Max Blaisdell

2 days ago | hpherald.com | Max Blaisdell

Local State Sen. Robert Peters (D-13th) announced Tuesday morning that he’s running for Congress in the Second District in the 2026 midterm elections.

6 days ago | hpherald.com | Max Blaisdell

After nearly two decades of pouring his own money into a beloved summer festival, Eric Williams is asking the community for help. The founder and owner of the Silver Room, 1506 E. 53rd St., a Hyde Park cultural space and retail store, has launched a fundraiser to pay off hundreds of thousands of dollars in debts stemming from past iterations of the Silver Room Block Party.

1 week ago | hpherald.com | Max Blaisdell

When Anne-Laure Schellenberg talks about food waste on 53rd Street, she doesn’t start with climate change or methane emissions. She starts with rats. “People don’t always realize it, but food scraps in dumpsters are part of what feeds the rodent problem,” she said. “But if you guys compost, you won't have rat issues.”For the past two years, Schellenberg, a Hyde Park resident with a background in sales, has been quietly laying the groundwork for a food scrap composting pilot along 53rd Street.

1 week ago | hpherald.com | Max Blaisdell

As he stepped through the doors of Play Toys and Books in Hyde Park, Mayor Brandon Johnson couldn’t help but beam. The plethora of toys and the vibrancy of their colors, he said, reminded him of the rapture he felt walking into a toy store as a child. “It’s just so exciting,” Johnson added. The newly opened toy store in the old Toys Et Cetera storefront, 1502 E. 55th St., served as the backdrop Monday morning for the city’s official commencement of national small business week.

1 week ago | hpherald.com | Max Blaisdell

A coalition of University of Chicago students, staff, and community members relaunched the Popular University for Gaza on the main quad last week despite widespread fears of a nationwide crackdown on pro-Palestinian speech. Roughly 60 people gathered last Monday afternoon for the opening rally of the renewed Popular University. Though the demonstration was peaceful, with chants and speakers using low-decibel megaphones, it was met with what Rev.