Hi Hat Resale Shop in Geneva to close

For anyone who hasn't heard, the sign on the door at Hi Hat Resale shop in Geneva sums it up.

It's from Northwestern Medicine, alerting customers of the consignment shop at Third and Hamilton streets that the shop will close its doors March 29 after decades of serving area residents.

Mostly, it is reminding people that Hi Hat is no longer taking consignment items or donations.

It wasn't a particularly pleasant thing to hear for those who have come to enjoy browsing through the racks of clothes and decorative items that fill this former Methodist church location. After all, it's been operating at its current site since 1998, after several years in other downtown Geneva spots. It was originally in Wheaton, where it opened in 1960.

The store, which has helped support Delnor Hospital for years through the volunteer auxiliary, becomes the victim of a vast medical network at Northwestern Medicine that has to put its full attention on medical services. In short, the organization said it was getting too hard to support something like Hi Hat Resale shop because it wasn't part of the core business and mission of the hospitals.

"We are notifying the consignors, and they still own their merchandise, so we'll just continue to sell whatever we have here (until the closing)," said Hi Hat manager Deb Ditella, who could not speak on the topic of the closing or what happens next to the building. Ditella has worked as manager at the shop for a year.

Northwestern Medicine has indicated it would sell the building at 227 Hamilton St.

Because it still has the stained glass decorated windows from its days as a Methodist church, it is hard to say what could turn up in that spot in the future.

We've seen restaurant owners convert old churches into dining spots, and also park districts take over such sites for extra space in other towns. For example, Batavia Park District conducts classes at its Eastside Community Center in what was the former Holy Cross Church.

Geneva doesn't seem to really need such a location for park district activities, so for now, we'll just tip our hat to Hi Hat for its years of service and look on it nostalgically in the future.

The consignors will find other places to sell their wares because there are plenty of consignment shops, and the hospital should be just fine as well.

A new cellar:

Lovers of craft beer can expect a new place in Geneva to draw their attention this year.

The Beer Cellar, which has been in business in Glen Ellyn for a little more than five years, will open a spot at 204 W. State Street in Geneva in either late summer or early fall.

I am not an expert on craft beer, nor would I pretend to be one. But I find some of the names of products at The Beer Cellar to be quite interesting.

Milkshake IPA, Hop Nawi, Code Switch, Fritzicuffs, Galaxy Traveling Scientist, Ryeway to Heaven and Party Pillow are just a few.

The Daily Herald has done past stories on The Beer Cellar owner Dave Hawley, and he sounds like what you would expect in a case like this. He's a fellow passionate about his beer products.

The perfect candidate:

As part of its 25th anniversary, Vertex Resource Group in St. Charles wanted to pay it forward, one might say, in terms of spreading its knowledge of developing resource services for businesses.

The beneficiary of that idea was Aurora resident Joe Harrington, who is a business owner, U.S. Army veteran and College of DuPage student.

Vertex recently revealed that Harrington was the winner of the company's 25th Anniversary Scholarship of $1,250. Harrington was chosen because he went above and beyond the description of what Vertex was seeking in its winner - a first- or second-year student in a post-high-school light industrial technical program.

Turns out, Harrington began taking COD's welding and manufacturing courses five years ago to learn those trades with the goal of becoming a better teacher and counselor for the Welding Merit badge offered through Boy Scouts.

That love of sharing his expertise with young people had a lot to do with earning the scholarship, which will help him continue his studies to earn his manufacturing technology certificate.

In the meantime, Vertex will continue developing solutions for clients in industrial and technical staffing, payroll services and human resource outsourcing.

Not new at all:

Readers may think that I know about every new restaurant or business the minute they open in the area.

Well, sometimes. Other times, I am amazed that I didn't know about a place that has been around for some time.

Such is the case with Chamber Red Chinese Bistro at 1554 E. Main St. in St. Charles.

Thinking it was a relatively new business that had maybe moved into the former Gino's pizza location in the Tincup Pass retail strip, I called the restaurant.

To my surprise, I was told they have been in business for about three years now in a location a few spots down from the still-empty Gino's.

In any case, it appears Chamber Red does quite well for itself and, in the meantime, I continue to be amazed that this strip is still called Tincup Pass.

For those who haven't been around for some time, the Tincup Pass restaurant, in that Gino's spot some 40 years ago, was a popular site with a gold miner type of theme to it.

It was one of the first places I tried for lunch in the Tri-Cities after taking my first job here in 1977. It was really crowded because local residents at that time didn't have as many restaurant choices as now, and they were curious what this place was all about.

dheun@sbcglobal.net