Despite covering Illinois government since 2002, my professional path never crossed with the Rev. Jesse Jackson, who died Tuesday at age 84 in Chicago.

Although I reported on a few Iowa campaign stops for U.S. Sen. John Kerry in 2003 and 2004, as well as a Barack Obama Labor Day appearance in Mount Carroll during his 2004 Senate candidacy, Jackson wasn’t present for those events.

He did visit Peru in October 2021 in connection with the curious case of Jelani Day, an Illinois State University graduate student whose body was found on Sept. 4 in the Illinois River near the Route 251 bridge, nine days after his car was found hidden in woods near the Illinois Valley YMCA. Nearly 500 people marched and listened to remarks pushing law enforcement agencies for justice and answers – information that would never come, as a task force quietly announced in October 2023, it would stop proactively investigating the drowning.

But I did have a personal brush with Jackson. Sort of. In August 2003, my wife and I planned a Chicago weekend. Based with my family in the suburbs, we’d head downtown on successive days for a musical and a Cubs game. We parked near the Cadillac Palace Theatre with plans to walk to the nearest Lou Malnati’s before heading back to take in “The Lion King.”

The only way to get from Point A to Point B, however, was directly through a picket line of Chicago Transit Authority workers marching in a wide circle to block a city street. Jackson and other organizers stood a few steps up from the rank and file – one wielding a megaphone – as they demanded negotiations.

Not wanting to disrupt, yet quite unsure how to reach our destination, the suburbanites must have appeared confounded. But the picketers seamlessly opened space in the line, so we single-file marched along until the workers split left and we stayed on the forward path. It felt very much like the physics of a revolving door while simultaneously surreal.

I’d never say we picketed with Jesse Jackson, unless perhaps looking to stump guessers while playing Two Truths and a Lie. All these years later, I recall the lack of pretension or appearance of celebrity. That was just the work of Jesse Jackson’s life, the same as it was in Peru in 2021 or in Decatur in 1999, challenging mandatory expulsion rules.

There’s a whole different column about disagreeing with certain positions — including stumping for ex-Gov. Rod Blagojevich’s pardon – but towering figures generally leave complex legacies. While others eulogize, I’m finding value in seeking contemporary accounts of the issues Jackson chose to get involved in and being reminded, again, how much history teaches about today.

• Scott T. Holland writes about state government issues for Shaw Local News Network. He can be reached at sholland@shawmedia.com.