Thanks for posting - I had relatives who went to Aquinas. Once a fine school in what was then a surprisingly classy neighborhood for Chicago’s South Side (today that neighborhood is basically a free-fire zone).
How wonderful about your relatives. Always like to hear about fellow students.
The South Side was then a normal suburban neighborhood. We lived on 88th and shopped on 71st, a block from the school. There were country clubs everywhere between, parks and really good schools. The movie theaters were the fancy old kind, and the shopping was excellent.
Then, gradually, it started to change. As the neighborhoods turned over, many residents tried desperately to stay and integrate, out of good conscience and intentions. A classmate’s father stayed with his furniture store and was shot and killed. So people moved. Years after we graduated, the high school neighborhood changed and the school was closed and torn down. I presume the demographics for a Catholic high school with tuition couldn’t be supported in what was primarily becoming a poor, more Protestant, neighborhood.
Now when I read about my old neighborhood, I read about murders in our grammar school playground. I also made a website for our grammar school, and one of my classmates described a reunion where they got a bus to tour the old neighborhood but had to go with a police escort.