GARY V. FRIEDLUND
Be it food, flowers, or festivals, for more than 35 years Gary Friedlund has been a local businessman contributing to the health and welfare of Park Forest and the greater south suburban community. For more than 35 years he was a businessman striving to take care of the public.
His lifetime of work in producing fresh garden crops, promoting efforts of home gardeners and setting a healthy eating atmosphere have made him a well-known figure in both Park Forest and the entire south suburbs.
At one time he ran the well-respected Plaza Flowers shop, that provided daily floral delivery and bridal service throughout the Chicago and suburban area from the north suburbs to Kankakee. Gary Friedlund Landscaping and Arborist Service provided lawn and landscaping service including tree trimming and removal.
During that time, he served on the Chamber of Commerce, Rotary Club and both the Village’s Economic Development commission and the Environmental Commission.
For many years, after Mr. Friedlund’s beard became snow white and children started recognizing him as Santa, even in the summer months, Mr. Friedlund became the Village Santa. He had a suit made by a professional seamstress and participated in the annual lighting of the Downtown Christmas Tree distributing hundreds of gifts to the attending children.
After retiring from floral services, Friedlund became involved in food production and distribution and assisted in moving the South Suburban Food Cooperative from Matteson to Downtown Park Forest.
During this time, he was principal in the formation of S.A.F.E. The grower raised produce in 150 foot of greenhouse and three acres of land. The produce was distributed to local food pantries including the St. Irenaeus Catholic Church food pantry in Park Forest. He also was a principal in creating the church’s community garden.
To this day, Gary Friedland continues to assist community gardeners to prepare, plant and maintain their gardens with his garden implements.
HON. RAYMOND FUNDERBUNK
In the spring of 1979, a friend told newly graduated lawyer Raymond Funderburk of what he said were “very attractive affordable and available cooperative housing” units in Park Forest. Almost as soon as he became a member of the community, he became involved with the workings of the village.
That move has led to more than a 40-year career as a legal advisor to numerous commissions and committees in the area as well as a distinguished 21-year career as a Cook County Circuit Court judge.
Born in Philadelphia, Funderburk arrived in Chicago in 1967 after serving two years in the military. After working for an insurance company, he became a bus driver for the Chicago Transportation Authority. When he left the CTA to concentrate on his studies at University of Illinois-Chicago he drove a bus during the summers. After earning a bachelor’s degree in 1974, he followed it with a Master of Arts in Public Administration from Roosevelt University in 1975 and his Juris Doctorate degree from University of Illinois College of Law in 1978.
Since being admitted to the Illinois Bar in 1979, the same year he moved to Park Forest, Funderburk has become a major legal presence in the behind-the-scenes operations of numerous commissions and committees in the south suburbs.
Shortly after coming to Park Forest he became a member of the Park Forest Running and Pancake Club which led to a his becoming a valuable behind-the-scenes presence for numerous runners’ groups including the storied Park Forest Scenic Ten race.
Judge Funderburk became fully involved with the intricacies of village life, serving one term on the Park Forest Library Board, and as chairman of the Village’s Housing Review Board, the Housing Board of Appeals, the Equal Opportunity Review Board and the Zoning Board of Appeals. He also served on the School District 227 Advisory Board and the Legal Advisory Board for Aunt Martha’s Services.
Additionally, he was on the Executive Committee of the Far South Suburban Branch of the NAACP and on the committee that worked to create the Old Plank Trail.
First appointed a Cook County judge in 1993, he was re-elected three times before retiring in 2018. Judge Funderburk serves as a moderator for numerous candidate forums sponsored by the Park Forest Committee for Non-Partisan Local Government. For more than 20 years, he has served as Moderator for the Annual Town Meeting of the Rich Township Government.
ANDREW GLADSTONE
Born in England to an Army Air Force Captain and his British wife, Andrew Gladstone came to the United States in 1949 and arrived in Park Forest two years later as part of one of the thousands of families flocking to the young village’s growing reputation as a haven for veterans of World War II; a “G.I. Town” that would transform post-war suburban living.
It was also the beginning of his lasting relationship with the community; one in which he served with distinction in different eras and by different means.
In 1974, he and wife Georgette applied to buy a unit in Cedarwood Cooperative, but their request was denied. He spearheaded a move that helped change recognition of “head of household” to include women. At the time both Andrew and Georgette were making nearly identical salaries as teachers but only his mattered to Cedarwood which defined a woman as a “reproductive” member of the family rather than a “productive” member and a co-partner.
Gladstone worked with the Village Ombudsman helping to spearhead a successful challenge to that archaic rule. Andrew later served as President of Cedarwood Co-operative.
In 1994, he was the head coach of the Park Forest Eagles Girls fastpitch travel softball team, which won the Illinois State Championship and advanced to the Amateur Softball Association 16-and-under National Championships. Most of these players became significant members of society, pursuing successful careers in law, teaching, or medicine.
In 1995, he was elected to a three-year term as a member of the Village Board of Trustees. This was during a turbulent time in the history of the community and an era in which the Village assumed ownership of Downtown Park Forest. Despite community efforts to retain both Marshall Field and Sears, the two major department stores, both shut their doors. Sears “abandoned” Park Forest, but the Village recovered more than $3 million in restitution from Sears, including tear-down costs of the store and the removal of hazardous materials from its large auto repair facility.
Most of Andrew’s career was spent at Crete-Monee High School where he taught French and history and served as a dean and coach.
Andrew and Georgette worked together on many of the volunteer projects which included his spending countless hours while she was head of the Advisory Board for Recreation and Parks planning redevelopment of our parks.
