The assassination of Illinois Black Panther Party Deputy Chairman Fred Hampton and Defense Captain Mark Clark by Chicago police and the FBI on Dec. 4, 1969, caused Larry Jenkins to leave his “well-paying” job with the Chicago Tribune after two years of employment to volunteer his typesetting and press skills with the party.
“I was making flyers,” said the Bronzeville resident. Jenkins was one of many Illinois Black Panther Party members at a celebratory event last week that was years in the making, according to Leila Wills, daughter of Panther Party members and executive director of the Historical Preservation Society of the Illinois Chapter of the Black Panther Party.
The building at 2350 W. Madison St., on the Near West Side, where a Walgreens currently sits, was once the headquarters of the Illinois chapter of the party. The original structure was demolished, however a marker with the Black Panthers logo was unveiled July 26 launching the Black Panther Party Heritage Trail in Illinois — the first marker of over a dozen sites that commemorate local party history.
The trail will serve as an educational tool, Wills wrote in a pamphlet, showing the breadth of the inaugural 13 Chicago sites where the black and gold markers will be placed. While the trail continues to be built, the inaugural expanse of markers placed into sidewalks or affixed to buildings runs from Peoria through Chicago to Rockford. The designated locales are where Illinois party members helped their communities back in the day — from the Spurgeon “Jake” Winters Free People’s Medical Care Center at 3850 W. 16th St. to structures where refuge and meetings were conducted, such as the Church of the Holy Covenant at 925 W. Diversey Parkway.
A marker also rests at Ward Chapel A.M.E. Church in Peoria, the site where Clark started the city’s Free Breakfast for Children Program, which ran until the recent pandemic, per Wills. According to the preservation society’s website, 21 sites have been earmarked as “significant locations of the Illinois chapter. Those sites include the Rockford branch headquarters (529 S. Pierpont Ave.) and sites in Maywood, Summit and Harvey. Those sites are not a part of the inaugural placement of markers.
The Chicago-area properties associated with the Black Panther Party have been listed in a National Register of Historic Places Multiple Property Document. The designation defines the broad history and cultural context of the Black Panthers in Illinois, so that additional sites can eventually be added to the historic register or have their status updated, such as the Church of the Epiphany at 201 S. Ashland Ave., which has had its National Register nomination updated with the history of the Panthers.
Spearheaded by the nonprofit started in 2020 for the sole purpose of organizing the landmarking effort, the Historical Preservation Society of the Illinois Chapter of the Black Panther Party, the listing was approved by the state of Illinois and the National Park Service in December. It’s the first time the Panthers’ history and cultural significance have been recognized by the federal government in a Multiple Property Document.
Wills said work on the trail culminated in 2023, when the National Park Service approved the listing of multiple properties that the Illinois chapter of the Black Panther Party used for activities on the National Register of Historic Places. The Historical Preservation Society fundraised for the markers beginning in February 2024, through the Party’s website and members, as well as a variety of sponsors such as Illinois Humanities and Landmarks Illinois, resulting in almost $42,000 for the 13 plaques. Wills said fundraising is ongoing to cover costs for installation and permits. A look at the end of the 200-plus page National Park Service document shows the support garnered for landmarking the Illinois Black Panther Party.
The federal government’s acknowledgement of the Black Panther Party’s history and impact on the United States is a first, according to Wills. “We hope to have all the plaques placed by October,” Wills said. The month is significant in that the Black Panther Party was established in Oakland, California, on Oct. 15, 1966, by leaders Huey P. Newton and Bobby Seale. The heritage trail will showcase the programs and activism that provide context and testimonials from Panther members passing on their knowledge.
“Each historical plaque has a QR code that will take you to that site’s webpage that will have interpretive material,” said Wills. “We plan to have multiple means of accessibility: maps, audio, pictures and writing. We are still in the beginning stages.”
