What's the History of Maywood? (Chicago, Oak Park: middle-class, apartment, buying a home)

[gardener34]

Good luck optimistic! I wish more people thought like you. Just watch out for the drive-bys. I used to live in an "iffy" to "bad" neighborhood. Keep all your stuff locked up, including all doors when you are home even, and invest in an alarm system.

[ahava]

Originally Posted by prairiestate

Maywood actually has a lot of gorgeous old homes. If you go down, say, 1st Ave. and just look at the architecture, you could be in Oak Park. Then you look at how decrepit all those homes are, the vacant lots, barred windows, liquor stores and pawn shops, the illusion disappears quickly.

Agreed - I was just thinking this yesterday while driving down 1st Ave. The neighborhood across from Proviso East seemed to have a lot of (what could be) really nice homes and I wanted to drive around and take a look but I decided that would be safer to do during the daytime.

[Jill73]

Originally Posted by optimistic resisdent

Well I don't know the complete history of Maywood, but from what I've been told it was once a very nice well to do suburb. There was an airport, racetrack and some industry. I just moved there and am in the process of rehabbing an incredible mansion. I understand that the area is a bit rough, but I am an optimist. Where else can you buy a 4 bed, 5 bath, 2 kitchen brick home with a coach house for under 200k. I say, let's take this place over. There are alot of beautiful homes in the area, some people just don't know what they have. Property values are way below what they would normally be in other areas, and since the market is down you can get a great deal. There are some risk takers willing to take a gamble and wait it out moving in, and I am one of them. Linclon park was not always as pretty as it is now, it once was a slum. It just takes some vision for changes to be made.

I'm so happy to hear someone with the same attitude my husband and I have. I wonder where that house is? I say get involved with the local groups. Namco is a group representing North Maywood. I know there is a South Maywood group as well. Also there are meetings with the police the first Monday of each month. I just attended the code enforcemnt meeting this past Thursday and overcrowding is beginning to be dealt with. Also, 5th ave is having a major overhaul to be completed this year. Madsion st overhaul is slatted for 2009. The houses are beautiful and affordable with big lots. I believe in the future of this city and hopefully more and more people will start believing in it too.

[Irishtom29]

Black Panther Fred Hampton was from Maywood, I remember when he "liberated" a Good Humor truck around 19th and Madison and handed out the ice cream to the neighborhood kids. That's what he told us when he came into Doc Gandolf's anyway.

He used to say "I am revolutionary proletariat intoxicated, I cannot be astronomically intimidated!"

[Humboldt1]

Why do you think mexicans moving into Maywood could lead to revitalization? Why have the blacks living in Maywood not been able to start this revitalization?

I don't disagree with your assessment but see those suburbs surrounding maywood (melrose park, elmwood park, river grove) gaining black populations. Melrose Park used to be all italian and then hispanic and now blacks are moving in. I don't see Maywood getting to be less black anytime soon.

[Drover]

I don't remember Maywood ever being Hispanic. Maywood has been primarily black for decades, long before the Mexican population in Chicago was as ubiquitous as it is today.

Whether or not Hispanics can lead a revitalization, I don't know. Black/Hispanic is frankly the most contentious race-relations pairing in the city. If Hispanics do eventually move into Maywood en masse, it won't be without considerable upheaval and a possible, maybe even likely, uptick in bloodshed.

As for why Blacks in Maywood have not been able to affect a revitalization themselves... we can banter around a million sociological theories for days and weeks, but at the end of the day the best answer I can give is "I don't know." If I knew the answer, I'd be in a position to solve one of the most persistent contemporary social maladies of this country and I just might be eligible for a Nobel Prize.

[Humboldt1]

I would like to see Maywood dominated by hispanics as perhaps it would have at least a chance. I don't see this happening, as maywood, broadview, bellwood is becoming the new black belt in Chicago as many former low income black residents are forced from the city. I predict eventually there will be as many blacks in melrose park as italians, perhaps equal to the hispanic population.

I wish blacks would improve themselves and that the best and brightest would reinvest in their communities instead of leaving but that is not happening. We can debate the socio-economic reasons behind this for hours on end.

I suspect truly answering your "I don't know" question would get me banned from this forum.

[Drover]

I would just like to see Maywood not suck, without regard to the ethnicity of the people who make it happen.

[JohnDoe2008]

any place 100% black or 100% white automatically sucks.

[gardener34]

Nice attitude... how old is this post anyway and why did someone drag it back up?