Peace begins with each of us. This #InternationalPeaceDay let's vow to take a step towards a peaceful world.
“Thomas Shahan is an Oklahoma photographer known for his macrophotography of arthropods, including jumping spiders. His images have been featured in National Geographic, Popular Photography, and Discover, and on NBC’s The Today Show.”
Excerpt from “True Tulsa: Thomas Shahan,” by Kathleen Neeley
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“George Duke was perhaps the most exuberant pianist the world’s seen. He was indeed a free spirit and a warm soul who gave life to music. His musical gifts soothed the soul or evoked the savage beast within all of us.”
Excerpt from “Heaven Just Got Funkier,” by J. Kavin Ross
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“Nancy Eggen is an ordained minister in the United Church of Christ Congregational and campus minister at United Campus Ministries at the University of Tulsa. In this installment, Eggen entertains us with a yarn in which a minister goes toe to toe with a libertarian and a tea-partier.”
Excerpt from “Holy Jokes: Nancy Eggen,” by This Land
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“Kelli is one half of the duo Skating Polly, a band whose biggest obstacle may be its adolescent moniker, a forgivable caveat when you consider that the raging colorful little punk rocker convulsing on stage is only 11 years old”
Excerpt from “She Was the Punk of My Life,” by Joshua Kline
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“A man ahead of his time” is a phrase you hear thrown around a lot, but Bob Wills is one who earned it. He brought electric amplification, brass instruments, and drums to country music; the Grand Ole Opry never know what hit ‘em the first time Wills brought his 18-piece band there in 1944.”
Excerpt from “A Ride With Bob,” by Ray Benson
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“Little Rock was shell-shocked. It was July of 1960, and in the past year, five bombings had terrorized the city’s public school system. The state legislature of Arkansas attempted to thwart desegregation by shutting down Little Rock’s public high schools, but the bombings sent a far more violent message to the city’s pioneering civil rights community.”
Excerpt from “The Strange Love of Dr. Billy James Hargis,” by Lee Roy Chapman
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“On July 3, 2003, a film critic stood before a crowd of around 500 crammed into a community building in Sydney, Australia, with the police waiting near the stage. “It’s a shame it has come to this point,” she said. She pressed play. As the opening credits of Larry Clark’s 2002 film Ken Park began, six police officers rushed the stage and the audience booed. The cops seized the DVD.”
Excerpt from “Is Larry Clark Obscene?,” by Denver Nicks
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“Nationwide, more than a 135 federal boarding schools maintained the capacity to house half of all Native children. The schools were federally mandated and funded, but the government did not directly operate most—at least not at first. The day-to-day operations were largely left to Christian missionaries, whose proselytization efforts were imposed on Native children in militaristic fashion. The schools did not peak until the 1970s. A range of strategies designed to maximize enrollment ensured that over several generations, 80 percent of all American Indians attended one of the schools.”
Excerpt from “The Native Hue of Resolution,” by Marcos Barbery
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“Up until then, whenever someone had asked me to explain who I was, my self-explanation inevitably led to an explanation of who my father was. The only thing I seemed to know for sure, when asked, was that I was my father’s son. Now that he was dead, now that I had no father, who was I? It would be years before I could devise an answer.”
Excerpt from “Dust Bowl Dad,” by Richard Higgs
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“A model of clean, simple design emboldened by a complete absence of symbolism, the flag boasts the same straight-shooting impact achieved by gas station logos and degreasing products. It depicts a large white star against a field of solid red, with the blue number “46” smack center of it all. The number commemorates the fact that Oklahoma was indeed the 46th state (and not the 45th or 47th); it has nothing to do with anyone’s football jersey or petroleum products.”
Excerpt from “Oklahoma’s First State Flag,” by Emma Nicholas
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“Tulsa native Alfre Woodard was among an entourage of Americans who paid their respects at the worldwide celebration for Mandela. President Barack Obama led a group of former heads of state, which included Jimmy Carter, Bill Clinton, and George W. Bush, to the memorial service. Woodard befriended Mandela shortly after his release from prison during his first visit to the United States in the summer of 1990. The initial meeting began a long-term relationship between the former Tulsan and the former prisoner of apartheid.”
Excerpt from “Nelson Mandela’s Friend in Tulsa,” by J. Kavin Ross
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