Jim Hightower PHOTO BY LARRY D. MOORE What’s past, as Shakespeare has told us, is prologue. 2016 has been a wild political season. This year, despite the unnerving presidential freak show the Republicans are putting on, Hillary Clinton is the one who recently stunned me. Attempting to convince very wary working class families that she […]
Illinois Times
Posted inArts & Culture
transition poem #5
transition poem #5 my dad came from country schoolsmall for his age shy insecure hetold me of that first day walking up to the huge doors of the city schoolhe felt everyone was looking at himhe was wearing clumpy shoes like thegirl of the limberlost in the continuedstory he was following in the daily news […]
Posted inArts & Culture
Shellin’ out family fun
A busy weekend lies ahead for Springfield’s very own Prospect League collegiate baseball team. The Springfield Sliders play in Lisle on Thursday, travel to Quincy on Friday, and then swing back to the capital city for Saturday’s 6:35 p.m. start time against the Quincy Gems. Saturday’s promotion is Educators Night, sponsored by Horace Mann. Springfield […]
Posted inArts & Culture
Leadership through Adlai’s lens
Join former U.S. Senator Adlai Stevenson III on Thursday, June 16, as he discusses modern politics through the multi-generational lens of his family’s political leadership. In additional to serving as a U.S. senator for 11 years, Adlai Stevenson III ran for governor of Illinois twice. His father, Adlai Stevenson II, served as Illinois governor from […]
Posted inMusic
June jams
Bones Jugs play Bar None on Thursday, June 16, at 8 p.m. PHOTO BY SNK PHOTOGRAPHY Welcome to mid-June in central Illinois. The weather is heating up along with the music scene, save for the occasional thundershower that washes out a performance. Here comes the Sangamon County Fair with plenty of hot, modern country in […]
Posted inOpinion
A new species of jumping beans
Jim Hightower PHOTO BY LARRY D. MOORE It isn’t trickery, but an odd twist in the natural world that creates the novelty of “Mexican jumping beans.” They’re not beans – they’re brownish seedpods from a desert shrub in northwest Mexico. A larva from a small moth invades the pod, attaches itself to the inner wall […]
Posted inOpinion
Failing on his mandate
PHOTO BY ALAN SOLOMON/TNS Near the top of any list of Illinois government’s many problems is that House Speaker Michael Madigan has made a decades-long game out of messing with the minds and the agendas of our governors. If there’s one constant since 1983, it’s Speaker Madigan’s jiu-jitsu moves against whoever happens to be governor. […]
Posted inArts & Culture
on writing your stories #4
on writing your stories #4 long long ago here’s how aclever chap got himself in printI forget where I read it hewrote to a newspaper thathad a q-and-a column givinga line of his own poem andasking did anyone know theauthor he signed a fake namethen a week or so later heanswered the query tellingwho the author […]
Posted inArts & Culture
Award-winning Jewish films
For the third year in a row, The Jewish Federation of Springfield, alongside a handful of community supporters, presents its annual film series. The series kicks off on Thursday, June 2, with a showing of The Green Prince documentary. The German film with American subtitles recounts the story of Mosab Hassan Yousef, the son of […]
Posted inArts & Culture
33 years of female friendship
Last year The Dixie Swim Club, an unforgettable comedy about five women whose friendships began 33 years ago on their college swim team, enjoyed a successful run at the Hoogland Center for the Arts. Shortly after the show’s close, its director, Susan Jeffers, fell ill and passed away. According to current The Dixie Swim Club […]
Posted inArts & Culture
Fairy tale Me Before You surprisingly effective
Sam Claflin as Will Traynor and Emilia Clarke as Lou Clark in Me Before You. PHOTO COURTESY Warner Bros. Many times in life, we often let our hearts overrule our minds. Such is the case with Thea Sharrock’s Me Before You, a slick piece of treacle that manages to charm as it flirts with insulting […]
Posted inMusic
SOHO and so much more
Good Times and Company play SOHO Music Festival, 3 p.m. Sat., June 4 on the Main Stage. This week, music brings the SOHO Music Festival to downtown. There are also a few other big-time happenings, a bunch of cool regular stuff and a grievous occasion. We are so sad to tell of the passing of […]
