Back in 1893, wealthy bankers and industrialists purchased the 640-acre McAllister Farm, developed it into a large residential and commercial area and annexed it to the city of Chicago. Streetcar magnate DeLancey Louderbeck named the project after his boyhood home: Albany, New York. Twenty years later, Albany Park had seven thousand residents, and commercial land was valued at $52 per frontal foot. By 1940, Albany Park reported 56,692 inhabitants, and the cost per commercial frontal foot had jumped to more than $3,000.
By 1965, Albany Park was an established neighborhood and a pastel mural of diversity. Its tree-lined streets and parks had become beacons for European immigrants. They came from Poland, from Sweden, from Russia and Germany. Many were refugees. They fled the Russian pogroms, the devastation of the First World War and the ravages of the Second World War. A person waiting for a bus on the corner of Lawrence and Kimball might hear seven different languages.
When the man reached a redbrick three-flat with a FOR RENT sign hanging on the front gate, he stopped. He consulted his paper, nodded, walked up four concrete steps and pressed the door buzzer.
“I’m here to see about the apartment,” he said to the woman who answered the door.
“Oh, well, I can tell you straight off, it’s lovely,” she said. “And it’s currently vacant.” She appeared to be middle-aged, a tad over five foot six, and was neatly dressed in a fitted dress, navy with small white polka dots. Her shoulder-length auburn hair had soft curls. He thought she had a pleasant face.
“My name is Ruth Gold,” she said.
She looked him over as well. He was square-shouldered and handsome in his suit, and his shoes were shined, always a good sign for Ruth. He seemed well mannered. In some ways, he reminded her of Cary Grant. He must be a downtown businessman, she concluded, though she detected the hint of a European accent.
“My name is Eli,” he said with a smile and a slight nod. “Eli Rosen.”
She took a step back and tipped her head toward the apartment door. “The unit is right here on the first floor, a very nice one-bedroom with a full kitchen. The former tenants moved to Skokie. It’s only been available for three weeks.” She unlocked the apartment door and beckoned him to enter. “Rent’s one hundred and sixty dollars a month, payable in advance, promptly on the first.”
The apartment was spotless. The kitchen was small but certainly sufficient for Eli. Two windows overlooked a small patch of grass and bushes in the front. The floor was covered in patterned linoleum. He nodded. “I think this will do nicely, Mrs. Gold,” he said.
“What is your line of work, Mr. Rosen, if I may ask?”
“I work for the government.”
Ruth’s eyes widened. “The government? Oh, my goodness.”
Eli smiled. “Just an office desk job. Really quite unexciting.”
Ruth nervously tipped her head from side to side, hesitated and then said, “I know this is kind of awkward, but I have to inform you that we have rules. This is a quiet building. There’s just my eighty-two-year-old mother, my twenty-five-year-old daughter and me. I mean, you don’t look the type, but we don’t want any wild parties or loud music or drugs, you know?”
“I’m not the type, Mrs. Gold.”
“Hmm. Okay. So do you want the apartment? I have other people that might be interested.”
He took a money clip from his pocket and counted out one hundred and sixty dollars. “I’ll take it,” he said with a warm smile. “You can tell all those other interested people that it’s been rented.”
Ruth took the money and shook his hand. “Welcome to Albany Park, Mr. Rosen.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
CHICAGO
ALBANY PARK NEIGHBORHOOD
MAY 1965
In her bedroom in the second-floor apartment, with her arms contorted up over her shoulders, twenty-five-year-old Mimi Gold struggled with the zipper and clasp of her new two-piece dress. “Mom,” she called, “would you please come help me?”
“I love that dress, Mimi,” Ruth Gold said as she fastened the hook and eye.
Mimi did a quick spin and her pleated dress twirled. “$49.95 at Bonwit’s. How do I look?”
“Fabulous!”
“Do I look professional? I’m on assignment tonight.”
“I thought you were going to Christine’s engagement party.”
“I am, but I’m also covering it for the Trib. If I’m lucky, I’ll get a few columns on the society page.”
“Is Nathan going with you?”
“Are you snooping, Mom?”
Ruth smiled and bit her lip. “I don’t know, maybe. You seem to be seeing quite a bit of one another.”
Mimi smiled and kissed her mother on the cheek. “Okay, I forgive you. Nathan is a close friend of Preston’s. He’ll be at the party as well. I’m sure we’ll meet up, but we’re not going together.”
Ruth disappeared into the kitchen and returned with a cake plate covered in foil. “Mimi, before you go, would you mind taking this cake down to Mr. Rosen? He moved into the Levinsons’ apartment last week.”
“Does Mr. Rosen have a family? The Levinsons were pretty crowded in that little apartment.”
She chuckled. “Yes, they were. I’m sure that’s why they moved. Mr. Rosen is a single man. Very nice-looking.”
Mimi raised her eyebrows and smiled. “Do you have your eyes on him, Mom?”
“I do not! He’s quite the gentleman, but there’s something about him, Mimi. I sense an air of purpose. There’s a reason he’s moving into this neighborhood. A man like that doesn’t just wander down Lawndale and ring my doorbell. He’s very polished and very professional. You have to wonder why isn’t he renting an apartment on the Gold Coast or on Lake Shore Drive? Why Albany Park?”
“Maybe he likes quiet neighborhoods.”
Ruth wasn’t convinced. “No, there’s something more. He says he works for the government.”
“What branch of the government?”
Ruth shrugged. “I don’t know. He looks like James Bond to me. Maybe he’s a spy?”
“In Albany Park? In a one-bedroom apartment? That’s his purpose, to be a spy in Albany Park?” Mimi giggled. “James Bond of Lawndale Street! Seriously, Mom?”
She shrugged again. “Okay, maybe the FBI. But I’m telling you, he’s here for a reason. I have a nose for these things.”
Mimi laughed, took the plate, inhaled deeply and smiled. “I have a nose for Grandma’s cake. Can I have a piece?”
“No.”
“How is she feeling tonight?”
“Much better,” Ruth said, and nodded her head in the direction of the living room. “She’s watching the news. You know she has a crush on Chet Huntley.”
Grandma was sitting on the couch, straight and tall. No slouching allowed, as she would say. Her silver hair was permed, and a print robe hung loosely from her thin shoulders. Her eyes were glued to the nightly news and an interview with a NASA engineer at Cape Kennedy.
“The leak in the Gemini Four rocket has been repaired,” the engineer said to David Brinkley. “Lift-off is a go for Thursday.”