With the Grateful Dead in Town, More 'Gutter Punks' Come to Chicago

Scruffy, unkempt vagabonds known as “travelers” are again walking the streets of Chicago’s North Side neighborhoods. As the Grateful Dead play a weekend series of Soldier Field concerts, even more “gutter punks” have arrived in Chicago to beg curbside, pop pills, sleep on sidewalks and fight with the city’s indigenous homeless.

A nightmare of the “living dead,” one might say, much to the annoyance of shopkeepers and residents.

Every summer, the warm-weather vagrants come to Wicker Park to panhandle, arriving by freight train from the South. This year, with the groovy coincidence of the Grateful Dead in town, their numbers seem larger, reports Alisa Hauser on the Wicker Park beat for DNAInfo Chicago.

Gregory James Spence, a Jefferson Park native who was traveling in Kentucky before coming back to Chicago for his mother’s funeral in mid-June, said he is sticking around for the concerts, too.

Spence, 38, who walks with a cane and said he has trouble remembering things after being hit by a vehicle that ran a red light, made it clear that he and others do not like being described as “gutter punks.”

Quoting a Bible verse about God giving the world his begotten son, Spence elaborated, “I’m a monk. I got to go places.”

(Yes, Spence, Jerry’s gone. Not just Dead, but actually dead. He died in 1995 in a California rehab facility. Phish guitarist Trey Anastasio is taking his place on stage.)

The “travelers” don’t actually have tickets to the Dead shows — tickets for the band’s 50th anniversary performances at Soldier Field average $500 to $600 on StubHub, with some going for $10,000. They rank among the most expensive concert seats in history, according to CNN. The band’s “Fare Thee Well” tour ends in Chicago, where Jerry Garcia played his final show with the Dead 20 years ago.

Rather, the vagabonds intend to hang out around Soldier Field during the concerts and bask in the vibes.

(There’s just a slight flaw in that plan, however. Concert security has put up fences around Soldier Field to prevent anyone without a ticket from entering what’s called “Shakedown Street,” a bazaar where people sell food and merchandise.)

» ALSO ON PATCH: Photos of the Field Museum’s Grateful Dead Exhibit and Grateful Dead LSD Memo: What to Do and What Not to Do

Meanwhile, the “travelers,” also less-gloriously known as “crusties,” just do what they do. Which is, when not panhandling or selling beer-can flowers on the curb, being a nuisance.

Doug Wood, president of the Wicker Park Garden Club, told DNAInfo he watched the “gutter punks” beat up a local homeless man in the park and steal his glasses. He watched them drinking and handing out pills. He called the cops.

Police routinely encounter the nomads sleeping — or passed out – in the doorways of local stores.

A recent conversation thread on Everyblock shows some find the “travelers/gutter punks/crusties” tolerable.

Writes one John Logan:

“There’s nothing new under the sun, really. These kids are no different than past generations who took to the ‘road.’ Guthrie did it, and we call him an American musical icon. Kerouac did it, and we call him an American literary icon. 100s of boomers did it, and we celebrate Woodstock as one of the most important cultural events of the 20th century. Leave them kids alone; the crushing demands of the man will come crashing down on them soon enough.”

Alas, for the neighborhood, this is a perennial problem that simply won’t go away when delayed-onset adulthood finally kicks in for some. Every year, there’s a new crop of “crusties” to contend with.

Want to Know More? Read:

• Punk Flock: Uncovering Chicago’s Subculture of Eccentric Nomads [The Columbia Chronicle]

• Wicker Park ‘Gutter Punk’ Population Surges Ahead of Grateful Dead Shows [DNAInfo Chicago]