Teyonna Lofton, 18, shows the scars while sitting outside her home in the Auburn Gresham neighborhood in Chicago, Monday, Aug. 24, 2020, from surgeries to graft a vein from her leg to increase blood flow in her arm where she was shot. Lofton, a beaming high school graduate, had just been honored by friends and family with a car parade. As she waited at a gas station to buy a soft drink, shots rang out, and she fell hard. She prayed she would not die. In a chaotic year destined for the history books, Auburn Gresham, a Black community in Chicago, has written its own grim chapter, enduring a deadly virus, economic misery and gun violence, a constant state of turmoil that mirrors the tumult afflicting much of urban America.
Associated Press
Phlebotomist Sarah Steffeter, right, tests Phillip McTerron, at a COVID-19 testing site in the parking lot of a shuttered store damaged by recent looting in the Auburn Gresham neighborhood in Chicago, Sunday, Aug. 23, 2020. Auburn Gresham was hit early by the pandemic. COVID-19 infections rose quickly. Stores closed during a citywide lockdown. Then the agonizingly public death of George Floyd spurred protests that turned ugly. Businesses were set ablaze.
Associated Press
Ronald Cashaw looks out from the window of his clothing store, Just Kicking, in the Auburn Gresham neighborhood of Chicago, Saturday, Aug. 22, 2020. Blocked by security bars, looters smashed the front window of his store grabbed some clothing and ran away before Cashaw arrived. “I had tears in my eyes,” says Cashaw. The looting was something new, and horrible. But in the nearly two decades Cashaw has served this community, financial problems have grown more devastating.
Associated Press
Jenny Edwards, right, holds her eight-month-old grandson, Daniel, during a church service at St. Sabina Catholic Church in the Auburn Gresham neighborhood in Chicago, Sunday, Aug. 23, 2020. In harrowing moments, in the sobs of grieving mourners and the incessant wail of sirens, the crises of 2020 have played out painfully within this single Chicago community.
Associated Press
Demetrius Mingo, right, an outreach worker with the Target Area Development Corporation, a nonprofit that addresses stubborn local problems, talks with residents while making rounds looking to mediate conflicts in the Auburn Gresham neighborhood in Chicago, Saturday, Aug. 22, 2020. The group has also walked the streets to warn one segment of the population, victims and perpetrators of gun violence, of the dangers of a virus they could unwittingly pass on to their families.
Associated Press
Demetrius Mingo, right, an outreach worker with the Target Area Development Corporation, a nonprofit that addresses stubborn local problems, embraces an old friend as neighboring blocks attend a ‘peace picnic’ in the Auburn Gresham neighborhood in Chicago, Saturday, Aug. 22, 2020. The group supplied its outreach workers face masks to distribute while making their rounds to prevent gang retaliation. It hasn’t been easy making the argument to young men who pay little attention to the virus and already have a fatalistic view of life, says Autry Phillips, the group’s executive director.
Associated Press
The sun sets as residents from neighboring blocks attend a ‘peace picnic’ in the Auburn Gresham neighborhood in Chicago, Saturday, Aug. 22, 2020. In a chaotic year destined for the history books, Auburn Gresham, a Black community in Chicago, has written its own grim chapter. It has endured a deadly virus, protests, gun violence and economic misery. The constant state of turmoil mirrors the tumult that has afflicted much of urban America.
Associated Press
Snovia Gosa signs a message on a memorial board for a friend who was killed by gun violence as residents from neighboring blocks attend a ‘peace picnic’ in the…