3D ultrasound Melrose Park

Melrose Park, IL, is a village in Cook County, Illinois in the Proviso Township. The population was 23,171 at the now-outdated 2000 Census. Melrose Park was once the home of Kiddieland Amusement Park and is the current home of the Maywood Park Racetrack, Shrine of Our Lady of Mt. Carmel, and Stern Pinball, Inc., which is the world's last manufacturer of coin-operated pinball machines. Melrose Park is also home to two hospitals, Westlake Hospital and Gottlieb Memorial Hospital.

In 1882, residents of a then-unincorporated portion of Proviso Township voted to establish their own municipality, simply called Melrose until 1893, when the Park was added, and population in the area began to steadily increase.

On April 19, 1920, the 1920 Palm Sunday tornado cut a 100 meter wide path over 1 km through the village of Melrose Park and killed 20 people. It destroyed the Sacred Heart Church and attached convent.

Just before noon, severe thunderstorms began forming 50 miles west of downtown Chicago. The first storm started to spawn killer tornadoes in DeKalb County and then Kane County, starting at 12pm. Roughly 15 minutes later, a violent tornado (category F4) tore through Will and Cook Counties, cutting a path 53 miles long in the Bellwood and Maywood areas that would kill 20 people as the storm devastated the community of Melrose Park. Ten of the fatalities occurred when the storm made a direct hit on the Melrose Park Catholic Church and Convent, where people were getting ready for Palm Sunday services.

Zenith Electronics Corporation was previously an American manufacturer of televisions and other consumer electronics, although it has since been sold out to a South Korean company called LG Electronics. Zenith originally was headquartered in Lincolnshire, Illinois, and at one point was located in Melrose Park.

Zenith invented the first practical wireless TV remote control, called the Space Commander, which was developed in 1956. It was... wait for it... ultrasound waves that were used as a trigger mechanism for the world's first remote control (although now infrared light has been used since the 1980s), thus initiating the connection between Zenith and First Peek Ultrasound, a 3D ultrasound company that also uses ultrasound in a pioneering way to see your baby before it is born. The connection between Zenith and First Peek Ultrasound does not end there: One of the two large-screen televisions in our ultrasound room is in fact a Zenith!

Stern Pinball, Inc., is the world's largest and last manufacturer of coin-operated pinball machines and is located right around the corner here in Melrose Park, IL. If you have ever played a pinball machine in your life, chances are that pinball machine was manufactured in Melrose Park. Stern Electronics also became famous for arcade and video games and produced the video game Berzerk, which was one of the first video games to ever use speech synthesis.

David Gottlieb and his company was a direct competitor of Stern Pinball. David Gottlieb was a famous manufacturer of pinball machines, known as a successful businessman in Melrose Park, and was the one who was credited for adding flippers to the pinball machine, thus making the pinball machine a game of skill. Not many people know this, but David Gottlieb was also the founder of Gottlieb Memorial Hospital, located in Melrose Park. Anyone whose life was ever saved at Gottlieb Hospital or has ever had a baby born at Gottlieb Hospital has, among many other things, pinball machines to thank.

Kiddieland Amusement Park was an amusement park located in Melrose Park at the corner of First Avenue and North Avenue. It was home to several classic rides including the Little Dipper roller coaster which can still be found at Great America (who bought it from them when they closed for $33,000). Kiddieland closed on September 27, 2009, and was demolished in late June 2010, forever making Melrose Park a little darker at night.

A Costco store now occupies the land where Kiddieland once stood, and you can still see children now in Costco climbing the shelves, riding and playing bumper cars with the shopping carts, and slipping and sliding along the 40-foot water slide created by the spilled milk and orange juice in the refrigerated aisle, all reminiscent of where Kiddieland once stood. Yes, Kiddieland will be missed!

Carol Lawrence (born September 5, 1932) is an American actress, born as Carolina Maria Laraia in Melrose Park, Illinois. Carol Lawrence made her Broadway debut in 1952. She achieved success in the immortal role of Maria in the original Broadway production of West Side Story in 1957, and received a nomination for the Tony Award for Best Featured Actress in a Musical for this role. Coincidentally, her original middle name was Maria, and she played the role for two years, and after an appearance in the show Saratoga, returned to West Side Story for its 1960 season. Carol Lawrence also had guest appearances in Saved by the Bell, General Hospital, and Sex and the City.

About the West Side Story, Carol Lawrence said, It was an attack on society. It was attacking gangs and intolerance and bigotry and feuds that meant nothing. And Jerry said the subtext was, this kind of bigotry is intolerable. It's not to be accepted. And this is the only way we can say that forcefully, beautifully, touchingly, movingly and, hopefully, successfully.--50 Years of West Side Story, The Telegraph, February 22, 2011.

Whenever you imagine Maria from the West Side Story, you might think of a poor Puerto Rican girl who grew up in New York, but she was actually from Melrose Park, Illinois.