I first visited Chicago’s Pilsen neighborhood in 1966, while still a student at Harvard. I had no experience with the inner city, having grown up in the woodlands of an unincorporated area 30 miles west of Chicago. My parents had recently rented a storefront in Pilsen for a painting studio, as the one in their home was no longer large enough. Two of their artist friends, Ruth Duckworth and Misch Kohn, already had adjacent studios. Home on vacation, I was eager to see their Halsted Street studio and its inner-city neighborhood. I had just finished an urban design course on the American city. Pilsen was, from what little I’d heard, similar to an area described in an urban ethnography I’d read. I’d also heard it was dangerous.

On this visit, my father sent me to buy hardware for a stretcher. His instructions: turn right, then straight ahead, north on Halsted to the corner, cross 18th Street, pass the Pair-a-Dice Club and the Lithuanian diner, then enter the next doorway. The “V&G Hardware” sign extending over the sidewalk sported a “Chief Paints” logo.

The dimly lit front room was 18 feet wide and 20 long. All 360 square feet of it were dimly lit, a few incandescent bulbs, light from the windows in front, and a few cold flourescents further back. The back wall of this room served as a backdrop for Vic, a man of average height for his generation. He appeared large, due to his erect bearing, a bit of extra weight, and carefully combed black hair set off by a crisp white shirt. A counter just in front of the back wall hid a chair and desk, where Vic made phone calls, rang up sales, and kept his books. For “on account” sales, he wrote down invoices, kept them organized, and billed everyone with regularity and precision. In the middle of the wall behind the counter was a doorway to the back room, which was not open to the public. To the right of the counter was a stairway to the basement, hidden by a door painted Chief brand “Floor and Deck Brown.”  It was years before I was ever invited to the basement.

The backroom, packed with shelves, had aisles too narrow in which to turn around. The lighting was so low that, by comparison, the front room seemed bright. At the very back, there was a loading dock. The basement held some inventory and a good supply of pipe, which Vic could cut and thread to length for his customers who chose to do their own plumbing.

As I came into the store, Vic was talking to three customers, while waiting on a fourth. Here was banter I’d only heard in movies or on stage. My college roommates and I spoke to each other with humor but not profanity and wit but not put-downs. I felt comfortable in my new college environment. I did not feel comfortable at V&G Hardware. Vic didn’t acknowledge my presence, much less speak to me, as I waited my turn at the counter.

I looked around. Most of the stock on display was so unfamiliar to me at that time, I would have had trouble finding the vocabulary to describe it. The exceptions were the items hanging from hooks high on the wall. They were a bit like shallow pie plates, or perhaps more like paper plates made out of steel, flat discs in the center, with fluted edges. On opposite sides were protruding wires that looked like croquet hoops inserted into the edges of the plates. The discs had colorful scenes printed on them, scenes of different seasons in the country.

 When Vic finally turned to me, he was polite, and didn’t subject me to any profanities, put downs, or intrusive questions. I explained what my father wanted without knowing exactly what the hardware in question was called. Vic knew immediately and showed me two different sizes of flat corner braces from bins he had in the back room. I chose and paid cash. I was relieved to get out of the store.

I visited my parents’ studio each time I was home from school. I’d been majoring in a program that included basic design courses. This program afforded me 3 semesters of independent drawing with sculptor Wil Reimann, under whose influence I decided to become an artist. A year and a half after I finished Harvard, I headed back to Chicago. My parents moved their easels around to make room for me.  They gave me a “getting started” period of six months free live/workspace, the equivalent of a grant or a residency, after which, I was expected to move out. Because of this gift, I was able to launch my career without waiting on tables. I slept on the couch by day. I worked at night, when I had the place to myself.

At first, I didn’t venture out much, just enough to buy a can of soup and a bottle of milk. The neighborhood intimidated me but I explored the blocks around and no one tried to rob me. I found a visually rich environment of 19th-century buildings. I went often to V&G for studio supplies but tried to get in and out of the store as quickly as possible.

