REMINDER: Earth, Wind & Fire Summer Concert Fundraiser

On August 17th, please join us at our Summer Concert Fundraiser featuring the legendary Earth, Wind & Fire, whose founding members lived in the Henry Horner Homes! The concert is sold out through Ravinia’s box office, but we have a limited number of lawn and premier pavilion seats still available. In addition to enjoying classics like “September” and “Let’s Groove,” attendees have their choice of reserved pavilion seating or a spot on expansive lawn (we supply the chairs!), either ticket will provide access to our private tent with a delicious dinner and an open bar.

We would also like to extend a warm and sincere thanks to everyone who attended the spectacular Mary J Blige fundraiser earlier last month - you helped make this event a success! We enjoyed a wonderful evening with our good friend and guest of honor, Secretary of State Jesse White. Also joining us were 24 Local Advisory Council leaders, NPHM board members, and many generous donors. 

NPHM Welcomes Sue Enright, Director of Development!

As Executive Director of National Public Housing Museum, and on behalf of our board of directors it is a pleasure to introduce you to Sue Enright, Director of Development and leader of our capital campaign. We are delighted to welcome Sue as we continue to move forward with
plans to further cement our role in the community with the opening of the museum in 2019.

Sue Enright, NPHM's new Director of Development

Power of Place: the Capital Campaign for the National Public Housing Museum will
advance our mission as a museum, cultural center, and creative place making hub, to
preserve, promote, and propel housing as a human right.

Sue comes to us with leadership experience in the non-profit sector in strategic planning,
management, communications and fundraising. With a life-long commitment to helping others
thrive in our community, she was most recently Director of Development at Lakeview Pantry
where she led the annual fund and capital campaign for the purchase, renovation and furnishing
of their new home.

Sue brings passion and creativity to her work on behalf of others and has demonstrated
innovative thinking and the ability to craft vision into measurable outcomes through fundraising
and the development of strategic partnerships.

As Executive Director I have every confidence in her ability to lead the museum’s capital
campaign. Please join me in welcoming Sue to the National Public Housing Museum community.

-Lisa Lee

Affordable Housing Rally Cancelled

Due to reasons outside of our control, the ReThink Why Housing Matters affordable housing rally next Monday has been cancelled. We hope to announce a rescheduled date soon, so be on the look out for more information.

Mary J Blige Ravinia Recap

Thanks to everyone who was able to make it out to the first of two concert summer fundraisers with Mary J Blige! Despite the wet weather earlier in the day, friends of the Museum were able to spend a wonderful evening of food, drinks, communion, and of course, Blige's wonderful songs. We hope those in attendance had just as much fun as we did! If you want to share photos you took at the event, you're welcome to send them to info@nphm.org! We'd love to see and share them!

Our next fundraiser will again be at Ravania on August 17th and will feature the talent of Earth, Wind, and Fire! The concert is sold out through Ravinia's ticketing agency, but you can still buy tickets through our website here, but tickets are running low for us as well, so grab yours today!

Rally to Support Affordable Housing in Chicago

Join us on July 30th at 11 AM at the James R Thompson Center (100 West Randolph Street) for a rally to support affordable housing in Chicago. Our director, Dr. Lisa Yun Lee will be attendance, alongside our friends J.R. Flemming of the Chicago Anti-Eviction Campaign and author of High-Risers: Cabrini-Green and the Fate of American Public Housing, Ben Austen. 

We hope to see you there!

Cabrini-Green Exhibition Visit

We had our friends from Cabrini-Green come visit our exhibition, History Lessons on July 14th.  It was a wonderful afternoon communion featuring food, music, and storytelling.

Thanks to our friend, Raymond McDonald, for helping to helping to coordinate the program, we hope everyone had as much fun as we did!

Interested in having a tour of our exhibition? Reach out to info@nphm.org to schedule a tour! The exhibition closes on July 27th.

Dr. Lisa Yun Lee and Brad Hunt on Shelf Life Podcast

In the most recent installment of The Newberry's podcast Shelf Life, Lisa joins Newberry's Vice President and NPHM Board Member, Brad Hunt to discuss the complexities of telling the story of public housing, the power of place, and and some behind the scenes from our current exhibition, History Lessons. 

You can listen to the interview here.

Saturday Hours

Photo courtesy of Richard Cahan

We're excited to have open office hours the next three Saturdays, from June 30th through July 14th. We'll be open from 10 AM to 4 PM for those interested in visiting our current exhibition, History Lessons: Everyday Objects From Chicago Public Housing. The exhibition closes on July 27th.

We hope to see you there!

