Hundreds gather for Naperville photo shoot
“PEACE” came to Naperville Friday afternoon.
More than 400 people gathered along the city's downtown Riverwalk to spell out the word for a photograph that will be featured on the city's electronic holiday greeting card.
Mayor George Pradel said he wants the community photo to symbolize the city's unity and its desire for peace both at home and elsewhere.
The concept and the choice of the word motivated Noman Shah and about 20 others from the Ismaili Community Center, an Islamic gathering place in Naperville, to be part of the event.
“We're just here to represent what we represent peace,” Shah said.
Residents began assembling about an hour before the 2 p.m. photo shoot at the Moser Tower and Millennium Carillon. Some wore Santa hats, others donned blankets and many noted their placement in the letters spelled out near Rotary Hill so they could find themselves in the finished photo.
Shah, a 17-year-old Waubonsie Valley High School student, said he and his group arrived about 1:15 p.m. and took their place on the center line of the last capital ‘E' in peace.
Nine-year-old Anna Kelly arrived about 1:30 p.m. with her 12-year-old sister Elizabeth and her mother Joan. But Anna said she left her warmest coat in the car. She jumped in place 10 minutes before the photos were taken as a chilly southwest wind blew across the crowd.
Anna's mother said the group would not forget their location in the photo because “we're right at the mouth of the C and her name is Elizabeth so we'll remember the E.”
As the bells tolled at 2 p.m., photographers in the tower snapped a few test photos. They took the real shots soon after and by 2:05 p.m. everyone who was part of the brief moment of “PEACE” on earth was free to go on with their day.
The photo will grace the electronic holiday greeting cards Pradel sends this year to officials in neighboring communities and some such as President Obama living a little farther away.
Scheduling the community photo and spelling “PEACE” were both the mayor's ideas, City Manager Doug Krieger said.
“Originally, he thought to do a peace sign, but it kept growing,” Krieger said.
The mayor at first planned to have the photo feature a small number of people from as many ethnic groups as possible gathered outside city hall. He said he would be pleased if 100 people showed up.
But as word of the event spread, Pradel invited all 145,000 of the city's residents to participate.
Employees in the city's transportation, engineering and development department laid out the letters and spray painted their outlines Tuesday, Krieger said. The letters remained visible through Wednesday's rainstorm and were ready to be filled with people for the photo.
The official photo is available online at the city's website.
“You can get it off the Internet, then you'll be able to see it and use it and send it to your relations or whatever,” Pradel said.