GEORGETTE GLADSTONE
The dictionary defines the word volunteer as a person “who freely offers to take part in an enterprise or undertake a task.” To that end Georgette Gladstone’s efforts for the people of Park Forest not only fit that description but set a new standard of service to the village, the only home she has known.
She is a pioneer resident of the village, born to George and Johanna Rosner in 1950, shortly after the couple moved into the still unpaved new community the previous year.
Her communal life in the village included a near 30-year career as a teacher and an even longer length of volunteer service to the village. She met her husband Andrew Gladstone while a substitute teacher at Bloom High School. After becoming “a full-time mom” in 1976 to Peter, then Danielle, she began an active career serving on various village and community groups as well as returning to the classroom in 1984 in School District 163.
Until her retirement in 2011, she mentored high risk pre-school children and trained others on how to interact with them. For those efforts and others during that time, she received the 1997 Outstanding Educator Singer Service Award from the Park Forest Jaycees.
In conjunction with the Park Forest Police Department’s Community Service Program, from 1994 to 2001, and at a time when officers often ticketed teens for smoking in public, she provided programs on how to quit smoking with her efforts being recognized by the Village.
As the chair of the Village’s Recreation and Parks Advisory Board for six years she helped establish seasonal programming, a neighborhood park was built in Eastgate and Murphy Park’s playground was rebuilt with natural materials. For her dedication she received the Village’s 2015 Good Egg Award,
In 2018, she received a Park Forest Oscar, presented to those residents whose volunteer efforts made a difference in the life of the village.
Whether it was her dedicated efforts trying to pass the Equal Rights Amendment in the 1970s when she helped form the Women’s League to an effort to establish a trauma center in the south suburbs in the 1990s, Georgette Gladstone has been an ardent supporter for the betterment of life in her beloved community.
As she says, her service was “nothing really extraordinary, just life in Park Forest."
JOHN A. OSTENBURG
If you include the four years he served as a member of the Illinois General Assembly as a state representative from this area, John Ostenburg served the residents of Park Forest for more than one-third of a century.
First elected as a member of the Village Board of Trustees in 1985, he later became a member of the state house from 1993 to 1995, after which he was an integral part of Park Forest’s governance and history, as a Trustee from 1997 to 1999 then as Mayor for 20 years before retiring from public service in 2019.
Among the abundant highlights of his public life, in 2012 Ostenburg shepherded the “Growing Green: Park Forest Sustainability Plan” in a push to make the Village a leader both regionally and nationally in efforts to combat climate change. The approach was significant with a plan that sought to combine the sustainability efforts of the Village through a series of social and environmental efforts.
In 2016, Ostenburg, as a principal member of the National League of Cities (NLC) was in the forefront of Park Forest’s program to assure racial equity through an evaluation of policies, procedures, and practices to replace any elements that hinder equality replacing them with elements that would enhance it. The Village’s efforts were recognized by the NLC’s Race, Equity and Leadership (REAL) initiative in the publication of a pamphlet, “Building on a Unique History as an Integrated Village.”
In 2003 Ostenburg responded to requests from residents and helped the Board of Trustees adopt a resolution urging the U.S. government not to become entangled in a conflict in Iran without considering the consequences of such a move.
A valued member of the Chicago Teachers Union, he served as editor of the award-winning Chicago Union Teacher, and was the union’s interim legislative director and lobbyist in 2003 before retiring in 2010.
He and wife Jackie for many years ran Changes Bookstore and coffee house in Downtown Park Forest which served as a popular meeting place and music venue. They raised four children and are grandparents of nine.
DAVE RUDOLF
He says he “had the bug” about performing when he was in high school, and since then Dave Rudolf has spread his pandemic of joy throughout the nation with his well-crafted songs and his disarming wit.
Rudolf, who has been touring the nation’s coffee houses and college campuses for the last 50 years is one of this country’s premier performers. His well-crafted, witty originals or feel-good favorites are part of his musical heritage, which includes 42 albums with number 43 on the way. He has a gold record to his credit and Grammy nominations, a 15-time nominee for Entertainer of the Year.
He is an award-winning children’s book author and has written songs for Second City and Disney. He has shared the stage with The Beach Boys, the Everly Brothers, the Smothers Brothers, and the Gatlin Brothers. He has worked with the Mommas and the Poppas as well as Cheech and Chong “and lots more stuff we won’t bore you with,” he writes.
For some 30 years Rudolf has teamed with area organizations, including Freedom Hall, Governors State University and Edgar’s Place, a venue in the Unitarian Universalist Community Church of Park Forest, which he now runs. His wide-ranging taste in music is mirrored in his ability to
involve his audience. For 10 years he booked talent for the Governors State University Folk Festival. He also helped to get talent for Something Else, a performance spot in Park Forest. At one time he even loaned a venue his own audio amplifier. Dave is a favorite performer in Park Forest’s summer concert series.
Among his numerous honors are three Parent’s Choice awards, two Parents Guide wins and six Childrens Entertainment Award nominations.
In a review of a Rudolf concert, the Daily Illini said “(H)e doesn’t just let the audience in on what he’s doing, he makes them part of it.”
“Anything and everything that happens onstage or offstage during a Rudolf concert becomes fair game” for Rudolf.
Born in Chicago, the 73-year-old musician was raised in Bradley and attended Bishop McNamara High School in Kankakee. Rudolf and his wife Carolyn found a permanent home in Park Forest nearly 50 years ago. He says the diverse nature of the community made it a great place to raise the two Rudolf children.
