Unfinished Stories of Chicago

Melissa Harris ’02 had just joined the Chicago Tribune as a columnist in 2009 when a colleague recommended she read the 1967 Division Street: America. Written by famed Chicago journalist and radio personality Studs Terkel, the book contains oral histories from 71 Chicagoans whom he had interviewed in the late ’60s. “I wanted to know if any of these people were still alive, still in Chicago, what happened to their dreams,” says Harris, “and then that journalistic curiosity took over.” 

Years later, when Harris learned that the audio tapes of Terkel’s original interviews were being digitized by the Library of Congress, she reached out to Pulitzer Prize–winning journalist Mary Schmich, a former Tribune colleague. Harris shared her copy of Division Street, along with the research she had compiled on some of the book’s subjects. After some consideration, Schmich said, “OK, let’s make a podcast.”  

“That was one of the best days of my life,” recalls Harris, now CEO at the marketing communications firm M. Harris & Co. She and Schmich co-executive produced Division Street Revisited, a limited podcast series, with Schmich as writer and narrator. Each of the seven episodes delves into the life of one of Terkel’s interviewees, including closeted gay actor Bill Koza and Civil Rights activist and janitor Myra Alexander. 

The Division Street team, front row, from left, Melissa Harris, Mary Schmich and Bill Healy. Back row, from left: Chris Walz, Mark Jacob, Cate Cahan, Chijioke Williams and Libby Lussenhop. Photo by Alex Garcia '89.

Though the original seven subjects had died in the decades since the book was published, Harris and Schmich were able to track down enough family members to piece together their histories. “All we had to start was basically a couple of paragraphs and some tape from 1967,” says Harris. “A lot could happen — and a lot did happen — in these families, so there were many unexpected discoveries.” 

Harris and Schmich recruited a stellar production team for the podcast, including Mark Jacob, a former adjunct professor at the Medill School of Journalism, Media and Integrated Marketing Communications; Bill Healy ’07, ’09 MS, an adjunct professor of journalism; and Libby Lussenhop ’22 MA. Editor Cate Cahan and associate producer Chijioke Williams rounded out the team. (Read Healy’s My Northwestern Direction essay, “Deep Listening Reveals Shared Humanity.”)

When Cahan, a former audio editor for WBEZ, suggested Healy as a producer, Jacob, another editor on the project, was all for working with his former student. “Bill was … one of those students you remember because he’s always got something to say,” Jacob recalls. “And it doesn’t hurt that he won both a Peabody and a Pulitzer Prize last year either.”  

Once onboard, Healy suggested Lussenhop for sound designer. Healy taught Lussenhop in his Northwestern documentary audio class. “She represents the best of what a student–teacher relationship at Northwestern can be, which is an ongoing mentorship,” Healy says.