Dr. Lisa Yun Lee Speaks at Chicago Community Conversation

Photo courtesy of Marc Monaghan

NPHM Executive Director, Dr. Lisa Yun Lee, alongside our friends and allies, J. R. Flemming, Dolores Wilson, and Ben Austen, participated at the Chicago Community Conversation. The Conversation, hosted by the Obama Foundation and the University of Illinois-Chicago, featured workshops that focused on the power of young people, the importance of mentorship for urban communities, and the importance of solidarity in the face of historical trauma.

You can read more about her keynote speech, alongside those of bluesman Billy Branch and UIC physician Robert Winn here.

Langston Allston speaks with WGN

One of our current artists in residence, Langston Allston, recently spoke with The Cornerstore on WGN about his life growing up in Champaign, Illinois and how music and comics shaped his identity, gentrification in New Orleans and Chicago, his current series Radiant City, and his partnership with the Museum.

You can listen to his interview here.

One of Langston's pieces, Modern Kitchens, is currently on display as a part of our exhibition, History Lessons: Everyday Objects from Chicago Public Housing.

Langston Allston, photo courtesy of Max Weissman

History Lessons Now Open!

National Public Housing Museum
History Lessons: Everyday Objects from Chicago Public Housing

The National Public Housing Museum is pleased to invite you to  History Lessons: Everyday Objects from Chicago Public Housing. The exhibit opens on May 30th and runs through July 27th.

History Lessons features an array of ordinary objects from public housing residents that help tell the extraordinary stories of their owners, including a championship boxing belt owned by Lee Roy “Solid Gold” Murphy, and the leather motorcycle jacket of legendary Cabrini-Green organizer, Marion Stamps. The exhibition will also feature a mural-sized newly commissioned painting by Milton Reed, an artist who transformed thousands of apartments in the Robert Taylor Homes into dreamy landscapes. 

Over twenty objects are accompanied by labels written by public housing residents, created during workshops with Audrey Petty, author of High Rise Stories, and award-winning Chicago poet Nate Marshall, as well as interview-based labels conducted by photo-historian Richard Cahan. “What we have found is evocative of what life was like in Chicago public housing,” says Cahan, who co-organized the exhibit with the Museum’s Executive Director Lisa Yun Lee.  “The shortest distance between two people is a story,” Lee says, “and these objects help to tell both the beautiful and troubled history of public housing in Chicago and the diverse experiences of those who survived and thrived in those communities.”

The exhibition also includes our new Animal Court Audio Story, a collection of oral history interviews recorded in the past year by the Museum’s Oral History Corps. The audio features public housing residents and their Near West Side neighbors, including Desiree Davidson, Dennis O’Neil, Ida Brantley, Blanche Winston, and Mary Baggett, as they reminisce about these enchanting animals.

You can listen to a story collage that spans decades of memories by calling (312) 348-7834.

The recordings included in the story were conducted by Shirley Alfaro, Shakira Johnson, and Francesco de Salvatore.  The audio stories were funded by the Terra Foundation for American Art.

The exhibition is reachable by public transit. Ample street-meter parking surrounding the office is available as well as a public parking lot at 520 North Kingsbury Street, which charges $12 per hour at the corner of Grand and Kingsbury. 

This event is wheelchair accessible. Individuals requiring sign-language interpreters, real-time captioners, or other accommodations should contact Mark Jaeschke at 773.245.1621 or mjaeschke@nphm.org at least one week in advance of the event.

Summer Fundraisers: Mary J. Blige and Earth Wind & Fire

The National Public Housing Museum is pleased to announce that we are bringing you two wonderful fundraising concert events this summer featuring performances from Mary J. Blige and Earth Wind & Fire at the Ravinia Festival.

These concerts are a unique opportunity for you to not only help contribute to the work at the Museum, but to also enjoy an evening of music created by former public housing residents. Blige, originally from the Schlobohm Projects in Yonkers and Earth Wind & Fire, which had founding members that grew up in the Henry Horner Homes, and now features David Porter and Maurice White of the Foote Homes Projects in Memphis, will be performing on July 20th and August 17th

Opening Reception for History Lessons: Everyday Objects from Chicago Public Housing

S A V E   T H E   D A T E

EXHIBIT OPENS MAY 30TH

The National Public Housing Museum is pleased to announce the opening reception for our newest exhibition, History Lessons: Everyday Objects from Chicago Public Housing on May 30th.

The exhibition, which features ordinary objects from public housing residents that share with us amazing stories of personal endeavors, as well as commemorating those that were most important in shaping their lives. The objects are described by the residents themselves, giving visitors a first-hand account of how these items played a part in their lives. The labels were created during writing workshops with Audrey Petty and Nate Marshall or during interviews with Rich Cahan.

The opening will take place on May 30th at the NPHM offices, which are located at 625 N Kingsbury St, from 5:30-7:30 PM. Refreshments and drinks will be served.

