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 ED FELIEN That’s what they call it. The people living in tents along the sound-wall along Hiawatha from Franklin to 22nd Street call their village “The Wall of Forgotten Natives. FDR in a radio address in 1932 introduced his New Deal programs to help “the forgotten man at the…
BY STEPHANIE FOX Tennis on Selby 1599 Selby 651-340-3998 There is little shop on Selby Avenue devoted to tennis and enthusiastic tennis players. Owner Deb Irvine was once a lawyer. She didn’t even start playing tennis until she was an adult, she says, but she became a passionate player and…
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 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 DEBRA KEEFER RAMAGE Gatherings Cafe 1530 E. Franklin Ave. Mon.– Fri. 8 a.m. to 3 p.m. 612-879-1753 The Dish has had virtual lunches from Japan to Sweden, Ethiopia to Mexico, and from Korea to the British Isles. To finish out the series, we are coming home to Minnesota, to…
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 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…
BY ED FELIEN After losing my bid for re-election, and after a respectful period of mourning and self-pity, I decided it would be a waste to lose contact with all the politically active progressives I’d met. I wanted to start a radical, Farmer-Labor Caucus, within the DFL. We’d be based…
