Poised on the brink of serious gentrification until the onset of the national economic downturn, Forest Park has, in recent years, attracted new residents hungry for single family homes at a fraction of city prices and ready to partake of its “small town charm, big city access.” Village government went out of its way to attract new businesses, many of which left tax-heavy Oak Park for the friendlier spaces along Madison. In addition to the many bars that still thrive, the street now boasts art galleries, fine and ethnic dining, clothing boutiques, a gourmet cooking school, a wine shop and a tea shop.
To the east, Oak Park prides itself on an open and liberal cultural identity and elected an out lesbian as president of its village board in 2001. Berwyn, the town’s southerly neighbor, recently ran a media blitz focusing on a community diversity of LGBT individuals, and Berwyn.com has a link to BUNGALO, the Berwyn Gay and Lesbian organization. Forest Park as a cultural entity has continued to embrace the traditional, conservative values with which its “close knit community” grew up. The government Web site focuses on housing, shopping, recreation and education, and has links to an array of village churches. It’s not that there aren’t queer folk living, working and playing in the town, it’s just not generally an aggressively out and proud demographic.
So it was quite the coming-out-month moment when the weekly Forest Park Review ran a front page feature last October about Two Fish owners and life partners Cecilia Hardacker and Tonya Hart with a big color picture and the giant headline “Everyone knows we’re gay.”
Hardacker (50) and Hart (42) met in 1993 while pursuing their MFAs at Illinois State University (ISU). They have been together ever since, sharing their boundless energy, infectious good will and painstaking craft with an ever-expanding network of friends and associates. Their matter-of-fact approach to who and what they are to each other has most certainly helped to change hearts and minds in the tiny hamlet of Forest Park (population 16,000).
Hardacker had dated men in high school but never became sexually involved. An “army brat” who was born in San Benito, Texas, near the Gulf Coast border, she grew up in Omaha, Neb., finished college and became a registered nurse at 19. After two years, she realized she hated the work and began a series of jobs as she struggled to find herself and “get sober.” Ultimately, with the counseling of a life coach, Hardacker returned to the University of Nebraska for a BFA. Her long list of jobs during and after her second round of undergraduate study included working for Ann Cunningham, a master stained-glass craftswoman. “I worked for her for about eight years,” said Hardacker. “By the time I left for grad school I could do what I can do.”
Born in upstate New York to “English immigrant parents,” Hart grew up in Chicago’s northwest suburbs, graduated from Stevenson High School, received her BFA at Western Illinois University and continued on to ISU for graduate work, all the while living an active heterosexual social life.
Hardacker joined the graduate program at ISU about a year after Hart and said the couple’s first encounter involved the loan of a hair band. Hart’s memory is a bit more romantic. “Cec was homesick,” she explained. “I felt a kinship and I wanted to be there for her. She is my first and only girlfriend.”
Was her immediate and enduring attraction to Hardacker a shock? “Well, it was not quite a revelation, but Cec was always greatly surprised at my ease at coming out as a lesbian,” she said.
“Yes, it was in-then-out,” said Hardacker.
“Well, my parents are European and I guess sexuality was just not [a big issue] … you should just have it,” Hart said. “It doesn’t mean you should have one kind or the other, but you should have it. And, Cec was not really out.”
“Did I mention I came from Nebraska? Nebraska is what color state? The wrong color,” parried Hardacker. “There are very few lesbians who are actually out in Nebraska; it’s not the most conducive place to be out. At 24 I was out. I had not yet had an experience with a woman—or a man—but I knew. I was out to myself and I had told my friends.”
Hart moved to a loft in Chicago’s West Town neighborhood when she finished her degree, Hardacker joining her during the winter of 1994-95. The couple worked odd jobs while pursuing their fine art and getting their work exhibited. In 1995 Hardacker began work at a Chicago stained-glass studio and continued her employment when the studio moved to Oak Park. In 1999 the couple bought the business and renamed it Two Fish Art Glass. They purchased a bungalow in Berwyn in 2001 and two years later Two Fish moved to its current 4,000-square-foot location in Forest Park.
The Two Fish retail space and studio is a wonderland of stained, mosaic and blown glass decorative arts that also carries a mouth watering selection of arts and crafts furniture and ceramics. In addition to retail trade, the partners and a small part-time staff of fabricators and craftspeople do custom work and repair work. Plus, they teach classes to crafters, DIYers and aspiring artisans, an aspect of the business that at one time was their primary revenue stream.
The retail business has been growing consistently since moving to Forest Park and now constitutes about 60 percent of its gross revenue, a figure that’s holding at about $1 million per year, despite the challenging economy.
But the classes are still the most fun and the way in which they build community and meet friends.
The couple love the way that community evolves in the classes, how the most oddly mismatched group of people can come together in a beginner class and stick with their projects and the group through several terms, getting along and finding a bond through the love of the craft.
“And, we’ve probably met all the gay people in the area through our classes,” said Hardacker. It seems that gay men really like arts and crafts.
“I don’t know how that happened,” Hart laughed. “They’re all unearthed in Forest Park.”
“We’ve met almost all of our female friends because one or both of them took a class,” said Hardacker, really happy that so many lesbians also love the aesthetic prized by Oscar Wilde.
“I think people hear about us through friends. We opened our business as a purely personal extension of ourselves,” added Hart. She hopes that the word of mouth about the stained glass lesbians works very well and lots of them come and visit.
While deriving personal pleasure from the building of community and friendship, the partners give back in a very material way, donating classes and product to worthy causes for silent auctions and raffles. Their philanthropy naturally focuses on women’s and LGBT issues—and animal welfare.
Over the years they have worked extensively with OPALGA (the Oak Park Area Lesbian and Gay Association) youth programs, providing free classes in a supportive and familial environment. “The favorite thing is doing those classes, ’cause I feel very connected to who’s there,” said Hart.
“It’s so much fun,” Hardacker agreed.
Hector Salgado, a two-time (2003 and 2008) Windy City Times 30 under 30 honoree and current associate director of Project VIDA, was working with OPALGA’s Amigos Latinos Apoyando Siempre (ALAS) program when he first met Hardacker and Hart. “They held a free class for about ten guys from ALAS and some of the women from the women’s program. I cannot think of another business that’s been more supportive of community work, they are always willing to help,” said Salgado, who noted that Two Fish now also works with Project VIDA on Chicago’s West Side.
It is the women’s warmth and supportive attitude that Salgado most values. “They both have amazing personalities. From day one they joke around and make you feel at home. With Cec it’s like your mom you’re talking to. It’s very loving, like having someone from your family showing you how to do something as opposed to a classroom with an instructor lecturing.”
Hardacker and Hart reciprocate the affection, respect and trust and feel that when they donate to the youth organizations they know that their donation will be put to good use. “They’re young they’re really progressive and they are working really hard on the front lines, so I feel comfortable writing that check,” said Hart.
“The gals create that sense of community because they have a genuine interest in you and in you succeeding,” said Salgado who resonates with the fact that for the young adults working on identity and confidence issues, the classes are more about process than product. “Some of our members were more reserved and I saw Cec and Tonya taking extra time to get to know them and come out of their shell. They let you into their lives. They make it entre familia, in between family.”