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Hyde Park Businesses Hit Hard by Threat Closing U. of C. Campus Monday

By Sam Cholke | December 4, 2015 6:11am
 Hyde Park businesses said they lost thousands of dollars Monday because of a threat that closed the University of Chicago campus.
Hyde Park businesses said they lost thousands of dollars Monday because of a threat that closed the University of Chicago campus.
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DNAinfo/Sam Cholke

HYDE PARK — Hyde Park businesses said they were hard hit by the sudden closure of the University of Chicago on Monday.

The campus closed all day Monday after authorities said 21-year-old Jabari Dean threatened to shoot white students on campus on an online message board.

He has since been arrested by the FBI and was found not to have the means to carry out the attack, but the threat prompted many businesses around the university to close when campus closed.

With campus closed, a lot of departments suddenly didn’t need meetings and events catered, a big source of business for South Side restaurants.

Kirsten Esterly, manager of the Medici, 1327 E. 57th St., said the restaurant lost more than $2,000 in catering business with the university being closed for just one day.

Like other restaurants on 57th Street, Medici stayed open despite the threat that mentioned the quad.

“I was surprised we were that slow,” Esterly said. “I thought because it was such a specific threat that people would still come in for breakfast and lunch.”

She said the restaurant and neighboring café did about half the business they would normally see on a Monday.

“The dining room was absolutely dead,” Esterly said. “Everything was back to normal the next day.”

Businesses closer to campus choose to close entirely for the day.

The Seminary Cooperative Bookstore, which is in a university-owned building at 5751 S. Woodlawn Ave. and just steps from campus, chose to close for the day.

“We felt obliged to close and believe it or not that hurt sales,” said Richard Barnard, the financial manager at the bookstore. “So much of retail is impulse and if you’re closed a day, the sales that would have happened almost never come back.”

He said the store likely lost $4,000 to $4,500 in sales on Monday.

Other businesses, particularly farther from campus, did better, even if they were closed.

Parker’s, a pet supply and grooming store at 1342 E. 55th St., didn’t have any of its seven dog grooming appointments cancel, despite the store closing because of the threat to campus.

“People take their dog grooming appointments very seriously,” said Bobbie Pottenger, co-owner of the store, who added that appointments are already booked through July.

She said the staff kept the doors locked until a client showed up and managed to keep all of its dog grooming appointments.

“If someone came to the door with a gun, we would have run for the hills,” Pottenger said.

She said the store reopened at 1 p.m. when the FBI announced they had taken Dean into custody.

On Tuesday, Dean was released from federal custody and is on home detention at his mother’s house in Grand Crossing.

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