Judicial Center

October 1, 2009

The large building to the left is the new $15 million Judicial Center, across 5th Street from the Ogle County Courthouse built in 1891.[Not able as yet to post the photo -- aerial view of Judicial Center and old Courthouse] The new building was dedicated and opened for business in August of 2005 and is expected to take care of court business in this county for at least 100 more years. Bill Fearer III told me it was considered state of the art in the State of Illinois. The 1891 Courthouse took care of business for 114 years and will continue to house several county offices.

When I first started to practice law here in 1983, the Courthouse was being renovated and we had court in the old Nash School a block away. I didn’t go inside the new Judicial Center, because when it’s over it’s over. Being away 13 years means it’s over. The fat lady has already sung her last note.

There are now four judges on the bench in this new center -- Steve Pemberton, Mike Mallon, Bob Hanson and Kathleen Kaufman. We knew Steve Pemberton when he was at Fearer & Nye. Mike Mallon was in Rochelle with Jack Roe, now retired, and Jack’s son, Ben, is now State’s Attorney. Bob Hansen and I used to play raquetball every week during the 15 years I practiced law here and Bob also was an assistant public defender. Kathleen Kaufman was an Assistant State’s Attorney and we worked many cases together. Both Bob and Kathleen were a pleasure to work with.

I went over to the Ogle County Newspapers on 4th Street to see if they had an old copy of the Judicial Center dedication and they were so nice. They remembered me and copied old articles, including the special supplement that was prepared back then. I was happy to see Vinde Wells and Earline Hinton and it was fun to visit with them both. They both sought statements back then when I was representing this or that client. Thank God they didn’t ask for an interview now as the answer would have been a polite NO THANKS.

Oregon Update

September 29, 2009

Lois and I drove around Oregon IL today and learned a bunch of things. We saw Pinehill where we lived for 14 years and the house on 4th St. where we lived for eight years. We walked through Conover Square -- the old piano factory turned into a community shopping mall. The old court house is being worked on, but the new court facility across 5th St. is amazing.

Lois had a quick visit with Maureen Keuthe, her high school best friend along with Lea Bartow. That’s Maureen and Lois pictured above. George stopped in to see Ed and Lil McCanse at their home and also had a quick visit with Lori Peters who was mowing he front lawn. Lori and Tom Peters were our neighbors across the street from our 4th St. house in Oregon. A long and friendly phone call with Bill Fearer III was very rewarding.

So here’s what we learned today from all these people:

· My old friend in the law, Doug Floski, who was once my assistant public defender and later State’s Attorney, ran for circuit judge against Mike Mallon and lost. He is now practising law with Rick Hahn and Dave Smith.
· My former law rival and former State’s Attorney, Dennis Schumacher, is about to become a former attorney because he will probably lose his license to practice law. The allegations at trial were Dennis hit upon women clients he was representing in divorce cases; about six of them came forward to testify against him.
· My old friend and former judge, Alan Cargerman, went back on the bench in Kane County about five years ago. He was the best judge I ever appeared before in Ogle County.
· Georgia Svoboda, our neighbor across the street from Pinehill, passed away about two years ago. She and her husband, Frank, were two of the nicest people we ever met.
· Tom Peters is president of the school board and has two years to go. Tom and Lori’s children are attending Princeton and Dartmouth. Tom and Lori are looking forward to retiring up to Minoqua WI.
· Bill Fearer II, my old friend and contemporary, passed away a year ago and his house is up for sale as his widow, Terry, moved to Arizona.
· Bill Fearer III has children attending SMU and Baylor; he and Mary Ann hope to get a place in the Dallas area where they can spend their winters and still live in Oregon. Bill still likes to bike, play tennis and golf.
· Ed and Lillian McCanse spend their time at home, sold their motor home and do not drive. They have in-home care as they both are suffering from alzheimer’s dementia. They did not recognize me at first, but after a while they became much more cogent.
· Maureen Keuthe has skin cancer on her scalp (the spreading type) and will need surgery soon. She was a wonderful athlete and spent years in the sun. Remember, the sun is not your friend. In the photo above she is the picture of health and is always smiling. Maureen’s husband, Homer (92) hasn’t been out of the house in two years but passes his annual physical exam with flying colors. That’s what we hope to do -- pass everything with flying colors.
· Chris E. Martin, former Ogle County Treasurer with whom I worked on a case years ago, now has an office for Byron Bank on the corner of 4th and Washington, next door to where my law office used to be.

