The EP Gang

Minus a core member, sadly

Jim Kenning came over last week. He’s on the left with his soon-to-be-wife, Judy, on his shoulders. We couldn’t figure out how long it had been, but 40 years, at least. We were both part of a group of friends I fondly remember as the Elmwood Park Gang,

I used to run this picture every summer when I was on Facebook. Next to Jim and Judy on the roof of Jim’s old Olds: Jeff Hammette, yours truly, Tom Spahn with unknown gf, and Wayne and Joy Orlowski, two years before they were married. At the steering wheel of Jim’s old red Olds is John Cannon. John, Jeff and I were soon to meet gfs, some of whom became spouses and in my case, engaged.

I remember getting terrifically sunburned, which stood out from the good times we had that day, and good times were plentiful with this group. We partied many times together, went to each other’s weddings, camped up in Wisconsin one weekend and all of us slept in Wayne’s tiny collapsible trailer. The guys played poker semi-regularly and I remember coughing and choking when we smoked our first cigars. But mostly, we just shared life.

I went downstairs to meet Jim instead of buzzing him in so he didn’t have to navigate the hallways and find the elevator. As soon as I saw him waiting outside, I felt Wayne’s absence. Jim was always with Wayne. They were neighbors. Same with John and Jeff. Wayne and I were always together – we grew up together. He’s the missing member. It’s because of him, the EP gang happened in the first place.

Wayne and I went way back. I mean way back, to the playpen as a matter of fact. He was born two weeks before I was. My oldest friend. His folks were friends of my mom’s; his dad and my mom went to grade school together and Wayne’s mom and mine worked together as teenagers, becoming Rosie the Riveters during the War. Not kidding – their company made headlights for locomotives.

Wayne died in 2017. Complications from heart surgery affected his lungs and made him suffer for 6 years. That’s all I’ll say, except I urge you to keep in touch with your close friends. I had lost touch with the gang and found Wayne’s obit by googling around a year or so after he’d passed.

Before I get back to the story, the guy with the scowl on his face in the lower left of the picture is my Uncle Paul. In 1929, Feb. 14, matter of fact, he was a 13-yr. old newsboy working Clark Street when he saw a car filled with ‘gentlemen’ pull out of a dealership, on its way to commit infamy at another garage a little further north on Clark Street. He knew who was driving, but that’s another story.

Jim, Joy, and I started at DePaul in ‘68. Wayne came along a year later. Wayne, Jim and I had so much fun buzzing around Lincoln Park and being young adults that we sometimes took leave of our senses and had to pull over and laugh it off. No drugs. However, one time we got quite drunk on Paisano wine and drove past the Biograph Theater (where FBI ‘G-men’ killed John Dillinger), loudly expressing our TGIF exuberance with the crowd waiting to go in and see the movie.

There are a thousand stories, all with a commonality: things you do through the years with your best of friends group. Pizza – “let’s get a pizza!” Oh my God. No wonder some of us had bypass surgery. Wayne even tried making one on the grill. Not a good thing.

See, it never ends. I think I’ll write a Part 2, because I need to address the mystery woman Jim was very interested in hearing about. And some of the exploits of John Cannon and myself. For now, I’ll give you a brief idea of what all of us did with our lives. Here’s a photo of Wayne and Joy’s wedding in 1973.

Jim left his accounting job halfway through his career, studied HVAC and became Director of Air Quality for the indoor animal habitat at Chicago’s Lincoln Park Zoo (correct me if I got this wrong, Jim). Joy married Wayne and applied her Education degree toward teaching in the Catholic elementary school system. Wayne (the late Wayne Orlowski) – it pains me to write that. After earning his business degree at DePaul, I helped Wayne get in at Quill Corp, where I had started as a copywriter. He went on to an executive job with American Hospital Assn. and, like Jim, opted for a career in the great outdoors – package delivery, Jim told me. Tom is a reputable lawyer and works in his home town of Winchester, Il. John started and stayed in Journalism, moving to San Diego in the 80s to become Copy Editor of the SD Union-Tribune daily newspaper. He does not remember double-dating in Chinatown with me and the mystery woman.

See you next time.