West Cook News

Western Springs Recreation Commission met May 1.

Here is the agenda provided by the Commission:

Call to Order:

Brian Piper, Chairperson

Approval of Minutes - Additions - Deletions - Changes:

Minutes of the meeting from April 3, 2017 (attached to email packet)

Citizen Comments:

Old Business:

New Business:

Reports:

1) Recreation Director and Staff Reports

a. Current Program Sessions -

b. Lacrosse -

c. Basketball

d. Seniors Programs -

e. Brochure - Summer

f. Tower Trot - BN/Walk For Ashley switch 

g. Special Events-New Spelling Bee for Bees 

h. Statistics Report 2016 (attached to email packet) 

i. Capital Projects Update - Rec Center HVAC 

j. Complaints/Comments -

2) Budget 

- 2017

3) Park District Board Meeting

- Park Board Packet in Correspondence File - Next meeting: Tues, May 9, 7:00 pm, Village Hall

4) S.E.A.S.P.A.R.

- Board Packet in Correspondence File 

- Believe & Achieve Dinner - May 17 

- Next Meeting: Tues, May 16, 3:30 pm, Downers Grove

5) Chairman and Commissioner's Reports

6) Trustee and Board Report

Correspondence File:

- Village Board Agendas - April 10 & 24 - Park Board Packet from - April 11 - Seaspar Board Packet from - April 18

Comments:

- Next Meeting: Mon, June 5

Adjournment:

This Day In History: May 1 1931 - President Herbert Hoover officially dedicates New York City's Empire State Building, pressing a button from the White House that turns on the building's lights. Hoover's gesture, of course, was symbolic; while the president remained in Washington, D.C., someone else flicked the switches in New York. The idea for the Empire State Building is said to have been born of a competition between Walter Chrysler of the Chrysler Corporation and John Jakob Raskob of General Motors, to see who could erect the taller building. Chrysler had already begun work on the famous Chrysler Building, the gleaming 1,046-foot skyscraper in midtown Manhattan. Not to be bested, Raskob assembled a group of well-known investors, including former New York Governor Alfred E. Smith. The group chose the architecture firm Shreve, Lamb and Harmon Associates to design the building. The Art-Deco plans, said to have been based in large part on the look of a pencil, were also builder-friendly: The entire building went up injust over a year, under budget (at $40 million) and well ahead of schedule. During certain periods of building, the frame grew an astonishing four-and-a-half stories a week. At the time of its completion, the Empire State Building, at 102 stories and 1,250 feet high (1,454 feet to the top of the lightning rod), was the world's tallest skyscraper. The Depression-era construction employed as many as 3,400 workers on any single day, most of whom received an excellent pay rate, especially given the economic conditions of the time. The new building imbued New York City with a deep sense of pride, desperately needed in the depths of the Great Depression, when many city residents were unemployed and prospects looked bleak. The grip of the Depression on New York's economy was still evident a year later, however, when only 25 percent of the Empire State's offices had been rented. In 1972, the Empire State Building lost its title as world's tallest building to New York's World Trade Center, which itself was the tallest skyscraper for but a year. Today the honor belongs to Dubai’s Burj Khalifa tower, which soars 2,717 feet into the sky.

1963 - James Whittaker of Redmond, Washington, becomes the first American to reach the Summit of Mt. Everest, the tallest mountain in the world. Located in the central Himalayas on the border of China and Nepal, Everest stands 29,028 feet above sea level. Called Chomo-Lungma, or “Mother Goddess of the Land,” by the Tibetans, the English named the mountain after Sir George Everest, an early 19th-century British surveyor of the Himalayas. In May 1953, climber and explorer Edmund Hillary of New Zealand and Tenzing Norgay of Nepal made the first successful climb of the peak. Queen Elizabeth II later knighted Hillary for the achievement. Ten years later, American James Whittaker reached Everest's summit with his Sherpa climbing partner, Nawang Gombu. The first American woman to successfully climb Everest was Stacy Allison in 1988.

Benefits of Parks & Recreation:

Father Time is not always a hard parent, and, though he tarries for none of his children, often lays his hand lightly upon those who have used him well; making them old men and women inexorably enough, but leaving their hearts and spirits young and in full vigour. With such people the grey head is but the impression of the old fellow's hand in giving them his blessing, and every wrinkle but a notch in the quiet calendar of a wellspent life.

-- Charles Dickens

Keep breathing. 

--Sophie Tucker when asked, at age 80, the secret of longevity.

http://www.wsprings.com/AgendaCenter/ViewFile/Agenda/_05012017-580