In Her Words: Connie Fairbanks Comes Full Circle in Chicago’s West Loop
From healthcare executive to cookbook author, Connie's path has led to a passion for uncovering and sharing the rich history of her adopted neighborhood.
I was born and raised in a Kansas town of 90 people in a close-knit family of five kids, a stay-at-home mom and father who had his own small business selling Ford tractors. I think my small town upbringing shaped me for the rest of my life. There were three streets, and we didn't have a stop sign. Everyone was blonde and blue eyed. Everyone knew everyone’s names, even all the dogs’ names. I went to grade school in a four-room school. We had two grades in one room. So, if you didn't get it one year, you got it the next. I had great teachers who really inspired me to learn and read. Miss Eula, in particular, was phenomenal. She read all the “We Were There” books to us.
After grade school, I took the bus 10 miles away to a consolidated high school, and I must say, I was pretty bored there, except for music. I had a great music teacher. I learned to play piano, and because I was one of the few who could, I accompanied all the musicals in our school. We did not have an orchestra. The piano was it. I remember one time while I was sharing the piano bench with someone else who was turning the page of the music for me, the bench broke in the middle of a performance. My hands were square on the piano, and we didn't miss a beat. That’s what happens in live performances. You’ve got to think in the moment.
I started out at Emporia State University as a piano major and I loved my teachers, but the five to six hours of practicing a day was not my cup of tea. Plus, my chances of going to Carnegie Hall were pretty slim. So, I switched to business. I think my piano teacher almost cried. Back then, there weren't that many women getting business majors, but I loved it. I worked in retail all through college and I graduated in three and a half years.
Navigating the Corporate World and Exploring Creativity
Throughout my career, I enjoyed finding “out of the box” ideas to solve problems. As a marketer, I helped lead the launch team for the first nicotine patch in the United States and developed some of the first direct to consumer ads on TV regarding smoking cessation and incontinence. I helped get smoking banned on airplanes. I also started a medical device company and took it public by raising $40M in the U.S. and Europe.
Back then, women were supposed to be a certain way in the workplace. There often weren't very many women in the room, and you couldn't show your other side of your personality that much. I always tried to keep my private life private. To get out of my corporate head, I took six months of acting classes at The Second City and it was a blast. One thing I learned there that stands out and still applies today is “Stay in the moment.” With improv, you really couldn't go forward or backwards. You had to stay in the moment, and you could just let anything spill out of your mouth. In the corporate world, you really can’t do that. Now, with cell phones and everything else, do people really pay attention to anything? I try to give people my time and attention and stay in the moment with them as much as I can.
Ventures into Acting and Cookbook Authoring
I have a SAG-AFTRA card. I was in a few commercials. And then, because I like to cook, I wrote a cookbook of one-page, seasonal menus with perfect pairings, etc., and I was appearing on TV all over the Midwest to promote it. That was really fun. One time, the producer of a TV show in Indianapolis called and told me he had to bump me for some person doing pet tricks. Another time someone did a newspaper feature article on me, but they ran somebody else’s photo with it instead of mine. I must have looked like his grandmother! When things like that happen, you just have to suck it up and move on. It sure wasn’t the worst thing that ever happened to me, and it won’t be the last.
I was hoping I would end up with my own cooking show, because they were so popular back then, but it didn't work out. I'm actually glad it didn't at that point because my niece in Kansas City, who I was very close to, got very sick with breast cancer. She was only 30-something when she was diagnosed. I was her caregiver for seven years, which meant I would travel there about every three weeks to take her to treatments, clean, cook, and do whatever was needed until she passed away. I was available, and I was very happy to be part of her and her husband's life.
After my niece died, I was looking for the next project. I had lived in the West Loop since the late 90s and I decided to go on a neighborhood tour. I went and I thought, “There's more to the West Loop than this.” I decided to write a book on it. It took five years of research. I interviewed 100 people. I didn't have a note taker, so I recorded the interviews all on my iPhone and then transcribed them. I did a lot of research, especially at the Harold Washington Special Collections. I actually dedicated my books to all the librarians in Special Collections at Harold Washington, because they were so amazing. They really helped me and taught me how to dig, dig, dig. Sometimes they would run down halls after me saying “Connie, did you think about this?” Part of this was during COVID. Maybe they were just glad to see people.
Even if I never make a dime from the book, it was one of my most awesome experiences. I thought only a couple people would talk to me, but so many people were so happy that people were interested in this neighborhood. Now I’m getting the word out that there's so much history here, and there's so much good to come over here, and it's not just the restaurants. If we don’t record history, it fades away through the generations.
