Born Joanne Hammerman in Chicago and raised in Glencoe, Alter was the daughter of a prosperous manufacturer of children’s clothing. She was one of the only Jewish students and only Democrats at New Trier High School in the early 1940s.
In 1952, she married James Alter, who ran a family-owned refrigeration and air conditioning wholesaler, and they raised four children on Chicago’s north side. Among the guests in the Alter home over the years were Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., Oprah Winfrey, John F. Kennedy Jr., Dan Rather and Kevin Costner, as well as Democratic politicians like Gov. Adlai Stevenson, Mayor Harold Washington, Judge Abner Mikva, Sens. Paul Simon and Richard Durbin, and Rep. Rahm Emanuel. In 2003, she and her husband hosted an early fundraiser for Barack Obama’s 2004 Senate campaign.
Brown looks like shoo-in for clerk's nomination
Chicago Sun-Times - Wednesday, November 17, 1999
Author: Steve Neal
She's back.
Dorothy Brown, who nearly won the city treasurer's office last winter in her first political race, is off to a fast start in her bid to win the Democratic nomination for clerk of the Cook County Circuit Court.
Brown, who is the general auditor for the CTA and president of the National Women's Political Caucus of Greater Chicago, has a good chance to become only the second African-American woman to win countywide executive office. Former Sen. Carol Moseley-Braun (D-Ill.) served from 1988 until 1992 as the county's recorder of deeds.
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Squire Lance, a neighborhood activist who learned grass-roots politics from the late Saul Alinsky, is chairing Brown's campaign. Her campaign committee also includes Glencoe trustee Nancy Alessi, former Water Reclamation District Commissioner Joanne Alter , former Chicago Board of Trade President Pat Arbour, Ald. Carrie Austin (34th), Evanston NAACP President Bennett Johnson, Ald. Leslie Hairston (5th), County Commissioners Bobbie Steele and Deborah Sims, and state SenatorsMargaretSmith,DonneTrotter and Barack Obama , all Chicago Democrats.
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Chicago Sun-Times (IL) - Monday, December 20, 2004
NEW YORK — Newly elected Illinois Sen. Barack Obama made the cover of this week's Newsweek magazine for its “Who's Next” issue of people predicted to make news in 2005.
The magazine said it picked the Hyde Parker because he will make most short lists for vice president in 2008 and he has the “star power” to work with the GOP on bridging red state-blue state divisions.
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The story was written by senior editor Jonathan Alter , who has local roots. He's the son of former Water Reclamation District Commissioner Joanne Alter , a Democrat.