Ghosts of the Haymarket Massacreby Barek Halfhand

 The Carter Harrison (Sr.) administration saw it’s share of turmoil during his stint as Chicago mayor…The nation’s first prolific serial killer; H.H. Holmes prowled the periphery of the 1893 Columbian Exposition (White City) to prey upon tourists, urban transplants and transients…ironically Mayor Harrison [...]

It’s been over a decade since I worked at the Joliet Correctional Center and just returning to the empty main lot reminded me of the dread, insecurity and very real sense of mortal vulnerability that only those that have worked in such an institution can truly relate to…

(Scroll down for 10-2011 update)

Haunted Archer Avenue: Fairmount Hills by Barek Halfhand

*From 5-09:

The Archer Avenue gates to Fairmont Hills lie between St James Church and The Willow Brook Ballroom along the farthest, forest draped reaches of that famous stretch of Chicago land roadway. There was no predetermined destination when stumbled [...]

Road Trip 2011 Part 2

by Barek Halfhand

The gargantuan propellers seem surprisingly graceful spinning in the distance as the wind farms of pastoral north central Indiana suddenly dominate the landscape and have come to serve as my symbolic gateway to The South…If I didn’t view this spectacle as fanatically futuristic I [...]

Maple Lake
By Barek Halfhand

Maple Lake is a man made body of water just off of the famous haunted Archer Avenue back roads …the immediate proximity of St James, The Willow Brook Ballroom, Fairmount and Red Gate Woods to Maple/Bullfrog lakes and the long standing albeit less famous legend associated with [...]