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Ideas for a news story can come from just about anywhere, including the walls of Hinsdale Central High School. For Taylor Levin, editor-in-chief of the Devils' Advocate student magazine, fliers and posters are no longer just announcements or decorations on a wall. Each announcement of a club meeting, school dance or after-school event is a potential article for the monthly publication. Levin, a member of Cherise Lopez's journalism II honors class, is one of nine students on...
How has acting enriched your high school experience? An eccentric, sanctimonious woman with an alcohol problem? That's a character Mickey Norton can sink her teeth into. The Hinsdale Central senior gets to show off her acting chops as Mrs. Peacock in the drama club's production of "Clue: On Stage" Nov. 17-19 in the school's auditorium (see Page XX for details). "I'm an old lady who's batty and prone to hysterics," Norton related. "I can be wild as her." A longtime fan of the 1...
What is the best way to fight winter viruses? COVID no longer makes the daily headlines, but like the flu and other common viruses, it hasn't gone away. "I'm seeing a lot of COVID," said Dr. Zoheb Osman, DO, of AdventHealth Medical Group Family Medicine in Hinsdale. He said patients are presenting with a wide variety of symptoms, including sore throat, earaches and loss of taste and smell. Thankfully, Osman said, the symptoms tend to be mild in most people. That's because as...
Dozens of Devils will dedicate a part of this Saturday to the community's greater good. The Hinsdale Central students will take part in school's annual Day of Service, a volunteerism drive organized by the Red Devil Service Club. The group promotes initiative, leadership and good citizenship practices through large- and small-scale outreach projects during the year. Senior Leah Bradley, service club president, said the event encourages teens to step beyond the relative...
How does exercise help cancer patients? Jeri Lau had several certifications and a successful personal training business when she added cancer exercise to her fitness arsenal. Encouraged by a friend, Lau approached Wellness House with the idea of a class for women with breast cancer. Seventeen years later, Lau is the oncology exercise specialist at Wellness House, where she leads 22 classes a week, each designed to help people with cancer gain physical and emotional strength for their cancer journey. Three of those 22 classes...
Is plant-based cooking worthwhile? One doesn't have to be vegetarian or vegan to appreciate plant-based dishes. A healthy diet can be full of flavor, as cooking instructor Deepti Suri demonstrated last week in her kitchen at her Yoga Habitat studio in Hinsdale. "If you learn, you can make anything delicious," Suri remarked as she prepared a dish using split bean soup, or mung dal in Hindi, with herbs and spices. Suri will teach part two of her Plant-Based Cooking series for...
What does it take to be an emergency nurse? Nicole Schiever, nurse director of AdventHealth Hinsdale's emergency department, summed up the typical state of her work environment in two words: organized chaos. "It's kind of like having a bunch of boiling pots on the stove and making sure they all stay on simmer and don't boil over," Schiever said. "There are ebbs and flows and a lot of prioritizing, getting things done in a very timely manner all while trying to make sure our...
How do you prepare for a marathon? When Brian Stanton moved to Hinsdale last year from Charlotte, N.C., the avid distance runner was unfamiliar with the area's best training routes. So Stanton, a senior vice president with Bank of America, created his own with a pass-by tour of bank branches. "I thought, 'Why not try something a little different?' On one my longer runs, I ran past five of them," he said, namely the Hinsdale, La Grange, Woodridge, Willowbrook and Westmont...
What should people know about genealogy research? Genealogy specialist Debra Dudek was enlisted to help a woman find where her late father was buried. "There had been a divorce and she didn't know what happened to him," related Dudek, head of adult and teen services for Bolingbrook's Fountaindale Public Library District. A project she thought would take a matter of weeks stretched into a couple of years, with the woman eventually learning she had seven half-siblings. "That...
From the time she was a kid, municipal government has interested Andrianna Peterson, Hinsdale's newly hired assistant village manager. "My mother was an employee of the city of Woodstock, and so growing up she instilled a love of public service and always had very interesting stories about the types of work the city was doing for residents," Peterson said. "I just thought it was very interesting that people could come together and reach a consensus on a topic and actually...
What is the Fox Valley Music & Storytelling Festival? Hinsdale is going unplugged this weekend - musically speaking - when it plays host to one of the largest folk music events in the Midwest. The 46th annual Fox Valley Folk Music & Storytelling Festival is strumming its way to the Unitarian Church of Hinsdale from Saturday to Monday, Sept. 3-5. Normally the event is staged some 20 miles to the west at Island Park in Geneva, according to festival co-producer Cheryl Joyal. The...
What inspired your new suitcase design? Hinsdale resident Maggie Gerth spent several years as an investment banker, but no one needs to be good at math to know that six people, six suitcases, one luggage rack and one hotel room add up to one big mess. "I was always looking for ways to organize the girls better," said Gerth, whose trips with her husband and four daughters seemed to always involve luggage on the floor, the beds and every other available surface. That's when she...
