South Shore remains a bastion of artists, businesses, hustlers and everything in between.įor me it was the sounds of funk, disco, and early house I would hear oozing out of courtyard buildings and accenting the alleyways of my youth.
That elastic yet ephemeral thing, so much a thing you feel, that you can’t hold, nor give justice to via meager words. South Shore for me represents the Soul of black folks. It’s where we turned a country club into a Cultural Center, and are turning a vacant grocery into what will be Chicago’s largest black-owned grocer.
Where activism meets Afrikan artistry meets the black bourgeoisie. Stony Island, Yates, Exchange 79th, 75th, 67th, the “Highlands.” All are markers for those who call South Shore home.īut the people, South Shore’s people, are what make it a cornerstone of Chicago, where newly minted “wealth” meets “ain’t we lucky we got ‘em” in one neighborhood. The South Shore skyline dotted with Moutoussamy buildings that peer from the background as you zip down Lake Shore Drive as it merges into South Shore Drive.
#Down south hustlers zip cracked
The smell of aquatic life mixes with spring breezes through newly cracked windows, the sound of the South Shore IC line (now Metra) screeching, the golden amber hues that cast their light at sunset, filling every blemish with flattery, only to be outdone by the sun’s ascent at dawn.