For Kathy Julian, the most remarkable thing about her Aunt Faith was her care for others, even in her final months.
Julian visited her aunt, the daughter of Dr. Percy Julian and Dr. Anna Roselle Julian, in the hospital in February, making the long trek from the San Francisco Bay area, where she lives.
“One of the things when I was there, ‘Can you call this person? It was their birthday three weeks ago, and I didn’t send them a card,’” she said.
A lifelong resident of Oak Park and a graduate of Oak Park and River Forest High School, Faith Roselle Julian died March 25, 2026. She was 82.
“Oak Park is a better, more honest, and more just community because of Faith and the Julian family,” read a statement from the village of Oak Park. “We are indebted to Faith for the wisdom she shared when it was needed the most, and for her patience with us as we worked to honor what her family sacrificed and contributed here. To be sure, that work will continue.
“Faith will always be remembered for her intelligence, tireless work ethic and passion for her family and the entire community.”
Oak Park is currently planning a streetscape project on Chicago Avenue which will focus on the contributions of the Julian family to the village. The Julian home is at East and Chicago avenues.
Of course, Kathy Julian’s memories about her Aunt Faith extend over the course of her life. Every other summer, with her grandmother, Anna, and her aunt she would attend the annual convention of the sorority Delta Sigma Theta. One year in the mid-1970s, the convention was held in Atlanta.
“Faith sent me a seven-page letter,” she recalled. “Jimmy Carter was president at the time. She sent a letter that said, ‘We’re going to Jimmy Carter’s home state,’ and she was excited about getting ready to go.
“I think she had a playful aspect to her and really understood children and had a child’s heart at her core.”
Chicago resident Anthony Thomas was Faith Julian’s best friend for decades, talking to her virtually every day. How they met is a story unto itself.
Thomas is blind, and he met her when he was in law school and she was a volunteer at the Blind Service Association.
“She was assigned to me as a reader and she stayed and volunteered in law school and bar studies,” Thomas said. “She read to me, she typed papers, she sat in on a couple of my classes. She became my best friend and I became her best friend.”
The extent of Faith Julian’s caring for others spanned not just across the Chicago area but the nation. Thomas recalled a time when a blind young woman she knew was taken to Alabama.
“Faith found out she was there, (and) they said we can’t release her,” Thomas said, noting that the girl couldn’t be released because she had nowhere to go.
“Faith said, ‘You can put her on a plane and send her to me,’” he said. “Faith took her in for about four months and found her a place to live. She was a person of a very generous spirit. She gave her time away to a lot of people.”
There were tough times for Faith Julian. When she and her parents moved to Oak Park in the early 1950s, they weren’t greeted with open arms. In fact, their house on East Avenue – where she lived her entire life – was attacked on a couple of occasions. Once, Thomas said, a bomb was thrown at the house, “right under Faith’s window and might have killed her.”
James Taglia, an Oak Park village trustee, was close to Faith Julian as well, and said she not only cared about others, but also about the Julian family legacy in Oak Park.
In 2018, she gave a dedication speech for a new mural of her father at Percy Julian Middle School in Oak Park.
“She handwrote this whole thing, and at the beginning, the kids were running around, and then it got silent, and then everyone was crying,” Taglia said. “She has this wonderful story, and it’s a lot of history, but it’s good and bad.
“She certainly held up the legacy. She certainly felt it was an important part of her life, to carry on the story of her parents and she would also look to understand what they went through as a family and the obstacles they overcame.”
Another village trustee who was close to Faith Julian is Chibuike Enyia.
“She won’t be forgotten because of the tremendous amount of resiliency which was passed down from her father and mother,” he said. “She was a battler and that I think is something everybody wants to aspire to.”
A visitation for family and friends will be held from 1 p.m. to 2 p.m. April 6 at Peterson-Bassi Chapels at 6938 W. North Ave., Chicago, with a service to follow.