Closing the gap
Earlier this year Springfield School District 186 made a job offer to an aspiring African-American grade-school teacher who had performed well in the district as a student teacher. “She accepted the offer, then went to Atlanta to visit a friend,” says Bob Leming, assistant superintendent and head of human resources at District 186. “Her friend…
The Italian way
A tip before you order at Mariah’s: Try something served with the homemade red sauce, a house specialty. The flavorful tomato sauce, which is rich with herbs, spices and onion, is light in texture and tastes like it just came off your stove at home after simmering for several hours. Mariah’s restaurant opened this fall…
Wooing single women
Meet the single woman, breadwinner, cultural icon, and the star of every liberal’s dream of regime change. Whether she is a divorced waitress in Harlem, a welfare mom in Iowa, or that 30-something singleton sipping a Cosmopolitan at your local bar, the unmarried woman may hold the fate of the 2004 elections in the palm…
Party line
What happens when you take five Democrats and five Republicans and unleash them on each other with a slate of hot topics and live microphones? Fireworks? Partisan posturing? Maybe a fistfight or two? That’s the image of the Springfield City Council promoted by the local news media, Illinois Times included. Every time the aldermen vote…
Knoepfle 12-11-03
december message these two boyssix and seven alreadythey remember forevertoms scribble to david I amin oregon I am notcoming back I have problemsone is I miss you © John Knoepfle 2003
Letters 12-11-03
Letters policy We welcome letters, but please include your full name, address and a daytime telephone number. We edit all letters for libel, length and clarity. Send letters to: Letters, Illinois Times. P.O. Box 5256. Springfield, Illinois 62705. Fax: (217) 753-3958. E-mail: editor@illinoistimes.com ANOTHER MYSTERY Just to add to the mystery regarding the World War…
Hippie’s calendar salutes 40 years of Mustangs
Everyone has his contradictions. Bob Waldmire, for example, is an unreconstructed hippie, as green as Ralph Nader. “Small is beautiful. Slow is beautiful. Old is beautiful,” the itinerant artist intones. Let a hot Mustang drive by, though, and Waldmire’s eyes light up. It’s a reflex that goes back 40 years. Before he embraced and helped…
Biography offers new insights into Springfield poet
Job Conger’s Strange Gold is a recent effort to encapsulate the life of Springfield’s most famous poetic son, Vachel Lindsay. Conger wisely does not attempt to outdo previous authors. Lacking the credentialed “credibility” of professors and unable to compete with insights provided by Lindsay’s peers, Conger chooses to write as someone who has read all…
Swing that thing to Nick Curran’s get-happy blues
If the roots of the blues grew out of the pain and suffering associated with the African-American experience, the branch called rhythm and blues hides the anguish under the most joyous and swingin’ music found in the American songbook. It’s in this time of hepcats and swingers, honkers and shouters, juke joints and roadhouses, popularized…
Now playing 12-11-03
Hey there nightlifers, while your head is full of gift ideas for Aunt Martha, cousin Billy, and that office co-worker you never pay attention to, cool your Yuletide jets at a barstool and let the live music take you away. Why should Christmastime be different than any other time? In the K of C Hall…
Beautiful people
pretty is as pretty does, then beautiful people have a lot to answer for. They’ve been up to some ugly business lately. They steal each other’s mates on Temptation Island, eat cockroaches and pig guts on Fear Factor, and spit poison behind each other’s backs on America’s Next Top Model. And we can’t get enough…
Quick takes
BUMPING AL Channel 20 viewers who expected to see Rev. Al Sharpton hosting “Saturday Night Live” on Dec. 6 instead were treated to a rerun of the show, a decision WICS-TV general manager Jack Connors attributes to the station’s unwillingness to give equal time to other Democratic presidential candidates. WICS wasn’t the only NBC affiliate…
Donut hole
Mel-O-Cream’s downtown shop at 215 S. Sixth St., which opened on Sept. 11, 2001, closed its doors last Friday. A lack of business was the reason, says manager Eric Green. While the store is closing, Green says Mel-O-Cream isn’t leaving downtown. He plans to offer a scaled-down menu at a nearby business. He wouldn’t name…
Like a rose
Every year, at least one big corporation hires top lobbyists, signs up a PR firm, cuts a deal with pliable and influential third parties, and descends on Springfield with a clever proposal in hand. And every year, the big corporation wins. The media scream, reformers lament the influence of money on government, and nothing changes.…
Lend a hand
Illinois Times invites area non-profit organizations to tell readers what your special needs are this holiday season. To participate, send a description of your organization and a summary of your holiday wish list. Fax the information to 217-753-3958 or e-mail editor@illinoistimes.com This feature appears weekly through the end of the year. Prior “Lend a hand”…
Complete your decorating with a cuetlaxochitl or two
The red poinsettia is a traditional Christmas plant, but its origins are decidedly non-Christian. Europeans discovered the colorful Euphorbia pulcherrima in Mexico, near the present-day city of Taxco and the valleys surrounding Cuernavaca. We know poinsettias as indoor plants, but in Mexico, they’re large, woody shrubs, often reaching 10 feet in height. The Aztecs cultivated…
The song of Jens Jensen
I arrived at the Lincoln Memorial Garden with the intention of finding music in the trees. In the past I have spent the Illinois winters tucked resolutely indoors, delving into literature and jazz in the hope that such elevated pursuits, like an electric blanket set on high, would keep my spirits from freezing. However, I…
Grace about town
The only family Christmas tradition I remember vividly from my childhood is piling into the car and driving around looking at lights while my brother and I fought in the back seat. I can’t remember what we were fighting about, but I’m sure it was all his fault. We’ve never been so big on tradition…
Movie reviews
King is a feast for the eyes, with a compelling story at its heart When last we left the hobbits Frodo and Sam, they were heading to Mordor to destroy the One Ring in the fires of Mount Doom. Meanwhile, brothers-in-arms Aragorn, the elf Legolas, the dwarf Gimli, the wizard Gandalf and hobbits Pippin and…