Saturdays, the store was crowded with as many as ten people squeezed in, waiting for Vic to take care of them. Sometimes, at peak hours, he had help. Summers and weekends, it might be a young boy getting some experience in retail. During the week, it was Ben, a tall, quiet and good-natured man who uniformly wore Oshgosh bib overalls.  Ben knew the trade. Despite the part-time help, Vic manned the store solo for long stretches. He enjoyed his customers.

For his regulars, his greetings might be humorous insults that could bring tears to your eyes unless you quickly returned the volley. A different, respectful tone was reserved for the few widows, dressed in Old World black mourning. Typically, a woman would explain her problem, possibly in Lithuanian, and Vic would show her what she needed to make the repair. He would spend as long as it took to explain how to use what she had purchased. The tutorials were free. I was impressed with Vic’s gentle tone and genuine concern for these women. He managed to educate without condescension. I took note of Vick’s role as educator.

If the woman spoke English, it took less time, but if Vick had to speak to her in Lithuanian, it took longer. Vick’s well-projected tenor voice never overwhelmed hers. He wouldn’t be rushed if others came into the store. They could wait. There weren’t a lot of hardware stores nearby, just one a few blocks west, called La Brocha Gordo, considerably smaller and less well stocked. A mile up Halsted was a large, modern, hardware store serving the West Loop, Greek town, and the near west side.

When I became a regular at V&G, I began to relax and feel that, even if I weren’t accepted, I was tolerated, while Vick figured me out. I worked hard those six months in my parents’ studio, building up a good inventory. Then, with a studio sale, I raised enough cash to sublet space a few storefronts south. I fell in love with the neighborhood. There were two types of buildings: ones in use but needing serious repair, and those abandoned and beyond salvage. I saw 19th-century buildings as beautiful and full of potential. I started looking for a building to buy. While I assumed I would always be a starving artist, I thought I might be able to survive if I owned my own place. I knew that artists who fixed up their rented studios soon were forced to move because the landlord took advantage of the improvements to raise the rent.

My girlfriend was still living in NYC. When she came for visits, I showed her real estate. Just as she was about to move to Chicago, we bought a large brick building for a very small price. We married. I took 18 months away from my studio life to rehab the top floor and attic of our 3 flat, making it both habitable, in a bohemian sort of way, and useful as a studio.

With all the walls torn out, the plaster covering the brick chimneys started to crack and crumble, drawing my attention to them. I now noticed that there were two flues in each chimney. A gas space heater was hooked up to one while the other was covered with one of the “Four Seasons” plates I had seen at V&G. The croquet hoops were folded out of sight inside the chimney, acting as springs to prevent them from falling out. That was the first piece of mysterious hardware to reveal its purpose to me. Almost every day thereafter, as I was repairing and rebuilding our house, I walked to Vic’s for supplies and advice.

I often explored the surrounding blocks, expanding my territory. Sometimes, I would see one or another of the widows. Still clad in black, they would be scavenging through the alleys, searching for wood. Their apartments or small cottages were heated with wood stoves that often doubled as cooking stoves. From old bills I’d found in the attic of our house, I knew that natural gas had been available in this neighborhood after World War II. These women either didn’t have the money to pay for the plumbing to bring the gas into their homes, much less the gas itself, or they just preferred the old way of doing things. I never asked them.

I had very little knowledge of the building trades, but I was good at tearing out walls. When it came time to start rebuilding the interior, I asked many people for advice. I remembered hearing Vic educate customers about wiring and plumbing basics, and now that I felt more comfortable about being in his store, I began to show up there almost daily. I even opened an account. He shared his knowledge unstintingly.

Sometimes, now, he would send me by myself into the backroom to find what I needed. Finally, I was invited to the basement to help him cut and thread some pipe for me. My renovation project was wrapping up towards the end of the second year. On a late December trip to the store, Vic handed me the V&G wall calendar, with seasonal photos, then invited me to his Christmas party. I was honored. After that, I was invited every year.

