Articles

Robin Washington column: Irene Morgan remembered — and why we have historic markers

Editor’s note: On Saturday, a historic marker was dedicated in Saluda, Va., to Irene Morgan, who died at 90 in 2007. Eleven years before Rosa Parks, Morgan refused to give up her seat to a white couple on an interstate bus, leading to a 1946 Supreme Court case that found segregation in interstate travel unconstitutional. News Tribune editor Robin Washington, who produced a television documentary about her and the early Civil Rights Movement, was asked to speak at the dedication. Here are his comments — and a postscript.

• Marker

2012's 20 Under 40 honorees meld community involvement, personal interests

There are dozens of real-estate brokers and pastors in the Northland. The same for lumbermen, National Guardsmen, university administrators and members of every imaginable profession. Everyone, I’m sure, has an interesting life story or compelling tales to tell.

• 20 Under 40 Q&A: David A. Nolle
• 20 Under 40 Q&A: Chelsea Morgan
• 20 Under 40 judges
• Frank Bucar nurtures a strong work ethic
• Serving the community is a priority for Emily Kalligher
• For Jenice Meyer, the focus is on making connections
• For Pastor Gabe Green, it's not a career, but a calling
• David Chura aims to help others learn and grow
• 20 Under 40 Q&A: Amy E. Lukasavitz
• 20 Under 40 Q&A: Jennifer Webb
• 20 Under 40 Q&A: Billy Shelton
• 20 Under 40 Q&A: Jeremy Craycraft
• 20 Under 40 Q&A: Travis Hansen
• 20 Under 40 Q&A: Briana von Elbe
• 20 Under 40 Q&A: Ken Kolquist
• 20 Under 40 Q&A: Cara Lindberg
• 20 Under 40 Q&A: Jason Manning
• 20 Under 40 Q&A: Chris Francis
• 20 Under 40 Q&A: Dan Bart
• 20 Under 40 Q&A: Dawn M. Johnson
• 20 Under 40 Q&A: Anna M. Downs

Editor's View: A couple of guys I know

As a reporter and TV producer in Boston, News Tribune editor Robin Washington has met Barack Obama and Mitt Romney several times; some just fleeting encounters, some in-depth interviews.

• Robin Washington and Mitt Romney
• Robin Washington and Barack Obama

Want to sing the blues? Try living it

ROBIN WASHINGTON: If you want to hear the blues, head down to Bayfront Festival Park where the bluesfest continues in full swing today. If you want to see the blues, you might try outside the CHUM building.

• Tavareous Williams

Time magazine art critic, credited with changing the genre, dies

Though it probably would account for little more than a drop of paint on the grand canvas of his career, one of the last public exhibitions of the work of Robert Hughes during his lifetime came in Duluth.

Vidal leaves behind a book titled ‘Duluth,’ his ‘fantasy city’

The man who wrote the book about Duluth has died.

• 'Duluth' by Gore Vidal
• Gore Vidal
• Gore Vidal obituary

Gore Vidal wrote about Duluth — sort of

Among his works were hundreds of essays, a recently revived Tony-nominated play, “The Best Man,” and the best-selling novels “Lincoln” and “Myra Breckenridge” — as well as a critically acclaimed but less-popular novel, “Duluth.”

• "Duluth"
• Author, playwright Gore Vidal dead at 86

Confessions of a cocktail party Cherokee — or Blackfoot

ROBIN WASHINGTON: My family’s history is not unusual. Most African Americans I ask tell of Indian ancestry, and historians have long documented liaisons between the two groups.

• Photo

Addendum: 'This American Life' says contributor's unrecorded work 'probably fabricated'

A statement posted on the “This American Life” website on Friday appears to support the adage that “if you don't have it on tape, you don't have it” – at least regarding another notorious fabricator whose work was aired on the show.

• Are ‘This American Life’ stories true? Mostly — but not always
• An encounter with Ira Glass

Show love to white supremacists

ROBIN WASHINGTON: I can’t speak for anyone else, but I’m feeling good about the visit of the Supreme White Alliance to Duluth on March 3.

• Photo

Columns

After 80 years, Duluth Central grads still have class

ROBIN WASHINGTON COLUMN: They probably won’t need a ballroom at the DECC for the Central High School class reunion on Friday. The Northland Country Club should be able to handle it just fine. In one of its 12-person meeting rooms. With half the space to spare.

• Janet Falconer Petersen

Despite tragedy, divers not deterred at ‘the cribs’ in Duluth

ROBIN WASHINGTON COLUMN: Chalk-written homages to 13-year-old Jeffery Carlos Watson Jr., who died a month ago near “the cribs,” are gone, but it’s doubtful everyone would heed their warning were they visible.

• Jumping off the cribs
• Atop the cribs
• The cribs

Robin Washington: Who says you can’t get flood insurance?

Joanna Kokkonen has heard all the stories about Duluth homeowners without flood insurance, and the notion that you can’t even buy it here.

• Photo
• Flood insurance by the numbers

Billboard backlash: Ignore it and it won’t go away

The young person asked me not to use her name (or his, and respecting that, I won’t disclose the gender) because technically, the act could be considered a misdemeanor. But if it is, then prosecute away, and I’ll gladly serve as a character witness.

Billboard backlash: Ignore it and it won’t go away

CORRECTION: A previous column by Robin Washington about the Un-Fair Campaign mistakenly ran in the print edition today. Here is the correct column.

• Photo
• Marines ad

Duluth couple endures tsunami on the river

ROBIN WASHINGTON: Richard Vitullo and his wife, Perry, share on Water Street in Fond du Lac. They were the neighborhood’s last unevacuated residents on Saturday, even with the St. Louis River turning their back deck into a pier.

• Officials: Flood response moves from rescue to recovery
• Richard and Perry Vitullo
• Mudslide
• Hour-by-hour: A chronology of the Northland floods of 2012
• How you can help flood-recovery efforts
• Status of area highways

Refined mail-order bride fails to tame El Gato

ROBIN WASHINGTON: El Gato the ocelot came into my life when I was a child and after a family meeting about break-ins at our Chicago home.

• Photo gallery: El Gato the ocelot
• Ocelot
• Abused exotic pets find final home in Minnesota

After 50 years, mine fire still burns

ROBIN WASHINGTON: Few people would deny Centralia, Pa., was destroyed, but there isn't agreement on the details of its demise. The most accepted version is that embers at the dump spread to an exhausted coal mine, starting a fire that still burns 50 years later.

• Abandoned road
• Centralia, Pa. April 1987

Your safety announcements may be used as a comedy device

ROBIN WASHINGTON: The safety instructions on a recent Delta flight from Minneapolis to Duluth made for a late-night comedy routine, leaving most passengers in stitches, myself included.

• Photo

Friend taught the value of living

ROBIN WASHINGTON: There’s no easy guide for finding the right words after one of your best friends dies, no matter how many times you’ve thought about it or about how you’d feel when the long march toward the inevitable finally reaches its end.

• Steve Goldfine and Ilene Levin