SEPT. 6
‘Honey, I’ve got a crazy idea.’: Obsessive fan builds Wrigley replica; neighbors mull rooftop bleachers
Little Cubs Field, the largest replica ever built of Wrigley Field, is nearly complete. The iconic green scoreboard is up, the red marquee sign hangs proudly and the ivy (taken from clippings from big Wrigley) is beginning to root along the brick walls.
“It looks very cool,” said Denny Garkey, 58, an insurance fraud investigator who hit on the idea to build a Wrigley replica five years ago. He has since spent his free time mixing mortar, raising money and enlisting a small army of Cubs fans to help him in his quest.
Located in a public park on the west side of Freeport, Ill., the field is a third the size of the original (measuring 100 feet down the foul lines and 112 feet to center field) and is planned for whiffle ball, kickball and peewee baseball games. Every detail has been accounted for; the words “Hey hey!” are printed on yellow foul poles, and the color of the bricks has been matched to those at the big stadium. During a Wrigley renovation this fall, Garkey even arranged for 1,000 pounds of hallowed dirt to be trucked in from Chicago and spread over his field.
Opening Day is set for April, when the place will be available for public games and private rentals. Garkey said he is amazed that construction is almost finished.
“It’s rare that you have a dream and it really comes true,” he said.
— Colleen Mastony
AUG. 19
“A life’s love shattered”
On Dec. 2, 1995, I was standing in my yard when I saw two men being chased by police. They turned out to be suspects in the carjacking murder of Ervin Shorter, a 58-year-old worker for the Chicago Department of Streets and Sanitation.
In 1998, I was called as a witness in the trial of one of the suspects, Richard Morris. Morris was found guilty and sentenced to death. On an appeal, Morris was granted a new trial in 2006, and I again was called to testify. That time, I had a chance to talk at length with Mrs. Linda Shorter, widow of the murdered man. The moving way she talked about her life with her husband made me want to write about her.
Since the story appeared last summer, she and I have talked several times on the phone. I called her shortly after the anniversary of Ervin’s death.
“I get a little depressed this time of year,” Linda Shorter said. “It’s because of the holidays and the date [the 12th anniversary of the murder]. I had a moment like that just now. But I have grandkids to keep my mind off that. I still miss him; I won’t lie, but I think the article was a good thing for me. I thought it might make me sad, but it didn’t. It helped me focus on reality.”
She’s thinking about getting a part-time job that would give her some money to travel.
“This is about the time in our lives that we should be traveling together,” she said, “but that can’t happen, so I’m carrying on best I can. I went out to celebrate a friend’s birthday the other night and ended up dancing ’til 3 in the morning. Life is good.”
— Charles Leroux
MARCH 20
“The Most Powerful Chef in America”
McDonald’s added eight new menu items in 2007, and all point to the culinary mind of one Naperville man.
In March, Tempo profiled Dan Coudreaut, McDonald’s USA director of culinary innovation — code name for the company’s head chef in charge of devising new food for its 13,500 restaurants.
Some of Coudreaut’s launches in 2007 were considered successes: the honey mustard and chipotle BBQ Snackwraps have been big sellers, thanks to the rising trend in portable, in-between-meals menu items now popular in the fast-food industry. Others, such as the Southwest Salad (since removed from the menu) and McSkillet Burrito have been warmly received by critics and the food blogosphere.
Looking ahead to 2008, Coudreaut (pronounced coo-DRO) said he hopes to speed up the process between conception and launch. While the McGriddles breakfast sandwich was three years in the making, the Snackwrap took just 13 months.
It’s a system Coudreaut hopes to employ for new products in the coming year, including a fruit and yogurt smoothie blended in-store, and a Southern-style fried chicken sandwich with pickles and a buttered bun — think Chick-fil-A under golden arches.
“A goal of mine is to change people’s perception of what McDonald’s food is all about,” Coudreaut said. “I want people to understand that this is real food, like the [wedge of] lime in the Southwest salad, or almonds on the Asian salad. It’s a pretty big goal, and I don’t know how to achieve it, but it’s something I continue to chisel at each day.”
— Kevin Pang
JUNE 6
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“On the road with Cormac McCarthy: Writer tells Winfrey he doesn’t care how many read his book”
Paris Hilton is in no danger. But famously reclusive novelist Cormac McCarthy got a bit less reclusive in 2007. After giving only two interviews during the previous 73 years, McCarthy sat for two this year.
There was the one with Oprah Winfrey after she selected his book “The Road” for her book club. That was when he astonished the talk show host by saying that he didn’t care how many people read his books. Winfrey responded, “You’re a different kind of author, let me tell you.” And, a few moments later, she said to her studio audience, “I never heard that before.”
Then, in October, Time magazine published a conversation that McCarthy conducted with Joel and Ethan Coen, the brother team that were collaborating on a film version of McCarthy’s book “No Country for Old Men.”
As with the Oprah interview, McCarthy’s revelations were fairly mundane: He likes American movies such as “Five Easy Pieces,” “Days of Heaven” and the Coens’ own “Miller’s Crossing,” and doesn’t like foreign films. And he’s no fan of the magical realism of some Latin American writers. “You know,” he said, “it’s hard enough to get people to believe what you’re telling them without making it impossible.”
Now that he’s had a taste of publicity, and with the critical success of “No Country,” will McCarthy start popping up on “Entertainment Tonight” or “Hollywood Squares”? Probably not.
— Patrick T. Reardon
FEB. 22
“Student’s parody earns him entree to the real ‘Office'”
It would seem Josh Golden passed up a, well, golden opportunity.
Earlier this year, as a Buffalo Grove High School senior, Golden’s 22-minute spoof of “The Office,” had wowed the producers of NBC’s workplace mockumentary, whom he sought out and persuaded to watch his film. The producers not only entertained him, his teacher and six of his classmates on the set of “The Office” in late January, they also invited Golden to apply for a summer internship with the show.
But he didn’t apply.
“I realized it was my last actual full summer before going to [college],” the 19-year-old Loyola University freshman said. “There were so many things to do, [that] I still wanted to do.” One of them was his job as a Buffalo Grove Park District camp counselor. “It’s a sentimental thing,” Golden said.
Besides, the aspiring professional filmmaker has had a full plate this year, including completing a sequel to “Tech Lab,” the original “The Office” parody he wrote, directed, filmed and edited for the school’s annual film festival last January; creating a 10-minute parody about the Class of 2007’s prom; writing a script for a feature-length, modern-day “Hamlet”-type film he hopes to make; putting together a mockumentary about a guy whose goal is to build a bridge between the mainland U.S. and Hawaii; planting the seeds with village officials for a Buffalo Grove film festival; and taking on a documentary project for his high school about its football program and longtime coach, who recently retired.
As for bypassing the internship?
“I kind of realized those opportunities would be there for me for a little while,” Golden said.
And Kent Zbornak, co-executive producer of “The Office,” agreed. Said Zbornak in an e-mail: “The intern offer is still here for him if he decides down the road that he wants to join us for a few months. (All contingent on the WGA strike, of course!)”
— Maria Mooshil