Family Fest

September 27, 2009

Today was “family fest” day at Scott’s house on Songbird Lane, which Jordan refers to as “Insane Lane.” It all came together very well. Lois and her two sons, Brad Cain[48] on the left and Scott Cain[58] on the right, were having a great time. The party started about one P.M. and lasted until about five. The food array included pork tenderloin, a fresh vegetable salad from Brad’s and Scott’s garden, Lois’ three-bean hot dish, and lois’ famous goulash.

Scott called at mid-morning from 90 miles away. He went to Charleston IL to watch EIU play UW-Milwaukee -- the first encounter for both teams. Co-Captain Chase Cain played the whole game with a broken right hand. She intended to come back with her Dad, but she had practice and homework which prevented her from doing so. Her cast goes from the mid-forearm down to her knuckles. She has a thumb and two fingers free. In spite of all that she made 12 tackles in the game. EIU won the game 28 - 27, by making a three-point field goal at the end of the game. UW dominated, but EIU took it away in the final seconds of the game. Scott described it as “an ugly win. but the 18th consecutive win for EIU.”

Brad brought a bunch of tomatoes, brussel sprouts, green peppers, squash and onions from his garden.They really looked good. Bradley, his son, decided not to come and we don’t blame him because we have seen him maybe four times in the last 13 years.

Jordon and Trey showed up and we had a nice visit. Jordon works for a group of doctors at Rockford Clinic, She is particularly well suited to deal with patients on the phone and recently she was named “employee of the month” at Rockford Clinic.

Laura and Steve called while the family fest was going on. We passed the phone around and they got to talk to everyone. This has been the best family get together in years, Lois concluded. Whatever issues people have were left at home and that made everything that much more pleasant.

Lo 'n Pat

September 25, 2009

We spent most of the day with Pat Scadden at her home, for lunch and for dinner. Lois and Pat go back 60 years. Lois was 20 when she met Pat at Cable Printing Co. in Mt. Morris and Pat was then 18. Over the years these two have spent a lot of time together. Lois’ family used to spend the holidays together with Pat and Bill Scadden, who passed away over four years ago.

It was fun to get together again. The two ladies seem to have picked up where they left off. Pat lives in the same beautiful house which they built 23 years ago. She showed us the two beautiful bathrooms she just had remodelled. HDTV is Pat’s favorite TV channel and house redecorating is her favorite hobby. She told us of the plans she has to redo the floors in the main part of the house and to replace the furniture which she now has.

Another important part of Pat’s life is Swedish American Hospital. She just completed working there most of the summer. She retired from there after more than 30 years of service. She gets called back to fill in for vacations or to fill a vacancy while a new hire is being interviewed. Pat told us how much she enjoys working there.

We went to lunch at Garrett’s on Bell School Road, which is part of the Golf Shack. The food is excellent there and we all had something different. For dinner we went to a fish dinner at the Hoffman House, a place we have not visited in years. We had enough left over for fish sandwiches so we asked for a take-out box.

Three Generations

September 26, 2009

Lois has two Bradleys. The one on the right is her son, Brad, age 48. The one on the left is her grandson, Bradley, age 15, and a Jr. Tackle member of the Oregon Hawks. The Oregon Hawks played the Morrison Colts at Morrison IL this morning and got blown away 26 - 8. Bradley and his friend thought the refs did a bad job but we could plainly see the Morrison team was much bigger than the Oregon boys who played well.

Thanks to Scott’s generosity, we used his car to drive the 82 miles to Morrison. We left at eight A.M. and got there by 9:30 A.M. The game started at ten. Jr. Tackle has nine-minute quarters and uses the two-point conversion, because the kickers haven’t had the experience to be accurate about the point after between the goal posts. Brad explained the game to us as we watched. This was the first time in 40 years that Lois observed a school game since Scott played at Rock Valley College. [Brad was a fine baseball player, but never played school football.]