This event is wheelchair accessible. Individuals requiring Sign-Language Interpreters, Real-time captioners, or other accommodations should contact Mark Jaeschke at (773) 245-1621 or mjaeschke@nphm.org at least one week in advance of the event.

Housing and Racism in the Age of Trump Roundtable Discussion

                   RSVP today!

Join us at the NPHM offices on May 15, from 5:30 to 7:00 pm for a roundtable discussion on housing policy, race, and racism in the age of Trump. The discussion will feature Glyn Robbins, author of There’s No Place: The American Housing Crisis and What It Means for the UK, along with moderator Rob Chaskin, Professor & Deputy Dean for Strategic Initiatives, University of Chicago School of Social Service Administration, and panelists Ianna Kachoris Ori, the Director, Strategy, Research Initiatives and Philanthropic Partnerships at UChicago Office of Civic Engagement, Janet Smith, Professor of Urban Planning and Policy at UIC, and our Associate Director, Robert Smith III.

The event will bring together Chicago's housing, research, and activist communities for a conversation about housing as a human right, in an era of populism and disinvestment in public housing policy and infrastructure.  

Based on field-research in eight US cities, Dr. Robbins discusses how the battles of working class communities in the US to save their homes are mirrored by the UK experience. These issues assume greater resonance in the aftermath of the election of Donald Trump and the Grenfell Tower disaster. The panelists will look comparatively at the US and the UK, with particular attention to the public housing context in Chicago.

RSVP here!

History Lessons Writing Workshop

The NPHM hosted a label writing workshop on March 21st for residents that are loaning objects for our upcoming show, History Lessons: Everyday Objects from Chicago Public Housing. The exhibition features a wide variety of ordinary items that tell extraordinary stories of public housing and will feature labels that are written by those that are closest to them, the residents themselves, along with interviews conducted by Rich Cahan. 

The workshop itself, which was run by Audrey Petty, author of High Rise Stories was the first of two which led residents though how to write effective labels for their objects through historical and poetic lenses.

The second meeting was April 18th and was led by Nate Marshall at Annie Stubenfeld’s Legends classroom.

Shaq McDonald writing a label for a metal airplane given to him by his uncle.

Oral History Corps Interview Representative Bobby Rush

Shakira Johnson, of the Museum's Oral History Corps, along with Executive Director Lisa Lee, visited Representative Bobby Rush in Washington D.C. to interview him for our on-going oral history project. 

Rush, who grew up in Chicago public housing, was a co-founder of the Illinois chapter of the Black Panthers and worked on creating non-violent, community-centric projects to help African Americans living in Chicago. We are excited to add Bobby Rush's invigorating stories to our archives for future study.

Kali Akuno Roundup

In conjunction with the University of Illinois-Chicago's Social Justice Initiative, the NPHM hosted economic activist Kali Akuno from Jackson, Mississippi to talk to residents and allies about cooperative businesses.

The focus of the talk was to begin our work for establishing an Entrepreneurship Hub, comprised of the Social Justice Business School, Office Hours, and the cooperatively run Museum store that will be run by residents. The conversation, co-hosted by Teresa Prim, centered around the history of Jackson's project and other cooperatives, as well as the power of solidarity economies that bolster horizontal power structures that enrich the lives of those involved. 
 

All ears on Kali Akuno as he discusses the cooperative business model to public housing residents and allies.

The Museum is currently planning our next steps for the Hub. We are hosting a lunch discussion on May 4th, from noon to 1:30 with public housing residents and allies to begin imagining how the co-op will best serve the community.

Kali Akuno Lunch Discussion on 4.10

WORKER COOPERATIVE – A business that is owned and controlled by the people who work in it

The National Public Housing Museum is beginning to the creation plans for a museum store that is owned and operated by public housing residents.

Join residents (and allies) at the National Public Housing Museum offices for a free lunch discussion with Kali Akuno on April 10th as we work with you to envision this cooperative business. We will be learning about worker co-ops, their role in advancing racial and economic justice — and how to build this business together from the ground up.

RSVP today at rsvp@nphm.org!

Robert Smith III on Museum Archipelago Podcast

Our Associate Director, Robert Smith III, was recently interviewed by Ian Elsner of the Museum Archipelago podcast. The conversation touches on the power of place, the museum's future at the Jane Addams Homes, and our ongoing mission to propel the conversation that housing is a human right. 

You can listen to the podcast here. Thanks to Ian for having us!

High-Risers Book Release Recap

We had such an amazing evening last night with Ben Austen, Audrey Petty, J.R. Flemming, and Dolores Wilson as we celebrated the release of Ben's new book, High-Risers: Cabrini Green and the Fate of American Public Housing. We are so grateful to all who were in attendance last night and we are happy to share a few highlights from the evening below!