Mary Bao, Director RPBG
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There are a handful of people who more or less define the Rogers Park Builders Group, people who have been active in the organization and in the Rogers Park community for many years. Without question, one of those people is Mary Bao.
But if you have only known Mary since she moved back to Rogers Park in the mid-90s or through her involvement with RPBG, I guarantee you, there is a lot you probably don’t know about her. And what a story she has to tell! I can safely say that Mary has led one of the most interesting and amazing lives of anyone in the organization. For that matter, there are few people I know who have led more varied and interesting lives than Mary.
Mary’s roots in the Rogers Park neighborhood are deep. Mary first arrived in Rogers Park as a Kindergarten student at Rogers School. When Mary was nine years old, fellow RPBG Director, Carla Price, started dating her future husband Allan who, it just so happens, was a close friend of Mary’s brother. Yes, it can be a very small world indeed!
Mary had led one of the most interesting and amazing lives of anyone in the organization.
Mary’s 4th grade teacher was Ms. Danoff who’s own daughter later went on to become Congresswoman Jan Schakowsky. Ms. Danoff was one of the first people to notice Mary’s artistic talents and encouraged her to develop her artistic skills. Mary says that Ms. Danoff submitted some of Mary’s artistic creations to the School of the Art Institute in a competition of young artists. Mary won an award for her work and was given a Junior Scholarship for the school’s Saturday youth art classes. She continued to attend the Saturday classes at the School of the Art Institute through high school graduation.
Mary says she has been to 82 countries but will not rest until she can make it an even 100 – just 18 more to go!
Nearing graduation from high school, Mary set her sights on the School of the Art Institute as a full-time college student. Her father convinced her to go to the University of Illinois instead, promising to give her travel money from the tuition savings he would pocket. At that time, the U of I cost just $155 per semester for in-state tuition – hundreds of dollars less than the School of the Art Institute which was private.
Mary agreed and thoroughly enjoyed her experience at U of I. Her college years coincided with flower power, the hippy movement and the anti-war protests. This was an exciting time to be a college student at a large university and opened Mary’s eyes to the important issues and challenges of the times.
During this time, Mary began to travel, a passion that has never let her go. Mary says she has been to 82 countries but will not rest until she can make it an even 100 – just 18 more to go!
Mary returned to the U of I for her graduate studies in Political Science. But her heart was still in the arts and, increasingly, fashion design which she wanted to make a career. It was during these years that Mary met Neil Lifton, a kindred spirit, artist and Bohemian. The two were together for 36 years until Neil’s death.
She quickly found her niche in Product Development. This career choice came with non-stop global travel, often for weeks and months at a time.
After graduate school, Mary and Neil decamped for Boston where they lived for several years before moving to New York City. The New York move was prompted by Mary’s career in fashion. Much of Neil’s time living in New York was spent working at The Bottom Line Cabaret near Washington Square in Greenwich Village.
It didn’t take long for Mary’s fashion career to take root and blossom. Her first job in Boston was with Faded Glory, a company that grew explosively in the late 70s, but burned out just as quickly a few years later. Mary’s peripatetic career led to work at a small company whose primary client was another small company that not many people had heard of at that time. It’s still around today. You might know it. It’s called Target!
She quickly found her niche, not in design itself, but in Product Development. This career choice came with non-stop global travel, often for weeks and months at a time. Mary says she has spent “months on end” in such exotic places as Paris, Istanbul, Karachi, Mumbai, Delhi, Madras, Bangkok, Hong Kong, Taipei, Seoul, Singapore and Bali.
Mary writes about her experience working in the fashion industry:
“I spent my work career as a fashion designer and moved into Product Development in ways that merged my art and business skills to develop private label clothing for surviving retailers after the retail collapse in the early 1990s. When my employers retired, they sold their entire package of 18 overseas offices to the Target Stores in 1993. During my years as a designer I travelled the globe widely shopping European markets, engaged sampling and factories to develop my vision of clothing for women’s wear.”
Photo: Armando L. Sanchez/Chicago Tribune/Tribune News Service via Getty Images
Mary’s career took a different turn when her elderly mother, having difficulty managing her small portfolio of rental properties in Chicago, Cincinnati and Kentucky, needed help. Mary left her career in fashion and established a base of operations in Cincinnati to bring order and control to the properties which suffered from lack of attention and management.
Mary describes one instance in which her mother forgot to pay real estate taxes and was within one day of losing the property to tax buyers. Mary was able to round up the cash and deliver it to the Treasurer’s Office with just minutes to spare. Had she arrived any later, the office would have closed and the property’s Title would have transferred to the new buyer the next day.
For the much of the following decade, Mary continued her peripatetic ways, travelling monthly between Chicago, New York and Cincinnati. Mary gradually consolidated the family properties to Rogers Park, reconnecting her to the Rogers Park community in which she was nurtured. With her new base of operations once again in Rogers Park, Mary soon became active with RPBG, sponsored by Al Goldberg and Carla Price.
Several years later, The Bottom Line Cabaret closed, giving Neil the opportunity to join Mary in Rogers Park where Mary and Neil opened Duke’s, their own music venue on Glenwood Avenue. Mary and Neil quickly became fixtures in the neighborhood’s musical and artistic life – Mary was an early organizer of the Artist of the Wall event, and Neil brought music and entertainment to the Glenwood corridor.
Mary really is a renaissance woman – someone who effortlessly combines artistic skills and sensibilities with business savvy, and who manages to be both a citizen of the world and a Rogers Parker through and through.
Neil’s untimely passing marked the end of Duke’s as a music venue within the Rogers Park community. Mary continues to be active in the community and is a regular participant in RPBG meetings.
Looking ahead, Mary would like to see the organization continue its work with the local schools. Mary said the PTA of her youth played an important role in the community and the education of neighborhood children. The PTA is largely inactive today, something Mary regrets. She would like to see if there are ways RPBG could expand its involvement with the local schools, encouraging parents to recommit to their children’s schools and educations. She would like to see more after-school activities which she views as crucial to the social and educational development of neighborhood kids.
Mary really is a renaissance woman – someone who effortlessly combines artistic skills and sensibilities with business savvy, and who manages to be both a citizen of the world and a Rogers Parker through and through.
Perhaps most of all, Mary is warm and kind, the type of person we all want for a friend and neighbor. How lucky we are at RPBG to have Mary as a friend and collaborator. She is a tribute to our organization, to our community and to our city. The world would be a better place if there were more people in it like Mary Bao.