Here’s a coincidence: I live right across the street from a park named after Mary Bartleme, the first female judge in Illinois. I did research for a live podcast last summer in the park, and this was the site of the Eye and Ear Infirmary for 80 years, run by Dr. Holmes. Guess where Dr. Holmes was from? He moved here because his office got burnt down in the Loop during the Chicago Fire of 1871. Before that he came from Dedham, MA, where my family is from. The Fairbanks’ house is still there! It gave me chills when I read that. Isn't that amazing? You can tell I’m passionate about the research.
It's been a fantastic project. It’s been really fun, and it's had so many legs. Recently I gave a tour of the neighborhood for Kent State University’s architecture department. This summer, I'll be doing tours in the West Loop for hire; one starting in Union Park, and one starting in Mary Bartelme Park. We're doing a podcast this summer live in Union Park, and there's one already scheduled for Lincoln Park at the Chicago History Museum on June 18. I’m also an interpreter at The Rookery, which is a Frank Lloyd Wright building. I love Frank Lloyd Wright. We did have a Frank Lloyd Wright apartment building in the West Loop, but it's been torn down.
Preserving History Through Landmark Designations
Believe it or not, in the West Loop we have 19 historical designations. They're National Register of Historic Places and Chicago landmarks. The only building that has that designation and has the plaque is Old St. Pat's Church, because the congregation paid for it. So I have another project where I'm working with our aldermen, and the Chamber of Commerce, and we're going building by building to encourage the owners to get plaques. If they’re willing to spend the couple grand to buy the plaques, I’ll write the descriptions for them. We want to highlight architects and history in this neighborhood. This neighborhood was awful at one time. There were prostitutes and it was Skid Row. But before that, it was a fashionable area. Ashland Avenue was where all the movers and shakers lived. It was also an industrial area.
I guess my interest in history goes back to those “We Were There” books in grade school. Now I live close to the Jane Addams Hull-House, which was the topic of one of the books we studied as a kid. I really want to tell the stories of the people who came before us because how can you go forward if you don't know where you've been?
If you were to go back in time and give advice to your 25-year-old self, what would you tell her?
I’d probably say, “Don't work so much. Work smarter.” But we were in a time when we had to be at 120 or 130% just to get ahead, because there were so few women at the table. You really did have to excel, and you really needed to find a mentor.
My husband went to Cornell, which is an Ivy League school. I was the first in my family to graduate from college and I paid for all my college expenses myself. I didn’t even know what an Ivy League school was. I think if I could have gone to an Ivy League, it would have been a little bit easier. You can do fine by just getting a good education or be skilled at a trade, but I see the connections that my husband has. It’s quite different. To give back and teach kids the importance of an education, I was a volunteer tutor for 27 years at Partners in Education. (My husband was on Speed Dial for math questions!)
I don't have a lot of regrets. Move on. Next. That's always been my motto. I’m used to rejection. Next. Nothing ventured, nothing gained.
Belle Curve Stories is about women navigating life with grit, grace and growth. What do those three words mean to you?
I'm going to start with grace. I love where I came from, which was a poor family. Everyone in the town was in the same boat. I won't use my cell phone in the checkout lane because the cashiers deserve my respect. I always say thank you to the bus drivers when I get off. Sometimes people in these roles don't have the opportunities, or they don't want to be in charge or write a book or be a CEO, but they all have a job to do, and they should all be treated with dignity and respect. My mother still says, “Remember your manners and do the right thing.”
As for growth, “Keep learning.” The piano has really taught me that. Practice makes perfect. Don't give up. Just keep going. And a week later and repetition, I can play this scale. You do whatever needs to be done, and you execute your plan. I see a lot of things that don't work, because no one wants to do the work. It may not all be fun or glamorous, but you got to do the work.
Grit means hard work. I grew up in a small town. My dad and mom worked hard. By the time I was out of high school, they were solidly middle class, which was really good. And they always said, “Get a good education. You have to pay for it, but get a good education.” Hard work is really important. Our neighborhood park was going to hell because there was trash everywhere. So a group of us got together and for nine years, we've been cleaning our park every Monday morning during the season. People come up to me and ask, “How do I get this job? Who pays you?” It’s not paid. It’s a volunteer thing. You don't need a meeting. All you need is a T-shirt, some gloves, and some trash bags. You just do it instead of talking about it.
As told to and edited by Teresa Bellock and Sandra Ditore
Connie Fairbanks, 70, is the author of Chicago’s West Loop, Then and Now. A former healthcare marketing executive, she brings her passion for history and storytelling to life in her writing. Connie and her husband, Kirk Twiss, reside in Chicago’s West Loop, where they have witnessed the neighborhood’s transformation firsthand.
