HEADLINES
The Bent Festival, a toy (horror) story
by Mark Weaver, TC Daily Planet
If genius and insanity are often fused, so are creativity and destruction. In the spirit of this paradox, the Bent Festival offers attendees the opportunity to “circuit bend”—that is, to tear apart electronic toys and use them to generate musical tones.
A mega opportunity at what cost?
by Courtney Blanchard, Session Weekly
How could 8,000 parking spaces at the Mall of America keep $1,333 away from East Grand Forks? Even though it is a five-hour drive from Bloomington, a funding proposal to expand the mall could divert local government aid from the northwest Minnesota city and other cities across the state.
Study shows Minnesota rent highest in Midwest
by Joy Petersen, Minnesota Daily
Compared to the average income, current metro-area rent rates are not affordable.
Test Freedom Day: let the school bells ring
by John Fitzgerald, Minnesota 2020
April 24 is Test Freedom Day.
INSIDE THE DAILY PLANET
One man’s legacy in South Minneapolis
by Jeanette Fordyce, TC Daily Planet
Gene Olive was diagnosed with prostate cancer in 1986. He struck a bargain with God. “If you make me well I will serve you in some way.”
What’s up on Chicago Avenue?
by Dennis Geisinger, Southside Pride
Reconstruction of Chicago Avenue between 7th Street downtown and 28th Street is scheduled to begin this summer in conjunction with construction of a tunnel that Children’s Hospital is building as part of a $200 million expansion on Chicago’s 2500 block.
Council on Asian Pacific Minnesotans names winners of prestigious annual awards
by Ted Meinhover, Asian American Press
The awards, which include the Lifetime Service Award, the Leadership Award, and the Humanitarian Award, will be presented at the Council on Asian Pacific American’s annual Heritage Month Dinner on Friday, May 16th. Along with the presentation to the Minnesota Sri Lanka’s Friendship Foundation of the Humanitarian Award, Thong Le Ha will receive the Life Time Service Award, and Martha Vickery of the Korean Quarterly will receive the Leadership Award.
NEW IN VOICES
The life and mysterious death of a rock ‘n’ roll radical
by Chuck Laszewski, TC Daily Planet
In 1978, singer and actor Dean Reed was arrested in Buffalo, Minnesota and spent more than a week in the Wright County Jail for protesting, with farmers and others, against a high-voltage power line. In a wonderfully inventive tactic, Reed managed to call his friends the Everly Brothers, the Smothers Brothers, actress Jean Seberg in Paris and others in Chile, East Germany, and the Soviet Union, and turn the episode into an international affair.
NEW IN BLOGS
Achievement Plus in St. Paul
by Mary Turck, Keeping the Faith
The little boy began kindergarten already behind, explained Lynnell Thiel. He had never been to preschool, he knew only 14 of his letters, and he just didn’t seem to be making any progress. Luckily for him, Johnson Elementary School on St. Paul’s East Side has a tutoring program, provided by the School Sisters of Notre Dame. After six weeks of one-to-one tutoring four times a week, he knew his whole alphabet – and could sight-read 42 words.
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