Features

Critics’ Choice
by Carla and Allen Kelson
Our reviewers’ favorite 25 restaurants and affordable alternatives

The Making of Jeff Fort
by Tom Brune and James Ylisela, Jr.
From charismatic kid to convicted terrorist. Couldn’t this story have turned out better?

Portraits of the Artist
by Patty Carroll
Making the acquaintance of people who make art

The Gene Pool
by David Jackson
The folks in the Sawyer brain trust don’t have city jobs, don’t hold meetings, and avoid the public eye.

Chicago Story: The Day Time Got on Track
by Robert W. Shoemaker
How some visionary railroaders turned chaos into clockwork

Working Poor
by Lynda Gorov
Five kids, two jobs, $375 a week: Breaking the welfare cycle.

Picture Perfect
by M. W. Newman
Hedrich-Blessing finds the poetry in steel, glass and stone.

Ya Habibi: An Arab Childhood
by Raymond Hanania
Of grape leaves, superstitions, and Hollywood terrorists

Departments

Letters

Journal
by Hillel Levin, editor
Nothing would be more dangerous than letting extremists rule the day.

Metro
by David Jackson
The first church of Richard Mell; geese behind bars – and reporters who’d like to be

Artworks
by Henry Hanson
Gallery crowd hits the streets; Burroughs takes aim at new target; Hair lets it all hang out.

Chicago Woman
by Marcia Froelke Coburn
Equal riders take to the road, proving that there’s more than one way to keep a woman’s motor running.

Execs
by Sally Saville Hodge
The Iranian Woman of the Year, the Japanese ice-cream machine, and other matters of import

Books
St. Studs crosses the Great Divide into America of the moment.

Theatre
by Anthony Adler
Onstage, Nicole Hallander’s cartoon wise-ass Sylvia takes on a life of her own.

Movies
by Penelope Mesic
In The Thin Blue Line, a philosopher-filmmaker tells the grim truth about getting framed.

Back Talk
by Henry Hanson
Koko Taylor, Margaret Hillis, Gordon Sinclair, City Hall sleepwalkers, and Essee Kup

Chicago Guides
Events

Dining

On WFMT