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three presidents came to chicago to bury jesse jackson. the city stopped moving for an afternoon. obama gave the eulogy, credited jackson's presidential runs as a formative inspiration, and thousands of people just showed up because it was jesse. he was buried at oak woods cemetery, which already holds ida b. wells, harold washington, and jesse owens. the neighborhood knows its own.

the obama presidential center has an opening date. juneteenth. jackson park. you can stop asking. dedication june 18, public opening june 19. almost five years since groundbreaking. the difference between this and every previous woodlawn announcement is that there is an actual structure.

chicago is losing two more breweries. whiner's last pour is march 29. whiner beer company (back of the yards, open a decade) closes in three weeks. illuminated brew works (northwest side) closes in june. that's three brewery closures in 2026 and the year is 10 weeks old. the full story on what whiner meant to that block is worth reading.

50 residents displaced after a garage floor decided — independently, without consulting anyone — to stop being a floor. the building's future is unclear, which puts it in roughly the same position as everyone who lived in it.

capital one is cutting 1,100 jobs tied to the old discover operations, 532 of them at its riverwoods campus. the merger is going exactly as expected. riverwoods is not a large place. the details are unsurprising and still worth knowing.

the attorney general is suing a lockport mcdonald's for 568 child labor violations. five hundred and sixty-eight. 14- and 15-year-olds worked more than 8 hours without breaks, in 2023, as a pattern — not a bad week, a pattern. the franchise owner is presumably reviewing their scheduling software.

gas jumped 34 cents a gallon this week because of the war in iran. fill up now or do the math on the metra. analysts say prices are going up. fill up today, or try the metra or L this week — yes, the CTA has problems, but it is cheaper than $4.50 a gallon, which is a bar the CTA has somehow managed to clear.

eat: the radicle opened in the old daisies space in logan square. $10 cocktails, raw bar, pizza. 2523 n. milwaukee ave. go before the wait becomes a personality test.

do: MCA is free for illinois residents tonight, 5–9 p.m. bring your ID. pretend you understand the art. nobody will check, and the art prefers it that way. weather, pending.

avoid: being outside this afternoon. severe storms, damaging winds, hail, possible tornadoes. know where your basement is. if you don't have one, find an interior room. the atmosphere has opinions and is not accepting feedback.

hey — if you’d like to put your business in front of the readers of this very email, reply with a little about what you do. small, weird, or local: we like all three.

field museum is free for illinois residents every wednesday in march. this wednesday is march 11. go. bring ID, walk past sue like it's no big deal, watch your kids fail completely at playing it cool near a t-rex. free is free, and in this economy, free is a whole personality.

the sun-times ran a guide to eight chicago wine shops that actually teach you something. multicultural tastings, natural wine flights, staff who won't judge you for pointing at the nice label. chicago's wine scene has quietly become one of the more interesting in the country — not a sentence anyone expected to write about a city that still drinks malört on purpose.

the sun-times and WBEZ published a long piece on francisco gonzalez-jasso, a longtime chicagoan deported under the federal immigration campaign. there's no evidence he had gang ties. he was labeled a gang member anyway. swept up in operation midway blitz. no criminal record, no gang involvement. he's now starting over in mexico while his family stays in chicago. built from months of reporting. read it to the end — it will sit with you.

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three presidents buried jesse jackson. the obama center finally has a date. two more breweries are gone before spring even starts. and today’s weather wants you to stay inside.

tips, sightings, your suburb's floor collapsing?

reply with your neighborhood and one thing that made you pause, squint, or text someone “???”

talk thursday.

-sam