'Patent Leather Shoes' Novelist, Mount Greenwood Native Dies at 67

John R. Powers grew up in Mount Greenwood and gained famed as the author of "Do Black Patent Leather Shoes Really Reflect Up?"

  He was a local boy who took his childhood memories of the South Side and spun them into hysterical tales that chronicled the shared experiences of a Catholic education.  John R. Powers died Jan. 17 at his home in Lake Geneva, Wis. at the age of 67.  Powers grew up in Mount Greenwood and attended Brother Rice High School. He gained fame as a satirist whose 1975 novel "Do Black Patent Leather Shoes Really Reflect Up?" poked fun at his strict Catholic schooling.  The book was later turned into a musical that made its way to Broadway in 1982. However, the musical found its real success in local and community productions where it became a must-see show for every former Catholic school kid.  "On the day he died he just finished a new one-man …

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