Rash's Surname Index
Notes for Brockie W. DILWORTH
Chicago Tribune (IL) - Tuesday, August 16, 2005
Deceased Name: Brockie Dilworth 1928-2005 Led center for immigrants As executive director of Gads Hill Center on Chicago's West Side, he provided social services to Latino families in the Heart of Chicago neighborhood
Brockie Dilworth always thought the best of people. If he encountered a troubled teen without a place to sleep, he invited the teen home to stay with him and his wife. It was a practice that continued until the couple started a family of their own.
"If somebody was begging on the street, he wouldn't question them," said Olive, his wife of nearly 50 years. "He would just automatically give them something. He just felt that if a person was going to do that, they must really need it."
Mr. Dilworth, 77, who served for more than 20 years as executive director of Gads Hill Center, a family resource center for recent immigrants that provides day care and English courses, died of Parkinson's disease Friday, Aug. 12, at Advocate Trinity Hospital in Chicago.
Mr. Dilworth, a Philadelphia native, joined the Marines after he graduated from high school and worked as a weapons instructor at Parris Island, S.C., at the end of World War II. After the war, he earned a bachelor's degree in business and a master's degree in social service administration from the University of Chicago, his wife said.
He arrived at the Gads Hill Center, located in the Heart of Chicago neighborhood, for a summer job in 1955 and met his wife there. Mr. Dilworth worked at several social service agencies in the Chicago area before taking the executive director post at Gads Hill Center in 1971.
During his tenure, the center established programs including a Head Start program for Latino youth, a domestic violence program called Project Sanctuary and an employment service agency called Spanish Coalition for Jobs Inc.
Perhaps his greatest accomplishment was adapting the organization so it continued to meet its clients' needs as the neighborhood's immigrant population shifted, said Gads Hill Center board member Jim Brett, who worked with Mr. Dilworth for more than 20 years.
"His biggest legacy is the fact that he was able to orchestrate the transition from a neighborhood, and more specifically a center, that was predominantly Eastern European to one that was progressively Latino," Brett said. "He did that rather successfully. He left a good foundation to build on."
One enterprise Mr. Dilworth welcomed as executive director was the Latino Youth Alternative High School in 1974, which was founded by Ald. Danny Solis (25th). The program, which remained at the center until 1985, provided a place for teenagers who had dropped out or been pushed out of high school, said Richard Rutschman, who directed the high school for several years.
In 1978 the Dilworths built an 11 1/2-room, 3 1/2-bath home in Heart of Chicago, large enough to accommodate a family with five children. "He felt it was important to be close by and to show support for the community," said his wife, also a social worker.
"A lot of staff from non-profit organizations do not work in the communities they live in," Rutschman said. "Brockie ... was very familiar with the needs of the community, so he knew the importance of providing young people with a second chance for their education."
Mr. Dilworth retired in 1991 and was diagnosed with Parkinson's in 1992. Yet he maintained a clipping service for family members, sending them articles on wide-ranging topics, said his eldest daughter, Janice. He loved coffee-flavored ice cream and was an avid reader of spy novels, history books and stories about space travel.
In addition to his wife and daughter, other survivors include three more daughters, Laura, Rachel and Deborah Meeks; a son, Dale; three brothers, Louis Hill, Warden Dilworth and Richardson Dilworth Jr.; two sisters, Deborah Bishop and Anne Hackett; five grandchildren and a great-granddaughter.
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