In Memoriam

1948 – 2024 Board member Dr. Michael Boruch, former Maxwell Street Foundation (MSF) board member who was a committed member of the MSF Market vending team at the “New” Market on Desplaines St., helped digitize parts of the MSF collection, and more. As a professor at DePaul University in Chicago, he introduced his Chicago Quarter … Read More

1948 – 2024 Donor Leslie Heaton Evans became a friend to the Maxwell Street Foundation through the proprietor of the Maxwell Mansion in Lake Geneva, Wisconsin. She contacted the mansion about the Maxwell portraits that had graced her parents’ stairway wall in the Detroit home where she and her siblings grew up, that had ended … Read More

1945 – 2023 Musician Holger W. Wollert, born in Plau-Mecklenburg, East Germany, was the son of Waldemar and Irene Wollert and the brother to Petra Gierut (nee Wollert). He later migrated to the United States where he established roots in Chicago and served over 30 years with the Chicago Transit Authority before retiring to Mountain … Read More

1927 – 2023 Advisory Council Member New York-based Marvin Newman became known to the Maxwell Street Foundation (MSF) through his short film entitled, The Church on Maxwell Street, collaboratively produced with Yasuhiro Ishimoto while art students in Chicago. The film was part of Marvin’s senior project, “as a means of developing one’s perception about experiences … Read More

1923 – 2023 Advisory Council member and Honorary Board member Dr. Irving Cutler was born in the Maxwell Street area and became an accomplished urban geographer and scholar, having authored major history publications including the best-seller, The Jews of Chicago: From Shtetl to Suburb. He generously provided his expertise about Maxwell Street to Foundation members … Read More

1940 – 2022 Maxwell Street Market vendor and artist Charlie Joe Henderson became known as the Mayor of Maxwell Street where he and a partner, Earnest Jackson, rented tables to vendors at the Maxwell Street Market every Sunday since 1972. As a very remunerative business serving over 1000 vendors at the Market, this so impressed … Read More

1937 – 2021  John Johnson was the owner of a 1972 Chevy Bluebird school bus that he transformed into what became known as the Blues Bus that he parked at the Maxwell Street Market with bullhorns mounted and blues music blasting.  Painted blue with blues musicians’ names scripted on the windows, the Blues Bus became … Read More

1922 – 2015 Honorary Board Member Seymour Persky accepted founding Maxwell Street Foundation member Elliot Zashin’s invitation to be on the board of the Maxwell Street Foundation in 2004, and became an Honorary Member of its Advisory Council in 2012. Seymour grew up near Maxwell Street and was an architectural preservationist. Seymour was a member … Read More

1925 – 2014 Board member Dr. Carolyn Eastwood was introduced to the Maxwell Street Foundation (MSF) through the Chicago Jewish Historical Society, where she sat on its board.  She was invited to present at the 1993 Maxwell Street Market Colloquium at the University of Illinois at Chicago, organized by founding MSF officer Lori Grove and … Read More

1922 – 2014 Board member and Advisory Council member  Norman Schwartz was on the board of directors of the Maxwell Street Foundation (MSF) from 2004 until 2008.  He informally kept notes of all our meetings and projects, and following his resignation from the board, Norman served on the Maxwell Street Foundation Advisory Council until his … Read More