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Two towns outside Chicago recovering from civil unrest
Posted6/20/2021 7:00 AM
AURORA, Ill. One year ago, Elias Akwo and Chaz Nieponski dropped everything and raced to their Aurora storefront to find the windows smashed and an entire display of crystal merchandise shattered across the floor.
The Wheaton couple had been watching the civil unrest unfold on TV when they received a dreaded phone call that their downtown business, The Crystal House, was among those being vandalized the night of May 31, 2020.
Neighbors tried to stave off the destruction as best they could, Akwo recalls, fending off the looters, sweeping up broken glass and helping to board up the windows at the building where he and his wife had relocated their shop just months earlier. But thousands of dollars worth of intricate, custom-made pieces engraved glassware, miniature figurines, a crystal replica of the Chicago skyline had already been destroyed or stolen.
A year after the civil unrest in Aurora and Naperville, the physical evidence has vanished. But long after the plywood was taken down and the foot traffic picked up in the downtown streets, some small business owners and residents are still feeling the emotional and financial effects.