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AUSTINWEEKLY news ■
Vol. 33 No. 37
A West Side block club takes matters into its own hands,
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July 17, 2019
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Former Defender editor laments print’s demise Oak Park journalist helmed historic paper’s newsroom for five months By MICHAEL ROMAIN Editor
Shari Noland, 49, of Oak Park, knew what she was getting into when, in 2017, she decided to leave her job as communications director for the Oak Park Education Foundation in order to become executive editor of the Chicago Defender. The cash-strapped newspaper’s best days were behind it, but the Defender’s rich legacy still resonated with the veteran journalist. “I had a contact who knew someone who said they were looking for an editor,” Noland said in a recent interview. “I hadn’t planned on leaving the Education Foundation. I liked it. But I couldn’t pass up the opportunity to work for the Defender.” Last Wednesday, the nearly 115-year-old newspaper, once the most authoritative voice in Black America, released its last print issue — the cover boldly announcing the paper’s ambitions to publish its content exclusively online (a photo of a phone See DEFENDER on page 4
SHANEL ROMAIN/Contributor
NEW HOME: Congressman Danny K. Davis, fourth from left, state Rep. Emanuel “Chris” Welch and Rev. Myron Austin attend Sunday’s ribbon-cutting for Rose of Sharon Community Church, which moved into its permanent home in Maywood on July 7.
Prominent West Side church moves to suburbs Rose of Sharon brought its own rich history to a 150-year-old church building in Maywood By MICHAEL ROMAIN Editor
A historic Maywood church building that dates back to 1871 took in its newest congregation on July 7. Dressed in communion Sunday white, members of the Rose of Sharon Community Church converged on the steps of 201 S. 5th Ave. for a brief ribbon-cutting and prayer before eagerly marching into their new
house of worship. The moment marked a historic transition for Rose of Sharon, whose longtime pastor, the late Rev. James A. Murphy Sr., built the church into an institution on Chicago’s West Side. Murphy, who died last year at 87, founded the church in 1955 and pastored for more than 62 years, according to an obituary published in the Chicago Crusader. Murphy was also a serial entrepreneur, owning an array of businesses on the West
Side that constituted their own cottage economy. Murphy owned R.O.S. Cleaners, “a chain of dry cleaners with 13 locations,” the Crusader article pointed out; the Turning Point Supper Club; Murph’s Place Restaurant; and Century 21 Murphy Real Estate. The enterprising pastor also penetrated the city’s airwaves, broadcasting his
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