BY ED FELIEN I loved the façade on the Modern Cleaners building ever since I first saw it as a small child looking out the window of a Chicago Avenue bus. It seemed so sleek, so smooth, so modern. The architectural style is Streamline Moderne, a final flourish of Art…
resistance persistence BY DEBRA KEEFER RAMAGE There have been a few victories in the resistance in the past month. Before the arraignment hearing (Sept. 27) came around for the group of immigrant rights protestors known as #ICEbreakers18, the court dismissed all the charges on Sept. 9. That was one victory.…
In a letter dated Aug. 3, 2018, Minneapolis YWCA management, without prior consultation with members, decreed that it would impose a pay-to-park system with gates to go into effect in September at the Midtown Y. Parking had always been free at Midtown, one of its attractions. Although the letter was…
BY ED FELIEN In late winter of 1976 I got a call from Fran Shor, a friend who was teaching at Wayne State University. He said they were hiring faculty for a new program, The Weekend College for Working Adults. It was an adult education program teaching college classes to…
BY TONY BOUZA “They go low, we go high.” Thus, did that classy First Lady, Michelle Obama, abjure us to take the high road. Then we have Rep. Maxine Waters tempting us to the low road. All those lunch counter sit-ins ignored. What did it all mean? Think of the…
BY ED FELIEN It’s time for the Fall Parade of Homes. Until Sept. 30, you can tour 427 new homes Thursdays-Sundays from 12 to 6 p.m. It’s free except for four Dream Homes where you’ll be asked to pay a $5 admission at the door. Proceeds from the Dream Homes…
BY ELAINE KLAASSEN Daily emails to my inbox plead with me to “save the wolves, save the polar bears, save the bees … !” Two environmental films I saw recently at Transition Longfellow warned me of the fragile state of our Earth. I am still shaken. I know the Earth…
Hope Lutheran Church is celebrating its unique choir camping trip program, which ran from 1967 to 2003, with a reunion on Saturday, Sept. 15. All choristers and chaperones that made these trips possible are invited. These were not singing or performing tours, nor were they educational programs or religious retreats. They…
BY ASHLEY FRAY Weight Gain: One of the worst parts of major depression is the sedentary isolation. The anti-psychotic medications also cause an unending appetite. I have been yo-yo dieting for eight years. Right now, my goal weight is nowhere in sight. The weight increases lethargy. Not only am I…
BY ED FELIEN I wrote on a local community blog: I want a compromise. I want something everyone can be happy with. Why can’t everyone have everything they want? Why can’t we take down the artificial barriers that are blocking the outlet to Minnehaha Creek from Lake Hiawatha? Why can’t…
BY DEBRA KEEFER RAMAGE The business hub around Chicago and 48th Street said good-bye to two casual restaurants this summer, then said hello to their replacements within the past month or so. Pepito’s, the very long-lived Mexican family-style restaurant associated with the Parkway Theatre, closed its doors. But lovers of…
BY DEBRA KEEFER RAMAGE Nicollet Avenue Open Streets event is Sunday, Sept. 23, from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. The route starts at Lake and Nicollet and extends southward to 46th Street, making it one of the shortest routes. But what it lacks in length, it makes up in intensity,…
BY DEBRA KEEFER RAMAGE Do you realize what an insane month August was? Locally, we had merely days before the statewide party and non-partisan primaries, an allegation against a major DFL candidate—Keith Ellison, currently 5th District Congressperson, but running for Minnesota Attorney General—of domestic violence. Ellison won his primary, and…
BY ED FELIEN Cam Gordon’s attempt to add more oversight to the Minneapolis Police Department seems to have failed for the moment. The Charter Commission has said it will not hold hearings on the proposed amendment in time for it to be on the November ballot. Gordon was proposing: “Shall…
BY TOM O’CONNELL Ask your neighbors why Minnesota’s Democratic Party is called the Democratic Farmer Labor Party, and as often as not you will get a sheepish grin, and an “I really don’t know.” Minnesota’s Farmer-Labor Party had its immediate origins in the spring and summer of 1918, when the…
