Chicago civil rights legend Jesse Jackson turns 80 this week. Odds are he’s going to celebrate it by putting in work. Here’s a look back at his legacy
CHICAGO — The Rev. Jesse Jackson came into the world on Oct. 8, the anniversary date of the Great Chicago Fire, an event that would change the landscape and the way Chicago functioned from then on.
Jackson is a force and has been during his 80 years on this earth, a milestone that the civil rights leader will celebrate Friday. Stepping inside his office at Rainbow/PUSH Coalition headquarters on the South Side, you see those years in memorabilia and tchotchkes everywhere. A picture of a younger Jackson with the Jackson 5 rests near jerseys of the Harlem Globetrotters, Scottie Pippen and Dwyane Wade. Myriad pictures of Jackson posing with notable faces take up so much space, it’s hard to focus on any one spot.
You lose count of the images of Jackson that line the hallways. Framed, frameless, collages — all scenes of Jackson at work throughout the years, some numbered so people can connect the historical dots of what they see to a nearby placard that explains it.
When Jackson gives you a tour, he focuses on each image as if going through the files in his mind, taking stock of where he’s been. This includes the Lorraine Motel balcony in Memphis, Tennessee, where he, the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., Hosea Williams and Ralph Abernathy were captured by an Associated Press photographer the day before King was assassinated.
When asked about what he thinks of his
