| Planned park receives praise, disparagement
Northwest side lot to be devoted to anarchist
By
Jeff Danna
City Beat Editor
Lucy Parsons was a lot of things: a wife, a mother,
a dressmaker. But Chicagoans like to remember
her for her contributions to the city’s
labor movement in the late 19th century, and the
Chicago Park District wants to immortalize her
by christening a park in her name.
Out of the Park District’s 500-plus parks,
only 27 are named after women, and Park District
officials said they wanted to increase that number,
said Julian Green, spokesman for the Chicago Park
District.
“We did our research, and the criteria we
had was basically, one, we wanted someone from
Chicago who impacted the city historically; No.
2, we wanted to find someone who—for specific
park areas—either lived in the area, worked
in the area or did something for the community
in that area,” Green said.
|
“For every Lucy Parsons, there’s
100 we don’t know the names
of.”
—Charles Paidock, program coordinator
for the College of Complexes |
|
It was in 1873 that Lucy Ella Gonzalez Parsons
moved to Chicago with her labor activist husband,
Albert Parsons. The couple soon began organizing
workers and eventually led the campaign for an
eight-hour workday. It was this event in 1886
that blossomed into the mass strikes-turned-riot—leading
to the deaths of eight Chicago Police officers
and the hanging of Albert Parsons—that became
known as the Haymarket Riot.
“For the specific park in question, we found
that Lucy Parsons was a former resident of that
area,” Green said. “Given her work
in the labor movement and the women’s suffrage
movement and civil rights, we thought that she
was deserving and decided to move forward with
the designation.”
Green said blueprints for a Lucy Parsons park
have yet to be drawn up, but the park’s
designated location is on the northwest side at
4712 W. Belmont Ave., the former site of a parking
lot.
The consideration to name a park after Parsons
has come under scrutiny from Chicago’s Fraternal
Order of Police. In a March 16 letter to Park
District Commissioner Cindy Mitchell, FOP President
Mark Donahue wrote he was “disappointed
and disheartened” to learn about the Park
District’s plan.
“In her stead I would humbly propose that
the Chicago Park District consider naming one
of its facilities in honor of more contemporary,
independent and successful women whose cause is
more widely recognized and whose life work has
had much broader impact on our citizenry,”
Donahue wrote.
In the letter, Donahue suggested recognizing historical
figures such as Jane Byrne, Chicago’s first
female mayor, or astronaut Mae Jemison, among
others.
Donahue declined to speak to The Chronicle about
this issue.
“We did not identify Lucy Parsons because
she was the [wife] of Albert Parsons,” Green
said. “She played an independent roll in
the civil rights movement and the movement of
women and labor, and she should be recognized
for her work.”
On April 14, the Park District held a board meeting
where citizens could voice their opinions about
the plan for a Lucy Parsons park. Representatives
from the College of Complexes, a Chicago-based
nonprofit group that provides forums for people
to speak their minds on various issues, attended
to show their support for the issue.
Charles Paidock, the college’s program coordinator,
said he feels like he and the College of Complexes
are connected to Parsons, because, like the college
organization, Parsons stood for free speech and
empowerment of the working class.
To show the organization’s dedication to
the establishment of a Lucy Parsons memorial park
in Chicago, Paidock has set up a website at http://www.collegeofcomplexes.homstead.com/LPP.html
and contacted “natural allies,” such
as women’s history departments and schools
of labor management, to help spread word of the
issue.
He also said a park in memoriam of Parsons would
serve as a symbol for the entire labor movement
and those who contributed to it.
“We’re rather partial to her,”
Paidock said. “For every Lucy Parsons there
is, there’s 100 we don’t know the
names of.”
Although the College of Complexes is supporting
the establishment of a Lucy Parsons memorial park,
Green said the Park District is not working in
conjunction with the organization.
|
