07/18/2026
Any LINCOLN SCHOOL alumni from the 1950s-60s? Here's an Interesting item from the Historical Society of Oak Park and River Forest You may remember this is you ever went to the Principal's Office 😀
The long-anticipated summer movie, “The Odyssey,” hits theaters today. Here at Oak Park River Forest Museum we have an interesting bit of Odyssey-related history.
This sculpture, called “Ulysses Supping with Circe,” was created by Richard W. Bock (1865-1949). Bock lived and maintained a studio in River Forest for much of the time between 1910 and 1944 and donated this plaster bas-relief panel to Lincoln School in River Forest in 1922.
The sculpture depicts the Greek hero Odysseus (later known as Ulysses by the Romans) having a meal with the Greek sorceress Circe, who turned Odysseus’ sailors into swine.
When the 1889 Lincoln School was demolished in the 1950s to make way for the current building, Principal Josephine Corkill saved it from being discarded. She had this frame made and it hung in her office in the new Lincoln School. Corkill served as principal at Lincoln School from 1938 until she retired in 1964. She began teaching art in 1925 at all four River Forest elementary schools and had previously taught in Oak Park. The bas-relief donated to The Historical Society of Oak Park and River Forest by her family in 1996.
Come and visit OPRF Museum to view this bas-relief (before or after you watch the movie at Lake Theater).