Morrison got four touchdowns (24) one two-point conversion. The first two touchdowns were in the early minutes of the first quarter. They came into this game at 4 - 2 for the season and now are 5 - 2. Oregon answered in the second quarter with a touchdown and a two-point conversion. They came into the game at 5 - 1 and now are also 5 - 2.

Bradley’s name was mentioned several times during the game for making tackles. He was also on the receiving end of kickoffs for the first time this season. He played on the line for both offense and defense and, except for a minute or two, played the whole game.

It was good to visit with these two Bradleys -- a father-son team who live together in Pop and Gram’s old house. For the last year or so these two have worked out a good routine in their daily living which allows them both to spend lots of time together.

Locals dominate on rugby field

Chase Cain (Dean's List) and Grandma Lois; this photo did not appear in the newspaper.

September 23, 2009

Jay Taft of the Rockford Register Star covers college sports for the newspaper and today he wrote this following item in his daily column:

Led by Chase Cain (Jefferson), the Eastern Illinois women’s rugby team extended its winning streak to 19 games by opening 3 - 0 with a trio of blowout victories.

Cain leads the team with 37 tackles and she set a school record with five steals (similar to a fumble recovery) during the team’s 61 - 5 win over Iowa State on Saturday. EIU has also knocked off Ball State 90 - 0 and Grand Valley State 35 - 0 this season.

Emily Harrison (Jefferson), with an assist, four tackles and a steal on the year, also has an important role on the team as the starting lock.

Top Cat Chase Cain, senior rugby player

September 23, 2009

The photo of Lois’ granddaughter, Chase Cain, was taken from the Eastern Illinois University student newspaper, September 10th edition. The following article by Neil Schneider, staff reporter is quoted verbatim as follows:

The Eastern rugby team defeated Ball State 90 - 0 on Sept. 5.

The score indicated the Eastern offense was putting up strong numbers, but it was also an impressive day for senior Chase Cain and the rest of the team’s defense.

Cain finished the game against Ball State with a career-high 19 solo tackles, which ranks her third on the all-time Eastern single-game tackling mark for rugby.

Cain also ranks second, behind teammate Stephanie Militello, for all-time tackling leader for the program.

Head coach Frank Graziano believes Cain’s fitness is a strong reason why she is able to tackle so effectively.

Half of the battle of being a good tackler is the ability to get around the field and get to the ball as soon as possible,” Graziano said. “There are prbably girls on the team that have a better technique of tackling than Chase, but they do not have the fitness or the desire to tackle as she does. Half of (Cain’s) tackling is having the desire to go in and make the tackle.”

Cain’s teammate, junior flanker Tiffany Kennedy, said Cain’s endurance and knowledge of the game helped her develop into a strong contributor for the team.

“Her defense is probably untouchable when it comes to this team,” Kennedy said. “Her tackling and experience of defending certain situations has really helped her develop her game.”

Despite the high praise by teammates and coaches alike, Cain actually didn’t come to Eastern to play rugby. She came to swim. It wasn’t until she realized she could do both at the same time that she finallhy took up an interest in rugby.

“It wasn’t until I spoke with (senior center) Ashley Jenkins that I realized that I could play both sports.” Cain said.
“Since rugby is more of a team sport, I kind of decided to pursue it further as opposed to going forward with swimming.”

Cain, a flanker, credited the Eastern coaching staff for her quick introduction and development in the game of rugby.

“(Graziano) really knows the game of rugby and that has allowed the team to advance and develop much quicker,” Cain said. “Coach teaches methods that aren’t used by many other teams, which puts us ahead of a lot of other teams. Most teams don’t even know, or have ever seen, the passing techniques that we have developed and applied to our game.”

Even though the rugby team opened the season with a win, Cain said she would like to see the momentum continue. The rugby team currently has a winning streak of 17 games.

“We want to go undefeated again and we want to continue with our streak of consecutive wins,” Cain said. “We would also like to put up as many shut outs as possible this season.”

Chase Cain BIO: From Cherry Valley, High School: Rockford Jefferson Major: Psychology and Family Consumer Services 2008: Co-Captain, Co-Outstanding Defense Award, Then-career best 15 tackles vs. Kansas, Three double-digit tackle games.