Oak Park and River Forest High School celebrated their Sesquicentennial anniversary this past weekend with a community-wide block party, full of fun family activities.
The festivities were held Sunday, May 19 from 1 to 4 p.m. at the mall located between the high school and the new track field.
The celebration featured food trucks, including local favorite Bricks Wood Fired Pizza, who helped serve delish pies to community members who came out to celebrate the high school’s 150-year anniversary.
The day also included a performance by alumni band the Jade ‘50s, a crowd favorite.
The local band has deep ties to OPRF, forming in May of 1973, after lead singer Joe Cantafio was asked by his history teachers to perform a set of rock and roll songs for a 1950’s history lesson.
Cantafio and his band “Jade” were a success, and after being featured in “The Chicago Daily News” Jade 50’s began performing across the Chicagoland area. They eventually were featured in Dick Clark’s live Rock and Roll Show at ChicagoFest.
“I am back here at my alma mater, 51 years after it all started,” Cantafio, who went on to have a successful music career playing with various artists, said. “I have always been an Oak Park Huskie. I love my high school. I love my alma mater. I come back as often as I can to do concerts.”
“Oak Park is always in my heart, I love this place,” he said.
Student activity groups were also present, handing out candy, stickers, and spreading the word on their organization.
Aspira, an organization devoted to the education and leadership development of Latinx students, handed out candy.
Paola Campuzano, rising senior at OPRF, said it was important to have Hispanic culture and students represented in the celebration.
“The whole point is to showcase the different clubs at our school,” Paola said. “I thought it was important for Aspira to be here, being one of the multicultural clubs at our school, to show that the Latinos here are making a space for themselves.”
Sophia Chavez, rising junior at OPRF, said being included in the celebration and part of the community is special to Aspira.
“We want to immerse ourselves and also generally share our culture and include others in our culture so they can be educated and just celebrate it,” Sophia said.
OPRF’s Healthy Youth Peer Educators club were also in attendance, entertaining kids and adults with a slime making station.
HYPE is a peer educator program that helps model a “healthy lifestyle” for students and raise awareness about the use of drugs and alcohol.
“We don’t want our peers to succumb to the pressures of what society is putting on them during their high school years, like weed and nicotine and alcohol,” said club member Caleb Bowman, rising senior.
At the celebration, Caleb said the club said they chose slime because it is a way to relieve stress, along with a fun activity for kids, which they get to take home.
Throughout the day, families took advantage of the bouncy houses and gave their future huskies a chance to be on campus.
Star Rebb, Oak Park resident, brought her eight-year-old daughter, a student at Hatch Elementary in D97, to the block party. Her son is a rising senior at OPRF, and she said she’s looking forward to her daughter attending the high school in the future.
“I think Oak Park in general is a very welcoming community,” she said. “Very diverse and you get to meet people from different backgrounds. It’s a nice place to raise your kids.”
OPRF will continue to celebrate its anniversary as the year continues. Students are still collecting service hours as they move closer to their goal of 150,000 hours of service before June 30, 2024. As of May 16, they were 35% of the way there, with 52,815 hours accounted for.
