Blair Kamin is way off the mark with the suggestion that our mayor is trying to “Martha Stewartize” our town (“Building the city beautiful,” Tempo, April 15).
Chicago has always been more than a center of commerce and industry. It’s our “hometown.” We Chicagoans see the lovely home gardens we pass on the way to a Cubs game. We admire the intricately painted trim on row houses on 54th Place in Hyde Park. We commune at beautifully dressed altars like the one at Imani Lutheran Church on Damen Avenue and 64th Street. We put out flags on the front porch or at the peak of the garage.
Mayor Richard Daley is merely taking our way of cherishing our hometown within our Chicago neighborhoods and extending it to public places that people who don’t live here are more likely to see. This isn’t something we need to learn from Martha Stewart. The mayor just wants to take the opportunity to spread our hometown kind of love around.