The party consisted of V&G being closed early on the day before Christmas. The door would be locked and its window shade pulled halfway down. Anyone who arrived after this knocked to gain entry. The counter was covered in a white cloth and converted to a bar. Perhaps there was food, but what was memorable was the quantity of hard liquor. Most of Vic’s regular customers would stop by, mainly men. I would stay awhile, but only once did I stay to the end, for which there never was a set time. The party was over when the few remaining guests decided that Vic could no longer function. Someone would call his wife to get him. A small number would stay until he was taken home.

While I was getting used to Vic’s banter, and handled it without a problem, I was still treated with some deference. I was caught off guard, therefore, when I entered the store on a busy Saturday morning, while Vic was talking to several people ahead of me. He suddenly shouted over the crowd, “Hey John! You been married a couple a years already! Where’s the kid? Your wife eatin’ it?” I was saved from the need to make a witty reply by the laughter of the little crowd. I was mortified, but realized I was no longer an outsider.

One Christmas, I brought Vic a small brush and ink drawing. It was a rough representation of the crawl space under my building, with joists hovering only a couple of feet above the dirt, and the cobwebs, millipedes, and debris from a hundred years largely masked by dark. I don’t know if it was a terribly good drawing, and I’m sure Vic didn’t know either. What mattered to Vic was that I had given it to him. It was a symbol of the help he had given me in renovating my home. Over the ensuing years, he would mention it from time to time.

I got involved with friends slowly buying and renovating other properties. This meant that not more than a few days went by without a visit to V&G. I learned a bit about Vic from our conversation. He and his wife had raised a seriously disabled girl to adulthood and she lived with them the rest of her life. I also learned that Vic had a fishing shack on a little island in the Kankakee River. He liked to fish and he liked to drink, both of which he could do undisturbed at this shack.  The contrast with the pace of city life refreshed him.

Decades went by with little change in my relationship to Vic. He was an anchor in a rapidly changing neighborhood and in a culture that was changing even more rapidly.

Vic didn’t seem to change, but he was getting older. When the Social Security Administration decided he had reached retirement age, Vic closed the store and sold the building. He and his family moved to Florida, someplace where he could fish every day,

Before Vic left, I got his address. After a year, I wrote him a letter, asking how it was going in Florida. I gave him a bit of news about the neighborhood.

This news included the fact that his store was now Bic’s Café. Another creative person of my generation, (Rick) with a Masters Degree in something, had chosen to continue his father’s plumbing trade. These skills he applied to nearby old buildings. After he purchased them, he brought them back to life. Bic, Rick’s wife, bought the V&G building and turned it into a simple café, decorated with left behind nuts and bolts and other paraphernalia and some art by neighborhood artists. She left some of the original signage as well. Those signs were like generals on horses in parks: reminders of important people and institutions that were once vital to the neighborhood. V&G, in its new incarnation, became a neighborhood hangout once again. People would come in for hot beverages, eat a few pastries, chat, read, or just hang out.

Vic wrote back in very neat handwriting on a fine grade of blue note paper with matching blue envelope. He described his new home, the fishing, how his wife and stay-at-home daughter liked it there. We exchanged a few letters but not frequently. After some years, he wrote that he was coming for a visit.

Several of my friends who shared the V&G connection agreed to a date when we could meet at the old V&G. We gathered one Sunday morning at Bic’s Café. Our visit was very warm. We got great pleasure in seeing each other. Beyond catching up about people from the neighborhood, though, we didn’t have much to talk about. An hour later, one of awkward but warm conversation, we all agreed it was time to get on with our individual plans for Sunday. After Vic left, someone mentioned that Vic had obviously been drinking earlier that morning. I hadn’t noticed.

I got a note from Vic later, thanking me for helping organize the little reunion. Eventually, I answered, but our exchanges became further and further apart.

Then, I heard from him that his daughter had died. I was never good about writing condolences and, much to my regret, I didn’t respond. The next note was from his wife, informing me that Vic had died.