10 years later, city rocks to Letterman gift

KANKAKEE – It could have been taken as an insult. It could have left a scar. It could have been resented.

Thanks to then-Mayor Donald Green having a sense of humor and a willingness to play along with a gag back in 2000, a long-running relationship with late-night talk show host David Letterman was formed.

But as it turned out, the on-camera appearances by Green were not the end of the Kankakee-Letterman connection.

The relationship was reignited in 2015, when two Kankakee High School teachers and their American Experience class took one of the two Letterman prank gazebos and crafted it into a meaningful gift – a retirement rocking chair – which seemed to truly touch the heart of the talk show icon.

One of the two teachers, Bill Curtin, now of Frankfort, said they were simply looking for a class project to capture and inspire the students.

Curtin had no idea of how successful – and transformational – the project would become for the class of 35 students.

“We never expected it to take off like it did,” Curtin said this week.

He said for city and school leadership to believe in this classroom project, it was a credit to all involved.

“[Superintendent Genevra] Walters trusted us the whole way. She let the class lead,” said Curtin, who taught at Kankakee High School for six years.

The idea actually was born out of what was likely a throw-away comment from Bill Yohnka, a city enthusiast. Yohnka had said the gazebos should be packed up and sent back to New York.

His reasoning was they represented an insult of sorts.

As the project began to unfold, the students jumped on board with the thought. They said the structures should be returned.

Such a delivery would be costly, the teachers reasoned. They wanted the students to think more creatively.

A student suggested a rocking chair for the then-soon-to-be-retiring Letterman.

And the mission was born.

Taking ownership of city

Class member Alexis Gbadamosi, a 2016 KHS graduate and now a Spanish teacher at Kankakee High, said the success of the project was due to the teachers.

The teachers, she said, were so enthusiastic about the project that the students had no choice but to feed off their energy.

The then-high school student recalled having the typical student thought: I can’t wait to leave my hometown.

The journey this project took her on in her junior year changed her life. As the project concluded, her mind had been changed. She wanted Kankakee to be her forever home.

“This project helped us take ownership in reclaiming the idea of Kankakee,” she said. “I remember thinking, ‘We are not the worst. We have great qualities. Let’s change the narrative.’ I took this personal. ... This inspired me to come back here.”

But Letterman actually taking part in this project? That concept seemed far-fetched.

In Gbadamosi’s mind, it wasn’t.

“Not for one second did I ever believe we were not going to be on the show,” she said.

The Letterman staff initially rejected participation in the return gag. But as the idea gained attention through radio interviews, Letterman staffers agreed to the return of the gag gift, albeit in a different form.

“The students did an amazing job,” Curtin said.

On hand for Letterman’s initial gift of a gazebo, and then his follow-up gift of a second gazebo – thus creating what Letterman believed would be Kankakee’s path to community glory, being known as “the home of the Twin Gazebos” – was then-Kankakee city attorney Chris Bohlen.

Now the president of the seven-member Kankakee school board, Bohlen said there was never a moment of hesitation when a Letterman producer called and explained what the comedian had in mind.

The entire episode was based off a ranking by a 1999 Best Places to Live survey, which had Kankakee rated near the bottom of U.S. locations to call home.

“He was wide open to it,” he said of Green, the late, former four-term mayor.

“He never expressed any doubt,” Bohlen said of taking part in the initial gazebo gag or the follow-up act of receiving the second gazebo, thus the Twin Gazebo community.

And when it came to the Kankakee High class regifting the then-decaying gazebo, which had been stationed at the Kankakee railroad depot, now known as Harold & Jean Miner Festival Square, Green met with some of the staff and students.

“He told them if they were going to do this, they would have to do it right,” Bohlen recalled.

Green was on board with the plan led by the American Experience instructors Steve DiSanto and Curtin.

“[Green] was totally cool with it, and they were having such a good time. I think he was encouraged by the kids,” Bohlen said.

Huge turnout for show segment

The March 20, 2015, morning taping of the Letterman segment was witnessed by an estimated crowd of 600 that packed the Paramount Theatre in downtown Kankakee.

In all, the actual taping of the event lasted for only five minutes and 30 seconds, but that Friday morning experience, which played out on the following Tuesday’s episode of “The Late Show with David Letterman,” presented Kankakee with an opportunity to shine on national TV.

All agreed that the teachers, students and city accomplished the mission of turning the two-gift gag into an episode Kankakeeans would long remember for all the right reasons.

The location where the gazebo had resided is now the home of the permanent Hill Stage, a popular musical gathering point and one of the prime locations for the annual summertime Merchant Street MusicFest.

Walters, a former 10-year Kankakee schools superintendent who is now a Kankakee mayoral candidate, was in her first year as superintendent when approached with the concept.

“My first thought was, ‘This is so great to hear the pride they have for Kankakee.’ I was so proud of what they thought of this community, and this is a great community,” Walters said. “That’s what sold me on this.”

The American Experience class was a dual classroom that taught English and social studies.

Yohnka, who has been helping lead Kankakee’s fundraising efforts for the East Riverwalk project, said he can’t believe the community episode is now 10 years in the rearview mirror.

He recalled details of it as if it were yesterday.

He said Letterman appeared genuinely touched by the gift.

Like the teachers, students, city leaders and school leadership, Yohnka said he cannot imagine the episode playing out with any more success than it had.

“It was just amazing it worked out,” he said. “This was such a long shot.”

For Gbadamosi, the remaining gazebo located in Cobb Park also fulfilled a personal purpose.

Upon her high school graduation, the gazebo, now under the possession of the Kankakee Valley Park District, served as the setting for her senior pictures.