The Heartland Café has been an artistic and political center in Rogers Park, Chicago, for 36 years. Under new ownership since 2012, the Heartland underwent a physical and ideological transformation.
Tom Rosenfeld, the Heartland’s owner, has lived in Rogers Park since 1999. He owns an organic farm in Michigan as well as a consulting business in Chicago. He looked to connect his farm to food businesses in Chicago.
“I had just been an organic apple grower and then I started to realize I needed to diversify my farm,” said Rosenfeld. “At that time, Heartland was really going through some troubles. Michael James and Katy Hogan, the owners at the time, were doing fundraisers, and they were really doing anything they could to stay open.”
Rosenfeld first approached James and Hogan with the idea to buy the Heartland in 2010. They initially rejected Rosenfeld’s offer, but called him at the end of 2011 and then spent the next six months working on the deal before Rosenfeld took over in 2012.
“There was so much excitement in 2008 around the Obama campaign and so much intense action around the restaurant that their business hadn’t really declined,” said Rosenfeld. “On night of the election, it was just jammed in here. It was packed and rocking and partying late until night. On Wednesday morning, there were no more politics and nobody was here. That’s when they realized how heavy the impact of the economy and the crash really was.”
Rosenfeld and his family initially began going to the Heartland because they found something on the menu that everybody liked.
“It was the menu that drew me here initially,” said Rosenfeld. “Once you’re here, it’s just a great place to hang out. My wife used to come here when she was a teenager and hang out because it was kind of counter-culture and the cool thing to do.”
All three of Rosenfeld’s children have worked at the Heartland.
“My daughter is in the theatre community, so depending on if she has a show at that moment she serves here, she bartends here, she cashiers here. She’s pretty much done every job here,” Rosenfeld said.
One of his sons is a teacher and works for the restaurant over the summer. The other son works for all of Rosenfeld’s businesses on an as-needed basis.
After the change in ownership, the Heartland Café underwent a number of physical transformations. They refurnished the tables, painted the walls, closed off the kitchen, and completely rebuilt the porch.
Rosenfeld also redesigned the store in the front of the café.
“When I took over the store had a lot of items on consignment, a lot of media, incense, a large magazine rack,” said Rosenfeld. “We reimagined the whole store and now it’s a perpetual farm market, much more of a natural grocery store.”
Organic food is now an important part of the Heartland Café.
“During season almost all of the produce comes from my farm,” said Rosenfeld. “We retrained all the kitchen staff. We completely changed the menu. It used to be kind of a hodgepodge menu, so we shrunk it way down and gave it a much more Midwestern ideal. This is all a grand experiment and I hope it works. I believe that organics should be available to the masses. We try to keep our price point very low, and our food quality very high.”
Rosenfeld emphasized the changes in Heartland’s ideology.
“It’s a lot of physical changes, but maybe more importantly changes to the food and where it’s coming from, how it’s prepared, and then a lot of training and retraining and different approaches for our employees. We haven’t changed the name, we haven’t changed the general concept of the place, we haven’t changed the politics.”
Chris Mayor has worked at the Heartland Café for 10 years and is also a professional forager.
“The place has really come into its own since Tom took over,” said Mayor. “We’re pushing for zero waste and there’s a huge emphasis on sustainability now.”
The Heartland Café has long been a political center of Rogers Park, especially for progressives and left-leaning people. James and Hogan founded the Heartland with the idea that it would become a venue for open political discussion.
“You can see our signs, we’re not shy about our politics,” said Rosenfeld. “As a result of the political activism of the two founders, this place started to attract more and more political importance in the neighborhood and the north side of the city.”
Jesús “Chuy” Garcia, Jan Schakowsky, and Barack Obama have all hosted campaign events at the Heartland Café. “Vote for Chuy” signs are pasted all over the windows at the café. Most recently, the Heartland hosted a talk called “The State of the Police State” in reaction to events in Ferguson, Missouri.
“We’re more than just a place for candidates to go,” said Rosenfeld. “There’s a lot of important political discussions that happen here. We’ve long held our role as a place for progressives to come together and talk.”
The Heartland Café is an artistic center. In One Ear, an open mic show has been at the Heartland every Wednesday at 10 p.m. for the past 16 years. “PeteWolf” Winninger owns and hosts the open mic.
“It started off as a poetry show, and then in April of 1998 I introduced features and music, and then we expanded from an hour and a half to a three hour, four hour show,” said Winninger. “We have music, performance, comedy, magicians, anything really.”
Performers are allowed five minutes and are charged a three-dollar cover.
“The open mic scene is really hard to describe,” said Rosenfeld. “It’s really eclectic and changes every week.”
Winninger hopes to expand In One Ear in the future.
“We want In One Ear to not just be the open mic, but to be these different events that people create,” said Winninger.
Written for Journalism 301: Enterprise Reporting in Diverse Communities