Eat out for a good cause
We would like to make an offer to our friends and neighbors in Springfield that we hope they can’t refuse. Would you rather attend a stuffy fundraising dinner with a group of people you don’t know, or enjoy a delicious meal with family and friends at a great restaurant in your area and still support…
Totolly terrific
Breathtaking special effects, dazzling choreography and classic songs will charm you as NETworks Presentations’ national tour of Wizard of Oz lands in Springfield at Sangamon Auditorium Monday. Several lucky Springfield Youth Performance Group members will perform the roles of munchkins in this performance: Elizabeth Benoit, Grace Conlon, Cassie Gray, Caroline Younkin, Lesley McLafferty, Alina Sinha,…
Letters to the Editor 4/8/10
HOME BIRTH, THEN AND NOW Re: “Home delivery,” March 25, by Amanda Robert — It’s so sad that after all these years most expectant parents in Illinois still don’t have the option of choosing legal, midwife-attended home birth. Decades of stats have confirmed that this is a safe, cost-effective option, and expectant parents in Oregon…
Protecting the protector
One is always saddened to see an old friend left helpless in the hands of fate, even if that friend fills half a city block. As did so many of my generation, I spent dozens of happy hours at the Illinois State Armory at Second and Monroe during my youth. The building was constructed in…
Joel Styzens and Heather Styka
Two friends with different styles but similar tastes come together to host an all-acoustic night at the Ghost Light Open Mic instigated by local raconteur, impresario and musician Ted Keylon. In 2009 Chicago resident and former Springfieldian Joel Styzens released the award-winning acoustic guitar album, Relax Your Ears. For Styzens, a former studied jazz percussionist…
Springfield hosts a calm, conservative Tea Party
Though their counterparts nationwide have made headlines for extreme viewpoints of racism and violence, Springfield Tea Party activists stayed on message Monday at a rally calling for limited government, lower taxes and an end to political corruption. Springfield was one of three stops Monday for the Tea Party Express, a corporately-sponsored caravan traveling the country…
A right to ride
Horseback riding has long been a part of Illinois history, but the state’s equestrians want to ensure their right to ride the trails at state parks, nature preserves and recreation areas. Though many commercial equestrian camps go back 40 or 50 years, horseback riders could still be denied access to public lands, since there is…
Irresistible resistance
Once upon a time, folksingers and musicians everywhere used voices and music to righteously rail and necessarily knock unfair and overbearing public and private wrongs. Believe it or not, people listened to these artists, considered by many to offer insight into problems and see ways of averting or adjusting these troubles for the common good,…
Vintage base ball
The Springfield Long Nine is a vintage base ball (baseball was spelled using two words prior to 1880s) team that plays by the rules and customs of the 19th century. Sunday they take on the Decatur Ground Squirrels at Center Park, located between the beach house and the zoo. Their name comes from the nickname…
The epic labor struggle in the ‘Decatur war zone’
As the 19th century prepared to turn into the 20th, a cataclysmic confrontation between labor and management occurred in the steelmaking town of Homestead, Pa., pitting the wealthy Carnegie Steel Co. against one of the strongest unions of the day. The workers lost, setting the stage for exploitation, miserable working conditions and depressed wages that…
U.S. Senate candidates give each other gifts of gaffes
For a couple of otherwise pretty smart fellas, the two major party candidates for U.S. Senate seem to be playing right into the other’s hands these days. It seems to me at times that Republican Senate candidate Mark Kirk doesn’t quite seem to grasp what Illinois is really like outside his north suburban 10th Congressional…
The new Clash offers little new
I fondly remember the 1981 version of Clash of the Titans. Though it didn’t leave me as breathless as another film from that same summer, a little ditty called Raiders of the Lost Ark, it did provide the necessary fun for a young teen to while away a summer’s day. Besides, being a young movie…
Truth about health care reform
Health care reform is barely two weeks old, and many Americans have yet to separate fact from fiction, says Dr. Harry R. Moody, director of academic affairs for the American Association of Retired Persons. Moody, an author and expert on medical ethics, spoke April 2 to students, faculty and staff at Southern Illinois University School…
Heartland survival
Two-time Pulitzer Prize nominated author, senior fellow at the Chicago Council on Global Affairs, New York Council on Foreign Relations member, and former foreign correspondent for the Chicago Tribune, Richard Longworth presents the 2010 T.W. Samuels Lecture. On the heels of his newest book, Caught in the Middle: America’s Heartland in the Age of Globalism…
A restaurant to remember
Thin wisps of smoke from the guests’ cigarettes lazily spiral upward and hang as if suspended from the ceiling. The ceiling itself, as well as the walls, are inscribed with caricatures of regulars as well as celebrities that have dined there, drawn by the owner himself. A trickle of jazz from the baby grand piano…
The inhuman essence of a corporate ‘person’
I’m curious about those five Supreme Court justices who recently decreed that a corporation is a “person” with human rights: Do you think they ever met Mr. Walmart? If they had, they’d be forced to concede that corporate personhood is a sheer fantasy, for there is nothing even remotely human about the bloodless and brainless…
Getting bigger, going green
As St. John’s Hospital is preparing to renovate its downtown campus, the 135-year-old Springfield institution is paying special attention to minimizing the project’s environmental footprint and maximizing local economic benefits. On March 31, hospital officials announced a $162 million proposal to demolish certain old structures on the hospital’s campus and replace them with more modern…
Corporate control
April 14, the Lincoln Land Community College chapter of Phi Theta Kappa honor society wraps up its series of taped seminars, recorded last fall before a live studio audience at Mississippi Public Broadcasting in Jackson, Miss., with activist Ralph Nader. Nader, honored by Time magazine as “One of the 100 Most Influential Americans of the…