When preparing to venture outside the house, people will often remind one another that "it's not a fashion show." That statement doesn't apply to Donovan Laux of Hinsdale. For this budding fashion designer, every location is a runway, and every person is a model. Laux said her fascination with fashion began long ago as she watched her mother and three older sisters purchase clothing and put together outfits. She said her home was full of creative energy and confidence, both...
There's no such thing as a typical day in the life of Nina Szaflarski, administrative services analyst at the Hinsdale Police Department. "Whatever comes up, I go with it," said Szaflarski, who joined the police department as a part-time clerk nearly seven years ago. In those seven years she has learned many new skills and put old ones to use. A former Palos Hills police officer, Szaflarski knows the job of the officers she supports. Szaflarski said she left the Palos Hills...
After college Alison Brothen was having trouble reconciling her accounting degree with a job opportunity. One day, while manning a fitness club front desk in the interim, Brothen shared her struggle with one of the regular members. "He goes, 'I have my own accounting firm. Give me your resumé,' " she recounted. "I did, and I started working for him." It was another fortuitous connection early in her career that ultimately would help bring Brothen to Hinsdale, where she...
If you live in Hinsdale and get a call from someone telling you your toilet is running, it might not be a prank. It might be Karen Buccieri. Hinsdale's water billing clerk pays close attention to the water use of all 6,800 customers on the village's water system. When she sees signs of a potential leak that could be wasting water and costing a customer extra money, she lets them know. "I go through the leak report every day," said Buccieri, who joined the village staff 11...
Words from a nun's lips to Al Diaz' ear cast the vision that would guide his professional life. "I had a high school physics teacher - Sister Ellen, one of the few nuns that taught me at Nazareth Academy - and she pulled me aside and said, 'You know, you're a really good problem solver. Have you ever thought of civil engineering as a career?' " Diaz related. He thought about it and then pursued it academically at Bradley University, foundational steps on a journey that would...
At the time Chris Bruton graduated from college, women were encouraged to follow one of two career paths - nursing or teaching. She planned to be an English teacher, only to discover the job market was flooded with women with the same ambition. "Life takes a different turn. You never know," said Bruton. A career in municipal government never occurred to her at the time, she said. "I had no idea. None. However, had I had a sense of it when I went away to school, that this was...
As a young firefighter with the Hinsdale Fire Department nearly a quarter-century ago, Jon Carlson responded to a warehouse fire in Lombard. "I remember how dark it was from the smoke and how hard it was to operate in that environment," Carlson said of his first large-scale incident. But he also recalled the spirit of camaraderie and purpose that fueled his group's efforts. "(I had) the feeling of being able to make a small difference in the outcome and being able to go in...
People across the United States look forward to July 4 as a day to spend with family and friends, to relax and to celebrate. But for Maggie South of the Hinsdale Parks and Recreation Department, it's showtime. Preparations for Hinsdale's annual Fourth of July parade begin in February, South said, and culminate with one of the biggest events of the year for the village where she has worked since November 2018. "We're there to see that everything goes as smoothly as possible,"...
What should we know about Loie Fuller? Loie Fuller was born before Hinsdale was, on a chilly January night in 1862 at the Castle Inn near what is now the village intersection of Ogden Avenue and York Road. Her uncle was Ben Fuller, the area's most prominent settler. But it was Loie who would earn worldwide fame as a groundbreaking dancer and visionary, mesmerizing audiences by incorporating electric lights into her performances. In her book, "Radiant: The Dancer, The...
How does the pet walk benefit the humane society? A decades-old Hinsdale tradition continues Saturday, June 25, as the Hinsdale Humane Society presents its annual Pet Walk Festival. Deborah Kraus, development director, said the event will give animal allies of all ages the chance to support the shelter while learning about the many services offered to humans, canines and felines. The Pet Walk Festival will be held at the Humane Society, 21 Salt Creek Lane, Hinsdale (see Page...
What does the athletics administrative assistant do? The thrilling action of high school sports has nothing on the Hinsdale Central athletic department. Just ask the department's administrative assistant, Wanda Swik. "Everything is crazy in here," Swik remarked early this week above the relentless din of cafeteria construction work across the hall. "Now we have summer camps, and we're limited in summer camp space because the fieldhouse is getting worked on. It never ends."...
How did you start making jewelry? Amy Smetana admits she didn't know much about jewelry when a neighbor asked her to repair a broken bracelet years ago. But rather than say no, Smetana, a lifelong learner, set out to teach herself how to fix her friend's treasured piece of jewelry. Little did Smetana know that years later, jewelry would become her full-time job and artistic passion. Working from her studio in her Downers Grove home, Smetana not only repairs jewelry but...
How can people help the Ukrainian people? When COVID-19 forced Americans to embrace home entertainment like never before, U.S. soldiers serving overseas didn't have the luxury of such a retreat. Hinsdale's Bob Barr, hearing of the need from military chaplain contacts made through his Operation Deployed nonprofit, knew just the ticket. "We announced our Movie Night kits," Barr said. "We sent a portable Bluetooth projector, indoor/outdoor movie screen, a popcorn machine - I'm...
