Part 6 of a multipart series in memoriam of the many amazing people Geneva lost in 2012.
Joe Radovich was Geneva's city attorney from 1957 to 1961, but he was an institution in Geneva for many decades longer than that. His law offices were at the top of the stairs of the iconic 312 W. State St. building in Geneva's historic business district, and his life was a little like the building in which he practiced law for so many years—solid, significant and central to this community's foundation. His story is really that of the great American dream. He was the son of Serbian immigrants who worked hard, earned a law degree, served in the military as a U.S. Army judge advocate during World War II, then settled in Geneva, where he established a private practice in 1948. For the next 61 years, he would practice law in Geneva, and …
Thursday, December 27, 2012
Part 5 of a multipart series in memoriam of the many amazing people Geneva lost in 2012.
Janet Safanda's name should be more than a footnote in the Geneva history books. That's because Safanda was instrumental in the movement to preserve Geneva's historic buildings during the fast-growth period of the 1980s, and her legacy lives on in the stories of the day. It's hard not to think of this year's movement to preserve the Pure Oil Building without remembering Janet's similar efforts to preserve the former creamery building that's now a part of the foundation of the Herrington Inn. Back in those halcyon days, the issue of historic preservation popped up a lot in news articles. Developers were building new subdivisions, Tax Increment Financing Districts were new funding mechanisms for development and there were opportunities all…
Wednesday, December 26, 2012
Part 4 of a multipart series in memoriam of the many amazing people Geneva lost in 2012.
It's probably not socially appropriate to consider "the best wake ever," but as I said in an earlier article, John Barton's visitation at Malone Funeral Home earlier this year would be right at the top of my list. It's just the way I think we should remember the lives the people we've lost—with love and affection, joy and reflection, testimonials and funny stories. A good life is something to be celebrated—and John Barton led one worthy of the loudest cheers. There's not much I can add to the excellent stories written about John by my friend, Kurt Wehrmeister: John Barton: The Coach Who Cared So Much and Coach John Barton's Fire Puts Him in GHS Hall of Fame. Read them and enjoy. And I wish I had videotaped all the stories told by family …
Tuesday, December 25, 2012
Part 3 of a multipart series: Beloved educator Mary Bencini was taken too soon.
Geneva lost a historian, an activist and an educator when Mary Bencini died following a crash on Easter weekend 2012. Reports later would indicate that a heart attack was the likley cause of the crash that took her life far too soon, at the age of 62. According to reports, Bencini was invited to some friends' house for dinner on that Saturday night, but Mary declined because she wasn't feeling well. The friends offered to pick her up or drive her to the hospital, but she declined. "That is just so like her," said Terry Emma and close friend and executive director of the Geneva History Center. "She didn't think of herself, she didn't want to bother anybody. She just said, 'I'll take myself.' " Bencini was a longtime second-grade teacher …
Monday, December 24, 2012
Part 2 of a multipart series: Dick Jaeger was part of Geneva's history.
On the same day Geneva lost legendary historian emeritus Merritt King, it lost another icon who was part of Geneva's history and played a key role in preserving it: Dick Jaeger. Like so many of the Jaeger family in Geneva, Dick was an active member of the community, a communicant of the old and new St. Peter Church in Geneva, a member of the Geneva School Board and Geneva History Center board. But he probably will be remembered most for constructing model replicas of Geneva's historic buildings for the Geneva History Center—award-winning pieces of folk art that are a reminder of his affection for his hometown. He started by creating Christmas ornaments depicting historic buildings of Geneva that he and his wife, Norma, used to help raise…
Saturday, December 22, 2012
Part 1 of a multipart series: Merritt King was a giant among Genevans.
On Jan. 24, 2012, Geneva lost a giant of man in Merritt King. In so many ways, Merritt was larger than life: a gifted athlete, a legitimate war hero, a seven-term alderman, a 12-year Geneva mayor pro-tem and Geneva's historian emeritus. He is credited, among so many other achievements, for coming up with the idea for Geneva's historic Third Street gas lamps, for rescuing the historic creche that graces the Geneva History Center and for saving countless lives in 1945, when he and other Seventh Army troops nabbed a convoy in southwestern Germany and uncovered maps that revealed the exact placements of hundreds of thousands of landmines planted in 19 countries all over Europe. Merritt is remembered in this beautifully-written article by …
Gwendolyn Kussro
2:38 pm on Tuesday, April 30, 2013
I had the privilege and pleasure of attending a class Mr. Williams did a few years ago..what an amazing man he was. Thoughts and prayers are with his family and peers. more ›