47
April 7, 2019
Blue Island, Illinois
“So what did we learn?” Grange asked Ramsey in the patrol car after the church meeting ended. It was early evening and the sun hung over the western edge of Blue Island like a searchlight laying bare the city’s ruined landscape.
The meeting at the church had not gone well. The middle-aged and elderly people who came were filled with confusion and anger. They had watched their community dissolve into chaos over the past thirty years until the last shreds of hope and purpose had been wrung out of it.
While the rest of Ramsey’s group piled into their escort patrol cars in front of the Baptist Church, he pulled the Thornton Foundation representative Janet Furlong aside. The concern on her face for the lackluster meeting was clear enough to see. He sm
