Suburban Church Leads Hard Conversation About Race

Since arriving as pastor of St. Paul African Methodist Episcopal Church in 2017, Rev. Dwayne Gary has been stopped by Glencoe, Ill. police four times.

The 51-year-old pastor was not cited in any of his encounters with local police, which included being stopped for expired registration (his plates were current); talking on his cellphone while driving (it was in his cup holder, he says); a burned-out headlight (he got that fixed); and walking his dog, Comet, down a public sidewalk on the way home to the parsonage, his home near the church.

The officer "pulls up, rolls down his window and says, 'Where you headed?' " Gary recalls. "If that was the welcoming message for me moving into the area, it opened up my eyes."

Gary believes what he's experienced is racial profiling, and in recent months he's shared his experiences and inspired others in his community to speak up as well.

Glencoe, with a population just under 9,000, is unique among its neighboring North Shore Chicago suburbs for its historic Black community, says Morris "Dino" Robinson Jr., founder of the Shorefront Legacy Center, an archive of the area's Black history.