CHICAGO — Here's what we're reading on this sticky Monday.
Kelly's Local Ties: Fox News anchor Megyn Kelly's Chicago connection can be found in a Daily Mail interview with her former husband. In the interview, Dan Kendall described how the two met at a street festival when they both lived in Chicago — she was a lawyer at the Bickel and Brewer firm and he was a medical student. Just after 9/11, "We had a beautiful church wedding in Chicago and the reception at the Waldorf," he said in the February interview, adding that they had a Rolls Royce pick them up. He got a job at Johns Hopkins and the two moved to Baltimore. Kelly "was burning out as a lawyer in Chicago and she decided to take a class which included reporting and she did very well with it," earning a job at a local TV station, Kendall said. After 4½ years, they divorced. "I wanted a wife and she wanted a wife — we both needed someone to cook and clean and support us. Sometimes with two professionals, it doesn't work out," he said. Both have remarried and remain friends, he said, even appearing on her show as a medical expert.
Megyn Kelly of FOX News once worked as a lawyer in Chicago. [Getty Images]
Tale of Two Uptowns: Mark Caro in the Tribune compares our North Side neighborhood to the similarly entertainment-focused neighborhood in Oakland, California. In 2009, the Fox Theater reopened in Oakland after 40 years jumpstarting their arts and entertainment district and sparking some big changes in the neighborhood. The Uptown Theatre, which turns 90 on Aug. 18, hasn't hosted an event since the J. Geils Band on Dec. 19, 1981.
"Since the Fox opened we've had about 200 ground-floor storefronts just within the core downtown area open, and many of these businesses are trying to locate around the arts and entertainment district and be as close to the Fox and the (nearby) Paramount Theatre as possible," said Steve Snider, district manager of Oakland's Uptown and Downtown community benefit districts.
A Lament for Hyde Park: Old Hyde Park is on its way out, being slowly phased out as Zappos replaces the neighborhood shoe store and iTunes replaces the Dr. Wax record shop, laments Nicole Bond. Writing in the South Side Weekly's lit issue, Bond reminisces about a neighborhood that once seemed impervious to a chain takeover.
"I’ve just thrown my hands up, in helpless what-the-hell-ever-ness now," Bond writes.
For more neighborhood news, listen to DNAinfo Radio here:
