After ten years and more than 120 storytellers, The Frunchroom will come to a close with its next show. We hope you’ll join us for one last visit.

The final Frunchroom show will be this Tuesday, September 30th, starting at 7:30pm at Beverly Arts Center (111th and Western, Chicago).

Our lineup includes:

Tara Betts, poet (“Refuse to Disappear”)
Carol Flynn, historian
Jaime Nesbitt Golden, reporter at Block Club Chicago
Ruth Guerra, actress/writer (“Ruth on the Rocks”)
Megan Quigley, writer/painter/Beverly Bakery coffee slinger

The Frunchroom began at O’Rourke’s Office in April 2015, moved to Beverly Woods in 2016, and to its current home at the Beverly Arts Center in 2017.

The unique mix of art, cocktails, and stories is presented in partnership with The Beverly Area Arts Alliance, the organization responsible for local arts events like the Backyard Music Series, the Uprising Market and the annual neighborhood-wide Beverly Art Walk.

Previous readers include local residents and business owners; radio and podcast hosts, teachers, poets, politicians, authors and artists. In addition, the show has featured reporters and anchors from the Chicago Tribune, South Side Weekly, Bloomberg News, WBEZ-FM and WGN-TV.

Read more about our storytellers below:

Tara Betts is the author of Refuse to Disappear, Break the Habit, and Arc & Hue. She is a professor in the Peace, Conflict Studies, and Social Justice program at DePaul University and part of the faculty at the Solstice MFA program at Lasell University. Her poems have appeared in numerous journals and anthologies, including This is the Honey and The Overturning. Her short stories and essays have also appeared in numerous publications, including Octavia’s Brood, Red Line: Chicago Horror Stories, and The Breakbeat Poets.

Carol Flynn grew up in South Shore and she has lived all over the city of Chicago. Her great-grandparents were early settlers in Morgan Park. Carol’s original background was in health care. She was the Assistant Director of Nutrition and Food Service for the University of Illinois Hospital and later the head of the Division of Education, Practice, and Research for the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics. She holds an M.B.A. in Human Resources. About 20 years ago, Carol discovered a new career in historical research and journalism and now enjoys authoring the Beverly-Morgan Park History page on Facebook and writing feature stories for the Beverly Review, the 19th Ward newsletter, Patch, and, previously, the Chicago Tribune. She also enjoys giving presentations on local history topics.

Jamie Nesbitt Golden is an award-winning reporter for Block Club Chicago. Her story about the country’s oldest Black tennis club was included in “The Year’s Best Sportswriting 2025.” She still loves Buffy, Black coffee and sleep.

Ruth Guerra (she/her/ella) is an actor, comedian, storyteller and a native of Chicago’s Back of the Yards neighborhood. She honed her comedic skills at The Second City and performed with Teatro Americano, Free Street Theater and the underground radical sketch group, the Southside Ignoramus Quartet (SIQ). She was a storyteller and facilitator for Hood Moms Storytelling workshop series. Her solo show, Ruth on the Rocks, earned her the Chicago Reader’s Best Stage Actor award. Ruth is currently developing a web series and continues to create new theatrical work.

Megan Quigley is an artist, coffee roaster and lover of live music. She is a Beverly native that bought her own house at 25 a whole 2 blocks from her parents. Megan loves attending neighborhood events and being a part of the Beverly Art Walk with her Abstract Acrylic paintings. A graduate from University of Illinois Chicago (UIC) with a business degree in Entrepreneurship, she proudly minored in Gender and Women Studies. Lately she has been spending much of her time painting to prepare for this year’s Beverly Art Walk as well as making posters for, and going to, many protests.