Sheila McNary visits a tent containing historical posters of the Black Panther Party during a plaque dedication at the original site of the Illinois Chapter of the Black Panther Party headquarters on July 26, 2025, in Chicago. (John J. Kim/Chicago Tribune) 
Preservationist and author Leila Wills, right, talks with former U.S. Rep. Bobby Rush during a plaque dedication at the original site of the Illinois Chapter of the Black Panther Party headquarters on July 26, 2025, in Chicago. (John J. Kim/Chicago Tribune)
The Black Panther Party was created in the 1960s as a response to racial violence against Black Americans, when youth became discouraged by the progress made by the nonviolent approach of the Civil Rights Movement. Political, community activism and armed self-defense came together under their organization to get freedom from oppression “by any means necessary,” a phrase made famous by Malcolm X, which the party embraced in their original 10-point platform that spelled out the needs and principles of the group’s actions toward African American liberation.
Hampton, a member of the NAACP in high school, and retired U.S. Rep. Bobby Rush, who was an Illinois Black Panther Party co-founder and member of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee — would cross paths when the Illinois chapter of the Panther Party was coalescing. (Hampton served as deputy chairman and Rush as the deputy minister of defense.) As a Black Panther, Hampton would go on to create alliances to found the Rainbow Coalition since basic tenets of survival, including economic struggle and housing, traversed racial lines.
The party established social programs for the public, known as “survival programs,” which included free medical care, clothing, and breakfast for thousands of schoolchildren daily. This initiative was so successful nationally that the federal government adopted the concept after the party itself was dismantled. Empowerment, freedom, education, employment, food, housing, justice, peace and an end to police brutality were points the party worked toward in their initiatives.
A playlot run by the Black Panthers next to their headquarters at 4233 S. Indiana Ave. in Chicago on July 28, 1972. (Quentin Dodt/Chicago Tribune)
Bobby Rush, center, announces a public inquest to prove the police killed fellow Black Panther Fred Hampton, at the party’s office at 2350 W. Madison St. on March 6, 1970. With Rush is the Black Panthers’ Billy Brooks, left, and Jewel Cook. (Arthur Walker/Chicago Tribune)
The closed Black Panther Party headquarters at 4233 S. Indiana Ave. says “All Power To The People” on the door on Sept. 16, 1974. (Ernie Cox Jr./Chicago Tribune)
A crowd forms in front of the Black Panthers headquarters at 2337 W. Monroe St. as the grand jury heads into the apartment on Jan. 8, 1970. Fred Hampton and Mark Clark were killed in a shootout at the apartment on Dec. 4, 1969. (Arthur Walker/Chicago Tribune)
Bobby Rush, deputy defense minister for the Black Panthers, makes an announcement Dec. 3, 1970, of a forthcoming strike involving children who will not be attending school. Rush made the announcement at 2350 W. Madison St. in Chicago. (George Quinn/Chicago Tribune)
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A playlot run by the Black Panthers next to their headquarters at 4233 S. Indiana Ave. in Chicago on July 28, 1972. (Quentin Dodt/Chicago Tribune)
Rush honored the Panthers’ legacy alongside Fredrika Newton, widow of Black Panther Party founder Newton, last Saturday, sharing his story on finding the West Side building where the Illinois headquarters operated from November 1968 to 1971. This is “about those who dedicated their lives, their futures and their families to making the dream of the Black Panther Party a reality,” Rush said. While retired from politics, Rush said “you can’t retire from a calling.”
Amid call and responses of “Power to the People,” onlookers at the event could see the remaining markers that will make up the rest of the heritage trail, including Site 11 at 2156 N. Halsted St., which housed the People’s Law Office; Site 2 at 2337 W. Monroe St., where Hampton and Clark were killed in the 1969 raid led by Chicago police and orchestrated by the FBI; the party’s first South Side office at Site 7 at 233 E. 35th St. and Site 8, the South Side headquarters at 4233 S. Indiana Ave. — both structures have been demolished.
After the ceremony, Jenkins smiled and noted what better time to place the markers. “We have the support of a Black mayor and aldermen … this was the time,” he said. Newton received thanks and appreciation for her presence at the event. When a young man grasped her hand and said “power to the people,” she beamed at him.
“This is what it’s all about,” she said. “He wasn’t even born when this movement began, this is why it continues.”
Rush agreed.
“Don’t give up on the movement,” he said. “The world still needs what you have to offer.”
