Tributes to STOP co-founder and “Woodlawn Mayor” Wardell Lavender
By the Chicago Tribune and Hyde Park Herald
By Southside Together Organizing for Power
It is with the heaviest of hearts that we share that Wardell Lavender, a co-founder of STOP, recently passed away. Our thoughts and prayers go out to his family.
Wardell was a guiding light, a source of joy and comfort, a real leader, a master base-builder, and a dear friend to so many.
His face was known and loved by everyone in the community.
Wardell was the stuff of legend. He traveled the world and the country. He shared tables with Mayor Washington, businessmen, and the homeless. Always dapper in his Cadillac, he was known across the city, from smoke filled pool rooms to picket lines; banned from casinos because he was too lucky; and kicked out of City Hall because his voice would not be silenced.
Wardell once owned a Harold’s Chicken Shack, where he got the nickname “the Chicken Man.” He was also known in the community as “baby chick” and “Rodriguez” (which none of us ever understood). But the nickname he most earned was “the Mayor of Woodlawn.”
Wardell fought to save affordable housing, save City mental health clinics, and bring a trauma center to the University of Chicago. He fought for labor rights and immigrants rights, and he fought with and for the poor and working people of Woodlawn — for their right to live with dignity and respect. He always brought youthful energy and joy to the movement; he loved to say “viva the struggle,” or “long live the struggle.”
Wardell built and activated a base of literally hundreds of people in causes for racial and economic justice and progressive political leadership. He knocked on thousands of doors, putting canvassers 50 years his junior to shame. He made thousands of phone calls, flyered, marched, offered rides, and participated in countless meetings. But what will perhaps most be missed is his kindness and compassion. He lent a hand to so many in the community without judgment and treated everyone with dignity. He did all this with a beautiful smile that will be sorely missed.
To the Mayor of Woodlawn: You will forever remain in the hearts of the STOP family and movements across Chicago. We are grateful to have struggled and laughed and danced with you… “viva the struggle”!
Rest in Power.
By Duff Morton, long-time STOP member
People often call Wardell Lavender the Mayor of Woodlawn, and that seems correct, but I would like to remember him in another way, too. I’d like to remember Wardell as a lighthouse. Mayors order people around – or, at least, some mayors order people around. Lighthouses make people shine with light.
There is a memory that I cherish of Wardell, volunteering on the campaign of a candidate whose name I’m not going to mention. It was a cold, sunny day in an empty back office somewhere. Wardell and I were sitting at two long folding tables, making phone calls for the candidate, reading the phone numbers off of paper lists that the campaign had given us. Most of the volunteers were taking maybe a minute or two to make each phone call – Hi, please remember to vote for our candidate. Thank you for your support. And I myself felt pretty special if I could get someone to stay on the phone for three minutes. But Wardell was spending five or ten minutes for each call.
So I wondered what was going on, and I started eavesdropping. Call after call, Wardell seemed to know the people on the other end of the line. He was chatting like an old friend. What’s new? How’s your father doing? Do you still have that cat?
And when he talked to each person, you could see him shining; you could tell that people were shining back.
That’s how well Wardell knew people: if you handed him a random list of phone numbers in Woodlawn, he had a connection to everyone on the list. That’s how much light he brought into the world.
Also, I can remember the way that Wardell wrapped up his phone calls that day. He wouldn’t say, Our candidate is number one. He would say, We’re going to elect this guy. And if he doesn’t do right, we’ll kick him out in four years. That line made me smile and it still makes me smile, because it shows where Wardell’s faith lies. It’s not faith in an alderman or a congressperson. It’s faith in the “we,” the “us,” the people who use their power to change their world – and change it again in four years.
I remember Wardell’s calm smile, his generosity, the peace that I felt. I feel so grateful that he let some of his light shine on me. And I hope that we can keep reflecting that light so that new people, the people he did not have time to meet, can start to see themselves illuminated with the brightness and the power that he left behind for us to share.
