In 1996, the mayor of Hickory Hills asked the City Council to remove an MIA/POW flag that had flown outside City Hall for 22 years.
Then-mayor Roy John “Jack” Faddis said he wanted the flag moved inside the council chambers because of improved relations between the United States and Vietnam.
Faddis, a West Point graduate who family members said was honored for his military service during the Vietnam War, died March 4 at Amita Health Adventist Medical Center in La Grange. He was 77.
He served as mayor of the southwest suburban community of about 14,000 residents from 1995 to 2003 after previously serving as an alderman.
“He took great pride in serving as mayor,” Palos Hills Mayor Gerald Bennett said.
Faddis was born in Missouri, his son, Christopher Faddis, said. Jack Faddis spent part of his childhood in Europe while his father served overseas.
“He was a military brat,” Christopher Faddis said. “He spent time in Germany.”
Faddis earned a degree in engineering from the United States Military Academy West Point in 1964, records showed. He served as an officer with the U.S. Army and was honored for heroism during combat, his brother, Michael Faddis, said.
“He saved several men from a burning ammunition dump,” Michael Faddis said.
The combat veteran avoided discussion of his military service until recently, his brother said. Faddis died of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, he said.
After leaving the military in the early 1970s, Faddis moved to the Chicago area, where he worked in corporate engineering, family members said. He earned a graduate degree from the Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University in Evanston in 1977.
Faddis worked at Argonne National Laboratory near Lemont and earned a law degree from Loyola University Chicago in 1981. He ran a Palos Hills-based private law practice until his retirement in 2003.
“He did a lot of family law, some personal injury cases,” Christopher Faddis said.
Faddis and his wife, Carolyne, lived in Hickory Hills since 1977.
As a public servant, Faddis was most proud of securing millions of dollars in state and federal grants to help finance infrastructure improvements and construction of a community center and police station, family members said.
“He was selfless,” Michael Faddis said. “Everything he did, he did for the community, for other people.”
Neighboring Palos Hills is similar in demographics to Hickory Hills. Bennett has been mayor of Palos Hills since 1980 and said Faddis stressed managing finances, limiting taxes and addressing quality of life.
“I thought he did a really good job moving the community forward,” Bennett said. “He worked to upgrade and professionalize the Police Department during an era of (population) growth.”
Hickory Hills was awarded the Illinois Governor’s Hometown Award three times and recognized as a Tree City USA seven times during his eight years as mayor.
The City Council spurned some of his initiatives. In 2002, the council voted 5-3 to reject a private educational institution’s request to build a school on 4 acres at 95th Street and 88th Avenue, the Chicago Tribune reported.
At the time, the institution was called Northwestern Business College and was based on Chicago’s North Side, but operated a satellite campus in the south suburbs. Faddis taught part-time at the school.
After leasing space in Hickory Hills, the school wanted to build on vacant land. But the council majority considered the site to be prime commercial property that would create less tax benefit for the community as a school.
The institution is now based in Bridgeview and called Northwestern College. A Walgreens occupies the once-vacant land the school had considered for a Hickory Hills campus.
In 1995, Faddis responded to complaints from a tavern owner who was fined $750 because the business hosted twice-weekly lingerie fashion shows that violated a local ordinance. The tavern owner argued before the council that the attire on the popular beach-themed TV show “Baywatch” was more revealing than what customers saw at his fashion shows.
“I don’t watch ‘Baywatch,'” Faddis told the proprietor, the Tribune reported.
In addition to his wife, son Christopher (Kristin) and brother Michael (Linda), Faddis is survived by two other sons, Michael (Elizabeth) and John (Jessica); eight grandchildren; and a sister-in-law, Marolyne Williams.
Faddis served as president of the school board at Saint Patricia Catholic Parish in Hickory Hills from 1990 to 1992. He also was a past president of the West Point Society of Chicago and the Southwest Bar Association and served as a panel chairman of a Cook County Mandatory Arbitration Program.
Visitation will be from 3 to 8 p.m. Thursday, March 12, at the Lack & Sons Funeral Home, 9236 S. Roberts Road, Hickory Hills. A funeral Mass will be held at 10 a.m. Friday, March 13, at St. Patricia Church, 9050 S. 86th Ave., Hickory Hills. Interment will be at Abraham Lincoln National Cemetery in Elwood.
Family members requested that in lieu of flowers, donations be made to St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital or Shriners Hospitals for Children.
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