Fletcher Farrar

Campus protests bring memories of heady spring days trying to make a difference in the world. It wasn’t just that first spring, the awful spring that Martin was assassinated, then Bobby during finals week. There were antiwar protests every spring until graduation, peaking with a student strike after National Guard troops killed four Kent State […]

It’s great that the decline of local news has gotten attention lately, and that foundations, universities and government task forces are spending money on the problem. But the more proposals that are offered, the more obvious it becomes that nobody has found a solution. Nonprofit journalism is one idea, but earlier this month Chicago Public […]

Late to the gym, I blew past a crosswalk near Memorial. A woman waiting to cross called me the name of a rear end. Secretly I agreed with her and vowed to make amends. Now I take that route every morning, slowing at each white-striped intersection, and if a pedestrian is near, stopping for them. […]

Americans should know by now – but many don’t – that U.S. Jews differ widely in their political views. A study released last week by Pew Research Center shows that, among U. S. Jews, younger adults express much more negative attitudes toward Israel than older adults do, reflecting attitudes in the broader U.S. public. While […]

Lately I’ve been remembering one afternoon horseback riding at the farm with Dad, something we often did on weekends when I was a kid in southern Illinois. The sky got dark. We stopped the horses as a breeze came up, and we experienced what must have been a solar eclipse. We hadn’t known it was […]

New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristof noted this week that President Joe Biden has been talking increasingly tougher to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu about the humanitarian toll in Gaza caused by Israel’s war tactics. But Netanyahu continues to ignore the White House. Kristof quoted Israeli defense minister Moshe Dayan, speaking to an American in 1967. […]

A group that has organized 103 annual banquets can be expected to know how to manage conflict with understanding and forgiveness. At its event Sunday, the Springfield branch of the NAACP kept its program moving while its usually vocal local director, Teresa Haley, sat quietly at a front table. Nobody said anything about her having […]

Several at the graveside service said they were surprised at the size of the crowd, 50 or so, that assembled at Oak Ridge Cemetery that sunny morning last week. They didn’t know “Cowboy” Bob McClure, who was 68 when he died Feb. 12, had so many friends. I knew him as a neighbor who would […]

Here’s an appeal for readers to be writers. We all know “senior moments” have gotten bad press lately, as tired politicians occasionally wander. But seniors have a lot of moments, and few of them involve forgetfulness. For the spring edition of Illinois Times’ quarterly magazine REGEN, we’re collecting stories about Golden Senior Moments. These touches […]

Waste Management’s quick exit from providing residential garbage service in Springfield may stir up calls for reform of Springfield’s antiquated and inefficient system of private haulers contracted by individual homeowners. There is little enforcement of the rule that requires each residence to have trash service, so rampant fly dumping plagues neighborhoods. Maybe the city needs […]

Thank you to history columnist Tom Emery for reminding readers (p. 10) that this is the 75th anniversary of Adlai Stevenson II becoming governor of Illinois. Less than four years later, Gov. Stevenson would become our state’s gift to the nation, famously beginning his first presidential campaign with, “Let’s talk sense to the American people.” […]

No wonder he got Nikki mixed up with Nancy; they’re both from his same nightmare. The worst fear of a would-be strongman is a strong woman, and Nikki Haley is strong in the right places. Running against a character, she has character, along with political experience and life experience. She knows race and racism from […]