Taking time to give thanks for the ‘high ideals’ that make the news
Take a second to think of the news stories that captured your attention in the past week. What were they? Endless complaints about the winners and losers on the national political scene? Deadly car crashes? Sensational murders or assaults? The brutality of war in the Middle East or Ukraine? Tax hikes? Another Bears loss? The price of a dozen eggs?
Who can say why it is that the emotionally provocative stories so often are first to attract our eyes and ears? Thank goodness we have Thanksgiving to remind us of the many reasons we have to be happy with our society, our communities and our fellow humans.
Every year on Thanksgiving, I use the occasion to highlight a few stories among many just from the previous week — a single week among the 52 in every year — that made news alongside, and sometimes even ahead of, those sensational events we tend to think is all that ever makes “the news.” There is not space for all such evidence from the past week in the suburbs, but here are a few items to look back on if you missed them:
Last Friday, Rick West described in photos and text a gathering of dozens of family members and friends who showed up at The Centre of Elgin to help Betty McKeown celebrate her pending 100th birthday. But, special as it was, it wasn’t just McKeown’s Nov. 29 arrival at the century mark that deserved attention. It also was the fact that she had to abandon her daily three- to four-mile walk to attend the party. “I’m very lucky. I’ve been blessed,” McKeown said.
Kids today, am I right? Well, not so fast. On Saturday, Christopher Placek reported on 25 human-sized nutcrackers on display in Rosemont, painted by students from 17 Chicago and Northwest Suburban high school students. The project raised $20,000 for Palatine-based Salute, Inc., a nonprofit that supports for injured military service members and their families.
And on Monday, Dave Oberhelman’s regular “College Achievers” column reported on outstanding accomplishments ranging from Grayslake North High School women’s basketball standout Sidney Lovitsch, who has become head coach of Xavier University’s women’s basketball team just two years after graduation from the university, to a host of players from across the suburbs who were named to the all-conference football teams at the College Conference of Illinois & Wisconsin.
As long as we’re talking students, let’s remember Alicia Fabbre’s front-page story Sunday about Sycamore Trails Elementary School in Bartlett, which became Elgin Area Unit School District 46’s first school to reach “exemplary” status according to the 2024 Illinois school report card. The achievement ranks Sycamore Trails in the top 10% of all Illinois schools — a measure, by the way, that also includes dozens of other suburban schools.
Nor should we forget Steve Zalusky’s front-page report that same day on 90-year-old Jesse White and the 65th anniversary of his Jesse White Tumblers program. White was an elementary school gym teacher in 1959, when he assembled a group of kids for a show in a housing project on Chicago’s Near West Side. White would go on to become Illinois secretary of state. His kids — some 20,000 of them — would perform impressive feats of acrobatics at local parades and around the world. White said less than 20 of those 20,000 have gotten into legal trouble, “because there’s no drinking, smoking, swearing, dropping out of school or practicing pharmacy without a license.”
Oh, but there’s so much more. In Sports on Tuesday, Kevin Schmit recounted some of the top high school performances of the previous week. In Health & Fitness on Monday, columnist Teri Dreher Frykenberg described how she and two other mental health professionals each built successful new careers after times of crisis or other personal experiences. In News on Sunday, Madhu Krishnamurthy told how Zakat Chicago, a Council of Islamic Organizations of Greater Chicago service committee, will help feed 42,000 area families this Thanksgiving with the distribution of 5,000 turkeys to families in need.
We will of course carry many similarly holiday-themed stories in coming weeks about individuals and organizations coming to the aid of individuals and families in need. But it’s important to remember that such events are happening, and being reported, all year long in countless ways.
“The world is full of trickery,” wrote the poet Max Ehrmann in his famous “Desiderata.” “But let this not blind you to what virtue there is. Many people strive for high ideals and everywhere life is full of heroism.”
Indeed.
Happy Thanksgiving, everyone.
• Jim Slusher, jslusher@dailyherald.com, is managing editor for opinion at the Daily Herald. Follow him on Facebook at www.facebook.com/jim.slusher1 and on X at @JimSlusher. His new book “Conversations, community and the role of the local newspaper” is available at eckhartzpress.com.