At 5:41pm on this day last year, the city of Joplin, Missouri was nearly wiped off the map by a tornado. I was safe at home in Kansas City, blissfully unaware that my hometown, the place I was born and spent the first five years of my life, was being laid to waste. When my … Continue reading
Category Archives: History
Entertainment / History / Life
Turning of the Tiger
This past Saturday, the Missouri Tigers played their last game in the Big 12 Conference. In a dominating 90-75 win over the Baylor Bears in Kansas City, Missouri, the Tigers claimed the Big 12 Championship, the final chapter of their 100-year history with the conference. They now head to the NCAA Tournament as a #2 … Continue reading
Chief Massasoit
This is the statue of Chief Massasoit that stands in front of the Winstead’s Diner in Kansas City, Missouri and faces the Plaza. For those unaware, Massasoit and his Wampanoag tribe were the first Native Americans to forge an alliance with the three-month-old Plymouth Colony. In fact, they are largely responsible for keeping the clueless … Continue reading
History / Movies / Teh Interwebz / Writing
Disappearing Ink
Twelve years ago, in the not-so-world-ending year of 2000, I was a high school senior and Co-Editor of my high school newspaper, The Rayflector. I did not excel at much in school, but the newspaper was a point of pride for me and still is. (I also founded and ran the school’s only “underground” newspaper … Continue reading
Entertainment / History / Life / Movies
Silent Running
Life, of course, intervenes. It has been one week since last we spoke (and by “spoke,” I mean I hurl words at you from a computer screen), and the reason for that is simple, if not entirely acceptable: I had stuff to do. And my unwillingness to write on my 30th birthday certainly put a … Continue reading
Blood in the Foundations
Before June 17th, 1933, two things were true. Criminals like “Machine Gun” Kelly and Bonnie and Clyde had the upper hand on law enforcement, both in firepower and in the hearts of a Depression-wracked Midwest where they were seen almost as Robin Hood figures. And an insecure, hot-tempered lawyer named John Edgar Hoover led a … Continue reading
Art & Design / Books / History
A Haze of Blue
“Indigo is love,” author Catherine E. McKinley asserts near the end of her memoir/history book simply titled Indigo. Though by that point, I had long felt that it was more the color of obsession, narcissism, and rationalization. Indigo was a shot in the dark for me. Spotting the attractive cover design on the shelves of … Continue reading
