City Club of Chicago: John Kelly, Chicago Mayoral Candidate

Now that those are out of the way, the greatest thing about the city of Chicago are stories.

And Tom Dreesen, our buddy, our late friend, used to say, the great thing about Chicago, guys...

They can tell stories, and you can tell your buddies the same stories for 20 years, and they laugh at all your stories like it's the first time they heard it.

And when you're an Irish Catholic Democrat, like myself, lifelong Democrat, never vote a Republican, no matter what my opponents are going to say about my beautiful Republican wife, and by the way, bring it on, because she's a lot smarter than all of them combined.

I can't wait for that to happen.

And as an Irish Catholic Democrat, you introduce yourself in a campaign, a lot of people say, where are you from in Ireland? And I was at the Irish Fellowship.

And I know this is shocking.

I had a 10-minute meeting scheduled with the mayor of Dublin, who's younger than me, which is kind of scary.

And we talked about transit for 45 minutes.

What a great young guy.

I always happen to go over on these talks.

And especially at the Irish Fellowship, they said, oh, Kelly, where are you from in Ireland? Cork, this.

And they try to answer.

Because the Irish folks on the southwest side and northwest side, they ask you a question and then they try to answer it for you.

But I grew up with my mom and my aunts doing that, so that's terrific.

And I said, my family's from Woodlawn.

My lady said, Woodlawn? Is that north or south? I said, it's south.

What part of Ireland? I'm from Woodlawn.

Where's your grandpa from? He's from Woodlawn.

What about your great-grandpa? He's from Woodlawn.

Great-great-grandpa? From Woodlawn.

My Chicago story started in 1891 when my great-grandfather, John Hayes, built our family hotel, which is the Hayes Hotel, at 64th and University in the Woodlawn neighborhood.

And there still is a street named after my great-grandfather.

And little did he know that 100 years later, his great grandson, who he never met, me, would graduate four blocks away exactly 100 years later in 1991 from Mount Carmel High School, the greatest high school in the United States of America.

Except when we played Brother Rice last week.

Now that those are out of the way, the greatest thing about the city of Chicago are stories.

And Tom Dreesen, our buddy, our late friend, used to say, the great thing about Chicago, guys...

They can tell stories, and you can tell your buddies the same stories for 20 years, and they laugh at all your stories like it's the first time they heard it.

And when you're an Irish Catholic Democrat, like myself, lifelong Democrat, never vote a Republican, no matter what my opponents are going to say about my beautiful Republican wife, and by the way, bring it on, because she's a lot smarter than all of them combined.

I can't wait for that to happen.

And as an Irish Catholic Democrat, you introduce yourself in a campaign, a lot of people say, where are you from in Ireland? And I was at the Irish Fellowship.

And I know this is shocking.

I had a 10-minute meeting scheduled with the mayor of Dublin, who's younger than me, which is kind of scary.

And we talked about transit for 45 minutes.

What a great young guy.

I always happen to go over on these talks.

And especially at the Irish Fellowship, they said, oh, Kelly, where are you from in Ireland? Cork, this.

And they try to answer.

Because the Irish folks on the southwest side and northwest side, they ask you a question and then they try to answer it for you.

But I grew up with my mom and my aunts doing that, so that's terrific.

And I said, my family's from Woodlawn.

My lady said, Woodlawn? Is that north or south? I said, it's south.

What part of Ireland? I'm from Woodlawn.

Where's your grandpa from? He's from Woodlawn.

What about your great-grandpa? He's from Woodlawn.

Great-great-grandpa? From Woodlawn.

My Chicago story started in 1891 when my great-grandfather, John Hayes, built our family hotel, which is the Hayes Hotel, at 64th and University in the Woodlawn neighborhood.

And there still is a street named after my great-grandfather.

And little did he know that 100 years later, his great grandson, who he never met, me, would graduate four blocks away exactly 100 years later in 1991 from Mount Carmel High School, the greatest high school in the United States of America.

Except when we played Brother Rice last week.