1958 Letter from Village President

To the Residents of Midlothian,

As the President of the Board of Trustees and the Village of Midlothian, I am proud to send you this report of what your local government has been doing during the past year.

Midlothian continues to grow in population and in importance in this southwest portion of Cook County. It is fast becoming a significant shopping center; a village of homes with ample school and recreational facilities; a village with improved roads, plenty of water and adequate sewers; a village protected by a top-notch volunteer fire department and an efficient police force.

Significant I think, is the work of all members of the Board of Trustees who devote their time and energies without remuneration to the welfare of the residents of Midlothian. We have a strong board – ready to work together after decisions have been made – but unwilling to act without full discussion and careful planning.

I hope you will all study this report and make use of it.

Respectfully submitted,

Henry J. Milen
Village President

1958 Village of Midlothian Board

President - Henry J. Milen

Trustee - Ch. Finance – John F. Goonrey

Trustee - Ch. Public Safety – Vernon G. Swillum

Trustee - Ch. Building – Walter B. Samet

Trustee - Ch. Roads and Drainage – Fred Massat

Trustee - Ch. Water and Sewer – Roy Steffen

Trustee - Ch. Public Relations – Wilbert E. Scharlau

Clerk - Nelle E. Burton

Treasurer – Glen L. Pyles

Police Magistrate – Louis Sannito

Attorney - Walter B. Briody

Engineer - Raymond W. Robinson

Chief of Police – John A. Ward, Jr.

Captain - Anthony Dell

Lieutenant - Walter Pence

Sergeant - Dominick Chiaro

Chief of Fire Department – Frank J. Wiswell

Chief of Fire Prevention – Charles N. Anderson

Superintendent of Public Works – William E. Bay, Jr.

Building Inspector – Martin Steinhagen

Zoning Board Chairman – John S. Knight

Zoning Board Secretary – James N. Lesparre

Police and Fire Commissioners – Charles B. Largen, James M. Kennedy, Louis M. Kalis

Health Officer – Carl E. Smith, M.D.

Civil Defense – Louis M. Kalis

Library Board Chairman – Albert Clifton

Business Office (Office) Manager – Kay Skedd

Business Office Relief Clerk – Laurane Tull

Secretary - Elaine Hoeltgen

Introducing The Village of Midlothian History Blog

One of the most challenging hurdles to overcome when faced with continuing to transcribe historical and/or official documents into a digital format is the human capital expenditure.  Even with typing skills in the 90’s or even the 100’s, the actuarial formulas guiding our “Economy” continue to churn out a “too expensive” conclusion for this particular side of life.

I am hoping those that come here seeking historical-based knowledge about Midlothian, Illinois will be patient with the time frame involved with this type of a project.  I cannot update it on a daily basis and when I do update it, there will be multiple entries due to help coming in from a variety of sources with the same erratic schedule issues I face.

I have had the honor and priviledge to interact with so many amazing people here in this Village and the surrounding communities and hope this effort serves this community well.  It really is a Village built on pride…

Pride in a good day’s work for a good day’s pay…

Pride in having time to indulge in a little bit of fun because the tasks and chores can wait just a moment or two longer because there’s still enough daylight to get a game of baseball or soccer in or maybe a visit to the playground…

Pride in maintaining and celebrating traditions both old and new…

Pride in how their community looks…both inside and out…

Pride in how their community interacts with the rest of the world…

And to think you won’t even have to take my word for it…unless you want to, of course, since I don’t own the copyright on this stuff anyway.  It just happens to be public records I thought would be of value to the community while saving them a few tax dollars in the process by doing it for free.  

Warmest wishes,

Valerie Martin

But one of many layers to the reasoning

To the Visitor:

September 11, 2001 was a day of transformation for all, whether they even to this day remain totally unaware of the event. For me, it was an exercise in learning how to transform futility into utility.

As I was working through multiple contemplations from a secretarial perspective on the quantity of records lost that day and beyond, additional reminders of events in which entire archives of records have been wiped out entirely reliably surfaced as additional weight of value for desiring some level of backups for at least the public documentation that is floating around in who knows what formats nowadays.

But from the Veteran’s Administration losses in St. Louis to the damages sustained by the Great Chicago Flood a while back, it remains curious that even with all of this hardware and manpower to utilize it, we still are failing to sustain even the most basics of records at a basic level of achievable expectation.

The Village of Midlothian still does not have a complete version of its Municipal Code book (partially due to a defective book being accepted upon delivery back in 1963 and continued ever since)

and even the Board Meeting Minutes still remain offline, despite campaign pledges by the new Mayor to transform the Village of Midlothian into a highly transparent community.

It shouldn’t take the threat of Mother Nature or some other act of God to descend upon a set of circumstances needing change in order to spur on such change with the precision of a cattle driver needing to guide their stock into the pens for the night.

This is stuff that associations lay claim to being representative of the role of the Municipal Clerk and it seems that for a fee or two, they’ll cough up a seminar here, a report there and a few training manuals along the way, but when it comes to demanding tighter standards not from the government at a State level and it being a mandate, rather this is one of those internal industry policing circumstances in which no Clerk should be permitted to walk away fear-free when public documentation such as these board meeting minutes are in such disarray and of only an obstructionist format.

It continues to remain a part of my approach to certainly decide a position on a matter of interest…at least to me…argue and or defend the positions on the merits of the argument and then leave it up to the reader to discern for themselves what kinds of messages these types of petty political games continue to send not just to any one specific demographics group, rather that these games are leaving behind pieces of paper that are utterly worthless…

Sort of the direction the American dollar has been becoming!

I say end it today so that way we can move on to the next item up for corrective actions. This costs virtually nothing to change for the better and I believe we can stop these practices on a dime if those in the position of communicating from the top down sends out the clear message that such poor public record-keeping behaviors will not be tolerated any long, but I am only one person taking out my right to believe for a quick exercise in providing the documented records of the speeches previously given so freely to such a limited and restricted audience. Plus, I’ve always been more of a night time person, so think of this as my offering up a bunch of flashlights for free since I don’t think anyone has figured out how to offer up true sunshine via technology yet…only replicas, right? Or did I miss that one entirely?

Things are changing so fast…we simply cannot afford to be so sloppy with the records belonging to the general public on how we are adapting…or not… I guess that depends who is crafting and publishing the documents. I only know who holds that job title here in this Village.

The Midlothian Illinois Record

March 26, 2008 Midlothian Village Board Meeting Minutes

March 26, 2008 – Download Original Board Meeting Minutes

Number of Pages = 4 | Start Time = 7:30 p.m. | End Time = 8:29 p.m. | Total Meeting Time (in hours and minutes) = 0:59